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Internet Book of Shadows, (Various Authors), [1999], at sacred-texts.com
ASATRU
Rathulvf Jamieson
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| Asatru is a term virtually unknown outside pagan circles. It's
| the pagans who have no idea what Asatru is that believe that it has
| any connection with the Nazis. Maybe you need to explain in more |
detail what Asatru is?? I'd be interested in that myself.
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Greetings, Adrienne. I know that Grendel will answer this, however
maybe a literal translation won't hurt either. Simply put from a
historical view, Asatru is a combination of two words:
Ase, pl. Ases [pron. `ace']: The gods and goddesses of
consciousnessintheTeutonicpantheon, governingthepowers
of sovereignty and physical force (ON Ass; AEsir).
troth: Religion, being loyal to the gods, goddesses and
cultural values of the ancestors (ON tru, OE treowth).
true: Adjectiveform of"troth," canmean "loyal."A "true
man" is a man loyal to the gods and goddesses of his
ancestors.
The word is a compound of asa-, "of the gods (aesir)," and -tru,
usually translated as "faith." But this can be misleading. Tru is
derived from the same root (deru-) that gave rise to "troth," "truth,"
"trust," and "true" in English. The root word "deru-" really has to
do with something firm, solid, and steadfast. The fact that the word
"tree" also comes from this word is significant as well. Therefore it
is clear that originally the term had more of the connotatins of our
"true" (loyal), "trusting," and "troth" than with the connotations of
"faith" or "belief."
Belief is the acceptance through an external authority that a given
thing is true, and perhaps that some form of "salvation" is dependent
on this belief. Troth is based on experience. One trusts that the
sun will come up tomorrow because this recurring phenomenon has been
experienced in the past. The things that one is commanded to believe
in Christianity,
Judaism, Islam, Marxism, etc., are precisely those things one cannont
experience, or those things known only to pastors, popes, rabbis,
imams,
commissars, etc. "To trust" therefore is to gain personal experience
of the
truth of a thing. The term asatru therefore most literally means
"gaining experience of the ancestral sovereign gods."
Thorsson, Edred. "A Book of Troth." St. Paul, MN: Llewellyn, 1989
This is what I based my belief on, even before I discovered
Thorsson's books. I just didn't know the "historical" meaning of the
word. I did, however, know the beauty of Asatru (the Troth) even
though it was twisted by others. I hung in there, and enjoy one of
the greater "freedoms of religion" today because of it.
Urdhr, Verdhandi, Skuld!
So is was, so it is, so it shall be!
- Rathulvf -
953
This article is excerpted from the Rocky Mountain Pagan Journal. Each
issue of the Rocky Mountain Pagan Journal is published by High Plains
Arts and Sciences; P.O. Box 620604, Littleton Co., 80123, a Colorado
Non-Profit Corporation, under a Public Domain Copyright, which
entitles any person or group of persons to reproduce, in any form
whatsoever, any material contained therein without restriction, so
long as articles are not condensed or abbreviated in any fashion, and
credit is given the original author.!
THE FORTUNE
by Richard Myers
I've seen them before at carnivals and flea markets -- dark
complexion, colorful scarves around their heads, crow's marks around
the eyes, often a babe balanced on the hip. They're harmless enough,
and I'd never before paid them any mind. Oh sure, storekeepers
complain about petty thievery, and a farmer may lose an occasional
chicken. But I'm no easy mark for Gypsy women. They leave me alone.
So it was strange when I saw two of them near the pawn shops on
Larimer Street; and the older woman said, "There's a man on a
dangerous journey."
I pointed to a newly purchased camp stove under my arm. "Good guess,"
I said. "Into the wilderness. So what else?" She stretched forth her
hand. "For three coins in the palm I shall tell what else."
I dug out three quarters and, wishing they'd been dimes, dropped
them into her hand.
"I see a difficult journey to a remote place where few travel."
"Wilderness," I repeated with an edge to my voice. "What else?"
"A high place. Very cold."
"Winter in Colorado. Another guess. Tell me what I don't know."
She dropped the coins into a pocket in her ragged old coat and turned
away. As she rounded the corner she paused. "I see death", she said
quietly. She was gone.
An empty feeling in my belly turned suddenly to laughter when I
realized that me and Chester were counting on a little death this very
weekend. We were after high-country Wapiti, the majestic Colorado elk
that roam the flat-tops. With any luck we'd put death to a couple of
'em before sundown.......
I saved the question til we'd packed the gear to a high meadow just
below Retribution Peak. I didn't want to seem too anxious for an
answer. "Chester, you believe in fortune tellin'?"
Chester kept right on settin' up the tent as he chuckled, "That what's
got you so quiet? You ain't said a word all the way up the mountain.
Someone musta told you a bad one."
954
"Gypsy woman said something about dying in the wilderness."
Chester fell silent for the briefest moment before he answered, "Hell,
you ain't dead yet, so start drivin' stakes!" "Chester, you don't
believe in nothin'" I laughed, "In any case, I'm sleepin' with my
rifle to-night."
By Saturday afternoon we'd scouted Three-Elk meadow without seeing any
sign, so we climbed the high ridges above the beaver ponds to scan the
area. It was almost dusk when we headed back through Medicine Spring
a ceremonial ground where the Cheyenne once danced the ceremony of the
sacred arrow. The Cheyenne were long gone, but in our sights were a
pair of the biggest, proudest Wapiti we'd ever seen. The bull had
already picked up the swish of our snow shoes when we topped the rise,
but Chester brought down the cow with a single shot. Grandpa Elk got
away, but we had all day tomorrow to track him down.
You might not think a Gypsy woman can see the future; and you might
not expect an elk to seek revenge for a lost mate; and I admit that in
the dark of the tent I never really saw the instrument of our
destruction. But we awakened to a bellowing like a steam train and we
fired our rifles in every direction before the tent finally collapsed.
I didn't dare move until the morning light showed Chester's skull was
cracked, and a Gypsy woman's words were ringing in my ears. ...from
RMPJ 12/86
955