Honest Scrap

I have been awarded the Honest Scrap by Dragon. Thank you! Glad you like my ramblings. Now in return I have to give you 10 honest facts about myself...

1. I have an awful memory, I live in mayhem!


2. I do my best to write everything down to try to be organised.


3. I don't draw and paint as often as I should do.


4. I get stressed out very easily so I need things to be tidy!


5. I organise my books in height order.


6. I like to be around people, but sometimes I need solitary confinement.


7. I have been in love with Anglo-Saxon and Norse history for a long time.


8. I am fascinated by cultural differences.


9. I would like a humble little cottage on the coast.


10. I have a reputation for being a bit eccentric.

Well those are the honest facts. I have to appologise for not writing in my blog as often as I used to. I've gotten into the habit of uploading a video every day instead. I must practice my writing! I think maybe I have quite a different manner of writing to other people. Is it a feminine way of writing? I guess it's an infromal way of writing. This is just my train of thought. I like it to be as honest and expressive as possible. I found a peice of paper from one of my old school books, I must have been about 8 or 9. It was written in Swedish and said, roughly translated, "When I'm older I want to write books, or paint paintings, or take photos and sell them." Often I look back on myself (or selves) and think I havn't changed. I've always had the same goals, always focused on the road ahead.

I need to find me some good books on Heathenism. Can anybody reccomend one? I don't want one that is too heavily Asatru influenced, or too distant from historical accuracy. I don't want somebody's modern interpretation. I want the archaeological facts. And then I can make my own modern interpretation!

Much love,

Annika x

Blog Award :)

I am happy to accept this award from geekstress.blogspot.com thank you for your kind words!

Now on to me chatting away... lately I have been reading through the Key of Solomon and Gardner's Book of Shadows - I like to read these regularly, and I can see why Gardner used the Key of Solomon rituals for his own coven. I feel myself sympathising with him. He wanted to bring back Traditional Witchcraft but he found himself lacking any ceremony or ritual. He wanted to give his coven a more religious nature, he craved the well thought out and planned rites. So he took from Key of Solomon, from Golden Dawn, from Co-Masons, etc and he tweaked them a little to be Witch-friendly. Is this a flagrant rip-off, or is it a case of immitation is the greatest compliment? Since entering Traditional Witchcraft I have gone a long time without the pomp and ceremony. Do I miss it? Maybe... I think its good to be organised in this way, to prompt yourself to do things, and to remember a formula to your workings. If you dont do something often then you're going to forget how. I feel like writing things down and following instructions from a book would be very un-traditional, not at all authentic, but it would be practical.

I havn't worked on my book in ages, I really ought to do that! I need to write things down so I can get my head straight and understand what I think! Ok I'm gonna do it.... I have to learn not to compare Traditional Witchcraft against Wicca, and let it stand alone as something seperate. I am often tempted to contrast the two and ramble on about why Wicca isn't right for me. Enough talk about Wicca already! Let's concentrate....

Social Skills

I am one of those people that gets really irked if someone pronounces something wrong, or spells something wrong. Does that make me a bad person? It just bugs me to no end? When it happens, should I just keep my mouth shut, and let the person carry on spelling and saying incorrectly? Or should I correct them, risking offending them? I'm only trying to be helpful when I correct them! I hope I don't come off as a massive bitch! I think sometimes I lack tact......... what am I saying, sometimes? My boyfriend is always commenting on how tactless and frank I am. Maybe that's a Swedish thing? If you have ever met a Swedish person, they are a very honest people, although they are also reserved. What I mean is that, Swedish people tend to only speak if spoken to. But once you do ask them something, they will give you the flat out answer. I think this kind of culture is the result of living somewhere cold, have you ever noticed, the colder the climate, the colder the people? The hotter the temperature, the hotter the temprement of the people, the more passionate they are. I wouldn't say I'm "cold" exactly, but I'm not exactly a fire of warmth and friendship. I can never understand those people who greet everybody with hugs and kisses and are constantly telling people how much they love them. That's just not the way I was brought up. In my family, hugs are for special occassions only. Kisses are in private. And "I love you"s are never heard out loud.

