#pre-Christian Nordic religions

[loptrcoptr]

Hi! I'm part of a Norse Pagan group and we(I) were wondering if you would be willing to share your thesis? One of my very good friends is doing a book about the 12 and it would be great to have more information on them, which I know you've mentioned at least one is in there. No pressure and thank you for your time 💜

Of course! My mphil thesis on the ásynjur (in Gylfaginning, specifically) is accessible for anyone on academia.edu and should be free for anyone with a free account. But I haven’t dealt with that site in a while, so if you have any access issues let me know, I’ll see if I can find a way to send you a pdf :)

[broomsick]

I often see people lamenting how difficult it is to research norse myth. No story seems quite consistent through time and space, no interpretation is exactly the same, no pre-Christian group even believed in exactly the same way… Would it not be easier if nordic religions came in one, monolithic package— all fossilized together into a single block? But one comes to realize that they don’t, and it’s proof of their wonderfully diverse nature. Oral tradition in Scandinavia, dating back long before the Viking Age and surviving into the christianization period, was unbelievably alive and organic. And taking it all in is a joy in and of itself— not necessarily seeking to acquire a single answer to every question we as heathens find ourselves pondering, but rather, appreciating the myths for what they were: ever-evolving, ever-shapeshifting.

[skaldish]

What is Norse Heathenry?

Norse Heathenry is a contemporary pagan spirituality derived from the beliefs, customs, superstitions, and folklore of the pre-Christian Norse people. It is one of a few different kinds of Heathenries, which include Slavic Heathenry and Teutonic (Germanic) Heathenry.

The word "heathen" means "of the heaths." However, it's not a word the Old norse people themselves used. They didn't have a word for their spiritual belief system, as they didn't distinguish this from all other aspects of their lives. Rather, "Heathen" was coined by Christian writers to refer to Scandinavian pagans (this is also why it's sometimes used interchangeably with the word "heretic").

Nowadays, Norse Heathenry is referred to by many names, which reflects different developing iterations of it. Amongst these names are Norse Paganism, Asatru, and Forn Sidr / Forn Sed.

Where does Norse Heathenry come from?

Norse Heathenry comes from the Nordic countries of Europe: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands. These places are also known as the homelands of the vikings. But despite their shared origins, Norse Heathenry is not the religion of the vikings. This very large misconception has a very long, complex history behind it, owed to a combination of commercialization and fascist tampering. The Heathenry we see in America is extremely muddied from these influences. Fortunately, we now have the means to disambiguate it, thanks to increasingly accessible cultural exchange.

The following explanation is a product of ongoing anthropological, theological, and cultural research, in combination with what we know about the historical.

Norse Heathen Beliefs

Unlike organized religions, Norse Heathenry is (and has always been) a decentralized belief system. This means it has no universal doctrines, no orthopraxy or orthodoxy, no holy texts, and no religious figurehead governing it. When you hear people say "There's no 'right' way to practice Heathenry," this is generally what they're referring to.

However, Norse Heathenry does have a distinct way of thinking about and viewing the world, and it's very different from what we usually see here in the US. If you're feeling stuck trying to figure out how to "do Heathenry," this would be why.

Animism

A staple of Norse Heathen epistemology is Animism.

Usually, Animism is defined as the belief that all things have a spirit or vital essence to them. But this is only one definition of many, and not the definition that applies here.

The Norse concept of Animism is "the awareness that all things are part of an interdependent ecosystem." This changes how we engage with everything around us. We understand that when we interact with the forces of this world, they will interact back on their own merit. Our relationship with all things is a social one, and we're not spectators in our environment, but active participants at all times.

This stands is stark contrast to the way the USAmericans typically view the world: As a landscape to either test or be tested by, with the forces of the world acting as the means through which this is done.

Additionally, there's no separation between the sacred and the profane.

Immanence

Faiths that focus on spiritual ascension, enlightenment, or attaining a good afterlife are known as transcendent faiths.

While Norse Heathenry has some transcendent elements, it's ultimately an immanent belief system, which means its focus is on living life for the sake of living, as opposed to living life to receive a good afterlife. A good afterlife is already guaranteed.

(Some Heathens may strive for a specific kind of afterlife, however, which do have certain conditions for accessing. But these are elective rather than required, and different as opposed to superior. It's all a matter of preference, at the end of the day.)

The Norse Gods

Many people are already familiar with the Norse gods, such as Thor, Odin, Loki, and Freyja, but not many people are familiar with how they operate as gods.

In Hellenism and Religio Romano, the gods are divine lords who preside over different domains of society. It's a reflection of what the ancient Greeks and Romans highly valued in their civilizations: Law and political/civic involvement.

In Norse Heathenry, however, gods don't operate in a lordship capacity. Instead, they're more like celebrities in that they're celebrated figures everyone knows about.

While they don't rule over one thing or another, the Norse gods often act as allegorical representations of worldly phenomena. Thor is to thunderstorms as Loki is to "random-chance odds." SIf is to wheat-fields as Odin is to the old wandering beggar. Frey and Freyja represent masculine and feminine principles, Skadi the driven snow and foggy winter, and so on. The gods exist as worldly experiences inasmuch as they exist as ideas.

Lastly, but importantly, the Norse gods don't distribute rewards or punishments in accordance with on one's actions or deeds, nor do they tell us how we ought to live our lives. The way they interact with us depends on our individual relationships with them, which can be just as diverse as the ones we have with each other.

Myths & Folklore

What people often refer to as the "Norse Myths" are stories found in two old Icelandic texts called the Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda. These texts are special because they're the oldest and largest collection of tales featuring the Norse deities.

However, these texts represent just one region's period-specific interpretation of Norse folklore. They also only represent a fraction of the tales that still circulate within Nordic oral traditions, so not only are they not "canon" in the usual sense of the word, they're also just a sample.

This is all to say that Norse Heathenry doesn't have a hard body of mythology. It certainly has a defined one, but its definition is built from local legends, fairy tale humor, songs, customs, superstitions, and family folklore in addition to what survives on runestones and parchment. The corpus of Heathenry is very much a living, breathing thing.

Spirits

Norse Heathenry recognizes a wide variety of different beings, the likes of which can be found all around us. Some of these beings are like how we typically imagine spirits, in that they're incorporeal or otherwordly, while others are physical but may play tricks on you so you can't see them.

Like many things pertaining to Heathenry, there isn't a universally-shared classification system for Norse beings. But generally-speaking, beings are defined by their natures and the manner in which they relate to the rest of the world, rather than their morphology. For example, Trolls can take the appearance of rocks, trees, and also living people, but they can also be incorporeal spirits. This is all, however, the same kind of Troll, rather than being different types of trolls.

This is also why the lines between "spirit", "god," and "ancestor" can become very blurry at times. In English use, these are all typically labeled under the category "vaetter." Sometimes "wight" is used to refer to spirits of various types, but isn't often used to refer to gods.

Typically, the way people interact with spirits entirely depends on what kind of spirit they're dealing with, as well as their disposition towards human beings. Some spirits may enjoy a personal relationship, while others are best when left unbothered.

