Rune: Gebo

Names: Gebo, Gifu, Gyfu
Represents: Partnership, Gift, Sacrifice
Alphabet: G
Color: Red
Sequence Number: 2 Blume, 6 Meadows, 7 Cooper - Tyson - Thorsson
Aett: Freyja
Gods: Hod or Hoder
Plants & Minerals: Elm
Potency: Giving and Receiving; exchange of power
Challenge: accepting concequences for actions
Primary Uses: active partnership with the divine & your higher self, releasing of debt through sacrifice
Stroke Order: Upper Right to lower left, then lower right to upper left.

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Though I love nearly all of Blume's explanations of the runes, I think he short changed Gifu. The rune is about so much more than basic partnership, or even partnership with the divine. The concept of divine balance is at work here. In science there is a law that states that nothing is created or destroyed, but simple changes energy states... aka. that all things remain in balance. Gifu is the exemplar of this law.

Whenever we ask ourselves, or the Gods, for assistance, we must be prepared to sacrifice something in return. The phrases "A gift demands a gift," "As I demand so I provide," and "As above so below," all characterize this mystical law. It is at this point, when we ask for the gift, knowledge, and we are then asked for something in return, our sacrifice for that knowledge. Odin hung himself from the great tree, faceing the waters of knowledge, and stayed, starving and weak, until the waters revealed the mysteries of the runes. From the sacrifice, he prospered. So must we do if we are to gain knowledge and power.

Gifu is the threshold to the cycle of initiation in Blume's ordering of the runes. In the most common order, Gifu is the 7th rune and is the point at which an initiate makes sacrifice to become a first level initiate. In both orderings of the runes, it is clear that only through sacrifice can one gain access to growth and change.