Does that make me a bad person? Do people see me as cold and mean? Over the years I have been trying my best to be a more social person. It doesn't come easily to me. Throughout my childhood I was a social outcast, always one of the less popular kids. I hung out with the other social rejects, the people too fat, too ugly, too gay, too smart for the popular kids. Well this definatley has its benefits! It means that I learnt to become a very tolerant person, accepting people for their differences. It also means that I got to hang out with people more clever than me, and copy their school books to get better marks. Haha. It also meant that instead of hanging out at the park getting drunk, I was alone in my room reading a book. Yes, I might be able to call myself a nerd. But then I don't really fit in with the nerds.... they like to play computer games and read graphic novels and quote cartoons. That really isn't my bag. I just like drawing and painting and studying folklore and mythology. I've always been a little "away with the fairies" in this sense.

So I grew up as a lonely book worm. This doesn't mean I don't like people. I really try to be social! But I need my down time. I need to have a few days just by myself studying and drawing, I need to be alone so I can concentrate. That doesn't mean I'm anti-social, I like meeting up with friends, just to go shopping or get drunk or whatever. I'm the kind of friend who doesn't care much what other people think of me, I will act stupid, dress bad, say outrageous things, get stupidly drunk, dance like a crazy person.... and I hope that I can be trusted as an honest person, who will tell you whether you look good in that dress, and will tell you whether I think your boyfriend's cheating on you, and will let you know if you've made some horendous grammar mistakes in your essay.

I am a person particularly concerned with the truth, with discovering mysteries, and revealing things for what they are. I love studying things, finding out why.... where does that word come from, why is it used in that way, what does it mean.... and I'm not ashamed of telling people when they have been fooled by misinformation. I would hope they'd do the same for me. Although I can see this being difficult when it comes to the matter of faith or spirituality. Whenever my sister comes to me with questions about Christianity, I will tell her the honest answers. She is an evangelical Christian herself but she's not the kind of person to sit and study something. She's more like one of the popular kids. I am the boring person who stayed in and read the Bible cover-to-cover just because I was curious. And I let her know "well actually, the Bible says such and such" or "actually Jesus was more likely to be such and such", even if it's something her church would disagree with. My sister is dyslexic so I am always happy to help her with reading and writing, and tell her what words mean. I do so because education means a lot to me. Well, how sad am I? lol

I was actually thinking about making a video about "public relations" and how to come off as an honest and friendly person over the internet. One thing that is.... possibly the most important... is the phrase "in my opinion". Always let people know "this is my opinion, you may come to your own conclusions." This is something I'm sure I forget to say a lot, but it really is important. Make it clear to people that you can accept people doing things differently to yourself. Let people know the facts and the conclusions you make from them, and then ask them to come to their own conclusions based on those facts. If I tell them "actually it's pronounced like so" and they reply "well I prefer to pronounce it differently" then that's fair enough! For heavens sake, I do the same thing. Whenever my boyfriend corrects me on my grammar or pronounciation, I will glare back at him "I'll talk how I want to talk!" n_n

Reconciling Christianity

In my studies I am always trying to unearth the hidden ways of pre-Christian Europe, but that annoying Jesus bloke is always getting in the way! There is no way we can get around the huge effect that this Middle Eastern religion has had on our home land. We could pretend it never happened, but then we will always have this mysterious dark hole where Christianity obliterated so much of our past. I feel I am being unfaithful to the old ways if I let Christianity have influence on my life, but there is no way I can avoid this! It was the monks and nuns who learned to read and write, who created their own history books of what the 'heathens' were like. They are often our only source of reference. Over the years the old and new became horribly mingled in a way that is so hard to seperate, like trying to un-mix the ingredients of a cake... how can you seperate the eggs from the flour, when they are already a bowl of indiscriminate goo? And I look at this cake mix and I think, sure it would have been nice to have eaten eggs by themself, but I'm sure this cake is gonna taste good.... ok enough with the cake metaphore! What I'm getting at is that some times I just have to accept that I am living in the aftermath of Christianity, and there is no way to turn back the clocks. What I have now is a cake! Accept it! I feel that when my ancestors forst encountered Christianity, they would have felt much the same despair, and knowing that they can never bring back what they have lost. The Church did all it could to wipe Heathenism off the face of the earth. I'm sure many would have continued to venerate the old gods, the spirits of the land, but they would always be tainted by that strange Christian taste. All the old heathen festivals continued to be celebrated, but now they were dedicated to the Saints instead of the gods, and prayers were said to Mary and Jesus rather than Frigga and Odin. Are Mary and Jesus simply pale disguises? Can we lift the veil and see Odin winking behind his disguise? Would he be chuckling to himself? Or would he be solemn and sad in the knowing that he is ever so slowly fading from this world?

