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Ep 2: Creation Story vs Big Bang Theory
829 Plays1 year ago
Oz and Kierra pull out the red string and get a little crazy with theory and comparison in this week's episode!
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Transcript
Introduction & Hosts
00:00:04
Speaker
You're listening to the Hearth of Weird podcast. Where we discuss heathenry, lore and legend. And the modern take on an ancient practice. Hello and welcome to the Hearth of Weird podcast. My name is Oz. And I'm Kira. And. Today. I never know what to say after that. I'm like, wait, we need to figure it out.
00:00:34
Speaker
That's all. We just go right into it today.
Content Warning & Feedback
00:00:36
Speaker
We'll be speaking about the creation story in Norse mythology and how we believe it is related to the Big Bang Theory. Before we begin this episode, I'm going to take a little bit of time here and give a brief content warning. Are you ready? I'm so ready.
00:00:57
Speaker
Okay, content warning. The topics presented in this show are primarily the ideas and opinions of two opinionated assholes. This podcast is not meant to be a historical or academic source and should not be cited as such. The ideas and opinions posited here are theoretical, sourced when we can provide a source, but even then, it is wise to remember that the only source material we have is one, maybe two regions lower, riddled with contradictions and plot holes.
00:01:23
Speaker
The rest is all ideas and theories presented by academics with incredibly varied credentials and typically drawn from contextual evidence such as archaeology, anthropology, etymology, and ancient forms of art and entertainment, i.e. accounts that were not written with historical accuracy in mind. The majority of what is accepted as known is still theoretical with varying degrees of validity and or legitimacy. Please think of this show as a thought exercise and do your own research in the areas that call to you.
00:01:55
Speaker
Yeah. So just so we're clear, we're just here to talk about shit that we love. If you don't like it, then tell us and we'll talk about it or don't. I don't care. Yeah. If you have other knowledge that you want to present and things that you want to get into,
00:02:12
Speaker
Gods, I love that. I love being a new rabbit hole. I love a new thought process, a new way of thinking. So like, it's not that we're close to feedback. It's just, you know, we don't know everything. We are limited to our own perspective and our own knowledge that we've gathered and the interpretations they're in. Share yours with us. That's cool. We love it. Yeah.
00:02:34
Speaker
please note that anything that we say, we're going to be omitting, in my opinion, from every single sentence in our podcast, because it's both the waste of our time and yours. Please just assume, unless the source is cited, it's an opinion. Thank you.
Gratitude and Milestone
00:02:52
Speaker
All right, before we get into the creation story, did you want to get into some bullshittery this week? Honestly, this week,
00:03:00
Speaker
I really don't have any bullshittery to get into except for I want to thank every single person who has liked, commented, shared, reposted, subscribed. Like our launch of this podcast has been humbling and utterly mind-blowing and the people that have come through to show their support and mention us on their channels and
00:03:24
Speaker
Just, I never expected it to go this way. And I am just utterly floored and so full of gratitude. Like, truly. Same. That's a lot of words. Same. Same. We hit a thousand followers. No, I just didn't, I don't have anything to add. Like, you said that so perfectly. Like, that's exactly how I feel. We hit over a thousand followers in our first week on TikTok.
00:03:54
Speaker
So obviously, people enjoy what we're saying. Within the first 72 hours, we hit 1000 followers, like we appreciate you, all of you so fucking much every single one of you like
00:04:08
Speaker
I know that it may not seem like much, but everything that you're doing, even just to like a post that we make, is getting us out there and bringing more people to us. And like, I'm just, again, I'm utterly, utterly floored. I have nothing else to talk about this week. I have not been paying attention to anything else online. I've just been really enjoying this experience. And sharing this with you.
00:04:36
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. Same here. I have no bullshittery to discuss either because this week's been great. I love it. I love it so much. I'm so excited. And this is just the beginning. Like, I can't wait.
00:04:50
Speaker
Um, but yeah, I appreciate you guys today. So today we're getting into the creation story and the big bang theory.
Norse Creation Story: Complexity & Interpretation
00:04:57
Speaker
And this, this was a conversation actually spawned, um, in my discord server, uh, by our buddy Dova. And so Dova came into the discord server one day and he said, he'd been reading the poetic eta and asked, how do you reconcile the big bang and the creation story? And I.
00:05:18
Speaker
opened my eyes. I was laying in my bed and I read that sentence and I was like, Oh my God. I was like, I have so much to say. I was like, they are the same story. And I was like, you know what? You know what? First I need to get up, get my coffee, get my head straight because it can get complex. So that's the other thing. This is just our personal feelings on how they align. And I'm so excited to share this theory with you guys. But like,
00:05:41
Speaker
It is so fucking cool. I'm so, so excited to get into it. It can get a little complex, but we're gonna try to keep it, keep it base level. Cause like this is the first actual episode where we're getting into lore and what that can mean potentially. And so like while I love doing the lore deep dives, don't get overwhelmed.
00:05:59
Speaker
Right. Yeah. I mean, it's, there's a lot to it. And what I would really enjoy if our listeners kept in mind when listening to this and future podcasts episodes specifically about lore is that these things are open to interpretation.
00:06:14
Speaker
Neither of us on this show are lower purists. So I don't believe that there was a gigantic cow in space feeding a gigantic man. I don't believe that, right? Metaphors, allegories. I believe that, metaphor and allegory. So when you're listening to this, understand that these are the opinions of two opinionated assholes, right? And that these things are open to interpretation.
00:06:37
Speaker
Yes, absolutely. And I'm not, I am not one that is entirely banking on metaphor and allegory either. I recognize that it exists in the lore. I'm definitely not a literalist, but I do believe it is symbolic of actual beings. They are. So and you guys will get to know our viewpoints on that the further we get in this. But yeah, I'm really excited to dive into this with you. Did you want to tell the people the creation story?
00:07:05
Speaker
Sure. Sure. So my version of the creation story is a collection of many different people's versions of the creation story. Of course, I'm not Jackson Crawford. I'm not an Old Norse translator. So I took the translations of other people and I combined them into one story. And that's what I tell my children. That's how it's done, though, right? That's how it's done.