Values & Morality

Because Norse Heathenry has no doctrine and is immanent in nature, it has no fixed value system. Just like the stories were decentralized, so were the Norse people's values.

This is a feature as opposed to a flaw, and a fact as opposed to a theory. But it also has a habit of making Americans very uncomfortable.

For this reason, Heathens sometimes choose to construct their own value system to observe as part of their practice. But what those values are is up to each individual, and individual community, if applicable.

Anyone claiming Norse Heathenry has a universal value system is either new to Heathenry, or selling something.

Veneration

Heathen veneration is not just limited to gods, but also includes ancestors and even certain kinds of spirits, such as nisse/tomte.

Like most things in Norse Heathenry, what, who, and how a Heathen chooses to venerate is their choice to make. One popular observance across the globe is to craft altars, shrines, or similar sacred spaces for the entities one venerates. If a Heathen lives in a house that has a nisse (similar to a gnome), they might leave porridge (with butter) by the hearth for him, and he'll in turn bless the house with good luck and fortune.

Oftentimes, relationships with entities are very interpersonal. Heathenry's animistic and immanent nature means entities are rarely cold and distant, including the gods.

Misconceptions!

A list of misconceptions off the top of my head:

The practice known as 'Odinism' is an invention of the Germanic Volkish movement, which was the social precursor to Nazi Germany. This is also, unfortunately, the first kind of "heathenry" to be brought to the US, back in the 1970's. It was spread through the country via one of the fastest-moving networks at the time: The US prison system.

The Black Sun is a Nazi symbol, not a Heathen one.

No, Norse Heathenry is not a closed practice.

No, you don't have to have Scandinavian heritage to practice Norse Heathenry. Blood quantum is not a thing.

The rune alphabets are old, but the method of runecasting is new.

So is the use of magical bindrunes.

Bindrunes are also different from Galdrastafir. The latter is actually a form of Jewish-Christian-Norse syncretism and needs to be taught orally since it's a mystery tradition. You can still slap the Helm of Awe on things and look cool about it though.

Norse Heathenry is not the same as being a viking, and Norse Heathens are not vikings. However, some Heathens partake in viking reenactment as an extension of their practice.

There's no good or bad gods in Norse Heathenry. All the gods are capable of great good and great bad, just like people. They're fallible, and that's what makes them relatable.

Odin and Loki aren't at odds with one another.

You don't need to wait for a god to pick you to start venerating them.

If you're interested in learning more about any of these in-depth, check out the website I've built on Norse Heathenry, located in my pinned post!

[thorraborinn]

Thinking about trolls (+elves, huldufólk, others) in light of Eduardo Vivieros de Castro. I'm not willing to say that pre-Christian Scaninavians were perspectivists in Amazonian style, but I do think that looking at Norse religion and later Nordic folklore through that lens is productive.

I'm mostly using the word troll as kind of a catch-all (which is not unlike how Scandinavian folklore uses it, though Icelandic folklore does not).

There are two main fears concerning trolls: that they will eat you, and that they will marry and/or fuck you. In Levi-Strauss's time that might have been seen as symbolically reducible to the same fear, but I think we can learn more by examining them in their distinction.

I dunno that I can summarize Vivieros de Castro's points here, but I'm reading from Cosmological Perspectivism in Amazonia and Elsewhere: Four Lectures given in the Department of Social Anthropology, Cambridge University, February-March 1998.

In western ontology we humans are like animals in that we have bodies, but what distinguishes us is the soul (or the rational mind, or whatever, the details change over time but the point is something distinctive about our interiority), so that for, say, Christian missionaries, "because the spiritual is the locus of difference that conversion becomes necessary (the Europeans wanted to know whether Indians had souls in order to modify them)." Sverrir Jakobsson says that Icelanders bought so heavily into the [Christian : Heathen] distinction as the primary ordering principle of the peoples of the world that they had trouble recognizing, or even outright denied, that there was an East-West split in Christianity.

In perspectivist ontologies this is flipped, the locus of differentiation is the body, because the interiority of everything is the same, difference comes from inhabiting different bodies. If you could acquire the sight of a jaguar, you would look at a puddle of blood and see a nice cold beer (but you would also be dangerous to humans, because you would see them as game animals). The resulting anxiety is cannibalism. If everything is the same in underlying essence, it becomes necessary to engage in an active practice of differentiation to avoid eating something that is the same as you. Ritual specialists who can transform into animals are sometimes bad hunters because they are too deeply engaged in this paradox.

The fear of marrying a troll (or elf, whatever) is the fear of spiritual conversion. This is sometimes made explicit: "I don't want to live with elves; rather, I want to believe in my Christ" -- Ólafur Liljurós (note that while this ballad is related to similar ones all over Europe, many of them deal with the protaganist's impending marriage and/or infidelity in some way; this is absent from the Icelandic and it's a purely religious conflict). In Tungustapi, Sveinn doesn't just fuck elves, he also goes to their church (which is a sort of inverted Christian church). He's alienated from the [Christian/human] community. This corresponds to "western ontology."

The other side of this is fear of being eaten. At risk of overthinking things, because being afraid of a scary monster eating you doesn't really seem to need a lot of explanation, I think there are religious/cosmological implications here.

The fear of being eaten by a troll is different from the fear of being eaten by a bear or a boar, because humans also eat bears and boars, we are on the same level with them. You can't eat a troll (we also don't eat wolves, and wolves are trolls' domestic animals, although I guess you could eat a wolf). A semi-human semi-Euhemerized jötunn/troll is associated with cannibalism in Orms þáttr Stórólfssonar. I've written before about the likely etymological derivation of jötunn from a word meaning 'to eat'; previously I said that while *etaną 'to eat' and *etunaz 'jötunn' have a clear etymological relationship, that might not be so a few hundred years later when they have become eta and jǫtunn, but maybe this relationship should be reconsidered.

Eduardo Kohn was once told to always sleep on his back in the jungle, because if a jaguar comes it will see his face and recognize him as a person, but if it sees his back it will see him as prey. To avoid being eaten by a troll you have to get the troll to see you as a person and not as food, you can do this by giving a gift (and initiating a relationship of reciprocity), or else by being more troll-like yourself (maybe even by preestablished kinship with trolls like Egill Skallagrímsson). It's a widely-acknowledge attribute of trolls, at least in Iceland, that if you do manage to get them on your side they are loyal, hence the word trölltryggur 'trustworthy as a troll [=extremely trustworthy].'

The alternate way to avoid being eaten is, of course, to pray to [Thor/St. Olav] to come destroy them with his [hammer/axe]. I don't think this throws off what I'm saying here though, because "extreme violence" is also an option for dealing with humans in a reciprocation-exchange relationship too.

Anyway, my point is that the responses to the two different fears are the exact opposite of each other. You respond to the fear of conversion by never associating with trolls, never falling for the deceit that they are persons like you. You respond to the fear of being eaten by trolls by establishing mutual recognition of each others' personhood.

