Whatever those two were going on about, and I don't particularly care about their personal grudges, they do touch on an interesting point.
How important would you say is ancestry?
Is blood or the land more important? Are neither important, just mindset?
And, of course, the related question: Can you follow the Celtic year in the southern hemisphere? On the equator?
Can someone of African descent connect to the Astaru? Can a Celt understand Christianity? Can a white boy practice Vodou?
In my opinion, mysticism should go above all this- direct communion with ultimate reality should look beyond things like religion and race.
I've learnt things from Kemeticism, Mithraism, Christianity, Sufism, Buddhism as well as the european pagan and occult paths- lots of Middle Eastern/Eastern religions that a white person shouldn't really have any connection to.
But I'm fascinated what others think.
How important would you say is ancestry?
Is blood or the land more important? Are neither important, just mindset?
And, of course, the related question: Can you follow the Celtic year in the southern hemisphere? On the equator?
Can someone of African descent connect to the Astaru? Can a Celt understand Christianity? Can a white boy practice Vodou?
In my opinion, mysticism should go above all this- direct communion with ultimate reality should look beyond things like religion and race.
I've learnt things from Kemeticism, Mithraism, Christianity, Sufism, Buddhism as well as the european pagan and occult paths- lots of Middle Eastern/Eastern religions that a white person shouldn't really have any connection to.
But I'm fascinated what others think.
How important would you say is ancestry?
Is blood or the land more important? Are neither important, just mindset?
All three are of utmost importance. We cannot ignore our physical ancestry and hope to attain any sort of spiritual understanding. Who we are is based on who we were, and what our ancestral power is says everything about "who we were" in the greatest sense.
Of course, it is foolish to consider this in terms of "race", which is were most modern Asatruar go wrong. Culture is a reality, and I personally am a "Meta-culturalist". Our ancestral powers are tied to spiritual cultural patterns from the past, which is why we feel deep-seated attractions to certain patterns of culture, ancient or modern.
Of course, some people are merely interested by how much money they can make off of others by writing books about lost cultures, like the Aztec. But they need not concern us here.
You don't have to be genetically related to a people to "become part" of their spiritual stream, their inner reality, or what have you. But it doesn't happen overnight. It requires great effort and dedication. Having an ancestral connection simply gives you easier access, and no matter who you are or what you go on to do, you ALWAYS have a right to your own ancestral power-roots. No one can take that away from you. It's an inborn and innate quality of power to your own body, mind, soul, and spirit, which you share with others who lived long ago and still exist in the inner world, where they affect you still, no matter how unconscious you may be of it.
You say "Mysticism should go above all this", but that is a very modern opinion. In the old days, "mystical" wasn't seperate from the Land and the organic realities of who and what you were. Mysticism today seems to be escapism, more than grasping reality.
Spirits are spirits; they are not ruled by human cultures, but humans are affected by human cultures, both now and from the past. That is the real point. Of course a white boy can practice Vodou. But he'd do better, much better, dealing with his own spiritual and physical ancestry first. OF course, many "white" boys have african in them now, so that's a moot point.
Very modern as in about 2000 years old, yes. I fully admit I'm rooted in the ideas that originated alongside Alexander the Great and the rise of philosophy, not in shamanism.