Asatru Folk Assembly - 3⧸22⧸23 Victory Never Sleeps, Episode 37 - Forseti

00:00:00.000 Transcription by CastingWords

00:00:30.000 Thank you.

00:01:00.000 Thank you.

00:01:30.000 Thank you.

00:02:00.000 Thank you.

00:02:30.000 We'll be right back.

00:03:00.000 All right, welcome to another exciting edition of Victory Never Sleeps.

00:03:20.820 tonight we are going to talk about Lord Forseti and he's going to finish our initial run on gods

00:03:32.720 so Svan and I will be back in the next few weeks to talk about goddesses but tonight we're going

00:03:39.840 to talk Forseti. Notes at the top of the program. If you guys want to, we are simultaneously

00:03:51.960 broadcasting on YouTube, Entropy, VK, and Twitter, and Odyssey. We're also, you can

00:04:06.300 download the podcast version of this, the audio version of this on Friday on Spotify.

00:04:14.780 If you want to participate in Super Chats, get your questions or your comments to the front of

00:04:20.560 the line, or if you just want to throw some dollars at us, which is always much appreciated,

00:04:27.500 please join us on Entropy. That's a good way to do that.

00:04:30.220 um checking in on some projects we've got uh working on getting phrase off and making that

00:04:38.460 happen in order to do that we need to pay off new york's off first doing pretty well on that

00:04:44.500 we're making a lot of progress um currently if every member of the afa were to donate 102

00:04:51.100 dollars we'd be there and having york's off paid off and ready to start on phrase off phrase off

00:04:57.380 is the Hoff that we are going to put in eastern Ohio or in a very off chance, perhaps very far

00:05:05.580 western Pennsylvania, but in that part of the country. And yeah, we got that going on. We also

00:05:12.300 are currently doing stuff at Sigurheim to make Sigurheim happen better. It looks like we're

00:05:19.900 to have two possibly three folks could be living out at sigerheim this time next month which is

00:05:28.060 very exciting these aren't going to be in super permanent structures at that point but we are

00:05:32.860 we're moving forward on it just had an expedition out there this last weekend to take some measurements

00:05:38.220 and to talk to a septic guy about some things so we are well in the swing of that uh been talking

00:05:45.740 to or trying to get in touch with some lawyers to talk a little bit about ownership rules and

00:05:53.820 getting that structured legally in the right way so we're definitely moving forward on it

00:05:59.660 any of those things you can donate to on our website at runestone.org

00:06:04.780 or feel free to donate on this program we'll make sure they go to a goes to a good cause

00:06:10.700 um yeah that's all i can think of on the top of my head that we got going on right now

00:06:17.540 uh if you spawn if you would tell these folks assuming that our fans know

00:06:25.380 know nothing about for seti what what do they need to know

00:06:29.000 uh in ausa true for seti is our god of law he is our ausa or aus of law he is the divine

00:06:43.160 um adjudicator if you will the internal adjudicator um sometimes i think there's

00:06:51.700 some confusion there with tear but we'll go over that later on um he is the sovereign of

00:06:57.800 the places in which we meet in order to reach peaceful agreements. His stasis position is in

00:07:11.040 that wherever we might gather to make negotiations to keep frith between the folk, for whatever

00:07:20.560 reason, it could be religious, it could be non-religious, or secular reasons, he is the

00:07:26.140 presider of law the internal ordering of the people to keep peace within each other so he's

00:07:34.600 our god of law all right so you mentioned you mentioned up front because i don't think there

00:07:47.700 is a ton of source material on it um compare and contrast if you would for for our audience

00:07:57.140 between forsetti and tier well somewhere along the way there was um kind of a a titling on

00:08:08.900 tier to be the god of justice and i think they took that uh you know in modern sense a little

00:08:17.540 off the rails because of certain things um one i think the symbology of the the tiwaz rune

00:08:24.740 or the tio rune uh and people kind of placing that with scales um and i think they they ended up

00:08:34.820 the uh presiding over or as being tear being the one that blesses over the all thing and since

00:08:41.540 the old thing was a gathering in which the one of the primary functions of it was legality um a lot

00:08:48.580 of folks i think took that to mean in some ways that he is a god of justice in law and i don't

00:08:56.020 think that was the case i think the case of that is uh that tier is the justice of a nation he is

00:09:02.820 the outward expansion or justice of a nation as they move forward collectively force at the is

00:09:13.140 law internalized and so a lot of people get these two confused they'll they'll i need to go and um

00:09:23.860 i wish to you know ask for guidance or aid in uh you know a courtly manner as far as something that

00:09:30.420 needs to be done and uh i would like to give prayers and offerings to tier for justice in that

00:09:37.220 in that courtroom or in that you know i guess mitigation of things and that's not

00:09:45.940 uh directly accurate if we're talking about the law giver if we're talking about

00:09:51.220 the law speaker of the gods we're talking about for setting and his sovereignty is about smoothing

00:09:59.620 things out in between so there's that i think that's where the confusion comes from a lot

00:10:05.380 i think it's worth mentioning that for seti's name means presider or president of things

00:10:14.740 whereas and not president so i mean i suppose it does mean president in a modern sense but

00:10:20.020 president in an original sense as the one who presides over an assembly or presides over

00:10:25.700 a um an organization and i think that just comparing them in a scale way it's interesting

00:10:34.660 to compare for seti to tier whose name means god um and you know ultimately god of the bright sky

00:10:44.500 um when thinking about things i think it's also worthwhile for our folk to consider that there's

00:10:51.620 multiple ways to address address a grievance um when you're dealing with people in your inner yard

00:11:00.500 and you want to talk it out and find a you know an equitable compromise or or work it out in some

00:11:08.740 kind of way that's going to yield peace between people that's going to literally reconcile men

00:11:14.340 that's much you know that's much more the domain of forsetti when you want to reconcile the fate

00:11:21.380 of nations through combat then i think that those things are more justice as adjudicated by tier

00:11:29.540 um and i think that flows with tier being our war god as well it's if you want to the justice of

00:11:36.900 of nations and races and cosmic things is the uh the domain of tear that that divine balance through

00:11:45.700 you know, through bloodshed, through conflict, whereas Forseti is, you know, settling

00:11:54.900 interpersonal things through peace. And it talks in the edits about how

00:11:59.300 Tyr is not a reconciler of men, whereas Forseti is.

00:12:02.500 Right. But ultimately, you just hit the nail on the head. It's the reconciliation of fate.

00:12:10.420 Both can apply to them, it's just in different ways, through combat or through

00:12:15.700 you know peaceful means of law and and maintaining uh you know corporal law of the people however

00:12:24.180 they you know might seem to or to deem it fit because when we talk about for city that's one

00:12:29.700 of the other interesting things about him as far as say historical lore um and i'm i'm excluding

00:12:36.340 personal devotion to for setting um things of that nature on a lore sense he's one of the gods that

00:12:43.220 we have really bright details about outside of the nordic realm that are perfectly parallel and

00:12:56.580 basically they're not explained in the eighties that they're you know there is this parallel but

00:13:00.740 when you see the lore that's based out of holland and phrygia in in specifics you you know it's it

00:13:08.580 becomes apparent that there um there's a lot of information about the dedication to for seti

00:13:14.180 outside of just the nordic realm and i think that's one of the most interesting things

00:13:20.340 okay so for people who are unfamiliar can you tell that story yes uh so there is an island

00:13:31.140 northwest of um holland and it is still there uh i think it's i believe it's called halgaland

00:13:40.740 now um can you throw us up a map with that island indicated

00:13:46.900 so yeah the off the northwest coast of um holland there is a small island it's close towards denmark

00:13:54.660 and this island is actually very specifically mentioned in the story though it's believed that

00:14:00.020 the story might be older it originates most people think it originates from the time in which

00:14:06.740 charlemagne was trying to uh utilize his you know force money uh property and marriage rights to

00:14:15.780 convert the uh germanic folk into christianity and this story seems to originate from there but they

00:14:23.540 there are many people that believe it might be older because there's some numerics involved there

00:14:28.660 but it's not 100 sure but uh basically the story goes that charlemagne comes to the land of the

00:14:37.060 phrygians and says um you know gather your your uh 12 law speakers bring them here i want to hear

00:14:45.460 the law and each one of the law speakers according to the story had different laws for their areas

00:14:54.260 and so none of it was consistent and none of it was the same and so he said you guys are you know

00:15:02.420 of no good and so he put him in a boat pushed him off into the ocean with no rudder and no oars

00:15:10.020 and so the 12 men were doomed to uh go out into the stormy seas and it was at that point where

00:15:17.540 they look at the back of the boat and there's a 13th man and he is carrying a golden axe it's

00:15:23.860 never described exactly how that axe looks um the axe he uses as a rudder and he guides the ship to

00:15:32.660 the island and then he walks up onto the shore and he throws the axe and the axe in in uh uh

00:15:43.060 in dutch is is called the axe mound on the island and he throws the axe onto the island and um a

00:15:51.620 spring comes forth from the strike where he throws the axe and then at that sacred spring he teaches

00:16:00.100 all of the 12 chieftains of the phrygians a singular law um and he is known as phocity

00:16:09.700 so it's slightly different in the in the um in the uh spelling but it's pretty much gathered there

00:16:17.620 that uh this is one of the rarest of occasions in which we have proof outside of the nordic lands

00:16:26.420 that a us intervened physically into these folks lives and created the law of the phrygians and so

00:16:38.180 now the phrygians are seen as you know that much like the swedes are of uh the lord froing or frey

00:16:46.580 today, the Frisians are of Forseti. And so that's how the story goes. From there, that island was

00:16:56.440 made sacred. And for the time that they were resisting all of this usury and chicanery and 1.00

00:17:06.060 even outright violence from from uh the religion of rome um they uh they ended up you know holding

00:17:16.380 on to true to these traditions throughout so that i think is truly interesting they had uh

00:17:22.780 remarks of um men and women there that once they entered on the island they had to remain silent

00:17:29.580 they tended to the island and there was no killing of the animals on this island

00:17:33.900 Let me check my notes to see if I can find the name of the island, actually, because I believe it is Halgaland, which is H-A-L-G-O, Halgo.

00:17:46.000 um let me see here

00:17:52.320 uh the the uh i the name is axon thou is the name of the axe mound that is on the island

00:18:03.320 um most people have taken the the axe to be a golden axe sometimes double-sided sometimes

00:18:10.540 single-sided um and there is actually reference to Forseti's Grove in Norway

00:18:24.600 as well Forsettelunder is again associated I can't find the name of the

00:18:31.880 island currently right now, as it is called today. Yes, but that's the interesting thing

00:18:41.840 about it. The Phrygians suffered a lot during that time period, and they also enacted a fair

00:18:48.560 amount of justice on the invader religion. That is also the place where Boniface, the monk that

00:18:59.980 with his well-armed retinue um even though he's often ones the one that's given you know uh

00:19:07.500 praise is um cutting the oak down he was with a well-armed contingent and uh he was supposedly had

00:19:15.580 cut the uh oak of donner down and it was the phrygians that later caught up with him many

00:19:22.540 many years later and they uh they were they never forgot that let's just put it that way

00:19:29.980 so as a point of interest the island is heligoland heligoland h-e-l-i-g-o-l-a-n-d 0.63

00:19:40.460 i knew i was gonna butcher it

00:19:45.260 and this uh this island is is real and they have statues to for settee on some of the uh the land

00:19:52.300 outside of that uh across the way um i was given kind of some insight about that area it used to be

00:20:01.580 um i have a friend who's from holland and um he said that the northern area used to be

00:20:10.540 far more flooded with water so they when they built the dams on the northern side

00:20:16.060 uh they ended up utilizing a lot of the land there but the uh it used to be far more reaching

00:20:22.620 of water so that that trip to the island was much more daunting than it looks today

00:20:30.060 all right well so so far we have zero questions in the question section so it's going to be uh

00:20:38.460 up to us to fill some space. And I know I'm sure that we can accomplish that. Teddy did ask a

00:20:46.600 question. It hasn't popped up in my question section. But he says, does the word charlatan

00:20:51.000 come from Charlemagne? It does not. Charlatan comes from, I believe, a Spanish word meaning

00:20:59.280 someone who talks indiscreetly or talks overmuch, someone who babbles. Whereas Charlemagne comes

00:21:06.260 from carl the great which comes from the uh germanic word carl meaning meaning a free man

00:21:14.740 free man so those two are etymologically different yeah char le mans like it says

00:21:22.260 spelled magna the greek that's why it's spelled oddly in latin carlos magnus carlos magnus

00:21:31.540 or uh in german carl de grossa

00:21:36.260 so oh oh interesting stuff i don't know if our fans like it or not but we're going to keep doing

00:21:44.540 it we're going to do our uh our episodes on our heroes because it's important but as a point of

00:21:50.720 interest last we had last week we had our first episode on the heroes of our folk uh we did uh

00:21:57.780 route the strong and there was absolutely there was exactly zero questions generated about route

00:22:03.940 the strong or his life and i know uh i know mike had prepared a lot of stuff i think it was good we

00:22:11.620 talked about him but uh folks didn't have a lot of questions so i think we're gonna have to

00:22:17.220 do a lot more storytelling on some of these things i think we're you know a year into ever

00:22:22.180 or not a year but uh what the last like eight months into this i think uh the questions are

00:22:29.300 are going to dry up a little bit compared to what they what they once were well i i wonder too if

00:22:35.380 new new people to ausitru are still trying to uh acclimate to understanding divinity acclimating

00:22:43.060 to understand cosmos acclimating to understand morals and so uh you know understanding the heroes

00:22:49.860 ends up becoming you know further down the list i i wonder about that if if that's the case or

00:22:56.900 perhaps a lot of people already know and i think it'd be quite interesting when we get to like say

00:23:03.220 uh maestro guidovon list or alexander rudd mills and there might be some more interesting questions

00:23:10.500 real we'll see but i'm excited about doing those um and i think it's going to give a

00:23:14.340 chance to some some other folks we haven't heard from to get on and uh talk to our uh

00:23:19.940 our video uh victory never sleeps audience hold on a second i got a sneeze that's trying to come

00:23:24.340 there we go apologize about that guy excuse me all right we got a couple of questions coming up

00:23:32.420 we've got our question from the king of cheese spawn how are you doing i'm doing great extremely

00:23:38.540 sore uh uh the the gym is catching up to me if you will so i feel like a a rickety wicker basket

00:23:48.760 filled with beef jerky there you have it uh tony i feel i feel great too i look forward to these

00:23:56.280 they're awesome it's kind of a broken record but a couple couple anecdotes i suppose uh spawn

00:24:02.920 mentioned his uh gym soreness i gotta tell you my joints are my joints have been killing me since i

00:24:09.800 hit 40. i hit 40 and it's like the day i hit 40 everything just everything betrayed me so always

00:24:17.080 working through something my uh my jujitsu is not not helping on my joints um but i'm gonna

00:24:24.120 push through till i get that black belt think i'm getting close uh but i got that going on

00:24:29.480 also as a random side note uh stomach stuff i just started drinking kefir from time to time

00:24:35.800 and i have noticed whenever i have any kind of an upset stomach the second any kind of yogurt

00:24:42.520 or kefir touches my stomach, the entire thing changes and it feels good. So not that that was

00:24:48.740 asked about, but that's my Matt recommendation. If you got any tummy troubles. Yeah, we are,

00:24:54.780 we are currently working on a yogurt strand and to, to, and sources of probiotics to make

00:25:02.920 kefir. That is a, a life changer right there as far as just everything, gut health, if you will.

00:25:12.520 agreed uh bruce asks matt and spawn how was your ostara swan how's your ostara

00:25:20.600 ostara was great um it was amazing uh that that's that that's a big one i mean everything from

00:25:30.600 arrival everyone was coming in everyone was safe so you know thanks to the gods for that

00:25:37.000 but it started off, um, with a boom quite literally as far as, uh, Thor's bloat goes.

