00:12:01.620one of the special things one of the the fortuitous things i think about uh
00:12:06.580about balder and his hof is the way that light plays into that hof the way that he's lit the
00:12:15.300way that svan conducted the just how the lighting fits into his mural and the really special light
00:12:24.260effect of that place after sundown because of its very beautiful stained glass windows on the side
00:12:30.420the light emanating from from that building from that hoff is really beautiful and the idea of
00:12:37.300of shining of brightness of nobility shining for the world to see is such a such a powerful part
00:12:44.660of of balder and i think it's really exemplified well at his hoff i've got a got a comment from
00:12:53.060tyler along with 15 thank you so much tyler we appreciate it good evening hope you all are doing
00:12:58.740well excited about the conversation on balder tonight hail well hail to you and hail to the
00:13:03.620folks that are being generous this evening we really appreciate it it's fun what would you
00:13:07.540like to where would you like to start telling people a little bit about balder and uh you know
00:13:14.500starting that ball rolling on conversing about him uh first and foremost i think the mystery of
00:13:22.180boulders is in i think our lore and the lore that we have that survives um is what makes the most
00:13:33.860mysterious kind of misplaced ideas behind boulder i think that we have a combination between um
00:13:42.500snorty's very uh christ-like depictions where he was trying to paint him in a certain light and
00:13:49.220And then we have Saxo Grammaticus's depiction of him in a very, you know, dark kind of warrior-esque style.
00:14:03.300So you have these two combinations that are going on.
00:14:09.500And they seem to be really, really playing out.
00:14:13.320But they draw some sort of kind of a blank between the two.
00:14:18.080And what we end up having is we have this kind of misinformation of whether or not he's this peaceful and gentle and soft god.
00:14:28.080god and then we have another in which you know clearly he's warlike and fighting hod against
00:14:35.360you know blinding hod with his own hands to to gain the love of of nana and um and that
00:14:44.600or or the fight between them in which um you know it takes great magic to defeat him
00:14:51.220so there's a lot going on there that i think that that's why a lot of people come at it with
00:14:57.400with great confusion and we should look at one the name of balder and his his meaning the meaning
00:15:07.020of his name and also to the uh correlation of of movement when we talk about um uh the way gods
00:15:17.700move about in cosmology so i think that that's very important i think that's one of the aspects
00:15:25.700that we should really focus in on is looking at the way the gods move in the stories do tell us
00:15:32.020a great amount of things um one of them mainly being
00:15:37.620that we talk about the stasis of death that the gods can
00:15:41.780have a doom that they meet out the doom of men and they have issues these issues are you know
00:15:48.980um these issues are a point of their being that the fact that they can move forward the fact that
00:16:00.660they can um they're they're posed to a doom and that doom uh drives them forward it gives it
00:16:13.160gives the gods purpose it gives the gods and our relationship with them purpose i think it's more
00:16:18.240purposeful than even the the uh later myths um the stories snorties saxos stories written down
00:16:26.400i think they alludes to it even greater than what we could possibly even imagine um people
00:16:33.360have a tendency to wonder like why would you even honor a god that that's in a chthonic state of
00:16:41.660underworld. And I think that's all the more important that we do. So I'd like to make a
00:16:48.220couple of notes here, because I think you bring up a point, and it's something that I've commonly
00:16:52.360heard. One of our, well, a couple of times I've heard this said, you know, why make a temple to
00:17:01.640a to a dead god and there's two ways to go about the question um we've mentioned this before on
00:17:12.040here but i believe that our myths take place in mythic time and i believe in the cycles of our
00:17:19.720of our faith in our myth cycle itself all of the all of the elements of our myths have occurred
00:17:28.680are occurring and will occur and i understand that you know with the very temporal existence
00:17:34.520that that we all live it's hard to relate to that and i think that's one of the reasons that
00:17:40.200our myths are portrayed in a in a chronological sequence but i think that mythic time and the
00:17:45.320time of the gods functions differently than the time of man so i think that you know whereas
00:17:52.520Because Baldr is alive, Baldr is in Helheim, and Baldr is resurrected are all true and are all simultaneous.
00:18:03.140And if that's too much for people to bite off, let's assume for a second that we are currently positing that Baldr is in the realm of Hella right now.
00:18:11.900if that is the case why would that make him any less of a god any less living any less
00:18:23.460capable of participating in that gift cycle because the gift cycle is the basis of our
00:18:28.840worship in general and if we believe that that applies to our ancestors and certainly we do
00:18:35.080this time of year, you know, many of us do desabloat and alpha bloat to our female and our
00:18:41.880male ancestors. We believe that they look on from beyond the veil and we believe that they can give
00:18:46.600us blessings and interact with us in the world that we're in. Certainly that same rule would
00:18:54.500apply to a God who is in that state as well, would it not? And so I think that the question
00:19:01.120is kind of moot, but it's interesting to think on. If our ancestors hear us and reciprocate to us
00:19:06.920in a state of death that we know is a thing, then certainly if that's where Balder finds himself
00:19:13.280right now, which is an if, then certainly he can still participate in that gift cycle with us.
00:19:19.920But as I said earlier, I think our gods and the series of myths all exist simultaneously in that
00:19:27.960mythic time to tell us about those gods. But either way, I think it's important to acknowledge
00:19:34.360up front, though, that Balder exists in a state where he can hear our prayers and our offerings
00:19:43.140and our hails and where he can gift us with his blessing, with his favor, with his inspiration.
00:19:50.420And certainly we've seen that our folk have been very blessed since we have established a temple
00:19:56.180to him. Got a couple of questions lining up. Feel free to ask any questions you guys want
00:20:04.920tonight. Absolutely about Balder, but also about anything you might like. A couple of questions
00:20:11.320coming up from Monk. What are the responsibilities of the priesthood in the AFA? Responsibilities
00:20:19.260are many. Svahn, go ahead and tell him a little bit about those and I will fill any extra holes
00:20:27.020or add anything to it that I might need to on the other end. Well, first and foremost, I think all
00:20:33.120Goth are poised to uphold duties and those duties could range from multiple things. If there is a
00:20:46.100Hoff involved around one or many of the Godar, then they are to maintain that Hoff and to
00:20:56.260allocate scheduling and in doing so, maintaining service and giving gifts. But also too, that,
00:21:04.640of course, involves deeply interconnecting with the people around the Hoff, whether it's multiple
00:21:10.400kindreds individuals families and then from that that duty kind of begins to segue out into um
00:21:20.000upholding thresholds whether it's baby naming ceremonies um whether it's uh you know name
00:21:28.160fastenings and coming of age uh weddings and of course funerals um so i would say that that would
00:21:36.320be a good framework to understand that the gothar are there and there are some gothar that are not
00:21:41.200connected to temples yet but um are connected to great communities so they're still doing these
00:21:49.040things they're just doing them from from a place where there might have um you know multiple
00:21:55.280destinations not a preset hallowed space and so uh here's the jets again um the uh
00:22:04.720The other thing is counseling and providing advice or even rectifying issues can sometimes be a place, I think, where Gothar are involved in which – and this is – we're speaking predominantly from experience.
00:22:26.700we're not postulizing what what gothar do what gothar have been doing this whole time i think
00:22:33.660uh the afa has you know a long track record of of uh go these witnessing oaths go these um
00:22:45.020mediating disputes between folk to keep frith trying to find a point of um consolidation
00:22:52.300between both sides, whether it's an argument or, or, um, perhaps a slight or a perceived slight
00:22:58.280or, or whatever it may be. Um, I've also, you know, just, uh, counseling for families after
00:23:04.600death, um, you know, and trying to, um, you know, preside over the, the, uh, I guess the physical
00:23:15.340remains of a person who is also true, but perhaps their family isn't. I mean, these are all really
00:23:20.700big issues that the gothar have been tackling as they've become more and more um solidified in
00:23:29.420in the australia folk assembly and i think as we become more complex we've uh you know conducting
00:23:36.420ceremonies on grassroot levels also kind of even folk building in our own right so there's a lot
00:23:42.980of stuff i think that the gothar are doing um to answer that question in in regards to our uh
00:23:49.780our duties so i think uh svan covered a lot of it uh there's a couple of things i'd like to add
00:24:00.580a gothi in the afa is a spiritual leader and a spiritual leader of our church and that
00:24:06.340requires different things at different times in the most fundamental way
00:24:10.820the Arians have always viewed our priesthood. It's been exemplified in Latin as the pontifex
00:24:23.040or the bridge facilitator, the bridge creator, serving as that bridge between the folk and the
00:24:33.180gods and between the gods and the folk. And that comes in a lot of different forms. Certainly,
00:24:38.900that's there in a ritual sense, when we perform ceremonies, when we do bloats,
00:24:45.460when we preside over namings, over weddings, over funerals, and things that way. But making
00:24:52.500that connection between our people and our gods and vice versa is essential. And we need to
00:25:00.560represent the folk in the best way we can before our gods and represent our gods before the folk
00:25:07.100the best way we can. Outside of those rituals and certainly tending to the temples and things that
00:25:12.820way, there's a lot of things that I don't think folk realize that our Gothar do. Counseling is
00:25:20.420the thing I would say I do most as a Gothi. Counseling occurs so much more often than I
00:25:31.400think people understand. And our Gothar are there to take calls and to counsel members who are
00:25:36.040struggling with things in their life or who need need someone to listen or just need someone to
00:25:41.160talk to uh they do that 24 7 and uh at a lot of a lot of cost to their own personal time and their
00:25:51.180own uh i don't know their own comfort because it's very difficult but it's something that we
00:25:56.220love to do because we love our folk and it's something we certainly signed up for
00:25:59.740but the counseling is huge we spend a great deal of time doing that also our gothar are in charge
00:26:07.400of running their district in in the afa and managing the folk builders underneath them
00:26:15.320managing projects and things that go on in that district and all the behind the scenes work making
00:26:21.580sure stuff goes in make sure the social media things work right making sure you know all our
00:26:27.640are all our tech things on the back end work as well so there's really a lot that goes into it
00:26:33.960one thing i think is very special about our gothar is because we've had so many different gothar
00:26:41.880in so many different walks of life with so much different experiences because we work as a team
00:26:47.880we have uh we have a really deep well of experience to draw from and so that allows us to to help
00:26:59.280people in a in a different way to be able to to bring more experience and uh more knowledge
00:27:06.280to dealing with folks and it's uh it's extremely important and i'm very honored we're able to do
00:27:12.620that uh 77 with a whole bunch of cues asks how many people draw a salary from afa funds
00:27:21.580just me right now i would love to get to a point where all of our gothar are able to uh
00:27:29.020make a living being a gothi and take care of their family with that being their primary vocation
00:27:33.660i'd love to see that uh so far i'm the only one who does i get a salary right now i get a thousand
00:27:40.380dollars a month um ali asks thorshoff was supposed to be in minnesota you said north
00:27:50.140carolina fits thor better does minnesota fit the idea and character of balder better than
00:27:56.460any other idea or place that was considered that's hard to it's hard to answer because
00:28:06.460i think that any answer i give is going to be colored by the fact that that's where the hoff
00:28:13.180ends up so i think that you know any my mind is going to make that fit to where the answer is yes
00:28:22.060um i don't know if that's the case or not um i don't know a reason that that's not the case
00:28:30.460i don't think that that's necessarily the god that everyone in minnesota would have chosen
00:28:36.220But what I have heard is how proud those people are that that is the God of their temple and how much that has brought them closer together and how much since establishing that Hoff they identify with and worship and have such a heightened relationship with Balder and how big of a blessing that's been in their life.
00:28:58.720But I think that's the only real honest way to answer that question.
00:29:02.560The next question I want Svan to take a swing at first. Thok refuses to weep for Balder. Do you ascribe to the idea that Thok was Loki in the form of a giantess? Svan.
00:29:32.560i cannot hear you spawn i hope everyone else can
00:29:44.060i'm sorry yeah i was doing that because of the jets i was didn't want the noise to um
00:29:50.040go into into that but i do i do um correlate the two because of the rise in
00:29:59.760in the presence of maliciousness as begins to metastasize in the kinslayer that is loki um
00:30:09.620you know it's it's reference to that thok will will will cry waterless tears um when you know
00:30:16.540it is seeked that uh if all were to weep for him uh and this again established earlier you know in
00:30:24.980in balder's dream uh kind of correlates to the shape-shifting and the establishment that this is
00:30:31.060already going to take place without understanding the precedence of who's asking in which in this
00:30:38.500case uh hell is asking for all to weep and it's it it's not specified though so the the question does
00:30:48.340you know bear to ask is this is this loki but there are there hints to it in balder's drama
00:30:56.340and it it alludes to the ongoing secession of of malicious acts that are taking place and continue
00:31:04.340to take place even after leading up of course to the the lokasana itself and uh the capture of loki
00:31:11.300and the binding of of loki um so i i do ascribe to the idea that that uh thulk is loki in in uh
00:35:24.980We just got words to explain how some of that magic worked.
00:35:29.440And I think they would do the same thing.
00:35:31.140If a god appeared before them, they would talk about a extraterrestrial entity, an interdimensional entity.
00:35:39.600They would make some science word that makes them not a god linguistically, and then they would be able to wrap their head around it.
