/asatru/ - Asatru / Heathenry / Paganism

The beginning stages? I guess it depends on what kind of time scale you're using to measure it. We've been living in it for the past 5.000 years and it'll last another 427.000 years. So technically you're right, this is only the beginning.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kali_Yuga

>>245
Kali Yuga is buddhist brah

We're talking norse faith here

>>246
Yeah I know, but it's a similar concept

>>260
That's one of the dumbest books I've ever read

Being apocalyptic end times oriented is a hallmark of Evangelical Christianity. Lose the baggage. Heathenry is about THIS world, not the next!

>>273

LOL. Do you have any idea how influenced and shaped by Christianity the Eddas are? Evidence of the tale of Ragnorok before the conversion are scant to non-existent, which also strengthens the theory that Ragnarok was probably nothing more than anti-Heathen propaganda. Several other tomes of "Heathen folklore" around the time of the Eddas are even more blatant in their disparagement of the gods (i.e. the theory of the Heathen gods being nothing more than historical figures from Troy, etc.)

Also: viewing the Eddas as some sort of "divine written word" ala the Bible or Q'uaran: another sign of Abrahamic worldview baggage.

Any Heathen who takes the concept of worldview seriously knows that archaeological evidence, history and local folklore are far more reliable sources of the original Heathen worldview than the Eddas are. In fact it's best to read the Eddas after you have familiarized yourself with the worldview, so you know the inaccuracies to look out for.

>>362

>They're definitely not.

The Prose Edda, in particular, was compiled by the Christian monk Snorri Stuluson.

There's the Satanification of Loki (no evidence of this form of Loki exist before the conversion http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loki All sources are from post conversion sources, and the archeological stones are post conversion)

There's also the Classical Greco-Romanification of the gods (such as the three Norns, Garm, and the description of Hel, clearly being influenced by Greek mythology)

>That's not true.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ragnar%C3%B6k

Scroll down to the archaeological record and tell me if any of those sources are pre conversion. Better yet, come back here with some pre conversion sources of your own. I'll wait.

>>364

>What?

You hold the Eddas sacred, and you indicate you have never heard of this debated stanza from Voluspa:

https://groups.yahoo.com/neo/groups/voluspa_studies/conversations/messages/927

>Ragnarok
>Little to no evidence before conversion
>Story of the Heathen gods dying
>Some versions have verse alluding to Christian god coming to take over in the aftermath

>>365

>What the fuck are you even talking about

Have you even read the Eddas?:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prose_Edda

"The Prologue is the first section of four books of the Prose Edda, and consists of an euhemerized Christian account of the origins of Nordic mythology: the Nordic gods are described as human Trojan warriors who left Troy after the fall of that city (an origin similar to the one chosen by Geoffrey of Monmouth in the 12th century to account for the ancestry of the British nation, and which parallels Virgil's Aeneid). According to the Prose Edda, these warriors settled in northern Europe, where they were accepted as divine kings because of their superior culture and technology. Remembrance ceremonies later conducted at their burial sites degenerate into heathen cults, turning them into gods. Alexander M. Bruce suggested that Sturlson was in possession of the Langfeðgatal or a closely related text when he composed the detailed list of gods and heroes given. He noted parallel sequences in the Langfeðgatal and the Edda, noting the second appearance of a "Scyld figure" as both an ancestor and a descendant of Odin in both. This figure is expanded upon in the Edda detailing Skjöldr as Odin's son after his migration northwards to Reidgothland and his ordination as a King of Denmark.[10] [10]"

>>366

Not only that, there were similar collections of Icelandic stories made post conversion, such as:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flateyjarb%C3%B3k

and

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Landn%C3%A1mab%C3%B3k

Flateyjarbók is particularly known for having unfavorable representations of the gods and goddesses for Christian propaganda purposes. Such as:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Br%C3%ADsingamen

"Sörla þáttr[edit]
Sörla þáttr is a short story in the later and extended version of the Saga of Olaf Tryggvason[6] in the manuscript of the Flateyjarbók, which was written and compiled by two Christian priests, Jon Thordson and Magnus Thorhalson, in the late 14th century.[7] In the end of the story, the arrival of Christianity dissolves the old curse that traditionally was to endure until Ragnarök.