00:07:31
Speaker
The people of our forebears were not reading out of books to one another. They didn't have books. These were stories told around a campfire. They were going to be different. They were going to emphasize the lesson that they wanted to focus on that day, or they were going to emphasize the character they thought was the coolest. So it's always going to be painted in a different light. And so this is just consider it a continuation of ancient tradition. Right. And also understand that, again, I've said this before, and I'm going to say it 1,000 more times, that there was no homogeny.
00:08:01
Speaker
In Scandinavia, this story was most likely thousands of pieces differently across different families, tribes, areas of Scandinavia and other places that shared the same type of beliefs. And I say most likely because we don't know, but I'm going to assume because of all of the research that has gone into it, that there was no homogeny. There was no unified cosmology. There was no canon. Absolutely. The Odin wink.
00:08:31
Speaker
We are on an audio platform, primarily. So I'm just explaining what that noise is. The Odin wink. Cold ice, as cold as it can get, and fire hotter than the sun. That is how our, that's how life began in this realm. That's the beginning. In the south, there was a realm called Muspelheim. And in the north, there was a realm called Niefelheim.
00:09:00
Speaker
And yes, I'm going to butcher pronunciations. Sue me. Don't sue me. Don't sue me. Please don't sue us. Please don't sue us. In the middle of these two realms was an area called the Gununga Gap. It was just the abyss. It was nothing. It was an expanse. In Muspelheim, Surt guards the borders, a gigantic, you know, fire giant. That's redundant. But yeah, fire giant named Surt with his gigantic flaming sword protects the borders of Muspelheim.
00:09:30
Speaker
And he's going to wait for Ragnarok because he wants to bring all the fire giants and come fight the gods. In the north, in Niflheim, is a land of ice and cold wind and darkness. It's also the location of the spring of Vurgalmir. And this spring, depending on the source, apparently, is the source of 11 or 12 rivers.
Norse Creation Myth Narration
00:10:00
Speaker
Uh, the name of these rivers is not in my native tongue, so I'm going to say it, but don't get mad at me. Alivagar. Sorry about that. They are the cool Sval and Gunthra, the defiant, Fjorm, and the bubbling Fimblethal, the fearsome Slid, and the storming Hrid, Seelg, Ilg, Broad Veed, and Laped, which shrieks like lightning.
00:10:29
Speaker
The frozen gill is the final. Between these realms, as I mentioned, is the Gununga Gap. The venom that's in these rivers that springs forth from the Virglemir thickens and congeals at the south end of Niflheim to form Horfrost.
00:10:52
Speaker
So the northern part of the Gununga Gap was cold and covered in ice where the southern part of Gununga Gap was warm and on fire. Infinitely hot. Infinitely hot. There the warm breath reached upward and licked the ice of Niflheim and it caused it to drip. And it dripped and dripped and dripped into the Gununga Gap and from that
00:11:22
Speaker
that venom in these rivers was formed Ymir, the primordial giant. While he was asleep, he began to sweat, as one does, of course. Like we do. A male and a female grew from the oozing sweat under his arms, and one of his legs, somehow, fathered a son with the other leg. That son's name was Thrugelmir. Sometimes I'm just really glad that I'm not a giant.
00:11:51
Speaker
Some critters being born of my sleep sweat feels very unsettling. Yeah. I don't need more critters. No, no. These were the first frost giants. Generally attested to an old Norse as Hrimthursar, which means in English, frost giant. What? Crazy. Ymir was the father of all the frost giants. As more of the ice melted,
00:12:18
Speaker
The fluid that ran off of this ice took the form of a giant cow, believe it or not, and her name was Aorhumla. Ymir fed off of the rivers of milk that came from Aorhumla's utter, and Aorhumla fed herself by licking the salty ice of Niflheim. She licked and licked and licked the salty ice to nourish herself, and by the end of the first day, a man's hair had come out, and by the end of the second, his head had come out, and by the end of the third day of her licking this ice,
00:12:49
Speaker
the whole man had come out. His name was Buri. Buri, in some translations, means the producing. Makes sense. Yeah. Buri was tall and strong and handsome. He had a son called Bor. Bor, in some translations, means the produced. Makes total sense. Imagine that.
00:13:19
Speaker
Bore married a daughter of Bullthorn who was a frost giant. Her name was Bestla. She had three children. All three of them were sons. The first one was Odin. The second was Vili. And the third was Vey. So just in case our listeners didn't actually catch that, Odin is a frost giant.
00:13:45
Speaker
This was all in the beginning before there was anything here on our realm. We didn't have a realm at that time. The three sons of Bor, they had no love for Ymir or the growing race of the Frost Giants. They believed them to be brutal and unruly beings. As time went on, the brothers grew to hate the Giants. And eventually they started a fight that they eventually won against Ymir and his kin.
00:14:12
Speaker
The blood rushing forth from Emir and his wounds killed all the frost giants, except for two. There were two frost giants that survived, Bergelmir and his wife. Bergelmir is the son of Thrudgelmir, which is the son of Ymir that the frost giants called Argelmir. They rode out on a wave of Emir's blood in a hollowed tree trunk or on a chest, depends on the translation. Odin villain Vey, they took the body of this
00:14:42
Speaker
primordial giant, and they hoisted it up onto their shoulders and carted it out to the middle of the Ginnunga Gap. And that is where they made Earth from, the Earth, our realm. In some translations, they crafted our realm specifically from Ymir. In some translations, they crafted Earth out of Ymir, and then our realm is just a piece of the Earth. Right. The Earth is from his flesh, and the mountains are from his bones.
00:15:11
Speaker
And from his teeth and broken bone bits, they made rocks and boulders and stones. The blood of Amir was so plentiful that they made it into seas and lakes and rivers. Then the three brothers raised Amir's skull into the sky and from it placed so that each corner of his skull reached out to the corners of the earth. They said a dwarf under each of these corners. Their names were Nordri, which means north. Austry, which means east. Sundry, which means south. And Vestry, which means west.
