Working with two pantheons

In a little section called “Spiritual Overinsurance,” Jonathan Kirsch (God Against the Gods) writes:

“Thus, for example, a pagan might be a devotee of the stately old gods of Rome and Greece whom Homer calls ‘the Olympians’ -- Apollo and Zeus, Aphrodite and Athena -- and at the very same time, a worshipper of the Syrian goddess known as the Great Mother, the Persian god called Mithra or the newfangled cult that conjoined the Egyptian goddess Isis and a freshly minted god called Serapis, a conflation of two older Eygptian deities. One famous pagan called Praetextatus, a contemporary of both Constantine and Julian, is described on his epitaph as a proud collector of pagan priesthoods and initiations of all kinds: ‘high priest of Vesta, high priest of the sun, a priest of Hercules, an initiate of the mysteries of Dionysos and Eleusis, priest and temple guardian in the mystery of Cybele, and Father in the mystery of Mithras.’ It says as much about paganism, as about Praetextatus that he used to joke with the pople that ‘he might be tempted to become a Christian by the prospect of being Bishop of Rome.’

“So welcoming was polytheism that even the holiest figures of monotheism were recruited into Greco-Roman paganism. One emperor . . . adorned his private chapel with ‘statues of Abraham, of Orpheus, of Apollonius, and of Christ,’ writes Edward Gibbon of Alexander Severus (208-235) . . . .

“Even Yahweh, regarded by strict monotheists who wrote the bible as the one and only god, was made over into the deity called Iao and given a place among the many gods and goddesses of paganism. . . . [T]hey wanted to make sure that they did not forfeit the blessing of the right god by making sure to worship all gods -- a practice that historian Robin Lane Fox describes as “spiritual over-insurance. . . .

“’Whilst all nations and kingdoms honor their respective god, the Romans respect the gods of all the others, just as their power and authority have reached the compass of the whole world,’ boasts the pagan orator Caecillus. ‘They search out everywhere these foreign gods, and adopt them for their own; nay, they even erected altars to unknown gods.”

Normally, I enjoy Jonathan Kirsch, but God Against the Gods is really just a popular history of the transition from paganism to Christianity in the Roman empire. I read it in an evening, and didn’t see anything that I didn’t already know, or that any reasonably well-informed lay person wouldn’t already know. I’d recommend it primarily to people who already know that the triumph of Christianity was largely the result of politics, but who are bit fuzzy on the details.

The passage quoted above caught my eye for a very personal reason. I’m becoming increasingly annoyed by pagans and neopagans both who talk about “working with more than one pantheon.” I didn’t mind at first, but after a year of hearing it everywhere, it’s like a kind of water torture.

Who thought up this silliness, anyway? It sounds like Llewellyn Press nonsense to me. First, I don’t like the implicit idea that being a pagan involves working with a pantheon. It sounds like something from wicca and magic circles. I don’t work with my gods; I fulfill my duty by according them appropriate honor. Secondly, I’m not particularly fond of the implicit assumption that the gods can be neatly divided into discrete cultural packages. I guess some people suppose that gods are a consumer package like any other commodity -- you do a bit of comparison shopping, then choose the style you want (but be careful that they go with the 9-piece living room suite from Sears, and make sure you can afford the payments).

The older I get, the more I go back to the core set of beliefs I already had when I was 14, and the more I’m prepared to ignore all the fluff I’ve learned to tolerate since then. I think of myself as a polytheist. I have my own set of preferred personal and family gods, who happen to be Norse. But I don’t deny the existence of the others. In fact, I think a good case can be made that the Christian god and the Greek and Roman gods are the appropriate civic and cultural gods of America. If I occasionally offer a pinch of cornmeal to Tonantzin as Queen of the Americas, or a pinch of incense to Hermes as a patron of lawyers (and thieves), I don’t see that I’ve given offense to my family gods, and I certainly don’t think of myself as “working with more than one pantheon.”

In fine, it seems to me that all the hand-wringing on this subject is really only possible among people who aren’t polytheists in the traditional sense of the word, people who have some kind of new-agey “all the gods are one” philosophy. If you accept, as I do, the proposition that each of the gods is a distinct being, it’s only a short step to “spiritual over-insurance.”

Founding Rome

Royal Roman ruins go back to age of myth

Newfound palace dates back to city’s legendary origin

ROME - Legend has it that Rome was founded in 753 B.C. by Romulus and Remus, the twin sons of Mars, the god of war, who were suckled as infants by a she-wolf in the woods. Now, archaeologists believe they have found evidence that at least the time frame for that tale may be true: Traces of a royal palace discovered in the Roman Forum have been dated to roughly the period of the eternal city’s legendary foundation.

https://www.msn.com/

By coincidence, tomorrow is the Quirinalia, a Roman festival honoring Quirinus, a Sabine god who came to be identified with Romulus.

Progress is a pipe dream

I saved this piece for myself but now I don't remember where I found it, or if indeed the text here is quoted from Richard Reese.

Only poets can save us now

by Richard Reese

The story of progress - that each generation is better than the one before it is about 200 years old. These 200 years have been the most tumultuous and destructive years in the history of the planet. In fact, the history of civilization is not a story of progress, but a story of continuous decline.

The Christian tradition begins in the Garden of Eden of the hunters and gatherers. The Fall symbolizes the dawn of civilization. Yahweh, a Semitic storm god, could see that farming was destroying Creation. For much of the Old Testament, he urges his Chosen People to destroy the hideous cities of the defilers of the Earth. But the farmers beat the nomads, and the Christian prophets tell us that we are now sitting in the shadows of an onrushing Armageddon.

