Hell and welcome Mythic Mind, where we pursue wisdom on the path between primary secondary world. I'm your host, Angrew Sneider, and I am always grateful for your company. Hey there, welcome back, and today we're going to be continuing our patron chat on the poetic Eda. But first I want to go ahead and thank all of my patrons that make this kind of thing possible, as well as all the other various things that I do independently and the
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on the Edit texts. Welcome back as we continue with our edit chats with the next series of texts here, which mostly continue to deal with the Volsong Saga and Cigaurd and Zigmund and whatnot. As a reminder to anyone who's listening or who is tuning in for the first time, none of us are at all experts on these texts. I mean, we're all kind of interested in myths and
fantasy and the things that these texts have inspired. But we're definitely just kind of amateurs going up the river here and seeing what we can find along the way. But before we get into the text, to just check in with Thomas and Josh, I mean, do you guys have anything going on, anything you want to plug any updates to provide for us.
Thomas, Yeah, So, as of recording that, this is still February, and earlier this month, my debut children's book finally came out from the Great Folks that weren't on Fire Votive, though if you go to bookstore dot word on fire dot com you can see my new book, The Riddle of the Tongue Stones, How Blessed Nicholas Steno Uncovered The
Hidden History of the Earth. It's children's nonfiction for ages about eight through fourteen, and it's the story of Nicholas Steno, who was a pioneering geologist and also a Catholic priest and a very holy man. And I go through his whole story of literally laying the groundwork for the science of geology. And as of tomorrow, I'll be starting work on what I hope will be the follow up book, so we'll see good.
That's fantastic. So what in particular led you here? I mean, no, obviously you're you know, you've got your science background, but like will lead you to that focus or to write about him?
Yeah, I've known about him for a long time. I took a lot of geology classes in my early years of college, and you know, he was always he was always in the very early pages of every like geology textbook, and I was always fascinated by him because those textbooks always tended to downplay the fact that he that he had this whole other side of his life, you know, that that he was, you know, a religious person and
a clergyman. So I wanted to tell his story. And even among you know, Christians and and and people who are you know, interested in the whole science and faith, you know, conversation, I feel like he's he's just not as well known, and he's someone who if I was. You know, if I had known about him when I was ten years old, it would have really excited me because like he's he's essentially like the patron saying of paleontology, and so that that would have really excited me as
a kid. And my whole goal these days is to write the kind of books that would have excited me as a kid. So that's that's really what drew me to this. I want to I want to write things that are gonna inspire, educate, and entertain young minds. And that's that's kind of what I'm all about right now. It's kind of my new mission and I'm very excited about it.
That's great, it's a very noble mission. Now, can you tell us anything about what you're working on next? Or is that under wraps at this point.
It's not really under wraps, because you know, I have sort of soft pitched it to my editors, but nothing's official yet. Next, I would like to tell the story of Henri Breuil. He was a French priest and an
archaeologist from the twentieth century. He was involved in studying the famous painted caves at Lasco in southern France and if if you look up cave paintings on the internet, they're the ones that come up and it and it's it's also a very neat story that I think kids will be interested in because those caves were initially discovered by kids who were looking for their lost dog and would turned out to find this hole in the ground that led to this whole cavern system and these cave
paintings that nobody had ever seen before. So I've just done a lot of preliminary research about the caves at Lasco and about Henri Burrell's life, and it's a really fascinating story and I'm really excited to get down to this week start drafting.
So that is exciting, and it is just so crazy how we can still just like find things like this, like yeah, you know, think like the you know, Dead Sea scrolls and you know how these things get discovered by accident.
Yeah, oh, the Dead Sea Scrolls. I may have to tackle that sometime because they have an interesting story too. I just love archaeology and paleontology so and the thrill of discovery. That was always something that you know, I loved reading books about explorers and scientists when I was a kid, you know. So that's that's really what I want to write about these days.
That's great, and it definitely sounds like you are doing your part two, you know, re enchant science fight putting it in proper context.
Yes, yeah, and to make a story out of it, you know as well. You know, they're you know, to like in our kind of hyper stem culture, we focus on facts and figures and numbers and not enough on the whole narrative and thrill of discovery and that there were people behind these great discoveries, and people with lives and with a faith in God. And I just think that, Yeah, I like that idea, re enchanting science. That's great.
Good good Josh. Do you have anything going on.
Other than hoping that along with these discoveries that keep happening that on one day they discover Cthulhu at the bottom of the other than that, no, not a whole lot. I mean, my sub stack is still just consisting of weekly posts right now. They're pretty much just all on the Divine Comedy, so just doing one canto a week, basically doing three cantos from each basically each section of
the comedy. So there'll be eventually be nine move there's five out right now, just finishing up purgatorio, so that's part of my graduate school program. But other than that, just working and preparing for my next child to be born. So try not to commit to anything else.
Basically, Yeah, I'm not very good at that, not committing to things.
I know. When my first daughter was born, I was like, you know what, I've slept like three hours a night the past three nights, and it would be a great time to start learning how to read the Bible and Greek, because you know what, this is a normal thing that people do.
Yeah, I just I got messed up by running my dissertation while working and having our twins because at that point, just out of necessity, I learned how to just do stuff without sleeping, and then I never learned how to turn it off. So it's just I just haven't really slept for years. I'm mostly okay with that, but I know that eventually it's gonna hit me. But yeah, you know, I've we've got our next is sometime with the next couple of weeks, and here I am planning out a
three more courses lead and all sorts of stuff. So but it's fine, it'll be fine.
I have been learning to sort of wake up automatically at four in the morning, So there's that. You know, I don't have kids, but you know, like I am learning to do without less sleep. But I'm sure, like you say, it will eventually bite me later. Yeah.
I think of that episode of Seinfeld where he's talking about how, you know, night Jerry or morning Jerry hates night Jerry. It's like, that's that's how I feel a odd times, like I'm fine at nighttime, morning's not always quite so. Uh thrilling. Uh Well, let's cool. Well, I guess we can go ahead and start to work through some of these texts. See what we're able to pull out here. Now. The first one we're starting off on was the Death of Sinfioti, which doesn't really have a
whole lot too. It's just a short little prose about the death of Sinfieli, who was the son of Zigmund of the vol songs and Borg killed or it's Borg Kill's uh not not biological, right, Yeah, because I'm trying
to remember all this sets to work it together. Uh, sim Fiot was the son of Zigmund and actually his sister, if I recall correctly, we get in the vol song saga kind of a children if You're in situation going on, No, yeah, where there's some deception and it's you know, it's it's it's kind of kind of strange, but definitely the inspiration I think for talking in that Children if You're in Situation.
So yeah, so that's where Sinfioti comes from. So stepchild of borg Kield who is now the wife of Zigmund and Sinfiltlee, and I think it's like his uncle are both going after, you know, trying to woo the same woman, and sim Filetle ends up killing the uncle. So then Borg killed essentially poisoned since Fieltle. Yeah, so it's like nor soap opera stuff here. I don't know. I don'tally don't have anything insightful to pull from this. I don't know if you have any of the comments.
Was Sigmund the one who all of his brothers and him were pinned under a trunk of wood and devoured night by night by like one by one by the she wolf and he was the only one that escaped.
Yes, that's correct, And okay, I'm just trying to.
Make sure I'm getting my names and orders mixed yes, but really profitable to read like some of the whole songs saga along with this and take notes that, so note for next time.
Yes, that would be helpful. And the Volksong saga it's not terribly long. It is interesting.
Oh yeah, I have read that before. It was a while ago, but I remember I was starting to remember things going through some of these shorter ETA texts. I was like, oh, yeah, that I remember that from the Volsung saga. Yeah, it's not long at all. So yeah, I'm gonna read that as a companion.
