odubhain
November 29th, 2008, 09:32 AM
My wife Deborah and I had a very pleasant lunch and meeting with Steven Akins and his son yesterday. During our meeting Steven and I discussed several aspects of the book and how it came to be as well as other matters local to Alabama Paganism, our own families and personal lives. All in all, the discussions were very open and revealing.
Steven presented me with a copy of his book, Leabor Feasa Rúnda, for review and I've read through it as a first pass. I'm not going to post my impressions of specific items in the book yet, as I wish to discuss them with Steven privately to better understand how they got included in his book.
My general impression of the book's contents is that much of it follows histories and stories contained within other works known to be authentic to Irish traditions and Lebor Gabala and Cath Mage Tuired. It departs from these works in its creation story and in embellishments of how some of the known parts of the traditions around the Sons of Mil and the Tuatha Dé Danann came to be. There are also a few deity names that seem unusual and these will need to be discussed. There areas of the book that strike me as peculiar while there are other areas that seem very much to be expected in an Irish or Gaelic tradition.
There are sections with incantations and spells within them as well as Ogham talismens. These are mainly formed as Name Ogham similar to the one example given in the Book of Ballymote's Ogham tract. The names provided are variatiuons of deity, place or object names from Irish traditions with possibly a few exceptions.
The incantations that are presented remind me heavily of Alexander Carmichael's Carmina Gadelica, while the general tone and language of the narrative is purposely modeled by Steven Akins after King James English. This implies that the translation of the German source material is actually a paraphrasing of a translation rather than a scholarly one. I would very much appreciate seeing what the German text that he posted here on Mysticwicks says in a direct translation by a German scholar.
Rituals and other magical constructions such as consecrations, oils, names, baptisms and effigies are covered. i will discuss all these matters specifically with Steven Akins before I attempt to analyze them here.
I did not receive additional German source from Steven at our meeting but can probably get them from him via email as he seems to ge very open and honest about what he's attempted to do with the materials he received for Leabhar Feasa Rúnda. How well he has succeeded and what can be learned from his efforts and the sources remains open to further analysis.
I can say that he is a pleasant person with whom to visit and who has been very forthright with me concerning what and how he produced the book that is the subject of this thread, Leabhar Feasa Rúnda. Much more will be learned about the book, its author and its source materials in open and frank discussions about it IMO rather then any sort of attacks directed at only parts of it without due consideration of all the factors that went into its construction.
There are many places for errors to occur even when the best intentions are embraced. Each potential source could introduce errors. Every translation or paraphrase will be subjective no matter how stringent an attempt is made for objectivity. That is why such works should be evaluated across the board of their creation and their lives. One should consider the motives of the many hands that have come to bear in writing the book over and over again. As a minimum, the book could be an actual Irish text of unknown provenance that passed through the hands of several churchmen and Medieval magicians as well as politicians and eventually the occult services of the Third Reich, Each of these occurrences could introduce "telephone" types of errors in their passage from hand to hand or ear to ear.
There's alot to discuss about the book with its author before additional details and analysis is done by me, but let me say now that I found Steven Akins to not be a neo-Nazi. a skin head, a white supremacist or a hard core racists. He does have his views on such things as do we all and he even expressed some of them here when directly questioned about them. He doesn't seem to have any agendas along those lines and gives every assurance of being a person who came into possession of some information that he wanted to share with others. Of course, he would not be adverse to making some money for the work he's done in publishing this book. That's something I can appreciate and I hope that others who write and read books about our traditions can also understand.
I'll post more as I get detailed answers to my own questions about his book from Steven Akins in the weeks to come. I hope that he gets treated better than Odran who was buried as a foundation sacrifice and then later dug up. Odran responded to a question about the nature of the afterlife and he responded that it was not as we've been told it is. When this knowledge was presented to the monks around him, their chief (who was known to have an extremely loud voice) shouted out "A sod upon Odran!" and he was reburied to keep that knowledge secret.