In the Norse myths, it’s the same cycle. The human gods conquer the powerful forces of nature, rule for a while, then are destroyed by the revenge of nature at the battle of Ragnarok. The ancient Greeks saw human decline as a series of historic ages. Hesiod writes of the Golden Age: “They lived like gods, free from worry and fatigue; old age did not afflict them; they rejoiced in continual festivity.” This was followed by the Silver Age, a matriarchal era of agriculture, when men obeyed their mothers. This was followed by the Bronze Age, a patriarchal era of war : “Their pitiless hearts were as hard as steel; their might was untamable, their arms invincible.” This was followed by the Iron Age, a time “when men respect neither their vows, nor justice, nor virtue.”

Compare Here

Oct. 20, 2019: I find online a composition with the same title and apparently written by the same author, but the content is very different.

• Richard Adrian Reese, Only the Poets can Save us Now (n.d.), in Aisling No. 25 (Bealtaine 1999), at Aislingmagazine.com.

Tribes and kindreds

I must be missing something. I just don’t get this thing that some heathens have about tribes and kindreds. Oh, I totally get the importance of family in the heathen ethic. What I don’t get is how someone could think that he or she is authentically living that ethic by creating an artificial group based on a common religion. I would call that a community, not a kindred. I understand the concept of intentional communities. The idea of intentional kindreds or intentional tribes seems a bit forced. Okay -- more than a bit.

Still, I’m open to understanding if I can find someone who can explain cogently why it isn’t just some modernist silliness.

I’m in the minority here, being neither folkish nor modernist myself. I’m a heathen because it’s the proper religion for me, not because I have some special calling from the gods. My ancestors came from Sweden. My surname is my badge of membership in their kindred. If I want to follow a non-Christian path, the only proper path for me is the pre-Christian religion of my kindred. It doesn’t matter whether I get along with them. In fact, I have ongoing issues with a few of them. It doesn’t matter that many of them are Christian. They’re still my kindred. It does help that the gods planted in my heart a passion for Norse sagas. It also helps that my Mom instilled in us a proper respect for tomten and encouraged us to pray to our ancestors when we need help. (After a few martinis, she’ll also remind us that we’re descended from Freyr and it doesn’t hurt to thank him for our prosperity if we want it to continue.) Christian or not, it’s inevitable that I’d be required to pay the proper respect to the Elder Kin. And, being more of the not, really my only choice is how much I want to learn about my ancestral faith and the obligations that go with it. I can flirt with any religion or philosophy that takes my fancy (and I often do), but I can’t not give proper honor to the gods of my ancestors. It just wouldn’t be proper.

But that’s just me. I don’t expect anyone else to see things the same way. We see people whose surnames announce their membership in a Gaelic kindred taking leadership positions in heathen organizations, and no one thinks it’s odd that they choose to honor gods foreign to them. Or, perhaps they have some sort of maternal connection to the Germanic peoples but they don’t take it seriously enough to legally change their surname to associate themselves with those maternal kindreds. Or, they adopt illogical names -- like Thorsson when in fact they are not sons of a man named Thor. I have an online chum -- most of you know who she is -- who happens to have no known Scandinavian ancestry, but she takes her religion seriously. Unlike some people who merely pay lip service to the idea of kindred and honoring the gods, she changed her name to a properly Scandinavian name without the pretension of filiating as the daughter of a god or goddess. She would disagree, I think, but it seems to me that by changing her name she severed her kindred ties, at least as far as our gods are concerned, and brought herself before the gods as a new woman and an honorary Swede. Such stoutness of heart! Surely, this is the kind of approach to the gods that they would never deny.

One of the things that bothers me is that the heathens who talk about the importance of kindred don’t care as much about their own kindred as they do about participating in a modernist project to re-create a tribal society. They don’t seem to notice that our society uses hereditary surnames as a badge of kindred membership. And, for most of us, those surnames were adopted 800 years ago. So long ago, in fact, that they have moved from being indiciae of family membership, beyond badges of clan membership, and solidly into being tribal labels. My surname is only 250 years old, and the surnames of some of my Swedish cousins are less than 100 years old, but most Americans belong to British and Continental patrilineages going back to about 1200 CE. Yet, somehow, their heathen members don’t regard membership in these tribes as important. They want to create new tribes.

I dislike saying -- or even thinking -- that anyone is wrong in matters of faith. But, it’s pretty easy to be dysfunctional in such matters. I hope someone tells me I’m wrong. I’m hoping that someone can explain to me how ignoring your own kindred to create an artificial tribe is an authentic way of honoring your relatives and giving the gods their due.

Fritterfae responded:

Kin and kindred are people you are genetically related to, and who fall within your anthropologic structures of kinship. Would you include adopted children among your kin? And what about marriages that bring people of different ancestry or religious traditions together, are your in-laws among your kin?

Kith was another of those old terms that gets tied with kin a lot. Kith refers to your familiar friends, neighbors, and probably some of your relatives (perhaps the not-so-close ones).

But both of these are of anglo-saxon origin, so why don’t the heathens use an actual scandinavian term like “släkting” for actual relations or “själsfränder” for people of like mind and avoid that silly confusion.

As for tribes of intention, I think that’s a valid distinction. The Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organisation, http://www.unpo.org/, has members that include:

“indigenous peoples, occupied nations, minorities and independent states or territories who have joined together to protect their human and cultural rights, preserve their environments, and to find non-violent solutions to conflicts which affect them.”

Radical Faeries have discussed at length their identity as tribe, and whether or not we should actively consider ourselves a separate people. Why? When we have no established qualifications as members of the tribe, we can’t decide on who or what is Faerie, we have these constant splits over what we do and don’t do as a group, etc. etc. There’s something in our spirit that tells us we are among these people. Does that mean we reject or disrespect our heritage, our families, no. We take on additional names, sometimes even changing our names legally to our Faerie names, does this mean we disrespect what we were given at birth, no, we have discovered ourselves. At least that’s how I see it.

But I’m of the touchy-feely Pagans, as well as a moral relativist. No conviction is so firm as to be unflexible with me. So, take my explanations as you will.