00:25:46.040 And obviously this was conducted by you. I was here ago. So, um, always very powerful,

00:25:51.800 but it's always amazing to like rattle the Hoff, uh, with how many people are in there. Um,

00:25:59.300 hearing the windows kind of rattle, uh, or, or, um, you know, just feeling that resonance in

00:26:04.780 your chest from everyone kind of booming and galdering together. And then we did an interesting

00:26:12.960 thing. I was not originally slotted to conduct it, but I ended up getting the, I was given

00:26:19.500 the privilege to leave the morning dawn bloat to Ostera. And a lot of people had been traveling

00:26:26.280 all day. So, you know, the numbers are smaller in the morning. We only had about 10 or 11

00:26:31.960 attendees in the morning because uh most people were still you know we were up all night and doing

00:26:38.040 things and um yeah and then the day proceeded on the children were playing coob and looking for

00:26:44.800 eggs and there was a women's study group that was massive and men were you know firmly standing

00:26:52.120 around um cooking uh barbecuing and and drinking um beer and and just chatting and talking and

00:27:01.720 it was a really good time and then after like as the night settled in we we finished the day at

00:27:07.240 sunset with a thank thankful float to austera it was quite beautiful and then um yeah big sumble

00:27:16.440 big, big auction, lots of, uh, amazing items and, um, always amazing items at the, uh,

00:27:24.460 at the auctions. Those are, those are like the highlight. And then, um, yeah, then it was just

00:27:31.680 beautiful to kind of ease out in the morning on Sunday morning with a wayfarer's blow. Everybody

00:27:36.740 was, you know, dressed, relaxed and having a good time and saying goodbyes and having to

00:27:42.060 kind of go our, our separate ways again. So it was a beautiful Ostra. I loved it.

00:27:48.580 Yeah. I told you guys last week about, you know, my experiences at our national, our national

00:27:53.980 O-Star at Thorshof. And it was, it was great. It was really great event. Just here locally,

00:27:59.340 you know, it fell on a, the actual Equinox fell on a weekday, but, uh, wife took it off of work

00:28:07.540 and we spent the day doing some cool stuff as a family.

00:28:13.580 It was really nice because my daughter is getting to the age where she can participate more

00:28:20.160 and figure stuff out, and so she was really excited going on an egg hunt

00:28:25.400 and finding the eggs that we had, I think hid is a strong word,

00:28:30.160 I think placed in relatively plain sight around the house.

00:28:33.320 um but she was excited about that and that was neat she had a lot of fun with that which was cool

00:28:39.400 um yeah i bought her an overpriced uh paw patrol themed basket from walmart that was mislabeled

00:28:51.080 and i was i was i was greatly vexed when i got to the checkout but i got it anyway because

00:28:56.040 she's obsessed with the paw patrol um but yeah ostar was really nice it uh the weather out here

00:29:06.760 in northern nevada does not seem to realize that it is springtime so uh we we were having blizzard

00:29:13.240 conditions as of earlier this afternoon and uh still dealing with some winter weather that way

00:29:19.720 but uh everything's going good on our endo star wise our next question is would from sarah would

00:29:26.720 for seti be the god the lox sumather would call upon it's fun when we get odd words you you are

00:29:36.260 the guy we ask yeah well i'm seeing uh mother here obviously loxu or loxu um this looks like it might

00:29:46.560 is that an o with two dots over it maybe i don't know i don't i don't speak that but

00:29:58.480 can you clarify on that one perhaps oh wait you mean are you talking about law like a law man

00:30:06.800 i i'm guessing that's what she might be talking about but again i 100 yes if it's if you're

00:30:13.840 talking about a law, a law, like a, yeah, like a law man. Um, the, uh, the, the, I can't, it can't

00:30:24.160 be emphasized enough. If we were to look at, um, Ausatru as let's say a defining point, if we were

00:30:33.520 to have our, we have our own town, we have our own state, or we have our own nation or whatever

00:30:38.380 it may be absolutely 100 the equation to law or or the houses of law uh the places in which law

00:30:45.900 is established and set forth the presiding symbol and the the god that presides over those houses

00:30:53.580 would be for seti so anybody connected to it um i think would take great benefit because

00:31:02.380 and it's it's interesting because when we talk about law we're not talking about

00:31:08.380 uh any particular nation's law we you know when we talk about they had their own law we know that

00:31:14.060 the Icelanders had their own law it was the act of law that he presides over that it was incumbent

00:31:20.860 upon us to take down that wisdom I think that the the reason of the story of Forseti coming forth

00:31:29.020 uh physically in the boat is definitely correlated to the threat that was coming into the land by

00:31:37.420 charlemagne but um so that that that emphasis i think is is painted there but yes if you are a

00:31:44.760 law man if you're a paralegal if you're a lawyer um you know it is again i would say deeply

00:31:52.380 you know obligatory or obligational that you have to you know at least give honorings and pious like

00:32:02.620 homage to Forseti um I think as a benefit though it Forseti is called upon to give and to protect

00:32:13.060 the the sanctity of law within that place and so Forseti would most certainly be correlated with

00:32:23.540 any sort of sense of like clarity clarification um the pursuit of correctness um in all in all sense

00:32:34.900 the the um the rectifying of wrongs if you will if people go against uh you know the natural law

00:32:42.980 of the folk this is the place in which they can be corrected um in order to make right and bring

00:32:49.940 things back to alignment so yes 100 percent um next question in some pantheons they have a deity

00:32:59.620 or god that helps them with court cases and stuff how do you feel about forsetti helping out with

00:33:07.300 that if you are a practicing vitki that was interesting at the at the uh at the end there

00:33:18.740 Vitke, if you're talking about in use with, say, like runes and willful manifestations of it, I mean, that was a very interesting end.

00:33:39.140 I'll just say that much.

00:33:40.480 100 yes he's he's the if we had a courtroom that courtroom should have the golden axe

00:33:48.880 and it and and an image of Forseti and all things presiding there would be of him I think it's also

00:33:56.800 very interesting to remember to who Forseti's parents are because that makes um a further

00:34:02.600 explanation more you know palpable as understanding why Forseti is the god of law and the god of the

00:34:09.500 of frith keeping in the courtrooms um as far as the vitki goes a lot of that resides on you

00:34:17.740 uh if you're a practitioner of those things in which uh for people that might not know a

00:34:22.380 vitki is uh kind of like a wise man who uses or has the ability to um willfully push desire into

00:34:34.380 into the things around him or her um and i i don't know how much uh you know

00:34:46.620 a a an ouse or announcing you will get in involved in that that's that's uh

00:34:53.900 that's on them so i think it relies more on you well it's a really interesting question um

00:35:01.100 um in in court cases and stuff yeah absolutely I think that's the God you should call on in your

00:35:12.620 court cases if you're a viki if you're a farmer if you're a Fisher if you're a homeless dude if 0.99

00:35:19.700 you're whatever you are I think that's you know the God to consult for legal matters 0.81

00:35:25.400 um it raises a strange question because you know what's fun said certainly but i think that the

00:35:32.940 closest that most of us would translate vicky to is a wizard um if you are i said wise man but yes

00:35:45.640 yeah if you're going

00:35:46.940 yeah you're going you're going literal i'm going colloquial

00:35:52.920 um if and i'm stumbling over this because it's it's an awkward thing to put into words

00:36:01.100 if you are putting your thumb on the scales with some hocus pocus then i don't think invoking

00:36:11.640 Forseti, if you're

00:36:14.520 influencing the system out of bounds with your Vicky Hocus Pocus,

00:36:24.880 I don't think that calling on Forseti would be appropriate.

00:36:28.040 I think it would be counterproductive to what you're trying to do.

00:36:31.220 Right. That's what I was trying to say, but it's more on you if you're kind of

00:36:35.140 pressing your finger on the scale or kind of pulling the strings in certain ways.

00:36:39.680 But if you were to implore faith in Forseti, the idea would be perhaps the guidance towards great counsel.

00:36:50.320 We have a lot of proof of names both in Anglo-Saxon and in Nordic that are deeply set on the word counsel.

00:37:00.980 Eldred means counseled by the elders.

00:37:03.680 Alfred means counseled by the elves.

00:37:06.500 Harold Hardrada. His last name, even though it's often said is Hardrada, is Hardrada. Stern or

00:37:17.160 hard counsel. The idea that he was a stern counselor who wouldn't mince words. He would

00:37:22.340 tell you exactly what you needed. There's all these names kind of referencing to counsel,

00:37:27.920 and that shows how much that was important. Something else I'd like to add, just while

00:37:35.120 we're on the subjects of invoking gods for your wizardry um there is a impious and disrespectful

00:37:48.400 tradition in a lot of magic to where they presume that they can summon gods and then

00:37:58.160 order gods to do stuff i think that it is always first not only is it impri impious and improper

00:38:07.120 but secondly i think that it is shockingly foolhardy for you to assume that your

00:38:15.760 magical acumen is such that you're you can out spiritually arm wrestle a god into doing what you

00:38:25.040 want them to do i think that when you approach the gods in an impious way and you start making

00:38:31.920 demands upon divinity i think that's a very quick way to have very bad consequences very quickly

00:38:39.120 i think at best our deities perhaps laugh at how silly that is and i think at

00:38:45.680 worse it can get orders of magnitudes worse from that um yeah that's if that is part of 0.93

00:38:55.360 the magical tradition then that is wrong-headed and uh and extremely presumptuous

00:39:02.880 yeah that's why that last word really stuck i was like oh wait a minute again that's no reflection

00:39:08.800 on the guy asking the question it just it right the last the last line through a lot of what ifs

00:39:14.400 well if you meant this if you meant that if you meant whatever and i think it was a good question

00:39:18.160 it got us talking about something interesting and going off on a on a kind of an interesting track

00:39:23.600 there yeah next question swan and matt would you relate feeling a connection to the symbols of the

00:39:32.240 jester juggling a flaming eight ball and dice to loki worship hmm well first first thing i

00:39:43.120 I would say is feeling a connection to symbology in modern sense. I think that

00:39:52.680 it doesn't equate to worship. There might be inclinations, but it's worth noting that our

00:39:59.240 ancestors have long placed value in gains of chance, dice. Tacitus marked on this greatly.

00:40:07.240 He said that the, the Teutonic people were very, very, uh, given to, you know, testing their luck

00:40:14.000 on certain things, betting, whether it was horse fighting or, you know, uh, rolling dice or lots

00:40:20.960 of chance. So the idea of taking your personal hominia and putting it to the test, um, has long

00:40:31.540 been i think a a standing point in our people and in our faith so um you know there's certainly that

00:40:39.460 that i mean the billiard ball the eight ball that's more of a modern i think kind of symbol

00:40:46.180 uh you know the the flames there have been people that have tried to equate i think um

00:40:53.540 you know, Loki to Lowy, who he fights against in Utgard-Loki's, you know, palace, and Lowy is

00:41:06.240 wildfire. And so there's always been kind of this connotation towards that. But no, I don't think

00:41:11.280 that equates. When you see modern symbology, there could be inclinations driving, you know, your,

00:41:19.840 i guess would be like subconscious context of the symbols but i don't think it equates to that kind

00:41:27.000 of worship at all i wouldn't actually consider going down that road at all um the the nature

00:41:34.020 of loki is very i i would think it's best to say and and antithetical towards um you know good

00:41:44.100 chance of game and um you know the things that that keep the folk together and entertainment

00:41:51.380 like billiards or bowling or you know all of these games that originate from very

00:41:57.940 you know far back into the past um were all originated for the folk to get together and

00:42:03.220 have fun and that's the way it should be i don't think it kind of equates to that

00:42:06.740 um yeah i've got to say i'm not really familiar with that symbology um i don't know where those

00:42:15.860 symbols are displayed and without knowing who is displaying stuff it's very hard

00:42:23.540 it's very hard to ascribe specific meanings if you don't if you're not familiar with where it's

00:42:30.660 displayed i see somebody over in the chat room talking about some juggalos is that some kind

00:42:35.780 of a juggalo symbol like the hatchet dude i don't know again i'm not familiar with the symbol um

00:42:44.820 but one of the one of the things that i will say

00:42:52.820 oh your tattoos somebody said tattoo sorry there's no uh

00:42:57.780 there's loki worship wasn't a thing historically um misguided people now

00:43:14.520 say that they worship loki and I wonder what all that really means

00:43:19.620 what i find in most of those cases and i'm i will stipulate we have enough people in the world doing

00:43:28.640 odd things that i'm sure some people genuinely feel that they are worshiping loki um what we

00:43:37.280 most often see though is very similar to the abrahamic idea of devil worship

00:43:46.680 Very few people worship the Christian devil. Most of the people that are intellectually minded involved in that movement aren't they worship and they define themselves by their contrarianism towards prevailing Christianity and they symbolize that by worshiping that faith's, you know, antithesis.

00:44:16.680 Very few of them have a relationship with the Jewish Satan.

00:44:24.180 That's not typically how that is. 0.95

00:44:27.060 Most of that is edgelords that want to be edgy and different and define themselves by how not aligned with Christianity they are.

00:44:35.820 And I think that we get that also in the realms of Ausatru by people who want to champion forces of chaos or Loki or Fenrir or Jormungand or Surt or things like that.

00:44:48.960 I think very often those people are not engaged in active worship of those forces as much as they're engaged in active trolling and edgelord behavior of people that want to live their life right.

00:45:05.820 I don't know if that really goes to the question, but it does approach some of the Loki things that come around the periphery of our circle every now and again.

00:45:18.580 Okay.

00:45:22.300 603.

00:45:23.580 Although Forseti is one of the 12 leading gods, he is not significantly in any surviving myths.

00:45:30.440 Could he be compared to the Teutonic god Fosite?

00:45:33.560 uh yes he's one of the same and we have been talking about that significantly at the beginning

00:45:40.180 of the program but yeah it's our main mention of that they're the same they're one in the same

00:45:46.440 this brings up a good point too though there has been some like i don't know like schools

00:45:53.020 of thought where like people will say it is is voton different than vote in and vote in different

00:45:59.260 than than odin or because uh you know votin is of the anglo-saxons and votan is of the germans

00:46:05.500 and odin is of of the nords that these are different gods

00:46:10.060 yeah that's that's uh that's crazy but it's because of the linguistical differences but yes

00:46:19.520 because the the etymology of fositi and forseti have very it's it's the same like the one who

00:46:26.560 sets things before or sets things in precedent or sets things out like law and then the one who also

00:46:33.320 sits above or sits before the presiding council as a presider or a president um you know yes they're

00:46:42.540 they're they are of the same and it's not i wouldn't say because there are no foolish questions

00:46:48.960 it's just that i think that a lot of times when you go on the internet and you do research you

00:46:53.600 find this mentality amongst people who are not looking at this from a from faith they're looking

00:47:01.680 at this from scholastics they're trying to pick this apart and i don't fault that when you get

00:47:07.920 it from wikipedia when you get it from a scholastic source that's okay that's what they're doing i

00:47:15.520 fault it when you're getting from it from folks that claim to be practitioners of that faith

00:47:22.000 and and i've been long-winded on why why i feel that way but if you're a scholar doing raw

00:47:29.040 scholastics that ends up happening a lot like if you look these things up on wikipedia which we

00:47:34.480 which we all do it's a very quick concise go-to for a lot of this information and honestly the

00:47:39.760 further you go back it's very often a very good source when you deal with modern issues that are

00:47:46.720 contentious in the overly politicized world that we live in that's not always the case but the

00:47:53.440 further you go back on archaeology and things very often it's a little bit better um but yes

00:48:00.100 short answer is is we believe those are the same thing so I I um used to be there was a guy and

00:48:08.100 I'm trying to remember what his name was but I believe he was out of Arizona and he uh or New

00:48:14.140 Mexico maybe. And he was almost, he was suggesting the idea that the gods are different and there's

00:48:24.660 multiple versions of them depending on the place they're worshipped in and all kinds of things

00:48:30.180 that way. And I've seen similar concepts in a book I read that I can't recall the name of the

00:48:38.060 authored a very good book called The Ancient City, as if different Greek city-states had

00:48:43.720 a different Zeus for each of the cities, as if they were different personalities, but

00:48:50.260 I don't think that it works like that.

00:48:53.540 I think that there are different reflections of deities shown to different peoples, and

00:48:58.760 And I think that the relationship that the Norse have to Forseti might differ from the

00:49:08.500 relationship that the continentals have to Forseti.