In my tradition we have let the Saints into our practice. At the start of Yule we venerate Saint Lucy, followed by Nickolas, and many others. Deep down we know these are just new names for old gods. When we look at the church building, we know it was once holy ground to Heathens. When we decorate the Christmas tree we know it is really the Yule tree. When we eat the Christmas ham, we know it is really Freyr's ham. When we see a statue of 'the queen of heaven' we know it is really Odin's queen. When we celebrate the dawn rising, we know it is old mother Sol. When we see the bald head of the moon, we know that it is really old man Mani. When we leave offerings for the Tomten, we know they are the old spirits of the land. This is the Northern Tradition, one deeply entwined with the Christian imposition.

Should I feel a Catholic guilt when I enter Saint Lucy's parade? Or should I rejoice in knowing that here a heathen goddess lives on? When I first began my path of Witchcraft, I would often be visited by the spirits of Maria, Nickolas, and Lucia... and their identities were a mystery to me! There will always be that air of mystery, because we can never truly know the old heathen ways, before Christianity. That is now a 'Dark Age' which has been hidden from us. Typical to my nature, I am always looking for hidden treasures! The very idea of this challenge spurs me on! Once I have found something and revealed its truth, it is no longer exciting, and I want to delve deeper, ever deeper, into the shadows.

Texts of the Renaissance

So I'm just taking a look, a glance, at the Renaissance, and those thinkers that were to inspire the formulation of Wicca....

The Divine Pymander, by Hermes Mercurius Trismegistus, tr. by John Everard, 1650:
1:27. Of the Soul; that part which is sensible is mortal, but that part which is reasonable is immortal. 44. Nothing good upon Earth; nothing evil in Heaven. 72. Things upon Earth, do nothing advantage those in Heaven; but all things in Heaven do profit and advantage all things upon Earth. 76. Heaven is the first element. 80. What is God? The immutable or unalterable good.

2:12. These things I understood, seeing the word, or Pimander; and when I was mightily amazed, he said again unto me, Hast thou seen in thy mind that Archetypal Form which was before the interminated and infinite Beginning? Thus Pimander to me. But whence, quoth I, or whereof are the Elements of Nature made? Pimander.--Of the Will and counsel of God; which taking the Word, and beholding the beautiful World (in the Archetype thereof) imitated it, and so made this World, by the principles and vital seeds or Soul-like productions of itself. 13. For the Mind being God, Male and Female, Life and Light, brought forth by his Word another Mind or Workman; which being God of the Fire, and the Spirit, fashioned and formed seven other Governors, which in their circles contain the Sensible World, whose Government or disposition is called Fate or Destiny. 33. Pim. The Generation therefore of these Seven was after this manner:--The Air being Feminine and the Water desirous of Copulation, took from the Fire its ripeness, and from the aether Spirit, and so Nature produced Bodies after the species and shape of men.

3:3. For there were in the Chaos an infinite darkness in the Abyss or bottomless Depth, and Water, and a subtle in Spirit intelligible in Power; and there went out the Holy Light, and the Elements were coagulated from the Sand out of the moist substance. 7. And every God, by his internal power, did that which was commanded him; and there were made four-footed things, and creeping things, and such as live in the water, and such as fly, and every fruitful seed, and Grass, and the Flowers of all Greens, all which had sowed in themselves the Seeds of Regeneration.

4:19. For it is possible for the Soul, O Son, to be deified while yet it lodgeth in the Body of Man, if it contemplate the beauty of the Good. 42. The whole is a living wight, and therefore consisteth of material and intellectual. 43. And the World is the first and Man the second living wight after the World, but the first of things that are mortal; and therefore hath whatsoever benefit of the Soul all the other have: And yet for all this, he is not only not good, but flatly evil, as being mortal. 46. But the Soul of Man is carried in this manner, The Mind is in Reason, Reason in the Soul, The Soul in the Spirit, The Spirit in the Body. 47. The Spirit being diffused and going through the veins, and arteries, and blood, both moveth the living creature, and after a certain manner beareth it. 52. For God is not ignorant of Man, but knows him perfectly, and will be known by him. This only is healthful to man, the knowledge of God: This is the return of Olympus; by this only the soul is made good, and not sometimes good, and sometimes evil, but of necessity Good.