Then I said:

My post might have been a bit clearer if I had taken time - as you have - to define kith and kin, then made the point that intentional tribes are really kiths, not kindreds. Uncountable years ago I belonged to a wicca group called Cyth Dana, which was the founder’s version of Community of the Goddess Danu ;)

Would you include adopted children among your kin? And what about marriages that bring people of different ancestry or religious traditions together, are your in-laws among your kin?

Of course I would include adopted children. Else what would be the point of adoption? It might take some work, but I think you could fairly extrapolate from what I wrote that I regard the surname as the determinative factor for membership in a kindred, and that would naturally include anyone adopted into the kindred. I’m not much impressed with arguments that family is defined by blood. It seems to me, rather, that families are defined by cultural structures - which is why the surname is the badge of membership.

As for in-laws, history shows that the Germanic peoples took marriage so seriously in part because it linked the ørlög of two families. In the oldest literature, one often sees children being named for, say, an uncle by marriage, or the father’s father-in-law from a previous marriage. No blood relationship to the new child. What was being honored was the union of the fates of the two families. The child was thereby linked not just to its own kin, but also to the kins of its affinal relatives.

Radical Faeries have discussed at length their identity as tribe, and whether or not we should actively consider ourselves a separate people.

Not my place to judge a system that works for you, but I am willing to say that in my opinion the Radical Faeries are an intentional community of people called out of the common herd by the gods. It would be impious not to honor that call on its own terms. I personally have too much American Indian in me to be troubled by any Anglo prejudice against having as many names as you can wring out of the universe. Every additional name, in my book, is its own dose of power. But, when you legally change to your Faerie name, you are changing your relationship to your kindred. I’m assuming that the name someone would take is something other than the name of a maternal kindred, so to my way of thinking the change severs the primary tie to kin, and replaces it with a primary identity as a Radical Faerie. As a heathen, it would trouble me greatly to do something like that, but I can understand that personal identity as a Radical Faerie could take first place for some people. Whether the change is disrespectful or a rejection of kindred is something the individual would have to work out between himself, his kin and his gods. If you’re not starting from a heathen premise that family plays a primary role in religion, I’m not sure that a heathen perspective is even relevant.

But I’m of the touchy-feely Pagans, as well as a moral relativist. No conviction is so firm as to be unflexible with me. So, take my explanations as you will.

I’m glad you took the time to comment. When I wrote this entry, I never expected to have the challenge of thinking about the Radical Faery perspective. I could never be one of you, but I have a special place in my heart for the spirit embodied by the Radical Faeries.

Wednesbury reponded:

Well, I have to admit that I see nothing wrong with trying to re-create a tribal society myself. I don’t see anything dysfunctional in it, although I will admit that at best all we can achieve at the moment are proto-tribes. My thought is that since ancient heathendom was originally practised in a tribal setting, then the same should hold true for modern heathendom. If this is indeed the case (and it is possible that i am wrong), then the best idea would be try to re-create a tribal society.

Here I must stress that I differentiate between kindred and tribe. One’s kindred is one’s blood kin or those that have been legally adopted into the family. One’s tribe is a group of people, not all of whom are going to be necessarily related by blood, with whom one shares a common history, heritage, et. al.

Anyhow, I have to disagree with you that “who talk about the importance of kindred don’t care as much about their own kindred as they do about participating in a modernist project to re-create a tribal society.” My kindred, whether heathen or not, is central to me. And it seems to be for most theodisc types. One cannot have a tribe without kindreds. I am lucky to have heathen who are part of Miercinga who are related to me by blood. As to my Christian relatives, I simply regard them as non-participants in the tribe.

Of course, the one flaw I can see in trying to re-create any sort of tribal society is that it is going to be somewhat artificial at the outset. I think at best what we are doing now is creating proto-tribes that may one day become full fledged tribes. But I do think it is a worthwhile project. And I don’t see it at all in conflict with blood kinship--in fact kinship is needed if it is to succeed at all.

Then I said:

Just so we understand each other, I also see no problem with trying to re-create a tribal society. My issue is only with the means.

The problem I see with current efforts is that they treat tribe as synonymous with a type of particularly close community, when in fact tribes were larger kinship groups, albeit fictive in many cases.

I’m not up on current anthropological theories but back in the day when I was studying, tribes were thought to have formed around a core kinship group. While there was probably a large accession by recruitment, one of the salient features was the fiction of a common descent from a semi-divine eponymous ancestor - the Saxons from Saxnot, the Ingvaeones from Ingvi, and so on. Among the Teutons, kingship was elective but only from among the male members of a sacral family, almost certainly the family around whom the proto-tribe coalesced, and to whom new members were tied by bounds of adoption, marriage and conquest.

It strikes me as a bit disingenuous to posit a necessary connection between tribalism and religion, then ignore the pieces such as a common descent and a sacral dynasty that would have mattered most to our ancestors. I’m sympathetic to the dilemma that these elements, if necessary, could be an almost insurmountable barrier to creating modern tribes. Nevertheless, I have to think that what matters is the whole system, not just the easy parts.

Of course, none of this will be anything new to you. The piece that’s missing for me is how you get from here to your particular brand of tribalism.

When I think about the ways tribalism might be re-energized (not re-created), I think about the Scottish clans. My understanding is that they are actually tribes, the word clan having taken on another meaning among anthropolgists and ethnographers. They have the fiction of a common descent (which is nevertheless an actual descent, at least in the maternal lines for many clan members). And, they have chiefly families, some of whom are desendants of ancient dynasts. Indeed, if I remember correctly, McLean of Duart is thought by many historians to be descended in the male line from the Yngling dynasty of Uppsala.

