Why are the Norse Gods Abusive?
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- Опубликовано: 18 июн 2024
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Written by: @nordic.animism @magpies_and_maggots
Edited by: Alexander Leistiko
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Speaking as a person who was born and raised in Bahia (BR) and now lives in Europe.
I can’t thank you enough for talking about the importance of loosing some of one’s agency through these ancestral technologies, as a very important step in one’s path of becoming a more mature (and therefore better, in my opinion) human being.
i think in general morality/ethics are scalar in nature (its a matter of degree, not absolutes) and i personally find many of the non-Judeo-Christian-Islamic religions to be much more relatable because of the dynamic nature of morality and ethics they depict. appreciate your content!
It’s like gods are reflections of humans and human psychology. The gods are messed up because we are messed up. They are ideas that embody archetypes of culturally specific ideals. Like certain comic book characters.
Once upon a time it was agreed upon that gods should be made to serve the purpose of individual growth. The narrative has reversed. In the case of the Aesir they were based upon many things and many people. The ancestors themselves and legends.
@@oddindian1 How can they serve individual growth when they abhor those that need their help the most- the weak- and exalt those who need exaltation the least- the strong? No, history has not even shown their efforts to be useful.
@@TheEternalClown When you get tired of being a victim you quickly learn to become strong. The idea that all you suffer and benefit from is from the gods. All that you do is either worthy to them or not. It is the struggle that yields a better individual. That is the understanding of it. This is not a case of history but rather the journey of the individual. Christianity offers eternal forgiveness but the Germanic gods only offer conditional forgiveness if at all. The idea you must be worthy to be forgiven for your failures. Your hand isn't held and you aren't told everything will be alright, you must make it so.
@@oddindian1
Suffering is not the ambrosia of the gods. It destroys minds and bodies and creates delusions and hard, careless hearts. These hearts perpetuate more scarcity and suffering.
If you need to prove yourself to the gods, they are not gods. For what purpose do they call themselves 'gods' if they are only gods over a tight group of the 'worthy?' The rest are the 'unwashed masses' they treat with disgust.
I can understand proving one's worth if one desires a close relationship with the gods, as there are so many humans, but this elitist mentality is why a Christianity or a similar teaching quickly replaces paganism. A god is he who claims as many subjects and treats them like his children. A true god raises those around him without judgement, as judgement generally provokes reactions, not growth.
I do not know what it is I need forgiveness for from the Norse gods. My failures? Let them not take offense at my failures! Why should I make up for something so banal and expected? I will only continue to fail if they do not make themselves more helpful. If they are disgusted by the 'soft modern?' Let them move out of the way for new gods! Such is the 'harsh' nature of life- you refuse to be relevant and sensitive to a culture's mores? You will be uprooted, and your memory spat upon.
My hand may be held, and I should be consoled. If I am capable, I should also move past these. If I am not capable, will kicking and spitting on me improve me?
These are human things, not childish things, and there is nothing admirable in expecting otherwise. Only a retardation of emotions results from discarding these, and if you atrophy any part of yourself, you will be crushed by someone who doesn't.
When I saw the title of this video, I was excited to hear your thoughts, because time & time again, I hear people struggling with the fact that the gods do horrific things (rape & murders) in myths. I was hoping I would take something away from this beyond what I personally do, which is mainly to view those portions of myths as "not literal", to see those parts as allegorical.
I must admit, I'm having a hard time understanding your points about "objectification" and "subjugation". I think I wrapped my head around perhaps a third of what you were trying to get across to us, but I think you were making bigger, valid points I simply couldn't grasp from your explanation.
In mentioning an African cult where they "remember" slavery, this terrible trauma... I felt like you might be suggesting we should experience some terrible "trauma" during ritual (albeit in a "safe" way), like some sort of odd therapy or catharsis? That sounds possibly dangerous to me, tbh. But maybe you aren't suggesting that at all, idk?
I am curious what you would explore in a video about trauma, as you mentioned you might do at the end of this video here.