You probably would be a good idea. I probably need to read through it again before next time. I read it several months ago by this point, in the midst of my My Baywolf studies. Kind of as a side note, I went off to read the Volsom saga. But I mean, all the specific details haven't exactly stayed in my head here. But yeah, and so Zigmund's wife or killed poisons and Fioti. But at first in Fieldle it kind of recognized that something's amiss, and so he goes and tells his father
Zigmund that my drink is kind of cloudy. And then Zigbin because you know, he's like this uber warrior kind of guy. He just drinks it because poison can't hurt him. And this happens like repeatedly, where Borkill keeps giving sin field Y this poison drink that then Zigman keeps drinking until finally, for whatever reason I because he's worn down, sin Fieldle decides to finally just drink it and he dies. Yeah.
I don't really have any great insight to pull from this. Yeah, Yeah, so I content just moving on to the next section, which has a little bit more to it.
That would be a great opportunity to kind of introduce, like sinfili in the concept of like the parallels and maybe even some non parallels with like the whole sung saga, since that's going to be a running theme through all of these uh fragmentary texts. Right, So I think that's I think that's good enough personally.
Yeah. And then from this point we're really moving on from Zigmund, and now we're going to be focusing mostly on Ziggurd, who is his son, and so well, I guess some of that story will sort of come out as we go, but I'll read the introduction here provided in the Larrington text, and so this is going to be concerning Gripier's prophecy or gripispas it says. It's clearly a late poem, depended upon the other poems which follow it in the Ziggurd cycle, and possibly upon an early
version of the Volksong saga. It's function is to summarize the story of Ziggurd for telling everything which will happen to him. And so that's really the gist of it. So Ziggurd is going to be talking to this guy Gripier, who's described as being incredibly wise. He has some foresight, he's able to look down the path of fate and tell Ziggurd various things are going to happen to him. And so that's really the context for what's happening here.
And so it's it's part prophecy revealing his fate. And also there's some like wisdom literature, like Norse wisdom literature type of stuff in here, some like proverbial wisdom. Yeah, I don't know, I mean, what are what are some things that stood out to you?
Just a note what they're relational here? But on the sixth standza, assuming it's the h this edition, but it says, tell me if you know, like comma uncle, as if there's like addressing him his uncle. So I'm guessing I don't know if it's said it in the introduction or not, but just like for like the listener's sake and all that this this is his uncle, correct, like that this is there is like a familiar relation here of some sort.
I believe that's even in the in the end notes they mentioned that, yeah, that h Gripier, that Sigurd is Grippier's sister son, and there was like a very in Norse societies, there's a very important relationship between a man and specifically his sister's son. I mean, we see that in the Lord of the Rings with Faydin and Aleen I mean I am and and also with Alen as his as both his niece and nephew, because they're his sister's children. He has very close bond with them.
Hm hmm.
That's a great connection, I would I would think I've already thought of that one. See, I'm just here for the on the no stuff like faf near and smoke.
So I am most curious in any sort of prophetic sort of literature from any culture, what sort of the relationship is between like the word of the prophet and how the word of the prophet can or cannot be undone by like the free will of the person who the prophet, who's like the main subject of the prophecy, right, Like I think this is a lot with like this like comes up all the time with like the uh,
like the dramatists of like the classical Athens period. I think, like, you know, first thought would be like Tyresius, like the profit of Apollo and like Thebes, especially in like Oedipus wrecks, there's like that. It's kind of like that tension where it's like can Oedipis like escape his fate or is he completely you know, fettered to exactly what Tyresi has told him? And was there any way he could have undone any of that? And I don't know how they
would think of that in this culture. I don't know if they of view all of any insight to that. But that's usually like a question I always thinking of with these kinds of texts.
Yeah, I'm not super well read in Greek drama. Do they come down like do they unravel that tension at all?
In your experience, it doesn't seem like I mean just thinking of like, you know, Sophocles Euripides and Aesculus, Uh, specifically, I don't think of any time where they specifically like really give like a clear cut you know how it is with like scholarship, where it's like you have like these you know, to twenty five hundred year long scholarly traditions where people are debating on whether you know, Sophocles was like a hard determinist or a compatibilist or people
even like libertarian free will or what exactly his message was with that right, So that's obviously like up for debate, and I don't feel qualified to give an opinion either way, that's for sure. But I'm curious how that works out in this in this specific culture, in this text.
Yeah, in my reading, it definitely seemed like the northern cultures take a pretty hard line fatalistic perspective of you know, he Ziggurt isn't asking what's likely to happen, what might happen. He says what's going to happen, And then he's told here's what's going to happen, and Ziggert says, okay, And it's like, you know, when things you know it seems like he's going to get some some misfortune of various kinds. Even like his death. He never is about trying to
avoid it or like questioning it. He just said accept it, like Okay, this is what's going to happen. And I think that's pretty common in the Northern literature. We get the strong emphasis on like the norns, the fates of Norse mythology, the fact that they not only lay out the path of mortals, but they even lay out the path of the gods. Right, even the gods are subject to fate, which is why Odin in a lot of these texts is constantly trying to figure out what's going
to happen, because he knows it's already settled. And so I would definitely say that these Norse texts take a pretty hard line, fatalistic approach to this, and so the story is not so much about like what is Zigurd going to do? Now we know what Ziggurd is going to do? We know what's going to happen at Ziggurd. I guess really the question is how is he going to relate to that fate now that's presented in front of him? Is he going to play the coward and in futility try to run away or is he just
going to accept it? And I think what we find is the heroes are those who simply accept their fate and march forward doing the things that they know they're supposed to do, even though they already know what the outcome is going to be.
Yeah, that actually makes me think of two different fantasy authors, one Tolkien because now I'm thinking about the Children of Hurin in that light, because obviously Tolkien believes in free will, but Turin is under the curse of more Goth So, like, how much free will does Turin have when we know that the author clearly believes that Turin has free will, yet like Turin is always making But it's interesting when you read the Children of Hurine, it's clearly Turin's choices
that get him into trouble, yet it's also made clear in the story that he wouldn't be put in these situations if it weren't for the curse. So I just
find that very interesting. And and then the other the other author I was thinking of in terms of what you said, Uh Andrew about you know, does does the hero run away from his fate or embrace it is Robert Jordan with the Wheel of Time, because in the Wheel of Time everything the future is gonna happen a certain way because it's happened that way in the past, and the hero becomes the hero by simply accepting his
destiny no matter what, that is going to be. So different fantasy authors have tackled it in different ways.
Yeah, I definitely think that, you know, I can obviously speak of Tolkien primarily on this that you know, he definitely makes use of this Northern fate, this idea that we're going to march forward even though, like you know, maybe we're doomed to fail either way. We're gonna do what we're supposed to do. We're gonna take the next step, even though we don't know exactly where that road's gonna lead.
But Tolkien I think gets I mean, he's more complicated who we're dealing with this topic because he's a Christian, and because he has more I don't know, more resources I gets to pull from regarding this relationship between fate and free will. Then we get simply in raw paganism, and so he brings the complexities of Christianity into the
Northern fatalism. And then you get the question like what exactly is the doom of more Goth or the curse of more Goth or you know, whatever we're told that is placed upon Turin, Like what exactly is that is it? Is Turin actually doomed to futility or is that his own doing? And I don't really know that. I don't know that Tolkien would be able to give us a clear answer on that.
Yeah, I agree, I don't think he's I don't think Tolkien was interested in clear answers to a lot of this stuff, which a lot of people don't get like they it. For me, it always goes back to Tom Bombadil, right, there is no clear answer to what he is. Yet everyone wants there to be a clear answer, and much ink has been spilled, and many YouTube videos have been done trying to get a clear answer, but there is none, and you just have to sometimes with Tolkien, you just have to accept that.
Yeah, And that's because I mean Tolkien. He's not like Lewis, where Lewis usually has an idea and then he tells a story about it, whereas Tolkien tells a story and then there are all kinds of ideas that are embedded in the story, and then it just becomes a lot more ambiguous because he's not writing propaganda. Now, Oh, that sounded like I'd really doing a slide against Lewis. That
was not my intention, right, yeah, yeah, no, I get it. Yeah, But I mean Lewis is obviously a lot more ideologically driven in his story creation, right, yeah.