00:15:42
Speaker
Odinvili and Vey, they seized sparks from Muspelheim and they threw them up on the inside of Ymir's skull to create stars. And in this way, the brothers gave each of each star its proper place. Some were fixed and some were set to follow paths that were appointed for them by the gods. The three sons of Bohr used Ymir's brain as well to create all of the heavy clouds that we have in our atmosphere. They flung it up into the air. Odinvili and Vey were, okay, so here's the thing.
00:16:13
Speaker
In this, in some versions of this story, Odin, Vily and Vey are the progenitors of man. In other versions of this story, Odin, Honir and Lothar are the progenitors of man. And yes, in most of the, of the translations that we have Odin, Vily and Vey made the realm and Odin, Honir and Lothar made us. So just so the listeners know. Okay. So Lothar.
00:16:42
Speaker
and Haneir Honeir Haneir Haneir Haneir Haneir, I don't know. H-Dude. Yes. Are not Odin's brothers? No, they're not in theory. So it's not. Okay, so if we're looking at the lore, are they clearly separate people? Because Honeir and Lothar are never mentioned to be Odin's brothers. Right? That's true. Are they mentioned in the
00:17:13
Speaker
in any other creation sort, like, okay, I know that we just looked at this. Can we clarify for the people? Like, where did that misconception spring? Was it Snorri's writing? I believe that it was. I believe that it was Snorri. There's also something to consider in this too, in that since this is poetry, a lot of what is said in poetry are are Kenning's metaphors. And so a Kenning for
00:17:43
Speaker
Someone very close to you, I'm not sure if you could go so far as to say a sibling, but someone very close to you would be Honir's friend, or Lothar's friend, or Odin's friend, which Honir and Lothar are called, Honir's friend, Lothar's friend, Odin's friend. And Loki is also referred to as Honir's friend and Odin's friend. We don't see those connections with Vily and Vey. Vily and Vey are actually only mentioned one time.
00:18:12
Speaker
I'm seeing that in Snorri's prose, Edda, that he just says that the sons of Bohr created man. And he just says the first son gave them this, the second son gave them this, the third son gave them this. It doesn't specify who gave what to whom. The other sources that we have outside of
00:18:41
Speaker
Snorri's prose, none of them say, Velian Vay, were the ones who gifted man with this, correct? Correct, actually, in the oldest source that I have of this, which would be Benjamin Thorpe's Norse Mythology, Volume One, written in 1850, page 10.
00:19:03
Speaker
Men came into existence when three mighty, benevolent gods, Odin, Honir, and Lothar, left the assembly to make an excursion. On the earth they found Ask and Embla, with little power and without destiny, spirit they had not, nor sense, nor blood, nor power of motion, nor fair color.
00:19:24
Speaker
That also, I want to talk about that fair color is not referring to the color of their skin being white. It's about the color of their skin being skin colored and not wood colored. Right. One also like lit with the breath of life, the hue of life. Right. They could have looked dead.
00:19:45
Speaker
Odin gave them spirit, honir sense, loather, blood, and fair color, somewhat less circumstantially. Though illustratively, it is related in Snorri's Edda that Boar's sons, walking on the seashore, found two trees, which they took up and created men of them. And so in Snorri's Edda, it states that Odin villain Vey, potentially by saying Boar's sons, after listing Boar's sons earlier in the creation story,
00:20:15
Speaker
I think that's where the confusion comes in, because every other story, I'm looking through the Poetic Edda now, every other story names Odin, Honir, and Lothar. Yeah. The only attestation to them being Vili and Vey that I'm finding could be wrong, right, is Snorri's prose, which, I mean, we've said before that the lore contains contradictions, and this is a prime example of that.
00:20:43
Speaker
Absolutely. I mean, also to be fair, like, Lothar is attested to as being a son of Bor and Bessla. So when they're saying Odin's sons, they could also be referring to Lothar at the very least. I'm not sure about Heineir. Bor's sons. Bor's sons. Buri was licked from the ice. Bor is son of Buri. Yes. Married Bessla. Had three sons.
00:21:12
Speaker
Lothar is also considered a son. Where is that? I'm pulling that up right now. Hang on. Thank you. Because in the prose, it says, Borin Bessla had three sons. One was called Odin, one Billy, and the third of A. It is my belief that this Odin and his brothers are the rulers of heaven and earth. Even in here, Snorri says it is my belief.
00:21:39
Speaker
True. So I, there is also an interesting connection. Um, if you look at Lothar and Honir and Wille and Ve in German, Germanic sources cite Lothar as being Odin's brother and Honir being Odin's brother in place of Wille and Ve. In place of? Yes. Odin, Wille and Ve are only ever mentioned by Snorri.
00:22:10
Speaker
No, they're written in locasena too. That is the only thing, that is the only source, however, in the poetic eta where I could find them mentioned at all. Where how does it mention them in that story? When it says freaks a big old hoe bag and sleeps with them. Specifically mentions them by name? Yes. However, that could be a matter of translation. We should find the original text, which I can actually do right now.
00:22:37
Speaker
I can find the original, the original language. Yeah, if there is any merit to those names just being different versions in different languages of the same name, then that's a pretty significant piece of that story.
00:22:53
Speaker
Totally, but I feel like we wouldn't be the discoverers of that on this podcast. No. Like, we're talking how there are a lot of scholars that will argue whether or not they're the same people. And I feel like they have a lot more information at their fingertips than we do. Definitely. Definitely. So, but I do like that we're getting into how these possibly could be seen as the same, like where the argument comes from, where there's confusion.
00:23:23
Speaker
what I'm looking at is veluspa.org, which provides a translation, but then also provides Old Norse. It's Old Norse written here. And this is also why we recommend having
00:23:37
Speaker
various translations of different stories, if you really want to get into the nitty-gritty of this, of these stories, or of the accuracy. Yeah, there are a lot of assumptions made about Vilyan Vay. Like in Haim Skringla, the original old Norse version of Haim Skringla, it says that Vilyan Vay governed the realm when Odin was gone, but it doesn't say Vilyan Vay governed the realm, it says Odin's brothers governed the realm.
