By Karl Thorrwolf

How can we find any information about the lesser known gods and goddesses, and how can we verify that information if the lore is silent with regard to these gods and goddesses? Several works that are available in the "heathen library" indicate that the author has "intuited" or "discovered" information regarding a certain god/dess. This is all well and good except in a case where the extant lore regarding that particular god/dess is only one or two lines in some obscure chapter of a lesser known saga. What are we to make of this? Is this just a variance of information? Has the author rediscovered some lost information? Or, even worse, is the author fabricating this information from his or her own imaginings? This article doesn't begin to assume that the answers to these questions are easily found, if the answers are even capable of being found. Perhaps, if we look at this situation long enough and from enough different angles, a consensus for determining the answers may be found. At the very least, we might find a method of being able to sense when the author is fabricating information or stretching what is available beyond all bounds of recognition.

Even works such as Our Troth rely upon intuited or rediscovered information. A case in point is the goddess Eir. She has two main references in the Eddas, each being very brief, yet there is almost an entire page of information shown for Her. Whence came all this extra information? In this particular case, the editor(s) of the article say that a lot of it was gleaned from people who had worked with Eir in one capacity or another. They also include a caveat that this is "intuited" material. So evidently, we can reclaim "lost" knowledge by working closely with a specific deity. However this is skirting very closely to circular logic. We know Them by working with Them and by working with Them we know Them. Is this the heathen version of the chicken and egg conundrum? (No, I'm not saying that the article regarding Eir is erroneous. I'm merely using it as an example since I've recently read it and it springs to mind.)

Let us approach the question from a different angle. Eir is the physician of the Gods. She represents healing in a time of relatively low technology. She uses the cures that most people have at hand (herbs, massage, tinctures, etc.), albeit charged with divine energy. We might conclude then that She would be appropriate to call upon for non-invasive healing. Since She is a goddess, we might also reach out to Her in times when radical healing is needed. (Desperation is a wonderful way to draw close to a god/dess!) Does this logic chain show intuition or merely deductive reasoning? Maybe a bit of both. Either way, we've "rediscovered" information regarding Eir. We've taken a bit of information and through logic expanded it to encompass new ideas. Another method of intuiting is using the "racial memory" transmitted to us through our line of descent, to tap the layers of orlog that have been laid down by those who have gone before us. (No, this is NOT a volkish statement. If we assume that part of our life essence is passed on, be it luck or hamingja or the soul itself, then there is a fountain of knowledge locked within each of us.) Just as our own experiences have made us whom we are, the experiences of those who have gone before us have added to the well of experience that we have received from our families as a type of inheritance. This knowledge could just as easily be in the form of our grandmother's herbal cough syrup recipe as in the form of some great metaphysical revelation.

It has been posited that using the rune raidho is a way to unlock this well of knowledge and to be able to uncover the vast knowledge within us. Unfortunately, this is an empirically unquantifiable way to do it. Some in our community believe that there is nothing after this life and therefore no knowledge passed on, at least on the esoteric level. They may be right. And therein lies the problem, we can't tell for certain if this "new" knowledge is correct or not.

How can we then verify any of this "rediscovered" lore if none of it is written down, or if it's based on logic sequences, or whatever? This is the really sticky wicket. We don't want to think that someone is making it up out of whole cloth, but do we really want to fall for any line that gets "channeled"? There has to be some test or measure that can be used to verify any of this "new old" information. Why not take the axiom "accepted as tru until proven otherwise by their actions" and apply it to the new knowledge? We have a stock of lore that we can use as a measuring stick to compare any new thing or idea. If it compares favorably with what is already known about any particular god/dess, then might we not assume that it might be accurate until proven so erroneous that the proof is obvious to any who view or read this new information? However, if it is an obvious bit of "thud and blunder" (a certain agrarian goddess using a sword for example), then we might safely assume it's a blatant falsehood (or the makings of a fair comic book).

There has certainly been a lot of lost knowledge. The case of almost all writings regarding Freyja is a good example. We know from reading the extant lore that there was a great deal of information about Her that was destroyed by the church in its frenzy to dehumanize women. Maybe by astute scholarship or by finding a hoard of hidden manuscripts (historically verifiable, of course), we might someday verify these tidbits of recovered lore, but for now we may have to settle for "tru until proven otherwise." This proof may have many forms. Is it obviously a fraud, or so outlandish that we may dismiss it without further review? Does it hold up when compared to other works? Does it elevate the heathen community or does it aggrandize the few at the cost of the many?

As was stated at the beginning, this is not going to answer the questions, merely make us aware of them. Hopefully we can avoid some of the pitfalls that any religion is heir to by asking these questions and keeping an open mind, while not shirking the intellectual side of our religion. The Gods make Themselves known to us in many ways. We may have to temporarily settle for this dictum that my daughter is fond of using with regards to the Navy (paraphrased):

"In the Gods we trust; all others, we verify!"

© C Skinner 2000

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