The Emerald Tablet, also known as Smaragdine Table, Tabula Smaragdina, or The Secret of Hermes, is a text purporting to reveal the secret of the primordial substance and its transmutations. This work was translated into Latin as Secretum Secretorum (The Secret of Secrets) by Johannes "Hispalensis" or Hispaniensis (John of Seville) ca. 1140 and by Philip of Tripoli c. 1243. In the 14th century, the alchemist Ortolanus wrote a substantial exegesis on "The Secret of Hermes," which was influential on the subsequent development of alchemy. One translation, by Isaac Newton, found among his alchemical papers as reported by B. J. Dobbs in modern spelling:
1. Tis true without lying, certain most true.
2. That which is below is like that which is above that which is above is like that which is below to do the miracles of one only thing.
3. And as all things have been arose from one by the meditation of one: so all things have their birth from this one thing by adaptation.
4. The Sun is its father, the moon its mother,
5. the wind hath carried it in its belly, the earth its nurse.
6. The father of all perfection in the whole world is here.
7. Its force or power is entire if it be converted into earth.
7a. Separate thou the earth from the fire, the subtle from the gross sweetly with great industry.
8. It ascends from the earth to the heaven again it descends to the earth and receives the force of things superior and inferior.
9. By this means ye shall have the glory of the whole world thereby all obscurity shall fly from you.
10. Its force is above all force. for it vanquishes every subtle thing and penetrates every solid thing.
11a. So was the world created.
12. From this are and do come admirable adaptations whereof the means (Or process) is here in this.
13. Hence I am called Hermes Trismegist, having the three parts of the philosophy of the whole world.
14. That which I have said of the operation of the Sun is accomplished and ended.

The Scale of Fluff to Fundie

Remember back in science class when you were handed a strip of litmus paper and told "acid goes red, alkaline goes blue, and PH neutral is green" ? Well, think of religion in these terms, are you acid, alkaline, or a balanced PH 7? I'm not entirely sure what colour I would turn on the litmus paper, but I am hoping it goes green! Perhaps this is the true meaning of "green spirituality"? Now, by "acid" what I mean is a high concentration of fluff. Just what is fluff? Well I would say that it is quite simply "ignorance". The fluffy pagan is someone who has no understanding of pre-Christian religion, who is completely ignorant of their roots, and will believe and perpetutate myths that have been long disproven by scholars. Most fluffy bunnies are fluffy by no fault of their own, they are simply young and naive, a new convert, who has been fed false information. Some of the fluffy bunnies are so sure that what they are being told is true, that they broadcast it from the roof tops, letting everyone know the "ancient" mysteries they have learned. There are those authors who are too lazy to site their sources and back up their facts, that they actively perpetuate false information. These are the real criminals, those who know they can make easy money from spinning a bunch of drivel they over heard in a new age shop.

So what's alkaline? Alkaline must be the exact opposite - it is someone who does nothing but research and do things "by the book". Granted, paganism has no "sacred text" but to the fundamental pagan, it is archaeology and anthropology that is the Holy Gospel. Somebody who tests a deep indigo colour on the litmus scale is someone who spends most of their time with their nose buried in a book, an "arm chair pagan". Although this person may know a great deal about history and understand the ways of the past, they have little understanding of how these facts can relate to modern life. They often live in their own Never Land, pretending time hasn't moved on since the Bronze Age. They may be so engrossed in reading that they never actually put anything they are reading about into practice.

These are the two extremes of the scale, and you can find people like this in all religions. Of course, we are all trying to live as balanced human beings, and meet that harmony of scholarship and every day practice. It may be that sometimes you swing from one side of the scale to the other. Now and then it's good to take a step back and ask yourself, what colour am I?