00:24:09
Speaker
Okay, in Old Norse, here is the actual word-for-word translation. The names given, in stanza 26 of Locasena. Loki spake, be silent, frig, thou art Fjorgen's wife, but ever lustful in love. For Villy and Vay, thou wife of Vithreir, both in thy bosom have lain.
00:24:37
Speaker
I mean, that's a direct translation into like old English, right? The point is, even in the Old Norse words, it mentions William Bay in the original poem. Okay, so arguably, there could be two things happening here. Hanier and Lother could be William Bay. They could not be William Bay, because also in every other story and where Hanier and Lother
00:25:03
Speaker
are mentioned, they're called Haneir and Lothar. And there's also the argument that Loki is Lothar because they pal around the three of them all the time in other tales. So this is what we mean when things are up to interpretation. You can easily come to the same conclusion just as easily, I think. You can argue either way that Lothar and Haneir are different gods than Billy and Vey or that they are one and the same. There's really no conclusive evidence. Right.
00:25:34
Speaker
Right. It's really difficult to find what really was said and who these things really are. I think it really just depends. Honestly, I think the villain Vey like a rabbit hole is just kind of fun, but it doesn't really change my opinion, my personal opinion about like my faith or beliefs. It is really interesting. Rabbit hole though, just to see where these stories came from.
00:25:57
Speaker
Oh, absolutely. Well, I honestly think that it lends to the fact that these stories come from many different places, and they may have been told many different times with many different names, right? The names of Odin's brothers could have been Vilyan Vey in one geographical region and could be Hanir and Lothyr in another, just how they would have evolved as these families spread apart and moved and created their own families and tribes and passed down the stories.
00:26:28
Speaker
It could be a nod to that as well. It could be an intentional nod to that.
Big Bang Theory vs. Norse Mythology
00:26:33
Speaker
Could be. It could be. Yeah, you're right. Sorry. Off that tangent, you want to get back into the story? Yeah. So after the people were created, right, that's where we that's where we ended off there is the people were created. The man was called Ask, which means Ash. And the moment was called Embla, which means Elm.
00:26:56
Speaker
And they gave us this realm. They called it Midgard. And all the families and nations and races of men are descended from these two driftwood pieces. And I think that they really made a mistake because... Now we are driftwood with anxiety. Yeah, that's what they did. They gave perfectly good driftwood anxiety. They gave us all manner of mental illness and torments. Yeah. Yeah. There's a giant and he had a child.
00:27:27
Speaker
His name was Narvi. He had a child called Knight, and she was dark-eyed, dark-haired, and dark of skin as the rest of her family. She got married three times. Her first husband was called Nagel Fari, which, of course, is really interesting because that's also the name of the ship that's made of toenails.
00:27:47
Speaker
Oh my gosh. Yeah. Is it the same? The exact same? Oh my gosh. It's very close if not. Thank you for that rabbit hole. Okay. It's a very closely related word at the very least. Their son was out. Her second husband was Anar and I'm butchering these names. They had a daughter called Earth or Yord.
00:28:13
Speaker
Her third husband was Deling, who was related to the sons of Boer. Their son was called Day, and like all of his father's side of the family, he was radiant and fair-skinned. Odin took Nott and Dogger, night and day, and set them in horse-drawn chariots.
00:28:32
Speaker
and put them in the sky to ride around the world every day. Night leads the way and her horse is called, it's a frosty maned horse called Hrimfaxi. And this means ice maned and the idea is that we have the spit from his bridle is the dew in the morning. Delicious. Oh yeah, love that.
00:28:54
Speaker
Dogger's horse is called Skinfaxi, which essentially means shining mane, and his mane is so bright that it lights up all of the sky and the earth. There's a man named Mundelfari, and he lives in Midgarden. He had two children, and they were so beautiful. He called his son Mani, and he called his daughter Sol. And these, the gods didn't like that for some reason, like they just were like, no,
00:29:21
Speaker
Fuck that guy. How dare you? That's what we named our celestial things. You can't name your kids that. Right, right. They got pissed. So Odin stole these children and then threw them into the sky. That would be alarming. Put them in chariots. So Mani leads the way for Nott. So Mani drives this chariot that holds the moon across the sky. And Sol drives the chariot that holds the sun.
00:29:51
Speaker
So the sun is soul and the person who drives the chariot of the sun is soul. Same thing with Mani. It's great. One of soul's horses, name is Arvak, means early awake. The other one was called All's Feed, which is like very, very fast, very fast, All's Feed. They also play the Aesir, the gods. They placed cold iron bellows under their shoulder blades to keep them cool. Ooh.
00:30:21
Speaker
The sun's always in a great hurry because there is a wolf chasing her. That seems fine. Yeah, there's a giant wolf. Where did these wolves come from? Interesting. Interesting, you ask. There's two wolves that chase these celestial bodies. Skull chases soul and Hati chases Mani. And these wolves are the children of Radvitnir.
00:30:49
Speaker
I don't know how to pronounce it. It's a word. It's a thing. Either way. The other, I mentioned the other great wolf, Hati, chases, chases Mani around the world. After these wolves also were, have been said to be the children of Fenrir, but we don't actually have any evidence that these wolves, Skol and Hati, are the children of Fenrir, unless Rodvitnir is another name for Fenrir, which I have not been able to corroborate.
00:31:19
Speaker
Okay, good to know. After the Sons of Boar made the first man and woman, and they set the sun and the moon in the sky, they remembered that there were these worms that were crawling around in Emir's flesh. Super tasty, super tasty. They gave these worms the shape of men, magic and crafting abilities, and they turned them, these maggots that were crawling around in Emir's flesh, they turned them into dwarves.