Anyway, thanks for this video, I wish understood the points you were trying to make a bit better. I think you were saying that the traumatic, terrible bits were or are "necessary" for some reason (somehow makes us more open or "permeable" to a relationship with "other" nonhuman entities), but if that's the case, I still don't understand why that would be so.
I enjoyed hearing your discussion on this matter. Its nice to find someone who goes into these topics with an academic knowledge. I find academic discussions in these matters tend to be packed in hour long presentations, i dont usually have an hour to hear whole lectures.
And i didn´t bother to listen to this academic intellectual one person discussion going in circles without saying anything.
Huh, your connections between porous subjectivity, intiation and the modern psychological state really got my gears turning.
Feeding a comment for the algorithm so others my have their gears sufficiently turned.
Love the jaw harp in the intro! I'm learning myself and the ritual drum bullroarers jorvik pipes etc
What an interesting topic, thank you for discussing about it! As a Greek I had connected the hellenic mythology's abusive patterns with athenian patriachy (given that women were thought as objects to the Athenians similar to the slaves) and as a metaphor to nature's untamed and dangerous potentially face.
very enlightening. thanks
This is a really helpful perspective that puts words to a lot of things I have experienced and have intuited.
Lovely video ❤
Gods are forces of nature and nature can be a bitch.
I agree with the need for initiations, particularly for boys. We ladies get to go through the shock of the first period, which catapults us into the reality of our role in adulthood, but boys have no equivalent shock that tells them their body is part of something greater then themselves.
You agree with initiations that often killed boys and are usually just violent rituals for creating more copy-pasted 'manly men?' It is good to be a part of something greater than yourself, but such a society that requires such men is not worth living.
haven't watched the video but I'd assume it's tied to the lifestyle of early Norse. They were a society that relied upon raiding. So much like early YAHWEH, the follows of Odin emphasized the aspects of his personality that justified their dog eat dog reality.
When people ask "why are God's usually abusive and dickish?" I like to point out 2 things.
1.) The reason good rulers and bosses are so special is because they are also so rare. Ambitious people rarely rise to power without also stepping on others to reach it.
2.) Anyone who has had to genuinely lead anything for any length of time can attest that it is a moral and mental NIGHTMARE, and slipping into being abusive and tyrannical is FRIGHTFULLY easy. Now just imagine being in charge of worlds of people for thousands of years.
yeah no those are not a good points
Do you know what the psychologies and limits of the gods are? Perhaps they would not be broken by such a task. Perhaps they would simply abandon us. Perhaps it is a complex political reality like our own world, with landscapes broken up by territories of gods, and arch-gods, and universal gods, and so on. Still, the gods are divine beings. Perhaps they can change their psychologies/natures and steel themselves against impatience, lust, fear, or anger. After all, a human can do the same through self-discipline, or even using magick, why not the gods?
Good rulers step on others to reach that position? Indeed, if you want to be ruled by a narcissist and psychopath, you will find yourself in competent hands, but not good hands. This is an evil of nature that a worthy ruler should fix. Someone who can rule with compassion and ambition, and who will have more friends than a gaggle of 'stormy' and 'unbridled' Odins can possibly oppose.
@@ZeroGravityFuneral Why not?
one thing, about the norse myths (and also the hellenistic and more) is that they are not meant to be taken literally, but are artistic... well poems or prose of the gods, they're meant to celebrate the gods through story telling, which then makes it more flavorful.
and it was written down by christians 200 years after the last polytheist in scandinavia and iceland stopped worshipping the gods and nature. Which also might've played a role in why they seem weaker than the greek gods, and are sometimes humanized, as the monks ofc ccouldn't go against gOd
Well... I kinda disagree with both the things you say there. I do think that gods are literal subjective agents. WE TODAY just tend to have trouble understanding that (for longwinded reasons). And the sources were not written down 200 years after the last polytheist in Scandinavia. The process of christianization is quite a bit more complex than that. Check this video:
ruclips.net/video/kSiO3RnXT3c/видео.html
HEIL FREYJA
the worst of it all is, it says lot was a righteous man
Coming off a migraine. Will watch again.❤
I'm very interested in the follow up about trauma. I have CPTSD from childhood abuse and was thinking back over some recent triggers as possible initiations (which i didnt recognize or make use of) before you got to that. I'd really like to better understand that connection!