00:49:12.560 And I think that especially when we get further afield to Celtic or Slavic or other reflections

00:49:20.520 of Aryan divinity, we know the gods under different names and sometimes with overlapping

00:49:26.680 lore and overlapping characteristics. And I think some of that comes to our relationships with

00:49:33.180 people are different. So I know my mom from when I was a small child being raised by her. I know

00:49:42.860 her as my mother and I know her in a very specific way. My grandparents knew my mother in a very

00:49:48.280 different way. They knew her as a daughter and they knew her as a child growing up and as someone

00:49:52.460 they were looking out for and somebody that was under their protection you know my father knew

00:49:58.380 my mother in a very different way her friends knew her in a different way her professional colleagues

00:50:04.780 knew her in a different way she was a teacher for 30 years the students that she educated

00:50:10.460 knew my mother in a very different way those are all reflections of the same woman but each of us

00:50:16.700 knew her in a different way and would tell different stories to express how we knew her

00:50:22.540 and i think that's the case with how our people who are spread out over the course of time and

00:50:29.900 the course of geography have different uh different understandings of our gods because

00:50:35.740 they know them based on a different uh a different relationship than than others do i hope that made

00:50:42.140 some sense um we've got we got a five dollar donation from michael hail uh matt and swan

00:50:51.020 hail the gods hail our volk 14 words thank you very much michael we appreciate it it's fine you

00:50:57.420 were saying i was gonna say um some of the points that you hit on the kind of consecutively as we've

00:51:04.700 been going through this when we talked about the the uh the invocation question we we kind of

00:51:10.380 brushed on the the loki question and and and as you've been kind of bringing this up i

00:51:16.780 it was is hitting me because it's strange to see that there's like a linking between all of these

00:51:21.900 but they're uh yeah the relationship that i think that a lot of folks have when you have those

00:51:29.100 edge lords who are worshiping loki because they need it's again they're their uh antithesis

00:51:36.940 mindset um or the the uh religious groups or i would say like you know these these kind of

00:51:45.580 schools of thought in certain sects where they can they feel like they can call forth a god

00:51:51.900 to do its bidding or their bidding this is all really about i think a very strange relationship

00:51:58.060 that our folk need to bridge the gap with about divinity and i think that's one of the things that

00:52:03.900 um people who engage with us as the ostrich folk assembly when they say for instance that they've

00:52:10.860 been practicing aussitru or and maybe come from other like more modern neo-pagan groups they they're

00:52:20.300 they're not well set to understand a relationship with the divine that we have clarified as our

00:52:27.660 our way of doing things this is our way i think that's one big point that i'm just now seeing

00:52:32.700 kind of connecting with all of these kind of questions is you know when people leave christianity

00:52:40.140 when they return back to the religion of their people they still have either an old way of

00:52:45.820 looking at divinity um or they have kind of a misaligned view of looking at divinity and how

00:52:54.540 you just were talking about our relationships with the gods are very real very tangible and

00:52:59.580 can be different based on the relationship um and i think a lot of people don't tackle those ideas

00:53:06.060 very clearly um and i just wanted to bring that up i think that's a great point as i i think

00:53:13.580 you've been hitting on them but for the folks listening to link all of those together is the deep

00:53:20.780 underlining question of that is is what who are the gods what are they and how do we interact

00:53:27.340 with them and if you're invoking if you're siding with you know or pretending to side

00:53:35.820 just because it's you know edgy and cool with with uh forces of you know chaos or disruption or

00:53:43.100 or uh outlandishness you know that that's uh that the deep-seated root of that problem is

00:53:49.580 the nature of engaging with the divine well you know on that there's

00:53:53.580 so we get um it's very easy to get carried away and it's you know i'm very easily offended by

00:54:05.340 impiety but i think that there is a difference between knowing better and being impious

00:54:13.500 and by folks just not knowing better and i think that one of the challenges with our faith is we

00:54:21.140 are in a stage in history where our people are you know the default is impiety um the tagline

00:54:31.940 that you want to you know advertise something as if it's a good thing is it's irreverent

00:54:36.980 like irreverent is a positive moniker to describe whatever your product is now

00:54:43.300 um and i think that that doesn't require any more for me to say on that that that being a thing is

00:54:49.860 twisted things around in such a way. I also think that our, you know, our recent ancestors came into

00:54:57.540 the world into families in a system in a society where Jesus is very real to them. And so their

00:55:05.780 take on the faith that they were raised with or born into, their default setting was piety,

00:55:13.740 because there was no point in their life that their God wasn't real to them.

00:55:18.940 We're at a point now where so many of us have had to rediscover our gods

00:55:23.960 and rebuild a relationship with gods that we don't start out with a default faith in.

00:55:30.160 Most of us, you know, and I think that the story is different for different people.

00:55:34.000 So I don't, I hesitate to say most of us or all of us.

00:55:36.840 But, you know, when I came to this, I didn't know our gods were real.

00:55:42.260 Well, I knew that something was and I figured I would give this a shot and see. And over time, our gods became very real to me. And I couldn't imagine it being any other way now other than to remember how it was when when I didn't know that.

00:56:00.120 I talk here a lot about how we'll get very well-meaning people that will join the AFA and, you know, they will say they believe in the gods very strongly.

00:56:09.340 But the coolest thing, and I've said this time and time again, this is a go-thee, when you can watch that moment that all of a sudden the gods became real to them.

00:56:19.520 And, you know, one of the ways to describe it, if you've ever been hunting, even if you're a seasoned hunter,

00:56:25.620 and maybe if you're not not if you're like a super awesome hunter but if you're a recreational

00:56:30.500 hunter you've never been hunting and you go hunting every dark spot is the animal you're

00:56:35.460 hunting every little thing off in the distance oh is that it is that it i think it's a moose i think

00:56:39.860 it's a moose everything seems like it might be until you see the animal that you're hunting and 0.90

00:56:46.020 then you how could you have been so foolish that all these other you know this log over here was

00:56:50.100 the moose no this moose is right you know until you see it and you experience it for yourself 0.98

00:56:56.820 expecting people to have a deep faith in something is um it's it's very difficult and it's asking a

00:57:04.900 lot so i don't always think that the scholastic approach which i know i'm very critical of

00:57:11.060 or some of these other things are are intentional flights i think it's a symptom of our people

00:57:18.180 not having come to that sincere belief yet in a visceral way. And, you know, it's one of the

00:57:25.400 things that Svon and myself worked very hard to do is help connect our folk with our gods and our

00:57:33.120 gods with our folk. And, you know, sometimes our role in that is bigger than others. Ultimately,

00:57:42.880 you know, it's got to be people that are sincere and it's got to the gods have to want to make

00:57:46.820 that connection. And hopefully if we do a very good job, and if we have earned favor and are

00:57:54.420 worthy in the eyes of our folk and our gods, then hopefully we can help people make that connection.

00:58:01.860 And I really hope people are catching on to the depth of what you're saying, just in that,

00:58:08.960 like with Christianity, a lot of people, you know, they say they believe. And again,

00:58:14.500 that's held over with a very heavy caveat if you don't bad things um or you know so much of this

00:58:21.200 kind of guilt and and the yoking of it whereas we're coming from the legitimate point that you've

00:58:29.880 been you've been brought here you know brought to the gods brought to the folk assembly we want you

00:58:37.840 to know that they're real but again so that that's i think that's something that's really deep

00:58:45.040 that you just said that i think people need to really get that extra layer of understanding is

00:58:51.280 is that it's it's a work in progress it's something that you you uh continue to do for

00:58:58.720 that's why the gother are there to try to help and um that the ultimate goal is to make folks

00:59:06.720 realize they are home they are home the walls are real the roof is real the the firelight is real

00:59:12.560 the warmth is real it's just it takes time and there's a lot of d i i guess i don't know i want

00:59:19.920 to i want to say deep programming but i think it's it's you know habitual ab or habitual um

00:59:25.920 tendencies that have a lot of people hung up on things you know i think for for my parents

00:59:31.840 generation there was a lot of deprogramming i think for you know our generation and those that

00:59:37.440 have come you know 10 20 years after us a lot of them are are blank slates or you know starting out

00:59:44.800 as atheists or at best agnostic what i think is really special is we're raising a generation of 0.86

00:59:53.280 people right now that start with that default that the hoffs are real they've always had hoffs

00:59:59.360 that of course the gods are real they grew up knowing about the gods their parents have always

01:00:03.280 worshipped the gods we're seeing the first you know the first generations of those things

01:00:09.200 and that's very special so things are definitely moving in the right direction

01:00:14.320 the next question is does the name for seti uh where does the name for seti come from

01:00:20.000 what runes would be associated with for seti now we've talked a little bit about for seti's

01:00:24.560 etymology, but what runes do you feel would best be associated with Forseti?

01:00:34.640 That's a good question. My instant law speaker got me over at Auster weekend. He said,

01:00:42.160 I'm going to say something and I want you to say the first thing that pops into your head.

01:00:45.600 And I had no idea what was going on. I was in the middle of doing something and then he asked me a

01:00:49.440 question and it popped and i thought that was a truly genuine way of pulling things out so the

01:00:55.880 first rune that popped into my head was was uh rido the the writing room um and a lot of people

01:01:04.820 might wonder that because if they're thinking about divinational explanations and books and

01:01:09.920 things that think of like travel but correct ordering and the uh setting into motion all of

01:01:20.200 the things that are balanced the polaric forces the you know the the positive the negative the

01:01:26.060 up the down everything has to be in in order in order to move forward and upward and that's the

01:01:34.220 first rune that came into my head as far as you know the correction of action

01:01:40.040 you know I think that this is the you know one of the special things about the runes

01:01:48.420 the runes function so much as lenses on how you want to view a subject that you could make a case

01:01:59.400 for you know many of our runes having some some relation depending on you know depending on how

01:02:06.760 your mind works on it and i don't think there's those are wrong answers um i think that as far as

01:02:14.520 finding equilibrium and finding balance i think uh gabo i think dagaz are reasonable ones

01:02:25.080 i see over in the chat that someone thinks that tiwaz is and you know though we mentioned the

01:02:31.400 the polarity between between tier and forsetti i also think that that right ordered upward pillar

01:02:39.080 um is is a very good choice on that as well guiding star too through throughout uh

01:02:45.560 anything that auspica gates you know seeing through the north star absolutely and and i

01:02:51.800 think that that rhido also is is appropriate so i think that you know i think there's a lot of cases

01:02:57.720 to be made there but i think those are some good choices um spawn i saw a video today by a volkish

01:03:08.440 let me scroll down i wasn't following h i don't know what ch is a

01:03:12.920 channel channel focus channel okay on a vote by a focus channel who said our ancestral version

01:03:21.800 of a shaman is called a tover or tover with the with the umlauts over the o have you heard this

01:03:32.360 before and is it connected to the word tofer so tofer is uh like a is a surname and i think it

01:03:44.200 has i'm not 100 sure on the front half the tou but i think it means that the latter half is fari

01:03:52.440 it comes from the word fari like uh to to travel or to fareforth um but i do know of the word

01:04:01.320 like tover uh and that's a german word and it's an older german word and it it's it's it's almost

01:04:07.640 synonymous with the with the nordic word galdr like a spell um especially the modern usage of

01:04:15.560 the word galdr in like say icelandic is understood as like a spoken spell or um you know something

01:04:22.360 that's being woven with words um and and you know this again shows linguistics there even the word

01:04:29.560 like i know a lot of people think of like warlock as you know uh some sort of like a male evil

01:04:36.920 witch of like you know post-christianity but the the etymology of it is word locking to walk

01:04:43.480 lock things or to lock down things with words um or or sight and so uh in this sense i think it's

01:04:51.960 it's it's not connected to the word tofer and it it does mean like a singer of songs or spells

01:04:59.700 and as far as in relation to like i guess what everyone would consider shamanism and you said

01:05:06.720 volkish in it that would be why german you know this is a german word i think it's it's not modern

01:05:13.280 german i think it might be like low or like old middle i i'm not they got a lot of different

01:05:22.080 classifications for german um but um as far as you know the the idea of it being

01:05:32.320 connected to shamanism that would be interesting i don't know most certainly connected to um

01:05:39.360 um you know runic galder uh again being a vitki if you will um but in in correlation perhaps to

01:05:51.040 uh what would be i think more saether style uh of um you know trance entering into trance and

01:06:00.740 things like that and communicating or perhaps being a uh a hub of communication of things

01:06:06.860 unseen i don't know if that directly correlates but it does have the same sense as speaker of spells

01:06:13.980 so yeah shamanism is a tricky concept and people have a lot of preconceived ideas

01:06:23.900 about it one way or another one of the things is it's tricky because

01:06:28.540 the linguists took a very specific holy man of one faith or one people and have cross-applied

01:06:39.420 it when they see similarities to universally and so it's never a completely clean

01:06:49.260 you know like is to like like i don't think that other faiths necessarily have

01:06:54.140 quote unquote shaman that are the same as you know siberian steppe mongol shaman

01:07:03.820 but i do think there's a lot of overlap in faiths including ours when it talks about

01:07:09.500 trance work and dealing with things beyond the veil but no i've never heard of the uh

01:07:16.380 the linguistics that you just pointed out i'm glad swan was here to add on to that

01:07:20.060 Our next question, gentlemen, what goddess could be considered protector of the mothers or what goddess should mothers reach out more often for guidance? Frigg, thanks. Frigg, certainly, but Svahn, who else do you think mothers should reach out to specifically?

01:07:39.960 Well, yeah, definitely. Frigg is the first and the primary. She is our mother. She is the mystery holder of all that is motherhood.

01:07:53.020 But perhaps guidance could come in a different sense. If it's protection or, you know, protection, asking the Ausenir Hlin, who is a maiden of Frigg, is important.

01:08:11.160 But let's say if you are talking specific guidance, I would say var. It's spelled V-O-R, but there's two dots above the O, so it's an A-U sound, var, and she is the veiled one. 0.95

01:08:22.860 The Asenia of insight and guidance or premonition, inclination, perhaps, you know, flash of guidance.

01:08:38.760 She is often seen as the one that sees beyond things.

01:08:44.980 You know, if you're looking for good counsel, perhaps Sauga, who is, again, we're talking about the Asenia,

01:08:51.760 who are maidens of fensala and they are deeply connected to frig and oftentimes i in my uh

01:08:59.440 faith practice to frig i will i will bring up the ausenia and frig as well together i oftentimes um

01:09:08.080 ask in that sense the other thing is is to to give to frig is good but it is good to ask her

01:09:17.440 her handmaiden now okay it's spelled g-n-a with a dash over it but it's pronounced

01:09:26.960 now and now is the carrier of messages so if you're seeking guidance from frigga

01:09:33.600 one of the things to do is to give gifts to now asking that she beseech on your behalf to

01:09:40.800 the all-mother about things so there's a couple of angles you could go with that on that one

01:09:47.440 All right. This question is a Svan question. Are there any nods to Forseti in modern day law

01:09:58.440 in places like the Icelandic thing? So other than a title, I think there is a holding title

01:10:06.560 of that, of Forseti being a, like a legal title utilized. Like if we were to say a judge or a

01:10:15.240 magistrate or or something like that i do believe there is an actual title in the government but

01:10:21.240 as far as directly to the elthing um i don't i don't believe so i don't think there's any

01:10:29.320 iconography i don't think there's any you know like statuary in front of any buildings and kind

01:10:36.760 of connecting those those um you know the elder beliefs to the modern uh law not not to my

01:10:45.800 knowledge so isn't uh fun in icelandic doesn't forsetti equal president yeah it's it's it like

01:10:55.000 to preside over yes well no i mean as a title so right now i noticed you know preparing for stuff

01:11:00.920 when you google for seti it gives you joe biden and then a list of other presidents of other

01:11:07.720 countries right well and it's like you know the usage of the word prime minister you know uh it's

01:11:18.120 not a common usage word okay but yes it's like a presiding a president if you will um

01:11:27.080 Um, you know, like Iceland had, you know, the, they, they're, they're, they have been involved in mitigations of peace, um, between like during the cold war, you know, uh, I, I remember it was a very big deal when Reagan came up there, uh, back in the eighties.

01:11:45.140 And so, yeah, I think it's I could definitely see the manifestation of of his power there in utilizing peace talks between nations and things like that.

01:11:59.240 But, you know, outside of that, it's not a common, you know, used word.

01:12:04.040 i think most people just you know especially in reference to anyone else let's just say president

01:12:09.480 you know or or i mean oftentimes by name because you could go right up to his house or or her house

01:12:17.320 back in the 80s we were talking about during the reagan time but um yeah so it's not a common use

01:12:24.840 i think but it you know it's it's kind of a position of one presiding over

01:12:29.960 All right, so we have a comical question, but a question nonetheless. Do juggalos need to come home? Juggalos need something. I was really surprised. I didn't know that was still a thing until this last, and I don't know why it came up, but until this last Feast of the Einherjar, I was driving through Texas and the conversation came up.

