Older than the New Testament, the Runes have lain fallow for more than 400 years. Akin in function to the Tarot and the Chinese Book of Changes, the Runes were last in current use in Iceland during the late Middle Ages.
The wisdom of the ancient Rune Masters died with them. Little remains but the standing Rune stones, the sagas, the far-flung fragments of runic lore, and the Runes themselves. So when I began to work with the Runes, I had scant information to go on. But function determines form, use confers meaning, and an Oracle always responds to the requirements of the time in which it is consulted – and to the needs of those consulting it. In the end, I relied on the Runes to establish their own order and to instruct me in their meanings.
The Rune stones I was working with had come to me in England: tiny brown rectangles hardly bigger than a thumbnail, with the glyphs scratched into the surfaces. The woman who made them lived on Trindles Road, in the town of Redhill, Surrey. She hadn't glazed her Runes, merely baked them in her oven – like cookies.
Along with this set of Runes came two unnumbered xeroxed sheets giving the glyphs, their approximate English meanings, and a brief interpretation for each Rune when ‘Upright’ or ‘Reversed’. To the twenty-four original futhark Runes a Blank Rune had been added, defined as ‘The path of karma: that which is predestined and cannot be avoided. Matters hidden by the gods.’ There were no instructions for using the Runes and, after a few days, the Trindles Road Runes went into my suitcase.
Almost a year passed before I happened upon them again. Alone on my Connecticut farm on a warm summer evening, unable to sleep, I went to my study and began rearranging books. And there, in their little chamois bag, were the Runes.
How the Runes taught me
As I spilled the stones out on to my desk and moved them around, I experienced the same pleasurable feeling as when I first handled them in England. And yet I didn't really know how to use the Oracle. It was then that it occurred to me to ask the Runes how they were to be consulted. I sat quietly for a time, composing myself, and said a prayer. Then I opened my notebook and wrote out this question: ‘In what order do you wish to be arranged?’
I spread out the Runes on my desk, blank sides up, and moved them around, touching each stone. Then, one by one, I turned them over, aligning them in front of me in three rows. It took only a few moments. When I was done, I sat and studied the arrangement:
I remember my first feeling was dismay that the Blank Rune, The Unknowable, had not positioned itself more dramatically, rather than simply taking its place among the rest. And then I got an eerie feeling: I had been told that the Runes could be read from right to left. Seen that way, the sequence began with the Rune of ‘The Self’, Mannaz, and ended with The Blank Rune, the Rune that signals the presence of the Divine in our lives. In other words, here was an alphabet that was at the same time a map for the self on its journey back to its Source.
I picked up Mannaz, the Rune of ‘The Self’. While I sat gazing at it, these words came to me:
‘The starting point is the self. Its essence is water. Only clarity, willingness to change, is effective now. A correct relationship to yourself is primary, for from it flow all possible right relationships with others and with the Divine.’
The Viking Runes had begun their teaching.
I worked on through the night, taking each Rune in my hand, sitting with it, meditating on its essential meaning, writing down what came to me. Now and then, when the flow dwindled, I turned to the ancient Chinese oracular system, the I Ching, and asked for a hexagram that would reveal the character of a particular Rune. The spirit of some of those readings is incorporated into the interpretations of the Viking Runes. By the time I had completed the interpretation of The Blank Rune, the sun was rising. The time was 6.31 a.m., and the date was 22 June. Without realizing it, I had worked right through the night of the summer solstice.
Since that night, I have read a great deal about the Runes and their history, the controversies over their origins, the speculations concerning their use. Only one thing is certain: beyond all the efforts of scholars to encompass them, the Viking Runes remain elusive, for they are Odin's gift, and sacred.
The gift of Odin
Odin is the principle divinity in the pantheon of Norse gods. His name derives from the Old Norse for ‘wind’ and ‘spirit’. It was his passion, his transforming sacrifice of the self, that brought the Runes to humankind. According to legend, Odin hung for nine nights on Yggdrasil, the Tree of the World, wounded by his own blade, tormented by hunger, thirst and pain, unaided and alone until, before he fell, he spied the Runes and, with a last tremendous effort, seized them.