00:35:47.280But yeah, I don't really think that's an honest or fair exchange ever, because I don't think that they approach it as if theists and atheists are intellectually equal.
00:36:01.520I hope that I hope that answers the question or at least touches at it.
00:36:06.600um antonio rodriguez i have look up on another ausitrue group named dakota prairie ausitrue
00:36:17.720what are your thoughts on this group um i believe this is i'm pretty certain that that is a group
00:36:26.720that is made up of people that uh were disloyal to the afa and wanted to start their own thing
00:36:35.680Um, my thoughts are that those people are, uh, in many ways, dysfunctional, and, uh,
00:36:49.520a concept that we talk on here about from time to time is forward-facing versus backward-facing
00:40:04.040Yes, I think one of the big things that starts to correlate throughout Baldur's drama and the subsequent events that follow do have cultural ties.
00:40:18.560ties i think that um when when the poets are speaking these stories they're also trying to
00:40:27.280tie in a a motif that would be understood by the audience and so yes i think that the overall idea
00:40:34.560is that the the the foolhardiness um is more or less a a lesson to be learned um because many
00:40:43.280people could argue all the way down the line as to uh many things that aren't said in the stories
00:40:49.920uh you know if if odin's eye is in the well then why didn't he see this coming uh if he did see
00:40:55.760it coming you know did he allow it to happen um you know if the gods you know why didn't he stop
00:41:01.520the gods when the gods were throwing things or it's again it's an understanding of one i think
00:41:07.760a correlation of the story speaking to the audience garnering an emotion and definitely
00:41:13.840teaching a lesson and that lesson of course is is that even after the assemblance of of
00:41:23.120of oaths from all things uh in protecting balder the the overall uh gathering in the
00:41:32.240fred stead and having fun at this moment i think was and is a deny a dynamic kind of um
00:41:39.600scene to be set in order to really drive home what's about to happen and i i think that any
00:41:47.680good storyteller any good poet um and as these you know these compiled prose were originally from
00:41:56.320stories i think they hold all of these essences even as they're you know written out in very
00:42:03.760very formatted um poetic sense so yes i think that it's to paint a deep picture of what is
00:42:12.080about to happen and that the gods have taken a certain sense of resolve um in in the in the
00:42:21.600oaths and in in the security of things and so it the lesson could then be that you know uh
00:42:31.840treachery can seep doom and the way that it is meted out even towards the gods can be uh deeply
00:42:42.240in you know intricate and it's all emphasized in the full-hearted nature the gods are
00:42:50.480laughing and joking and even baldur's kind of laughing and joking at this moment this i think
00:42:56.000is deep theatrics of the of the story to really drive home the it's a lull before the punctured
00:43:05.200death and um so you could read into it and say you know all the things that aren't there but
00:43:11.840what is there is the lesson and the lesson is of course that you know as as the gods have kind of
00:43:18.640held um a a fluctuating trough with an outsider that's been allowed into the into the inner guard
00:43:28.880of the gods as this you know always is repeated especially like with fenris coming into the halls
00:43:35.680of the gods there's a lesson to be learned about tribalism there's a lesson to be learned about
00:43:39.920divinity there's a lesson to be learned about the saint sanctity of an inner guard that could be
00:43:47.840brought to a point of no return and i think that that's what's really being laid out is that
00:43:54.240this full-heartedness is the point it's a threshold that the gods can't turn back from now
00:44:01.200and yet they still think that they can and that makes the tragedy even all the more palpable
00:44:09.040um got a few more questions lining up but uh spawn i think this is a good time can you
00:44:14.800And I believe Nick has the graphic, if you could throw up the graphic, Nick, of Baldur's mural.
00:44:24.560And Svahn, could you explain a couple of things, I think, what you wanted to portray and how you portrayed it in the mural,
00:44:35.120and also anything about your experience while doing the mural?
00:49:32.620So one of the other things that really kind of struck was hair and beard and face placement.
00:49:43.080um the alzheimer and i were talking about positioning of eyes where where we wanted
00:49:53.000we wanted everything to be forward and upwards and especially since everything is moving upwards
00:49:57.960the aesthetic of the building uh the light everything is going up so uh again producing a
00:50:04.680uh face with the chin placed above the adam's apple for me was a difficult a task i hadn't really
00:50:13.160um tackled a lot of times it's much easier to show a a masculine figure with the chin down and
00:50:19.800preparing for something or moving forward but the idea of looking up and it just i guess proportions
00:50:25.800and understanding the aesthetics of of the way uh hair and eyes and i that very that helped me
00:50:34.760out a lot and it seemed i'm trying to logicize that that's the reason why it all worked out
00:50:39.240perfectly but in one swoop of that pencil everything became immediate and then it was
00:50:45.400just a matter of you know uh attaching a string and and making the son and rod behind his head
00:50:52.200and once i got all of that kind of dark penciled in i left it until the painting and just worked
00:50:57.960on everything else and so yeah the the timing uh the use of color the wanting to use uh the the
00:51:08.520the sky blue in correlation to the color of the hof the wanting to use two wolves as that is the
00:51:14.520the kin of the hof um but also wanting to use their position of being relaxed and being um
00:51:22.200not aggressive but more subdued and to be subdued in a way that it would represent
00:51:29.780almost like a wild nature being uh calmed or in control by the forces of courage the forces of
00:51:40.360devotion piety strength and so that's what i i ended up kind of playing with especially uh if
00:51:48.560look at nana's horn it's written in the folk food dark on uh on there um you know devotion strength
00:51:54.720and and piety um it there's so there's a deeper message there that i was trying to play with as
00:52:02.160well uh again also too in in our religious culture the givyas uh have a great importance and
00:52:10.560significance in holding horns uh all arian mythos of the idea of of the feminine giving over the
00:52:18.320goblet giving over the horn giving over the the cauldron to the warrior to the hero to the god
00:52:25.920of deserving might uh was all being played there that's why um you know the imageries were chosen
00:52:34.880and and of course at the same time having uh nana having one hand on the wolf as a sign of of that
00:52:44.160That devotion, piety, faith will ultimately guide the ferocious nature, the drive, the will to victory is tempered by, or I guess would be, yeah, tempered.
00:53:00.760tempered is a good word tempered by um the feelings of understanding the gods trying to
00:53:06.360to become one with them trying to understand their place our place and our places together
00:53:11.480through devotion prayer and um uh acts of of giving and so you know along with that just
00:53:24.120after that was basically i tried to figure out where balder was where nana was going to be0.81
00:53:29.960i she had shifted on both sides and again working with the triangle shape that was very difficult
00:53:38.000and then of course wolves um i mean i i admittedly i i critique myself on my drawing of of animals and
00:53:47.020and things and and especially fur and trying to get that medium with paint as i'm not you know
00:53:53.840traditionally a painter um all that stuff was very very frustrating but it it all didn't matter
00:54:00.400because that the first part was made and it was done so it was like you can do this the rest of
00:54:05.600it you can do and so i just you know kept pushing through until finally at the end when we got
00:54:10.400everything settled um i started to build in the landscape and uh normally i do landscape first
00:54:16.480and then build everything so that was an interesting thing of it there's also uh one
00:54:20.160thing that i that came about during the drawing that i thought was very interesting uh the brooch
00:54:25.520on um nana's neck is a heart with a sowillo rune or a seagrune in the center so it looks like a
00:54:35.360broken heart and the um the idea of nana dying of a broken heart to be with her husband uh was
00:54:46.000played out there but i i had no intention of that that evolved entirely on its own um
00:54:53.520as as i was you know drawing this it was it was as if it needed to be there it wanted to be there
00:55:00.080and i was just told this is what's gonna this imagery needs to be here and it's it's important
00:55:07.360and um so i i i was quite amazed at some of the things that were kind of popping into my head
00:55:14.480as i was going um with with no real correlation as to exactly what i was going to be doing
00:55:21.040and it was all because of that timetable three days you got three to four days or three and a
00:55:26.560half days to do this and it just all kind of poured out and all the while working on an elevated ladder
00:55:35.120so it was it was really one of my favorite experiences
00:55:40.800you know i've i've said this time and again and those of you who have been in the presence of
00:55:48.640these murals but uh our gods very much work with and work through spawn when he creates these
00:55:56.900things and that's to take nothing away from the amazing artist that spawn is but you know the
00:56:03.020question was asked earlier about our gothar being you know what they do him being that bridge in
00:56:08.400And bringing that God to life on the canvas or drywall, as it may be, it really is a profoundly magical act.
00:56:22.320I love the mural, and my favorite part of it is that, is that shining face and head of Balder looking upwards.
00:56:30.380it's a constant inspiration for us to always look up hold our heads high be our best selves
00:56:39.260and look towards moving forward and moving up um king of cheese what aspects do you think
00:56:46.900balder embodies i understand understand the gods are people and not totem poles and thus it is
00:56:53.060difficult, if not impossible to distill, but think of it as a
00:56:57.620mental exercise. Aspects as in hope, light, etc. Svon, what do
00:57:03.780you what aspects do you think that Balder most embodies?
00:57:10.220The folk soul. In a way, I've always correlated Balder as
00:57:19.140being of course the son of the god of consciousness of the consciousness of the folk
00:57:27.140and so that would then of course align to the birth of the soul of the folk
00:57:33.140and and that correlation of inspiration giving body and that and that the folk soul is bright
00:57:40.500the folk soul is courageous the folk soul is noble the the folk soul is bold and so balder and and
00:57:50.660uh holder or hodd um kind of i think give a portrait of the understanding that there is a
00:57:59.540the bright side the the that which we strive for and then that which is behind us that which is in
00:58:05.940the deep recesses of us so i think one the the polarization of the two have a deep representation
00:58:12.420towards um the folk soul and what they both represent whether it's blindness or rage or uh
00:58:20.420anger as you know correlations to to battle and then of course brightness complete sight and uh
00:58:28.500of light and and and of the future but when we talk about balder and the folks will becoming
00:58:34.820chthonic and traveling into the third and and lowest world um kind of presiding in the stasis
00:58:43.720of death uh as i believe helgard is true truly a representative of the the processes of death
00:58:52.260the calamities in which you know mankind faces um whether it's illness and disease and things
00:58:58.280like that or whether it's the the natural cycle of things that place becomes a stasis point
00:59:03.920for the folk soul to return from it's not it's not an ending point at all and so again kind of
00:59:12.580leaning towards why pray uh to Baldur's because we know that that that part of death is a
00:59:21.420transitional point that we can return and that we our folk soul our blood and our people our ideals
00:59:31.000uh like like him can and well return so i i think that as a as a an intellectual exercise as you
00:59:41.980said is um is to look at balder and hod firstly as the light and the dark side of the folk soul
00:59:49.440springing forth from the the god of consciousness and also the one who has deep connections to
00:59:56.160being as the godhead of time through Mimerswell and how he moves where he moves in the stories
01:00:05.180is very important where the gods find themselves the positions they're in and how they are spoken
01:00:11.340of returning to show the folk that even in the dark deep recesses we can and will return and I
01:00:19.540believe that balder and hod come back more unified as uh as they have uh kind of conjoined their
01:00:27.540powers together to be more complete and i think that that's because the process of our uh our
01:00:34.500evolution of of uh enlightenment involves us facing that that dark side and and and melding
01:00:44.020it together within ourselves and bringing forth and the only way that we can really do that is
01:00:48.260through devotion and through piety through self-awareness and self um reflection self uh
01:00:55.060critique and uh being and i think that that's where nana uh represents that as well in her
01:01:01.620devotion and her piety and her um giving that the gift cycle to balder in order to power him for the
01:01:11.540return yeah um as far as things that balder exemplifies or or shows to us so much to me
01:01:22.340is the nobility and the brightness the shining nature of of balder um he is he is literally the
01:01:31.540embodiment of the word arian which implies nobility that that shines that projects um
01:01:39.140Um, so that, and then I suppose the, uh, the aspect of, of hope for conquering over our foes for returning from death for a new golden age.
01:01:50.540I think that that eternal hope for, for victory in the future is certainly, um, an inspiration of Balder, but, but that brightness, the shining nobility, uh, embodies Balder's essence to me in the most profound way.