01:12:54.080 apparently that's, that's still a, that's still a thing. So I, I was unaware. Um,

01:13:01.240 they need something. Uh, the only thing I know of is that the, uh, there was a thing I remember

01:13:08.300 seeing where, um, they were being accused of, cause whenever a large group of like white people 0.53

01:13:14.560 congregate, people get, you know, they, they, they, they immediately start decrying all kinds

01:13:20.960 a bad thing. So I think that I remember seeing this whole kind of tirade of jungalows, basically,

01:13:27.040 you know, admonishing that they're, you know, they're not, they're not racially aware. They're 0.93

01:13:33.640 not trying to push for anything. They're just having a good time. And obviously, I mean,

01:13:36.800 it's built around clown face rappers. You know, these guys are folk, but they're clearly not.

01:13:44.440 Yeah, they need to come home. They probably need to wash off significantly first,

01:13:49.660 Probably need some cleansing rituals before we get Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope to come over.

01:13:56.380 I don't even know their names.

01:14:00.360 Are they on a wrap snack, Mac?

01:14:03.700 No, but that would probably be an amazing flavor.

01:14:05.900 I think they're being persecuted, and they're not represented on the wrap snacks.

01:14:12.920 all right so here's a question that is an interesting one to think about

01:14:20.820 will our gods exist if we as a people cease to exist what are your thoughts on that's fun

01:14:27.860 uh yes um i think you know they existed before and they would exist uh if that was the case

01:14:41.320 um there is a a correlative sense of understanding though that in in us especially through our

01:14:49.420 stories that doesn't happen that life and the will to live we we continue on that um you know

01:14:58.180 the the people who that the gods when we we talk about our gods we are their people and we look at

01:15:05.360 them you know from ourselves um and not from anyone else's lenses they are our gods um

01:15:13.720 that puts into perspective the idea that the connection between the people that honor the

01:15:21.300 gods not just some other random people in the world us and our connection to them once all

01:15:29.340 things come to head and the what the the the life and the will to live well continue so we don't

01:15:39.740 cease to exist ever but if that was the case yes the gods were here before us so

01:15:47.520 yeah it's uh i mean it's a it's a dark question to contemplate um there is certainly a symbiotic

01:15:58.300 relationship in the gift cycle and the exchange of of energy between us through worship and our

01:16:06.140 gods and our gods through blessings to us um i i think that is that would be a horrible outcome

01:16:19.460 and i think it would be a horrible outcome to our gods i like to think that as the beings that

01:16:27.120 created us they could continue to create in a in a different way if if us were to see

01:16:33.600 cease to exist um you know the logic of what we know of things that predate us

01:16:44.160 says that you know if they predated us then they can post date us as well but that's us using

01:16:50.480 this dimension mundane logic that that who's to know the exact implication that has

01:16:59.940 um beyond the veil to our gods i think it would be a devastating thing certainly

01:17:05.040 i think one thing that we see that's similar to that and folk have had different thoughts

01:17:12.600 and opinions on this um our gods are empowered by our worship i don't mean to say that's the only

01:17:23.800 source of their power but they are more powerful if more of us worship them better and more

01:17:32.040 so i wonder their state of health

01:17:37.980 when all of our folk worship them versus in the last you know 1,000 1,500 2,000 years in some

01:17:49.300 places when they have been devoid of temples and worship um i have to feel that they are

01:17:56.120 strengthened in some way that we have come home and that we are worshiping them again

01:17:59.860 And I think that strengthening will continue the more of us come home to our gods.

01:18:04.460 I don't think that's the only factor in their power, but I do think it is a factor.

01:18:09.480 Yeah, the synchronizing of our faith and gift cycle and connecting to the holy tides of the year,

01:18:17.780 it all is about that raido, the riding route, getting everything into alignment.

01:18:23.500 That brings, breaks blockages.

01:18:25.160 It's one of the things does, you know, does Thor need the little bit of you putting your heart on your hand to the horn to be powerful and do things?

01:18:34.820 Probably not. But does all of us consistently doing that together, ritually for decades now, does that matter to him?

01:18:46.620 i think certainly and and it's not to say that he doesn't appreciate when the smallest individual

01:18:51.820 does but as far as you know overall empowerment is it statistically significant maybe not

01:18:58.860 but our ritual acts we have to um and some of you may have different ideas about emmanuel

01:19:04.540 kant but the idea of the categorical imperative of acting as if you know is something right if

01:19:11.100 everyone in every situation were to do that thing each of us individually are relatively small

01:19:19.260 but if all of us do the right thing and the right thing synchronized in the fashion of

01:19:24.220 rhido like sfan mentioned that is powerful any of the big changes we want to see in the world

01:19:31.660 affecting you know our state or our nation or our race or whatever or even affecting

01:19:38.140 the gods of our people small actions that we do individually if we all do them together

01:19:46.860 equal very big actions and i think that's that's a truth that transcends beyond the veil

01:19:55.820 um that's actually a great point to bring up something that you had mentioned earlier this

01:20:00.540 week um that synchronization of us all doing it together comes through clarity so like that

01:20:06.700 question about um uh faux city and four setty uh and the usage of words and uh you know somebody

01:20:14.300 brought up the the usage of of old norse and the clarification that our church uses and then you

01:20:21.580 had brought up the reasoning behind this is for all of us to be focused in clarity not confusion

01:20:26.780 yes people understand that there is votan and voting but here in america if you say odin or

01:20:33.420 oh then people are gonna know exactly what what we're what we're talking about so clarity is

01:20:40.220 part of that us building together making the the flow of that much more clear absolutely um

01:20:51.180 how do we study so this question from jennifer and justin young

01:20:55.900 how do we study things beyond the veil is there a way to use the runes

01:21:03.420 It's kind of a broad question. Svahn, what would you say to that?

01:21:08.480 Well, I think when we talk about, I think she's referring to when I was talking about the Holy

01:21:15.160 Goddess Var and seeing things beyond normal sight. Because that has two meanings in our culture.

01:21:23.460 Speaking about beyond the veil could also mean beyond death. But I think that's in reference to

01:21:29.820 the the site beyond um yes there i mean there's lots of books and subjects on that in which we

01:21:40.620 could go into the uh you know i think that people new to the the faith don't understand

01:21:47.640 the roots are are utilized often in faith but when we talk about seeing beyond the veil um

01:21:53.920 this could apply to um you know knowledge that's been passed on uh even gifts that you perhaps

01:22:02.140 were born with um and you know again there are a lot of uh ideas about the way that our minds

01:22:09.340 could be brought about to see more to be aware more um and in in usage of the runes yes there's

01:22:17.620 the the runes both internally to help you see i would say yes the runes and there's again lots of

01:22:25.740 um ideas and thoughts on that um lots of a corpus of lore to study there um to utilize the

01:22:35.300 runes to see beyond the veil or to see beyond things but it doesn't always have to uh manifest

01:22:40.440 in the runes and the runes are when you talk about like we would mention the vitkis and things like

01:22:45.740 that those aren't i would say the the core of our faith at all that's that's more something that i

01:22:52.840 think certain people might be interested in and and that kind of stuff is stuff that was i think

01:22:57.660 culturally seen as on the on the edges of things the the i think our ancestors had the the meat

01:23:05.880 and potatoes of the community were built around faith family and you know togetherness as a as a

01:23:13.160 people um but when you go into looking beyond certain things yes some people do use the runes

01:23:20.280 but that's not the only thing there are people like spa mothers that are you know spout on us

01:23:27.160 that uh have the ability to see beyond perhaps through water or there's lots of different

01:23:32.280 things dream interpretations um you know there's a lot of uh interesting stuff there

01:23:39.480 even today my my family had an uh a pretty um haunting encounter with a uh a

01:23:49.400 a spow mother or a man who could see beyond things um in relation to an injury of one of

01:23:55.080 my family members um and he was in iceland describing the hospital room that uh the

01:24:02.600 family member was in and was basically coming to say you know i think that everything is going to

01:24:07.160 be well from what i can see he was clearly seeing beyond the veil uh it kind of shocked a lot of uh

01:24:14.280 us uh being here in the states but it wasn't used by the runes there were no runes involved in that

01:24:20.680 so sometimes it's a gift sometimes it's something that you have to you work at opening it and

01:24:26.200 and being aware of opening your awareness but yeah the runes can definitely help

01:24:32.360 yeah it's such a complex question because many many many of the things we do involve piercing

01:24:44.820 that veil in some way even if it's just simply you know participating in bloat and making

01:24:50.540 offerings that transcend and go beyond the veil to the gods and from the gods to us um

01:24:57.900 if it's prayers interacting with your ancestors if it's through meditation work you know somebody

01:25:05.180 said in the thing mushrooms i'm not advocating that practice but that is a way that people try

01:25:14.480 to transcend the veil as well got to be careful with it yeah there's a lot of rich there's a lot

01:25:19.500 of different ways it's fun mentioned you know scrying or things in in water or in in other

01:25:27.200 mediums that way looking at the runes i mentioned earlier the runes are lenses

01:25:31.900 um you know if that's your way of doing things certainly runic divination

01:25:37.380 is transmitting messages from beyond the veil um so yeah i think there's a lot of ways to do that

01:25:45.120 it depending on what you want to do and you know the the specifics matter there

01:25:49.100 but yes runes can be helpful in that practice as can many other things

01:25:54.180 next question is coming in late how was Ostara and also how is Sigurheim going as of now so

01:26:03.920 updates talked about a little bit at the top of the program but Ostara was awesome

01:26:08.480 Ostara at Thor's Hoff was absolutely amazing as far as I've heard Ostara's and all of our

01:26:14.180 Hoffs were really good the Ostara at Balders Hoff was difficult because the weather there

01:26:18.000 was not cooperative so a lot of roads in Minnesota were closed off but yeah the national event Ostara

01:26:24.140 thorsoff was was fantastic this year as far as how things are going with sigerheim things are going

01:26:29.500 great we should have two or three people living in non-permanent structures on the site this time

01:26:38.620 next month we are currently contacting different lawyers as far as helping us with ownership

01:26:48.700 agreements and uh bylaws and any things necessary as far as the legal framework of the intentional

01:26:55.420 community there um had a guy out there last weekend taking measurements and talking to a

01:27:01.420 sewage guy so we're we're moving forward on that and be aware we are going to have an event there

01:27:07.100 in july sigger bloat at siggerheim it's going to be the annual event at siggerheim 0.99

01:27:13.020 continuing certainly when we get a hoff and when we get a haul there but 0.98

01:27:18.220 rather rustic until then but we're gonna we're gonna do that starting this year

01:27:24.140 um can you please talk a little more about saga witten callahan gave a great informal talk

01:27:33.020 at baldershof yule and i'm very interested but struggling to find more info it's fun can you

01:27:39.900 tell folks what you know about saga yeah saga is

01:27:49.100 the awesome year she's the maiden of fence solar that we often um her her dominion her throne her

01:27:56.220 power is in relation to memory and uh that memory is usually in the application of story but also

01:28:03.260 kind of extended to genealogy um and so i think when you meet people and they have their own

01:28:11.580 relationships they see saga as the the memory reservoir of the of the gods she's the accumulator

01:28:18.220 of knowledge or perhaps um it would be more uh like i guess akin to the surface knowledge there's

01:28:26.940 deep knowledge and then there's the knowledge that needs to be pulled up immediately pertaining

01:28:30.860 to the situation and that's why it's mentioned that odin seeks sauga um to uh recollect lore

01:28:40.140 and i think that that i've always kind of um if you were to say and i know we're using like legal

01:28:46.540 talk but it's like if you needed somebody to go and find and look up something that was pertinent

01:28:51.340 to the moment uh that i think is the relationship that sauga is to odin and to the gods as a as a

01:28:58.860 kind of a reservoir of knowledge that brings forth pertaining moments or pertaining focus

01:29:04.860 um she's uh in grimness mall she's mentioned as being in sock for back sock for back means the

01:29:13.900 sunken benches um and that could have two meanings one is that um the you know if the benches are

01:29:20.380 sat upon that they are laden with with uh guests and that could you know uh correlate to a hall

01:29:28.300 Like, that would be a good, you know, title for a hall is a place in which the benches are always full. But it more likely has connection to the watery aspect, the mist and the water of the fens, because they're referred to as the maidens of fensaler, the halls that are in the shining fens or the marshland.

01:29:52.460 um so marshes are often connected to frig and to the maidens um it's kind of like again the place

01:30:01.340 between the air the earth and the water um the uh i guess the essence of her in relation to most

01:30:12.360 folks is that she is seen as the historian of things and history has become a huge thing within

01:30:19.100 the astro folk assembly every hoff has a historic uh as a historian um and again uh witten callahan

01:30:26.380 is you know spearheading a lot of that so her her bringing up sauga is kind of again in relation

01:30:33.980 to that so any sense of keeping note log diary story connection of genealogy always about the

01:30:47.100 the the looking back and attaining that knowledge is deeply connected to sauga so much so that you

01:30:54.140 know the organization of knowledge is just as important being able to bring it forth

01:31:00.700 applicating it in the current situation um so yes you know sauga is definitely the goddess of deep

01:31:08.460 minded long memory um you know i would say one of the best things to do is to take on the task

01:31:16.300 of genealogy and utilize that as a devotional act you know dedicated to her as if like someone was

01:31:24.220 to go to the gym and um say you know i i'm i'm i'm working out i'm getting better i'm getting

01:31:30.940 stronger and i do this in the glory of the gods and i do this in the glory of thor because i want

01:31:35.500 to be stronger and i want to break through uh catharsis and through stagnation it would be

01:31:40.300 very much the same way with with sauga i want to deeply remember i want to find the avenues i want

01:31:45.340 to search i want to be relentless i want to know the lines that come before me and then i want to

01:31:50.540 help others that would be a great devotional act in and of itself but it could take form in other

01:31:56.140 other ways as well but yes she's she's often seen as the the uh the um

01:32:05.820 i mean she has the ear of odin that's pretty every every evening he shares a horn with her

01:32:13.900 and again you know this this the the story the language is talking about how he's going there

01:32:19.340 and pulling this knowledge that that is applicable to the the the situation current so useful it's

01:32:27.820 not just tomes and tomes and tomes it's it's it's focused so that's something to consider as well

01:32:35.580 with sauga you mentioned uh winton callahan in that a number of times it is her birthday

01:32:43.500 today happy birthday brandy we hope that you're here today um next question what's the position

01:32:51.420 of the afa on the practice of necromancy and related graveyard dark arts considering that

01:32:58.460 it's part of sather and galler so this is a we're i promise you we're not trying to dodge

01:33:08.460 any of these questions it is hard to answer some of them where the details make so much of the

01:33:15.980 difference what is necromancy um it really depends on who you ask on what counts

01:33:25.340 magic involving the dead i think that conjures up images of you know resurrecting a skeleton

01:33:36.860 zombie army to fight for you um i think that's probably not what the afa does when thinks okay

01:33:43.260 but the idea of out setting or going and practicing in mound sitting sitting amongst graves and trying

01:33:51.740 to commune with the spirits of our ancestors or our fallen loved ones i think that's a beautiful

01:33:58.060 thing that we certainly support um when you throw in dark arts as as a descriptor i mean ghoulish

01:34:08.700 gothic silliness isn't something we want to be a part of but the idea of interacting with those that

01:34:15.260 that were alive and have passed beyond the veil is you know something we all do very commonly 0.61

01:34:20.940 you know it is a seeking information from those who have passed

01:34:27.100 isn't the lens that we think of it as but going before your altar and praying to deceased loved

01:34:36.120 ones and honoring them and asking to interact with them is a form of necromancy in the most

01:34:42.460 strict sense of the word those things are certainly appropriate um in the lore there's plenty of

01:34:48.720 examples of those kind of things there's plenty of you know odin summoning you know summoning the

01:34:57.600 vulva summoning um talking in the rune songs about i believe the uh the tear rune to to speak to the

01:35:05.400 hangman um and and speak those are are legitimate practices i think that when you add dark arts to

01:35:15.020 it to make it edgy that's probably not something that that we want to get behind and put on the

01:35:20.860 postcards but the idea of interacting with the dead is important i think it's a good time to

01:35:27.880 throw in here that one thing that is empowering and special about um eventually all of our

01:35:37.140 hoffs but specifically now about odin's hoff and in the future or and to a smaller degree or a

01:35:44.160 different degree at Thorshof is we actually have the deceased on the property. At Thorshof, we have

01:35:51.760 a man that was a Christian gentleman that passed somewhere around the 1900, but with the purchase

01:35:58.580 of the property came his grave that was in a very poor condition by the Hof. We've restored it as

01:36:05.800 best we can. We try to honor it. That's where I took the ritual mead when we did sumble and

01:36:13.020 and different things at Ostara to go out there and share some of that with Mr. Bethea who lies

