The Wars of the Gods: Three, The Disruptive Divinities of Magic

The War Between the Vanir and Aesir
 
Listen and hear of the first war in the nine worlds. When the realms of the tree were but newly formed from the flesh of the giant Ymir, then a goddess came from Vanaheim to the halls of Aesir in Asgard. She was Gullveig, the Golden Power, and she brought with her the strange new arts by which the future could be foreseen and, at times, rewritten. The Aesir gods, amazed at her power, sought to end the might of Gullveig. They pierced her with their mighty spears, then set her flesh to flame. Thrice they burnt her, and thrice they failed and she rose forth yet alive. The Aesir gods called this goddess of the Vanir Heidi. As Heidi she went about the land and, magic knowing, magic worked. Wolf-tamer, prophetess, a wonder onto the Aesir she was and they feared the aid and power she granted to the women who learned the magical arts from her. So they tried to destroy her and failed. 

The War Between the Vanir and Aesir

The Wars of the Gods: Two, Aeons and Sexes

The prehistory of the gods is shot through with primordial conflicts, the echoes of ancient wars. But who or what are these wars truly between? 

Continuing in the path I set out upon a few days ago, I would like to discuss one of the classic examples of a conflict between the gods and a lesser known example from the same cultural context. These examples are the war between the Titans and Olympians, and Apollo's stealing of the Oracle of Delphi from a female earth goddess through the slaying of the Pythian serpent.

Apollo Slaying the Pythian Serpent

The Wars of the Gods: One, The Friction of Finitude

There are a number of seriously vexing problems with which monotheism must contend that are avoided by polytheism. In fact, attempting to answer these problems constitutes almost the entirety of the history of Judaic, Christian and Muslim theology.

The Warlock and Truth-Breaking

Manray, "Leave me Alone"

There is a wonderful blog post over at Summer Thunder on the pros and cons of using the word "Warlock" to describe a male occult practitioner. I encourage you to check it out. The heart of the conversation revolves around two issues. First, that Warlock is a gendered term (a point the blog discusses brilliantly, but which I have little to say about here) and second that although it was originally a negative term it is worth reclaiming. The most likely original meaning of the term Warlock was "oath breaker". As the blog at Summer Thunder states its perspective: 

"I like the term “Warlock”. It retains a counter-cultural charge, an unassimilated, deviating quality, some semblance of mystery and outlawhood. And it is a male term, and that is a valuable relief from the femino-centrism of so much neopaganism and Wiccan derived Paganism. It is not a term which speaks of male sacrifice, usable chivalry, soldiery and war service or a reproductive donation of sex or semen. Oath breaking is a good thing, when your oaths are coerced and in service to an oppressor. So I have to ask, if this term is an insult, who is it an insult to? A free man, or a good slave?"