00:31:47
Speaker
Oh, wow. Okay. Okay. So, right. All right. Yeah. You know, we all come from somewhere. Yeah, I guess we do. Some of us are worms and a giant. Yeah. Some people are driftwood, given life, some people are worms. That's the truth.
00:32:08
Speaker
Maud Sognir is the leader of the Dwarves originally. There's many, but he's the first leader of the Dwarves, is Maud Sognir, and his deputy is Durin. After the Sons of Bor made all of the things, they crafted Asgard, which is their realm. And it has a gigantic, beautiful stronghold, and it's a place of these green, shining plains and hills and trees and forests. It's a beautiful place, high over Midgard, in theory.
00:32:38
Speaker
And the two realms were linked by the B-frost, or bifrost, depending on how you feel like saying that word, which is a flaming rainbow bridge. Gorgeous. I actually, you know what I love? I love how Marvel depicted it. He actually did too. I know that that's like sacrilege in our community, like mmm, mmm, mmm, Marvel. But I loved it. I loved that depiction. It was gorgeous. Yeah, it did a really good job. It was really cool looking. This was the beginning.
00:33:08
Speaker
of all that has happened, remembered or forgotten. All that has happened since in all the regions of the world live under the branches of the world tree, Yggdrasil. I love how people pronounce that word sometimes. Oh, yeah, no, no, no. And I mean, I mean, I feel like we are also pronouncing it wrong because we're not pronouncing it like in Old Norse like Yggdrasil. Yggdrasil. Yggdrasil. Yggdrasil.
00:33:34
Speaker
You have to say it spooky, I guess. But no, Yagdrasil, Yagdrasil, all of the sounds. I like that. I like it. You like it. I like what they say. Yagdrasil. I like people say Ymir. Ymir. Yamama. Yamama and your father, technically. I love that, too. I love that, too. Do you understand? I know you do, but you, the listeners, do you understand?
00:34:04
Speaker
that in order to be capable of what is called a Parthenogenesis, which means creating your own children without a partner, you must be some kind of both male and female thing, which means that Ymir was not a male. Right. Right. Absolutely. Very cool. Parthenogenesis. I love that. That's a great word. Parthenogenesis. Parthenogenesis. I feel three times smarter. I feel like my brain just grew three times bigger.
00:34:35
Speaker
I mean, that's essentially like the end of the real creation story. There are some other like pieces to it where there's like, there's three main roots of Yggdrasil. One of them goes into Jotunheim, into Mimir as well. One of them goes into Asgard, the Well of Urd. And one of them is in Niflheim at the Virgilmir, at the Spring of Virgilmir. Okay, yeah, yeah. But as far as the creation, and that's what I, that's another piece that I wanted to point out too. This is not the creation of
00:35:04
Speaker
the entire Norse cosmos. There were already realms existing. There were already beings that were there. This was not the birth of the first beings in the Norse cosmology. This was just the origin story for Asgard and Midgard. Yes. Yes. That's one thing that I like to point out as well, is that just like you said, our creation story is not the creation of everything.
00:35:36
Speaker
like thinking about that, like it might be our beginning, but it's not everything's beginning. And so these gods didn't create the universe. They just created our universe. Right. Okay. Are you ready to get into the Big Bang and that comparison? I'm kind of stoked. Yeah. Oh my God.
00:36:01
Speaker
Okay. And I'm going to say the same thing that I said to Doba in our server, which is that to believe that our forebears, I mean, when we're looking at them through a modern lens, it's easy. It's easy to get there. It's easy to believe that our forebears were a bunch of country pumpkins, right? Like they didn't have books. They didn't have formal education as we know it today.
00:36:27
Speaker
A lot of people look at superstition and magic and all of that as a sign of somebody being uneducated. But my personal opinion is that while they lacked any formal education, we need to recognize that they were intimately connected with the forces around them. Intimately connected.
00:36:48
Speaker
Right? So they understood the forces of nature far better than I could. I am seeking those connections. That is the path I walk, is seeking those connections, fostering those connections, growing those connections. They lived that connection.
00:37:03
Speaker
They understood the ebb and flow of nature. They were very, really affected by drought, by natural disaster, by bad harvest. Every season was life or death. They walked with the pulse of yord. The connection is deeper than we could imagine.
00:37:30
Speaker
And they were also an inspired people. So these connections with the world and the natural forces and the universe inspired them to create these works of art. And that is what this path is based on. That's what this spiritual walk consists of is literally art.
00:37:49
Speaker
They wrote songs. These are songs. These are poems. They are literally imbued with magic. They are imbued with metaphor and allegory. And so I hate to look at them as though they were of lesser intelligence. They weren't.
00:38:06
Speaker
they understood that the Earth was a globe, right? They understood that, that is written, that is attested to. So when I'm, when I'm looking at this, and I see the Big Bang Theory, which is simply the most widely accepted explanation for the Dawn of the Universe, it is a theory, right? It is incredible to me to see the similarities in that breakdown. Incredible to me.
00:38:38
Speaker
It's just that instead of seeing it as black and white, instead of me throwing on a lab coat and going, well, here's how subatomic particles work, we are looking at it as an intentional thing. We are looking at it being because of a divine will.
00:38:57
Speaker
that the structure of the cosmos was weaved by the Norns, was held together by Idrassil, right? Like the existence of space and time and life and all of that, all of this really coincides with the creation story you just read. Yeah, something from nothing, something from chaos and nothing.
00:39:21
Speaker
Yes! And so, like, okay, okay. So we're looking at... when we look at the Big Bang Theory, right, we're looking at this infinitely
00:39:31
Speaker
dense point that is hotter than we can imagine. Think of it as like the black hole on steroids, right? This is how this is typically understood, correct? Like, and then the theory goes that from that point was an explosion, okay? And that point is considered the birth of the structure of the universe. However, we need to remember that the first portion of the Big Bang Theory
00:40:00
Speaker
was only energy. There was no matter. There was no mass that could be measured. And so we see that
00:40:11
Speaker
the universal energy that was, and I'm talking Big Bang Theory, not cosmology, not our cosmology right now, then we have the super forces that separate within this big void of nothing, right? We have gravity, we have nuclear force, we have electromagnetic force, and we have weak force. These are the things that can later
00:40:37
Speaker
make atoms exist. Pull together these, these, what are they called? Quarks? Something. I can't remember the name. Do you know the name? Quarks are small. Okay. Great. Perfect. Yes. All that. But anyway, so we had all the ingredients that we needed for atoms to exist, but it was still too hot. It was still too hot. So we literally had
00:41:00
Speaker
a yawning void full of forces that were unseen, unmeasurable. It was the nothing that was not nothing. It was the void full of potential. It was Gungegab. Yeah.