01:02:05.420um katla asks so many who have died talk about going to the light balder is talked about being
01:02:13.340a light do you think people may be seeing his light when they cross over what do you think swan
01:02:22.700i uh i i've often really tried to ponder the processes of death and uh placement uh yes if if
01:02:33.900if hellguard is a transitional state of death and in the stories represents a lot of the breaking
01:02:40.540down uh when we talk about um the processes of dying going through uh nipa's cave in in the the
01:02:49.260hillock uh in the north and downwards and into the chthonic realm of a time that or a place that is
01:02:56.460beyond time where time doesn't even really truly move um this this process of passing through again
01:03:06.540is a is a reconnection as we die our our soul becomes part of the folk soul so seeing a light
01:03:15.500um or understanding that that that light that that emergence between the individual
01:03:21.500layered soul as it peels itself apart and and it stands before it's you know the the individual's
01:03:28.300ancestors and gains admittance through the passage of death into the realm in which balder resides
01:03:37.260i think is a mythic story of connection between the individual soul and the folk soul and so yes
01:03:47.820in a way i i do believe that the light that we're we're referencing to uh is part of the dominion
01:03:56.300and power that um that balder has just as much as we we could look at it in in other ways like
01:04:04.060to to give an example would be like when understanding say the fervor of of poetic or
01:04:10.700music uh when there's a sudden gust of inspiration that's beyond even the comprehension of the
01:04:16.540performer or the audience uh when we talk about battle um confusion and in the midst of battle
01:04:25.020we're not understanding things and there's this kind of static state where everything time slows
01:04:30.380down we we can clearly associate these kind of feelings and um situations with odin so likewise
01:04:39.660we then could apply that to the dominion or understanding the dominion of the other gods
01:04:45.580and i think in this case death and the return of the soul to the folk soul to the the the overall
01:04:51.900collection in in in that light would then be balder's dominion so if we could correlate
01:04:59.980one to the other i think it becomes pretty easy to see um yeah that's my take on that you know um
01:05:09.820Um, this is the first time I've ever really thought about that, but, you know, the, the idea of Baldur's light being that light at the end of the tunnel, that light on the other side, uh, when people have near death experiences, uh, I'm not going to say it is, but that would, that would certainly be beautiful if it was and paints a beautiful picture.
01:05:31.480What I do think is true in either case is it's of the same substance that balder shines with that light. I think that light of holiness, that light of shining glory that our gods embody and project and manifest is the same stuff of the light that folks see when they pass and when they're going back to their ancestors or perhaps even when they're ascending.
01:05:59.580I think that heavenly light is what Balder emits.
01:06:05.000I don't think he is the only source of that, but he is so full of it and so overcome with it that he literally exudes it.
01:06:16.920And I think that holy light is what is seen beyond the grave and is what Balder perhaps most embodies and projects.
01:06:26.300yeah when we when we talk about uh death in the sense of uh the stories you know there's this
01:06:34.780process that goes on uh that is described the traveling on hell's road going through nipa's
01:06:41.580cave passing by garm these are uh of course deeply pan-arian uh you know structures that happen
01:06:51.580in stories in which we do have a threshold that we have to pass through and that threshold
01:06:56.220in the process that begins and ends with admittance of course people who um you know are not admitted
01:07:04.700to cross the bridge are then uh you know given to tread low and in the shaded banks of and to
01:07:13.260cross girl and and um sleeve and get to naustrand and and they're left there only to return as uh
01:07:20.780some sort of transformed um processes because they've been denied by their ancestors to be
01:07:28.060admitted into the process of the returns that can come from that the ascension that can come from
01:07:34.380that so we have that light as like a beacon through the process of death which i think in
01:07:43.580in the stories is is uh is told in the story of us walking of traveling of the idea of us having
01:07:51.980uh like our ancestors having the the shoes that uh are to be worn you know upon being burned or
01:08:00.060buried so that the trek you know the symbology of that culturally is to show that the the process
01:08:06.620of death has an end point and i think that that that balder does represent that beacon
01:08:13.340at the end of that process that we have to go through
01:08:19.980um what do you believe is the greatest lesson we can learn from balder you have thoughts on that's
01:08:29.580fun well the the the greatest lessons um i think ultimately tragedy
01:08:44.380how it's perceived as being tragic sometimes is not always um
01:08:54.140the end all of it, that there is a, that nothing is linear, that everything is cyclical and moves
01:09:02.820around and through in processes. And I think Balder represents that nothing is completely
01:09:11.040in a state of tragedy, that the loss is never fully there, that loss sometimes
01:09:21.100garners or produces the steps necessary in order for ascension and so i think that's the greatest
01:09:28.280lesson to be learned um and i think that's the message that the gods are trying to teach us
01:09:33.260in that story as we as if we do look at the stories as um happening has has happened and
01:09:41.540will happen um then we begin to see the perennial truth of the stories and then it guides us to an
01:09:48.360understanding that that we can see things in deep tragedy at the moment and we can see the folly of
01:09:55.060our actions we can see the folly of of whether it's uh admittance of an outside force and
01:10:01.060taking into trust and then and then it turning malicious and turning against the gods this is
01:10:06.560clearly a lesson but ultimately balder returning from the deepest point of tragedy i think is the
01:10:16.520greatest lesson that we we can learn and it's not necessarily a point of like oblivious hope
01:10:23.160as it is an understanding that processes um happen that i think that the gods themselves
01:10:30.160see both the good and the bad or at least the perception of good and bad but also understand
01:10:36.320the forces of positive projection and negative retraction and how these waves um can affect the
01:10:45.440future and how they can establish the stage for more ebbs and flows of joy and tragedy. It's a deep
01:10:54.500and ever reminding tale of the fact that we are connected to the ebb and flow of Orla or the ebb
01:11:03.080flow of weird and that we must bear that in mind at all times yeah i think uh i think the lesson
01:11:15.880of uh let's just switch sorry my daughter turned my light off as a as a parting gift as she ran
01:11:24.760out of the room a second ago so i had to have mandy come correct it um yeah i think the the
01:11:29.960lesson of balder is is that hope and like swan said not just uh not just a a vain hope but an
01:11:37.640assurance that things come around pendulum swing and if we stay true and if we shine with that
01:11:48.520nobility that golden age will return and will return again and again and again um the idea of
01:11:56.600and i've tried to explain this before too it's very easy for us to see things in two dimensions
01:12:01.960and see a cyclical relation to things but cycles build upon one another and what i think is more
01:12:08.440true than the cyclical nature is the spiral of elevation or if we do poorly of degeneration
01:12:17.560but though things do run in us in in cycles
01:12:21.000if we continue acting right and being noble we spiral upward all of those cycles build upon each
01:12:30.260other towards something greater and something better as opposed to to descending and into
01:12:35.520something worse or something something less uh monk asks would the afa be interested in having
01:12:43.500a blessing of the bikes this spring there are people in the nncoc would like to know
01:12:51.100so far there is no blessing of the bikes that are not christian related um sure i don't know
01:12:58.300very much about that i'm not sure what that acronym stands for uh i'm not very familiar
01:13:05.580with motorcycle culture i do not ride a motorcycle but um yeah i think the idea of of doing or being
01:13:12.380part of a blessing of the bikes would be kind of a cool thing to do. I'd have to know a little bit
01:13:16.980more specifics about exactly what that looks like. What is Nana holding in the painting, Svon?
01:13:26.700A horn. A white, gray, and tan horn. And to be honest, the inspiration from it is at the
01:13:38.820off, there is a horn there. So I try to replicate the colors. I try to replicate the texture.
01:13:44.540And then I added some golden elements. And I wanted to convey some message of what the horn
01:13:50.800represents, which I believe is the receptacle that receives the devotion, the piety, and the
01:13:57.420strength of the folk from the middle, from the middle world, from the middle plane, as we give
01:14:06.780our devotion strength and piety towards balder at midsummer and we we pour ourselves out it is
01:14:16.560being received in the horn that nana carries and then she bestows it upon balder who then
01:14:23.280replenishes himself and it whether this could be read as um again if we're talking about a mental
01:14:29.520exercise of the cycle of devotion or the cycle of replenishing the folk soul as this happens
01:14:39.920quite a bit. The Nornir, they wash the root at the base of Yggdrasil with the waters from
01:14:49.420the well. This too is kind of a watering of the folk soul.
01:14:54.080And Lawrence, I apologize. We have a monetized question over on the side that should have
01:14:58.620technically come before this one. We will shuffle you in right now with 10 Canadian dollars. We
01:15:04.560really appreciate you, Lawrence. You're on here just about every week donating and asking questions.
01:15:10.900Evening, gents, and bless your hearts. A newbie question, not Balder-related. Do we know who wrote
01:15:17.160or compiled the prose and poetic eddas? I thought I saw somewhere there was Judeo-Christian
01:15:24.140influence in these works, but I can't remember where, and I hope it's not the case. I don't
01:15:29.520trust anything. Svan, go ahead and take first crack at this. Yeah, it's to be understood that
01:15:37.640think of it like a scattering. The poetics that were in Iceland were either written down,
01:15:47.760memorized, or, well, predominantly written down by that time, but in smatterings, there was also,
01:15:53.440So it was a collection that was brought in and which Snorri began to look at them and formulate them into cleaner prose and under the desire to keep Icelandic poetic traditions alive.
01:16:13.440So he's not the creator of the stories as he is the formulaic component that brings it all together.
01:16:27.880Now, there is clear influences. I would say there is a smattering certainly of Christianity, but there's also a great smattering of Hellenic ideals that are also brought in.
01:16:41.980um you could see it in the humanizing of the gods in the beginning and and and the motivations for
01:16:47.900that could be uh multiple and people have speculated for multiple reasons that perhaps
01:16:53.580he was trying to uh downplay this as not being necessarily a point of worship to the gods
01:17:00.460because he had maybe a church influence or a political influence that was kind of over his
01:17:05.900shoulder so he was placing this as a safety net so that it wouldn't be uh ultimately shut shut
01:17:13.820down or canceled in that sense um but you can see too that writers of that time really did lean
01:17:22.700heavily on the classics they the iliad and the odyssey and just connections to um whether it's
01:17:31.020the um the um connections to troy connections to rome connections to greece uh whether it's in
01:17:39.500format and things like that you could definitely see a lot more of that than i think you you you
01:17:44.540see the smatterings of christianity in in involving balder though you you definitely get
01:17:51.020this uh christian aspect of his correlation to balder uh with kind of a christ-like figure
01:17:59.980um whereas you know the name denotes boldness strength uh and and and living courageously and
01:18:09.100forthright and moving forward and and not really necessarily being a pacifist or any of that nature
01:18:14.300the name doesn't even denote it so you know it's it's a matter of reading it into the stories that
01:18:21.580were compiled and formulated and understanding that there may be parts that were placed in to
01:18:28.060create congruity there's also huge um skips and uh kind of like where there's basic concepts that
01:18:39.180are written down in one story are lost in another or not glossed over or not fixed or or not even
01:18:46.860uh compounded upon whether it's um the correlation of say uh the necessity of a god having family
01:18:53.100or having a father and a mother or an origin or or things of that nature there's familial ties
01:18:59.500that are emphasized heavily but then kind of loosely let go on other gods and so i think
01:19:06.680you find that there is during the compiling a an attempt to make it flow very much like
01:19:16.060a Hellenistic poem and has a lot of influence from that. And then I think Christianity is
01:19:24.640secondary to that. So the good news is Hellenicism is an Arian branch. So there is a kind of,
01:19:32.040I think there's a lot more, an Arian aspect that we try to write off as, oh, you know,
01:19:38.820the uh this might not be very nordic this might not be very um you know uh late viking period or
01:19:47.540you know using the word viking during the time it's kind of funny but uh because it was well
01:19:51.380after that period to begin with but certainly there was some influences i think more so with
01:19:57.380an attempt to make a hellenistic style great and grand connective story that was pulled together
01:20:05.620from multiple sources all over iceland at the time well after the conversion um and so yes you
01:20:15.220you you have to understand it is uh has some influences i think it has some missteps i think
01:20:22.100it has some some uh things that are not there there's the blatant and obviously two um core
01:20:30.100correlative uh beings in the story whether it's like uh whether it's the son of rinda
01:20:37.540valley or the son of loki valley and it's just not expounded upon because the poetics
01:20:44.420don't allow it to be explained it's it's just left there in understanding that the poetic meter had to
01:20:51.540be spoken so perhaps our ancestors even at that time maybe knew uh or understood the differences
01:20:58.740but by by our time it's it's leaves a lot of speculation as to those correlations
01:21:07.060um you know it's a very complex question um
01:21:18.500it's not like snorri sat down and decided to make up all these things it was a compilation of oral
01:21:24.180tradition and perhaps written tradition that was was available to him to codify to put down
01:21:30.420to make work in the right meter and uh and i think that was was the major effort i think it
01:21:38.340would be dishonest to suggest that there's no possibility that any christian themes or or
01:21:44.580anything had any overlap but i think what's very important to take note of is how european
01:21:51.060christianity differed from middle eastern christianity and the extent to which not that
01:21:58.180our lore was christianized but that christianity was uh germanicized and uh paganized and you see
01:22:08.900that throughout all of the cool things about the catholic church um all the things we don't like
01:22:14.580about the catholic church are are the authentically christian elements and all the things that are
01:22:19.460awesome are are the european pagan elements um i think that you can you can see some christian
01:22:30.580correlation with balder but it's very hard to tell what of that is trying to make balder christ-like
01:22:36.980and what of what is trying to make christ balder like um and i think there's there's a lot of that
01:22:44.340interplay back and forth throughout all of the culture for hundreds and hundreds of years in
01:22:50.500europe christianity itself even most of the themes found within the bible certainly within
01:22:59.060new testament scriptures and stories about jesus are very much borrowed or very very heavily
01:23:04.580influenced from other other pagan traditions often arian traditions that found their way
01:23:10.820in so i'm fairly unconcerned about any any christianity sneaking into to our lore i think
01:23:19.540our culture at the time that was written down was very strong and i think that the bigger
01:23:25.460influence has been the way that our lore has affected uh medieval christianity that
01:23:31.460plays out even today in some elements of the catholic church
01:23:34.500i i wanted to bring up one point i was here ago the um woodside wanderer made a point said
01:23:42.340mistletoe is parasitic to oak and i wanted to to talk about that for a minute i think that
01:23:47.540i and i've heard this quite a bit and i wanted to um lay something out there on the table for
01:23:53.300people to ponder about i don't think our ancestors knew uh that it was a parasitic nature i think
01:24:00.500that what they saw was that they viewed the mistletoe as being a polaric power in juxtaposition
01:24:08.740to the oak much like um the oak uh symbolizing strength symbolizing power connection to vitality
01:24:18.900and to life the long lastingness of it and inside the the bows of the oak tree live the the slight
01:24:27.540and slender green mistletoe and so that correlation between the hard the unmoving the strong the
01:24:35.140deep rooted and ever long living oak and then this this uh soft inner plant is kind of being
01:24:42.820seen as like the soul of the oak and even though the oak dies in winter with the leaves um you know
01:24:50.180falling and and breaking off yet still through the branches or the the the dead tree of winter
01:24:57.620you see the the um the soul you see the the true heart of the oak and it is this soft but very
01:25:08.340powerful plant um and so i think a lot of the mystique and power of the mistletoe in in relation
01:25:16.020to the oak uh or to any tree in reality uh i think uh was not lost on our ancestors and they
01:25:21.780they correlated that again to the idea of balder being much like just as much the folk soul or the
01:25:28.260soul of the people as also to being the soul of the gods when the body or when when the winter
01:25:34.260time comes when the darkness when the cold comes there is the the the evergreen and soft and ever
01:25:41.380light um and the white berries of the mistletoe that reside there and are are when when life
01:25:49.220returns again is is obfuscated until death comes so i really wanted to point that out i think that's
01:25:57.060that's a good point and i've heard a lot of people talk about it i really wanted to
01:26:01.620share that that thought that i had on that um i have a question from sarah i apologize if this
01:26:08.660has been talked about already could you speak of nana and the lessons the folk can learn from her
01:26:14.900story uh sfon did touch on that earlier but i think he may have some more he wants to say can
01:26:20.020you uh speak on that sfon uh yes i i really do uh in my personal belief and uh ever uh
01:26:31.460I've been Auschwitz for many, many years. I've always associated the dominion of Nana,
01:26:40.480or at least perhaps the dominion in which she sits and emanates that power. That power that
01:26:46.460she emanates is devotion. That power that she emanates is piety. And the idea of the
01:26:53.420the placing of oneself in a position of helping to bring forth, I think, overall the power that
01:27:08.800we give in devotion and piety to the gods. She represents an Aryan framework of the maiden who
01:27:20.520bears forth the horn the maiden who bears forth a power that is um designated to a masculine power
01:27:30.600and that power projects power into the world whether it's light whether it's will whether
01:27:35.960it's action this constantly is is uh being reinforced in almost all arian myths that there's
01:27:42.760this moment of of the risk that the receiving of uh or the bestowment of power from a feminine
01:27:50.520force to a masculine force and that masculine force then takes power into the world or projects
01:27:56.440it into the the multi worlds or uh even into fate itself so i think she represents that and i think
01:28:05.800she represents ultimately what we are trying to achieve i think what what we find ourselves
01:28:10.920sometimes battling with is at the inception of the new reconstruction or reemergence of
01:28:17.080also true is that a lot of folks are starting to show those signs of that they're moving away from
01:28:23.340a posturing sense of will into the world they have created space for us our predecessors have
01:28:29.940created space and we continue to create space but now we start to really inner reflect on
01:28:36.320what it, the deeper points of that, what that replenishes, what that brings forth.