My own bit of tribalism extends only as far as memberhip in the Clan Sinclair Association. I am descended - maternally - from the Sinclairs, and through them from the ancient Jarls of Orkney, from whom the Sinclairs derived their Earldom. If I were ever to be tempted into a tribalist project, I think it might be a cooperative project with other Sinclair heathens (or some other family group with whom I have an actual familial connection). Considering the high interest many Sinclairs have in their Norse heritage, I don’t think it’s an unlikely scenario.

And he said:

Well, I’m not sure that current efforts do treat tribe simply as type of particularly close type of community. The Ealdriht and the groups that emerged from it were always aware of the importance of kinship. Whether by design or by coincidence, I am related to a good number of my fellow theodsmen. Some of those relationships are very close--Swain is my brother. In other cases, the relationship are more distant--Brian is my second cousin. In some cases they are so distant that we simply share descent from Penda and Alfred through William the Bastard. But there are relationships there and they have always played an important role in the Ealdriht and now the groups descended from it.

The problem is that not everyone who wishes to be part of any given tribe (or proto-tribe, as the case may be) are not going to be necessarily related blood. I could not seriously see restricting membership of a tribe to blood relations as this would seem too restrictive to growth. Ultimately, while blood is important, there are other matters, such a shared belief system, shared customs, shared history, that are as important. Besides which, I see a tribe as composed of kindreds, of extended families. Not everyone in a tribe is going to be a close relation, or even a slightly distant one.

Anyway, I see it, this is something that will take time. Over time we will establish our own customs and develop our own shared history. People will marry and have children. This is how I see us achieving a truly tribal society. I admit that it is going to be difficult and it is not without obstacles, but I honeatly think that it can be done.

And I said:

Well argued. Although I disagree, I think it’s only fair to let yours be the last word.

Wodening responded:

Well, I know you were going to let Eric’s be the last word here, but I have something to add. I think part of the problem is we are seeing tribes differently. The Clan Sinclair is a clan.... not a tribe. In our particular brand of neo-tribalism we break it down into tribe, clan, family, or in our own Anglo-Saxon terms, þ&eacure;od; sibb, mægð. The sibb could also be called a kindred. Your mægð are folks immediately related to you; brothers, sisters, first cousins, aunts, uncles, mother, and father. The sibb are all related to you out to five or eight generations (for example Brian Smith of Néoweanglia is mine and Eric’s sixth cousin by blood). The þ&eacure;od; are all those that claim a common line of descent no matter how common, share a common history, and a common identity. Now this is the only place we really have to stretch things. Instead of claiming a common descent as the ancient tribes did with ancestors like Ingvi, Irmin, and Esta (mentioned in Taticus’ Germanic), we are more vague... folks that are of English descent OR participate in an English derived culture.

All that aside House Wodening, our sibb, is very much the sort of thing you were talking about with a theorerical cooperative project with other Sinclair Heathens. So we are indeed approaching it in a way you seem to think we should. Beyond that, I think we may simply be using terms differently.

Welgá!

Swain

Then he added:

Well, I think part of the problem is that Asatruar in American decades ago adopted the term kindred without really thinking about what it meant. What they were really trying to say I think was tribe or, at least community. Believe me though there has been go arounds in the Heathen community about the true meaning of the word kindred.

As to forming an articial [sic] tribe, whose to say that means throwing off your own true kindred and ignoring them is part of forming a tribe? The majority of my family are Xian as are my wife’s, and we are still very much a part of them, and yet, also very much a part of our Heathen tribe. I simply cannot see where you are coming up with one would have to ignore their own family in order to form a Heathen tribe.

Maybe it is different in the path you have chose, but in Germanic Heathenry probably 90% of the folks I know still feel they are a part of their real (birth, genetic, what have you) family, Xian or not.

I responded:

I don’t know why I’m so disappointed in yours and Eric’s response. I guess I just thought there’d be more. I’ve thought on and off all day about how best to respond. The easy answers would be to let myself be distracted by the details -- Do you really think the Anglo-Saxon mægð is well-enough understood be considered a subunit of the Sippe/sibb? How do their traditionally cognatic structures play into your use of them as subunits of a tribe? Or perhaps you do not envision the tribe you’re creating as agnatic? Why have you set the limit of the sibb so much further than the Anglo-Saxons seem to have done? Why do you disagree with the contemporary schools of thought that define the Scottish clans as tribes? Looking at your descent from Penda, which I assume is one of the scholarly conjectures currently in favor, where did you find one that passes through William the Bastard?

I’d love to know the answers to these questions, and others, but I would be doing injury to our topic if I went off on a tangent.

I’m sympathetic to many of your arguments, but you seem to be glossing over my principal concerns. As I read your comments, it seems to me that the bottom-line answer is that you’re choosing the path that seems practical. Perhaps you regret a few of the compromises you are making, but you regard them as necessary to achieve your goal. (It’s taking a bit of reading between the lines, so correct me if I’m wrong.)

You and Eric both objected to me saying that forming a modernist tribe amounts to throwing off your own kindred. I think you mis-read or misundstood my meaning. I don’t want to patronize you, but I do want to be very clear about this point, and I’m not sure how accustomed you are to thinking about kinship in scholarly terms (as opposed, let’s say, to educated terms).

Each of us belongs to a named lineage, typically agnatic. This lineage is marked by the use of a particular surname. It should not be confused with a bilateral kinship group (that is, with the relatives you think of as your relatives on both sides). If your surname is English, and I assume it is, it’s probably about 800 years old -- perhaps a little more, perhaps a little less. You were born into that group. And, here’s where the misunderstanding seems to arise.

I am not saying that forming modern tribes involves a rejection of your aunts and uncles and cousins -- your bilateral kinship group. I’m saying that forming a modern tribe with people of different agnatic lineages -- different surnames -- evidences a disrespect for the lineage you were born into.