He knows the kind of story he wants to tell going in, whereas Tolkien is much more more like, let me see where this goes.
Right, I mean, all the time you're reading his letters, and you know, he's talking about how he just discovers this and that, and you know when he gets to Fangor and that's when he met the ends for the first time. Like he didn't he didn't have this idea as to what he was gonna plant here and there, and it just just discovered stuff, which is, you know, not something that can really be replicated.
Tolkien's is more like, I have this language, now I need to create a mythology for this language. And now I've got language and mythology, but I don't have a narrative. So now I needed to create a narrative to include my mythology and my language It's like, this is a totally different approach, right.
I think that Tolkien is, in like the pure sense of the word, a genius. And you know that sounds like I'm just Tolkien fanboy, which I mean fair enough, I guess, but that you know, he's a genius in that you can't really teach somebody to write in the way that he went about producing his story. It just came out of him as a person. You know, he he obviously in the way that he went about writing.
He didn't write as somebody who's a trained novelist doing the kinds of things that trained novelists are trained to do. It just you know, he read a lot of good literature. Obviously, he had his academic training. Obviously he had his background with the sorrows of his youth, his time in the war. It's like everything that made Tolkien Tolkien came out in the Legendarium, and a lot of that comes from the Northern Tales. And so, uh, I guess back to the text.
Here, say derail us a little more.
No, I mean, that's that's fine. It's this We're we're not doing academic presentations here. It's all right if we get derailed.
I did like the uh, the structure of this particular section. I just I actually started to get into it, whereas some of the earlier material in the ED I was just like, oh, yeah, you know, they just go and like, uh, let's kill some guys and take their stuff, you know,
do basic Viking things. But with this, the conversation between Sigurd and his uncle and that kind of back and forth where it's like tell me, tell me, and then he tells them or he tries to hold stuff back and Sigurd is like, come on, you've got to tell me. It was you know, it was good at building that kind of tension that keeps the reader entertained and wanting to go on and read the next stanza and see
how everything's going to play out. I just thought that the poet here is very effective in doing that.
Yeah, for sure. And we get them just classic beginning of really almost every now tale of your avenging your tin and so that's where this starts off. And yeah, that's that's always happening in the Northern tails that so and so kills your father whoever, and then you have to go off and do your your your vengeance. And then they in turn are going to ventuance against you, and so we get these dynastic feuds playing out here.
And so he's going to go out and he's going to avenge his father, and then he's going to the next major thing is to go off and kill Fafnir.
Now it's also significant that he's going to kill Fafnir with the reforged sword of his father, and so we get see some narcal underall stuff going on here when this is highlighted in in the saga, and it's it's it's kind of referenced in the text that when in Zigmund's final battle, up to this point, Zigmund his father had really had the blessing of Odin upon him, which is one of the reasons why he was so successful.
But as Odin tends to do, you know, after he builds up his warrior, then he makes sure that they die in battle so that way they go to Valhalla and so that way they can fight for him on the day of Ragnarok. And so after really building up Zigmund into this great warrior, this great king, he has
him killed in battle. But he Odin himself appears as like a warrior in the midst of the battle, Zigmund goes to attack him, not really know who he is, and so doing shatters his sword, which then those shards are maintained and passed on to Ziggard, who then is going to have that reforged so then he can go off and kill Faffnir. And so we definitely get some more talking connections here.
I feel like there's a story to be told by a writer more talented than me, which kind of takes the which were like takes the Odin Odin's m L and like applies it to like the dark lord sort of character, because Odin is essentially harvesting people to serve as his undead army, and I'm like, that's a very dark lord thing to do.
Yeah. At the same time, Odin is seen is like, you know, one of the best. Yeah, it's interesting mythos that they have going on there, I guess, because I mean death and battle itself was seen as a good thing, and so I guess it's the kind of blessing that Odin bestows upon his warriors to have them die in battle.
I'm sure Odin would say that.
Yeah, yes, Odin, wouldn't you say that? But yeah, it's it's kind of demented. In fact, in one of the fleeting contests, I think it was Harvard song when Odin and Thor are going at it with each other. It's one of the things that Thor brings up the fact that he's always the manipulating people killing him off.
And what's funny is that that Odin normally wouldn't think Thor would would be that quick on the uptake to figure that out. So sometimes Thor is smarter than Odin gives him credit for.
Right. That was I think one of my favorite text so far that we've done. It's great.
Yeah, when I was I was telling a co worker that I was reading the EDAs like, that's one of the ones I used. Is kind of like the pitch that like you should read this because that was the funniest session.
Yeah. When when I teach bayf on campus, now when we get to the bay Wolf back and forth, now I have them read Harvard's song as well, and they always enjoy that. Now, of course we do have Fafnir and you know, as Josh brought up, you know, we connection to Tolkien dragons here in that you know, it's a it's a it's a wives dragon. You know, they're they have conversation with each other, and so this is not just a beast. And I guess we can say more rough fer a little bit because he gets his own way.
Yeah yeah. They even say in the last stanza, let's part and say farewell. One can't overcome fate. So the author is like, you know, pretty clear, okay, yep, you know this is all set in stone.
Yeah yeah, and underlying that as well, and so there it is. There's no point fighting against it. Definitely a strong sense of fate there.
I think in my mind there's always like it's seems like in a lot of like models of like especially in like different like Christian theological traditions, it's like some kind of like kind of like mysterious relationship between like uh you know, like divine sovereignty and will. But it kind of like makes me forget sometimes to some culture like they literally just take like a hard, fatalistic, deterministic approach.
It's even kind of like with like it's kind of like a different version of Stoicism in a sense right where it's like everything you know and like like all like matter is like deterministic, but like the only thing you can control is like what goes on on the inside of you, right, And it's it's like obviously not quite stoicism, but it's kind of a sense where it's like, yes, everything on the outside is determined what we can control how we we respond to it, which is kind of
stoic in a sense, but they they manifest that in a different way where they it's kind of like a sense to where it's like different cultures, like most cultures, not all cultures, or at least any like stable cultures would believe that, like you know, cultivating virtue is a great thing, but the difference is like what is like one of those virtues that you actually cultivate and how do you cultivate them? Is like what makes them different? Right?
And I think that's probably equal word just like we're seeing here is almost like a different version of of that in some sense, right, Like there's something there's some connection there, I would think.
Yeah, as you were saying that, I'm like, I don't think it's an accident that in How to Train Your Drag and the lead Viking is named Stoic.
Yeah, I guess you're right.
I never thought, right, So there is kind of that you know, Vikings do seem stoical in a way. You know, even if it's not exactly the same ideology. You know, there's that. I think that you're right, that connection of your response to things internally is what you can control, you know, whether you're a coward or brave or whatever,
whether you face up to this or run away. It's like but that you know, but that the material sort of state of things is completely out of your hands, and that you might as well just accept what's going on.