I hope that we will be able to gain knowledge in the discussions about Leabhar Feasa Rúunda rather than casting sods upon its author. I hope that we will also follow the words of Steven's dedication of my review copy which simply stated:
"An Firinne in aghaidh an Domhain!"
Searles O'Dubhain
Steven presented me with a copy of his book, Leabor Feasa Rúnda, for review and I've read through it as a first pass. I'm not going to post my impressions of specific items in the book yet, as I wish to discuss them with Steven privately to better understand how they got included in his book.
My general impression of the book's contents is that much of it follows histories and stories contained within other works known to be authentic to Irish traditions and Lebor Gabala and Cath Mage Tuired. It departs from these works in its creation story and in embellishments of how some of the known parts of the traditions around the Sons of Mil and the Tuatha Dé Danann came to be. There are also a few deity names that seem unusual and these will need to be discussed. There areas of the book that strike me as peculiar while there are other areas that seem very much to be expected in an Irish or Gaelic tradition.
There are sections with incantations and spells within them as well as Ogham talismens. These are mainly formed as Name Ogham similar to the one example given in the Book of Ballymote's Ogham tract. The names provided are variatiuons of deity, place or object names from Irish traditions with possibly a few exceptions.
The incantations that are presented remind me heavily of Alexander Carmichael's Carmina Gadelica, while the general tone and language of the narrative is purposely modeled by Steven Akins after King James English. This implies that the translation of the German source material is actually a paraphrasing of a translation rather than a scholarly one. I would very much appreciate seeing what the German text that he posted here on Mysticwicks says in a direct translation by a German scholar.
Rituals and other magical constructions such as consecrations, oils, names, baptisms and effigies are covered. i will discuss all these matters specifically with Steven Akins before I attempt to analyze them here.
I did not receive additional German source from Steven at our meeting but can probably get them from him via email as he seems to ge very open and honest about what he's attempted to do with the materials he received for Leabhar Feasa Rúnda. How well he has succeeded and what can be learned from his efforts and the sources remains open to further analysis.
I can say that he is a pleasant person with whom to visit and who has been very forthright with me concerning what and how he produced the book that is the subject of this thread, Leabhar Feasa Rúnda. Much more will be learned about the book, its author and its source materials in open and frank discussions about it IMO rather then any sort of attacks directed at only parts of it without due consideration of all the factors that went into its construction.
There are many places for errors to occur even when the best intentions are embraced. Each potential source could introduce errors. Every translation or paraphrase will be subjective no matter how stringent an attempt is made for objectivity. That is why such works should be evaluated across the board of their creation and their lives. One should consider the motives of the many hands that have come to bear in writing the book over and over again. As a minimum, the book could be an actual Irish text of unknown provenance that passed through the hands of several churchmen and Medieval magicians as well as politicians and eventually the occult services of the Third Reich, Each of these occurrences could introduce "telephone" types of errors in their passage from hand to hand or ear to ear.
There's alot to discuss about the book with its author before additional details and analysis is done by me, but let me say now that I found Steven Akins to not be a neo-Nazi. a skin head, a white supremacist or a hard core racists. He does have his views on such things as do we all and he even expressed some of them here when directly questioned about them. He doesn't seem to have any agendas along those lines and gives every assurance of being a person who came into possession of some information that he wanted to share with others. Of course, he would not be adverse to making some money for the work he's done in publishing this book. That's something I can appreciate and I hope that others who write and read books about our traditions can also understand.
I'll post more as I get detailed answers to my own questions about his book from Steven Akins in the weeks to come. I hope that he gets treated better than Odran who was buried as a foundation sacrifice and then later dug up. Odran responded to a question about the nature of the afterlife and he responded that it was not as we've been told it is. When this knowledge was presented to the monks around him, their chief (who was known to have an extremely loud voice) shouted out "A sod upon Odran!" and he was reburied to keep that knowledge secret.
I hope that we will be able to gain knowledge in the discussions about Leabhar Feasa Rúunda rather than casting sods upon its author. I hope that we will also follow the words of Steven's dedication of my review copy which simply stated:
"An Firinne in aghaidh an Domhain!"
Searles O'Dubhain