Just to play the devil’s advocate for a moment, you could respond that Rice Miercinga is composed primarily of people who trace their surname line back to the area of Mercia, with a few folks here and there who have been formally adopted and changed their surname. I could have very little objection to that, except to churlishly quibble about whether such a project should be centered in Mercia. If you were to add that arrungs take into account a person’s proven descent from the nobility of Mercia, at whatever period, and that you see House Wodening becoming the sacral family for the tribe -- well, I might not personally want to join your project, but I would hold it in high esteem as an authentic reconstruction project.

My real, heartfelt objection to modern tribalism is that there is no way to claim on behalf of your entire named lineage that you belong to this tribe or that. It is only possible to subtract small sub lineages from their authentic surname group and attach them to new groups.

Evolution vs. creation

Almost half of Americans believe God created humans 10,000 years ago

by Frank Newport

Only about a third of Americans believe that Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution is a scientific theory that has been well supported by the evidence, while just as many say that it is just one of many theories and has not been supported by the evidence. The rest say they don’t know enough to say. Forty-five percent of Americans also believe that God created human beings pretty much in their present form about 10,000 years ago. A third of Americans are biblical literalists who believe that the Bible is the actual word of God and is to be taken literally, word for word.

http://www.gallup.com/poll/23200/Almost-Half-Americans-Believe-Humans-Did-Evolve.aspx

Multi-part souls

Having written about the idea of a multi-part soul among the Norse, I suspect that some will think that such a system is too obtuse to be meaningful. So, I want to present -- very briefly -- a quick summary of two other cultural systems with multi-part souls.

Among the Lakota of the American Plains, the soul has four elements: the niya, the nagi, šicun and the nagila. The niya is the basic life-element, or life-breath. This is the soul that animates the body and allows it to move, although the body will not be able to move fully without the other souls. Proper care of the body nourishes the niya, while ritual cleansing and healing are designed to strengthen it. The nagi, on the other hand, is a more personal soul, although it is thought to be capricious. The nagi, typically in conjunction with the niya, can leave the body and journey to the spirit world. However, the nagi might need to be lured back from such a journey, and the return of the two requires reintegration of the niya. It is the nagi that is strengthened by a vision quest. Because all beings possess nagi, an individual on a vision quest can communicate with animals in the language common to all nagi. If the nagi leaves but the niya remains, the person might become ill or insane, or even fall into a coma or semi-consciousness. Like the Greek shade, it takes the form of the body and after death can become a ghost. Because it has a great deal of freedom, the nagi can be reborn, in which case it will retain the memories of its former life. The third part of the soul is šicun, the person’s store of spiritual power. This power can take the form of knowledge or wisdom, as well as the unique traits or strengths of a being. Some people possess more, and some less. The nagi on its journey may be given a part of the šicun of those he meets, along with instructions about its use, and ritual songs, dances and prayers to activate it. The fourth and final part of the soul is the nagila, or “little ghost.” It is the individual part of the energy that animates and the entire universe and binds the parts together.

Among the Ga of West Africa, the soul has two elements: the susuma and the kla. The kla is the life-force that pervades everything living. It has no individuality, but it can be gradually stolen by witches, who thereby add to their own store of it. Those who live to a very old age are often suspected of doing so by stealing the kla of others. At death, the kla returns to the heavens in the form of a shooting star to rejoin that universal store of kla from which all living things receive it. In contrast, the susuma is individual. It is the conscious personality. It might know more than the person does, and indeed it controls the individual. The individual can survive temporarily without it; it leaves the body in dreams. Illness can be caused by a struggle between the susuma and the kla. To this three-part individual, the Ga add two additional elements: the name and luck (gbeshi). A person can be injured through his name, which is kept secret for protection. On the other hand, a person’s own gbeshi might lead him astray and frustrate his good intentions.

Among the pre-technical cultures of the world, belief in a multi-part soul predominates. Generally, people are thought to have two, three or four souls, although there are examples of cultures that have as many as 30 or 40. The two systems, briefly outlined here, show surprising similitarities with the Norse system, although there are also significant dissimilarities. For those particularly interested in other theories about the Germanic system, Swain Wodening has a very interesting article online, Cosmology and the Soul: the Soul.

Sources

Arthur Amiotte, "Our Other Selves" in I Become a Part of It: Sacred Dimensions in Native American Life, D.M. Dooling and Paul Jordan-Smith, eds. (1989, 1992), pp 164-172.

William Howell, The Heathens: Primitive Man and His Religions (1962), pp. 151-52.

Norse souls

I don’t like the idea of reincarnation as it’s normally presented, but I have no problem with the idea that some part of the soul can be reborn.

Many cultures believe that at death an individual joins his or her ancestors. Although there is some debate, most heathens I know believe that at death they will join the ancestors of their particular kindred, going to live in their ancestral halls in the otherworld. This belief is poetically captured in a prayer from The 13th Warrior, a movie based in part on Beowulf:

Lo, there do I see my father
Lo, there do I see my mother and my sisters
and my brothers
Lo, there I do see the line of my people
back to the beginning
Lo, they do call to me
They bid me to take my place among them
in the hallowed halls of Valhalla
Where the brave shall live forever!

This belief differs from some of the sources, which say that Óðinn and Freyja divide the souls of warriors slain in battle between themselves, Rán gets the souls of those who drown, Thórr gets “the kin of slaves” (see Hárbodsljód), the souls of those who die of old age and sickness go to live with Hel, and women who die unmarried go to serve Gefjon. However, some scholars believe that these beliefs were late innovations. More likely, the older, general belief was that the dead went to live with their families in Hel’s realm. Snorri Sturlusson tells us that Óðinn was called Valfödr, father of the slain, because everyone who falls in battle is his foster-son. This explanation emphasizes the usual connection between death and joining one’s family. However, I think the idea that the dead join their ancestors might be oversimplified. Although scholars disagree sharply among themselves, I think there is some justification for thinking that the Norse believed in a multi-part soul.

