Untitled - Awaken Video

Chapter 6. The Sky 156
people at all. They may have simply accepted the conflicting information pertaining
to the Land of the Gods as being no different than their own personal experiences
in the Land of the Ancestors during their dream-flights. Instability of physical laws
(from consensus reality) governing space, time, mass, and energy is common to one
traveling in an altered state of consciousness.
The question may then arise, “How can someone live in an altered state of consciousness,
or accept obviously hallucinatory material as being on the same par as
physical reality, and still consider themselves to be in the here and now?” There are
probably a large variety of theoretical answers, but the facts remain: “They did and
they did.” In reality, the ancients did not live in an “altered state” but interpreted
their world through a different worldview which included as fact much material that
is generally viewed as “fantasy” in the 20 th century. Modern world views are no
more or no less fantasy than those of the ancients, however. Theories, themselves,
for example, have no physical existence other than the fact that they seem to “work,”
for the most part. Imagination, emotions, ideas, religions, philosophies, morality,
democracy all have no physical existence which can be perceived by the human
sensory system, yet all have their place in the modern worldview. Is there really
any difference between an ancient Scandinavian dreaming that Óðínn has provided
him with the skills necessary for a sea voyage or Francis Crick dreaming that two
snakes are fighting which became the basis for the discovery of the genetic material
called DNA? It is truly amazing how little people have changed over the past two
millennia.
Who lived in the sky realm? Because of conflicting information from the Sagas,
the Eddas, and folklore, it is difficult to say for certain. The Æsir appear to have
been the primary inhabitants, and their abode or abodes, depending on whether
one is talking about Asgard, the city, or the individual Halls of the Gods and
Goddesses, seems to have been located far to the north. Certain ancestors who
have died in battle or through the shedding of their blood, i.e., murder, and these
were called the Einherjar. 21 Their doom was to fight one another each day and
to be renewed each night. The red aurora borealis is supposed to have been the
Einherjar engaged in practice battle in preparation for the final battle at the end of
time, the Ragnarök, and, apparently, because of the rule of reciprocity, nighttime on
Midgard was reversed daytime in Asgard. Sturluson mentions that the light-elves
lived in the “second” heaven far to the south and above, called Andlangr, 22 and in the
“third” heaven, called Viðbláinn. 23 There were also animals mentioned as belonging
21 See Chapter 4, Sky Connection, which discusses the possibility that Asgard may have
actually been on the northern horizon as opposed to "up in the sky."
22 Faulkes, Prose Edda, p. 20
23 Faulkes, Prose Edda, p. 20.