Anglo-Saxon Heathenry

Crucial for the practice of Germanic heathenry which is the ancestral folk religion of the English peoples as a life way, you must have an understanding of the goals it is intended to serve, as well as the philosophical and religious principles that rest at its core. Germanic heathenry is a holistic faith, which means that our world-view and practice comprises a series of wholes, one within the other, and many interlinked, creating larger wholes which all transcend the sum of their parts. These wholes exist within concentric circles, expanding outward infinitely. The lore of Heathenry is replete with circles, for a circle has no clear end and no beginning, and can grow without breaking. The heathen universe is a living, evolving phenomenon, not a static one. Our doctrines are based in the traditions of antiquity, but the heathen of today lives in today. Our way is not an anachronism, nor is a simply a celebration of the past. It is a path toward a future that the Gods have envisioned, and toward which they help us strive. 

The doctrines of Fyrnsidu (the old ways) as it is today are a distillation of the social, spiritual, and ethical teachings of the ancient Germanic peoples focusing strongly on the Anglo-Saxons, as extrapolated by the Sácerdhád (priesthood) from diverse primary sources. These sources include the remaining corpus of Old English and Old Norse literature and gnomic verse, as well as surviving English folk-lore, customs, holiday traditions, moral codes and common law which can be demonstrated or postulated to originate in the Heathen Era. Thus, with regard to the ethical, spiritual teachings of Asatru, Fyrnsidu, and Germanic paganism there is a long and august tradition, stretching into dim antiquity, upon which these teachings are based. This traditional ethic served the heathens of old very well for centuries, evolving over time as the tribes that made up the greater Anglo-Saxon nation migrated and expanded into new lands. The corpus of lore upon which our honour-code of today is based is fairly extensive, if fragmented.

Theology on the other hand is a different matter. Germanic heathenry, like all religions is faced with a number of philosophical problems and intellectual challenges from non-believers with regard to its teachings on the nature of the Gods and divinity. With regard to metaphysical and spiritual matters, we Germanic heathens embrace the practice of mysticism which is to say, the direct experience of the divine or sublime through non-ordinary states of perception. This practice of drawing conclusions of a spiritual nature based upon such direct, non-ordinary experiences of the Divine or "otherworldly" is called a Doxastic Practice, a practice of gaining knowledge or understanding which cannot be established as reliable outside of the practice itself.  

With regard to this religious conundrum: it is the official position of the Sácerdhád (priesthood) that the truth claims of any religion, with regard to its doctrines or teachings concerning divinity, can only be justified within the context of a religious tradition. From a purely epistemic standpoint, belief in the Gods cannot be satisfactorily justified without recourse to personal gnosis or religious experiences/revelations as evidence. Therefore, the goal of epistemology within the tradition of Fyrnsidu cannot be to prove the truth of our religious doctrines, but rather to understand them. So long as these doctrines continue to advance the stated goals of the tradition, then their veracity need not be challenged from an epistemic standpoint, as the existence of the Gods and wights of Germanic heathenry cannot be demonstrated with absolute certainty except from a position of faith. 

Heathen morality in practice is not founded upon hard and fast "commandments", but upon commonly held usages or customs called þéawas. A þéaw or simply "thew" is a mode of conduct or ethical value which encourages personal growth and social stability. Our Sidu/Troth is codified into a sort of ethical code through these þéawas, which in times of yore would have been taught to the young by their parents as simply "the way things are done." Today, we have refined these þéawas into practicable policies called sidungas.

The Twelve Æþeling Þews

Bisignes – Industriousness.
Efnes - Equality, equal justice for all.
Ellen – Courage.
Geférscipe - Community mindness, putting the good of the community above one's self.
Giefu – Generosity.
Giestlíðness – Hospitality.
Metgung - Moderation or self control.
Selfdóm - The ability to be an individual, true to one's self.
Sóð - Truth, Honesty.
Stedefæstnes – Steadfastness.
Tréowð - Troth or loyalty.
Wísdóm – Wisdom.

Other branches of Germanic heathenry have presented these tenets differently, some may teach a greater number, some less, but most will adhere fairly closely to what is written here.

It is important to note, that while these teachings are adapted from heathen ethical codes and practices as found in primary sources, it is unlikely that the ancients codified these teachings to the degree we do today. It is doubtful they had a "list" of thews as such, for they had no need of such lists. To the ancient heathens, the thews were implied in every form of social instruction, from parents, warriors, leaders, and holy folk. We modern heathens are faced with the task of restoring our system of ethics to the state of robustness that it once enjoyed, and so for us, such constructs are meaningful.