Contrary to popular belief (which says to never accept any gift from the fey under any circumstances), both of these are represented in folklore. Ólafur Liljurós even presents both of them at the same time, and says it's better to be killed than convert.

There's a big gap in this, which is magical creatures that don't want to eat you but which are still dangerous. e.g., an elf is not going to eat you but you still don't want to piss him off because he'll shoot you with a disease-transmitting arrow. But I think this can get filed along with the fear of being eaten, it's just that because the Eduardos (Vivieros de Castro and Kohn) are themselves talking about cosmological food chains, and I'm working from their material, there's better opportunity for examining trolls that eat people.

[dailydemonspotlight]

Norn - Day 70

Race: Megami

Alignment: Light-Law

Arcana: Fortune

July 12th, 2024

Fate is a fickle thing. Concepts of fate have existed throughout many world religions, mythologies, and superstitions- walk under a ladder, and fate may bring you ill fortune, after all- or perhaps, a black cat will bring bad luck. Most mythologies have specific deities or beings dedicated to fate, or one's own life- take, for example, the Greek Moirai sisters, or today's Demon of the Day, a Nordic subset of deities who spin the wheel of fate and measure one's own time left to live, the Norns, A set of three Jötunn who paint pictures of one's fate and judge them to see how their life shall go.

Depicted in the Völuspá, the most famous poem in the Poetic Edda, the sisters Norn are depicted as caretakers of the great tree Yggdrasil, as said in the passage below. The Poetic Edda is, of course, an intense and long story, and while the Norns aren't given many mentions, their role is still as important as any other deity- that being to take care of the tree of life, keep it alive, and keep humanity and the Æsir alive in tow. As described as well, the poem also goes over their role in fate. To quote,

I know an ash tree, named Yggdrasil: Sparkling showers are shed on its leaves That drip dew, into the dales below, By Urd's well it waves evergreen, Stands over that still pool, Near it a bower whence now there come The Fate Maidens, first Urd, Skuld second, scorer of runes, Then Verdandi, third of the Norns: The laws that determine the lives of men They fixed forever and their fate sealed.

The well they drew this water from, Urðarbrunnr, named so after one of the Norns themselves, contained sacred water that could wash away the rot gnawing at the tree's roots, nourishing the grand tree and keeping it from bringing about the death of the realms riding upon it. Beyond just this, though, what's the deal with the fate imagery? Well, it's complicated. The three Norns are, in effect, the 'Primary' Norns- there were attestations by Snorri Sturluson, the primary compiler of the Poetic Edda, that there were far more that watched over the fates of man themselves. As stated by pre-Christian Scandinavian sources, and later recalled by Snorri in the Prose Edda's first book, there were good and evil Norns. To quote,

"If the Norns determine the weirds of men, then they apportion exceeding unevenly, seeing that some have a pleasant and luxurious life, but others have little worldly goods or fame; some have long life, others short." Hárr said: "Good norns and of honorable race appoint good life; but those men that suffer evil fortunes are governed by evil norns."

As implied, it's said that Norns were different from just being three fates- they were, in effect, guardian angels, those who watched over others and ensured their fates. I personally find it interesting that this is one of the only major differences between the Norns and the Sisters Moirai, as the three main Norns do not govern the fate of everyone; everyone instead has their own Norn to govern them and their time. The main three, Urd, Skuld, and Verdandi, seem to simply be major Norn figures who protected the fate of all of life itself through their attending of Yggdrasil.

Looking at the design of the Norn in SMT, I believe it's less meant to represent the three sisters, and more of the overall concept of them as guardians who represent fate. The three Norn surrounding the clock do appear to be allusions to Urd, Skuld, and Verdandi, but the clock itself seems to be drawing comparison to the concept of fate- the idea that, when the clock ends, the one they watch over shall die.

To completely swerve topics, @averagefungus was the one who got the easter egg in the Alice DDS first! Congratulations! To answer what it was, if you look at the first letter of each paragraph, it spells out DIE FOR ME!

[the-occult-lounge]

Heathenry vs Norse Paganism vs Ásatrú

When we dig deeper into the ideologies from the Nordic countries (Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Iceland, as well as the Faroe Islands, Greenland, and Åland) we find that there is a split of sorts in religious ideologies. The following are a few of the groupings one may find when digging deeper into this area of practice. (Quotes provided from thetroth.org)

> Heathenry is the preferred general term for someone who practices a reconstructed version of a pre-Christian religion for the Germanic area of Northern Europe. “Heathen” was first used in the Gothic language to mean a “Gentile” and was originally a neutral term meaning someone from a particular region who wasn’t familiar with Jewish or Christian Scripture. This wasn’t a negative or pejorative term until it became a negative thing to not be a Christian.

> The way we use 'Norse Paganism' is not to refer exclusively to the ethnic practices of the pre-Christian Norse peoples (Swedes, Danes, Norwegians, etc); rather, the “Norse” in Norse Paganism refers to the names by which we call the Gods. Most of us refer to the Gods by the names they were called in the Norse languages, and much of our ritual taxonomy is based in the Norse languages.

> Ásatrú is a combination of two words. “Tru” which means “Faith/Trust in” and “Asa” which means “The Gods/Aesir.” Some do not like this term, as they believe it excludes those who place faith and trust in the Vanir (Vanatru) or the Jotnar (Rokkatru or sometimes Thursatru). There is some debate here as to whether or not the “Asa” in “Asa-tru” is truly exclusive in this sense. Someone who worshipped Njord, Skadi and Freyja exclusively could still call themselves “Ásatrú” and most wouldn’t object. In the United States, “Ásatrú” is losing favor as a term because of its usage by Folkish groups. But the term itself is not indicative of white nationalist or folkish beliefs, and internationally it remains a popular general term.

***Please note that within the above ideologies there may be a few outliers, typically within these practices white supremacist tend to hide and morph the gentle beliefs into something that they are not. Be careful of groups that you may join and pay attention to the words that they use or the symbols they may show***

For more information on Heathenry, Norse Paganism, and other forms, please visit thetroth.org.

[historia-vitae-magistras]

Hi! I really loved a post you made earlier about how society is only now returning to a variety of religious beliefs and was wondering if you could talk more about it. Any thoughts on countries taking up their original religions? Magnus and asatru? Rhys or his siblings with druidism?

TW discussions of religion, religious skepticism and fictional depictions of religion in historical fantasy. I feel like they pick up things they themselves remember but the modern human iteration is... Meh. No shade to believers, I did some time with the Nordic pantheon before the Nazis took it over but the modern iterations of almost all European pre-Christian religions are unfortunately mostly constructed between the 18th and 20th centuries. Almost none of it dates back further than revivals during the enlightenment. Would they see echoes of their lived experience in these revivals? Sure. I just don't know if they'd be adherents to the modern form when they can remember at least some of the real thing, otherwise now dead and gone. So I do think there's things in them that survive but they can't quite look at modern paganism as a belief system.