01:28:42.860And that can't just be always projection. It has to be about
01:28:46.680being willing to receive and to give devotion and piety. So I think she represents that.
01:28:55.160Before we continue on, I forgot to mention, I believe this is week two, maybe week three,
01:29:07.820that we are also broadcasting on VK and on Odyssey. We're also, we have been doing this
01:29:18.520for a little bit. We're broadcasting live on Twitter right now as well. So if you know people
01:29:24.020that that use those those things perhaps instead of this please let them know they can get it there
01:29:29.780also uh for anybody on here that ever misses one of these or wants to listen to replays in
01:29:36.020a different format i know that this does get released every friday as a podcast on
01:29:43.300spotify so make sure you check those out or you can have you know friends of yours
01:29:49.060or anybody else you think would like to like to listen to these check that out on there
01:29:54.020I have a question. What are the AFA's position on our God's representations in art? And I think that Svon can give a really good answer to this. He's, I forget what we called him, but we came up with a little name for it, too. He's kind of our art guy that directs our devotional artwork in the AFA.
01:30:17.460Okay. From where I'm sitting, a couple of thoughts on it. We certainly want our gods
01:30:27.900to always be portrayed in a respectful and a reverent way.
01:30:35.540Art is so subjective that undoubtedly people are going to
01:30:39.060compose in a medium and in a way that uh that speaks to their soul and speaks from their soul
01:30:49.060i think that's a good thing to do what is a convention in afa art that that we want to do
01:30:54.580is represent our gods with that 12 spoke sun and rod behind their head as a as it in a golden
01:31:02.800fashion as a halo representing their divinity. That's an important feature. Again, having our
01:31:10.340gods look like our people is a really important feature. They're white gods representing
01:31:18.960white folks back to our origins. That's extremely important. You'll notice that in the murals and
01:31:26.600very often our gods are portrayed in a, certainly a Scandinavian and often in a Viking way. And
01:31:34.040that's one of the, you know, though I talk about dressing nice to ritual, and I talk about the
01:31:39.920modernization of many things, you know, I get it. Most of our stories come from a period in history,
01:31:47.680and that's often ways that we conceive of kind of a high period of how we conceive of our gods.
01:31:55.160But I don't think it's inappropriate for them to be represented in attire of a different age or a different time that's relevant to our people.
01:32:07.320And I don't think that's heretical or bad.
01:32:09.640I think because the stories draw images from the time that the stories were spoken and certainly codified, that naturally makes us, you know, makes us have that picture in our head is the easiest to come to, to envision our gods.
01:32:26.940But I don't think that it's it's wrong to portray them a different way.
01:32:31.840The other thing that certainly an AFA official things I want to do is to base our gods.
01:32:40.360I'm trying to think the best way to say this that makes the most sense.
01:32:45.300But Svan has pioneered what these gods look like.
01:32:50.260um from here on out the odin that's in odin's hof is the odin that's going to appear in afa art
01:32:58.620in different settings doing different things maybe wearing different clothes but that
01:33:02.900that look that those facial features that uh appearance is how the all father has appeared
01:33:09.980to the astro folk assembly through spawn same with thor or uh or or a balder or njord at this point
01:33:18.860So those core characteristics, as far as hair color and facial structure and things that way, I want to see continued in our artwork, because I think that that vision is is a part of the connection that we're building with our gods.
01:33:34.600What do you have to say on the topic of of our position on the gods representations in art?
01:33:41.860First, first off, when you when you speak on it, it kind of definitely hits me like a ton of bricks.
01:33:47.440It's this kind of weight of wanting to make sure that it's done in a way that, I mean, to have these Godsteads being talked about as representations of the folk through, I can't explain it.
01:34:11.780It's extremely a heavy and not a bad feeling, but just the gravity of it just hits me really, really hard.
01:34:21.180I think that, you know, when we talk about the gods in representation, whether they're in symbolic form or whether they're in a form that reflects our people.
01:34:35.240and i think that all people uh all over the world do this um you know it'd be very strange to see
01:34:42.660a shinto representation of the divinities that they they prescribe to as being not
01:34:49.120japanese uh so i mean that's that's clear uh but yes like what you said in a different time
01:34:56.660i think it would be completely um applicable and i think even our our ancestors did it at
01:35:02.900time when they were drawing the gods when they when they showed pictures of of um of odin uh
01:35:10.420carrying like you know a gross measure style sword or a single-edged kind of uh falchion style sword
01:35:19.220that was more popular at the time the clothing was more uh of the immediate time and so it could be
01:35:24.900argued well why did we do modern dress or modern clothing or something of that nature but i think
01:35:30.900that ultimately they drew the gods then not just in modern dress but in royal modern dress because
01:35:39.780of the the audience that they were speaking to that when the audience saw the royal clothes the
01:35:46.100the outstanding clothes the clothes that weren't worn every day though that those that even weren't
01:35:53.540even available to many of the people who believed in the gods that imagery showed a sense of hierarchy
01:35:59.300a sense of of of of being a high on the the strata of the world and so for us i think the
01:36:10.260representation of of the way that the time period late nordic and and uh i would say like i kind of
01:36:17.540pulled from about 800 900 with the anglo-saxons and a little bit with the late nordic period in
01:36:24.580in the year 1000 to to the 1100s trying to find things that would work there but also not make
01:36:32.660them so period detailed that um that it would it would make it so timely but it's the feeling that
01:36:40.340we get i think that the deep motivation right now in our art and in our religion is a reconnection
01:36:48.820state. Many of us are coming from a great divide or we're coming from a place in which we are
01:36:55.380deeply, before we can move forward, we must reconnect. And so the feeling that we, when we
01:37:01.580represent the gods in clothing of an elder time is a subconscious attempt to represent the nobility
01:37:12.000of the gods, but in the motion of us reconnecting to them so that we can move forward. So perhaps
01:37:18.340there is an age and a day long after we tread um hell road and we our children our great-grandchildren
01:37:28.500our great great-grandchildren perhaps you know they will represent the gods in a different way
01:37:35.220or in a way that's more uh showing that they have reconnected healed brought together and are moving
01:37:43.860forward together with the gods in uh from within and so i think that like the representation of
01:37:51.540the gods in that sense is good devotion is of course a key component people that you know draw
01:37:57.460the the gods whether it's for money or doing things like in comic books and in stories or
01:38:02.420in uh cover art for for kids books i i think that we can see a certain sense of use in the idea of
01:38:09.700of um that it it keeps like the gods are in the peripheral of some people who don't know
01:38:19.060that they're there um but beyond that i mean it can be detrimental or i think
01:38:24.020too sometimes very antagonistic the way they portrayed the gods uh you know with good reason
01:38:29.180and especially in popular culture whether it's video games or or comic books and the biggest
01:38:34.640thing i would say there is not to not to gripe on it too much we understand that there are people
01:38:38.840that are antagonistic towards anything that fulfills a spiritual need of the folk of us as
01:38:46.360a people so they're going to be antagonistic that's just let that go and understand that
01:38:52.080the best art is the art that comes from devotion that comes from belief that comes from piety
01:38:58.200that's the that's the art you should want to create for yourself that's the art you should
01:39:03.260want to share with others and that's the art that we should support from others and then you know
01:39:10.860that that was really what i was trying to convey i think ultimately on a material level when it
01:39:17.660came to this the presence of the art was to represent the art from a point of devotion
01:39:22.860in hopes that the folk could see the gods being there as a godstead accepting seeing them being
01:39:30.940inspired by it and i don't think that that that that bridge is ever crossed when people are doing
01:39:36.940it in popular culture things like that um can you speak to the significance of the sonnenrad
01:39:47.180within the afa svan yeah we've hit on this uh a couple times and hey uh you know if you haven't
01:39:57.180seen any go back and definitely watch those those are good too but we covered here as well
01:40:01.740the sun and rod um as a symbol of dynamic power the power uh that is uh moving uh that that the
01:40:12.140gods are a moving uh collection of forces that are driving towards something that there is there
01:40:21.900There is a meeting out of purpose based on fate, based on doom, based on the ideas of cycle.
01:40:31.740If there is a dawn, there has to be a dusk.
01:40:33.800And so the symbol of the sun and rod as a moving emblem is important, I think, to show the correlation of the divine powers being deeply interconnected to a lot of the moving forces of the universe.
01:40:48.200whether it's the primordial forces that created the universe that the gods shaped, whether it's, you know, the sparks of Muspelheim or the ancient matter that bubbled up from the wells of Nivelheim and Helgard and the rivers that flow and all these things.
01:41:03.020this symbol represents their dynamic connection to it as as all things are aligned in us in cycles
01:41:10.460by them um as as they take ascendancy in heaven um but also to symbolically to see
01:41:18.520the the sun and rod is not just a circle it's not just a sense of light it's a sense of again
01:41:25.560polaric movement all things moving around an axis and that symbol in and of itself has become
01:41:32.320I think what we see as a sign of the divinity of the gods and their power, their might that exudes from them, the positions in which they take in the universe and the positions oftentimes that we bestow upon them culturally are both one and the same and equally as powerful.
01:41:53.440And they represent themselves in that symbol emanating from their head, from the crown.
01:42:02.320Yes, that's kind of the most evolved version of that symbol and the 12 spoke and its solar
01:42:14.500connotations are important to us, to our ritual year, to the number of gods.
