Contemporary Norse paganism is a few decades old. Some call it “Asatru,” a combination of two Old Norse words that together mean “belief or faith in the ancient gods.” For many of its followers, their chief focus includes drawing inspiration from older deities, stories, and customs, reinterpreting them and giving modern Heathenry relevance. With these spiritual goals in mind, Germanic Neopagans choose many ways to express and develop their faith in both public and private spaces.
Cultural Ties and a New Public Temple
While the Heathenry movement is enjoying significant growth in the United States and Canada, Washington Post writer Terrence McCoy explains that the rebirth of this faith began in Iceland with the founding of the Asatru Association in 1972. McCoy attributes its growth to Iceland’s initial motivations for adopting Christianity, which were more political and economic rather than being rooted in religious zealotry. Since Iceland retained ties to its cultural legacies, the Norse gods and legends never faded from the public consciousness.
Additionally, McCoy revealed plans for a new temple to be built in Reykjavik. This temple, topped with a dome that permits incoming sunlight, is a circular building resting 13 feet deep inside a hill overlooking the nation’s capital. Construction is projected to end in late 2018, according to a December 2017 piece in the Iceland Monitor.
Worship in the Great Outdoors
While many faithful Norse Neopagans in Iceland await the new temple’s debut, communal worship practices all over the world occur in outdoor spaces. The National Museum of Denmark explains that gatherings in the open air are common, with European celebrants sometimes choosing pre-Christian cult sites such as Bronze Age burial mounds or ships left over from the Viking era. Meanwhile, Idunna writer Diana L. Paxson divulges that American or Canadian practitioners choose other sacred sites and construct altars or shrines. Community worship practices can include the following:
- Praise for the gods with offerings and feasts
- Toasts to one’s personally chosen deities
- Prayers, praises, and songs
- Offerings in the form of fruit, grain, flowers, or meat
While public worship can be practiced at any time of year, blóts are special ritual sacrifices dedicated to specific deities, ancestors, or even the land. The word “blót” translates as “sacrifice,” with the food and drink shared considered sacred. The Asatru Community describes typical fundamentals of a blót and offers guidance for how to plan them.
Private Devotional Practices
In her Idunna article, Paxson also discusses solo devotional practices. For example, personal altars can be created for in-home daily adoration, worship, and offerings. Also, old prayers, praises, and spells were preserved in writings such as the Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda. Paxson breaks down some of the older texts, divulging how they contain key elements such as salutations, praises, and requests. She further delineates that such essentials can be combined with chosen epithets of the gods, which she terms “hailing the powers,” to identify and honor them as well as gain their notice. Furthermore, she provides a few instances of their adaptations for modern worship, as well as a general template from which devotees can construct their own materials.
Faith Takes On Literal and Metaphoric Meanings
“We see the [Old Norse] stories as poetic metaphors and a manifestation of the forces of nature and human psychology,” Asatru high priest Hilmar Orn Hilmarsson clarified in Terrence McCoy’s Washington Post piece. For centuries, debates have raged about the very nature of human faith and spirituality, and it’s easy to view religious elements such as idols, hymns, prayers, and theological constructs with skepticism. Yet as Hilmarsson’s statement reveals, people often find deeper meanings beyond these rituals and objects. As modern Norse paganism proves, faith can both develop individualistically and through communal fellowship and practice.