Freyja was a human in Asia and was the favorite concubine of Odin, King of Asialand. When this woman wanted to buy a golden necklace (no name given) forged by four dwarves (named Dvalinn, Alfrik, Berling, and Grer), she offered them gold and silver but they replied that they would only sell it to her if she would lie a night by each of them. She came home afterward with the necklace and kept silent as if nothing happened. But a man called Loki somehow knew it, and came to tell Odin. King Odin commanded Loki to steal the necklace, so Loki turned into a fly to sneak into Freyja's bower and stole it. When Freyja found her necklace missing, she came to ask king Odin. In exchange for it, Odin ordered her to make two kings, each served by twenty kings, fight forever unless some christened men so brave would dare to enter the battle and slay them. She said yes, and got that necklace back. Under the spell, king Högni and king Heðinn battled for one hundred and forty-three years, as soon as they fell down they had to stand up again and fight on. But in the end, the Christian lord Olaf Tryggvason, who has a great fate and luck, arrived with his christened men, and whoever slain by a Christian would stay dead. Thus the pagan curse was finally dissolved by the arrival of Christianity. After that, the noble man, king Olaf, went back to his realm.[8]"

>>367

>They're the tales of our ancestors, the gods they worshipped and also describe how the world and reality itself came to be. Of course they are divine in nature, in the context of the norse faith. If yo useriously dispute this you have no clue what norse heathenry is really about.

But this is not the product of a book like the Bible or the Q'uaran, that is supposedly divinely inspired by god. Our tales are the product of our people. The books just recorded them down, albeit sometimes in a flawed manner, twisted through the Christian worldview.


>What?
>Again; What?

Now you're just playing dumb.


>You strike me as some trolling redditor rather than being genuinely interested and invested in the norse faith, which has found its purest expression yet in the sacred Eddas of our people

Yet you are the one who shows blatant ignorance of the lore.

>>369
>>370

Okay, I can safely disregard you. You're a either troll or a moron.

>>364
Greco-Roman mythology is an Indo-European faith you dumbfuck, of course it has similarities to Norse mythology. The outlook is all thats different.
Are you saying that the stories of Sigurd the dragonslayer and Thor slaying the World Serpent are just based off the Hydra?

Fuck off shitlord

>>366
This should be interpreted as a flawed memorization of how the Germanic people are descendants of the Aryans, who came from an inprecise location in Asia and spread to Europe, Persia and India. The Germanic people were known to worship their ancestors and the most heroic of their ancestors were elevated to the status of godhood. Snorri did not euhemerize the Gods, he was telling the original story but leaving out the godhood part. This was intended.

>>373

No you dumbass. My point is that there is a Germanic worldview independent of Greco-Roman influence. The Christian medieval priests who collected and transcribed the Norse myths were Classically educated and often allowed this influence to seep and and color their translations. Garmr literally did not exist prior to conversion, and is a perfect analogue for Cerebus. The three Norns in the Eddas are analogues for the three Wyrd sisters of Greek myth, but originally, there were not
"the three Norns". In fact before Classical influence, Norns were local female protective deities.

Yes, Heathenry, and Greco-Roman culture are Indo-European and have some cross over, but not THAT perfect of a cross over. Some of the stuff in some of the texts collected is Heathenry blatantly mixed with Christian and Greco-Roman mythology.

For fuck's sake, the Sagas are fantastic sources of the Heathen worldview, and yet some of the Saga stories blatantly have an ending involving a Christian coming in to solve a problem the Heathens could not solve on their own, and then the Heathens convert to Christianity.

I'm not saying the Eddas, Sagas, etc. are worthless or forged, but have enough non-Heathen influence that they should be combed through with a critical mind.

>>374

I disagree, because in the very next section, Gylfaginning, he portrays the mythology of the gods as being the product of trickery:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gylfaginning

Also the last two sections of the Prose Edda,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sk%C3%A1ldskaparm%C3%A1l

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C3%A1ttatal

are concerned with the structure and tradition of Skaldic poetry.

The reason why Snorri compiled the Prose Edda in the first place is because the Skaldic poetic tradtion, at the time, was on the decline, and it's knowledge being forgotten. A lot of the Skaldic tradition is rooted in kennings (i.e. allegorical imagery) rooted in Heathen culture.

Snorri wanted to preserve Heathen mythology for the sake of keeping the Skaldic poetic tradition alive.

He specifically added the accounts of the gods being from Troy and Gylfaginning to geld the gods as being less than divine, and thus make it "safe" for him to transcribe the tales without fear of a pagan revival or reprisal from the Church.

In other words, he wanted to render the gods as glorified fairy tales purely for poetic purposes.

>>376

>purely for poetic purposes.