Yeah, I mean, I think I've mentioned this before in one of our one of our t that there'd be some benefit in reading the Stoics, right, reading Marcus Arelius or Seneca or whoever, alongside the Norse text, because there definitely is some commonality. There's some kinship there between the idea of like the the stable steadfast Roman warrior and the Norse warrior. There's some common philosophy up play there, and what drives them, what guides them, what grounds them
in their changing fortunes. Yeah, I definitely think that that's there. I have always, at least ever since I can remember, had a kind of longing for death. It was when I was happiest that I longed most. It was on happy days when we were up in the hills, the three of us, with the wind and the sunshine, where
you couldn't see Gloam or the palace. Do you remember the color and the smell, and looking across at the gray mountain in the distance, And because it was so beautiful, it set me longing, always longing somewhere else there must be more of it. Everything seemed to be saying, Psyche, come, but I couldn't come, and I didn't know where I was to come to. It almost hurt me. I felt like a bird in a cage when the other birds
of its kind are flying home. And now I will make answer to you, oh my judges, and show that he who has lived as a true philosopher has reason to be of good cheer when he is about to die, and that after death he may hope to receive the greatest good in the other world. For I deem that the true disciple of philosophy is likely to be misunderstood by other men. They do not perceive that he is
ever pursuing death and dying. And if this is true, why, having had the desire of death all his life long, should he regret the arrival of that which he has
always been pursuing and desiring. The longing of Plato and the control of the Stoics pervades Lewis's retelling of the Cupid and psyche Myth until we have fail With this incredible novel, which he believed to be his best, Lewis demonstrates the tensions in ancient thought, and even more significantly, the limits of rational philosophy, which can only go as
deep as the foxes can dig. Beyond that, under that and providing the life of that thought, we find the dark and holy places that blind our faculties of reason. What then, shall we do? This is a topic that we will explore after first surveying some important philosophical contributions in the ancient world that have had some significant bearing
on Lewis's great novel. To this end, we will begin with Plato's Phato, which discusses the immortality of the soul and what those who love wisdom might expect in the life to come, and then we will spend four weeks with some of the great Stoics, including Epictetus, Emperor, Marcus, Aurelius,
and Seneca. Finally, we will turn our attention to till we have faces for the final two weeks with original content, and so this will not be the same as what you may have seen in the Fiction and Philosophy of C. S. Lewis course. Each week of this eight week study will include readings from primary sources that will be provided as PDFs, although these are all texts that belong in your personal library.
You'll be provided with recommendations for secondary readings. You'll have recorded presentations for you to watch at your leisure, ongoing discord chats, and weekly life meetings to discuss the readings enrolled today by going to patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind and checking out the job. Or you can gain access to all courses, past, present and future this year
by purchasing a Tier three annual subscription. I hope to see you there, and you know, I think there's a lot of a lot of wisdom in that, you know, even if as Christians, you know, will maybe deep in and make this conversation a little bit more complicated, there's definitely some wisdom in just focusing on the things that you are responsible for, the things that you can control, and the vast majority of things that happen to us and around us are things that are simply outside of
our control. Like it doesn't matter how much you maintain your health, you can still get hit by a car, Like you can still get cancer or whatever. And so obviously our decisions matter, but the vast majority of what actually happens in our moratl lives is outside of our control. And so instill getting spun up in anxiety about things that we were never responsible for. Focus on what you are responsible for, which is how you're relating to changing
fortunes around you. And I think it's starting sound a lot like Boethius as so I say that, and that's I mean, not an accident. But so there's a lot of wisdom here, even if I think it might need a little bit more context.
Oh yeah, I definitely benefited a lot in a you know, in a more in a rougher period of my life from reading the Stolics, and you know, of course I've kind of moved beyond them into how Christianity builds on that. But it's like, but yeah, I think they're a good starting point, especially for it because we live in such
an age of anxiety. Right, So there, I think that's why you know, even a lot of like you know, secular minded people are gravitating towards Stoicism because I think they recognize that there's something there where it's like I'm sick. I'm sick and tired of being anxious about stuff that I have no control over, you know. So I definitely
think it is a good starting point for people. I think the problem is is that people kind of get stuck there and and they don't, you know, move on to to other traditions which kind of build and and have more of that nuance than the Stoics have.
Correct that, you know, I think Marcus really is he he has He's a good starting place. But from there you have to go to Boethias. That's the next dome. Oh yeah, So anything else from from this text that stood out to you. You know, there's this interesting story which just goes into the Volksong saga that you know, after he kills FoST near the dragon, which you know, he he kills it by striking its underbelly, which to us sounds like, you know, a classic that's how you
kill a dragon that's its weak spot. But that's because it's it's drawn from these foundational myshere of that this is where this came from, right, Uh, does go back to to Turin, you know, killing the dragon, he slices underbelly and then he consumes its heart and its blood, which gives him wisdom, which allows him to hear the birds, which the birds tip him off that Reagan, the guy who reforged his sword for him, that he doesn't have his best interest at heart here, and so then Reagan
gets killed as well, and then Ziger takes the riches and he goes off and then he gets He falls in love with this valkyrie Britain hild in this text. Although let's see what was her name in the Bulkling saga. It's actually different.
Yeah, there appears to be some confusion as to what her name is.
Because don't they refer to as it's like Sigur Siggar deal from sig deal Far or something like.
That, something like that. Yeah, and so her her name is a little confused here. But overtheless, he falls in love with his valkyrie and that kind of plunges himself to her. But then later he gets bewitched and forgets about her, and so it's just this whole just confusing comedy of errors. I don't. I don't know if that's
the right right firm. I like that so and so getting with so and so, and you know, he helps this other guy, you know, basically his brother in law get together with the valkyrie, kind of forgetting that he added a connection to her. And so it ends in just this turmoils, everything unravels, and you know, he kind of remembers what's going on, and then he ends up
getting killed as essentially Brent Hill. The valkyrie conspires to bring about his death because he kind of refused her because at that point had been too late as everyone's card of getting married off, and so she just kind of scorned and embittered, and so she plots for his death, which kind of unfortunate that this is how this great man dies. But this this bewitchment that befalls him that
really leads ultimately to his death. I mean, can think of the number of times we see in the Norse wisdom literature the warning against going with witches and you know, those who would bewitch you. And I think of when you read the Biblical proverbs, there's this regular warning of you know, stay away from the prostitute, the lady of you know the knight, whereas in the Norse text it's usually stay away from the witch. And so it's just kind of interesting the parallel but also the twist there.
Yeah, yeah, here's a thought on that, because I didn't think of this until you said the word witch, but and I think of the it sparked my thought on what Lewis said about this, which is an observation I've noticed in medieval literature as well, with like the just kind of image he talks about how like people like often like associate like witch trials and stuff like that with the Middle Ages, and really that's more of like
an early modern thing. So do you think like this form like of witchcraft is like unique to its time or do you think it's just something utterly different from what we see in like the early modern period, especially even like you think like an obvious example would be like the Weird Sisters and like Macbeth. Right, So it's like I thought there because like, yeah, there's kind of
like a claim he makes there. I think it has a lot of validity where you actually don't really see a lot of like witches like you know, cooking body parts and cauldrons and stuff like that. Out in the forest somewhere in medieval literature, like it's often portrayed as sometimes in our contemporary world.
Yeah, you know, he says similarly in Abolition of Man that you know, you don't really see magic like witchcraft in the Middle Ages very often, that that's something that's really more of a Victorian reality or at least early modern. And yeah, I don't know. It seems to be that magic and witchcraft does play a pretty important role in the Norse culture in that that is a regular warning. And so I don't know, I don't I don't know if this is something particularly unique to Norse culture that
they have this space for witchcraft. I don't know. I don't really have it a lot to comment on that.
Yeah, I wonder if it's more of like a fig and like that, or even like maybe like the Germanic traditions, whereas like you kind of think of like our like you know, anglospheric like English tradition. It's like like the first like mythology think of for the Middle Ages really for all of English history. That would be like the Arthurian legend, right, And like you it's kind of like those elements are like pretty absent from that for the
most part. I mean, you might see like glimpses of them here or there, but wonder.
Is Yeah, Arthurian magic is more you know, concerned with like the fae and even like witches like Morgan le Fay. You know, she's tapped into fairy rather than like you know, what we would think of as witchcraft exactly.
Yeah, and so yeah, I wonder, I wonder if this is more like that, or if this is something that's completely of its own, or like if it's distinct in some other ways. I certainly don't have an answer. That's why I'm asking the questions and not answering myself. But this is the thoughts running through my head right now, I guess as you brought that up.
