Last Friday I had an unusual experience when the vision in my left eye was affected. At the time I thought that I might be going blind but a subsequent medical examination revealed it to be an ocular or retinal migraine.
When I closed my left eye I could see a bright fiery ring, a semi-circle in fact and within the rim of this semi-circle I could clearly perceive a sequence of runes.
I blinked and closed my eyes and the same thing happened again.
After several days of reflecting on this stange episode I was reminded that the great Rune Lord Himself, Woden, our All-Father sacrificed an eye in order to gain the wisdom of the runes. We should remember that Woden did not `invent` the runes: they did not originate with Him for they are in a sense timeless. They revealed themselves to Him whilst He hung suspended on the world tree in an apparent shamanic trance state.
"I know that I hung, on a wind-rocked tree, nine whole nights, with a spear wounded, and to Odin offered, myself to myself; on that tree, of which no one knows from what root it springs.
Bread no one gave me, nor a horn of drink, downward I peered, to runes applied myself, wailing learnt them, then fell down thence."
[Poetic Edda, Havamal 140-141]
It is more than possible that whilst in this state Woden was deprived of some if not all of his normal 5 senses and he may have perceived the runes in His `mind`s eye`.
Woden sacrificed an eye to the well of Mimir in exchange for wisdom:
"The owner of this well is called Mimir. He is full of wisdom, because he drinks the waters of the well from the horn Gjoll every morning. One day All-Father came and begged a draught of this water, which he obtained, but was obliged to leave one of his eyes as a pledge for it."
[Prose Edda]
The runes are inextricably linked with the acquisition of wisdom and they have an existence which is independant of the Gods.
The great Rune Master Guido von List received the revelation of his Armanen Futhork whilst in a state of blindness which lasted 11 months following a cataract operation in 1902. Interestingly his 18 rune Futhork is compatable with the 18 rune stanza poem in Havamal, known as the Runatal.
There are two forms of initiation: that outward form which takes the format of induction or reception into a cult such as the varying degrees of profession and oaths within Odinism/Wodenism and the more personal and occult experience which comes from within, apparently initiated by a God. I believe this episode to be a form of esoteric initiation into the secrets of the runes.
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