/asatru/ - Asatru / Heathenry / Paganism

Eh, I'll bite…

I'm not seeing mysticism, the esoteric, dreams, the artistic, or the divine inspiration among those characteristics.

Hoenir, as you described him, seems more left brained and entail a meditation 101 level of meditation. Not holy and incomprehensible ecstasy or the right side of the brain.

The only one who comes close is Freya in some of her aspects.

Also, considering that Odin/Woden/Wotan/etc. personifies the divine spark that created the universe and man's own divinity beyond being animals…well, he kinda gets to stay on that principal alone.

Also, inb4:

>but Odin is shifty and untrustworthy and mercurial and and….

Well, duh. That's the nature of life and reality in a nutshell.

>>8974

It almost sounds like to you Wodan is defined by ,,Whimsy.'' That's pretty interesting.

From It's thanks to Hoenir that Man is capable of conscious thought, though, which is at least half of what separates him from animals. In the mythology Odin's role seems rather clinical in comparison.

>…whence came the people who inhabit the world? Har answered as follows: As Borr's sons went along the sea-strand, they found two trees. These trees they took up and made men of them. The first [Odin] gave them spirit and life; the second [Hoenir/Vili] endowed them with reason and power of motion; and the third [Ve] gave them form, speech, hearing and eyesight. They gave them clothes and names; the man they called Ask, and the woman Embla. From them all mankind is descended, and a dwelling-place was given them under Midgard.

Giving to Man his 'spirit' is the crux of this, then. Just how is that to be interpreted? It could very well be that something like Joy of Life, Humor, Creativity, and Light Heartedness is meant by spirit which is also something animals lack and does separate Man from animals.

But let's say that it is so. How can it be the monolateral deity of worship? Certainly such things are important to being a complete human, but how do you get to the point where you can venerate the god that stands for them – let alone venerate him as primary god of the pantheon?

>>8976

From the mythology, it's thanks to Hoenir that Man capable of conscious thought*

>>8976

Weird. Referring to Odin's role as "clinical" is really odd and rather backwards. Like something I'd expect to hear in Bizarro world.

Hoenir gave man reason. A well-made robot/android or a decent A.I. can make use of reason.

While it's certainly important and part of what makes humans human, "spirit" entails things beyond making decisions based from evidence, or mathematical formulas.

Not only does intuition produce art and poetry, but true genius is a synthesis of the right and left. Genius is utilizing mathematics and reason with creative thinking beyond logic to ascertain the laws of physics, black holes, etc.

Thus, I find myself at a loss for how you can refer to creativity as "clinical." You will have to elaborate further.

As for why he became the head honcho of the pantheon, I am not 100% certain myself, and can only indulge in guesstimations and theories.

Perhaps our ancestors simply valued the "spirit" as the primary spark of life, without which we would be animals (without reason or spirit) or robots (with only reason alone.)

>>8979

(cont'd):

Also, the more I think about it, Odin's place probably has to do with the values of our ancestor's at the time.

What is more than likely going to propel a warrior into bloody melee combat where the chances of winning glory vs violent end are at best 50/50, if not worse: spirit or reason?

In fact, what ultimately motivates the kind of crazy risks that are a necessary evil to doing something truly great? With reason primarily at the helm, one might logically deduce that such slim chances aren't even worth risking.

>>8979

By 'clinical' I'm not referring to creativity, I'm referring to merely giving them life. The only word we have that lends itself to your vision of creativity and intuition is 'spirit,' which could be interpreted in other ways entirely.

The word for 'spirit' used in icelandic is önd – it can mean two things. Breath, or in other words a redundant reference to bringing life, or it can also mean soul, which is what you favor.

Additionally spirit in its original sense meant merely 'energetic, animated.' And it conjurs a vision of a writhing mass which is nothing before Ve granted it the genes & form of our people and Hoenir granted it thought.

But this is merely semantical, I don't want to dwell on it. I just want to make myself understood clearly. I'm completely willing to believe that by 'spirit' it is meant emotion or intuition.

One is not supreme over any of the other two. You have made the case for thought without emotion being a robot; but you have neglected the case of emotion without thought which is useless hysteria and essentially the modern leftist or untempered female allowed to run wild with no order, logic, or mindfulness. And you can have both emotion and thought without our form - our European genes - and you end up with an African.

All three are equally essential to making us, us. None is clearly supreme. So why does Odin then become the top dog? Well, the Prose Edda is contaminated with Christian syncreticism. In verse three, we find evidence for önd meaning soul rather than breath, but with troubling monotheism mixed in, and you can clearly see the parallels to the martyr cult.