But two parts I think would really feel important to them: a lot of the pagan revivals are about a rejection of the Calvinist themes of Reformation and counter-reformation Christianity that emphasize individuality, created the belief of the elect who are saved by god and stripped Christianity of a lot of its older emphasis on community and mutual aid and responsibility. I think a lot of the pagan revivalism would very much appeal there and in its counter-culture themes.

And second, because I'm a weirdo who uses hetalia to get into really niche topics and practice writing historical fiction I want to publish when I'm grown, I try to stick to what we actually know. I want to replicate the perspectives of history. The fantastical aspects are often just adaptations of what magic was actually believed in, as far as I can adapt from a very limited pool of knowledge. I have written Alasdair carving the symbols we have from some Pictish standing stones and Ogham, a Gaelic form of literacy into objects and sacred trees to make them into portals and protective objects. I have written Arthur's primary contact with their mother as being not when he visits the site of her barrow and the Kirk that gives them their name that was later built on he same site, but after he drowns or is caught in a storm, because we know the Britons of prehistory and the Roman era and even into the early medieval believed water was a kind of portal between this world and the sacred. I gave Rhys their mother's bronze age sword because magic swords are everywhere in every flavor of Celtic Mythology. Arthur keeps Cromwell's head on the mantel partially because he's a stubborn fuck who can hold a grudge for centuries but also because we know that the ancient Celts believed the head specifically to be a very powerful magical object.

Norse paganism as we know it today is based on things like the Icelandic Sagas and the descriptions of the temple of Uppsala by Adam of Bremen. Those are fantastic documents but they only come into being centuries after the end of the Viking age and are written by Christians, usually clerics, and usually men. Our heads are full of images of powerful priestesses, shield maidens and goddesses, but more than a third of human women were starved as children compared to under ten percent of boys. Every Norse grave is different, with only general categories being able to be sussed put based on grave goods, the style of inhumation or cremation and marking ships or stones. We just don't know fuck all about the specifics what the people of this era really believed.

Or with the British celts. We know what the Romans said. That they burned criminals in wicker men, committed human sacrifice, that the Romans slaughtered the druids on Anglesey in Wales. We know the names of their gods when they are twinned with Roman ones or archaeologists find inscriptions. But so many of them are only known by one or two inscriptions. There are only eight for Brigantia and she was the patron goddess for the largest tribe by territory in Iron Age Britain. We know they offered sacrifices of value to bodies of water, we know from medieval Irish sources, also written by Christians, that they had 4 holidays aligning with the seasons and divided the year into half light half dark. But we don't know shit about songs or prayers or even how much the Romans made the fuck up. Which was likely most of it but we'll never know. What the Picts in Scotland may have believed is especially lost, we don't even have most of their language or even sheep counting like Cumbrian.

There's been a lot of push back against terms prehistory and dark ages and rightly so in that they conjure images of a filthy past, people living in their own shit and grim misery. But on a historical level, on an archival level, there really are such things as dark ages and prehistory where we just do not know the details and when discussing and writing religion I err towards what we know the most about, especially where archaeology and history can support each other.

[alephskoteinos]

There's a video on "Nordic nature religion" that I might want to revisit again.

It's not Heathenry exactly, but there's a throughline that seems to various obvious overlap with certain concepts of Paganism, and not just in modern terms. One can think of it as overlapping with certain ideas about immersion in the totality of the cosmos or natural world, and in this sense my mind specifically turns to the way Justin Sledge keeps talking about what he takes to be one of the core assumptions of alchemy (as in, as an actual pre-modern science that sometimes took on religious/spiritual/philosophical significance). It's not really difficult to pair something like that with the way polytheistic religions such as Heathenry conceived the cosmos, as sort of illustrated by this channel's video on Old Norse Religion.

But the nature-spirituality described here also seems sort of...feel-goodish? Idk what the right word is. Or maybe that's just me looking into it with the latent sense that it's perhaps people ostensibly immersing themselves in a mystical relationship with the natural world, but at the same time with its outer serenity, without necessarily reckoning with its inner depths and darkness; the breeze of the trees, the sound of leaves, the chirping of the birds, but never, for instance, the implicit presence of death that we all recognise in the wild.

But make no mistake, there's still a lot of value to be found in what David Thurfjell and this channel is talking about, and I find the idea that something potentially "Pagan" may have somehow been accessed in a kind of popular Christian language is very fascinating. Not to mention, we are very clearly talking about mysticism when we are talking about the kind of spiritual access to the natural world being discussed, and the comparison to certain religious experiences of God.

[sayitaliano]

I hope this question makes sense- but do Italians have their own creation story and/or religion pre-roman history? And does anyone follow those beliefs today?

Ciao! Not sure I really get what you mean by "our own creation story" but... on a general level, we're Catholic Christians, so we follow the Bible (BTW the State is laic, so anyone can follow their religion actually or be atheist).

As for Ancient/Pre-Roman Italy, our country was divided into many areas controlled by different populations with different histories, languages, cultures and probably even cults. To mention a few, we had Greeks (the famous Magna Grecia in Sicily and Calabria, more or less), Latins, Etruscans (who really showed religion through arts -they were also influenced by the Greeks), Sardinians, Celts (center of Italy and North -they founded Brescia, Milano, Bologna...), Samnites, Phoenicians... and even during the Roman's Age, some areas were influenced by Nordic populations (the so called "barbarians") and Eastern populations too -feel free to refer to the Medieval/Roman Age posts I wrote not long ago and integrate it with this: it generally says that Central Italy was influenced by the Greeks and their myths of Eastern origin (as mentioned above) but still some ancient Latin myth were orally passed through generations and it probably was used by ancient orators later on and prolly being used by the Romans too (they in fact had the fabulae = stories told orally, much more than myths). Religions basically moved on from a phase in which there were mostly indigenous cults (pagan/magic)*, then got a big influence by the Greeks and Etruscans (we see objects/deities in human shape and mostly of them are connected with the rural cycle), and then the cult of the Emperor and more Eastern religions (during the Roman Empire).

*For example the Celts, brought their druids who were the connecting piece between Earth and the Spiritual world (you have probably seen many movies or TV shows with them, and even if things were a bit exaggerated, they were still kinda accurate). They had a similar job to the Àuguri of the Roman Empire -already known by the Etruscans as well- who were able to make predictions by looking at the intestines of animals or the flight of birds. Celts were very connected with nature, they carved wood, they used to live in forests and near water, so they didn't even had real "cimiteries" or necropolis as for example Etruscans had, but more of sacred areas in nature.

Now, Idk how many pagans (and of what kind) are around in Italy atm but there could be, as there are in other parts of the world. I think spirituality is a personal thing and again, being a mostly Catholic Nation, with a lay State, there's not much infos about it (or maybe it's just me not caring about others' religious/spiritual matters).

Anyway here you have one last link (in Italian, as the ones I mentioned above) with a little more infos and a map with some of the biggest populutions that were in Italy in the Ancient days. They're divided linguistically, but maybe you can find out more about their religions/cults too.

[greenpanda-basicfakewitch]

Pagan | Wiccan | Witch

Where did Wicca originally come from?