01:36:20.060 out there and having him on the property does empower it in a way. At Odenshof, we've got Adam

01:36:28.400 and Becca who are with us out there and their remains are in our graveyard there. And I always

01:36:35.700 trying to make a point of going over and you know giving them my regards when i go through there and

01:36:43.300 end up sharing some of the mead from ritual and and incorporating them as best we can into the

01:36:49.460 things that we do and i think having their remains with us strengthens you know the magic of that

01:36:56.740 place and a part of them is is literally with us when we when we do our rituals and when we practice

01:37:02.020 house so true there at odin's hof so i think in less spooky ways a degree of necromancy is used

01:37:11.620 a lot even though that's probably not what most of us would term it as or think of it as

01:37:16.500 what's a use fun well i definitely you were kind of hitting them in the in the in the hitting those

01:37:22.500 topics uh necromancy i think when we talk about it is a lot of it was brought about post christianity

01:37:29.620 um when in in regards to the idea of it being spooky or dark art stuff and a lot of that was

01:37:34.580 about ancestral worship uh repression trying to keep that out of um uh the folk and it it it didn't

01:37:45.380 really work because even you know staunchly christian um uh you know populace like even the

01:37:51.380 the tombs under paris and ancestor worship in the building of shrines to the dead um long been

01:37:58.020 connected to our people but i think the spooky factor really was pressed because again uh you

01:38:03.780 know uh christianity by way of saul of tarsus and all of that that they are they have very very

01:38:10.500 strict rules about communication with the dead and um you know when we talk about odin and we

01:38:18.580 talk about lore and you hit that as well um you know that is a contexting the power of of odin

01:38:26.020 and of course to even the the sense of like spookiness or power or not to be trifled with

01:38:34.420 sense of odin and so i think our ancestors when they you know they heard these poems and heard

01:38:39.940 the stories they that was the context they were taking it in um but you know when you look at and

01:38:46.820 i wanted to bring this up is there's this line after christianity in iceland when you're talking

01:38:51.540 about the golden book when you're talking about a lot of like the the roy the bach or the svartabok

01:38:58.020 of sman the black in iceland that was post christianity and a lot of that had some you

01:39:06.500 know admixtures of like medieval kind of uh logics behind that so there was some really dark and and

01:39:16.900 odd stuff that came out after that time uh you know i'm speaking of like most people might even

01:39:24.660 know about and please look it up at your own risk but the in golden bach they talk about the the

01:39:30.740 dead man's pants if you will um and a lot of that stuff that stuff came post christianity and a lot

01:39:38.420 of people don't realize like the the the baby sir the um the compass symbol and the helm of awe

01:39:46.420 came from that time now a lot of runic knowledge did pass up from that time in the past but there

01:39:52.500 was also a lot of layering of things that weren't necessarily nordic or germanic and so i think

01:39:59.860 when you see a lot of this um uh like manipulation of the dead that i don't think our ancestors were

01:40:07.300 were into the idea was when when odin talks about the hanged man he's talking about like a criminal

01:40:13.620 or a crossroad body that person was there probably not for the best of reasons um the vulva you know

01:40:20.820 deep seated in the darkest places outside of time and he needs desperation in that so it's that that

01:40:28.420 those are those are very you know poignant things but when we talk about like seeing our ancestors

01:40:34.100 in the mounds or if a woman tells her you know her husband to be or her new husband to go to

01:40:42.500 to the mound of her father and to retain the sword of her father so that he can go forth and

01:40:48.420 and um you know become a conqueror build his kingdom that type of communication to the dead

01:40:55.800 isn't i don't think it's built on that kind of nefariousness it was seen more as like an ancestral

01:41:02.000 linkage. So, uh, yeah, that's graveyard arts clearly, but it's done in reverence. It's done

01:41:12.660 in, in, uh, respect in the sense going out there and, uh, laying upon the mound to be inspired,

01:41:20.420 um, by those who came before us to connect ourselves to the, to the flows of those who

01:41:27.240 came before us so ancestor worship versus you know necromancy dun dun dun is kind of a thing i think

01:41:35.880 that needs to be clarified okay so uh this one's from nick might many of our folk especially some

01:41:43.160 of the young men focus too much thought and effort and worry and conspiracy on politics

01:41:49.880 and on the other as fawn said earlier the lore and myths show and say that we as a folk will survive

01:41:57.240 Can we make a concerted effort as a folk to focus more on of our attention and efforts on the gods and on our faith and maybe stop worrying near as much?

01:42:08.580 One thousand percent. Yes. It's hard. I get it. There's there's things involved there.

01:42:15.740 um when i think that our young men are more prone to it than everyone else

01:42:22.700 and i think that we live in a world where there is an increasing at a very rapid pace alienation

01:42:31.600 of our folk from our tradition it's very easy to get caught up in that the other thing is

01:42:38.660 when you finally find a group of people that think like you and that finally you know the

01:42:44.260 whole world's gone crazy, but this other group of people, they think like me, there is this

01:42:49.160 tendency, and I think we've all done this, to where you just vomit up all of the possible

01:42:56.400 things you've been holding inside that you want to say to somebody else who gets it.

01:43:01.240 And it can be very overwhelming for the audience that maybe is not in that spot.

01:43:08.700 I think that there, we shouldn't be ignorant to the things that go on around us.

01:43:14.260 But the nonstop drumbeat every single day in our circle of what everybody else does that we don't like and everything that's broken and all of these things and all the conspiracies and all the doom and all the gloom.

01:43:29.300 And it builds up. It builds up in a very malignant way that is is terrible. And in the meantime, it doesn't accomplish anything.

01:43:41.120 um what we are far far far better served doing is being aware of the things that go on that we don't

01:43:51.200 like and not engaging in those things but also spending our time building the things that we do

01:43:58.280 like we become so focused about how everybody who's not us is doing everything wrong that we

01:44:04.300 spend too little time focused on what are we doing and are we doing the right things and are

01:44:10.400 we doing enough things you only have so much energy mentally and otherwise to spend over the

01:44:16.080 course of your day and when so much of it is spent on negativity that's in some ways

01:44:25.800 masturbatory and in other ways 0.83

01:44:28.860 masochistic you're just flagellating yourself over and over again with

01:44:39.640 unpleasantness and all that energy could be put towards building and that's something that i'll

01:44:46.180 say the afa has has really made a lot of strives in when we stopped just focusing on all the stuff

01:44:51.940 we don't like and really started doubling down on yeah but what can we do we found a lot of cool

01:44:58.580 stuff to do. We found enough stuff to do to give four Hoffs and we're working on a fifth with a

01:45:04.120 plan for a sixth. We got Sigurheim. We, you know, we, we grow, we do things. We built a beautiful

01:45:10.380 AFA family. We're having kids. We're doing amazing things. There's a lot of stuff broken.

01:45:15.500 We all get that, but there's a lot of stuff that we're doing. That's amazing. And if we focused

01:45:19.580 our attention to the more of us, if we all, if everyone in this conversation at night

01:45:24.140 took all of the energy that they focus in every day on guess what new video we can watch

01:45:32.380 of people that don't look like us doing something we don't like and instead put that towards doing

01:45:38.420 something we do like I think we would be amazed at what we can accomplish together

01:45:42.840 you have thoughts on that Svon yeah and I think you you spoke very very clearly and hit all that

01:45:52.940 very well i mean other i would say you re-emphasizing to what you just said there

01:45:57.720 are a lot of folks that come into our community they meet they meet folk and they're happy to

01:46:03.380 talk about a lot of the um you know dreadful and the dark and the gloom because they haven't had

01:46:10.560 anybody to talk to about it um and then they're kind of met at the same time with like okay

01:46:17.040 so look at this room full of people and we're not we're happy we're doing things we're organized

01:46:25.360 we're we're honoring the gods we're doing things i think it throws people for a loop at first or

01:46:31.680 oh these don't these people don't care it's like we're doing the proper usage of care is is moving

01:46:39.780 forward and upwards so i i wanted to yeah that was a good point that you hit there all right

01:46:46.720 uh next gentlemen we are experiencing an awakening of our folk and people at the same time the degree

01:46:54.360 of degeneracy in clown world is astonishing do you see a correlation all father guiding us forward

01:47:01.320 um there's absolutely a correlation and this is one of those things is focusing on positive things

01:47:12.340 It is terrible that the world is spiraling into clown world as bad as it is, but it doing so is pushing so many traditionally minded, just regular folks outside of their comfort zone that they are awakening to our gods.

01:47:28.500 They are awakening to our faith. 0.73

01:47:30.500 They're coming to the Astro Folk Assembly.

01:47:33.360 When things are comfort, it's very easy to grow stagnant when you're comfortable.

01:47:39.160 When the times that we live in make things very uncomfortable for those of us of good conscience, it drives people towards action, towards doing, towards changing the paradigm that they're currently thinking about, towards awakening.

01:47:56.160 And we're seeing that in a really beautiful way.

01:47:59.660 And, yeah, the two are absolutely correlated.

01:48:04.320 And is the All-Father guiding us forward?

01:48:07.160 I certainly hope so.

01:48:08.440 I believe that. I know that he is doing that in the form of the Ostru Folk Assembly. It has been

01:48:13.680 now for 54 years and with amazing and beautiful results. Say you, Svon. Absolutely. I mean,

01:48:24.380 from Founder McNallan and his relationship with Odin and the clear mark of lighting the torch,

01:48:33.100 placing the flag or pointing in the direction. And then you also, again, repeatedly being

01:48:41.080 guided, led, physically even acknowledged in the process and seeing some of the things that I have

01:48:49.360 seen. I believe it 100% that yes. And the Allfather is dynamic. He moves. He is capable

01:49:00.760 of the movement that is required to invigorate the souls of the folk across many lands, across

01:49:08.820 borders and oceans. And oftentimes, at the same time, people coming in like great waves

01:49:15.820 to this inspiration. So yes, 100%.

01:49:19.760 Next question is, how did the AFA start?

01:49:26.740 so all right the afa as it's currently formed the house true folk assembly

01:49:36.020 started depending on who you ask and there's not like a specific date that we can find so

01:49:44.740 i always date it from the beginning of the year from january 1 1995. basically over that yule

01:49:54.900 the decision was made to make it a thing and it you know so when you go back and you read the um

01:50:03.220 the old runestone from the time in the you know the winter issue that came out before that yule

01:50:11.380 talks about how you know the afa is going to get started and the spring issue of the the the next

01:50:18.900 one out says how the afa is now started so sometime in that winter uh the afa started and it

01:50:27.700 was a coming together of a number of different things so and just as a point of interest i

01:50:33.780 posted a couple of videos about a month back now i'd say of uh an old an old vhs of

01:50:43.620 a midsummer bloat from 1994 and that was just a few months before six months before the afa was

01:50:50.900 found and you can see kind of the state of where as true us true was at at the time um

01:50:59.860 so steve mcdallin our founder began his relationship with odin in 1968

01:51:06.260 shortly thereafter in 72 we founded the austral free assembly and then through various stops and

01:51:14.660 starts and figuring stuff out over the course of the 70s and into the mid late 80s the austral free

01:51:22.580 assembly established a lot of things that we still do today as far as ritual structure and things

01:51:28.740 that we kind of take for granted but they did those um fundamental first steps in developing

01:51:34.900 Oustru at the time. But there's a lot of infighting. There's a lot of squabbling over

01:51:42.040 petty things. There was a lot of, you know, follies that young men have and didn't work

01:51:50.200 out. And because of that, Steve closed shop on the Oustru Free Assembly in, I want to

01:51:59.580 say 1987 I think it's not somewhere very close to that um and he kind of traveled the world and

01:52:08.700 went about doing some of his own things for a while still very much else is true still very much

01:52:14.280 um in trough with with the all-father but you know seeing the world experiencing some things

01:52:21.120 having a little bit of a dark night of the soul as far as introspection on things that worked

01:52:26.520 things that didn't work. A number of people carried on doing

01:52:31.000 Ausatru in the meantime. The Ausatru Alliance did a lot of

01:52:34.560 carryover of what the old AFA used to do. And the Ring of

01:52:38.960 Troth was founded and very, very quickly turned from a

01:52:43.840 relatively folkish organization into a far leftist extremist

01:52:49.240 social justice cabal. That was the first period that there was 0.64

01:52:55.260 any such concept as universalism. Before then, Austertru was always inherently folkish, 0.66

01:53:00.600 but around 1990, the Ring of Troth decided to take a hard left, and that's when universalist

01:53:09.700 Austertru kind of started. And so Steve, during the early 90s, he'd gone through a divorce in,

01:53:17.920 believe the late 80s right around 90 or so um he got together with with his wife sheila and they

01:53:28.080 started reprinting or uh printing new copies of the runestone early on in the 90s i think

01:53:32.880 in like 92 or so and steve started getting re-involved in the also true scene that he'd

01:53:40.000 kind of left behind for a while and seeing the developments in that and the folkish element

01:53:46.880 wasn't developing very strongly or didn't grow as much as he would like to have seen and this

01:53:52.160 universalist heresy had really taken root in a lot of places and there was a lot of confusion

01:53:58.240 on this thing that he started and so he really felt a need to get back involved and to re-establish

01:54:05.920 the right way of doing aussitrew and so that's something that he and sheila decided on and

01:54:13.920 and then got rolling in that winter between 94 and 95 and it started very slowly and it

01:54:20.080 took a while to gain momentum but that's uh that's when and why the afa and how the afa started

01:54:30.320 svan can you speak about idun's apples

01:54:36.000 yeah well i i wanted to say too over here uh obsidian skull had made a reference

01:54:42.320 back to the idea that not not dark as in nefarious but dark isn't just you know the aspects of of uh

01:54:49.600 you know talking about death and and that stuff and i i think that there's um some clarification

01:54:56.640 that was brought by just saying that so i i appreciate that point being mentioned that he

01:55:04.160 wasn't talking about just like perhaps say evil but you know the subjects that are kind of on the

01:55:09.040 the winter tidying side, the underneath, the dark and the shaded beyond the veil of things.

01:55:15.740 And yeah, that's an interesting point because again, words and you only have, you know,

01:55:20.340 when you're typing is when you say something like necromancy or vidki, like one little word

01:55:24.740 can just throw that off into lots of different meanings. But I thought that was very interesting

01:55:30.480 seeing some of this, the chat going on over here. As far as, so Edun's apples,

01:55:36.960 um one of the truly beautiful things that i think about is that there is when we talk about pan

01:55:45.440 arianism that's a word that a lot of people have been asking about what is what does that even mean

01:55:50.720 and um i think this is one of the greatest examples of it because when we look at um

01:55:58.880 all branches of the of the arian folk uh all over you know from from the source westward and

01:56:07.280 southward and all over there is the correlated like power source of the gods there is a sense

01:56:15.440 or a source of that which the gods nourish themselves from and it's often taken in the form

01:56:22.640 of a a power source or a pure source gold light youthfulness is always kind of associated with it

01:56:34.240 the the light of it of enlightenment and the opening of the mind um it's important to you

01:56:42.240 know for us apples again uh that that has a lot of connotations to our people and what that might

01:56:49.360 mean you know it's a i know a lot of people try to connect either one with eden and uh apples to

01:56:57.440 the bible but you know most likely that the the biblical stories were referring to a fruit and

01:57:02.560 that fruit most likely was like a pomegranate um the apple was added later with you know once uh

01:57:09.600 christianity was kind of embedded into europe because of the importance of what the apple is

01:57:14.480 to us as a folk so the usage of the the apple as a symbol of that power that nourishment that the

01:57:21.840 gods contain and then she she is the threshold in which that power passes through that the gods

01:57:30.160 nourish themselves in continuance with it that that is a an interesting topic and i think you

01:57:37.600 get a lot of different answers from people but i would say purity light and order that the apples

01:57:45.360 symbolize natural law and cosmic order in capsulation there that the symbol of the apple

01:57:54.160 the golden apple is the that symbol of the encapsulation of all that is cosmic order and

01:58:01.120 natural law that once the gods attained that that alignment with each other once the the the vanir

01:58:09.040 and the icier became one that encapsulation of that moment that power that was from that moment

01:58:16.800 bringing them clearing all obstructions that power flow is represented in the apple so and even is

01:58:26.960 is the harbinger, because again, another Aryan, pan-Aryan concept in all of our faiths, whether 0.67

01:58:35.220 Hellenics or Slavics or Gaulish or whoever, the bestowment of that power and the keeping of that 0.76

01:58:43.040 power in the feminine that is then given to, well, it's given to the gods, but you can see it even in 0.61

01:58:50.880 the imagery when you see Ethan giving the apples to an oust in paintings, that image

01:58:59.180 is very well clear, and I think it has a deep folk meaning, is that the bestowment of that

01:59:07.480 power upon the masculine is a constant thing. When the horn with the mead is given, when

01:59:16.540 the apple with the light and with the with the power of the imbuement of of eternal is given

01:59:22.760 it's given so that it then the gods can go out and willfully manifest in the world so you see

01:59:28.560 a lot of that too so both of those the apple itself and the source of nourishment of the

01:59:33.200 eternal and that being threshold by a maiden are both you know clear connections to like

01:59:42.640 you see this motif in the stories of all the Aryan folk. And so I would definitely say that's one of

01:59:49.500 the ones that I bring up when we talk about our connectivity to our cousins or our brothers in

01:59:56.140 the branches of all the folk faiths. You can see that happening over and over and over again.