If the idea of a multi-part soul seems unusual, it shouldn’t. Many cultures have the idea that the soul is composed of parts that separate at death. I’m told that the Chinese, for example, conceptualize two souls, the Hun (superior soul), which strives for Heaven, and the P’o (inferior soul), which is malign. In the west, Plato tells us that Socrates believed in a three-part soul (or mind), the parts of which govern desire (sensation and appetite), emotion (spirit and will), and reason (intellect). He used this division to explain why an individual might have conflicting desires. The division was accepted by the early Christians. St. Paul called the parts (in translation) body, soul and spirit. We retain Plato’s tripartite division in popular discourse about body, mind and spirit (soul), although we no longer think of them as three souls.

In the 9th century, the Christian church rejected the idea of a tripartite soul in favor of a simple duality between body and soul. Interestingly, we also get from Socrates (or his mysterious teacher) the idea that the spirit is pure, the material world is corrupt, and therefore our souls are polluted by living in this world. It’s proven to be a curiously popular idea. This is how most of the people I know think of themselves, as a soul inhabiting a material body.

The clue to the idea that the Norse believed in a multi-part soul is, I think, their creation story. The dwarves fashioned the first humans, Ask (“ash-tree”) and Embla (“vine,” or perhaps, “elm-tree”) from pieces of driftwood, and the gods gave them life. According to Völuspá, Lódhr gave them lá (vitality or blood), Hœnir gave them ódhr (passion or inspiration), and Óðinn gave them ónd (breath or spirit).

These are the parts I believe separate at death. Without a scholarly examination of the subject, I’m guessing about which part plays which role, but it seems likely to me that one part passes on to an afterlife with the ancestors or gods, one part is reborn in a later generation of the same family, and one part stays with the body, perhaps to be reabsorbed into the landscape. If so, the system would be similar to the shamanism of the Russian steppes. It would also be analagous to the Platonic system of body, soul and spirit.

The Lá

First, the body itself, which is not completely lifeless after death but perhaps still retains the lá, the vitality or blood given by Lódhr. Before the gods animated Ask and Embla, they were “fateless” and “capable of little.” This passage might suggest that the first humans already possessed a minimal life even before the gods gave them souls, but another translation reads, “empty of might.” I think it is likely that this passage is an example of the laconic style of Norse poetry. Probably, Ask and Embla were capable of nothing. Yet, a dead body could be animated by what we would might a shade, without higher faculties and perhaps even dangerous. I suggest that this shade is the lá. It would have been similar to the shade in Homer’s poetry, where it descended to Hades to lead a much diminished life. This faculty can also be equated with the lowest of Plato’s souls, which governs desire, sensation and appetite.

The sagas and folklore have several examples of a haugbúi, a mound-dweller, essentially an animated corpse living in splendor in his burial mound, guarding his wealth and feasting at the head of a warrior band. Burial mounds were generally stone chambers, roofed, then covered with dirt. A family’s burial mounds stood near its dwelling. The heir to a farm had to name the ancestors who held it before him, and be able to point to the burial mound of each. These mounds were the family’s doors to the other world and were the places at which the owner would perform sacrifices and pour libations to honor his ancestors. A fire not usually visible surrounded the barrow and formed a boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead. To see the fire was to know that its occupant was active. At Júl the dead return to the world of the living, where they are especially honored.

The body in the tomb could be helpful to its living relatives. Through úitseta (out-sitting), an individual could contact the ancestors and seek their advice. In Grettirs Saga, Kárr, although dead, helps his son Thórfinnr extend their family’s influence over the surrounding countryside. Moreover, the haugbúi might have magical powers, including the ability to shape-shift, to move through rock, to foretell the future, and to give dreams and poetry to the living. For example, in Flateyjarbók, the shepherd Hallbjörn receives the gift of poetry by sleeping on the burial mound of the poet Thórleifr, who appeared to Hallbjörn in a dream. In Laxdæla Saga, a church was built on the grave of a dead seeress, who appears in a dream to complain of being disturbed by the living. In Landnámabók, Ásólfr, a dead Christian, appears in two different dreams, once to complain about a girl wiping her muddy feet on his grave mound and then to complain about having his peace disturbed when his bones were dug up.

The dead were not always benign. The dead, particularly those killed by violence, might leave their barrows as draugar to roam the countryside. Being jealous of the living, they could be dangerous. Moreover, a barrow was thought to be a dangerous place if the occupant was not kin to those in the region.

It would seem that the body, with its lá, retains vitality as long as it receives the offerings of the living, but otherwise fades, even though it is never entirely dead.

The Ódhr

Second, ódhr, which means “passion” or “inspiration.” I equate this faculty with the second of Plato’s souls, which governs emotion and will, and with our concept of “mind.” I’ve already pointed out that the earlier, general belief was probably that individuals join the dead of their family in an ancestral hall in another world. Helgakvidha Hundingsbana II tells us that “In olden days it was believed that people could be reborn (væru endrbornir), although now that is reckoned an old wives’ tale.” The two ideas seem to be related.

From Ibn Fadlan’s Risala, his account of the time he spent among the Rus in 921, comes an eye-witness account of a viking funeral. He says that the companions of the dead man raised a slave girl three times to look through something like a door frame. Each time they raise her up she reports what she sees:

Lo, I see here my father and mother;
Lo, now I see all my deceased relatives sitting;
Lo, there is my master, who is sitting in paradise.
Paradise is so beautiful, so green.
With him are his men and boys.
He calls me, so bring me to him.

In Eyrbyggja Saga, Thórsteinn Thórólfsson drowns with his crew while fishing, and a shepherd sees them entering Helgafell, the holy mountain of Thórsteinn’s family. Inside the mountain, men are drinking in a brightly lit hall. Thórsteinn’s father, Thórólfr of Mostur, welcomes him and leads him to the high seat. There is no hint here that the men's bodies rest within the mountain, so this scene is quite different from that of a haugbúi in his burial mound. It is, however, not entirely clear whether the company is actually within the mountain or whether the mountain is a nexus that connects this world to another.

