PaganSquare.com - WitchesAndPagans.com

Many people spend their lives looking for purpose. Sometimes what they really want is meaning, which is slightly different. Sometimes their inner yearning for purpose is really a calling, which is very different. But purpose? I wanted purpose, when I was younger. I didn't know that I was already fulfilling my purpose. If I went back in time and told my younger self, "You are art"-- she wouldn't understand what I meant. But perhaps I can explain it here.

Title: Loki's Wager (Vikingverse Book Two)

For some reason, when you work alongside certain deities, outside folks loooooove to come and chat you up about Them. Only, rather than asking questions out of genuine desire to learn, more often than not, it seems to turn into a smug confessional. I’ve even gotten the literal elbow poke to the ribs from folks who’ve never met a Norse God. Wink, wink. Toothy grin. “You know what he’s like right, riiiight?”

It really makes me feel like I’m talking about Geralt of Rivia.

The Asatru FAQ series is my answers to questions asked on my forum, the Asatru Facebook Forum. Frequently Asked Question: Was Odin human?

My answer:

That's a fairly common interpretation, but I personally don't think he was.

The logic of the interpretation of Odin as human who ascended to godhood goes like this: Tyr was the original Sky God and King. Odin appeared in the culture suddenly. Odin's myth includes a shamanic initiation, or possibly two-- the Tree and the Well. He was therefore a great mystic to ascended to godhood.

Odin is well-known for his many bynames and, interestingly, one of them—Jólnir—specifically associates him with Yule.

Jólnir  (YOLE-neer) is hard to translate. "Yule-man"? "Yule One"? "He of Yule"? "Yule-er"?

The title clearly derives from Jól, Yule. -Nir is an Old Norse suffix of agency. An English equivalent would be -er, but unlike -er, which attaches to verbs, -nir pairs with nouns. Interestingly, it is a common element in Old Norse name-creation:

Sleipnir, Odin's eight-legged horse = “slip-er,"

Skírnir, Frey's attendant = “shine-r,”

Gleipnir, the chain that bound Fenris-wolf = “open-er,”

Grímnir, another title of Odin = “mask-er” (or “hood-er”), and, of course, mostly famously of all,

Mjöllnir, the name of Thor's Hammer: “mill-er.”

So maybe “Yuler” would be the most accurate translation, though it's hard not to think of the German Weihenachtsmann, the “Yule Man.” (Modern German pagans have taken to calling Yule Weihenacht—which is an older form of the word—to differentiate it from Weihnacht, “Christmas.”)

In this Land of Ten Thousand Storytellers, Kevin Kling has got to be one of the very best.

Here's a story from his boyhood.

When you're seven years old and growing up in a Norwegian Lutheran town on Minnesota's Iron Range, you know that there are certain things that you just can't do. One of them is to bother Pastor Lindquist—who is, after all, right up there next to the Big Guy—with theological questions.

But one night at the church supper Kevin finds himself sitting next to the pastor's wife, and he figures that she might be close enough to the Source to ask.

“Mrs. Lindquist,” says Kevin, “If Jesus and Buddha got into a fight, who would win?”

“Well, Jesus would win, of course,” says Mrs. Lindquist.

“Well, if Jesus and Allah got into a fight, who would win?” asks Kevin.

“Jesus would win,” says Mrs. Lindquist.

“Well, if Jesus and Odin got into a fight, who would win?” Kevin asks.

There's a long pause.