00:41:16
Speaker
It's incredible. It's incredible. Okay. Okay. Okay. Now I'm going to get into my, I feel like I'm like Charlie Day on, on always sunny with like all my red strings, just like, Oh my, all right. And then we say, it all makes sense. But like it does. And this is why I love this and I love this. Okay. So then we have Ymir, right? And who is, who is the formation? Things start to cool down. Things start to mix together. Things start to become matter, right? Like we have,
00:41:42
Speaker
which lines up with the creation of protons and neutrons and eventually elements. They organize themselves into the elements, right? And atomic clouds and whatnot. So we have
00:41:54
Speaker
the similarity there in these forces forming mass. We have our two main beings, right? We have Ymir, and also looking at the names, right? Even just looking at the names. There are several names for Ymir, but the two main ones, Ymir and Orgomir. Ymir just means sound. So again, it is an energy, it is a force that is
00:42:20
Speaker
unmeasurable, immeasurable, immeasurable, but it still exists. It is, it is the, the nothing that is something, right? Yeah. Um, and then algomer means mass or sand or gravel or whatever the translation is, but it's something, right? It's a collection of particles. It is an actual physical measurable thing. Then we have out Humbla, who is also created from these forces, these elements,
00:42:48
Speaker
And her name breaks down to, I mean, cow, right? But also cow of riches or abundance, okay? So we have the elements of mass. We also have this nourishing force that allows creation to grow. Ymir can grow and not only grow, but be nourished to a point where he can then
00:43:19
Speaker
spring forth other beings from this source mass and then we see the families start to form and then we see the the the all of these things spring forth from these two these two primordial beings all of it is in alignment all of it is in alignment and then come the aesir you know the the beings that are springing forth they're organizing themselves into tribes they're organizing themselves into family
00:43:43
Speaker
then the Aesir are like, they have always stood for organization to me, right? They came into this chaos, they came in with this clay of Ymir who had been slain and they're creating all of these things with this clay, this primordial goop now, creating lands and, what did you say? Goop. Goop, creating lands and creating,
00:44:12
Speaker
more beings and create it anyway, creating entire fucking realms. But they are also organizing it and structuring it to where now we have time. They create time, linear time, organized time. They're creating days, months, weeks, years, minutes, seconds, organized time, you know, and they are everything, everything that the Aesir does takes chaotic elements and structures it. Aesir is structure.
00:44:42
Speaker
that tribe is structure, you know? Like, but that's what I mean. Everything, everything lines up with Big Bang. It does. It's so fucking cool to me. Yeah, it's really cool. I really like that you mentioned that they organize themselves into tribes and families because it makes me think about like, what is a god? Yes. Like these things, the organizers of our
00:45:08
Speaker
realm here are our gods, but these are all the same race of beings. Yotun, these frost giants of all types, like they are all the same race of beings, just different tribes. So in my opinion, these are just our gods. And while there are many listed in the source material, the only reason that they are our gods is because they had a hand in the creation of our realm. But all of these other things that are the same race as our gods, they
00:45:38
Speaker
at the very least are still deity. I agree with you though. I completely agree with you. And I feel we get into this argument a lot, right? Where it's like, well, that's, you can't worship that being, that's not a god.
Nature of Gods in Norse Cosmology
00:45:50
Speaker
I'm like, okay, well, how are we looking at gods then? Because if we are looking at the source material, like you said, there are, there is a delineation there within like prose eddive, for example.
00:46:01
Speaker
that is like, this is a god, this is a god, this is a list of gods and goddesses, the As and the Asenur, and, you know, there's an official list. However, to me, that does not, that does not exclude the other beings from veneration, if you so choose. I would never exclude hell from veneration. I would never exclude veneration from veneration. I don't exclude any of these other beings that people
00:46:29
Speaker
are pulled toward or want to want to venerate or even emulate aspects of their of their personality or their strengths or weaknesses or associate with them in some way. I don't exclude those beings from being gods. Right. Like, as you mentioned, there is a list of deities in what we consider the source material. But in that source material, when it says that list of
00:46:55
Speaker
beings that are gods. It doesn't say, but there are no others. It just says, these are gods. It doesn't say, the other things though, they're not gods. They are lesser beings. I've had that argument so many times because people will say, well, there's a list. And I'll say, yes, while there is a list, that list does not say at the end and nothing else is a god. Right. Right. And so I have said always that a god to me, right, is a deific being who is
00:47:24
Speaker
somehow involved in the human existence, right? Can have influence or power over the either environment we live in or the wellbeing or our fortunes, right? And so like there are so many things that fall into that. So many things that fall into that. They don't have to be in a list, you know? Like if they are associated with us in any way, you know,
00:47:52
Speaker
Well, okay, that's a whole other tangent. The Norns? Are the Norns not in some way a god? Like gods? They're not listed as gods in the lore. Right. But I honestly, and I've always said too, that I actually see the Norns as kind of being the gods to the gods. I do too. Because they are the weavers of weird, which is the structure of the universe and the gods are bound by weird as well. Yeah.
00:48:20
Speaker
They're attested to as weaving the fate of every being in the cosmos, and that includes the gods. And that's the interesting thing about what is and is not a god, too, is that people will say, oh, well, historically, this was not venerated. Most of our pantheon that everyone considers gods were not venerated historically, most of them. Right. Well, and I don't know that. I don't know that, right? We don't know. There's no... You can't know.