02:00:02.800 But it is my belief, yeah, that is the power, that conduit power that the gods received after they

02:00:09.360 aligned you see that transcend beyond just in this part of panarianism you see that transcend

02:00:17.920 um paganism into christianity in the form of the grail and the grail mythos the idea of

02:00:25.440 sipping the very sustenance of the divine that that which grants the immortality which grants

02:00:33.260 you know the godliness to the gods being able to to somehow have a sip of that

02:00:38.960 um and sharing that in a form of communion yeah the the ambrosia amongst the hellenics the

02:00:46.680 cauldrons amongst the gulls the soma amongst the vedics exactly absolutely the interconnection of

02:00:52.760 all of our folk uh gentlemen what information do we have about slavic perun uh looks like it's thor

02:01:00.880 minus the axe versus hammer description, but if you look closely at a Mjolnir pendant,

02:01:06.960 it kind of looks like an axe head. Thanks. What say you, Svan? Well, that's a cultural thing.

02:01:15.380 Yeah, when, you know, if the Slavic see, I've seen them also use a bow and arrow.

02:01:20.520 That, some of the imagery that I've looked up in my, just researching some Slavic artwork,

02:01:27.580 because i'm interested in in uh art is uh one of the greatest forms of symbolic faith translation

02:01:35.320 the way to to the way you can see a people is the way they see and express the divine

02:01:41.920 and the the the symbology and imagery um that's how you know european uh it it changed the face

02:01:50.400 of christianity when christianity came into europe it didn't look like what it what it is

02:01:55.020 perceived um you know after it came into europe there was a lot of change there um the uh the

02:02:03.420 usage of of these things so an axe a bow a hammer i mean and again remembering too that you know

02:02:10.780 thor had had the iron rod before mjolnir and of course too you know there's correlation perhaps

02:02:16.860 in the bronze age that there was the the bronze-headed axe especially they've been found

02:02:21.900 in wells and at the bases of trees that um you know are presumed possibly to be struck or grown

02:02:29.020 from a place where lightning was struck um and those correlations to the oak so again oaks thor

02:02:37.420 peron there's heavy associations there um the striking implement so i i always call it the

02:02:44.060 switch the contact switch whatever that form might be the slavs viewed it in their own way

02:02:50.140 and we view it in our way um but it's more important to understand that when we talk 0.77

02:02:55.180 about perun i think in respect to the slobs you know seeing uh seeing how they culturally see that 0.77

02:03:01.660 that contact switch of the striker is important but our way is slightly different and um

02:03:09.980 again the the dynamics of of perun to velis the god of the dead and magic and they're kind of

02:03:20.140 I guess competing an antithesis in the Slavic religion is very interesting. I think it greatly influenced the poem of the Norse of Haurbar, where Thor and, you know, high beard or gray beard or the hoary beard ferryman across the water.

02:03:40.120 I think there was a lot of influence there because you can see that same dynamic that's also placed within like Eastern Germanics and the Slavs in relation to the striker and the, you know, the entity of death, if you will.

02:03:56.620 um and again that's another like very loud pan-arian point is when the striker is um you

02:04:06.660 know he doesn't stop until death is involved he doesn't step foot in the land of the dead

02:04:10.640 it's connected to the earth and that that's a huge thing amongst you know whether you're talking

02:04:18.020 about you know uh the vedics or slavs or hellenics but um as far as you know answering fully about

02:04:27.620 perun you know that i i have respect and i'm i'm studying but i you know somebody that is of the

02:04:35.140 slavic folk faith would be a much better uh speaker on that but from my observations of them as a

02:04:44.180 people i see there is it's just there it's their culture and our culture speaking of the same

02:04:52.900 divine arian god of of the sky and of thunder storm father so yes um your original thing

02:05:03.060 looks like thor but with a different weapon yeah same same thing i think it oversimplifies

02:05:08.500 but to avoid confusion from an outsider's point of view who's not slavic yes that's the take home

02:05:18.180 there's undoubtedly a deep well of really important mythology that comes through the

02:05:25.540 slavic understanding of thor and i don't mean to discount that but yes fundamentally that is the

02:05:31.380 same god worshipped in a slightly different way with a slightly different implement at the end of

02:05:36.980 the day um we need to understand that mjolnir or that axe is a symbol and not a physical item

02:05:51.380 um thor exists on a plane that transcends that and our myths talk about the the great power 0.97

02:05:58.980 of the strike of a hammer so we we envision it as a hammer um to the slavs that's the crushing 0.98

02:06:08.020 you know swing of an axe to different folk perhaps that's because all of that is the power of 0.95

02:06:14.180 lightning lightning comes like a bolt perhaps it's like a an arrow that's shot to great effect

02:06:21.220 the point is the striker god has the super immense power to strike with great might

02:06:29.040 and uh so we need to you know it's not like we we can go break into thor's armory and see his

02:06:35.060 his hammer or his axe and i and i don't mean to be silly but i think it's worth reminding

02:06:40.360 ourselves of that from time to time um yeah go ahead i was going to say too like another thing

02:06:48.040 that would be a great point to look at is the Perun is often depicted as being in a chariot

02:06:55.220 or being in a wheeled wagon of some sort. And then, of course, amongst the Gauls, Tyrannus

02:07:04.100 carries a wheel as his symbol, the wheel that rolls. And then, of course, Thor is upon a

02:07:13.440 chariot so the rolling and the movement uh thor is often referred to as ein reidi the the one who

02:07:20.060 rides alone or low reidi the one that rides upon high or is is a loud and cacophonous rider um

02:07:28.260 is uh these are all links between each other so finding those commonalities between our branches

02:07:34.480 is great it's wonderful but yeah the symbology is more important than the literalism of it it's just

02:07:41.120 our cultural version and they have theirs or oku thor the driving thor right um could we use

02:07:49.360 forsetti as an example to keep our minds clear for our own judgments of situations so we're not quick

02:07:55.680 to act on emotional reflection or reactions can we learn through forsetti of course you can we can

02:08:02.960 absolutely learn from all of our gods we can and should um i think that forsetti is a very good

02:08:10.160 example to reflect on when you're in a position to make judgments and to deal with interpersonal

02:08:19.360 relationships with other men um certainly but yeah we should of course we can we should learn

02:08:26.000 from all of our gods uh i made mention of this remember uh the um i made mention of the parentage

02:08:35.360 of Forseti. When we talk about Balder, the bold, the soul of the folk, the light, the nobleness,

02:08:42.920 the attainment of that which is before us and above us, the connection between and his movement

02:08:51.000 from the above and below and back up again, those connections, Balder is the light of the folk soul

02:08:58.380 And nana is the devotion and the piety, the bestowment of faith. And so out of that comes

02:09:05.740 the nobleness of right action and correct action and acting noble. So Forseti is the embodiment

02:09:14.640 of those two factors coming together, bearing forth clarity in mind and clarity in the heart,

02:09:21.220 clarity and spirit so yeah absolutely i would say for seti is kind of a personification of that

02:09:29.540 it's fine can you tell folks about uh specifics about hexanoct at thor's off yeah

02:09:39.540 absolutely so uh yeah that's that might be an interesting one um just yet hexanoct is coming up

02:09:45.940 um so hexanoct is ultimately i would say the basic way to cut it down is it is a blessing

02:09:54.340 ceremony a blessing by creating fire through friction through spark um and in doing so

02:10:03.000 you uh you bless the folk with smoke and herb from the fire and i mean this in the sense that

02:10:14.100 we have at thorsof we have a list of herbs dried herbs um uh kind of a like a spell um there's a

02:10:22.660 list and that list you you compile the the herbs um together dry them and place them in the fire

02:10:30.340 to make the smoke sacred so once the the smoke is created it is billowed over the folk as they pass

02:10:40.500 through it because they're entering into a time of the year in which well historically it was

02:10:45.940 important um to bless your your men folk your children and the flocks as they were heading out

02:10:52.020 into the the mountains or the valleys in order to um to uh you know graze if you will so the origin

02:11:01.460 of that kind of comes from there there's a deeper metaphysical point to it as well though there's

02:11:06.740 there's chthonic forces of of kind of chaos and and the tearing away of the fabric of of of the

02:11:14.660 folk of the of the family of the community that that have often and uh numerous times um are

02:11:24.100 referenced in nordic stories as the kind of the wolf riding jotinus which is the uh the hags the

02:11:32.980 the uh you know these these kind of degenerating forces of chthonic power um and they you know they

02:11:42.580 have the the connection to the feminine in relation to kind of the drawing down and the tearing apart 1.00

02:11:48.500 into into the uh dissipation of the earth and and the murkiness so i think that's why the hag is

02:11:55.220 kind of often seen that way so the knight of the witches from thorshof and and our usage of it is

02:12:02.100 that we're blessing the folk against those forces those the uh the hedge shadowed hags and and uh

02:12:11.780 dark forces out there and it couples with the ceremony of creating a fire to bless your your 0.74

02:12:18.980 menfolk to bless your children and so usually the women are the ones that preside over the billowing 0.91

02:12:25.380 of this smoke and so we have taken it to uh since we can't have all the women just logistics uh we

02:12:33.380 usually choose four women who who bear the color red and that color red is symbolic of their power 1.00

02:12:40.260 red is a dynamic color of power in our culture so they they don some sort of red and they carry

02:12:49.700 brooms and the brooms are used to billow the smoke in a direction so they take their bundles of herbs

02:12:56.580 and um they place them in the fire and then they billow the fire with their brooms and that pushes

02:13:03.620 the smoke in a direction so that the folk can walk through it and receive their their blessings over

02:13:08.500 there over them um you know there's a lot of theories to this is like one it might have been

02:13:14.340 of good use to do this especially when uh you know going out into the fields with your with

02:13:19.540 your flock and your and the menfolk you know smelling like smoke keeping predators at bay

02:13:24.580 uh there's a lot of uh poetic lore to the idea of there's the inner guard and the outer guard or

02:13:31.300 there's the inland and the outland and the herdsman was going into the outland he was going beyond the

02:13:37.780 hedgerows he was going beyond the the confines of the the controlled field to graze on new grass

02:13:44.900 that was growing after austra or after spring um had started so blessing the folk when they go out

02:13:52.660 there because they would stay out there for long periods of time so this is kind of extended to

02:13:58.580 not just the men folk and the herds but or not just the men folk and the young men who are you

02:14:03.860 know out there uh watching over the uh the cattle and the and the sheep but now it's presiding over

02:14:10.500 the ideas we go forth into summertime and we go into working and testing those edges going out

02:14:18.100 beyond the inner lands um it's that blessing of our women uh utilizing their you know the herbs

02:14:27.380 the earth magic the good magic healing magic the um the protective um essence of our women

02:14:37.300 fighting against those destructive forces out there now there's a lot of stuff when we talk

02:14:42.340 about like walspergenacht and germany and the uh the bakken mountain and uh even christianity with

02:14:50.180 saint walberga and all of that and that is an interesting thing to go into but you asked

02:14:56.420 specifically about hexanoct at thor's off and that's the intention of of hexanoch that we do

02:15:02.420 that's the uh the kind of the overall driving force of what we do when we celebrate hexanoch

02:15:10.340 now for the longest time in house true hexanoch was seen as that that ceremony or that the night

02:15:15.700 before mayday and of course mayday in the gregorian calendar being may 1st um is still

02:15:22.180 utilized today because the gregorian calendar is used a lot but um the those that those connections

02:15:30.500 came later the overall point is the initial separation of those two was you know them going

02:15:39.140 out and and and setting the flocks out you know to to herd and after they got established you know

02:15:45.940 they would leave people out there to watch over things and settle things and then a lot of the

02:15:50.420 folks came back and again sometimes you know the young men come back and they celebrate and so

02:15:56.260 that's why you see a lot of the young men young women connected to mayday but mayday wasn't always

02:16:00.900 just specifically on the first of may and that does have connections to um you know the the

02:16:08.260 the interactions between the teutonic people and the hellenic uh or the the romans the romantic

02:16:14.900 uh empire um and so there's a lot of crossover there that's that's truly interesting as well

02:16:21.620 but for hexanoct it we usually place it a good amount of time before mayday and that's the

02:16:28.500 intention of it is to bless the folk as they about to you know start their their new movement forward

02:16:35.060 into the summer tide all right what are the views of alsatru when a person commits suicide

02:16:42.180 like so many questions tonight context is everything um

02:16:50.880 so

02:16:54.380 trying to think of where to start on that because it's a it's a big question and i know that

02:17:02.380 in other faiths um perhaps it's sinful and in some it's sinful to the point where it would

02:17:11.900 you know, prevent one from, from going to their heaven or, um, from being buried in,

02:17:19.540 in, uh, consecrated ground and other things. It's not the case in house of truth. Um, but

02:17:26.000 I think that it bears, I don't know, a little bit of reflection on, um, and I talked about

02:17:32.540 this a little bit, I think last week and the week before, but times have been very rough for our

02:17:40.980 people, especially for our young men recently. A lot, I mean, a staggering number of our veterans

02:17:51.820 are taking their own lives. Since all of the reaction and lockdown towards COVID,

02:18:02.200 we've had quite a number of people take their own lives. In the AstroFolk Assembly,

02:18:08.300 we've seen a number of suicides in the past few years and it's devastating and

02:18:15.900 really tough for those of us left behind um

02:18:22.460 in also true our deeds define us but we're not i mean it depends on the scope of the bad deed but

02:18:34.220 But most of the time, it's a it's an aggregate of your deeds combined that make the judgment on a person.

02:18:41.800 So there's not a if someone commits suicide, there's there's a hard no on something good happening for him in the afterlife.

02:18:49.400 That's not one of our lives.

02:18:52.840 But something that that we do know to be true and that our Lord does speak of is it's better to be alive than not to be.

02:19:01.260 as long however bad things are while you're alive you always have the opportunity to make

02:19:08.360 that better to alter that to uh write those scales just like i said that there's not you know 0.96

02:19:14.700 just one thing and you're damned typically um your when our gods judge you when your ancestors judge 0.98

02:19:25.220 you. It is a complex layering of all the good and all the bad that you've done. While you are 0.99

02:19:33.240 alive, you have the opportunity to continue to stack that well with good layers of good deeds

02:19:41.380 and good things. Once you cash in your cards, you're done and you lose that opportunity. You

02:19:50.660 lose the opportunity and the potentiality of all the good that you could do. I mean, it's easy to

02:19:59.020 have a generic response to suicide's bad, and it is, and it's very hurtful to the survivors.

02:20:06.580 But in an outstri-specific context, that's what I would say in regards it. And, you know, again,

02:20:15.040 there's gray area. There's people who are suffering from terminal diseases that are in

02:20:20.420 humiliation and pain and want to go out on their own terms. There are people that

02:20:28.760 throw themselves into the heat of a conflict because their sacrifice of life allows

02:20:36.100 an objective to be achieved or other life to be saved.