There is not one right answer. As the founder for Wicca/Paganism was passed through inner circles through word of mouth or most text/information about witchcraft was burned [literally] there is no concrete academic sources that;

Don’t sound like misinformation/appropriation of other cultures/ discrimination from christians claiming the source of wicca is accurate/ Witches who sound patronising/ two hour long video thats as dry as desert-

So all in all, as you can tell I get bored and if it’s not something I’m a hundred percent invested in the information slides like sand through my fingers and nothing sticks in my brain.

*So take this Historial segment with a grain of salt and assume it’s all misinformation but I tried my best/included sources and hope that if someone explains it simply I would fix the post and make sure the information is as accurate as I can.

Wicca is Considered the modern interpretation of Pre-Christian traditions, though some involved claim a direct line to ancient practices. It may be practised by individuals or members of groups [Sometimes known as covens]

 Wicca also has some commonalities with Druidism and is considered the inspiration of the Goddess moment in spirituality. 

 There is a great diversity among individuals and groups that practise a Wicca Religion, but many are Duotheistic worshipping both female Goddesses and a Horned God.

Duotheistic: "Disbelieving or lacking belief in the existence of god."

Other Wiccan Practices are;

Atheist, Pantheist or respectful gods and goddesses as archetypal symbols rather than as actual or supernatural beings. Rituals in Wicca often include holidays centred around phases of the moon, solar equinoxes and Solstices. Elements such as Fire, Water, Earth, Air and initiation ceremonies.

Most civilisations have developed their own form of Magical Practices, going back to Shamanic Tribal customs of Siberia. Forms of todays non wiccan magical practices [as both are separate Pagan isn���t wicca nor witchcraft, but Witchcraft can be both Wicca and Pagan]

 Icelandic, Nordic, Asartu, Druidic, Greco-Roman etc. Wicca is a form of British Witchcraft since the 1950’s Wicca has evolved beyond the early Gardenian. Alexandrian, Seax, Dianic etc. Tuscan Culture influenced the writings of Folklorists Chs. Lelands book “Aradia.” gerald gardner sourced Wiccan Goddess concepts & the change of the goddess from Aradia.

[thiswaycomessomethingwicked]

Hi! I saw your tags in that post about identifying skeletal remains, and what is the book you mentioned about gender? Do you have any other you recommend about gender marks in burials or gender in history? This sounds amazing, now I want to read more about it!

Hey!

 Yeah, I was referring to Neil Price's Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings. I believe he also gets into it a little bit in his The Viking Way: Magic and Mind in Late Iron Age Scandinavia, but it's been a while since I've read it (still recommend as an overall text on magic in the time - also for anyone who has read my Grima stuff and thought: huh, that seidr shit sure is interesting). He's very good at saying archeologists can, at best, determine the sex of remains but gendering them is beyond the reach of science.

A small excerpt from Children of Ash and Elm to give you a flavour of his approach (any grammar or punctuations errors are mine):

However, in many cases the deceased were created an the resulting ashes are hard to sex reliably. More often, presercation conditions in the soil are unfavourable for the survival of bone in any state, and there are many graves without human remains at all (although they were evidently originally present). In these cases, for centuries archeologists have resorted to determining the sex of the dead through associated with supposedly gendered objects--this weapons in a grave are held to suggest a man, jewellery sets donate a woman, and so on. Beyond the obvious problem of conflating sex and gender, and also effectively sexing metal, these readings risk simply piling one set of assumptions on another in what forensic-decision-makers call a 'bias snowball' of cumulatively questionable interpretations. Clearly this is unsatisfactory, and at worst can lead to a potentially vast misreadying of Viking-Age gender from the literally tens of thousands of burials that have been analysed in this way over the years.

[...]

At Vivallen in Swedish Harjedalen, there was even a male-bodied person buried according to Sami rituals, in a Sami settlement, but wearing conventional Sami man's equipment over a Nordic woman's linen dress, complete with jewellery to match--a crossing of both gender and cultural norms.

Some additional resources to consider (there are more Neil Price pieces in this list since early medieval Scandinavian burial practices are a cornerstone of his research). It's a mix of books and journal articles as well as a mix of more "layman" friendly and more true-academic texts. For the journal articles, I'm not sure if you're associated with a secondary educational institution, but some local libraries will grant access to online academic journals, as an FYI.

(Apologies in advance for the lack of correct accents and other things on names (e.g., Th instead of the proper thorne), I'm working with a north American keyboard and doing this off the corner of my desk at work, so to speak)

---

Stfean Brink, Neil Price, The Viking World

Hilda Ellis, The Road to Hel: A Study in the Conception of the Dead in Old Norse Literature (this is a broad study of death rituals in the era, not really gender-archeology focused, but it's 100% worth the read and very thorough)

Anders Andren, Jens-Peter Schjodt, and John Lidow, Pre-Christian Religions of the North: Histories and Structures (Neil Price has a good essay/chapter contribution in here on death & mortuary behaviour)

Howard Williams, Death and Memory in Early Medieval Britain

Marianne Moen, Matthew J. Walsh, "Agents of Death: Reassessing Social Agency and Gendered Narratives of Human Sacrifice in the Viking Age," Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 2021

Leszek Slupecki, Rudolf Simek, Conversions: Looking for Ideological Change in Early Middle Ages (has some stuff of "deviant" burial customs and concepts of the "dangerous dead" - stuff I fucking wet myself over, honestly)

Andrew Reynolds, Anglo-Saxon Deviant Burial Customs

Joanne O’Sullivan, "Strung Along: Re-evaluating Gendered Views of Viking-Age Beads," Medieval Archaeology, 2015

Judtih Jesch, Women in the Viking Age (note: it's from the early 90's and very much reflects academic gender and feminist work at that time - still always worth reading older texts for the sake of good historiography alone. Also to see what has been explored before and why we might have new approaches, or to see wher current views originated etc)

Sarah Tralow and Liv Nilsson Stutz, The Oxford Handbook of the Archeology of Death and Burial

Duncan Sayer, Howard Williams, Mortuary Practices and Social Identities in the Middle Ages

Charlotte Hedenstierna-Jonson, Anna Kjellström, Torun Zachrisson, Maja Krzewińska, Veronica Sobrado, Neil Price, Torsten Günther, Mattias Jakobsson, Anders Götherström, Jan Storå, "A female Viking warrior confirmed by genomics," Wily Online (link to article, it's open access)

Jacob Bell, "Magic, Genderfluidity, and queer Vikings, ca. 750‐1050," History Compass, 2021

Isabelle Algrain, "Gender and diversity in archaeological contexts," Revista Arqueologia Pública, 2021

Thora Petursdottir, "Icelandic Viking Age graves: Lack in material--lack of interpretations?", Archeologia Islandica, 2009

Anna Wessman, "Death, Destruction and Commemoration: Tracing Ritual Activities in Finnish Late Iron Age Cemeteries," Finnish Antiquarian Society, 2010

Ahmad ibn Fadlan was a 10th century Muslim traveler/explorer who visited these areas and wrote about it. You can find various translations of his works around. He has a description of at least one burial and related practices. Also some fun descriptions of sexual/fertility rituals though he sadly "fades to black" before the good stuff starts.