These two passages show that the dead were welcomed by their relatives. Norse iconography is filled with images on gravestones of a mounted warrior being handed a horn by a woman. Conventional interpretation has it that these images show the deceased warrior being welcomed to Valhöll by one of the valkyries, and this is no doubt true of many or all, but the symbolism would equally fit the welcome of any man to his ancestral hall by the dísir (female ancestors). Indeed, the image of a warrior being welcomed to Valhöll might have evolved out of a more general idea of being welcomed to an ancestral hall.

The dead not only receive their relatives at death, they are concerned for their well-being in life. In Víga-Glúms Saga, Glúm offends the god Freyr, then has a dream that his kinsmen intercede on his behalf. He sees Freyr sitting on a chair by a river, with people massed around him. Glúm is told that these are his dead relatives, begging that he not be driven from his land. The ties betwen living and dead are reciprocal. At Júl, the dead would return to the world of the living to be honored by their living family. Very likely there is a sub-text in Víga-Glúms Saga that the dead did not want to lose their own connection to the land or the honor that Glúm would pay them there.

The ódhr seems to be connected, to some extent, to a person’s name, and it was probably this part of the soul that was concerned about its good name and its lasting fame. In Svarfdæla Saga, the young Thórólfr receives a mortal wound. Dying, he asks his brother to perpetuate his name: “My name has lived but a little hour, and thus I should be forgotten as soon as you are gone, but I see that you will increase the family and become a great man of luck. I wish you would let a son be called Thórólfr, and all luck (heillir) I have had, those will I give him; then I think my name shall live as long as men dwell in the world.” Thórsteinn promises: “This I will gladly promise you, for I look that it shall be to our honor, and good luck shall go with your name as long as it is in the clan.” He keeps his promise, and the new Thórólfr grows up to be much like his uncle.

In Flateyjarbók, Thórsteinn Ox-foot sleeps on a burial mound and is invited to enter by a man in red. He obtains the charm he sought, and as he was leaving the man in red begs Thórsteinn to give his name to a son, so that the dead might “come under baptism.” The incident makes sense only if we understand that giving the red man’s name to a new child would bring him back to the world of the living.

Among the Norse, a baby could be rejected by its father and be exposed, or be given a name and be accepted into the family. In this practice, repugnant as it is to modern sensibilities, I see evidence that a child was not fully human until it received a name, which might therefore have been connected with receiving the final part of its soul. Moreover, I think it is significant that the giving of a name was coordinated with acceptance into the family, that the name conferred was a family name, and (arguably) that there was a taboo against using the name of a living relative. To me, the conjunction of these elements suggests that the Norse thought of names as connected to a part of the soul and that to confer a particular name was to confer that particular soul on the new child. I suggest this part might have been the ódhr, the mind, because it could have been seen that lá (vitality) and ónd (breath) were present in the child from birth.

For this part of the soul, life is a revolving door, in which the dead spend their time feasting in the barrow on their ancestral farm, then return to the same family when their name is reused among their descendants. So, at any given time, part of the family was in this world and part in the other world. The Romans had a similar idea. The genius (or juno) of the individual was already one of the family’s lares prior to birth, and would return when its name was given to a member of the gens.

It seems possible to me, perhaps even likely, that the ódhr remained connected to the physical body until it was conferred on a new child. If so, the dead who feast in their tombs, who receive offerings, and who might sometimes be seen by the living would be those who still have their ódhr.

The Ónd

Third, the ónd (breath or spirit) or sál (soul), which was conferred by Óðinn himself and must have been the most important part of the soul. I equate this faculty with Plato’s highest soul, which governs the intellect and reason, and with our modern idea of the soul or spirit. It seems to me that this is the soul that joins the gods, whether Óðinn or Freyja or some other. It might, in fact, be a faculty that humans share with the gods.

Three stories might suggest that it is the ónd, not the ódhr, that is reincarnated, but I do not think they are persuasive. First, in Völuspá, we learn that Gullveig, who some equate with Freyja, was born three times (þrisvar borin), and burnt three times (þrisvar brennd) by the gods. Nevertheless, she is still alive. Because Gullveig is clearly not human, I do not think we learn anything about the nature of the human soul from her successive births.

Second, Helgakvidha Hjörvardhssonar tells the story of two lovers who repeat their doom over the course of three lifetimes. As proof of reincarnation, this story has been much criticized. I think properly so. Helgi retains his name and family connection through all three lifetimes, but the name of his beloved changes from Sváva to Sigrún to Kára and there seems to be no connection between the families into which she was born. Sváva-Sigrún-Kára was a valkyrie, not a mortal woman, so I question whether she can properly be said to have had an ódhr. Moreover, I see the recurring name and family connection of Helgi as emphasizing the completeness of his continuity from lifetiem to lifetime. I read the story as poetic and heroic, not as indicative of the normal fate of humans. It seems likely to me that the portion of the soul reincarnated for both the lovers was the highest part, the part that would normally have joined the gods.