02:20:41.340 um there are circumstances uh but it's it's a very very final solution to what are very often

02:20:57.180 temporary problems and uh i think that it bears saying on this while we're discussing it not to

02:21:04.120 be too grim i think you know i don't know if your question is out of any kind of a personal

02:21:08.400 association or anything but anybody listening to this what i would ask is if that's something that

02:21:15.840 you're ever contemplating and it's not going out to the lady who asked the question this is to

02:21:20.480 everybody if you ever get to a point where you're at that point it's not going to hurt you to stick

02:21:28.160 around for a little bit longer and i would ask that you reach out to one of our gothar

02:21:34.800 and give us the opportunity to speak with you um again if that's what you've decided to do then

02:21:42.720 sticking around and having another conversation isn't really gonna gonna hurt your timetable too

02:21:47.520 bad but it would mean the world to us if we got an opportunity to to have that conversation and to

02:21:54.960 to try to dissuade you from doing that but that's what our growth are here for and we're always

02:22:01.280 we're always listening and sometimes when things are overwhelming in our own heads

02:22:07.920 to the point of making folks contemplate those kind of things

02:22:15.280 it would do a lot of good and save a lot of heartache to be able to talk to somebody who's

02:22:19.840 a little bit removed from the situation get those things out of just bouncing around in your own head

02:22:24.640 and then see what things look like on the other side of that before irreparable decisions are made

02:22:32.640 do you have anything to add on that spawn

02:22:35.240 not much i i you know the severity of that i think deserves just the clarity of your response

02:22:44.200 right there is is well enough all right poetic or pros etta yes

02:22:51.440 yes is our official answer yeah i uh the i think we were just talking about that and

02:23:00.820 uh witten callahan and i were talking about that about the usage of all of translations

02:23:05.540 all the corpus of lore to look at things uh broadly and to discuss and to speak to the

02:23:13.500 gothar and talk about interpretations whether it's you know linguistical interpretations

02:23:18.260 whether it's spiritual metaphysical mythological yes we do it all we want it all we want we want

02:23:26.020 to be able to to look at all of these things i think that's so uh it just popped up in the chat

02:23:34.700 um lady who asked the question said the question was in fact a reference to a family member and i

02:23:39.260 just want to extend my condolences that you find yourself in that in that situation that's terrible

02:23:44.740 And I'm sorry you're going through that. 1.00

02:23:53.200 How would someone from the modern age gain ascension? 0.99

02:23:57.840 And I think this is a very important question.

02:24:01.660 Svon, what do you have on that?

02:24:04.520 Well, when we talk about ascension in quite a few ways,

02:24:08.820 I think the first one that most people would be very familiar with is being chosen.

02:24:15.380 by odin and that ascension upwards that ascension over the the very bridge that the gods use uh to

02:24:23.380 connect themselves to the middle directly into the heart of the of the home of the gods in heaven um

02:24:30.740 that ascension i think most everyone is familiar with and there's you know do does it happen if

02:24:35.860 you just die in battle or well the val father is the choosing father so there's a big point about

02:24:42.020 being chosen um but again context is is a lot um i think that when we speak about folk that

02:24:52.900 pass on and then their their stories their their um is still affecting the middle world

02:25:00.340 still affecting the actions and the minds and the hearts and the and the words of the folk

02:25:06.100 that also leads to an ascension because it's worth remembering that yigdrasil the roots are

02:25:15.360 connected to all the layers and so there is a like a circulatory system of this movement the roots

02:25:22.460 are of course you know deeply symbolic and but we'll use the the terminology there is is a coming

02:25:28.920 up so there's an ability for the folk soul to ascend back up and i think that that happens

02:25:37.080 by decree of the gods again but also to um there's an organizational factor that happens once

02:25:44.720 there is an ascension or or a pulling up um even after being in the middle world um again because

02:25:53.580 hamina and your effects of things are still affecting other folk you you ascend in title

02:25:59.020 you ascend in being and um the gods i think from there either bring you in to their their abode

02:26:08.140 or sometimes uh especially like in the ascension of of of the dc another great example that a lot

02:26:15.580 of people don't think of is is like for instance if there is a matron of the family that is deeply

02:26:21.660 powerful and her haminya is has long been spoken of and affected the folk her possibility of

02:26:28.220 ascending up as a dsir going through the veil passing through and being drawn back up and

02:26:35.100 being placed in that spot in between the gods and and mortal men is where i think the dsir and the

02:26:42.540 alvar preside themselves so there's ascension in a lot of different ways or avenues and i think that

02:26:49.660 A lot of people do get that when we talk about soul ascension in Ausatru is that, you know, the pieces of our souls have the ability to be placed in a strata that's beyond just simply going to a place where dead people go.

02:27:07.580 It's not seen as that way.

02:27:09.320 It's there's a reservoir of the folk soul and there is also pinpoints of where we are ascended even after death.

02:27:17.260 Yeah, so this is kind of complex and I think this my answer may go a couple of different places, but I think it's an important concept.

02:27:28.260 So fundamentally, a value that's at the core of Alcetru is the idea of worth and measuring worth.

02:27:48.200 We absolutely judge people. We judge people all the time.

02:27:51.660 And you should. And apply worth to people. That's the very root of the word worship.

02:27:58.260 is the applying of worth to someone so how your community how your family

02:28:08.740 the worth they place to your existence and the worth that the gods put on your existence

02:28:15.460 worth affects ascension fundamentally um we have developed some bad habits linguistically

02:28:25.220 of calling people good like oh he's a good guy a good guy means that he's 0.98

02:28:32.980 not a jerk not a jerk doesn't equal good guy um there's actively bad like you are 0.77

02:28:43.220 you subtract from the value of the environment you are in and then there's neutral where a whole 0.99

02:28:49.620 lot of people are that you don't really add or take away we could take you we could leave you

02:28:54.340 you know you don't not great but you're not hurting nothing that doesn't make you're not

02:28:59.220 a good guy if that's where you find yourself you are a good man or a good woman if

02:29:06.820 your family is better because you are there if your community is better because you exist if

02:29:12.820 your folk are better because you are part of it so we need to often consider throughout life

02:29:19.860 are we worthy are we worthy of our position are we worthy people what is our worth

02:29:26.980 we need to do actions and live in such a way to increase that worth

02:29:33.140 and the exact matrix of what allows you to ascend and what doesn't

02:29:37.220 um there's a lot to interplay with that on who's judgment um but fundamentally i think that it's

02:29:50.540 worthwhile and i think it's good to hold out hope that our gods make that judgment first going back

02:29:57.700 and just not ascending just passing on and going to your ancestors is not a terrible thing it's not

02:30:04.680 a terrible thing at all. It's a nice thing. It's where probably most people, what happens to most

02:30:09.000 folks. Maybe there's the possibility of after that in your next existence of something happening

02:30:16.460 where you ascend somewhere beyond the veil. There's so much of that that's such a mystery to us.

02:30:24.260 But you asked specifically about ascension. Heroes ascend. Now there's big heroes with a big H,

02:30:31.420 and there's little heroes who are like heroes of your family ascending to go with the alfar or with

02:30:37.580 the dsir because you're a special member of your family that's a type of ascension ascending to

02:30:45.540 where you get to go to one of the halls of the gods to where you become something something

02:30:49.580 closer in essence to them is another form of ascension um i know that what we're all very

02:30:57.520 used to seeing is the Valhalla story of ascension through battlefield death. But it's very important

02:31:06.400 that we don't try to limit our gods on what they can and can't do. They can invite whoever they

02:31:11.980 want to their halls based on whatever criteria they choose. That's certainly up to them.

02:31:18.020 So I don't think that battlefield death is the only path to ascension. And I also think if you're

02:31:25.160 inviting people to your halls that it doesn't make a lot of logic sense that if you happen to be such

02:31:30.840 an amazing warrior that you defeat all your foes and end up dying in bed because nobody can kill

02:31:37.040 you i don't think that really excludes you from from ascension i don't think logic bears that out

02:31:44.060 at all at some point we and i'm not claiming it works exactly like this we don't know the

02:31:51.120 the extent of how gods think or what makes gods but we know the bare minimum and the bare minimum

02:31:59.960 I think we always have to start with is like we do with any other relationship is empathy

02:32:04.440 if we assume that the gods are the very best versions of us but more but at the very base

02:32:11.220 level they're at least the best versions of us then we've got to assume that they make decisions

02:32:18.280 on based on values that that that they cherish and that they care about not based on a mathematical

02:32:25.080 rubric of who gets in and who doesn't so they weigh in the and they measure folk for ascension

02:32:31.320 now we talk about heroes heroes ascend um men ascend through overcoming and through mastery

02:32:39.800 very often they ascend through mastery of themselves or mastery of the situation or

02:32:44.200 mastery of others mastery through combat prowess mastery through excellence in a you know in a

02:32:54.120 vocation or a uh a skill set mastery through overcoming their physical limitations or their

02:33:00.120 mental limitations and transcending and becoming more um that's at the very root of masculine

02:33:06.360 ascension whereas feminine ascension is through devotion and through through motherhood and

02:33:13.800 through being there being that loyal support of of things being that stalwart that builds the

02:33:22.600 family and births heroes female ascension occurs a lot through deep deep devotion

02:33:32.600 so those kind of things elevate people towards hero status and the heroes ascend we also believe

02:33:39.080 that um the afa heroes that we douse true heroes that in the afa we've honored with days of

02:33:44.440 remembrance we all believe all of those folk have ascended and we celebrate them one thing

02:33:50.840 that we believe helps ascension is we believe in an idea of posthumous ascension if we

02:33:57.720 spread someone's fame to where it is resounding in the halls of the gods and in the other world

02:34:03.800 because we have told the story so much and celebrated them so much it ups their status it

02:34:10.280 ups their uh it ups their fame and in essence it ups their worth if we can do great things in honor

02:34:18.680 of or in the name of someone that we cherish that we want to see ascend in the afterlife

02:34:27.240 there's carry over there and so one thing we can do to love ones who've passed is continue to speak

02:34:33.640 their name to sing their praises to sing of their deeds to do great things in their honor

02:34:40.840 those things help that person to ascend on the other side and those are some ideas about modern

02:34:48.680 ascension if we ex okay next question is if we explore our own personal relationship with the

02:34:55.240 gods and travel to our ancestral lands like our founder stephen mcnalen uh can we develop the

02:35:01.720 same relationship with our gods no of course not no relationship between any two people is ever

02:35:09.240 the same but by doing that can you develop a very powerful relationship with your gods absolutely

02:35:17.480 but each of our relationships with our gods is going to take a very different form

02:35:23.320 maybe by doing that yours will be even greater than our founders maybe it'll just be very

02:35:28.840 different but i would encourage everyone to uh to travel and try to connect themselves with the

02:35:36.360 lands of their ancestors with their history with where they come from and i think that's

02:35:40.520 bound to help you have a much more powerful relationship with your gods whoever you might be

02:35:48.920 is the bestowment of power by women the reason why idun is often depicted holding the basket

02:35:55.560 of apples over the womb what are your thoughts fawn yeah well we talked about the the symbology

02:36:04.440 there the most of the paintings and pictures and things came you know fairly on later especially

02:36:11.080 in the romantic period but yes i think that is a deep in inward folk expression of that that that

02:36:22.200 that that in imbuement is uh whether we talk about it being natal or whether we talk about

02:36:29.820 it being from the core or from the bosom or from the the belly the idea of the source the core the

02:36:36.900 threshold um yes that symbology is there at very point in in bringing that up and and and seeing

02:36:43.860 that and that that exactly is the kind of mindset that you know should be encouraged and seen as

02:36:51.080 yeah you see that and you should tell others and or do you see this as well because that is where

02:36:58.360 we see that that cohesiveness of i don't know that the inspiration of an age i was watching

02:37:04.360 over the um comments somebody even had used the word zeitgeist and yes again that's the that

02:37:10.120 that expression 100 i think you're absolutely right in noticing that as well so we have questions

02:37:17.320 about the origins of the term arian european scholars use the term arian to identify the

02:37:23.160 indo-european or indo-germanic peoples who settled throughout india persia europe thousands of years

02:37:31.720 earlier would we welcome these people into the afa so that's most often a very big hypothetical

02:37:43.560 um on the term arian yeah those are our people that swept across asia and europe

02:37:54.360 conquering and developing civilization and doing amazing things and the extent of that

02:38:02.600 well i mean you could argue that the extent of that in the modern age goes to you know australia

02:38:07.400 new zealand in the new world but in the in olden times as it were the two extreme ends of that

02:38:14.600 were ireland and iran both of which words mean the land of the arians so the question being

02:38:23.000 you know would we let persians and indians into the afa that's a big what if and the imagery it

02:38:31.800 It conjures up is, you know, makes people cringe because I think we have a misunderstanding of what

02:38:38.620 that means. The population of Aryans that went into Europe are made of the same people that had

02:38:46.420 stayed in Europe. So you end up with white folks. The population that settled in India and in Iran 0.96

02:38:54.160 very you know over the centuries over the millennia have um been diluted by other

02:39:02.540 populations and by the native populations of those areas to such a degree that they're no longer us

02:39:09.440 they're they're something different um in theory if there was some high caste indian that was

02:39:16.420 hiding in some remote part of india that never his people never intermixed with with dravidian

02:39:22.100 people over the okay but i think that that's highly highly fanciful now i think you find

02:39:31.220 more enclaves similar to that in iran but our standard has always been in the afa and continues

02:39:37.940 to be if you're white if you look white if you identify as a white man and if other people who

02:39:45.060 see you identify you as that then you're our people um i'm not concerned with the migratory

02:39:54.100 patterns of your ancestors as long as you are clearly like the rest of us

02:40:00.420 it's not the most satisfying answer to some folks asking a question but it is the honest answer

02:40:08.180 i think you can look at iranians and you can look at jason georjani that i think a lot of

02:40:13.380 people may be familiar with or you can look at the iron cheek and i think that they're you know

02:40:19.380 two very different looking folks so um that's just something to think about but yes aryan people 0.88

02:40:27.700 wherever they find themselves if they look like the rest of us and are obviously the

02:40:32.580 rest of us can join the afa and should join the afa um i have a question is there

02:40:40.580 there okay if keevi and russ was uh co-op was occupied by old norse finnish and slavs who

02:40:54.260 traded with each other in the 9th to 13th centuries who would have occupied that territory from 1 a.d

02:41:01.940 to 20 a.d it's a very specific question

02:41:11.460 it's fine do you have any insight on who would have lived in kiev

02:41:18.420 from 1 a.d to 20 a.d well we spoke about uh the uh you know the the kievian russ as far as they're

02:41:28.420 uh creating the the the structure of kiev in on the coast of the black sea but that there were

02:41:35.860 people before there there was people when the when the guttons moved into that area there

02:41:40.660 were people living there uh they they made mention of it but they came in and they they took over

02:41:46.180 and then um they established you know in the same spot again because kiev is is um you know

02:41:54.900 named after their influence from the kievian ruse but we do know that the the guttons when they

02:42:01.140 traveled from the black sea they they went over the the southern land and entered into the aegean

02:42:07.300 sea and attacked uh athens um you know during the migration periods uh in the early early um

02:42:17.300 times when you know this was one of the first of the noted migrations um you know they they helped

02:42:23.940 establish but this was before the you know the uh invasion of the huns the um the gutanish people

02:42:30.180 moved into those areas and and noticed and the guttons were a conglomerate of tribes like much

02:42:35.940 like the alamani or the soebian nations they moved in and uh there were people living there they 0.96

02:42:43.140 integrated them or they you know conquered them removed them sent them you know running 0.99

02:42:51.060 a lot of times uh the folks that you know when they were leaving those areas because the guttons 1.00

02:42:54.900 moved in they were the first ones to tell the the romans and the greeks that what was going on up 1.00

02:42:59.940 there um and then of course they got hit from the east by the huns and um were uh for many years 0.93

02:43:07.620 brought under subjugation of the huns um but were not seen as huns they were seen as gutins that

02:43:16.500 were kind of again the the eastern folk that had came in and did the very same thing that gutins

02:43:22.580 had done you know these layers were all established in in um before the kievian russ came down from

02:43:32.340 uh ultimately from sweden you know moving in eastward uh into uh you know russia and then down

02:43:40.260 and southward um so there's a lot of layering there but there is yeah the the eastern germanic folk

02:43:48.260 uh that spoke the you know the gutanish language uh and then the the folk that were there before

02:43:54.100 and those folk you know that's a lot of you know the the the pre-ancestors to what we would call

02:44:00.180 the slavs um you know that that was a a huge intermixing time because the language the the

02:44:07.540 writing systems the architecture and stones and stuff there's they show a huge blend of influence

02:44:13.140 between the germanic slavic and even again eastern hunnic um influences and then even before that

02:44:19.940 the scythians you know i would assume they were thracians yes they're thracians and dashians

02:44:26.420 or docians yeah prior to uh you know in the first couple centuries a.d but it's a it's very much a

02:44:37.380 crossroads of many different points of conquest but the vast majority of those are are different

02:44:42.820 branches of arian folk and it's even mentioned in the bible that you know the the the people above

02:44:49.860 um the the most eastern side of greece and into where it would be thrace thracians uh you know

02:44:57.060 they're mentioned as you know having cattle having iron using chariots or wagons um eating a lot of

02:45:05.140 dairy and beef uh even the egyptians mentioned it uh going all the way back that far saying that the

02:45:12.020 the people above um the area like say you know like the levant just above that those people were

02:45:20.420 most certainly uh folk of of various branches again and scythia is like an an interesting one

02:45:27.620 i saw a map recently where they you know the as from a roman perspective they listed scythia as

02:45:32.900 being all the way far east into into uh what would be now china so i mean and that's interesting

02:45:39.940 in the context of things, but how they viewed the migrations of those people moving back and

02:45:45.600 forth from the steps. But yeah, there's a long list of layered people in that area and all of

02:45:52.540 them having connections, you know, as folk. So we've got another question. What about

02:45:58.120 ascension in a more Greco-Roman sense? Heracles, Achilles, Perseus, Theseus. Is there some form

02:46:07.080 avows a true demigod sigurd comes to mind as one of the greats but he doesn't seem to be regarded

02:46:14.440 in the same manner of heracles and his ilk and what would make a modern hero fit amongst these

02:46:21.880 ranks do our afa heroes hold this regard um no and i think that it's

02:46:37.080 I'm trying to think of the right words for it. First, you mentioned demigods. Those heroes of Greco-Roman antiquity are all semi-divine and were semi-divine in their life.