01:42:20.380All of that correlates and is very important, but in its most basic sense, any version of
01:42:29.600son and rod is used artistically in the afa as a halo gold around gods and red around mortals
01:42:38.960to show holiness so it's it's a holy symbol and we use it specifically to denote holiness if
01:42:47.040you're to see it on you know afa buildings or things that way would denote something holy about
01:42:54.320them uh travis wants to share a comment and not a question not a question but wanted to express the
01:43:02.800fact that our folk and our ways are true my folk builder of colorado has been here for me as a new
01:43:09.280member more than family or close friend that's great to hear um your folk builder uh nick salo
01:43:17.040is doing an amazing job so far and i say that i have no idea if that's the right way to pronounce
01:43:22.160your name nick i apologize um but yeah he's doing an amazing job in colorado so far he's helping out
01:43:28.400an area that hasn't had a lot of representation in the past and i've heard nothing but great things
01:43:33.760and just so happens he is the next guy with a question uh nick says what lessons can we take
01:43:41.840from frigga overlooking mistletoe when she took oaths from everything that could harm balder
01:43:47.200Svon what are your thoughts on that again I think that that is what I lent to when I was talking
01:43:56.800about the soul of the oak or the the the slightness that the meekness of the of that which
01:44:04.300lives within the great bows of the oak tree is that oftentimes I think we overlook
01:44:12.160um even the small vestige of of that which can spark or you ignite the cycle
01:44:22.140and so it was quite fitting that we haven't you know a soft evergreen um
01:44:29.040bow or tree that that becomes the catalyst that begins the cycle that starts the the woe of the
01:44:38.600gods but then in essence creates the uh the salvation of the gods in a sense because remember
01:44:46.720balder being placed in a in a stasis point between uh you know the heavenly the earthly and
01:44:55.340the chthonic realms of of timelessness he's placed there to return so i think that
01:45:02.700the lesson of Fricka's writing off is an understanding that even the smallest of
01:45:14.200things can be the catalyst that begins a cycle. And that ultimately that the inevitability of
01:45:21.080those cycles, that ebb and flow as the waves move in, the waves well move out, is an understanding
01:45:26.560that even if it's the slightest, tiniest thing that starts that catalyst, that ultimately could
01:45:32.220lead to being something that aids, that helps with the surviving the process. There's a great
01:45:40.320lesson to be learned in that. So, you know, take note to the details. Take note that, you know,
01:45:50.420all things should be covered. But ultimately, I think the story has to predecess itself that
01:45:57.640something so slight, not a thorn, not a, not a arrow, not a, a blade or metal, but this
01:46:04.460tiny little thing is the only thing that's left to begin the catalystic change that will bring
01:46:11.260about great woe, but also ultimately a great boon over time. I mean, I think there's an obvious
01:46:26.180don't overlook anything. Even tiny things can develop into threats. I think it is a message
01:46:34.800of vigilance, but I think it's also a story element that has to exist to convey that story
01:46:42.640and to teach us that truth. Do you think Forseti inherited the best characteristics of both of his
01:46:49.780parents, and that made him well qualified to be the god of justice. What are your thoughts, Svon?
01:46:58.180That's amazing that you brought that up, but we were just having a discussion about that, and
01:47:02.600yes, I think that one of the idea of nobility, especially in relation to the inner guard,
01:47:14.120when we talk about looking and reflecting in, the boldness, the courage, and the nobility
01:47:19.680of balder mixed with the devotion and the piety and the strength and the power of faith in nana
01:47:26.880manifest them in themselves in the sense of setting thews setting laws setting points in
01:47:35.520which we have to maintain a sense of of rightness a sense of structural and societal um stability
01:47:45.840uh and that that we see that in for set these guidance um of course you know when we talk about
01:47:52.880uh his story amongst the phrygians and his correlation of of him helping create the
01:47:58.000phrygians tribal laws um that i think is is an aspect uh that that expounds even beyond just the
01:48:04.640phrygians to all of us in an understanding that yes um it's a perfect example of our caretaking
01:48:11.840of that which is within we don't necessarily have to project law to that which is with
01:48:16.640outside of us oftentimes we can enact a different type of justice uh uh and actions actions that are
01:48:24.640swift and i i think that we see that in tear and i think people get confused with that a lot when
01:48:29.840we see tear as being like our our actions being just are we acting swiftly are we acting cleanly
01:48:38.800Are we acting nobly and righteous for ourselves, whereas Forsethi represents an inner form of justice with a deep sense of care and mediation with a desire to make peace within the friv of the inner guard.
01:48:56.080So, yeah, I think it's extremely poignant that that's all correlated in the stories or in the thrones upon which we see the gods sit and the dominion of power from their thrones.
01:49:17.480Yeah, I think that's a very interesting correlation, and I'm glad that you guys brought it up.
01:49:22.460uh certainly i think that's important uh we have another question balder's story is one of death
01:49:30.240and rebirth after ragnarok could it also be connected with reincarnation do we as asatuar
01:49:36.760reincarnate i think that's a really interesting thing to bring up um certainly to a degree what i
01:49:46.040think is more relevant to our form of reincarnation with the balder story is odin's placing of dropner
01:49:58.520on his pyre and whispering into to the corpse of his son a secret that passes into the realm of
01:50:07.560death and then comes back to to inform or to be fertile again in the golden age and i think that
01:50:16.840that is much more similar to our reincarnation i've never been one that believes in the one for
01:50:23.400one reincarnation pattern i think that in a certain case i don't think that's an impossible thing
01:50:30.520i think that perhaps some heroes or somebody that there is is some important spiritual mission for
01:50:37.240can be be reincarnated as perhaps an avatar or something like that i don't think that's out of
01:50:44.680the question but i think in general and i think that math bears this out when you see the difference
01:50:51.560in population today versus our ancient ancestors that a one-for-one you know bob dies and then
01:50:59.960gets resurrected as his grandson bob iii i don't think that's a complete picture and i think
01:51:06.840some of it has to do with the the logic of
01:51:13.160believing in our ancestors existing beyond the veil because you don't really exist two places
01:51:20.600at once at the same thing if we believe that they're dead residing in the halls of the ancestors
01:51:25.560or perhaps even ascending to being with the gods then they don't really occupy two spaces at once
01:51:33.000if we believe we're you know this would have us believe that grandson bob the third
01:51:40.040is bob the first but is also at the altar worshiping bob the first and it's just a very
01:51:46.920very complex thing what i think is a truth about our soul and how that works is that there's many
01:51:53.400different soul components certainly pieces of the soul absolutely reincarnate into our bloodline
01:52:00.920um pieces of our luck pieces of hymenia certainly pieces of ancestral memory
01:52:10.120those things can absolutely re-manifest in the bloodlines of our family and i don't think
01:52:15.080there's nothing to it but i think especially by naming naming children after ancestors or after
01:52:22.120heroes a piece of them lives on through that child a piece of them manifests within that
01:52:29.560child's soul and can bring them some of their luck or some of their favorable attributes
01:52:34.760but i don't think that it means the whole personality the whole soul complex one for
01:52:41.240one reincarnates down the line again i i don't venture to tell our gods what they can and cannot
01:52:47.720do but i don't that is not my understanding of how reincarnation works in uh in our faith
01:52:56.920But I know it's very nuanced, and so many things in Ausatru are. There's not a lot of quick,
01:53:01.960easy answers. The answers all have gradation to them. What are your thoughts on this subject, Svang?
01:53:11.640Well, it's much like what you said. The layering of the soul, the components of the soul,
01:53:17.880what exactly comes back um you know that that could be a truly wonderful
01:53:25.160theosophical debates about that um i think that it's important to understand that there's a
01:53:29.720desperation that some people have to to create yggdrasil as some sort of a a central axis mundi
01:53:36.840but they're losing i think a great point of what i think our ancestors especially the nordic
01:53:41.960ancestors and why they chose a uh an ash tree specifically um is that looking at a nexus of
01:53:49.480power understanding that the the the symbology of a root and a well in in all three levels
01:53:56.440is very very important because from all three wells there is an emanation and a reception
01:54:03.240of that realm and there is a descending down from that realm and there is also an extracting
01:54:10.120up from that realm through the roots so when we understand that we can see great movement
01:54:18.040happening between the heavenly realms the material realms and the dark cathodic realms and we see
01:54:25.240that which happens in heaven descends down into time and into the material and then that which
01:54:30.120happens in the material descends down through memory and through the past and into the primordial
01:54:36.120And all of that is at the same time slowly being brought back up to the core nexus of that divine power and dripping and disseminating back down again in that cycle.
01:54:48.840So if we can see the pathway as being cyclical, yes, but the components and to what degree, that is one to be greatly pondered upon, I think.
01:54:59.660we know that we believe in ascension, that we believe that there is an ability to be ascended
01:55:04.720by the gods through fame, through deed, through nobility, through right action, whether it's to
01:55:10.000be plucked up directly from the middle by the Valfather, to be chosen, or whether it's ascendancy
01:55:17.200even in older age or even post-mortem to be brought up and ascended and to be placed into
01:55:24.800gimli hall uh to be amongst the gods or to be alfar and dsir and not be mortals again but to
01:55:33.280preside over mortals and so understanding that the real point of the nexus of power is yggdrasil
01:55:42.240and whether or not pieces are being brought back up or being produced anew from that nexus of power
01:55:48.480placed in the well and disseminating into the material in the form of soul soul power that
01:55:55.360extends the life of the folk i think there's a combination of newness and of from from that power
01:56:02.320and there's a combination of oldness from the folk soul that is also kind of correlating uh in
01:56:09.200in the present moment in the material plane as we produce more children and those that those
01:56:15.360droplets from that uh entering into the well the droplets are the souls are the power that
01:56:23.760have a combination of both new life and old from their bloodlines of the past
01:56:32.640okay we have a complex question here um have you heard of stefan he sees loki as an evil one like
01:56:42.160the saturn black cube abrahamic religion uh loki tricking hoder to kill balder was like our folk
01:56:50.320being manipulated to murder each other to pass on christianity what do you think our ancestral gods
01:56:56.800care about us like a parent would a child whereas the jealous murderous maniac schizophrenic quacko
01:57:04.640keko demon yahweh god of calamity and mischief he wants us destroyed and enslaved
01:57:13.120so what are your thoughts fond do you know who he is referring to the stefan person
01:57:19.600uh i am not familiar no i i i am i am not familiar with with uh stefan uh perhaps if there was
01:57:28.560a last name i i don't know um i think that the the lesson first and foremost is yes that there is a
01:57:36.000that Loki does represent a great amount of things that are a warning. When we see
01:57:43.900the seeds of maliciousness being sowed within, being applicated, they're always kind of covered
01:57:51.660with a sense of gifts and a sense of goodness. But we clearly know, be careful of those who give
01:57:58.000many gifts because they're indebting you perhaps to a price that you're not really understanding
01:58:02.900what you're uh you know supposed to pay and um you know so we see this warning of loki uh in
01:58:12.660many different ways and he's represented culturally at the time in in a very specific way he is seen
01:58:18.740as not being of orderly fashion he's he's he's a force that can move between boundaries and that's
01:58:26.980clearly seen as being connected to like primordial chaotic forces forces that aren't stable forces
01:58:36.700that aren't um built on order aren't built on the everlasting they're they ebb they flow they move
01:58:45.000they change and so these warnings i think um are taking place for the audience to catch that to
01:58:51.740see that to understand that um and as far as in correlation with perhaps uh saturn or the black
01:59:01.900cube or uh in relation to perhaps like the canaanite slash you know eventually evolving into
01:59:09.180the the judaic uh yahweh uh the correlation there i i don't really have on there in a lot of ways um
01:59:18.220I think it's important that we see our faith and our stories as the lessons and the points that we should see them in their framework for ourselves because those stories speak to us.
01:59:32.480Perhaps if we could see correlation in other people's things or perhaps in the way they manifest in this world through, you know, oftentimes I correlate fanaticism of certain ideologies that happen in this world.
01:59:49.000I correlate that oftentimes to the venom of Fenris' mouth as it's boiling out of the Black Lake.
01:59:56.700So I can see where you're going with a connection point and comparative sense. And I'm not going to say that your connective points or the way you're bringing these things. That's, again, the power of our stories is the perennial truth.
02:00:14.520So if the perennial truth is leading you to an understanding of that there is some sort of kind of correlation, I would say, you know, perhaps you are right or perhaps you are at least gleaning into an area where we should consider.
02:00:29.520I think all things in the pursuit of wisdom is to be considered. But we should also try to look at our religion and our stories and our truths within the framework of our people first and foremost.
02:00:49.100And so I oftentimes look at Loki as clearly is as he is and that it wasn't always seen as just some kind of coy trickster that we should – oh, we should just – that's actually the warning.
02:01:05.620The warning is don't take what is going to become or what can manifest as just being some coy trickster that we should just, oh, you know, kind of play it off.
02:01:17.520So consider first within our framework, and then all correlative connections to things outside of our framework. I don't think that they lack merit. I think instead what we should do is try to find the perennial truth in those connectivities.
02:01:38.640Otherwise, we end up spiraling out, fragmenting out and leading down rabbit holes and pathways that ultimately force us to engage foreign ideas with foreign ideas.
02:01:53.240And we shouldn't do that. We should find connectivity, but always bring it back within the inner guard of our framework of understanding.
