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To: alt.magick.tantra,alt.magick.tyagi,alt.pagan,alt.mythology
From: "Ingeborg S. Nordén" 
Subject: Re: Germanic Creationism and Sacred Sex (was Fire/ice polarity...)
Date: Fri, 5 Mar 1999 15:15:54 -0600

sam hain wrote in message <7bp900$q7t@bolt.sonic.net>...

[Hemradj wrote:]

>#> I like the creation. When you say "Even before sentient beings existed
>#> (including the gods!), creation took place through the union of
>#> opposites: fire and ice." you mean that fire and ice excisted before
>#> the gods. So the gods are made from these elements(?). Where did
>#> these elements came from.  Who created them?


[Sam replied:]

>my question exactly when I read that text from Ingeborg.


[I originally wrote:]

># "Creation from nothing" is not part of Germanic belief: the Eddas
># assume that matter and energy have always existed in some form,


[Sam replied:]

>then The Creation (i.e. that which is the prominent feature of
>Creationist cosmologies in which some fabulous being manifests
>it all -- no mention of 'out of what', that would be impugning
>the omnipotence of the cosmic magician) is not part of it either.


Good point!   I ought to have used the term "cosmogony", not "creation
story", as I didn't mean to imply that the universe originated with
something saying/willing "Let there be..."


[I wrote:]


># ...and that creation can take place without a sentient, personal
># being behind it.


[Sam replied:]


>that's what I understand to be called 'transformation' or
>'transmutation', rather than creation in the Judeochristislamic
>sense...



Fair enough; the idea of "transmuting" a universe sounds a bit odd to me,
though.

[I wrote:]


># Even when the gods came into being, their act of "creation"
># involved taking material that already existed and using it to
># build the universe.



[Sam replied:]


>how did the gods come into being?  they couldn't have 'always
>been around' if they 'came into being'. where did this other
>material come from?  perhaps the explanations of from where
>this material derived have been lost?


Unfortunately, part of the story does seem to be lost here:  no one knows
where the "raw material" for the gods themselves came from.  All the Eddas
say is that another primordial being (a hornless cow) was created from the
fire/ice union along with Ymir...and that *she* was responsible for licking
the first god free from an ice block.  How he got trapped in there to begin
with, no one is sure; but if you look at the *other* end of the cosmic story
(Ragnarok), you'll notice that a few gods and humans survive the destruction
of the old world, to repopulate the new one.  (Fire and ice are also the
agents of destruction at Ragnarok, BTW...)  Taken together, all these ideas
suggest that the universe is continually being destroyed and reshaped--with
a remnant of the old one left behind each time.    The myths do not give a
specific number of cosmic cycles, or a fixed duration for each:  the whole
process is simply accepted as "the way things have always happened".

If there were any reference to the cosmic cycle _before_ this one (or to
gods older than Odin's grandfather), I might have even more support for this
hypothesis.  However, both the "creation" and the Ragnarok story are told by
a narrator who can remember no other world before that one.  That might
indicate that there has _been_ no other creation/transformation before--but
since the narrator is just an "ordinary" magician (not a goddess!) talking
to Odin, her lack of earlier memories may just mean that she didn't live
during the previous cycle.

[I originally wrote:]

># Obligatory sexual reference:  according to the same creation
># story, the first sentient being that came from the fire/ice
># interaction was a hermaphroditic giant (Ymir).  Ymir supposedly
># produced children with him/herself (more giants, not gods or
># humans!); these children were the first beings with a distinct
># gender.


Oooooops!  I feel stupid for forgetting the COW in that last posting (kinda
hard for a cow with no udders to feed someone!).  So much for Ymir's
children being the first sexually distinct entities--moving right along to
your next question...

>when you say "hermaphroditic", are you talking about a being
>with breasts and a cock and cunt?  or are you talking about a
>left-half-woman-right-half-man division?  are there any graphic
>representations of this figure in historical remains?

I'd probably go with the left/right division myself, based on the lines in
the Eddas that mention Ymir's dual gender:  "one of his feet fathered
children on the other".   (Nice euphemism there, but it does give some idea
of how the relevant organs were arranged!)  Too bad there is no period
religious art showing how the Norsemen visualized him/her...


Ingeborg S. Nordén
(runelady@msn.com)