[Main Blog Post] [Heathen Rosary] Draft "Hail Holy Forebears"

[jprussell]

I am so very, very close to having all of the bedes of the "Heathen Rosary" at least to a stead where you can say the whole thing, but the draft of the closing bede still feels a bit "flat," and so once again, I am asking for your help in working out what I might change about it.

Your thoughts on the "Hail Idun" and "All-Father" have been very worthwhile and truly helped them take shape, so even more so than usual, kindly share them on this one as well so I can have a full set of prayers I'm happy with and get to working out the "mysteries" to go with them.

Thanks ahead of time if you choose to share any and all thoughts, big or small.

Comments

[k_a_nitz]

Is that the right link?

[k_a_nitz]

First brief thought on the second half of the first line before I go to bed - would "seed-horn o' our eld-father" work?

Or is that too risque? ;-)

An update

[borealbear]

Hey, hope you don't mind a late reply on this, but I figured I'd give you a quick update and let you know I appreciate the ongoing effort. Anyway, after some postal mishaps I've finally received and put together the physical components of the Tally, and I'm happy with the result. Again, I know this is a serious religious project and not a LARP, but I really enjoyed matching the different parts and putting it all together.

When it comes to the Bedes themselves, though, I have to admit I'm still struggling with the translations. It's just so hard to keep the alliteration and intent intact in another language without some really torturous contortions. Especially since my ambitions are more in prose writing than poetry, which I have very little experience with.

So I think two things are becoming increasingly clear to me: first, if I'm going to practice this as presented here, I'll probably have to recite them in English as written. And second, maybe my best bet would be to take a little more time and start from scratch with the Catholic Rosary prayers as a loose template. Your Bedes are beautiful, but they also feel very personal and idiosyncratic, so maybe I'd be better served finding my own interpretations anyway (ie. more of a focus on Frigg than Idun, among other things).

Either way, I'm thankful you gave me the idea to do this, and I'm determined to find an approach that works for me eventually.

[borealbear]

Thanks for the encouragement! And yes, as I might have said before, I'm very much of the mind that there's a certain appeal to using beautiful objects as part of the practice, as long as it doesn't get out of hand. For this Tally I found some lovely oak beads, which might be more in style of the Druid Revival, but it's still a suitably regal Northern wood. For the three bigger beads, I went with ash. Personally I prefer the traditional interpretation of Yggdrasil as an ash, even if I respect the scholarly position that yew might be more "correct". For the medallion, I went with a piece of an apple branch from my own property, since I didn't find anything for sale I either liked enough or felt was worth the price. One thing this showed me is that the Etsy market for beads of tropical woods is huge, but there's not much choice for temperate trees.
In case you're curious how it ended up, here's a picture of the result: https://tinypic.host/image/Tally.24yYxf


Using the old Germanic languages could have been a good option too. Still, I'd also rather have them in my native language if possible. Speaking of which, after my last comment I had another look at the Catholic prayers, and I think I made some decent progress. I was thinking of a way to adapt the Apostle's Creed's declarations of "I believe..." with something more suited to actions and intentions, following your reasoning for the "Tree Deeming". That's when I had a realization that's probably obvious: what if prayers could also be affirmations, JMG style?

So I tried to phrase it as "I [verb]...", as if it's already a fact, which as I understand it is the idea behind affirmations. Instead of the Christian triad of declaring belief in the three aspects of the Christian deity, I made a threefold structure based around 1) the Aesir/wisdom and trust in their guidance, 2) the Vanir/peace and reciprocity and 3) the Tree/being rooted in the human and non-human community of life. I also tried to incorporate some alliteration and rhythm, without going all-in on the poetic meter. It's not the most exquisite composition of all time, but I'm reasonably happy with it. At least for a first attempt. And again, your explanation of your thinking behind your "Tree Deeming" was very helpful here as a guide.

[borealbear]

"I tend to best like the idea that It transcends earthly species and partakes of something of the essence of both ash and yew (and maybe every other tree), and so which mundane wood we choose to symbolize it is more about calling out certain aspects, rather than getting it "right."

This is probably the best way to approach it. Like you said, it's a mythic idea in any case, not a matter of botany. Still, I do have a soft spot for the ash as the one distinctive wood of Germanic tradition, and its properties and appearance also go very well with a Golden Dawn approach as I understand it - which is one reason I also got an ash wand to use for the HGD when that time comes.

"JMG's response was that prayers shouldn't necessarily follow the rules of affirmations, because they are a form of communication with a fully sentient other being, rather than a way of hammering something into your own subconscious."

True, that's a very valid point. My thought process here was similar to yours: this prayer, both in the Heathen and Catholic context, is more a personal declaration of intent towards the Gods as a whole, so I thought it was fitting. I agree that it probably wouldn't be right with the other Bedes.

Again, appreciate the encouragement, and I'll let you know when I've adapted the whole thing and hopefully gotten a chance to try it in practice (which is of course where the real value lies).