02:02:00.200all of the things that spawn said but yes loki is bad and uh yes loki's
02:02:12.280trickery and what's important to take note of about loki and his way of doing things
02:02:21.720is that it is subtle is that it is tricky and it does come in disguised as a friend or disguised
02:02:28.580as a joke um and then ends in in tragedy uh as opposed to an opponent that comes to you face to
02:02:38.020face and stares you down and man for man you you guys settle something loki's opposition is always
02:02:44.980done in a slimy shady way and uh you know certainly that has commonality with with people
02:02:52.900who behave that way as well and and i think that you know that is a similarity in character and
02:03:00.180not necessarily a literary representation but it is very interesting to note um
02:03:08.740hans asks i know we don't take the eddies literally like people do with the bible
02:03:13.940but does that still apply to the have them all i think the same things apply to the have them all
02:03:19.940um the lessons from the eddas and the truth of the eddas we do take as a as a truth the literal
02:03:29.220descriptions of a of an illustrative story we don't take each of those facts as being
02:03:34.820being literal truth but they are a metaphysical truth the have them all doesn't put those things
02:03:44.020in specific time and place it puts out a list of proverbial advice that is true and rings true
02:03:52.740and so i think that you know i don't see that there would be a literal versus not literal
02:03:58.580interpretation issue of the have them all if we accept that the edit speak truth the have them all
02:04:03.380advice is applicable to you know throughout time and space in one way or another i think that
02:04:09.540perhaps when he describes the um the spells i suppose that's something that could be taken
02:04:17.380literally or symbolically but certainly all of all of the advice portions of the have them all
02:04:22.820are very straightforward and i don't think they they require uh you know a literal story or a
02:04:30.820context that way other than you know advice to travelers um but no i think those things are can
02:04:37.620be applied forever and applied to almost any circumstance in a very very easy and very
02:04:43.780straightforward way and those things are all true points those things are all valid and true things
02:04:49.940if you mean literally like in the the you know don't trust the council of women
02:04:55.060obviously use some common sense it doesn't mean that women can't give you good advice but it does
02:04:59.540mean that you need to season that advice with understanding where it came from and understanding
02:05:04.660volatility of women depending on the circumstance i think these truths were all adult enough to be
02:05:11.460able to to read into them and to see the truth in them and they're they're extremely valuable
02:05:16.820to have them all is one of the most easily accessible and most valuable you know for
02:05:22.820practical use items within our eddas and i think it's one of the reasons that that it's so beloved
02:05:29.300by Ossetruar since the very beginning. Shay asks, is there any disrespect towards Balder
02:05:37.240in using mistletoe in the known traditions during the upcoming holidays? Do you have
02:05:43.860thoughts on that, Svon? Yes, absolutely. I mean, the argument between whether our Celtic
02:05:50.060cousins brought the honoring of mistletoe, we can clearly see mistletoe seems to be deeply
02:05:55.560connected on the anglo-saxon side of things so i would state that there is a heavy case that
02:06:05.000a cultural tradition of showing friv showing friendship uh to mistletoe through uh handshakes
02:06:15.880uh when when people come through a threshold the handshake at the door uh between men folk the hug
02:06:21.880between menfolk the the the the kiss upon the forehead the kiss upon the cheek the the sign of
02:06:27.640affection i think is a cultural thing that has survived uh perfect example that say didn't
02:06:34.600survive is cobblers taking pieces of the of the leather shoe and whatever's left over the scraps
02:06:41.400from the edges to be kind of sacrificed to vidar in essence a kind of a testament to his eventual
02:06:48.520completion of his oath in which he will avenge his father that didn't really survive it was
02:06:54.360culturally poignant at the time but i think as truly beautiful as that mistletoe and this kind of
02:07:00.120folk cultural uh tradition that's not stated in the adis it's clearly there's no mention of it is
02:07:09.720is important to keep around so i do this as well i i um during uh the lighting of the yule log um
02:07:19.160whether it's at home or at the hof uh there's mistletoe that's gathered and uh i have a kind
02:07:24.520of an interesting family tradition involving gathering of mistletoe but um the idea is is to
02:07:31.400to disseminate it amongst the folk and to show kindness and frid to the folk that pass through
02:07:39.880the threshold before it. And at the end of Yule, I sacrifice it to the boon fire that I light
02:07:46.800from the flame that I've kept from the Yule log throughout Yule. So I think that's a great
02:07:52.680tradition, I think it exemplifies a great point is that the blame is not on the mistletoe. It's
02:08:02.160not necessarily even blamed on hod or hodur. It's blamed on the maliciousness or the transference
02:08:09.920of the one who is malicious and the one who is chaotic, the one who is the kinslayer. And so
02:08:16.880there is a sense of forgiveness in the deed of showing frith before it i think it's important
02:08:26.380i like it um you know as it gets closer to the holidays or to uh the yule tide we will ask
02:08:35.320swan some more about his yule traditions i need to figure out where we get the the pig's heads
02:08:41.000uh-oh now i've done it now i've done it hold on you offended the pig head
02:08:48.040i spoke the pig head out loud and calamity ensued you get this re-straightened out guys
02:08:56.460i think we're back straight so rob's got a got a question for you swan
02:09:04.020Svan opinion on Balder and his resurrection as a representation of the path to ascension
02:09:11.460and his correlation with other solar deities and their roles as guides on the hero's path
02:09:17.940yes uh definitely a representation you get a one word answer yes no the the the uh the ascension
02:09:32.620correlation, I think, too, has Pan-Arianism all over it. Wherever we look at, we see the
02:09:40.880ascension of the light warrior, the soul or the ascension of the brand. It survives in ancient
02:09:51.700names from Germanic origins, like Albert, meaning all bright, or Herbert, meaning the bright warrior.
02:09:58.700There's all of these deep connections to the ascension of the light warrior, and that light, that idea of expounding from a place of darkness is, again, a clear and poignant perennial truth that absolutely can be applied.
02:10:21.260The question I think that is placed upon us is the definition of where that darkness comes from. Is it external? Is it internal? Is it from outside? Is it from the betrayer's hand or is it from the brother, the dark brother? Is the dark brother the darkness within ourselves?
02:10:41.160considering where the light is being quelled and finding that source i think is most important
02:10:48.720to leading towards it expounding beyond what is trying to quell it and i think that's one of the
02:10:55.560great mysteries of the story in a warrior aspect is understanding the source of the darkness that
02:11:00.820quells our light identifying it admitting it appearing it and then then expounding beyond it
02:11:09.520once we face it, we can move beyond. So King of Cheese asks, Matt Svon, I nearly forgot to ask,
02:11:22.600how are you both doing tonight? I'm sure I know your answer, Matt, but it's a good thing.
02:11:28.460Svon, how are you doing? I'm doing well. There was complications, obviously, with sound and,
02:11:36.120And, you know, planes flying overhead and logistic things like that.
02:12:02.400I'm now deep in thought about where to get the pig's head for the Yule celebration so that my child and I can eat the pig face.
02:12:11.840That's a spawn tradition that I keep meaning to do, but I don't get on it early enough.
02:12:16.660So, yeah, he'll tell us more about that as the Yule Tide gets closer.
02:12:23.160I'm doing great and I appreciate you asking, Tony. That's kind of you. I hope you're doing well as well.
02:12:28.120uh travis is the folk uh this is for you svan is the folkish futhark written
02:12:35.980in something we can study like other runes
02:12:39.060uh i mean the folk futhark is is written out in well there it is so but to understand
02:12:48.720that you have to remember that the folk futhark is not a futhark unto itself it is a culmination
02:12:56.400of all the other futharks so the best way and that's the reason why we did that was to spurn
02:13:02.320people who are deeply interested to look at the folk futhark and then go back and look at the
02:13:08.320different futharks that we pulled from maybe why we pulled from it uh and and encourage study but
02:13:15.360it you in order to understand the folk futhark you must understand all the futharks and that's
02:13:22.400i'm saying that in a tongue-in-cheek but also not in a way uh it's to spurn interest
02:13:29.040um it was not an attempt to create something new it was more or less a spark of inspiration
02:13:36.560to convey messages in the murals and to give a commonality of reading since you you might talk
02:13:44.480to a lot of people that write in runic um whether we're talking about an old norse or in modern
02:13:49.760german or modern english or um you know even in slavic i see a lot of slavic rune work now
02:13:56.240uh being written where there's like a cyrillic runic that uh has taken place in some some art
02:14:02.320forms um so i kind of wanted for us to have the same thing to transfer some ideas and and to
02:14:10.640unify our ability to get those ideas but they're based off of the anglo-phrygian
02:14:17.040the elder Futhark, the younger Futhark, the Armanin. So all of those, yeah, look into them.
02:14:23.800That's where you're going to find, you know, the deeper intrinsic meanings of them.
02:14:33.760So you guys know, it looks like we've got two questions left. So if you guys got questions,
02:14:41.380go ahead and put them up there. And if not, we'll, you know, we've already been going over
02:14:45.520two hours so we'll sign off after these two but yeah if you guys have questions you want to answer
02:14:49.840be happy to get to those uh a user on odyssey robert pile asks i usually use wings uh usually
02:14:58.880on the helmets to show that a person is a celestial being or favored by the gods does
02:15:05.040anybody in the afa also do this or is the sun and rad only i'm very aware of the tradition of doing
02:15:12.640that and i think that's really cool as far as i know artists in the afa i can't think of anyone
02:15:18.560specifically who does that with their art but it certainly wouldn't surprise me uh sfan do you know
02:15:25.840uh i mean i i immediately think back to like some of the stuff in the in the uh early 80s
02:15:34.000you know some of the artwork then definitely and i think was in the same in the same vein
02:15:39.200of what you're you're saying about the the uh understanding or the expansiveness of divinity
02:15:44.880and so yes i think that's a great point that we should bring up and and and bear about is that
02:15:49.920the what the ring wings represented some people now will try to scoff because i think we're
02:15:54.800we're filled with we're overly abundant with cynics in the modern day and at people that are
02:16:00.400contrarians people that try to tear things down people that see something going up and they just
02:16:05.920kind of throw their their you know venom at it just because it's not them or so i don't know
02:16:12.560what the source is but you know so when we see these wings and we're like oh god oh it's
02:16:18.320vagnerian and no what is the deep symbolic meaning behind that is yes the expansion the elevated
02:16:25.920the elevated power and so i would say the wings and the sun and rod have the same meaning and that
02:16:33.600um it was briefly i think we were talking about that when we were talking about artistic
02:16:39.600representations in the early 80s and how we wanted to kind of demonstrate a next step so i think that
02:16:45.920was the ultimate reason why i think me and elsewhere ago they didn't really fully commit
02:16:50.880to that idea um there were some other reasons too of course the idea of wearing helms in general
02:16:56.480and it um the first mural was thor and and one emphasis that i really wanted to show was the
02:17:02.720wind blown and wild hair that is that is spoken of the red hair that is wild and windy
02:17:09.600and so that would kind of be hard to convey under the capsulation of a helmet so it just kind of
02:17:16.800ended up in that evolution not not happening and that the sun and rod would then be the same
02:17:23.200meaning but it's our time now as as we represent it that way i don't know if you have any thoughts
02:17:30.400on that possibly uh no i think that that both are are really you know appropriate and uh artistically
02:17:39.920beautiful ways of doing it i think that one of the things that comes in especially when we consider
02:17:45.440um our modern heroes in a day and an age where uh all of the heroes celebrated were warriors
02:17:54.000and thus you know and in a time where warriors were commonly wearing a helmet
02:18:00.320the wings work on there the wings just attached to the side of somebody's head without a helmet
02:18:04.960would look odd i don't know how terrible that would be i think it would take some getting used
02:18:09.600to i think artistically you can put any head in front of a sun and rod halo and it looks right
02:18:17.360it works there it fits i think if you did that with wings and they weren't attached to a helmet
02:18:22.960it wouldn't uh wouldn't have the same effect um not that you couldn't do it like i said but i
02:18:28.320think it would take some getting used to but yeah it's the it's the same concept and and
02:18:32.480that's cool that you do that i'd love to see some of your work um so tony asks what are the
02:18:41.360use and history of rosary beads and aussitrew i've seen them used by catholics so you can
02:18:47.280understand my confusion when i see asitura use them but i am dearly curious so what i think
02:18:55.920you're seeing as rosary beads are are mala beads and i think they were incorporated from
02:19:04.080hindu tradition which which is an arian an arian offshoot faith um i know that a lot of folks
02:19:12.080in their esoteric practice have used mala beads for the same reasons that hindus use them to count
02:19:21.040during galder sessions to also count during any kind of mantra work they're doing
02:19:26.400and so i know a number of people use those we have a friend of the afa that usually
02:19:32.080will will make a mala bead um necklace for uh auction at afa events and those are very beautiful
02:19:43.080with uh runic beads on them but yeah i think that's what you're referring to uh history of
02:19:49.820those the mala has been used since i think like the fourth century as far as in vedic or hindu
02:19:56.820practice i'm not sure how long folks have been using them in ostrich circles but i think since
02:20:04.580pretty early on because there is a a tendency to seek inspiration from um eastern arian
02:20:13.860traditions that lasted longer and and developed some more modern techniques in their spirituality
02:20:21.060that's my knowledge of them Svon do you have anything to add on the the use of of beads and
02:20:28.060ostrich well I think what you said about galder and and also too about the randomness I think that
02:20:34.320um as the beads uh because each of the beads has a generally has a rune symbol on it and there
02:20:40.340could be varied runes because some people prefer maybe a rotation of a certain amount from a
02:20:46.220Futhark, like whether it's the Elder or the Younger or the Angulophrygian. Now we're talking
02:20:52.000about different numbers, whether it's 24 or 16 or 32 or 18. And the idea that how many times they