Lol, did not intend the above, but very appropriate, considering that alliteration is a major aspect of Skaldic poetry!

>>376
He did this because he didn't want a backlash from the church for promoting Heathenry. This doesnt mean he didnt have sympathies for the old ways, and the skaldic tradition is something deeply rooted in the heathen religion itself.
I am not saying they are flawless but you're looking for foreign influences where they arent

>>383

That's what I already said, but while I agree that he had sympathies for the old ways, he was still a Christian priest through and through, and such sympathies did not venture further than skin deep. A bit after the conversion, Scandinavian culture (Icelandic especially) went through a period of romanticizing their ancestors, but ultimately characterized them as good, but flawed and made better by the "newer, better, one true religion", Christianity (which you can see especially in the post conversion Icelandic Sagas that I mentioned earlier.)

As for foreign influences, syncretism between Heathenry and Christian-Greco-Roman culture was a fact on multiple fronts.

For example, until contact with Christianity, Heathens had no conception of spiritual realms outside of a spiritual realm existing in parallel with the physical. In other words, in the original Heathen worldview, you didn't go to some far off upper or lower realm like Heaven or Hell, you went into the earth, or into the local mountain to live with your ancestors.

Tombstones, visitations, and leaving offerings (i.e. flowers and such) are leftovers from this worldview, because their was a time when Heathens thought the person who was buried in the grave, was still literally there in spiritual form.

There is historical documentation of Heathens burying their family close to their home, or even under their house for reasons of maintaining close ties and protection and good luck (this even went so far as a King/Chieftain with good luck and renown having his body divided up and buried in multiple towns so that each could partake of his good luck.)

The concept of dying and going to the separate spiritual realm of Valhalla did not even exist pre-conversion (and was more than likely originally a kenning/metaphor for mass burial graves in the aftermath of battle, hence, Valhalla meaning "hall of the slain".)

>>398

The bottom line is that Heathenry is much more complex and richer than the Eddas and Sagas alone. They have much to offer and teach, but are not the sole infallible divine authority on Heathenry.

Go beyond them, and read the works of H. R. Ellis Davidson, "The Well and the Tree," "The Culture of the Teutons," "Teutonic Mythology" by the Grimm brothers, "The Road to Hel" etc.

The rabbit hole goes much deeper than you think and is far more interesting and exciting than just the Eddas and Sagas alone.

Reminder to ignore the christian troll ITT

Someone post the family tree of religion chart where it shows how all european pagan religions are descendants of the ancient aryan hyperborean source faith of all white people

>>403
Aw yes, there it is. Thanks man

Although i'm pissed off every time i see how the lard classified finnish Saami animism as somehow "asian", which is of course complete and utter bullshit since the white saami pagans worship the same gods as other northern germanics, just under slightly different names. They even use similiar runic systems of writing too.

And of course "animism" itself is a grossly generalized term too, we don't call monotheist religions "anthroism" either

>>399
I have read these, trust me. I agree with most of your points. I still think youre looking too much for Greco-Roman and Christian influences.

Alot of people assume that the Odin myth of him hanging and spearing on a tree is just a copycat from the cross of Jesus, but archaeological study and deeper reading proves otherwise. The Germanic tribes would sacrifice their enemies in a way that was identical to how Odin sacrificed himself, which indicates his cult is much older than the Christgod.

>>454

Fair enough. I agree that Odin hanging on a tree was a reference to said sacrifices and older than Christendom (in fact I would not be surprised if in this case, the analogues went in the reverse direction, with Christian priests seeing Odin hanging from a tree as parallel to the Crucifixion, in the same way as Romans saw Thor as analogous to Hercules due to characteristics such as both having magical blunt force trauma based weapons, etc.)

Nevertheless, I have to respectfully agree to disagree with you regarding Greco-Roman/Christian influence in the Eddas and Sagas. I will always view them as supplementary sources to archaeology, history and academic research works.

>>458
I am ok with this

Whats your opinion on the saga of Hacon the Good, the first Norse king to be a Christian? He tried to make his countrymen Christian but they were stubborn, even making him participate in the rituals of the temple of Uppsala to appease the gods and people. He wasnt as harsh as Olaf though and never imposed his religion.

The most interesting part however is when he dies. Hacon died in a large battle, and when he realized his body could not be returned to England in time, a Christian country, he reluctantly asked his warriors to give him a heathen burial, since he was to die in Heathendom. This shows an interesting worldview of the Norse; even the Christians seemed to think their god had no power in a heathen country, which seems more like old heathen thinking than the universality idea of the church. Hacon then goes to Valhalla and is welcomed by Odin and the gods. An interesting saga.