Weird, i was thinking about this seconds before seeing this. With all that trauma and dealing with opposition and people who don't have the same experience as you judging you and telling you what you need to do. If you make it through all that to a position of influence, it's not going to be through the systems that rip us apart and feed us to who knows what, its going to be Solo and anything that gets close enough certainly isn't getting a chance to oppress or find a vulnerability.
@@alexwelts2553 Interesting tangent, unironically lead me to the conclusion austrain painter man did nothing wrong.
@@grapenut6094 murdering over 6 million people is unequivocally wrong, as is the invasion and subjugation of his neighbors. Your "painter man" is the most vile person in human history. And you are vile for this comment as well.
every atrocity begins with dehumanzation
Do you feel any smarter after having spoted that platitude?
It strikes me as obvious that gods, in the personlike sense, can be "bad" because the world is complex, the phenomena they partake in are varied and polyvalent & the gods have to be at least as complex as the phenomenon. Similarly humans are complex in their relationships, we cannot understand gods except how we understand each other. Some fathers are good some are bad, some are good to some & bad to others, some are bad fathers but good brothers, strong at leading but weak at building... etc. To exist humanwise these spiritual must be as complex as the social?
Heck for example, a bugbear of mine is the "western" year round food abundance (a good thing, famines are unquestionably bad) has made us relatively unafraid of winter; thus the hades-persephone myth is seen with less horror, & the way people understand the gods changes, because our relationships to nature & each other have changed
Why should the Gods represent reality as it is? Unless you are not making a normative statement, gods often represent what humanity can become, or ought to be. There is no reason to celebrate gods that restrain us to an imperfect and brutish ethos save for lack of perspective.
why? when someone has power, they use it. most often in bad ways
Freya Aswann claims Christianity formed Frost Giants into Demons?
as a follower of the thursatru tradition i see beings such as odin or yahweh or marduk as demiurgic figures and while i understand that is not a traditional view i find it interesting to see how the concept of a god has changed over time and i respect your take on these gods. its so easy to say things like "zeus bad" without the context of the people who wrote these old stories and their mindsets. i like your channel please keep up the good work
Of course you would say as you do due to the beliefs you have
Isn’t Christianity kinda responsible?
All Gods are abusive. If you met one that said otherwise, it's because they are too cowardly to admit it.
-Phobos
of course, you wanna go into what a deity eats, it's the skin and the bones and sinew and smoke. to the priests the meat
danish accent hurts as a dane :p
I think by todays standards it's easy to view it as abuse and tyrany, but probably because most want instant gratification and avoidance of pain, I think what Seneca said regarding praying for misfortune should be applied or at least looking at it as misfortune challenging an individual as apose to those whom have or are given everything without adversity.
Instant gratification and avoidance of pain can be negative things, but there are ways to acquire gratification and growth without misfortune or adversity. This is just leaning into nature, as if it cannot be changed or criticized. Of course, as beings living in constant scarcity we require challenges, but this does not mean we should continue to reproduce such beings, or that we cannot transform the human race if that fails. Not to mention that it is abuse and tyranny, and the good that comes of it is transient and meaningless. The only way to reap everlasting rewards is by removing the need for pain (by whatever means, physical or spiritual) and not justifying it like some fawning victim.
@@TheEternalClown Not sure what your trying to convey, it's not a coherent message if your trying to content what I interpreted from the presentor or do you know the perpetraitings gods causing tyrany and abuse In the past or present? I never justified anything nor did Seneca, their is no garantee anyone will overcome adversity for the better, but those whom do are a living testament in deeds that is meaningless in a sense of materialness that is fleeting, of course, but beyond that it's not for me to say. Can't agree with gratification and growth being aquired without adversity, considering just about everything is interconnected, even sleep or breathing oxygen isn't free or harmless. As for the use of eugenics or controll of beings that are endoctrinated in scarcity consciousness, that didn't work out to well with the Americans whom pioneered it followed by the English and Germans in the last two centuries, but I won't deny fuedalism not being ever so present worldwide.
