How many members here are Odinists, Asatru, or whatever you may call yourself? How long have you been a believer and how did you discover it?
I was raised in a krisjian family and forced to go to church, Sunday school, etc. I never felt anything for their beliefs and didn't believe in their bible, prophets or the desert god. About 6 months ago I got the Therion cd Secret of The Runes. It deals with the ancient beliefs and contains one song for each of the nine worlds as well as an intro and outro. This led to Richard Wagner's Ring of The Nibelung. From there I began researching the web and reading books. An excellent website is Northvegr. They do an excellent job of keeping the true ancient traditions from being infected with new age or wicca elements which are quite common in some belief systems I've found. For books, you've got to start with the Eddas. The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturleson written about 1000 CE after Snorri's conversion to krisjianity to preserve the stories and beliefs of his ancestors. Unfortunately the krisjian influence is easily apparent in his writings. The other must read is The Poetic Edda. I have the Oxford World's Classic edition. I greatly prefer the Poetic over the Prose. From there you can read the Sagas and there are alot of them.
I think it's great how more and more I'm seeing people wearing Thor's Hammers and hearing bands like Amon Amarth who are trying to make people aware that the ways of our ancestors are not vanished, but are actually in resurgence.
I was raised in a krisjian family and forced to go to church, Sunday school, etc. I never felt anything for their beliefs and didn't believe in their bible, prophets or the desert god. About 6 months ago I got the Therion cd Secret of The Runes. It deals with the ancient beliefs and contains one song for each of the nine worlds as well as an intro and outro. This led to Richard Wagner's Ring of The Nibelung. From there I began researching the web and reading books. An excellent website is Northvegr. They do an excellent job of keeping the true ancient traditions from being infected with new age or wicca elements which are quite common in some belief systems I've found. For books, you've got to start with the Eddas. The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturleson written about 1000 CE after Snorri's conversion to krisjianity to preserve the stories and beliefs of his ancestors. Unfortunately the krisjian influence is easily apparent in his writings. The other must read is The Poetic Edda. I have the Oxford World's Classic edition. I greatly prefer the Poetic over the Prose. From there you can read the Sagas and there are alot of them.
I think it's great how more and more I'm seeing people wearing Thor's Hammers and hearing bands like Amon Amarth who are trying to make people aware that the ways of our ancestors are not vanished, but are actually in resurgence.
I do not practice asatru (or whatever) tho! I just love viking mythology and will probably read the book mentionned above.
