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Posted by Haus:
"People tend to represent their deities as belonging to their ethnic and cultural group."
Haus is right, an example of this is a 9th century Saxon poem called the Heliand which is effectively a Saxon version of gospel history, though Jesus and the disciples are turned into a merry band of Viking warriors. This is what Sausseye says of it in Religion of the Teutons:
"the Saxon poet reproduces the gospel narrative most naively in the setting of his own time. Landscape, mode of life, character, all has been coloured to be in keeping with the Saxon surroundings. Such scenes as the storm on and the catching of the fish are depicted most vividly, and the feast at Cana is a merry drinking bout. Combat stands in the foreground; the devil is the arch-enemy, the disciples brave warriors who achieve heroic deeds in defence of their chief. Their fealty is of a simple and resolute character, not marred by doubt or hesitancy; their hatred of the enemy violent. The struggle has therefore been transferred from the inner to the outer man, and the corruption of Jesus himself is in keeping with this. He is not the Man of Sorrows, nor yet the heavenly Son of God of the Catholic church, but now the brave Teutonic chief, who valiantly leads his men to victory, and then again the wealthy, generous Teutonic popular king, who gloriously traverses his land to teach, judge, heal and to battle, and who in the end in defeat itself outwits the enemy and gains the victory, - a Christ different from that of the gospels, but one that was living and real to the Saxons."
It was about the trnasformation of a southern religion made relevant to a northern people. The Viking helms with Christ on the nos guard are an example of this process.
There are also parrallels between the story of Christ and Nordic myth such as the story of Balder (revived from the dead, mother figure, spear through the side etc.).
Suddenly I suspect this post maybe to serious for the thread. |
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