----

I hope this helps! I am always very excited to talk about anything related to early medieval Scandinavia (also early modern Europe) and so always happy to get these asks <3 <3

[broomsick]

List of interesting ressources pertaining to norse paganism, scandinavian folklore and history, and nordic religions in general

These are sources I have personally used in the context of my research, and which I've enjoyed and found useful. Please don’t mind if I missed this or that ressource, as for this post, I focused solely on my own preferences when it comes to research. I may add on to this list via reblog if other interesting sources come to my mind after this has been posted. Good luck on your research! And as always, my question box is open if you have any questions pertaining to my experiences and thoughts on paganism.

Mythology

The Viking Spirit: An Introduction to Norse Mythology and Religion

Dictionnary of Northern Mythology

The Prose and Poetic Eddas (online)

Grottasöngr: The Song of Grotti (online)

The Poetic Edda: Stories of the Norse Gods and Heroes

The Wanderer's Hávamál

The Song of Beowulf

Rauðúlfs Þáttr

The Penguin Book of Norse Myths: Gods of the Vikings (Kevin Crossley-Holland's are my favorite retellings)

Myths of the Norsemen From the Eddas and the Sagas (online) A source that's as old as the world, but still very complete and an interesting read.

The Elder Eddas of Saemung Sigfusson

Pocket Hávamál

Myths of the Pagan North: Gods of the Norsemen

Lore of the Vanir: A Brief Overview of the Vanir Gods

Anglo-Saxon and Norse Poems

Gods of the Ancient Northmen

Gods of the Ancient Northmen (online)

Two Icelandic Stories: Hreiðars Þáttr and Orms Þáttr

Two Icelandic Stories: Hreiðars Þáttr and Orms Þáttr (online)

Sagas

Two Sagas of Mythical Heroes: Hervor and Heidrek & Hrólf Kraki and His Champions (compiling the Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks and the Hrólfs saga kraka)

Icelandic Saga Database (website)

The Saga of the Jómsvíkings

The Heimskringla or the Chronicle of the Kings of Norway (online)

Stories and Ballads of the Far Past: Icelandic and Faroese

Heimskringla: History of the Kings of Norway

The Saga of the Volsungs: With the Saga of Ragnar Lothbrok

The Saga of the Volsungs (online) Interesting analysis, but this is another pretty old source.

The Story of the Volsungs (online) Morris and Magnusson translation

The Vinland Sagas

Hákon the Good's Saga (online)

History of religious practices

The Viking Way: Magic and Mind in Late Iron Age Scandinavia

Nordic Religions in the Viking Age

Agricola and Germania Tacitus' account of religion in nordic countries

Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandinavian and Celtic Religions

Tacitus on Germany (online)

Scandinavia and the Viking Age

Viking Age Iceland

Landnámabók: Book of the Settlement of Iceland (online)

The Age of the Vikings

Gesta Danorum: The Danish History (Books I-IX)

The Sea Wolves: a History of the Vikings

The Viking World

Guta Lag: The Law of the Gotlanders (online)

The Pre-Christian Religions of the North This is a four-volume series I haven't read yet, but that I wish to acquire soon! It's the next research read I have planned.

Old Norse Folklore: Tradition, Innovation, and Performance in Medieval Scandinavia

Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings

The Penguin Historical Atlas of the Vikings by John Haywood

Landnámabók: Viking Settlers and Their Customs in Iceland

Nordic Tales: Folktales from Norway, Sweden, Finland, Iceland and Denmark For a little literary break from all the serious research! The stories are told in a way that can sometimes get repetitive, but it makes it easier to notice recurring patterns and themes within Scandinavian oral tradition.

Old Norse-Icelandic Literature: A Short Introduction

Saga Form, Oral Prehistory, and the Icelandic Social Context

An Early Meal: A Viking Age Cookbook and Culinary Oddyssey

Runes & Old Norse language

Uppland region runestones and their translations

Viking Language 1: Learn Old Norse, Runes, and Icelandic Sagas and Viking Language 2: The Old Norse Reader

Catalogue of the Manks Crosses with Runic Inscriptions

Old Norse - Old Icelandic: Concise Introduction to the Language of the Sagas

A Companion to Old Norse-Icelandic Literature and Culture

Nordic Runes: Understanding, Casting, and Interpreting the Ancient Viking Oracle 

YouTube channels

Ocean Keltoi

Arith Härger

Old Halfdan

Jackson Crawford

Wolf the Red

Sigurboði Grétarsson

Grimfrost

(Reminder! The channel "The Wisdom of Odin", aka Jacob Toddson, is a known supporter of pseudo scientific theories and of the AFA, a folkist and white-supremacist organization, and he's been known to hold cult-like, dangerous rituals, as well as to use his UPG as truth and to ask for his followers to provide money for his building some kind of "real life viking hall", as supposedly asked to him by Óðinn himself. A source to avoid. But more on that here.)

Websites

The Troth

Norse Mythology for Smart People

Voluspa.org

Icelandic Saga Database

Skaldic Project

Life in Norway This is more of a tourist's ressources, but I find they publish loads of fascinating articles pertaining to Norway's history and its traditions.

[skaldish]

What is Norse Heathenry?

Norse Heathenry is a contemporary pagan spirituality derived from the beliefs, customs, superstitions, and folklore of the pre-Christian Norse people. It is one of a few different kinds of Heathenries, which include Slavic Heathenry and Teutonic (Germanic) Heathenry.

The word "heathen" means "of the heaths." However, it's not a word the Old norse people themselves used. They didn't have a word for their spiritual belief system, as they didn't distinguish this from all other aspects of their lives. Rather, "Heathen" was coined by Christian writers to refer to Scandinavian pagans (this is also why it's sometimes used interchangeably with the word "heretic").

Nowadays, Norse Heathenry is referred to by many names, which reflects different developing iterations of it. Amongst these names are Norse Paganism, Asatru, and Forn Sidr / Forn Sed.

Where does Norse Heathenry come from?

Norse Heathenry comes from the Nordic countries of Europe: Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands. These places are also known as the homelands of the vikings. But despite their shared origins, Norse Heathenry is not the religion of the vikings. This very large misconception has a very long, complex history behind it, owed to a combination of commercialization and fascist tampering. The Heathenry we see in America is extremely muddied from these influences. Fortunately, we now have the means to disambiguate it, thanks to increasingly accessible cultural exchange.

The following explanation is a product of ongoing anthropological, theological, and cultural research, in combination with what we know about the historical.

Norse Heathen Beliefs

Unlike organized religions, Norse Heathenry is (and has always been) a decentralized belief system. This means it has no universal doctrines, no orthopraxy or orthodoxy, no holy texts, and no religious figurehead governing it. When you hear people say "There's no 'right' way to practice Heathenry," this is generally what they're referring to.

However, Norse Heathenry does have a distinct way of thinking about and viewing the world, and it's very different from what we usually see here in the US. If you're feeling stuck trying to figure out how to "do Heathenry," this would be why.