00:48:47
Speaker
But there are a lot of players in the list of gods that you don't really see historical attestations to having temples or having statuettes or having anything that indicates a veneration, but they're still listed. I mean, lack of evidence does not indicate lack of existence.
00:49:09
Speaker
right? But then we get into a... I mean, that just opens up a whole slew of rabbit holes, but that's what's fun. That's what's fun about this. That's what... that is what fuels the thought exploration. That's why it's important not to be black and white, at least to me, to me, right? I know that a lot of people crave structure and they want a list of what we do, what we believe in, who we worship, who we do not.
00:49:34
Speaker
That doesn't exist. There is no unified canon as to what that is. There are some very, very strong opinions, right? Mine included. Mine included. We have the whole pendulum swing here, though. We have me and you kind of on one end where it's just like, sure, why not? There's no reason why not. These are all the same beings. They're all the same race. They just split. And they have different tribes that evolved in different ways and have different realms. And then we have other people who are like, this is what the lore tells me I can do.
00:50:05
Speaker
And it doesn't tell you what you can do and who you can worship. However, that's how they interpret it, which is fine. This is who the Lord says that I can venerate, or this is who the Lord says is a God, therefore worthy of veneration, right? They make that conclusion. They're not wrong, they're not wrong, but I do see it as a limited perspective.
00:50:27
Speaker
Probably because I'm over here in this camp. And I'm like, look at all these, look at all the shit you can do. I'm not gonna squeeze it into this little box right here, this little list on a paper. That doesn't work for me. Again, I'm not here for the box. I am here for the path and the connection and the understanding, right? And so I'm not interested. I'm not interested in structure in that way. That isn't heathenry to me.
Incompleteness of Norse Mythology
00:50:52
Speaker
Well, yeah, and canon's a weird subject anyways, because canon is just like,
00:50:58
Speaker
A list of rules by which other things are judged, essentially, is what canon actually is. Since nowhere in our source material does it say that there are no other gods, it's not canon that there are no other gods. Strictly and purely speaking, in a literary standpoint, it is not canon that those are the only gods that we have. Right. Well, the other thing too is there can't be.
00:51:26
Speaker
There can't be to think of one source reference that we have. Again, like we have the prose and poetic, which is the main, we have other source material, but people discount it all the time for one reason or another, which is fine. I do the same thing, right? I'm like, I'm not really a big fan of that work because he was this person and his motives were this, or because he was limited to this lens, right?
00:51:52
Speaker
But to not think of Snorri's works in the same way, we again are only looking at stories from a few regions where Heathenry and the scope of these stories was massive. It spread out over such a huge area. And we know for a fact that we are missing pieces. There are references in the lore that we have to stories we don't have. We don't know where all of Odin's names came from.
00:52:20
Speaker
tales that are incredibly small that reference these battles and these conflicts that he had and these experiences he had, we don't have those. Those are just like, oh yeah, remember this guy? And the person in the story is like, yep. And we're like, who? You know? So we can see in our lore that there are pieces missing. So I can't say that that is what it is, full stop. That is not a black and white thing to me. It can't be. When you're looking at the
00:52:47
Speaker
fucking Copenhagen fire of 1728, which was essentially the the Norse Alexandria, right? Where it was it was popular, it was it was popular to collect Norse works. There was a revival period. And a fire took out so much of that material, so much of that material to where all we have. That's why we are so lucky to have what we have, because it is entirely possible that that could have been entirely destroyed. And we wouldn't have any source material at all.
00:53:15
Speaker
You know, but like you you to me to me you must acknowledge.
00:53:20
Speaker
that we are missing pieces. And it is silly, at the very least, to assume that we have a full picture. We can't, we don't, we can't possibly. Yeah, I mean, it's known and it's generally accepted by basically everybody, even people who are lore purists, that we don't have everything. Like, this was primarily an oral tradition. You know, however long ago, these stories started up to and including maybe 2000 or more years ago, which is speculative, of course, but
00:53:51
Speaker
We accept that. We understand that we are reconstructing something that we are missing so much of. I'm not going to say that it's Swiss cheese because they're not just holes. We're missing whole chunks. We're missing everything because going back to earlier in this episode about not having homogeny in their practice in Scandinavia, the Old Norse just didn't. They just didn't. Like, hearth cults were very common. We know that hearth cults were very common and that they weren't shared very widely.
00:54:20
Speaker
You know, these people didn't have a religion. This was just their way of life. And so they would very frequently, most likely, because it was not a religion with a scripture, make up their own stuff. And the stories that we have are just what remains. We're missing so much. Absolutely. And you're right about that. What we have is a slice of Swiss cheese from an entire block. We're missing the rest of the block. Right. Right.
00:54:44
Speaker
Not only are we missing holes, we're missing entire books. We might be missing chapters and sentences as well, but we're missing entire volumes.
00:54:53
Speaker
When we know that, you know, to the modern lens, Odin is the main dude. He's the main bee based on our stories and how he's kind of elevated. But we know that in other areas, Njord was the main bee, Frey was the main bee. Like in Sweden, it was Njord and Freyr. You know, you can look at the temples and things of that nature, the giant stone phalluses everywhere, like those stories,
00:55:20
Speaker
are Fray and Njord based, right? So like we know, the stories we have on Fray are minimal, minimal. There had to have been more that we are missing so much of. But yeah, I'm glad that you brought that up. I'm glad that you brought it up about, you know, we can't really say, at least in my opinion, we cannot say who is and who is not, quote unquote, worthy of veneration. I wouldn't, at least. Some people do.
00:55:49
Speaker
But I would not. I think that it's everyone's prerogative. If they want to say that to them, something isn't a god, or isn't a deity, or is one or the other. To a person, your personal practice is perfectly valid. If you don't believe that Fenrir is a god,
00:56:07
Speaker
to you, that's perfectly valid. But when you go and then you try to curtail somebody else's worship of what they consider a god, that's where I have to draw lines because what is to me is not what is to others. I don't think that any mortal person has the authority to tell anyone else what is or is not a god. We don't make those rules.