02:21:02.100might be cycled, but one of the things is the randomness of it. Oftentimes I've seen in usage
02:21:08.520while being counted and doing Galder that perhaps losing count or losing sight of which rune you may
02:21:15.240have started on but the randomness of the stopping point may have some significance as well in which
02:21:20.820they'll look down and see the symbol and the symbol has a phonetic value but it also has a
02:21:25.460deep intrinsic philosophical and religious value and they'll look at that as perhaps either a point
02:21:31.760to meditate on focus on or some even believe that it might have some correlation to the events of
02:21:38.360the life that they are either experiencing right now or perhaps uh the the fate and the debt in
02:21:44.000which they are walking into in the world, like I would say fate, but debt or the coming of their
02:21:51.120time in the future, that these symbols might glean some help. It really depends, I think,
02:21:56.220on the people. It's different amongst a lot of folks. I don't even really have a lot of
02:22:01.920experience with them, but I see them and I've seen them used and I've asked and it was told
02:22:07.220to me very much in that vein of the sense that the randomness of what might come about
02:22:13.180has significance while also helping keep pace while doing mantra or galder i've used them i have
02:22:21.500a set that was gifted to me and i i've used them for for galder work and for mantra work and and
02:22:27.840found that to be useful because you can just thumb them with your finger and keep track that way
02:22:32.560without having to focus on the count which again helps free up your mind in that galder and in that
02:22:38.860mantra mantra and galder are the tools that help me meditate those things allow my mind to
02:22:47.580disconnect and be in that meditative place where if i don't do those things it's very hard for me
02:22:52.860to silence all the all the random business and thoughts that come into my mind so i think it's
02:22:59.100it's a powerful tool um finn asks i'm wondering your opinion on this svan does the afa believe
02:23:06.220in the claims that odin is santa claus and do you have an opinion on the christians who say
02:23:12.860santa is saint nicholas a greek bishop or do you think santa could be a mix of the two what are your
02:23:19.340thoughts on santa claus and our folk um yeah uh well so we you know we have the the um uh the
02:23:32.060deep connection of course sent santa niklaus or saint nick and uh i guess i believe he was this
02:23:39.860a syrian living in greece i'm not super familiar with the story of the christian saint however um
02:23:50.300there's always been a spirit of yule and and so there's some i think some correlations there seems
02:24:00.560to be folk correlations that don't i think glean towards um odin being uh that that spirit or well
02:24:12.560first and foremost i i want to preface that we're not trying to find a singular spirit but that
02:24:18.560there are some things that i seem to point towards a folk belief of a an angle nook white or hearth
02:24:26.960spirit or or an alpha or a lad or a or a kind of um uh the the premise of a spirit that is
02:24:36.720uh um connected to the hearth connected to the the house connected to the home and so part of
02:24:42.880me says a lot of these traditions that i read about seem to correlate towards a house spirit
02:24:48.880but yet at the same time there is also heavy correlations especially amongst the anglo-saxons
02:24:54.800and and the nords with uh like the naming of of odin as being the yule father but um
02:25:02.880you know the the connections of to him specifically around say gift giving or being
02:25:10.480uh of one uh amongst the children uh doesn't i don't see a lot of that i see that more there's
02:25:17.120more warrior s connections to the yule father uh at the time of yule in which odin is seen
02:25:23.600deeply connected to the warrior class of the anglo-saxons he's venerated at this time i think
02:25:28.240he was also venerated at this time because it was seen as yule was the end of the wild hunt
02:25:33.600um that the wild hunt wound down at that point and that uh that uh after his ride he was taking
02:25:41.280ascendancy back into his throne so i believe that our ancestors were looking at that this
02:25:45.600was a time to celebrate his returning and settling down and i think that has a deep connection to the
02:25:52.400word you'll the the the the turning or the return um but as far as uh gift giving uh placing um
02:26:03.840gifts into the stockings this goes throughout all of european cultures and it oftentimes seems to be
02:26:11.280always correlated to a huswite or a hoodlfolk or a lanvetier or um like i said i like an inglenook
02:26:21.280spirit uh because again the connection to the charcoal um the idea of the goat or a means in
02:26:27.760which they they carry the packages um i know a lot of people because of the yulbach make deep
02:26:33.920connections to thor being um like the yul father or and then there's some debate between odin and
02:26:40.800and and thor but again uh there's more connection definitely towards odin as being the old father
02:26:47.600because it's literally said that he is the yule father but uh as far as when we see like in modern
02:26:54.080day iceland when we talk about the yule lads and these the the evolution of most spirits in post
02:27:02.320nordic christian times the gods are not made into um sprites and spirits and wearing you know red
02:27:12.160caps and and kind of fun things the gods were oftentimes made bad or mortal or you know you
02:27:19.600you hemorrhaged and all those things and that what was kind of left for the kids in a lot of ways
02:27:25.120remained because even that to a degree was off limits from the church or from the parents or
02:27:31.440or or things like that so i really find that um the yule lad father christmas as he as he's referred
02:27:38.640to in england or or you know and um a lot of the correlations of that and a lot of the traditions
02:27:44.000surrounding that uh i mean there could even be an argument when we talk about uh connections
02:27:49.120to owen and yule we could also talk about the connections between fray and yule again with
02:27:55.680the pig's head and the othing on the boar's head uh or the fact that that might also be correlated
02:28:01.600to a tradition of the wild hunt that a wild hunt of owen going out is symbolic of also the
02:28:08.320noble lords going out and hunting a boar in the winter time to bring it back slaughter it eat it
02:28:15.280and take oaths upon its head um there's a lot of correlations there but i i'm i'm of the mindset
02:28:22.960that i i and in my house we always we always celebrate the yule elf um the jolly old elf
02:28:29.440um and as far as like connections to christianity i mean when you look at saint nicholas you know
02:28:36.160uh iconography of him in greece at the time it's there in name alone i think after that it
02:28:44.560completely shifts into the colorization that is deeply germanic the color red the color white the
02:28:51.440color green these are all correlated to mistletoe and to holly leaves and the protection of the
02:28:56.880holly leaf um and i know christianity has tried to correlate it to the story of painting red upon
02:29:02.240the doors in exodus and um i think that those those have really very little tangible connections um
02:29:11.120so when we see uh european uh santa claus or father christmas or or the yule elf you know
02:29:19.520and then of course when we talk about the americanization of um santa claus or um saint
02:29:25.760nicholas or old old saint nick and um and we see him you know changed in iconography amongst the
02:29:33.520americans um i don't know i think that's it's a really interesting i love the con the the topic
02:29:39.840of yule but especially in aussitry right now there's so many different various groups that
02:29:46.080have different things that they emphasize on you'll see a lot of people who have german ancestry
02:29:50.560really emphasizing on krampus um i grew up in iceland so grilla was a thing and i i really
02:29:59.600don't particularly like that that the idea of this um i feel like it might have been a uh
02:30:07.360i don't know some sort of maliciousness of i think that a lot of christianity brought to
02:30:11.600to in into iceland about this this witch this troll witch eating the children they always kind
02:30:18.400of like soured the the joyous occasion of what i think yule really meant to our ancestors
02:30:26.080about the returning of the light and the understanding that this was going to be the
02:30:29.680darkest time of the year and that the light must be kept and cultivated amongst the folk
02:30:34.080so that it can return again another perennial truth within the story of balder um so i always
02:30:41.680in my house correlate the yule elf as coming and uh upon lighting the yule log and being placed
02:30:50.000into the fireplace he then travels and and brings gifts from the ancestors so we have two gift
02:30:56.880giving cycles at our house we have the ancestral gift giving and then we have the gift exchange
02:31:03.440amongst kin amongst the sib or the sifa amongst us so uh the ancestors get their gifts are given
02:31:11.200out first and and we bring the pictures down and we talk about them and and tell the children about
02:31:17.360where these gifts came from and which ancestor they were brought by the yule elf you know he
02:31:22.960brings them there and his gifts are usually in the stockings that's his gift uh and exchange and we
02:31:28.880have the kids you know place out porridge or cookies or things of that nature and that that
02:31:35.360teaches them a gift cycle and then the gift exchange after the ancestor gifts generally one
02:31:42.640gift is uh you know given to each and every other person in the in the family so we have this gift
02:31:49.120exchange and we always caveat the idea that the ul elf is against miserly behavior and you know
02:31:55.360it could extend to uh being bad throughout the year but one of the big things in our house is
02:32:01.840that the gift giving cycle of going out and not thinking about the gifts you're going to get but
02:32:07.120thinking about the gifts you're going to give to your brother to your sister to your mother to your
02:32:10.400father or whoever's going to be present is the most important thing that that the yule elf really
02:32:16.400focuses on and if you are miserly if you are covered at covetous then you get you know blocks
02:32:22.720of wood burnt wood in your stockings or charcoal if you will again another thing that kind of
02:32:29.680correlates to um uh the spirit of yule time being a an englenook alf um but it's different everywhere
02:32:42.320yeah i think there's there's no simple answer that this god equals santa claus i think that
02:32:50.400santa claus equaling saint nicholas is ridiculous and kind of silly there's no
02:32:57.840correlation there i think linguistically with the name certainly but i think that's
02:33:02.080the only thing that shows any similarity santa is absolutely a pagan germanic european
02:33:11.920thing and has nothing to do with christianity but i think you know a lot of times
02:33:20.240those kind of folk customs depending on when and where take on different forms much like
02:33:25.200the leader of the wild hunt sometimes it's odin sometimes it's theodoric the goth sometimes it's
02:33:32.800um you know other germanic leaders it's depends on on the the day and the age of the story and
02:33:41.200the location on who they personify those things certainly one of the names of odin is is the yule
02:33:46.960father and we celebrate that and i think that if i have to go with one of our gods most associated
02:33:53.360with yule it would be him but uh you know spawn mentioned that some folks see a lot of thor
02:34:00.080elements it's interesting to see just how santa's uh portrayed i have a picture of the 1950s when my
02:34:07.440my mother and my uncle were over there with my grandparents as little children
02:34:12.240and they were there with you know their version of father christmas and that santa was
02:34:17.040creepy looking skinny and terrifying with crazy eyes and you know I again growing up over here
02:34:26.540I've I'm always think of the the big fat jolly you know drunken rosy cheek Santa with the you
02:34:34.220know with the big white beard and that's you know that looks looks right to me and I think that's
02:34:40.320probably looked very different throughout the depth and breadth and scope of our folk as as
02:34:46.120they've migrated, but that idea of giving and a spirit that personifies that giving, especially
02:34:52.700for the children around Yule, is absolutely our pagan thing. And certainly, you know, that's one
02:35:00.880of the things I appreciate about Jehovah's Witnesses is they don't celebrate Christmas for
02:35:05.180that amongst many other reasons. It's very obviously a pagan celebration.
02:35:10.100Shay asks, how does Balder make his way out of Helheim? Svan, have you pondered that? Do you
02:35:19.700have thoughts on that? Well, it doesn't specifically say, and I would, when we talk
02:35:28.840about, for instance, in the Volaspau, when the Volva, the Vala, she's talking about the rising,
02:35:37.140like the the dead the the foul um and they're riding upon nail far the the the the denied ones
02:35:46.800the ones that are of nastron uh you know they're riding up the rivers from underneath and uh and
02:35:55.900in the story you know it it talks about them coming out and then it makes reference to the
02:36:00.480east and to the jotuns and in jotunheim and how this correlation of the rising tide from underneath
02:36:06.320is coming to jotenheim and then from jotenheim there is a clear understanding that the that
02:36:12.960they're coming from the east into the realm of heaven from the middle realm so there's the
02:36:17.680under realm to the middle and then the middle to the upper and and uh all the while the gods are
02:36:22.960preparing but then the focus of the war happens and then it is just simply said that you know after
02:36:29.200the the after it settles um and the gods return they return to either wall they return to the
02:36:38.360plane in which the gods have created their guard in heaven which is generally seen as above the
02:36:45.500actual like level of heaven heaven is uh if you would will if you would will it to to see is a
02:36:51.980like yggdrasil at the well and then the nexus of power through the roots spreads to the middle
02:36:57.800world into the lower world um they are above even the well and they descend down to it well they
02:37:04.920don't ever talk about uh that in the in the poem they just say that the gods return and find the
02:37:11.780golden um pieces and the runes uh on either vault where the gods um had once built their glory and
02:37:22.840then they again attain them and take up the rods take up the pieces remember the elder gods and
02:37:29.880then begin again so it's not necessarily specified but again when we talk about movement of the gods
02:37:36.160when we see about like for instance the striker in all arian um mythos is the uh the striker does
02:37:45.040not descend into the chthonic level he seems to always battle death in the middle or he he rides
02:37:51.740around the edge we see balder is going to the depths and then again polarizing back to the top
02:37:57.320again um you know that movement could be we could speculate it uh a reverse trek it could be a a
02:38:06.620an ascendance through the root which is that nexus pulling back up um into heaven or it could be
02:38:14.800simply seen as just the same way that that which from the chthonic world come up to the middle and
02:38:20.380then come up to the the height it's not very much specified um in any particular way or a
02:38:26.400mode of vehicle like for instance with the with the the forgotten dead and the foul dead coming
02:38:31.180upon nail farra the nail faring boat uh that's mentioned as a specific vehicle whereas the
02:38:38.080jotuns go by foot and they're um they're you know all amassed behind um uh hrimnir and his and his
02:38:46.740uh, his shield coming from the East. So it's not, it's not specified, uh, that I don't know.