Yeah, just in my reading and not having any brets here, but just in my reading so far, it seems like that there is space for kind of natural magic. I would say this would be something like fairy magic, right that, that kind of reality, which seems fairly commonplace, as sometimes people will like change shape or you know, have something that's not really seen as terribly like striking or or diabolical. But at the same time we do get this pretty
regular warning against witches. Don't collaborate with witches. If you see it in the road, go another direction. And so there seems to be like this kind of natural phaytype magic, but then there also seems to be something like diabolical that they're told you need to stay away from this. So yeah, I don't know. It seems to be a little bit of both, which I mean, they obviously live in a very spiritual culture in that you know, the everything is kind of spiritually charged, which is where you
get the druidic type of mentality. And I guess that that can be mused in a positive or negative direction. I don't know. I don't I don't have a lot of firm answer here either.
Yeah.
I wonder if it's tied into into the natural world in some way, right, because in a lot of ways that you know, these types of cultures would view the natural world as almost like as a neutral thing that can either help you or harm you, depending on almost
like its whim so like I want it. I wonder if that's, like you know, leads to this sort of idea where it's like, yeah, there's kind of natural magic and it can either be for your benefit or it could kill you, you know, And again it's it seems like something they don't have a whole lot of control over. It's just another thing in the world that could kill you or hects.
You, or.
I remember speaking of like the medieval concepts of magic. I was reading somewhere recently that our word grammar is related to glamour, glamour being in its origin fairy magic was called glamour. They're sort of illusionary magic to appear as different things or can to confuse you. And that those two words glamour and grammar are etymologically connected because
fairy glamour was powered by speech words. That's why you weren't supposed to talk to fairies, because as soon as you start talking to them, you get caught in their net of illusionary magic. It's inter sidebarmer there.
But yeah, yeah, it reminds me of a line in Talking on fairy stories where he says that you know, a spell is both a story told as well as like a word of power over men. So again that idea of just like language is so attached to the world of faery. It's interesting. I don't really have anywhere to go from that there, but it's interesting.
Yeah, I just think that, like, you know, in this time, in like this general time period of the Middle Ages, there seems to be different cross currents and ideas of what what even like magic even is. Because I think that's also a very modern idea, right, that there's this thing called magic that we can very easily define as such. I don't I don't think that hm, peoples would have really looked at it that way. It's like, oh, yeah, there's magic, and that's different from the natural world or
the spirit or whatever. It's like its own I'm not sure they would have had their own category of like, oh, this is magic, you know.
Yeah, I really like some of the comments that we get on this topic from that hideous strength when talking or Lewis rather Lewis is talking about, you know how things used to be a lot more ambiguous, which is why someone like Mertlin kind of had his place in that. You know, he wasn't really like a demon. He was called a son of the devil, but that wasn't really accurate.
He lived in kind of this ambiguous type of reality. However, the kind of magic use of practice is no longer lawful because now things have become kind of more precise. Over time, things have become less ambiguous because over time things take kind of more form, more shape, And so you know what maybe used to be allowed as sort of this blending of nature and what we today would call magic, but was really just part of the natural world that it's just kind of become disentangled over time.
And not that I'm pulling anything dogmatically from that, but I think that, at least on a level of I don't know literature, I guess I think it's an interesting perspective.
Are you sure that on the whole that novels are Are you sure that they're not better when there's no miracles in them?
Right? Thanks for that? Who is it? Said that? Or well that's well, that's right.
Yeah, like that novel was good until like you know, Merwin came in and all the magic stuff started happening at the end. I'm just like, no, he's dead wrong, like the end of story, like period, like move on.
That was the best part, right, what's about? Yeah, that's right? Or said it was great until we got to all the supernatural stuff, Like that's literally the story. I don't know.
Sorry that that hideous strength is a way better dystopian novel than nineteen eighty four and the story online.
Yeah, it's just so obviously true. I mean it'd be easy to get off track here, but I mean read that hideous strength and just look at what's happening in the world, and low this was a prophet of sorts for sure.
I think people have the same problem with another great Christian dystopian novel, a Canticle for Lebowitz, where the miracles happen at the end and people are just like what, and I'm like, no, that that's the whole point.
Absolutely well, all right, moving on to the Light of Reagan, which mostly is just like a list of like different omens. I mean, we get more of the story. I don't know that we need to get into every detail of the story here, but we do get a little bit more about Bafnir and his origin and the fact that he wasn't always a dragon. Fafnir was actually originally the brother of Reagan, but essentially by hoarding this cursed gold,
he ends up turning into a dragon. As Lewis would tell us that sleeping on dragon's hoard with dragonish thoughts, you know, might actually turn you into a dragon. That's where we get used to scrub turning into a dragon.
Oh, for goodness sake, Yeah, you're right.
The dragoning of Eustas is like an underrated h inspiration for twentieth century literature here.
Yeah, and so I mean the Fafnir, I mean he's used to scrub with a different ending, and he's.
Glour Rung because not only is he killed from underneath, but he has that whole conversation with his slayer, just like he does with with Turin, although Fafnir's is much longer. I'm like, just die already.
And sometimes Fafnir actually seems to show some respects for for Ziggurd, you know, as opposed to Glowrung. So he's not like just purely villainous. I mean he is. He is a villain, like he turned into a dragon because he was doing dragonish things, but also he remains a level of humanity here, a level of respect for the one who was able to slay him.
Oh.
So I noticed the magic sword or I don't know if the sword's magic, but it's called Graham, And I'm like, oh, wasn't that a King of Rohan? Like I'm remembering the Nameless and I feel like there was a king of Rohan called Graham. So again Tolkien is just pulling random names from the Eda, sprinkling them throughout Middle Earth.
Which I like.
So yeah, he'll do that again in a little bit one of the other texts, and it is Yeah, it's kind of interesting that Tolkien thinks that in Beowulf that the dragon of Beowulf was another one of the stories
of a man turning into a dragon. You know, it's kind of subtext when we're told in Beowulf that it was this loan survivor of this horde of treasure that he barely eating, kind of kept all by himself, that this is the last survivor of the people that gives us the treasure, and then cut forward and there's dragon there, and so the fact that there is some foundation here. In fact, even in Beowulf, at one point, after the slang of Grendel, the poet in Herot connects Beowulf to
this slang of Fafnir. He references refers to him, you know, in connection to Zigmund, because it all gets kind of confused. So even though Zigger who killed the dragon, he connects them to Zigmun because these tales kind of change a little bit here and there. But so there's already this this connection of the dragon of the Volsung saga to Beowulf's dragon to the story, and so that's just something talking sort of supposes that's kind of interesting.
It's funny because I was going to actually make a comment on all these like sort of like anthropomorphic dragon figures and comment the one in Beowulf is not that way, but maybe he actually is that when he's actually in dragon for and there doesn't seemed to be like these humanesque qualities in him. But I had never heard that theory. So if we're looking into.
Yeah, it's easy to go way off track here. But I do love that that scene in Beiowulf where he is summoning forth the dragon, it's very Bengolfing and Morgoth where he is directly like calling it forth, you know, to to come and meet him for battle. And so Tolkien just he's all over these northern stories. But yeah, so so we get a lot of just descriptions of various omens to look out for. We don't need to necessarily go into all that. I do think it's interesting
that the Norse treat the sun as feminine. Yeah. In stans At twenty three there's a reference to the sun as the shining sys of the moon, and so in North the Northern myth thoughs a lot of times they refer to actually every time they refer to the sun with the feminine and the moon masculine, which is just kind of interesting to me. I'm not exactly sure how they get there, because I mean, naturally our way of thinking of the sun as masculine and moon is feminine,
that makes like some rational sense to me. So I just I don't really know how the Norse got to this position, but it's just interesting difference, which I mean, this is what Tolkien does in this Summarlion. Yeah.
Yeah, and even in the Lord of the Rings that the Hobbits always call the sun.
She right, whereas you know, read Tolkien's or Lewis's Ransom series and the sun is masculine and the moon is feminine.
I was about to say, that's like you know, soul and Luna and like the Roman mythos, that's totally reversed.
Right, It's interesting.
Yeah.