02:46:54.340 um you know heracles is the son of zeus those those all of those heroes you mentioned are

02:47:04.460 relations to the gods in a very literal very tangible way and exist in a in a mythic time

02:47:11.160 in a mythic place that the reality of their deeds that got them there are exalted and beyond

02:47:20.580 beyond historical examination. So it's hard to, it's very hard to take a modern person and compare

02:47:28.800 them to Achilles. That's a difficult thing to do. The heroes that the AFA celebrates are all heroes

02:47:40.200 of our faith, our faith specifically. And the other folks you mentioned are existing in a society

02:47:47.080 where their devotion to their gods is a given and they're so they're not

02:47:56.140 they don't have to be overtly heroes of their church because the context of their relationship

02:48:04.240 to their gods was inherent in the story so in modern times I think there's a lot of people

02:48:11.560 that have the kind of heroic battlefield prowess that might put them amongst that echelon of hero

02:48:22.680 but it would certainly be looked at in a very different light because we have such a

02:48:28.760 such common history to go through we can we can look at them in a very

02:48:32.840 a much more realistic light as opposed to the light of great antiquity to see their flaws up

02:48:43.760 close or to see the things of them that dim some of that shine that we can't you know we can't

02:48:51.020 parse through things about perseus that might make somebody you know make him have real

02:48:57.200 characteristics that we that we don't like it would be a much easier thing to do with a person

02:49:03.120 that we knew in the modern age um certainly there are great heroes and great warriors that are are

02:49:09.920 of that caliber i think that you know there are medal of honor winners that probably deserve that

02:49:18.640 kind of exaltation i'm sure there are iron cross uh recipients that deserve that kind of exaltation

02:49:24.560 there's people that have achieved that kind of battlefield prowess to be mentioned in amongst

02:49:31.840 the likes of achilles but i think unfortunately there's such a big separation between

02:49:37.840 those men of such an ancient past and modern people that we have so many

02:49:42.000 historical details about to compare them fairly in the same light i think is unfair

02:49:47.680 um but that's part of why we're doing our series on our heroes is to try to elevate that knowledge

02:49:54.160 of them and that celebration of them our people have moved so far away from the cult of the hero

02:49:59.680 that was such a beautiful standout of greco-roman uh paganism that we need to bring some of that

02:50:07.360 back in celebrating our great men and our great heroes um maybe when we establish that cult and

02:50:14.480 we're able to do that better then some of our heroes will have names that ring with the same

02:50:20.640 glory that uh that achilles does what are your thoughts fun well i'm i mean when we talk about

02:50:28.040 heroes like perseus and the the the the forces being fought and and the goals being attained of

02:50:37.600 those heroes that's i see that a lot in in uh the same regards as we see with like sigurd or beowulf

02:50:44.300 Um, but Heracles or Hercules is an interesting one because we see the grand mythos of Hercules

02:50:53.740 going beyond mortality.

02:50:55.820 And, and, you know, I, I would argue that there's aspects of the striker in Hercules

02:51:01.000 that, um, perhaps were shed by the Hellenics and then later adopted down into Hercules

02:51:08.520 as a as a form that was seen as um you know more acceptable in a uh demigod but you know

02:51:16.420 when you see connections of of hercules being this striker uh that's fighting these forces you know

02:51:22.900 he's clearly even beyond mortal um in those regards yeah i uh i mean there is an interesting

02:51:30.720 point to be made when when frey sends skirner uh gareth asks him are you are you a god are you an

02:51:38.420 elf are you a man he says and i am not i am not and so uh one of the things i think that is

02:51:44.640 important from the gods is that i would say the demigod aspect um could also be either we've

02:51:54.700 theorized or like debated and conversed about the idea of the focusing of the gods in avatar form

02:52:03.980 when we talk about perhaps like shield sheafing who's mentioned in beowulf um being the the

02:52:10.860 personification or the focused energy of um fray or uh or you know and skirner skirner also being

02:52:19.660 that manifestation of a focused sense of them uh and that way i think would be the closest thing

02:52:26.620 i would see as a demigod as a kind of like a an emissary in between so it's more of a top down

02:52:33.100 as opposed to a bottom up kind of concept i think that differentiates our cultures um heroes are

02:52:41.260 from the middle up and i would say like demigod by definition would be from the top down you know

02:52:49.420 even arguing to like his hair mode you know he's listed as a son of odin but much like skirner

02:52:56.060 he's a he's an uh an avatar a movement forward going down the uh projecting himself

02:53:04.300 much like skirner and the being like this emissary if you will

02:53:12.940 um all right so this is another question that we get a lot but maybe there's some good

02:53:16.460 recommendations for this guy i want to study more books and learn i'm in the process of getting the

02:53:21.340 culture of the teutons and i have about finished mcdallin's also true book but are there any other

02:53:27.900 books you would recommend i get yes there's tons i would recommend you get um outside the prose

02:53:35.660 and poetic edda which we talked about earlier i would recommend you read beowulf

02:53:39.900 also there's a book called deep ancestors uh that i always recommend and think is a really

02:53:53.740 good choice it's fun do you have any recommendations on books that this folk this guy should get

02:53:59.180 uh yeah i wanted to say it correctly that's why i was i jumped over here to

02:54:04.420 to quickly look it up.

02:54:07.000 Let me see.

02:54:08.040 I'm just making sure I want to give the title correctly. 0.98

02:54:11.300 Germanization of medieval Christianity is a good one. 0.90

02:54:14.160 I think if you're looking at the lasting effects of Germanic and Teutonic 0.93

02:54:22.100 spirituality that even survived past Christianity,

02:54:25.620 that's a more nuanced one.

02:54:28.720 I don't know if that, you know, is the best, but let me see.

02:54:37.420 I'm looking it up right now just to make sure I'm giving you the correct title.

02:54:46.940 Okay.

02:54:55.160 Here we are.

02:54:58.720 oh it's not coming up um the the myths and legends of ancient europe um it has a kind of

02:55:07.840 one for one connection between the teutonic and the celtic um expressions of the of of faith

02:55:15.260 amongst the gods um uh it's myths and legends of yeah i think it's myths and legends of

02:55:21.600 pagan europe um that one was a a great book because it really did show some interconnections

02:55:32.020 between the teutonic people yeah myths and symbols of pagan europe um early scandinavian

02:55:39.320 and celtic religions this is a great book um that really does cover in little sections so that when

02:55:46.200 read this book like ascendancy by heroism funerary rites uh the cult of the of the head like the idea

02:55:55.880 of um germanic and gallic culture the the idea of the head the face um and what it might have

02:56:03.960 represented in different aspects like with the gauls and their war trophies of head but also like

02:56:10.920 thor's effigy often being depicted as just the head with a glaring face um so there's a lot of

02:56:17.640 really cool things and it's easily digestible because topic by topic small little sections

02:56:24.360 um and it really gives great insight to some of the spiritual um motivations of our ancestors so

02:56:31.480 that's i i like to recommend that one because it's it's just fun to read um it's not dry even

02:56:36.600 though you would think but yes it's hr ellis davidson and i always for some reason get davidson

02:56:43.080 and hollander jumbled up in my head but that's why i wanted to make sure myths and symbols in pagan

02:56:48.920 europe that's a good one okay so last question of the night and this is something that comes up a

02:56:54.360 lot and it gets answered but i know people have a lot of emotional ties to it uh interesting to

02:57:01.000 what i was hearing gothe said about if we look the same and identify as white as i have blonde hair

02:57:07.800 green eyes and to looks i am white but i have 10 african in my dna along with a small percentage 0.97

02:57:15.400 of puerto rican and when i asked in a group chat my soul would be ripped in two is this true

02:57:23.960 here's the thing i didn't just say if you identify as being white if you look white i also

02:57:30.120 i said if you look like us and if other people identify you as that so it's important that

02:57:35.560 other people see you as a white person and that you see yourself as that but here's the thing is

02:57:40.520 you don't following the chat over in the side you obviously don't see yourself that way because

02:57:47.480 you're asking the question and you've asked the question it sounds like in a couple of different

02:57:51.480 groups you are very aware and you in your mind are very much think that you're mostly white

02:58:00.760 but think that there's lots of you that's not my example is you know any of our people

02:58:08.360 very often the united states in the south specifically in southeast everybody's got

02:58:13.880 some legend about having a cherokee princess great grandmother most of the time that's not true but

02:58:20.280 it's a very common thing and if it turned out to be true that one cherokee woman way back at some

02:58:26.520 point and you had no knowledge of it that's not the biggest crisis the biggest crisis is when we

02:58:34.280 as a group have to deal with your conversation about how ten percent black you are and how 0.84

02:58:41.000 puerto rican you are that's part of the thing isn't just about you because one of the things

02:58:46.440 in australia that's really important is the group and the effect that a member has on the group

02:58:51.640 when we evaluate letting somebody into the australia focus assembly or not it's not just

02:58:56.280 whether it's good for that individual to be there it's whether it's good for the group if that

02:59:01.160 individual is there and if you're going to come in and the point is how other you are then that

02:59:09.080 breaks up what's very special that we have that you don't get to experience a lot of other places

02:59:13.480 the homogeneity of the astro folk assembly being one people with a shared heritage and a shared 1.00

02:59:19.740 commonality is broken when someone comes in and their focus is on all of the things that make 0.92

02:59:25.300 them separate and different if you again i don't know you personally but i have to say this is a

02:59:34.080 you know as an example if you were not internally conflicted if your soul were not pulled in

02:59:42.560 multiple directions. And if you did not consider yourself not white, I don't think that you would 0.71

02:59:48.140 be asking the question that you're asking. I think you wouldn't have brought up the percentage of

02:59:54.580 African or the percentage of Puerto Rican. I think you would have, if you really look and are as you 0.96

03:00:01.380 say you are, then you would have just gone with that and it would have worked out fine. The second

03:00:06.220 you bring up that other that's when all of us then look at you as as something other and i do think

03:00:13.900 that's a very real concern so as a separate separate thing besides you as a specific study

03:00:19.900 and i hope that you didn't find that rude it wasn't intended to be um but when you do have

03:00:26.460 somebody of a very significantly mixed heritage you know somebody who's you know half black and

03:00:32.300 half white i do think there's a very serious soul struggle there that goes on internally having

03:00:38.220 nothing to do with membership in the astro folk assembly or not just as a person i think there's a

03:00:44.300 tremendous struggle internally on where one belongs what gods accept them what gods don't

03:00:50.780 what they do where does their soul go how do all these things work i think it's a tremendous

03:00:56.540 um conundrum that so many people do find themselves in in this day and age and unfortunately i don't

03:01:02.460 have a good clean answer for it the answer for it is i would advise those situations not occur

03:01:07.900 before they before they exist but once they do it's a it's a very serious thing and i know that

03:01:13.580 it's been a very difficult thing for a lot of folks who go through swan do you have any thoughts on it

03:01:25.980 it's fine i think you're muted i see your face but i don't see i don't hear you

03:01:37.340 sorry yep my uh my my clock was uh was ringing in the background there

03:01:41.820 um just to reiterate what you were saying is that a lot of people in this day and age see themselves

03:01:47.500 individual sense and they only see themselves in the individual sense and i think that's

03:01:53.100 people hyper focusing to on on our you know genetics and oh i did this genetics test and

03:01:59.820 it says i'm one you know one percent sub-saharan african and three percent uh iberian or i don't

03:02:09.340 know it's just they the idea is that when they focus entirely only on the individual as their

03:02:16.700 who they are, they have a tendency to forget that what is going on before them when they

03:02:24.460 encounter the folk assembly is that we are about our cohesion, about our, you know, our

03:02:33.500 connectiveness, our collectiveness together, our shared sense of who we are, our identity,

03:02:40.980 why we choose the words we choose is because these are words that we've named ourselves that

03:02:45.780 haven't been named by others i think we use the word white because it's culturally

03:02:51.300 clarifying as far as in our in english and things like that but when we say about aryan or teutonic

03:02:57.620 or germanic and things like that um that cohesion is something that when people come in as an

03:03:04.340 individual they they are conflicting with themselves and then they present that out

03:03:10.580 yes to a cohesive group that's going to make you uh you know an an outsider an outlander and um

03:03:22.500 so yeah just to emphasize what you were saying is that a lot of people don't ever consider that

03:03:27.060 point um you know again totally within reason that people uh engage everything from the individual

03:03:36.180 perspective but not seeing or understanding that when you come into you know any group if there was

03:03:44.020 a person again like you had mentioned who's like perhaps half black half white and they try to

03:03:48.740 enter a cohesive group that's based off of say i don't know being afro-caribbean or or being african

03:03:56.740 entirely like you're ruben gone and african and you come in and say well i'm but i'm this and i'm

03:04:03.060 that and this is that that immediately it's like you're you're the individual uh highlighting

03:04:09.540 things to a collective group and they then that's that's lines are made because the collective group

03:04:16.580 has a wall has an edge and uh i think a lot of people get shocked by that um but they don't see

03:04:23.860 it that you know it can apply anywhere and every group has its ability to define those edges

03:04:29.780 some groups are porous some groups are based off of um you know your economic standard it doesn't

03:04:35.860 even matter your ethnicity or spiritual outlook could be economic it could be uh regional um

03:04:44.260 like look at some of the native american groups you know where they're um some reject other

03:04:50.500 groups and then other like other fellow native american groups and then others have like

03:04:54.500 cohesion together like up in the northwest with like lakota and sue and things like that um

03:05:00.820 everybody has their ability to define their collective edges and then maintain those and um

03:05:08.500 so i think it's important if folk come in they are folk they see themselves as folk

03:05:15.140 other people see them as folk that's that's where they're starting to kind of break away from um

03:05:23.620 hyper individualization and understanding the collectiveness of the group and the tribe and

03:05:27.780 the folk and the people um you know if we say you know the other iranians you know they but if they

03:05:35.540 look like folk you know at what point are we spiraling you know at the other the other sense

03:05:42.980 too is that a lot of times the answer that comes about is if there's somebody that's non-folk and

03:05:47.220 they try to join the afa and there have been people that have tried to do that the encouragement

03:05:52.100 of them going and seeking their heritage, seeking their people, the way they look, the way they

03:05:58.440 identify, the way they know. When they see themselves in the mirror, they're not folk.

03:06:02.660 They are what they are. They should go and seek that out. It's just not here. I think that shocks

03:06:10.400 a lot of people. And people don't like that because we're in such a hyper-individualized

03:06:14.900 society. But you mentioned that all these groups do it. So many groups do. I think that people are

03:06:21.780 shocked because we're we're honest about about what that we do it and i think more honesty is

03:06:29.220 is better than less but anyways that's the last question we have for tonight it's been a great

03:06:35.460 show swan thank you so much for joining us once again folks look forward to these shows i know

03:06:41.940 that uh that everybody is excited to have you on here you're you're such a very knowledgeable source

03:06:48.020 and we appreciate having you on thank you so much for having me it's been it's been fun wild ride

03:06:54.980 all right guys hope you all have a great night i look forward to seeing you all again next week

03:06:58.900 hail the gods, hail the folk, hail the AFA, remember that victory never sleeps.

03:07:28.900 Transcription by CastingWords

03:07:58.900 Thank you.

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Asatru Folk Assembly - March 23, 2023

3⧸22⧸23 Victory Never Sleeps, Episode 37 - Forseti

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