@@UrzuaTroskenia0369 It was a coherent message- I rebutted what I saw as a trivialization of human suffering and the portrayal of those who want to escape actual rape, violence, or cruel initiations as moderns who desire 'instant gratification' and 'avoidance of pain,' as if these are incredibly bad things.
You referring to praying for misfortune or interpreting it as a challenge is the aforementioned 'justifying suffering like some fawning victim.' If we cannot overcome the scarcity and natural evils that causes the demand for this twisted mentality, why not just stop reproducing altogether? Or wait for better chances in an afterlife- surely those in the afterlife cannot depend on those in this life for their existence. What kind of an ancestor has hunger where he goes but cannot find or grow food there? And we have to reproduce ad infinitum to feed and remember the ancestors? Usually, where there is a hungering body, there is also a means for satisfying that hunger.
My claim was that we can create a world where there is no need for pain, wherein 'breathing oxygen' can be free or harmless. If not here, we should at least look to an afterlife for such. Your presentation of the failure of eugenics is precisely why I positioned it as inferior to simple anti-natalism. Nevertheless, eugenics commonly and easily happens- people select with whom they want to reproduce, and exclude those they do not find desirable. This is why we look and act the damned way we do.
Its more of an alchelical relationship between states of being and the forces with in the cosmos that are expressed in us and all of life. Judging beings that are not within the moral framework of duality isnt really the point of the gods behavior. the morals shift due to potential outcomes, and the value of the outcome dicates if it was good or not, not if what im doing to find the outcome is good or bad. Ie the gods as multidimensional beings who see the future are grasping as straws to avoid intense outcomes for all, and even doing something perceived as wrong in a lineal sense, or using someone or a situation for their much larger perception of ordering the potentiality of fate... its quite a different perception form where humans judge morality from. this is normally a judgment from where a society has landed in its collective thinking, and allot of it stems from a lack of contact to the gods and a lac of relationship with them to find a profound deep time understanding. Duality is a good and bad conceptualization with its roots in zooroastrianism into modern Judasim , so even perceiving the gods from that state is a whole universe apart in comparison
How is moral duality a zoroastrian concept? Is this even historical? And how is this any different from human moral views? It is just consequentialism. Surely pagan societies conceived of duality, and used it all the time, judging things as good or bad by various standards, with varying shades. Of course, the question here was why do the gods engage in petty, human evils? Why do they rape? Why do they engage in crimes of passion? Surely you cannot argue that raping a woman was a necessity in order to avert some future cosmic evil? Can they not create an order where these lesser evils are not necessary, in their intelligence and loftiness?
The myths were recorded by early Christians, not the Norse themselves so it's difficult to determine how much of it is from the actual pagans themselves (I use the term pagan, since people seem to forget the Anglo Saxon and Germanic branches of heathen myth) and how much is from Snori and Saxo. Compare this to Greek, Roman and Egyptian myth which were recorded by the people themselves and not by outsiders.
Yes, but part of his point is that examples of "terrible acts" by gods (even the Yahweh monotheist god) occur across cultural myths.
@@Karina-Loves-Andreas Yahweh wasn't a monotheistic God, there were many Gods in the Levant, and the children of Abraham for a long time followed quite a wide range. This only changed after the period of enslavement in Egypt where they came across the idea of a single God as presented by King Aknaten in the form of the Aten, represented by the sun/sun disk.
The myths were recorded by *Norse Christians.* Many simply added Christ to the family of gods, in continuity with their forebears who also added various gods through time. The traditional polytheisms were mainly a bricolage of rites and customs.