And then in Staton twenty five, right toward the end here it says combed and washed every thoughtful man should be and fed in the morning, for one cannot first see where one will be by evening. It is bad to rush headlong before an omen. So there's always talk about omens, which are definitely tied to this theme of fate that we've been discussing that you know, an omen is properly perceived, brings awareness to something that's going to happen,
and so there's this fatalism. But also, you know, we're told that you just do with the stuff that you need to do, like get dressed for the day and go out and meet fate, don't just wait for it to come to you.
And that reminds me too of some I was listening to a podcast once this is another Roman connection where they were saying how the Romans were very obsessed with omens, but almost kind of retroactively where a big, you know, earth shattering political event would happen, and then they would search back in the weeks and months previous to try and find all of these natural omens that would have forecast it in hindsight. And so like in Roman history,
it's like Suetonius and stuff. He'll talk about somebody's assassination, but then also list all of these omens that supposedly predicted it before it happened, or were supposed to clue us in. So again there's a maybe the Romans were always in conflict with the Germanics because they had more in common than either of them would like to let on.
Right, they don't want to admit their commonality with the Barbarians. Well, unless there's anything else there. I mean, looking over to the lay of Fafnir, and we've kind of been talking around some of the different story elements, but I mean, there's listen more about Thoftnir, but this is mostly about the conversation between Fafnir and Ziggurd following the mortal blow
to Fafnir. And you know, Fafnir recognizes the fact that like this gold is going to play a part in his undoing, in Ziggurd's undoing, he says, those rings, like this treasure that you're liberating from me right now, he says that those rings will be your death. And so there's this strong sense that this is curse gold, and that you know that seizing a dragon's horde is not
necessarily that the right virtuous course of action. You know, in Faftner, if anybody would understand the consequences of latching yourself onto gold, and so he's even trying to give a kind of warning to Ziggard, although of course in the movement of fate it's not going to do anything.
You're saying I thought of. But contrasting again the difference of like with Beowulf, there being like the pic dragon fight, and then with Sigurd's approach to his dragon, it's more the approach is more about like cunning, a cunning ability and wit than it is like direct valor and combat.
And I can't help but see this connection with like, you know, Achilles and the valor and combat in the Iliad, and then Odysseus kind of getting his way back to Ithaca through through wit, right, rather than through being through being cunning in this sense, rather than through more like brawn and valor, and in the way that Achilles approached
it in the Iliad. Kind of contrasting those two characters and seeing almost like those parallels in this tradition, I can't I couldn't help but notice that when I was reading the that that introductory paragraph or two to this to this poem.
Yeah, yeah, there's really not a great like huge fight. Epic fight between Ziggurd and Fafnir. It goes pretty quickly. It's more about the discourse than the actual combat.
Yeah, it's almost like it is like Odysseus blinding the Cyclops, isn't it. It's quick and then it's over.
You know.
It's like almost like he doesn't need to be strong and you need to be able to go, you know, blow with blow with Hector in a sense even like the you know, the other greatest warrior and in the fight right because he can just he can just figure out a way to deal with it quickly once he's figured it out in a sense.
Yeah, And later on in this lay, Ziggurd says to Reagan, courage is better than the power of a sword when where angry man have to fight for I've seen a brave man fighting strongly conquer with a blunt sword. So courage is more important than the weapon that you're wielding. Even though he has an important weapon like that, that's not really the point. His courage is primary here.
I'm also interested by this, and the text mentions it several times that Faffnir has something called a helm of terror, and if you look in the endnotes, it says, we're not really sure what that was. Was it an actual helm or is this like a metaphor?
You know?
And I find that interesting.
But I do think that regardless of what this was in the story, this is where we get turns helme, oh the dragon helm.
You're right, yeah, I'm missing some of these connections. Sounds like I'm due for reread on some of these non word of the rings.
Tolkien tails, Yeah, we talked about maybe doing a children suran for the next next patron chats. Maybe we'll see, but that might be might be a good follow up to this the set.
It might be, yeah, because it's it's so infused with that Norse spirit. I think of all the things, of all the First Age stuff, it might be the most.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely anything else stood out to you here.
I do just have to point out the stands of fourteen referring to blood as sword liquid. I just need to I just find out what to incorporate then.
That that's a good one.
You ever which one it was.
In, But it was one of like the first poems in this entire book, Like they refer to like a beard as like a cheek forest, And I'm just like these these aren't terms that like I need to start, like I need to start using these on people and just see how they react.
Yes, yes, yes, there's a lot of great phraseology in these texts.
Oh. I like how the text can't decide whether Reagan is a dwarf or a giant and that kind of Again, it's that Norse ambiguity about what some of these things even are, you know, like where sometimes the dwarves and the giants are used interchangeably, Elves are never explained at all in any detail.
And so what even was a dwarf in the in the EDA is? Because like ever since and it's like we have Tolkien dwarfs, and now Tolkien dwarfs are just every dwarf that's ever existed since Tolkien, right, they all just like look like you know, the dwarfs in the Hobbit and Gimli, right, But before that, it's like, what exactly was a dwarf in like the thirteenth century?
Right?
I mean my understanding is that, you know, I mean something like like Tolkien's dwarves at least in stature, in that they seem to be smaller for the most part, they seem to be into smithing that sort of thing. However, usually are they're either evil or at the very least like you can't really trust them, like they're kind of wily,
and so they're not really good characters. In fact, in Tolkien's first imagining of the Dwarves, they were going to be villains, like inherently the kind of like the same calipers like the Orcs and that like these are just bad people. Obviously he re reworked that, but yeah, and so they seem to be these like little crafty troublemakers.
I wonder if like him, like making the Dwarfs good was like the first time and like you know, the literary tradition that Dwarfs were actually like not bad in this sense. So it's like maybe him the script just kind of has changed it for the past, you know, seventy or eighty years or so.
He mentions in one of the letters that his Dwarves take more really from the brothers Grim Dwarves than the Norse, so like the snow White in this SEVN Dwarves where they're kind of where they're basically good characters, and so he seems to have like just merged the two. I guess traditions that there were and out pops what seems like a completely new thing.
It would be interesting to study the history of dwarves, you know, like how do we get to the brothers grim dwarves, you know from the original version? Like that'd be interesting to study. Sometimes one of my side projects.
Say the things I would study if this was my day.
Job, exactly if I ever get to a point where I'm just fully funded independently, that's the kind of stuff I'm gonna do with my life.
Oh yeah, believe me. Yeah, yeah. I was doing that this morning where I was outlining like my dream book of like do of researching some of this stuff. And I'm like, I'm never going to write this because I don't have the time or you know, like I'm not yeah, I'm not independently funded. But it's like, and I was thinking about the stack of books I would need to write this one book, and I'm like, see.
A lot of times I get this impulse of Okay, here's what I want to write because it's what I want to read, right, that tokenyan impulse. But then I realized, I feel like only I would want to read this. Yeah.
Yeah, that was one of those that was one of those cases for me. It's like, I think only I would want to read this. Oh and the sidetrack the birds that seemed like straight out of the Hobbit almost, where like they taught like the thrush where he talks to Bard and say and exposes the weak point, because it's the same thing right there, warning Sigurd of some danger,
you know, with what's his name? We're Reagan, right, so yeah, but well, oh but but they weren't thrushes, though there were some other kind of bird.
Who were they?
Not hatches, that's it, and not hatchest And I don't really know what a nut hatch is, No, I've never so I don't think I've ever seen one.
I don't know. And so I guess birds are connected to wisdom. I mean, I know, you know, Odin has his ravens who go throughout the earth and then report back to him, And so I guess birds do have this connection to wisdom. And you know, consuming the dragon heart gives you this kind of this access to the same wavelength essentially, so you can understand what they're saying. Interesting.
That was another thing where I was like, oh, that's where that comes from, because I've seen that referenced in other things, where you eat the dragon's heart and you can understand all languages, and I'm like, oh, it's from this originally, right, So much dragon lore comes from the.