Animism

A staple of Norse Heathen epistemology is Animism.

Usually, Animism is defined as the belief that all things have a spirit or vital essence to them. But this is only one definition of many, and not the definition that applies here.

The Norse concept of Animism is "the awareness that all things are part of an interdependent ecosystem." This changes how we engage with everything around us. We understand that when we interact with the forces of this world, they will interact back on their own merit. Our relationship with all things is a social one, and we're not spectators in our environment, but active participants at all times.

This stands is stark contrast to the way the USAmericans typically view the world: As a landscape to either test or be tested by, with the forces of the world acting as the means through which this is done.

Additionally, there's no separation between the sacred and the profane.

Immanence

Faiths that focus on spiritual ascension, enlightenment, or attaining a good afterlife are known as transcendent faiths.

While Norse Heathenry has some transcendent elements, it's ultimately an immanent belief system, which means its focus is on living life for the sake of living, as opposed to living life to receive a good afterlife. A good afterlife is already guaranteed.

(Some Heathens may strive for a specific kind of afterlife, however, which do have certain conditions for accessing. But these are elective rather than required, and different as opposed to superior. It's all a matter of preference, at the end of the day.)

The Norse Gods

Many people are already familiar with the Norse gods, such as Thor, Odin, Loki, and Freyja, but not many people are familiar with how they operate as gods.

In Hellenism and Religio Romano, the gods are divine lords who preside over different domains of society. It's a reflection of what the ancient Greeks and Romans highly valued in their civilizations: Law and political/civic involvement.

In Norse Heathenry, however, gods don't operate in a lordship capacity. Instead, they're more like celebrities in that they're celebrated figures everyone knows about.

While they don't rule over one thing or another, the Norse gods often act as allegorical representations of worldly phenomena. Thor is to thunderstorms as Loki is to "random-chance odds." SIf is to wheat-fields as Odin is to the old wandering beggar. Frey and Freyja represent masculine and feminine principles, Skadi the driven snow and foggy winter, and so on. The gods exist as worldly experiences inasmuch as they exist as ideas.

Lastly, but importantly, the Norse gods don't distribute rewards or punishments in accordance with on one's actions or deeds, nor do they tell us how we ought to live our lives. The way they interact with us depends on our individual relationships with them, which can be just as diverse as the ones we have with each other.

Myths & Folklore

What people often refer to as the "Norse Myths" are stories found in two old Icelandic texts called the Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda. These texts are special because they're the oldest and largest collection of tales featuring the Norse deities.

However, these texts represent just one region's period-specific interpretation of Norse folklore. They also only represent a fraction of the tales that still circulate within Nordic oral traditions, so not only are they not "canon" in the usual sense of the word, they're also just a sample.

This is all to say that Norse Heathenry doesn't have a hard body of mythology. It certainly has a defined one, but its definition is built from local legends, fairy tale humor, songs, customs, superstitions, and family folklore in addition to what survives on runestones and parchment. The corpus of Heathenry is very much a living, breathing thing.

Spirits

Norse Heathenry recognizes a wide variety of different beings, the likes of which can be found all around us. Some of these beings are like how we typically imagine spirits, in that they're incorporeal or otherwordly, while others are physical but may play tricks on you so you can't see them.

Like many things pertaining to Heathenry, there isn't a universally-shared classification system for Norse beings. But generally-speaking, beings are defined by their natures and the manner in which they relate to the rest of the world, rather than their morphology. For example, Trolls can take the appearance of rocks, trees, and also living people, but they can also be incorporeal spirits. This is all, however, the same kind of Troll, rather than being different types of trolls.

This is also why the lines between "spirit", "god," and "ancestor" can become very blurry at times. In English use, these are all typically labeled under the category "vaetter." Sometimes "wight" is used to refer to spirits of various types, but isn't often used to refer to gods.

Typically, the way people interact with spirits entirely depends on what kind of spirit they're dealing with, as well as their disposition towards human beings. Some spirits may enjoy a personal relationship, while others are best when left unbothered.

Values & Morality

Because Norse Heathenry has no doctrine and is immanent in nature, it has no fixed value system. Just like the stories were decentralized, so were the Norse people's values.

This is a feature as opposed to a flaw, and a fact as opposed to a theory. But it also has a habit of making Americans very uncomfortable.

For this reason, Heathens sometimes choose to construct their own value system to observe as part of their practice. But what those values are is up to each individual, and individual community, if applicable.

Anyone claiming Norse Heathenry has a universal value system is either new to Heathenry, or selling something.

Veneration

Heathen veneration is not just limited to gods, but also includes ancestors and even certain kinds of spirits, such as nisse/tomte.

Like most things in Norse Heathenry, what, who, and how a Heathen chooses to venerate is their choice to make. One popular observance across the globe is to craft altars, shrines, or similar sacred spaces for the entities one venerates. If a Heathen lives in a house that has a nisse (similar to a gnome), they might leave porridge (with butter) by the hearth for him, and he'll in turn bless the house with good luck and fortune.

Oftentimes, relationships with entities are very interpersonal. Heathenry's animistic and immanent nature means entities are rarely cold and distant, including the gods.

Misconceptions!

A list of misconceptions off the top of my head:

The practice known as 'Odinism' is an invention of the Germanic Volkish movement, which was the social precursor to Nazi Germany. This is also, unfortunately, the first kind of "heathenry" to be brought to the US, back in the 1970's. It was spread through the country via one of the fastest-moving networks at the time: The US prison system.

The Black Sun is a Nazi symbol, not a Heathen one.

No, Norse Heathenry is not a closed practice.

No, you don't have to have Scandinavian heritage to practice Norse Heathenry. Blood quantum is not a thing.

The rune alphabets are old, but the method of runecasting is new.

So is the use of magical bindrunes.

Bindrunes are also different from Galdrastafir. The latter is actually a form of Jewish-Christian-Norse syncretism and needs to be taught orally since it's a mystery tradition. You can still slap the Helm of Awe on things and look cool about it though.

Norse Heathenry is not the same as being a viking, and Norse Heathens are not vikings. However, some Heathens partake in viking reenactment as an extension of their practice.

There's no good or bad gods in Norse Heathenry. All the gods are capable of great good and great bad, just like people. They're fallible, and that's what makes them relatable.

Odin and Loki aren't at odds with one another.

You don't need to wait for a god to pick you to start venerating them.

If you're interested in learning more about any of these in-depth, check out the website I've built on Norse Heathenry, located in my pinned post!

[thenightling]

A very abridged explanation of the controversies surrounding Wicca:

Wicca was made an "official religion" in the UK in the 1950s when witchcraft was finally de-criminalized. It was the first legally recognized Neo-Pagan religion by the UK government. It spread fast to the US in the 60s and 70s but wasn't officially recognized by the US Military as a religious option for soldiers until 2007.

The word Wicca is old English for masculine witch. Wicce is the feminine. They were pronounced as Witch-ah, and Witch-uh, which eventually became the word Witch (and was intended to be unisexual). But the modern word for the religion "Wicca" sounds more like Candle Wick. Wick-a.

