Praxis: A Forn Sidr Primer
book recommendation
There are plenty of books out there on paganism and magick and runes.
Lots of them use a lot of flowery language to explain simple things. This can quickly devolve into fluff and woowoo. Because a lot of them conflate paganism with spiritual cherry picking: everything is one so anything is everything and vice versa. Which in my opinion is nothing more than rebranded monotheism. Which is something that irks me because it cheapens the traditions of our ancestors, traditions that were built up over generations, that the Roman catholic church tried to hide from us and certain political factions even tried to kill us for trying to preserve it.
We do our ancestors (and ourselves) a great dishonor by pretending that all traditions are the same and lead to the same outcome.
Because what happens is that we start taking things out of context and only hear what we want to hear without understanding the underlying philosophies of why our ancestors believed a certain thing. Very often this is tightly linked with the environment they lived in, an environment that was (and is) vastly different from the Middle Eastern desert regions and hot, humid jungles.
That is why I am always pleased to see authors write about Norse-Germanic traditions and history without trying to link it to faiths, beliefs and traditions outside of its (European) area. While it is fine to compare and to look for similarities, I am not a fan of pretending that they are all the same.
It’s a question I and others have often encountered from people who want to return to their ancestral roots: “Where do I start?”
This book is an answer to that question.
It provides a solid anchor for people who are overwhelmed by the vast amount of information out there in libraries online and offline.
The author did research and it very clearly shows. There is no flowery language to explain simple things. There are no interjections of foreign beliefs. It explains things very clearly and concisely. In its 124 pages it delivers what it promises, a starting point. No tangents involving long and outdrawn philosophical ponderations that distract from its essence. It sticks to the Germanic-Norse gods, their known practices and how they performed these. There is a ritual described in the book that is easy to follow and makes no use of expensive and hard to come by tools, thing our tribal ancestors did not have at their disposal either.
But it also speaks about the pitfalls of modern paganism which is definitely worth mentioning and reading about.
It is honest about the reconstruction factor of paganism in modern times. It doesn’t make any assertions about thing that are historically unclear and impossible to verify.
There is not much more I can say other than: I recommend this book to anyone interested in Norse-Germanic traditions!
I do not want to give away the contents of this book, but for those interested; it contains simple ritual, a chapter on divination, an introduction to runes, an introduction to the gods, an introduction to herbalism and its spiritual connotations, idols and altars, and more.
The author seems to want to step away from wicca’esque new agery and woowoo which is very refreshing. And instead took a step towards real revivalism, a less convoluted and cherry picked path of tradition.
In the words of Bjorn Ehkdal who has been on our No BS Pagan podcast: I can not think of any better way to venerate our ancestors than to look for what they were looking for.
Links:
Buy the book:
https://www.amazon.com/Praxis-Forn-Sidr-Primer-STARKADR/dp/B0DVMHFTWN?ref_=ast_author_dp
Author’s Substack:
I allready orderd one, when i saw your post on FB.
Came in the mail yesterday, can’t wait to get started on this one.
So happy you wrote a review of this!