>>475

>An interesting saga.

Indeed, and one that shows one of the more interesting aspects of the Heathen worldview: the separation between the inborn luck of men, and the luck that comes from allying oneself with the gods, as well well as the sometimes prioritization of community beliefs over theism.

Haakan being accepted in spite of his Christianity is not that surprising at all. Athiests were accepted as part of the tribe back then as long as they attended blots and fairings and maintained the standards of the community.

Hrafnkels Saga, in particular, deals with a man who becomes atheist after feeling abandoned by his Full-Tru Frey, in the aftermath of defeat and humiliation. Ultimately, he rebuilds his fortune, standing, and takes revenge on his persecutors, all under the power of his own inborn luck. His adversary falls due to said adversary's weaker luck, in spite of support from more powerful men.

That Haakon felt the Christian god to have limited to no power beyond local lands is indeed a reflection of the Heathen worldview.

Firstly, on the simple level of the fact that Heathens initially just added Christ as another member of their pantheon of gods to worship when proselytized to.

Secondly, the Heathen belief of gods, or certain gods being specifically tied to the land. One can see this aspect with offerings being left at certain groves and lakes, as well as when the original Icelandic settlers brought along pieces of earth and temple/altar items such as high seat pillars along with them, in a sense, to bring their gods as well. Not to mention this being reflected in the four guardian spirits of Iceland.

Some current Reconstructionist Heathens take this aspect further and theorize that the Odin of Iceland, and say for example, the Wodan of continental Germany, and the Woden of Anglo-Saxon Britain, are not the same gods at all, but are local deities that fulfill that specific role for the people (the more capricious personality of Odin contrasted with the king maker personality of Woden is often used as an example of this.) I am personally agnostic about this issue until I see further concrete evidence.

Indeed, as I said before the Sagas can be wonderful sources of the Heathen worldview. One must simply be on guard for things like the anti-Heathen subtext of Laxdæla Saga/The Saga of the People of Laxárdalr.

>>364
>Snorri
>Christian monk

are you fucking insane? snorri was a lawyer. he was never a monk.

look, i'll be the first in line to say that it's stupid to turn the lore into a bible. that's about the most virulent manifestation of abrahamic baggage that's even possible in heathenry. and i'll be the first in line to say that there's no reason to be obsessed with ragnarok.

but seriously, did you just say that snorri was a fucking monk? are you literally retarded?

>>954

Mea culpa.

You are correct, and my memory of Snorri was apparently fuzzy. At the time I could have sworn I remembered a source calling him a Christian monk or priest of some sort, but doing research on him again, I am clearly mistaken.

Perhaps in error, I conflated my memory of his Classical education and euhemerism of the gods as being indicators of being a Christian monk.

>>957

hell, if you read through his sections on the names of the gods, the way he just tosses a little blurb about jesus in there almost reads as hostility. the sense i get from snorri is overwhelmingly one of striving to preserve and protect the heathen traditions. he basically scribbled a bit of christian lipservice into the margins just to pacify the church.

of course, this is only one very late icelandic perspective on the lore. for example, a lot of what was preserved in the british isles is significantly more degraded by the influence of insular monks. but even in these cases, there is valuable content in the lore. it's just important not to approach it as a uniform, unerring bible, in that OCD semitic way, where we're just transcribing the text by rote and calling it holy scripture.

heathen lore has always been an oral tradition. at the point in history that our ways were suppressed, we were fortunate to see it frozen up into some written texts so it could ride out the next few centuries, when a thaw in the political climate has allowed us to resume the flow of the traditions. i think what is most important is that we embrace the orality of those traditions – and i think that a place like this, for example, is a great way for that lore to live on in the minds and on the tongues of those who embrace the ancestral path.

>>958

Personally I am still leery on whether Snorri wished to preserve Heathen lore for purposes beyond poetics and tradition for tradition's sake.

Everything else, I completely see eye to eye with you. Post-conversion written sources should be viewed as valuable goldmines to shift dirt (foreign influence and propaganda) from to reach the gold (documentation on the Heathen worldview), and not infallible holy objects of worship unto themselves.

>>958

Okay, I'm back, there is one part of your post that kept bothering me in the back of my mind that I've got to respond to:

>hell, if you read through his sections on the names of the gods, the way he just tosses a little blurb about jesus in there almost reads as hostility. the sense i get from snorri is overwhelmingly one of striving to preserve and protect the heathen traditions. he basically scribbled a bit of christian lipservice into the margins just to pacify the church.