Yeah, and in humbo is commentary on Bawel for many monsters and the critics. But Tolkien says that you know, oftimes, we think that looking back that you dragons were all over the place in the old stories, but they're really not. There are only a few major examples of dragons in the old literature, and Faffner is one of the primary
dragons of Germanic lore. And so the fact that there actually weren't a lot of dragons in their imagination means that this story is going to be very significant for a lot of the dragon lore that comes out of it.
That's so true, because like I think last year or the year before, I did a deep dive into dragon law, and you're so right, like, it's far less common than you'd think it was. And then once once a pattern gets established in dragon law, every subsequent dragon uses it.
Right in the in the Saint Hay geographies, almost all the dragons are identical and do the same kinds of things like that was very very interesting to me because I thought I would because I was specifically trying to find as many stories as I could of saints with dragons, and I thought they would all be interesting and different and varied. But no, they were almost The stories had the same beats, and the dragons themselves all had very much the same details.
Well, obviously that tells us that's how dragons were and that's what saints were like. So now, I mean, one last Tolkien connection at this point. I mean, there's a reference to the importance of rings. In fact, even the birds reference Ziggert as like someone who gives away rings.
And so this gets to the Germanic culture of you know, the great leaders get gold, they'll you know, break up the rings of their foes and then they'll basically, you know, turn me into other rings, and then they give out to those who do service to them, which definitely feeds right into the idea of you know, Salaran as the ring lord. He's a giver of rings. You know, obviously
he's a perverted form of the ideal ring lord. But nonetheless that that imagery comes, you know, directly from these texts.
There's anybody else like growing up on like Tolkien and stuff like just whenever you started reading historical like ancient medieval text, do you just like to see like the word ring and you're like You're instantly looking for a connection to Tolkien. It's like the First Time or the Republic and like the Ring of Guy. I guess I'm like, okay, like how's this going to relate? Like I'm just I'm
always looking for those connections. And sometimes they're probably there and I miss him, and sometimes they're probably just not there, but sometimes they are.
Yep, even when it comes to Tolkien, sol In Plato, are they're teaching at these schools exactly? Well, yeah, unless there's anything else, can and move on. We've got the delay of Zigertrifa. I'm sure I just butchered that terribly.
That that's the britn Hild name in this text, which threw me off for a second.
Yes, and so this is brent Hild, britn Hild as she should have been.
Right through here.
Oh, here's another Tolkien name, Paul. There's a reference to uh meme here m I m, such as with the petty dwarf of children of Huron. Yes.
Yeah, Oh, and the warriors are often referred to as trees in these texts. I don't know if you guys picked up on that or like, uh, the apple tree of battle. At one point someone is called and I think at some point somebody is called a beach tree or something like that, so that that seems to be a recurring theme warrior as tree, And I'm wondering what the symbol like what they're picking up on, because you wouldn't you wouldn't have that metaphor if there wasn't something
tree like about a warrior. So I wonder what they're I'm missing some context here that they're that they're picking up on.
I mean, I guess you got the indomitable strength of nature, you know, the steadfastness. Yeah, I mean other than just like strength that you know, instead being steadfast, I'm not quite sure.
I was would say is as simple as like just like their rigidness and sturdiness as well, like equating to like fortitude in some way, or I don't know, there's probably something far beyond on that.
But you know, I wonder if when if that language and you know, we can't help, but it constantly referenced Tolkien and studying these texts. But you know when Tolkien says that he had this image in his head of you know, okay, what if the trees went to battle? Right, this is where we get the version of the end says he tries to you know, improve on Shakespeare, as he essentially put it, But a lot of this tax is really going through runic wisdom of you need this
room in order to do this thing. So it's a long list of that.
I would say it was really like it was kind of like this these like runic stands as well as that like five through eighteen, where it's kind of like just listing like these different uh, these different ruins that represent these different things that like that he must have in a sense, and that's like it doesn't doesn't really I should kind of like go back into like the frame of like the I guess, like the plot of this poem to like you know stand such twenty one,
but yeah, you have like what like I think like five through eighteen there it's kind of like DV it's a little bit to go into that.
Yeah, and even then in twenty one where it shifts a little bit, Okay, we get this Norther encourage statement here where it says, I will not flee even if you know I am doomed. I was not born a coward. And so this idea of I'm going to march into my doom because well, being a coward is worse, and so it doesn't really matter what lays in front of me. I'm going to keep marching forward. And then and there's
very similar lines to that all throughout Tolkien. But then, you know, move forward, And the rest of this text is largely like proverbial wisdom now, and so a lot of this is wisdom literature.
It also like that reminds me. And this line is not from Tolkien himself, it's from the movies, but it's very it's very Norse in a way when Gimli says certainty of death, small chance of success, what are we waiting for?
Yeah, it's an obviously comical approach ad this very northern idea mm hm.
Like in Stance of twenty three, how it's like it's kind of has like a like biblical language almost in a sense, kind of like in the Sermon on the Mound during like I think it's like James five or talks about do not swear an oath unless it's truly kept. Terrible fate bonds attached to the oath tear like just like this value of like basically like hey, like don't make an oath unless you're actually going to keep it.
And also therefore there are is deep, maybe even mortal consequences to the oath breaker in a sense for not keeping it. Like they take over this really seriously right, and like we certainly see that, and like biblical language and the New Testament as well.
So done, harrow, this is the army of the dead right terrible fate bonds attached to the oath terror wretched is the pledge criminal. They broke their oath. Therefore their you know, condemned to undeath until they fulfill it.
Mm hm. That all comes full circle. It's all in Talkien say TALKI and Jesus said, it's all there.
Yeah, that that but that does definitely tie into just this resolute, really kind of stoic idea of there's this direct connection between like your words and your steadfast soul and so your oath matter. You need to do what you say that you're going to do. And so that's
a continual idea here. And so you know, as much as you when you read some of the early wisdom literature that looked at like the the Havamal and sometimes the proverbs that they're given, it seemed well, not very virtuous to us looking back, like there is still a degree of virtue that I think is that we would
see as virtue even in the North wisdom literature. Here, like in you know, there's oath keeping in Stane at thirty two, it says, you know, I advise you that you guard against evil and distance yourself from light mindedness. Do not entice girls or any man's wife, nor encourage excessive pleasure. And so this idea that like you don't you know, don't commit adultery, keep yourself from evil. And so some of some of this wisdom could you know, easily just be pulled from Proverbs as well.
Mm hmm. I was going to say that that sounded straight out of Proverbs almost. Yeah.
Oh.
And the next stanza it talks about you should bury the day mm hm, which is interesting because I thought that Norse normally burned they're dead. Yet it says here that I advise you ninthly that you bury corpses where you find them on the ground, whether they are dead of sickness or else drowned or men killed by weapons.
So I wonder if just burying is what you do, you're just like half an upon a body. But then you maybe do the ceremony if it's for like somebody, you know that you need to honor. Ah, yeah, it's my guess. I don't really know. Again, there's a warning in here about staying away from witches and stands at twenty six.
Oh yeah, I like, yeah, that's a humorous one almost. It's like that, I advise you. Fourthly, if a witch full of malice lies on your roat, better to go, better to go on than be her guest. Though night over taq. And that was in other words, like even if it's dark, don't stay at a witch's house. Keep walking.
You can see how that plays into somebody, even like the the you know, the grim fairy tales. Oh yeah, don't go to the witch's house in the woods. Yeah.
And then there's a lot here about quarreling, you know, like don't quarrel over ale over women, you know, very practical, you know, practical advice.
For back then and you know, yeah, and then towards the end in thirty six. You know, he says, quarrels in enmity, don't think they've gone to sleep any more than grief. Common sense, and weapons are necessary for the
prince to acquire for him who shall be foremost among men. So, you know, don't don't think that just because you seem to have dealt with this argument, this disagreement, that it's over, you need to make sure that you have some weapons on your side, all right, And you'll saying, well, let's bring up for that that text okay, then rolled on to a fragment of a poem about Ziggurd.