Racist Mythology of Atlantis

I am sure you are familiar with the myth of Atlantis, a supposed drowned island which was once a paradise of highly evolved human beings with advanced technology. This was a myth Hitler fully accepted and believed in. He believed Atlantis had been the cradle of civilization and the evolution of the Aryan race. He believed that Aryans were more evolved than other humans, that they were a seperate Race of their own. When Atlantis was submerged in The Great Flood, Aryans took refuge on the mountain tops of the Himalayas. Hitler was a self confessed Catholic, and to him the story of Noah surviving the flood was paralleled in the mythology of Atlantis. God had punished the other humans because they were impure and flawed. Only the Aryan descendants of Noah were loved by God. The Nazis had written on their belts "God is With Us" as they believed them selves to be the "chosen people" of the Bible. The Old Testament show a very tribal attitude, in which outside tribes are killed, raped, enslaved, at the behest of an angry god. Only the chosen people, the Aryan Race, were favoured by god, to reign over the earth and inherit God's Kingdom.

Hitler had many experiements carried out in the area of the Himalayas. The natives would be inspected, their skulls and faces measured, to determine what ancestry they had. It is in this area of India that the term Aryan derives, and refers to the ruling class, who had lighter skin and blue eyes. Hitler believed that the blue eyed Aryans of India were the ancestors of the Germans, and that Aryans had spread northward to populate Europe and Scandinavia, but had been contaminated by outside races. Hitler wanted to eliminate the outside races from Aryan blood, and breed a new nation of super-evolved humans. Nazis raded neighbouring countries to kidnap children with blue eyes and blonde hair, to bring them back to German orphanages where they could be trained in Nazi schools. The Nazis encouraged single young women of Aryan appearance to fall pregnant by Nazi soldiers who had been selected based on their Racial Purity. The children conceived by this selective breeding were brought up in the orphanages, or given to racially pure German families.

As Hitler believed India and Northern Europe to have common ancestry, he adopted the swastica, a symbol found in both Hindu and Norse art. Hitler believed he was serving God by carrying out the Biblical mission of achieving Aryan supremecy. The Old Norse myths were re-written to reflect the Atlantis mythology. The Norse Gods were pictured as Aryan Kings who travelled to Scandinavia from Asia.

The Prose Edda (sometimes called the Younger Edda or Snorra Edda) was written by Snorri Sturluson, a prominent thirteenth-century Icelandic poet and politician. In Snorri's view, the “historical” Odin, king of the Norse gods, was one of these "men of Asia" descended from Trojan heroes. He migrated north, founding various Norse, Swedish, Danish, and Saxon dynasties. This Odin is the one who later imparted Norse mythology to Gylfi, a Swedish king, through a deception described in the first main section of the Prose Edda.

Indra, a Hero of the Rig Veda, was thought to have been an Aryan leader. Rig Veda, Book 5, Hymn XXX:5 "When thou wast born supremest at a distance, bearing a name renowned in far-off regions, Since then even Gods have been afraid of Indra: he conquered all the floods which served the Dāsa." XXXI:3 "When out of strength arose the strength that conquers, Indra displayed all powers that he possesses. Forth from the cave he drove the milky mothers, and with the light laid bare investing darkness." XXXI:11 "I hear that thou wast born sole Lord of heroes of the Five Races, famed among the people. As such my wishes have most lately grasped him, invoking Indra both at eve and morning."

I once picked up a Theosophical book from the library and was surprised to read of the Racist Atlantis mythology. Theosophists were very interested in Indian mythology and the concept of Atlantis. In their beliefs, Humans were on a path of evolution that would lead to spiritual enlightenment. Theosophy is a doctrine of religious philosophy and metaphysics originating with Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891). Blavatsky argued that the whole humanity, and indeed every reincarnating human soul, evolves through a series of seven "Root Races". Thus in the first age, humans were pure spirit; in the second age, they were sexless beings inhabiting the now lost continent of Hyperborea; in the third age the giant Lemurians were informed by spiritual impulses endowing them with human consciousness and sexual reproduction. Modern humans finally developed on the continent of Atlantis. Theosophists believed that Aryans were the most advanced Race, and that the older Races would eventually die out.

Guido von List later took up some of Blavatsky's theories, mixing them with nationalism to formulate Ariosophy, a precursor of Nazism. The Thule Society was one of several German occult groups drawing on Ariosophy to preach Aryan supremacy. It provides a direct link between occult racial theories and the racial ideology of Hitler and the emerging Nazi party.