Many of the early Norse Christians were so only in name. In the beginning Jesus was just another god that they worshipped. If some of them actually believed it to be real or not. There were Norse Christian Viking Crusaders that raided in Spain before sailing to fight in Jerusalem. It was not an immediate process. It took many generations and interference by the church. All this to say likely the Sagas and myths were not tainted. The cult of Odin was one of many with different afterlife's. Valhalla was one of many places in the Germanic faith. Much of what media shows is a modern Christian lens. It tends to focus on what is flashy rather than the whole picture.
Of Shem was Eber and so the Hebrews
It's because society says so.
First of all let's think about what gods are... Now let em look and act human and yeah, let em act like assholes cause they can! Problem is myth is folkish by definition, it's interpretation of spirituality for (and by) plebs.
It's understandable that some people, like the Meso Americans, would think their gods are monsters. The blessing from God of the Christ's passion will reveal otherwise. Believe in God and love him and you will know.
The gods only know themselves. The archetypes are not meant to directly represent human nature but the extra-natural aspects of those deities. Exaggerations of the capabilities of humans. It's what makes them gods. To accent the sphere of purpose a deity represents. In terms of the Germanic faith constant struggle and arbitrary actions by the gods shapes people to be resilient. It is all about elevating the strong and punishing those who choose to be weak. That is one of the main reasons why Christianity was so offensive to Norse peoples. Christianity cherishes the meek and subservient, it grants forgiveness. To the Aesir forgiveness is not eternal, it is conditional. You must earn it.
Pula, why would a people need to be resilient? Why would these competent buffoons and their gods not affect the world to remove this endless need to traumatize into 'resilience'? Don't be a naive, blue-eyed beast- no sane man chooses to be weak. That would imply they possess the discipline and conscientiousness to improve, precisely what being 'weak' entails the lack of. Not to mention the backdrop to their weakness- their environment, genetics, circumstances, traumas, diet, knowledge, and other systemic or preceding issues.
What good comes from strength being elevated? It's merely strength, it should be cultivated in people with kindness, and with firmness, where necessary. The only purpose I can see is in helping people enjoy their lives and be the best versions of themselves, freer by lack of delusions, incapacities, self-harm, etc. Exalting the strong and spitting on the weak has not created a Heaven on Earth yet, so it seems largely a stupid Darwinian burden humanity will probably never shake off because of its moral idiocy, indifference, and lack of perspective. Precisely, we are still 'strong' in your 'Nordic' way because we are weak. We are glory-seekers, envious, competitive, honor-obsessed (easily offended), conformist, indifferent, mortal. Our gods are not even examples of a different way of life, you've just selected filthy drinking partners.
This mentality you propose is not the product of a strong or eusocial mind. The ancient and medieval Norse, perhaps, grew misshapen in this way simply to survive in such a place and time as theirs. They were simply human, so to hold both the finesse I present and to live in that clime would have been a great difficulty. But the primacy of that mentality lived and died in that time. Now it is romantic 'aristocrats' of the soul who seek to return to humanity's vomit and eat it, like dogs, despite being moderns living in affluence.
Christianity damns the weak- those incapable of resisting what Christian teachings consider sinful. It exalts strength- the athleta christi, the ascetics, the saints and martyrs, impenetrable writings and philosophies of church fathers and theologians, builders of civilizations, the various kings and warriors who fought for passably Christian causes, etc.. Look at the Christian domain today, from right-wing to mere fundamentalists- universally, they despise the weak and exalt the strong. I doubt you can find a much kinder and meeker culture in the Christ Pantocrator of the Book of Revelation. Christian Universalism (i.e., apokatastasis) is considered a heresy, so the bastards do not even allow that.
Besides that, all cultures value subservience to some extent, and Christianity does not value it in itself or to a fault, as you seem to claim. You probably misunderstand what was referred to as 'meekness' in Matthew 5:5, as I have seen it interpreted and stretched like a whore's pussy to fit all kinds of right-wing desires in my time. Ivan Ilyin's On Resistance to Evil by Force would be a good example.
Idk,the concept of god Itself is somewhat abusive.Yahweh isn’t innocent either.
If the Christian god is first cause, that means he is the cause for everything, and every action god is the only thing that belongs in hell
Holy gay 😂