>he basically scribbled a bit of christian lipservice into the margins just to pacify the church.

This is completely false. I've already gone over in earlier posts >>366 >>376 on how the first half of the Prose Edda is dedicated to desacralizing the gods as essentially fairy tales of a noble but ignorant people that are perfectly safe to derive poetry from. That goes far beyond mere tidbits of Christian lip service in the margins.

Though I was mistaken in Snorri being a Christian monk, he was, nevertheless, a Christian:

http://web.uvic.ca/~becktrus/assets/text/vesteinn_02.php

"It is important to understand these words correctly. Snorri Sturluson was a Christian, who had been raised and instructed at a seat of Christian learning. There is no reason to expect that he or any of his contemporaries were followers of the heathen faith, or doubted the church's gospel. Snorri's world view was shaped by clerical writings as well as that knowledge of the world and understanding of human existence which the clergy preached in their books and from their pulpits. This is also clearly indicated both in the Prologue and in the words quoted here above. It has been demonstrated how ideas in the Prologue concerning the roots of heathen faith have clear parallels in church teachings and the writings of learned men in the Middle Ages. There is no longer any dispute among scholars on this point, although we cannot know with any certainty how many of his ideas Snorri developed through his own reading, how much he took from sermons or conversations with learned men, and how much is his own original conclusions. It is important, however, that Snorri encourages the young poets not to forget or reject the old traditions. These words, and the whole work, show that his attitude to the heathen material itself was completely different from the most common attitudes of the Middle Ages."

>>975

i think you are grossly oversimplifying the relationship between heathenry and christianity in iceland during that period. for example, it has always been completely normal for icelandic christians to accept the existence of the elves. if snorri had a reading of christianity that – like we see in most of the world – was actually to the exclusion of all heathen lore, that would be pretty extraordinary.

it has never been in dispute that snorri grew up in a christian culture and personally participated in that culture. but dedicating so much of his life to preserving the heathen lore – and explicitly stating that he wanted to preserve it – has far more bearing on how we should read snorri.

i.e.: it's an oral tradition, and that itself causes mutations to the lore. and, he was living in a christian society as a christian, so his cosmology is not going to match that of the prechristian germanic peoples. …but everything we have says that he was not twisting the lore to some christian end. he was preserving it for reasons other than an earnest dedication to the heathen spirituality, but he was working to record it accurately, not to appropriate and destroy it.

"snorri was christian" just doesn't tell us much worthwhile about how to read him.

>>885
>I tried to find a connection between the Kali Yuga thing and Ragnarök

This ought to interest you; (from wikipedia) "Valhalla has five hundred and forty doors that eight hundred men can exit from at once (from which the einherjar will flow forth to engage the wolf Fenrir at Ragnarök)".

540*800=432,000.

(Also wikipedia) "The Kali Yuga is sometimes thought to last 432,000 years, although other durations have been proposed".

>>977

I know that there was much syncretism between Christianity and Heathenry during the early post-conversion years. People in Scandinavia to this day believe in trolls and land spirits.

We both agree with the fact the he was preserving the lore for reasons other than sincere Heathen spirituality. I was disagreeing with the concept of Snorri being a crypto-Heathen trying to preserve the practice of Heathenry under the church's nose that I thought you and others in this thread were implying.

Also with all due respect, this:

>i.e.: it's an oral tradition, and that itself causes mutations to the lore. and, he was living in a christian society as a christian, so his cosmology is not going to match that of the prechristian germanic peoples.

Contradicts this:

>"snorri was christian" just doesn't tell us much worthwhile about how to read him.

The fact that Snorri was a Christian growing up in a Christian society with a worldview that was more than likely a syncretic mishmash of Christianity and Heathenry, directly informs the earlier statement of yours I referenced. In other words, your earlier statement admits that his interpretation of Heathen lore could be colored by the Christian worldview coming into dominance during that period, due to the oral nature of the transmission of the lore up to that point.

Because of that, "Snorri was a Christian" is indeed something worthwhile to keep in mind, especially when comparing the lore as Snorri recorded it, in comparison to such things as earlier rune inscribings and other archeological evidence.

>>352

This guy knows what's up

>>368
>Now you're just playing dumb.

I don't think he's playing.

>>1761

>believing in "end-times prophecy"
>not judeo-christian

Son, I've got bad news for you.

>>1781
This is my favorite macro to ever exist