The Runes

The Runes is a complete guide to runic divination and reflection, featuring new, word-for-word translations of original sources. J. Hamburger combines deep respect for the ancient texts with years of practical rune reading experience to bring you a truly authentic and inspiring guide book.Rune reading is a tool for gaining insight, using ancient symbols to challenge and inspire. Some see it as divination-a way of tapping into hidden knowledge. Others use it for self-reflection or focusing intention. Consulting the runes can be like talking to an old friend: you may know the truth, but sometimes you need to hear it before you believe it. Rune reading uses your intuitive wisdom to help you see a little further, feel a little deeper, and reach a little higher.Before Christianity spread to northern Europe, the indigenous peoples of that region were Germanic tribes, like the Anglo-Saxons, Goths, and Norsemen. Runes were the letters of their alphabets. Over time these letters developed rich symbolic meanings, passed down through poems and myths. Like most pre-Christian cultures, the Germanic peoples were polytheistic, and they revered natural elements as sacred. When you pick up the runes, you are entering a vibrant world, grounded in nature and everyday life, yet full of heroes, gods, and mythology.Most of what we know about runes comes from just a few ancient poems. Some books pick and choose the easier elements from each poem, while overlooking anything too difficult or unpleasant. But it's clear from the poems that runes have a dark side-and we know from history that the people who used them were both fearless and fearsome. This book doesn't leave anything out. All of the mystical beauty is there, and so is the fighting spirit. The Runes gives you strong, unfiltered runes with a hard-enough edge to face anything that comes up.