19. The World
As we found, three outstanding runes, Fehu, Ansuz, and Jera do not fit the Stone but got enabled by Thurisaz rune brought to the center, and, combined, give the "World" bind-rune:
Let's learn more about each of them separately and how they complement each other in the "World" bind rune, which is a result of Creation.
Ansuz Rune
This rune means "god", "mouth", and "estuary".
It starts from the synchronicity of Water, Air, Void, and Earth.
And it flows down from the Water to the Air.
At the same time, the Air descends to Emptiness.
This rune is a projection of the Will of the Sky down to the Earth.
It feels like liquid, transparent, but heavy, "Uranium" vibration, which makes expanding ripples contouring objects, contrary to similar but much softer and lighter Water-Lagus energy.
You can sometimes catch this vibration seeing grand clouds in the clear sky.
Ansuz has the power of the first Word which started the world's creation in Christian myth.
For humans Ansuz represents Consciousness, often believed to be based on Speech.
What makes this rune different, is the second, "wrong" descending bar from the Air to the Emptiness.
This is Sky built of Ymir's skull - descending bar of Thurisaz rune, brought to the center. This makes god's will prevail over the will of nearly extinct giants.
Ansuz rune is a part of asymmetry introduced into an ideally balanced universe, which caused pain and destruction, but triggered a blow of exponentially growing complexity.
It represents the rule of Æsir, powerful beings born of the Light, the spirit of the Fire, reflected in the Water, the bright image of Fire looking into the dark mirror.
In the modern community, the Ansuz rune is often associated with Odin. While it's not attested by any historical source, I still feel the presence of some truth in such a connection, so let's play with this speculation. To spell Odin's name using Elder Futhark runes and make some sense we also need to use his older proto-germanic name "Wodanaz".
So in Elder Futhark, it will be "ᚹᛟᛞᚨᚾᚨᛉ".
All these runes combined as part of a "broken" Philosopher's Stone look very intriguing:
Someone could see a one-eyed face or head in this combination.
Fehu Rune
Fehu means "wealth", "money" and "cattle" (as a main form of wealth at that time)
It's a sibling rune for Ansuz, it starts from the synchronicity of Fire, Earth, Void, and Air.
And it's doing a double raise of Light from Crystal Earth to the level of Emptiness and From Emptiness to the Air, meeting descending Ansuz in both levels.
The top bar of Fehu is the "legitimate" ascendance of Light, so connected to the "legitimate" descending bar of Ansuz it gives Love of Wunjo. The second, "rebellious" bar of Fehu ascends from the Earth to the Emptiness and connects to the "wrong" descending bar of the Sky coming from the Ansuz rune. The Second Bar represents Matter, the earth, and water of our world made of Ymir's flesh and blood.
If narrowed to human life, Fehu is connected to physical love, material success, and prosperity, which, if not well balanced, sometimes overshadows the spiritual foundation of human beings and is blamed as the source of sin by various religions.
In the modern spiritual community around a runic topic, it's common to associate Fehu with Freja. While there is also no evidence such a connection existed historically, such a connection follows the same first letter logic, as we see in the case of Ingwaz - Ingwi, Tiwaz - Tyr, and Sowilo - Sól runes, which were associated with their respective deities.
Again, to see Freja's name spelled with Elder Futhark we need to take her correspondingly older name "Fraujo" - "ᚠᚱᚨᚢᛃᛟ":
Profile of a woman with a braid on the back of her head looking to the left?
Jera Rune
We already discussed "technical" details of the Jera rune in the previous chapter, now let's focus on its meaning and sense. In our book, we use a sunwise-directed variant of Jera with the left side lower than the right side, so if you pull Jera in these opposite directions - it will rotate sunwise, symbolizing the sun, which first rises and then sets.
Jera means "harvest", "season" and "year":
It represents the cyclical nature of our world, caused by the introduced "imperfection" - the event of the killing of Ymir. In mechanics, the rotational part of the movement results from the force applied not precisely to the center of mass of the target object.
But we are not going to blame Odin for making a mistake. This game was started much earlier by someone hidden in the Emptiness. Fire and Water are not just two equal halves, they are different. And Jera is a spiral spring, winded to run the clock, the Ymir's power of time focused on the Emptiness by both descending and ascending bars of the Thurisaz rune which is the right half of Jera rune.
Entire Stone in Triplets
Separation and Reunion - Kenaz, Isa, Ingwaz
Key of the Balance - Eihwaz, Tiwaz, Algiz
The Night - Hagalaz, Naudiz, Dagaz
The Light - Sowilo, Laguz, Wunjo
Raido, Ehwaz, Uruz
Othala, Gebo, Mannaz
Perth, Berkana, Thurisaz
Ansuz, Fehu, Jera