00:56:28
Speaker
Well, I'm like, that's kind of how I feel too, because I feel like I was drawn to this path by a specific god, right? And I'm not saying that I was called to the path by a god or whatever, but I do feel like I was drawn here and that I closely related with one specific deity. And that has changed over time. But who am I to say that another deity didn't draw someone else here?
00:56:52
Speaker
if they're not listed in my list of appropriate deities. If somebody said, Fenrir was the one that called to me, he came up in my dreams, and then I started walking this path. Who am I to say that that's bullshit? If they want to venerate Fenrir for that, I feel like that's appropriate, honestly. Yeah. Am I going to venerate Fenrir? I don't really have an interest, but then again, I don't have an interest in venerating a lot of the people that are on the official gods list.
00:57:17
Speaker
Same. Same. It's also an interesting topic too, is that we don't have to. No. Some people think that like you must venerate all of the deities that are deities in our... No, you don't. No, you don't. I agree with you. It does not make you monotheistic to only venerate one or a few. It does not make you monotheistic because you believe in the others. That's what makes a person polytheistic is the belief in multiple deities.
00:57:40
Speaker
Right. And I know a lot of Norse animists who don't even bother venerating the gods. They work more with the land viteer, the land spirits and their ancestors primarily. You know, they don't really worry too much about creating reciprocal relationships with the gods. They believe they exist, you know, which makes them the Norse animists, but they're not really worried about building forth with those beings. Right. I offer to several gods, but I don't work with them. Right.
00:58:11
Speaker
I do, but again, when you have a whole group of heathens, you can have a hundred heathens in the room and you're gonna have a hundred different heathen practices. And that's a cool thing. That's what keeps me interested. I have never been interested in an organized religion.
Crafting Personal Spiritual Paths
00:58:25
Speaker
I don't like it. I don't like the assumed authority. I don't like the inability to look beyond what is given to me. And so I relish the fact that I can create
00:58:39
Speaker
my own understanding from the path and it's perfectly valid. Yeah. I don't practice any organized version of heathenry. And that's why when people bring up, should there be an organized version of heathenry? Should we organize into a single path? I'm always vehemently against it because not only would I never tell somebody else how to practice their faith, I'm not going to let anyone tell me how to practice mine. I know. I was like, who's organizing it? Who's writing this official guide to heathenry? Right.
00:59:09
Speaker
Like there are plenty of books about that, like Guides to Heathenry, Essent for Ossetrue by Diana Paxson. Like there are lots and lots of ways that people have attempted to create some kind of like linear path in Heathenry. I just, I'm not about it. My path is my own, my practice is my own, and no one gets to tell me how to do it. No, no, I am several raccoons in a trench coat. There is nothing organized about me. I do not want you telling me what to do, how to do it, and when to do it. I don't. And that's also, that's again why we do what we do here, which is,
00:59:39
Speaker
you know, empowering people to find their own way. I think there's so much to be learned there. There's so much to be learned in that walk. Discovering yourself, discovering your own connections with the beings that be, you know? Yeah. Your path is your own listeners. Like you, you take, if you want to read everything, read everything, craft your own path. You do not need to allow anyone to tell you how to practice your faith because it's not theirs, it's yours. It's your path.
01:00:09
Speaker
you are taking the steps down this path. So don't let anyone else tell you how to do it or that what you're doing is wrong. Don't. Correct. I loved this. I loved this conversation. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to nerd the fuck out. Of course. I think it's really an interesting topic, like the idea of creation and the Big Bang, because everything you said is so on point. Like it is the culmination of
01:00:35
Speaker
energy being dispersed and created and ordered by some other kind of energy that was created from that energy, which is the same exact thing. On purpose. On purpose. It's fantastic.
01:00:47
Speaker
by design. There's the difference. But I love that. I love that. And it's not a widespread theory. I actually looked up on Reddit to see if I could find anybody talking about it, to see if this was just me being up in the night and creating and drawing the similarities. And I don't see a lot of people talking about it. But that's OK. That's OK. Maybe they'll start now. Maybe they should. I love it. I think it's a really fun thought exercise. I think it's a really fun theory to look into. But yeah.
01:01:16
Speaker
Next week, we're going to be getting into the Norse Sky Daddy. We're gonna be getting into it.
Next Episode Teaser: Odin
01:01:28
Speaker
Our favorite, our favorite god, Odin, the Allfather. Yeah, there's so much to say. There's so much to say about Odin. There is so much. There really is. And there will be a lot to say. This may be
01:01:46
Speaker
a make or break show for us. Oh, we're going to lose the Odinists. We're going to lose the Norse Christians. Sky Daddy enthusiasts. Yeah, because that's the thing.
01:02:00
Speaker
I do feel that there is a tendency from people that come from an organized religion and hold one higher than the others to ignore all of the fallibility within that person, you know? Like, there is a lot to Odin that's not perfect, you know? He's not the all-seeing, he's not the all-knowing, he's not a lot of things that people attribute to him, and we're gonna get into it, you know?
01:02:30
Speaker
Absolutely. Absolutely. It's going to be an interesting conversation. I'm also going to get into how our gods are contextually not omnipotent and not omnipresent because we have particular stories, right, that tell us when a god or goddess is somewhere and not somewhere else, which means that by definition, they are not omnipresent. No, no, absolutely not. No.
01:02:59
Speaker
Um, yeah, I'm really looking forward to this. I'm looking forward to the deep dive. I think it's going to be illuminating. Absolutely. Um, all right. Well, thanks for joining us. We'll see you next time. Okay. Bye. You're listening to the Heart of Weird podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, be sure to subscribe, rate, and review the show on YouTube or your favorite podcast platform.
01:03:29
Speaker
and follow us on TikTok at hearthofweirdpodcast to stay up to date on all things heathenry. Every small interaction you have with us helps us grow. We appreciate it so much. You can email us directly with all of your heathenry questions at hearthpodcastteam at gmail.com. Be well, and as always, thank you for listening.