Untitled - Awaken Video

Chapter 6. The Sky 148
with many unknown variables as in the case when the first settlers came to Iceland
and needed to deal with the yet “wild” landvættir who had up to the time of the
first settlers little or no interaction with men. It was understandable, then, that
there would be many bad years until the immigrant family had completely aligned
itself with the flow of luck seeping up from the Underworld or had been able to coax
luck to flow their way. This was a natural course of life in the Germanic worldview.
But, for the Christian, any bad year was automatically interpreted by the Church
to be a punishment for some transgression against the new God (which may have
been somewhat confusing for the newly converted Christian who believed he had
committed no “sins”). For the Heathen, life was simply a series of struggles which
could in most cases be overcome through knowledge of ¸Orlög, and proper action
which would lead eventually to lining oneself up with the same Flow of the Waters
of Life which fed the entire World Tree. Such an “all-or-none philosophy” did not
match up easily with the unpredictability of lands of the North.
The Landnamabók (“The Book of Settlements”), the Islandingabók (“The Book
of the Icelanders”), and much of the sagaic literature reveals the function of the
Gods for the early Germanic people which also differs greatly from how They were
seen by the Christians. “Function” here refers to the actual roles that the ancients
believed their Gods to play in their daily lives. In the early settlement of Iceland,
as is clearly stated in the sagaic literature, the northern Gods “guided” settlers to
their new homes, and guidance from the Gods is a key issue from the earliest known
writings about the Germanic peoples up through the Viking Age and well into
the Age of Conversion. Tacitus, writing around the 1st century CE, describes the
Germans as placing much value in the reading of lots (which some have interpreted
to mean slips of wood with runes or proto-runes engraved on them) and omens, and
that they would not make a move either agriculturally or in war until the “signs,”
presumed to be communications from the Gods, Ancestors, or spirits of nature, were
right for it. In the settling of Iceland, it was common for the ship’s master or the
leader of the expedition to seek an omen which would result in the settling into
a lucky place which would prosper. Although there are very few formal prayers
directly from the Heathen Era, many of them must have contained a line similar
to “(name of deity) lead us to . . . ” as opposed to the formal Christian phrasing of
“God give (or ‘grant’) us . . . ” for in the Heathen philosophy “a gift ever looks for
a gift.” The role of the Heathen Gods as guides recurs over and over in the early
writings.
The idea of northern Gods as guides concurs well with the early Germanic world
view as presented so far. The Waters of Life which maintain the health of Yggdrasil
need to be constantly modified and changed to suit the needs of the Tree itself so
to hold off Its collapse (Ragnarök) as long as possible. The joint efforts between