My wonderful friend Lena always finds nice, beautiful, wise phenomena, experiences and things and now she has found the candlestick.
I fell for it immediately, because I like the old customs and what they have meant to us in the dark Nordic countries, as Midsummer Eve and Walpurgis Night, but just this time… the dark November, December when the darkness deepens even more and we count the days until the light turns.. what should we do with it? Adventsljusstaken, which is about waiting for Jesus, has been allowed to function as ”companion” through the darkness. That it is a matter of waiting for the birth of Jesus must be thought out a little. I have nothing against Jesus, tvärtom, but I am not a Christian at all. Therefore, it feels a bit.. so there… when you pick out your Advent candlesticks every year and light your candles. Actually, it feels like a bit of the strength of the plot is lacking, as if it is not really bottoming out, as if it were a bit of an outside influence. Although a very important one, because these wonderful lights make us feel better.
That is for sure for many.
My father was a fan of the Icelandic fairy tales and the old asatron and it amazes me and many others that we do not learn more about these. No matter how you feel about it, it should be part of our inner culture's cultural treasure, the treasure we should carry with us from school from which we should then be able to scoop and bounce against when we trot through all of life's hardships and moments of joy. We know basically nothing about the old tales and myths that were woven under the stars in our exciting part of the earth, where it is either very light or very dark. Why do we know so little about these old Nordic tales and myths and figures and symbols? There is so much nourishment for creativity and imagination! I do not know much I either, because I did not listen to my father, but the interest was aroused and since adolescence I have been thinking: ”one day”, like so much else, have I thought I should improve in asatron and the old fairy tales. Men ”one day ” applies to most things, so I'll not get there.
On the way to the end, when nothing has been done, In any case, the TURNING LIGHT appeared. It has six candles, the first of which is lit six weeks before the winter solstice. At the time of writing, I do not know WHY it is exactly six weeks, but do not mind me. Then it appears that it is a candlestick and not an Advent candlestick. You light a candle for each week you approach the RETURN OF THE LIGHT, and it does happen 21 december. It's the day it turns and we can see how the day brightens again. JA! Wow! I want that! Äntligen!
It really SPEAKS to me, and I think that applies to many, who does not know about this (nya) custom inspired by the times before we became Christians. No god stands above it all like a judgmental or forgiving tyrant. THE WAITING CANDLEHOLDER is just about waiting for the light to return. As we sing about in the Lucia songs…. the light we love, even more so because we also feel the darkness that surrounds us during the winter, this magical darkness … which you TIRED of! And that makes it human, embracing, gives everyone the opportunity to celebrate. Every week a new candle is lit but it 21 December the last is lit., so if it is one If you want you can decorate it with six different runes like Lena. I'll probably do that. I love watching runes and learned the runes when I was little because I wanted to be able to read on old rune stones.
According to Lena Månstråle's interpretation, the six runes mean the following:
Feh : the rune of prosperity. Prosperity through gratitude for what one has.
clock: original power and new start
Thurs: Åskrunan. Tors runa. All radical change takes place through chaos. Thor breaks through the darkness and thunders and flashes!
Ass: The rune of the air and the wind. ( like letting go and FLYing instead of muttering around in the dunes)
Reid: The trolley run. The journey of life. The strongest protection rune.
Kenwas: The fire. The inner fire. Spark of life, viability.
Maybe they did not mean this from the beginning! But it's good for me.
Now I long until I get home the WAITING CANDLEHOLDER! And it almost makes me long for next fall already, then I can be with from the first of the six candles.
The candlestick is lit between Alvablot or All Saints Eve and Midwinterblot, which is celebrated at the winter solstice, it will be six weeks 🕯
Hope you will like your candle holder from us at Yllisar
Thanks for answering that. I love my candle holder. And with the runes that my friend Lena Månstråle taught me, lighting the candles feels like both a liberating and constructive act. For each candle I light, I think about what the runes stand for and connect back to it: clock power, gratitude, the realization that change happens through chaos, the willingness to consciously let go of things that only continue to hurt…. For me this gives a daily ” Purification ”, a moment of inner reflection and it gives another dimension to know that the LIGHT is approaching. Tack, and thanks for the nice wrist warmers, you at YLLISAR!