The original meaning was "wise person."

It's a religion derived from the fragmented remains of pre-Christian religions in the UK and Greece. The main deity is a maternal goddess figure (loose interpretations make her Hecate / Triple Goddess, or Diana or a combination of the two) and sometimes accompanied by a God figure representing the likes of Pan and symbolic of appreciation for nature.

Wicca used to be very loose and allowed borrowings from various sources but as other Neo-Pagan factions gained presence Wicca started to get accused of things like "Cultural appropriation" which is ironic since ALL Neo-Pagan traditions are patched together from scraps. And most are Hermetic, which was very much the byproduct of what we today call cultural appropriation. It was the merging of the Greek Hermes with the Egyptian Toth.

Even Asatru (Germanic Paganism) is based on the Eddas, which were written down by Christian monks attempting to make the Nordic Viking religion "more Christian-like" so many stories were butchered to make Loki more Satan-like, or were left out entirely.

When Wicca is not being treated like "fake Paganism" because it was "Invented" in the fifties (even though that's just when it was legally recognized) there are those that call it the "Fluffy bunny" of Neo Paganism and mock it as Hippie Pagan religion because it's one rule is "Harm none, do as thou wilt." I guess some people can't handle "Don't deliberately hurt anyone."

I think a lot of Neo Pagans don't realize their versions of Paganism aren't actually ancient. They're also cobbled together from fragmented lore, like Wicca was. Neo means New.

[thorraborinn]

Good day, I was curious:

Is the idea of Odinn being the leader of gods a historical Pagan concept or is it christian influence on later writings?

Any specific sources on this subject that you know of?

It's complicated. The shortest I can make the answer is: the idea of Óðinn as leader of the gods definitely existed before conversion, but it was most likely only one of many ways that people conceived of the gods; and also the conception of the idea of "leader of the gods" itself almost certainly changed over time, beginning before conversion and continuing after it.

There is a very good paper on the subject called "How High was the High One?" by Terry Gunnell. It's a chapter in Theorizing Old Norse Myths edited by Stefan Brink and Lisa Collinson. Gunnell also made an appearance on the Nordic Mythology Podcast discussing the topic although I haven't listened to it. It's Terry Gunnell's opinion that in certain places, Thor and Freyr were each respectively considered the most important of the gods (which does not rule out that there were other contexts in which yet other gods were the most important). That isn't the only paper that goes into this but it is the one that makes the best case for certain specific social contexts in which Óðinn was likely not the primary deity. Some other works that are relevant for this are Nordic Religions in the Viking Age by Thomas DuBois (this is the book that kind of set the new standard for treating "Nordic religion" as "Nordic religions"), and "How Uniform was the Old Norse Religion?" by Stefan Brink (which is only talking about place-names, and might be the paper most responsible for making heathens think that place-names are the only permissible evidence for determining the presence of a cult of a god, but that isn't Brink's fault).

However, that doesn't mean that the idea of Óðinn as the most prominent god doesn't also occur in pre-Christian times. It's rather that the mythology that we have represents only one out of many perspectives. The skáld Glúmr Geirason used the kenning 'ruler of the gods' for Óðinn in the 970's. As always, it should be remembered that one of the primary demographics of Óðinn-worshipers were the same poets who produced most of the content we use for knowing about Old Norse religion. And there might be more to it than just "our god is the best, therefore he's the king." They probably actually did relate to Óðinn as a king-like figure ruling over human subjects including themselves, during life and after (and over life and death itself in some capacity), before people outside of their context would have, and it's less of a leap to extend that set of relations to include the other gods as well from there.

An interesting paper on the reception of the idea of Óðinn is Uses of Wodan: The development of his cult and of medieval literary responses to it by Philip A. Shaw. This is a great paper for understanding how we arrive at the concept of Óðinn~Woden~Wuotan that we have today, even for understanding the influences that Snorri had (note for example that in the Prologue, Snorri calls Óðinn "Voden" (Woden). Note that Shaw makes a rather extreme error in the paper (he proposes that *Wōdanaz and *Wōþanaz were two entirely separate gods who were later conflated and his argument for it is very easily disproven) but it doesn't ruin the paper, and it's only there to try to reinforce other arguments that he's already making separately on firmer ground.

I do want to point something out, that it's easy to make category errors here. I don't know whether the people who settled Iceland who worshiped Thor and the Vanir more than Óðinn also thought of Þórr as an "Allfather" or creator or what. So I'm hesitant to make too many guesses about specifics of mythology that we don't have pieces of, while being confident that there were things that didn't make it into the written record. I think it's a reasonable guess that some Nordic people thought of Þórr as the world-creator, and we can make guesses about that using comparative mythology, but to me that isn't a replacement for myths that we don't have. I also have absolutely no idea whether "Óðinn is creator" and "Þórr is creator" people would have, like, argued about it or if it would have just been seen as two different equally valid explanations (I tend to agree with those who think that inn almáttki áss was a sort of ecumenical gesture that would allow people who disagreed about who that was to still swear oaths together). Anyway we're getting into the weeds now and there's no end to what we could bring into this conversation so I'm gonna wrap it here.

[mannazandwyrd]

I have been thinking a lot about how we - as inclusive Norse pagans or Heathens or Nordic Animists or whatever we label it - are building a living, modern belief system in collaboration with our deities and their fragmentary written records and other forms of historical and archaeological evidence. Are they ancient entities who were worshipped in pre-Christian societies? Sure, but devotees universally seem to describe them as meeting us where we are and being aware of the times. They don’t seem to want us to live in the past. So how do we build modern, inclusive spiritual practices, and how do we evaluate possible new additions to our practices?

I think we need as a community to talk about how to handle UPG/SPG and more modern experiences of deities in The Religion With Homework (TM). We don’t have (or want!) a central authority to vet our theology - but what if we used more of a rabbinical or peer-review model?

What if we encouraged the “UPG day” thing happening in some FB groups and Discord servers to compile lists of SPG about our deities, and encouraged those doing spiritual leadership/theology training to discuss them as part of their scholarship?

What if the culture of inclusive heathenry was both “here’s a Shared Personal Gnosis emerging in the community to discuss” and “here’s the latest academic research to incorporate” instead of a strict adherence to Snorri’s skaldic fan-fic?

I’m feeling like the “study groups” and “homework” culture of asatru and heathen groups could be a bit less like bible-study and more like the journal clubs we have in graduate school for discussing current academic research in our field of study - every student picks a recent paper from an academic journal to present, and includes any critiques of the authors’ methods and conclusions, and in the question period afterward the professors and other students point out other possible problems. It combines critical thinking and peer review of new ideas. Maybe literally that could be included as part of clergy training, and a modified version of that could be introduced to study groups to see how it works for those who are less immersed in the lore? We might also look to how Rabbis are trained and how they debate their beliefs in Judaism as a model for how Heathen organizations might do the same.

Obviously as solo practitioners we can do whatever feels right - I’m speculating more about how new ideas might be adopted by kindreds and other organizations.