I think that I mean that first stands uh? I kind of I kind of read that almost like obviously that's a question that belongs within the narrative of the text, but it almost seems like a question that could be like directed to the reader as like a reflection for going into the rest of the text as well, Like it's like, what has Segur done so wrong that you want to deprive the brave man of life?
It?
I just think that's kind of like a profound introductory, uh. Kind of it's like an introductory like provoking question to the text, and even like thinking some way it's like you're thinking almost in like a like platonic terms in a sense here, But it's like I almost instantly like start thinking about like justice, and it's like, is there some way in which like Sigurd dying is is just or it is just complete and justice? And was there was he not deserving of it in any way?
You know?
That's those are kind of like the questions that begun to come to mind for me with this.
Yeah, and a lot of this you ask we read about the death of Ziggurd. I mean, in the kind of meta level of this narrative, it goes back to Fafnir's warnings that taking the treasure is going to be his doom or it's going to lead to his doom, because it's part of the attention that he gets from this great victory taking the treasure away is that he enters into this relationship with Brittnhild, which eventually is going
to end up leading to his death. Right she's the one who's going to conspire his death through this entire series of mishaps and the witchments and whatnot. But going back to taking the treasure hoard from Fafnir, like that can be seen as really a starting place of the end. It says that the end of the epilogue that there are snifferent versions as to exactly where and how Zigger died, but with having common is that he died when he was flying down and unarmed, so he didn't get to
die really a hero's death. He just died as a result of a plot, which I suppose continues the connection to at least the sort of the aesthetics of Children of Urine, and that Turin doesn't die in battle. He can just he kills himself. And I feel like it it has the same kind of feeling as you get to the end in that you follow the story of this great hero who's done some incredible things, some great feats of strength, but in the end he dies a kind of pitiful, sad death.
Right, it's almost like, yes, spoilers, it's almost if like Turin had if he had died, you know, fighting the dragon, that would have been a much more classically heroic way for him to go out, no matter or what had El said transpired. But you know it has to be a full, literally to the hilt tragedy.
Right, These falls on his suddenly talking sword.
You joke about spoilers. But I have friends that I'm going to send this video to and it's published that I don't believe haven't read children or whoever, And so maybe I'll just tell them to stop at like a certain timestand or something.
Yeah. Yeah, then again, it is entirely fitting with the Northern stories to know the ending before it happens, right, So it's fate.
There's alsot of sense to it that where even like slight like side side thing here, but like, yes, like you know, obviously you want to be surprised and see like the plot unfold for the first time, to experience that spoiler free. But there's a sense where like our culture builds everything. I'm like, you know, gods, it's just about like stuff happening in the plot where it's like
that's why. That's why like people like I don't want to get on a soapbox and preach too much here, but this is like why like people like just they read a bunch of like just different contemporary books like one time, and they like don't understand why people would reread books, and it's like, no, like what makes a great book is the fact that like people for hundreds or thousands of years have reread it because it's so rich that you can reread it over and over and
over again like every year of your life maybe even and never never comprehend some things and that.
Yeah, yeah, and that's what Lewis says, I mean, very much drawing on his Platonism when he says that a good story is not based around becoming but on being on like states of being, and that the more that you reread good stories, the more you're going to move closer and closer to the ideals that are represented within the stories, and that is itself the story. This is the further up and further in idea we get the end of Narnia, that it's you know, we're going into
the real Narnia within Narnia. It's a I think that is absolutely true that a good story is one that you're going to be compelled to read again and again and again, and gets better.
The more that you're familiar with it, right, Yeah, because you start to look forward to those beats and those moments where it's like, you know, yeah, it's not like experiencing the first the first time, but it's almost kind of better in a way when you know it's coming. It's very strange, but it's something I've definitely experienced as I reread my favorite texts, you know, where it's like you almost start to live in the text in a way. It's it's very and experience it as a as almost
like a participant and not a spectator. It's very strange experience. Like I don't think I'm explaining it well, but yeah, it's very strange.
Yeah, it's the idea of like enchantment or entering the perilous realm. It's like it it becomes or it awakens some thing inside of you. The more connected you are to it, and so that that discovery is it's part of the experience, and it only grows the more that you grow with the text, you know, as land seems larger as you grow larger. Weep. So now last text for this section, short old text, the poem of Gudrun.
Who see who is Gudrun again? Okay, that was the wife of zigurd H. And so Gunnar is the if I'm recalling correctly, Gunar is the brother of Gudrun. Uh and Gunnar is the one who actually killed Ziggurd I believe,
And so Gudrun now is she is lamenting. Well, actually, at first she can't really lament, like she she isn't responding really at all, until finally somebody has the wisdom to basically show her the body of Ziggurd, to unveil the body of Ziggurd, and that allows her to connect to the reality of what took place, So now she's able to actually lament. And then also she starts to pronounce doom on Gunnar for what he's done, and he says, you know you won't get the good of the gold.
The rings will be the death of you for you swore oath to Ziggurd. So she accuses him of being an oathbreaker and says that we see this gold is going to be your doom, even as we're told that the gold is going to be the doom of Giggurd himself. So there's this idea of history repeating itself. We definitely see some precedents for tolkien tendency to have a lot of very similarly sounding names.
Oh yes, yeah. On the Secrets of Middle Earth podcasts, we joke about that all the time, where it's either everybody's name starts with F or everybody's name starts.
With c and.
So brilliant. Yeah.
Oh, I like it stands at nineteen where Gudrun's referring to herself. I believe she says, I am as little as a leaf among the bay willows now the prince is dead. I thought that was very beautiful. Mh.
You know, she.
Feels like almost viscerally feels her littleness in the face of the death of her husband.
Yeah, and then contrasting that with the big beginning of that stand though, where it says, you know, I seemed also among the Prince's warriors to be higher than any of Odin's ladies. So she says, like when I was with you, I was like better than the valkyries, and now I'm less than nothing. Yeah, this whole section, I mean, it's I don't have a lot to like comment on other than just to just to like such a visceral, impassioned lament. It's just kind of beautiful and heartbreaking.
Yeah, and just very complex, you know, like psychologically complex too, as you mentioned. You know, she almost can't even grieve in the beginning, because like it's, like you said, someone has the wisdom to show her the body, you know, which almost unleashes that kind of torrent of you know, she's finally able to almost process in a way.
Right, Right, that's almost like that like that at first like stage of denial and then like the seeing of the body almost you know, invokes you know, the sensory in a sense where like she can't deny, she can't deny like what she actually sees and witnesses, and that like that that image of death is what actually brings about and provokes the uh, it finally provokes the lamentations in a sense, right.
I mean the right kind of lamentation is itself grounding. It connects you to the reality of what you're experiencing. And so you know, she she had to come to terms with this reality in order to properly connect yourself with the world, because you know, it is so easy to do in the midst of sorrow. She's kind of disengage, which you know, as you said, is something like denial. It's it's an escape without hope of recovery.
Right, And it's like that that recognition that like no death is wrong. This shouldn't be like the world is broken somehow, you know, like this shouldn't happen. And yet you know, like it it does, you know, whereas nowadays our culture just flees from that idea of having to deal with it. You know, if we can ignore it and we don't have to deal with it, we don't have to see it, we don't have to grapple with the reality that a death is real, and b we almost know it shouldn't be like this.
You know, yeah, absolutely, you know I'm content with that being the ending words, unless Josh or Thomas, do you have anything else that you want to feel compel ad And we've been going on for a little while now, all right, Well, I enjoyed this chat, you know, after taking a month off, it's good to get back into it. You know, we'll see what next month looks like with you know, we're with our next one coming soon. I know Josh is coming soon as well, and so we'll
see where things look. But hopefully we'll be able to get another one out next month with whoever's able to attend. But for now, appreciate guys stuff and buy and we'll do it again next time. All right. Well, that's it for now, and so thank you for listening, and remember to go to patreon dot com slash Mythic Mind to join the fellowship. And I should say that my wife and I are expecting our next kid really any day now, and so I'm trying to build up a little bit
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