I am just starting writing another novel called ‘Ogham Web’. It is centred in the Ogham Pathways, and I have already written the Novel ‘Rune Magic’, and this makes me want to reflect on the difference between these two ancient alphabets, and I’d be really glad to hear from you if you have insights on this issue:
I have been teaching the Runes since 1994: magical, visionary and personal empowerment. My mother’s blood line comes from Connemara, Co Galway, on the far west coast of Ireland, I don’t know if there’s ancestral memories here. There were quite a lot of Viking invasions and landings on that coast and the Runes are the alphabet of the ancient Norse and other peoples of Northern Europe. They are powerful and ancient magic. Each Rune tells us about a key facet of our life. Each is a key to deep personal transformation, and they are also a system of Divination. But they are also Gateways to new ways of being, ways of bringing in needed change. You enter the wonderful world of Odin, the Norns, Freya, Heimdall and Tir. You learn how to transform your understanding of the events in your life. You use the genuine magic of making a Rune, chanting its name, rune stance and journeying for its true meaning as applied to your life at the present.
The Ogham, too, is in my blood-line (and my grandmother was a fortune teller and match-maker in Connemara, though her family the Kyles originally came from the Western Isles of Scotland). The Ogham is the Celtic Tree Alphabet of the ancient Irish Druids.
I have meditated a lot on the difference between the Runes and the Ogham and I think they are very different magical and visionary worlds.
The Runes are more linear and may-be they are will-based magic: the first eight Runes (Freya’s) are about what it is to be a human being, valuing yourself, having enough strength, being able to defend yourself properly and so on. With the second eight Runes (Heimdall’s Aett) you take a step onto the Rainbow Bridge that leads to the God Realm and you learn to perceive situations in ways that are above the human, and in the third Aett (Tir’s Aett) we actually co-create and share in god-consciousness. The Runes feel more active and masculine.
The Ogham, however, is not linear like the Runes. In the Ogham Worlds, the different Otherworlds merge and interpenetrate. There’s no sense of linear progression, but of merging with totality and experience of so much magic and vision, of meeting the beings and entities of the Ogham paths, who are very non-linear and heroic and laws unto themselves. There’s real fairy magic and the ancient wisdom and power of the Sidhe in the Ogham, it’s elusive, mysterious, gentle and spikey The Ogham feels even more out of time and multi-dimensional than the Runes. It’s much more rooted in the Earth. But what a privilege it is to have both of these ancient magical systems of power and vision flowing through our veins.
You can see details of my novels on: www.inspirationalnovels.org.
As I said, I’d be really glad to hear from you if you have insights on this issue. you can email me at michaelconneely@googlemail.com or message me on Face Book. And I’d like to thank you for this.