Third, the story of Saint Óláfr. In Flateyjarbók we learn that Saint Óláfr II of Norway was thought to be a reincarnation of his ancestor Óláfr Geirstadaálf, but the idea disturbed him. According to the story, Saint Óláfr’s mother had a difficult labor. She was delivered only after the sword, sword-belt and ring of Óláfr Geirstadaálf were brought from his burial mound, and the sword-belt was placed around her. The new child was given the name Óláfr. He grew up to become king of Norway as Óláfr II and became a Christian. While riding past the barrow of Óláfr Geirstadaálf, one of the king’s men asked him if he was his ancestor reborn. The king answered, “My soul (ónd) has never had two bodies; and cannot, either now or on the day of resurrection.” It is significant that Óláfr speaks of his ónd, when (as I argue) his retainer meant his ódhr. To me, the twist is deliberate. As a new Christian, the king must think only of a duality between body and soul. So, he uses the word ónd, even though he would have been perfectly aware that in conventional belief it was not his ónd that would have been reincarnated. I acknowledge that my argument here is circular. Having decided that the ódhr is the soul that is reincarnated, I dismiss Óláfr’s explicit reference to his ónd in the context of reincarnation. Absent other evidence, I’m not entirely comfortable with my interpretation, but I’m willing to rest here for the time being.

The Fylgja

In addition to the three souls, each person had a fylgja, a fetch or double that acted as guardian throughout life. It seems to have been born alongside a child, and was personified as an animal. The fylgja could appear in place of the person. In Hrólfs Saga Kraka, the warrior Bödvar Bjarki sleeps through the beginning of a battle, but a huge bear fights alongside his men. When they wake Bödvar, the bear disappears and the battle turns against them. The fylgja could also appear in times of crisis or impending death. In Njáls Saga, Thórdr sees a goat covered in blood, but the goat is invisible to Njáll. Njáll suggests that Thórdr has seen his flygja and is doomed. Njáll was apparently correct; Thórdr was killed shortly thereafter.

Although I think the fylgja was a separate life-element, it is possible that there was a connection between the fylgja and the ódhr, and that the fylgja rather than the ódhr was the part of the personality (speculatively) projected by seers. It is also possible that the fylgja rather than the lá was the shade or double that stayed with the warrior in his burial mound. I leave these questions for future consideration.
The kynfylgja seems to have differed from the fylgja. The kynfylgja was personified as a woman, and was perhaps originally one of the dísir (ancestral mothers) who protected members of the family. The surviving sources are late and have already begun to confuse the hamingja and the kynfylgja (if indeed there was not always a great deal of overlap between the two).

Other Elements

Finally, I want to mention in passing three of the other elements that play a role in human life: ørlög, heillir and hamingjur. Although perhaps not part of a person’s soul, they are nevertheless discrete elements attached to families and individuals.

Ørlög is the fate of families and individuals. In Völuspá, we learn that when the gods animated Ask and Embla, were “fateless” (without ørlög). In its most basic form, fate consists of living out the consequences of past actions, both one’s own actions and the actions of one’s ancestors. The first humans had no past, so they had no fate.

Heillir (“luck”) can help a man meet his fate, and in some cases turn it aside. A man whose luck has run out is feigr (“fey”). He rushes blindly to his death. Unable to heed the counsels of his friends, he makes bad decisions and and cannot turn aside the rush of events. In Njáls Saga, Njáll’s luck runs out and his fate unfolds, until at last his enemies surround the house. His son Skarphedinn recognizes that the end has come, and says, “Our father is marked for death now.” Njáll’s sons choose to die with him, and the family is burned inside their house.

In Grettirs Saga, an old woman curses Grettir, “Here I declare over you that you shall be forsaken of luck, of fortune and blessing and all guardian strength and wit, the more for all your length of life.” Yet, the outlawed Grettir has already lost his luck. The old woman merely declares his predicament, “These men [Grettir and his brother] might yet be luckless in their boldness. Good terms are offered them, but they thrust them aside, and nothing leads more surely to evil than being unable to accept good.”

The hamingja is the embodiment of luck attached to a family, perhaps something along the lines of a family soul. At death, it leaves the individual to attach itself to another of the same family. In Víga-Glúms Saga, Glúm dreams of an immense woman striding across the countryside toward his house. He interprets the dream as meaning that his grandfather Vígfús has died and Vígfús’ hamingja is coming to dwell with Glúm. It might have been a special attribute of the head of the family. Glúm, although a maternal grandson of Vígfús, was his grandfather’s heir.

Seidhr

In seidhr, certain powerful women could commune with spirits. I’m skeptical, but some scholars suggest that seidhr was a form of shamanism, and that the völva (seer) projected a part of herself on a soul-journey (hamfarir). The idea is speculative, depending as it does on theories about the ways that the Norse might have been influenced by the Sámí (Finns), whom they regarded as great magicians. Against it is the story in Eiríks Saga Raudha, in which a seer communes with spirits without any suggestion that she has made a journey to reach them. In fact, a singer is required to call the spirits to the seer. Likewise, in Laxdæla Saga, it does not seem that Gríma or Kotkell make any type of journey.
If seers did project a part of themselves, I suggest that part was the ódhr, essentially the mind. Although it is the faculty given by Hœnir, the word ódhr is cognate with the name Óðinn, who was a master of seidhr and his ability to undertake soul-journeys is mentioned in the Ynglinga Saga. The idea of projection also has a corollary in Huginn (“thought”) and Muninn (“memory”), the ravens Óðinn sends throughout the world to gather information about it. Moreover, for human seers it could have been seen that lá (vitality) and ónd (breath) were still present in the seer, just as they were in a new-born child, although the personality itself was apparently absent.

Conclusion

It seems to me that the Norse believed in a multi-part soul. One part stayed with the body, perhaps to decay at death. A second part stayed connected to the family, awaiting rebirth. And, a third part joined the gods in another world. There is no idea here of a pre-existing soul, or of the individual as a soul incarnated into a physical body or succession of bodies. Instead, the essential parts of the individual come together for the first time at his or her birth, and at death they separate forever.

I’ve had to keep this account at a very simple level. I’m aware that there are many different interpretations even among those who agree that the Norse believed in a multi-part soul. Many of them are much more complicated than mine. In fact, my own thoughts have developed since I wrote the core of this entry many years ago. I’ve been tinkering with this piece for years. I’ve polished a bit and placed it here to serve as the basis for future entries on this subject.