Next to the gift of fire, that of the alphabet is the light in which we see our nature revealed. In the Old Norse poem, The Poetic Edda, Odin, the great Rune Master, speaks across the centuries. Hear Odin now:
Do you know how to cut them, know how to stain them,
Know how to read them, how to understand?
Do you know how to evoke them, know how to send them,
Know how to offer, know how to ask?
It is better not to offer than to offer too much for a gift demands a gift,
Better not to slay than to slay too many.
Thus did Odin speak before the earth began when he rose up in after time.
These runes I know, unknown to kings’ wives
Or any earthly man. ‘Help’ one is called,
For help is its gift, and helped you will be
In sickness and care and sorrow.
Another I know, which all will need
Who would study leechcraft.
On the bark scratch them, on the bole of trees
Whose boughs bend to the east.
I know a third
If my need be great in battle
It dulls the swords of deadly foes,
Neither wiles nor weapons wound me
And I go all unscathed....
A sacred game
The motto for the Runes could be the same words that were carved above the gate of the Oracle at Delphi: Know thyself. The Runes are a teacher and a source of guidance. Consider this Oracle, if you will, as a sacred game, an instrument for serious or high play. For the value of play is that it frees us from the effort of learning, frees us to learn as children learn.
The truth is that each of us is an Oracle, and when we pray we are exercising our true oracular function, which is to address the Knowing Self within. Consulting the Runes will put you in touch with your own inner guidance, with that part of you that knows everything you need to know for your life now.
One prominent modern authority for the efficacy of Oracles is the Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Jung. Jung affirmed that ‘theoretical considerations of cause and effect often look pale and dusty in comparison to the practical results of chance’. This suggests that nothing is too insignificant to be regarded as a clue to guide us in right and timely action. Consulting an Oracle places you in true present time because whatever happens in the given moment possesses what Jung calls ‘the quality peculiar to that moment’.
Experiencing a true present is something most of us find extremely difficult. We waste a good part of our lives dwelling on past regrets and on fantasies of the future. In my own life, when I jog or drive long distances, I find I am often busy reviewing ideas, sorting agendas, going over options and possibilities. Then I catch myself: I realize that miles of countryside have slipped by unseen, that I am not aware of breathing the air, not aware of the trees, the breeze, the contours and colours of the land.
Nowadays, I catch myself more and more frequently, which is a start. The ‘roof-brain chatter’ is slowly being replaced with a stillness that keeps me in the present. Once the momentum is broken, the habit will soon wither. We have only to remember: in the spiritual life, we are always at the beginning. Remembering this helps us to overcome our addiction to ‘getting ahead’. For when we experience a true present, that is where everything happens.
Consulting the Runes enables you to bypass the strictures of reason, the fetters of conditioning and the momentum of habit. For the brief span of interacting with the Oracle, you are declaring a free zone in which your life is malleable, vulnerable, open to change.
We are living in an age of radical discontinuity. The lessons come faster and faster as our souls and the universe push us into new growth. Familiar waters seem suddenly perilous, alive with uncharted shoals and shifting sandbars. The old maps are outdated; we require new navigational aids. And the inescapable fact is: you are your own cartographer now. Just as the Vikings used the information provided by the Rune casters to navigate and sail their ships under cloudy skies, so now you can employ the Runes to modify your own life's course. A shift of a few degrees at the beginning of any voyage will mean a vastly different position far out to sea.
Whatever the Runes may be – a bridge between the self and Self, a link between the Self and the Divine, an ageless navigational aid – the energy that engages them is our own and, ultimately, the wisdom as well. Thus, as we start to make contact with our Knowing Selves, we will begin to hear messages of profound beauty and true usefulness. For like snowflakes and fingerprints, each of our oracular signatures is a one-of-a-kind aspect of Creation addressing its own.
From The Book of Runes, text copyright 1982, 1990, 1993 by Ralph Blum, published in the UK in 2002 by Eddison Sadd Editions.
|
Inspirational features 