>Ganglere then made the following question: Who is the highest and oldest of all the gods? Made answer Har: Allfather he is called in our tongue, but in Asgard of old he had twelve names…

>…Ganglere asks again: Where is this god? What can he do? What mighty works has he accomplished? Answered Har: He lives from everlasting to everlasting, rules over all his realm, and governs all things, great and small. Then remarked Jafnhar: He made heaven and earth, the air and all things in them. Thride added: What is most important, he made man and gave him a spirit, which shall live, and never perish, though the body may turn to dust or burn to ashes. All who live a life of virtue shall dwell with him in Gimle or Vingolf. The wicked, on the other hand, go to Hel, and from her to Niflhel, that is, down into the ninth world. Then asked Ganglere: What was he doing before heaven and earth were made? Har gave answer: Then was he with the frost-giants.

So in other words by the time the Prose Edda was written, centuries after the conversion of the Danes and Norwegians, Odin had already taken on significant similarity to Yahweh, God of Israel.

Should I then, attempt to reverse-engineer Odin back to before this syncretic contamination occurred? I certainly can't relate to a stand-in for Yahweh, a Chieftain, or a literal Sky Daddy. I just can't get into venerating Odin at all. I don't like the essence of him as he is understood within the Asatru tradition. Trying to make him into a different god because I don't like him is juvenile. He is what he is. I don't think he can be reforged to anyone's personal tastes, even if he was reforged once already as a stand in for Yahweh. I just don't know how to deal with Odin at all.

>>8985

Aye, all three elements are important, but I was attempting to theorize why Odin would be held in the most esteem. In order for Odin to be construed into a pseudo Yahweh by the Christians in the first place, I think it's logical to assume that he held a high enough position that such a transition was fairly easy and organic. This is an area where my knowledge grows dim, and thus is something I'm going to have to research further.

As for your feeling cold towards Odin, I wouldn't worry about it too much.

Reverse engineering him to find out about his earlier forms would probably be a worthwhile task for it's own sake and you might find interesting information. (Freya/Frigg becomes a much more complex and interesting goddess when you investigate Perchta, Holle and Holda from whence she sprung.)

But honestly, if you don't feel drawn to Odin, don't sweat it. Different tribes and areas held different gods to different degrees of esteem to the point that there were outright rivalries between cults (the one between Odin and Frey in Norway and Iceland was particularly notorious.)

Hel, the three gods Odin, Thor and Frey were honored in Upsala, Sweden, with Thor be considered the most foremost honored.

So if you aren't feeling Odin, don't feel him. Go with who you wish; that's one of the points of polytheism after all.

>>8987

*with Thor to be

>>8987

(cont'd):

One additional thing I just thought of was the fact that Odin was heavily associated with and venerated by the aristocracy. Among the Anglo-Saxons, in particular, he was a kingmaker.

So maybe the Christians went:

"Venerated by kings + kingmaker = king of the gods."

I had kind of hoped to sort of provoke other asatruans to tell me about their relationships with various gods and how they formed them. I'm concerned that there was not much shared even for Odin who I assumed many of you felt a strong relationship with. We may indeed need to begin a project for writing about various gods from which a sacred canon can naturally arise over time (many years) and eventually be considered reconstructed mythology. Even if nothing truly divinely inspired ever arises, it will still aid in reforging the broken connection between your soul and the Gods. I'm gonna go bump that thread.

>>9024

With all due respect, why did you not go about this in a more direct manner?

Now you seem like you wanted a more emotional and spiritual discussion, which you would've gotten if you had just straight out phrased your question more in line with your true intentions.

Instead, notice how the very first sentence I responded to you with was: "Eh, I'll bite…"

While now I know that you were intending to troll in a Socratic sense, initially your post came off as trollish period; and some trolls just want to take people for emotional joy rides for the lulz with no intention of reaching a higher understanding of sorts. I did not want to be that sucker, and I imagine others felt the same. Thus, I also approached the discussion in an extremely logical and dispassionate fashion in order to guard my emotions. Which is tragically ironic, considering the result you wanted, as well as the subject matter we discussed.

I realize you were probably trying to get people to go "FUCK YOU MAN! ODIN IS AWESOME AND HERE'S WHY…" but we're on a chan board, and a board that gets trolled by Christ-cucks regularly enough to where people are more leery of this approach.

You honestly would've gotten better results if your post just said "Tell me about your relationships with the gods and how you formed them."