02:38:53.960You know, my thoughts on that are it's a time of great cataclysm and the rules of order and
02:39:00.640the natural order is broken. Uh, you know, the prophecies of that time, natural order goes by
02:39:07.840the wayside and brothers fight amongst each other. And there's the fimble winter and the,
02:39:14.220know the laws of seasons don't apply and i think that probably is true of of all of the ordered
02:39:20.060processes you know the the dead rise and uh and and ride on the on the toenail ship um
02:39:31.100you know if those dead are no longer held in the place of the dead and they they can travel willy
02:39:37.420nilly to do these things then perhaps those bonds that prevent fall balder from just getting up and
02:39:43.500walking back to asgard are also uh also sundered it's a time where all of the rules break down
02:39:50.220where order literally breaks down under chaos and balder re-emerges and brings with him that order
02:39:59.100in the reordering of things so i think that you know i think that these are all poetic ways to
02:40:06.060tell a story um but i think the key there is those normal rules don't apply at that point
02:40:13.180the order that that separates the realms and separates the rules that we understand breaks down
02:40:19.900and uh you know all kind of things that keep things in place and delineate the space
02:40:26.140in our uh understanding the cosmos is is no longer those are no longer rules um
02:40:34.540what is the best way to approach a family member from a mormon upbringing who is interested in
02:40:40.540coming home i'm curious fawn's uh thoughts on this but i want to throw out there first
02:40:50.700one of the situations we find ourselves in that makes this an easier conversation
02:40:57.340is that the mormonism of 2022 is not the mormonism that people my age grew up with
02:41:05.900um i don't know how old the person in question is but if they're a long time mormon they will have
02:41:12.220seen you know traditional values that were a very very strong pillar of that faith erode over time
02:41:21.900and degenerate they will have seen the chaotic forces of cultural marxism and liberal degeneracy
02:41:32.220overtake the fundamental tenets of of their faith if those things i think that we find oftentimes
02:41:39.980that if those traditional values that are our values as arian people are upheld the the higher
02:41:49.340mythology can change back and forth but when those fundamentals are challenged that's a much harder
02:41:55.740sell so i think they're already primed to look for something that meets their needs in a way that
02:42:01.900that mormonism no longer does we see this throughout the world with christianity
02:42:06.860so i think that primes them and puts them in a in a good spot for that conversation
02:42:11.900um as far as that goes the mormons are very involved in ancestor veneration and i don't
02:42:21.580think that they would necessarily refer to it that way but their respect for the ancestry
02:42:27.500and they're posthumously baptizing people and doing things as though their ancestors still
02:42:34.060are alive and well in a different part of existence i think that is a good transition to get them to
02:42:40.540worship their ancestors in a more honest house true context and i think that leads back to our
02:42:46.940gods i think that leads back to our core values and i think that the more you speak to them of
02:42:53.980our commonality of worldview between us and the the better generations of mormonism
02:43:02.460the easier it will be to open their minds to our gods and our and the the finer points of our faith
02:43:09.900do you have ideas on this spot yeah i what you just said about the context points i think are
02:43:15.900clear as day and and that's really good because that's an easy spot they do do their ancestor
02:43:21.740veneration i think that one thing to consider if you are talking to someone it does not even have
02:43:27.180to be mormon but particularly monotheistic and this kind of also brings us back to the original
02:43:33.020questions in the beginning about atheism one of the problems that i think uh christians have
02:43:39.660within themselves and then also in trying to understand us is that uh their god has become so
02:43:48.060uh obscure that in a lot of ways culturally they're left either feeling a great sense of abandonment
02:43:55.900or like even with a george washington spoke of like a great providence distancing clock
02:44:01.420maker mindset because he couldn't explain why things were happening as they were happening
02:44:07.340and so on and so forth uh based off of precepts that were set in the religion so if these things
02:44:12.220are happening and it doesn't seem like they should be then god just must be distant and then
02:44:18.940it it starts to lead down this process of some people feeling completely abandoned and then
02:44:26.300other people kind of going through the cultural motions of christianity and then there's other
02:44:31.420folks who are they they become angry and bittered and because of the obscurity of their divine
02:44:37.500concepts, they become atheistic or at least agnostic, and then eventually drift into the
02:44:44.480obscurity leading to venom and an outright, well, if it can't be proven, and a lot of that comes
02:44:51.140from them kind of feeling fooled into believing in such an obscure concept. One of the things that
02:44:57.860i would definitely um advise you to uh to address is that we do the opposite that our gods are not
02:45:07.200obscure and they're not obscure for a reason because they're connected to us like literally
02:45:13.720through our souls and through our through our folk and through our people but they also represent us
02:45:18.620culturally linguistically they have all the things that speak to us on subconscious conscious levels
02:45:24.560So we are the opposite of obscurity. We don't seek to make our gods universal and kind of like shells that can be sold to people that are not us and might not understand it.
02:45:39.120We don't want and have no interest in doing that. So really get them to, one, understand how the divinity of Yahweh as a concept amongst the Judaic people and the shifting into the Greek philosophy and then eventually into the Roman church.
02:45:59.160And yes, there's a lot of good things structurally and societally wise that exemplified in European Christianity, but divinity itself became very obscure.
02:46:09.080And I think that that's led a chain of events towards all kinds of fracturing and disillusionment.
02:46:16.180And we should, one thing that our faith really offers is the opposite of that disillusionment, the opposite of that obscurity, that opposite of just kind of philosophical whimsicalness that never tangibly associates itself unless I want to condemn someone or forgive someone.
02:46:34.480Or, you know, taking parts of the Bible and kind of utilizing a solidified spiritual divinity for a moment at a time, but not necessarily throughout all of time and moments.
02:46:48.860And so that's one thing I would say I have always had, both in my self-reflection of going from Christianity when I was very young to becoming Ausatru and also talking to other people, especially some Mormons.
02:47:04.380I've met quite a few Mormons coming back home, coming to the faith of the Ausa.
02:47:11.340And the points that I was hearing ago they talked about are great.
02:47:16.140Those are clear as day steps. But one of the big ones that they're going to have is one fear of being damned by this obscure divinity in, you know, an underworld, whether, you know, they call it Sheol or Gehenna and how that's kind of trans morphed over time to Hades and then eventually to hell.
02:47:37.720you know utilizing the words from the germanic sense you know that damnation and that stuff is
02:47:44.560one big opponent that you're gonna have opponent you're gonna have to face and then the other is
02:47:48.060of course is them getting over the hurdle of understanding that our divinity is the opposite
02:47:52.280of obscurity that we take pleasure in in um associating and affiliating with our gods because
02:47:58.900it builds our relationship with them they'll write it off as idolatry but they do it themselves in
02:48:05.140many different forms, whether it's through objects or imagery or saints or whatever you have, and
02:48:11.080they can do the mental gymnastics all they want. At the end of the day, you can point this out and
02:48:17.240say, well, that's why we do this. That's why we take relish in it because our evolution of our
02:48:22.160gods and the way we perceive them is all part in the celebration of them. So what are your thoughts
02:48:29.560on an Ausatru credit union by and for the AFA? As I understand it, only seven individuals are
02:48:35.560needed to start a credit union. I think that folk are people in general, folk with traditional
02:48:45.260mindsets, folks that are not associated with the degeneracy we see around us, starting their own
02:48:52.400lending institutions is a great idea. As far as the AFA, I know that there's a lot of regulation
02:48:57.780when it comes to banking in that industry, and I think it's best left to people that want to
02:49:02.640make that their career, make that their life, is to run a credit union. I would love to have
02:49:08.360that happen. And if that's AFA members that do that, that would be a great place for us to
02:49:13.100look for lending and banking in the future. But I don't think that's a project the Astro
02:49:18.100Folk Assembly wants to take on and is part of our core functionality. I've got another question
02:49:27.640from robert i'm new to the afa is the teachings of ron mcvan okay to follow or studying stephen
02:49:35.480flower's room books okay first i appreciate you asking the reverence of asking and checking and
02:49:41.800making sure is is really important i've seen some of the side chat um it depends what you're doing
02:49:50.680those things for and this is more of a nuanced answer than i mean it to be ron mcvan is fantastic
02:49:57.800he is a great guy he is a important figure in the uh the resurgence of alsatru he's an amazing
02:50:06.280artist and with not just his visual arts and his drawings but also with his poetry um
02:50:14.280mr mcvan has contributed a tremendous amount to the the development culturally
02:50:19.800avows to true and i think reading his books is is really cool really inspirational really important
02:50:25.160and they're full of interesting takes on history and just amazing tidbits of things i can't vouch
02:50:32.280that everything everything in there is going to theologically align with the finer points of
02:50:38.040the afa in 2022 but i think in broad strokes the things that ron mcman writes are are fantastic and
02:50:45.880I would absolutely encourage you to read those books. On finer points of theology, if something
02:50:51.980sounds different or askew from what you've heard, I would encourage you to ask an AFA Goethe just to
02:50:57.800check in and see, because again, many of Ron's things were written 30 years or more ago, and
02:51:06.140the understanding of the faith has evolved since then. As far as Dr. Flowers and his
02:51:13.240rune material, as far as scholastics, absolutely. As far as concepts of the runes, absolutely.
02:51:22.260As far as his personal philosophy or points on religion, no, I think I'd take those with a grain
02:51:28.560of salt and I would check in on those. But as far as his understanding of runes, Dr. Flowers is the
02:51:35.920foremost rune master in the history of the world bar none and i think that he deserves that i think
02:51:44.000his education on it is vast and he spent his entire adult life gaining a better understanding
02:51:53.100of the runes um so i don't think you can get better as far as a source for runic information
02:51:58.940than Dr. Flowers. What thoughts do you have on the books of Ron McVehan or, for that matter,
02:52:08.820the rune teachings of Dr. Flowers? Sivan? You covered a lot in the overall encapsulation of
02:52:16.380it, so I just hit some fine details from my perspective. One, the artwork, yes, again,
02:52:22.520and that's what I was alluding to about earlier artwork with wings and some of the grandiose
02:52:27.540symbology that I think uh inspired a lot of us in the early 90s and the late 80s uh I was I came to
02:52:35.400Austria in the early 90s and a lot of people in the late 80s were you know just a lot of that stuff
02:52:39.800was um very inspirational in a time before the internet and so I think it's cool as a historical
02:52:45.860point and it's just great artwork I think one of the other things that's kind of um good to remind
02:52:51.360us is the concepts of uh like the culture of the teutons heavily influence influencing that time
02:52:58.160uh and those and and like the creed of iron and things like that these the concepts of
02:53:07.040uh loyalty friv and uh maintaining um loyalty friv keeping oaths and um meeting out
02:53:15.920a certain sense of holding yourself to to these i think that that's really cool stuff that's worth
02:53:22.840looking into i do uh some of the fatalism i would say you know again renegotiating oh this is
02:53:30.300something that you know doesn't get enough love even today so getting into too much fatalism can
02:53:37.800be kind of um not good i guess or i would be weary um but there is a good sense of the idea
02:53:46.240of upholding what is right what is wrong and all of that the other thing as far as uh dr flowers
02:53:52.280goes um runic stuff yeah he's got i mean he has access to information that other runemasters in
02:54:00.620history have never had um his devotion to the subject is uh i think anybody throwing any sort
02:54:07.080venom atom is misplaced in the sense that again we're full of cynics that that see a a great
02:54:15.400precipice of things and they they try to pick it apart they try to tear it down and there are
02:54:20.360other great you know uh rune um runesters rune rune studiers uh you know uh again i i not often
02:54:30.760into uh nigel pennic a lot of times about certain things um but one other thing i wanted to point
02:54:37.240out is if you if you get a chance to find tier t-y-r tier volume one the first essay that is
02:54:46.440done in there is done by um dr flowers and it is about uh the structuring of i think uh
02:54:55.400duemezillion structuring, Aryan structuring, religious concepts, and what makes a people
02:55:03.240in a four post sense. And I think it's a great read. I highly recommend that. If you're looking
02:55:10.440for something from him that's not strictly runic, but does glean some great stuff about what makes
02:55:15.980a people a people, their ethnicity, what they produce, the languages that they speak. He covers
02:55:21.860a lot of that. And I find that to be a gleaming little star in his huge lexicon of work that
02:55:28.640really inspired me to look at where Alcatru is as a folkish religion.
02:55:36.400All right, guys. Well, thank you very much for that tonight. That was our last question of the
02:55:42.260evening. I appreciate your participation and your great questions as always. And thank you so much,
02:55:48.020Fawn for joining us. You're getting a huge following amongst our listeners. People really
02:55:54.480look forward to your programs and they get a lot out of them. Thank you so much. Thank you so much
02:55:59.480for having me. All right, guys. Well, until next time, hail the gods, hail the folk, hail the AFA,