Wyrd, Orlagu, and Ordæl, Crucial to gaining an understanding of heathen ethics is an understanding of Wyrd. In Norse heathenry, we see frequent reference to a trio of "weird sisters", the Norns. These enigmatic figures are called Urth, Verdandi, and Skuld. In Anglo-Saxon heathenry, their names are Wyrd, Werthende, and Sculd. We view these beings as being hypostases (different aspects) of one entity, the goddess of the Underworld, who is intimately connected to the web of causality linking all things in the cosmos. This Wight is often seen as being one and the same as Holda, the goddess of the dead, and of the lower reaches of the spirit world, the region called Hel. Her appearance in heathen literature in the guise of three sisters is a mythological representation of her three states, or functions: that which has become (cause), that which is becoming (action), that which should become (effect). The wierd sisters have been likened to the Greek fates; however this is a flawed comparison. The weird sisters are not bound by time, they do not equal past, present, and future. Rather, they are three 'modes' in the unfolding of events in the universe, regardless of the chronology of those events. The key in understanding Wyrd is not time, but cause-and-effect. Let us imagine a 'web', like that of a spider. Let us now say that this web is the universe, and every thread in the web a distinct action, or phenomenon. Our deeds, both great and small, weave new threads, which link other threads together in an ever-expanding network. These new connections bring new circumstances which prompt further actions, and form still more connections. Wyrd is often seen in the lore gazing into her well, in which she can see a "record" of the deeds of all beings. From this we can infer that the ancients saw the wyrd (deeds already wrought) of every being as being indelibly written on the face of reality, never to be removed or undone. Werthende, the Norn ruling that which is becoming, represents the Moment, what we might call the present, if we were to use the term loosely. Werthende is the process of weaving wyrd. She is in a sense, the very act of doing. Sculd, the third "sister" is for want of a clearer description, the consequence of wyrd. The word sculd is the ancestor of our word "should", and likewise refers to what "should" happen, based on the turnings of wyrd. The word also has strong connections to "debt", and is used to refer to the logical consequence of any given deed. In terms of ethics, sculd is used to describe both guilt, as in responsibility for the outcome of one's actions, and debt incurred thereby. To summarize, our actions are werthende, the wending or weaving of the threads. When those actions invoke a consequence, a relationship of cause and effect is created, and Wyrd is "fulfilled". Today, many people will still pause and reflect upon witnessing an occurrence that seems to be one of divine provenance, or on seeing someone suffer a just and ironic turn of fortune, and say "that was weird". This is truer than most people realize. Two concepts very closely related to those of Wyrd and Sculd, are Orlagu and Ordæl. Orlagu, meaning 'primal law', or 'that which has been placed down before', refers to the layers of Wyrd that pertain to an individual person or entity. In a sense, one's orlagu comprises one's 'personal' wyrd. This is very similar to the Hindu concept of Dharma. Likewise, Ordæl is 'the hand dealt to us' as a result of our Orlagu-- or put another way, the consequence incurred by past-actions. This concept is roughly analogous to the Hindu concept of Karma. From this word we have the modern "ordeal".

Consistent with the doctrines of panentheism, animism, and holism, our ancestors symbolized the living cosmos as a great tree, with the homes of spirit-beings nestled in its roots and branches, its trunk serving as the world-axis or axis mundi. The heathen Anglo-Saxons of old called this tree the Eormensýl, the “Heavenly Pillar”. The Norse called it Yggdrasil, which is “The Terrible One’s Steed”, in reference to the sorcerer-god Odin’s self sacrifice by spearing himself to its trunk. The Eormensýl is a sacred symbol to heathens, and represents cosmic order.

Heathery is a panentheistic faith. Panentheism is defined here as the belief that divinity exists within the universe and yet encompasses the universe at the same time. To most practitioners of Germanic Paganism, the Divine is not a remote and coercive force, but rather a subtle and immanent one. This means that the Divine surrounds and permeates everything, taking part in the unfolding of the universe rather than transcending it. We believe that the Divine is active in the world of men and influences both us as individuals and our world at large through the agency of the Gods, whom we call the Ésan.

Strongly linked to the concept of panentheism is that of animism, which is the belief that all objects and creatures in the universe are endowed with a subtle or spiritual essence, a soul, which governs their existence. Put simply, animism is the doctrine that everything is alive on a spiritual level, though they may be inanimate physically. Even inanimate objects possess a subtle or spiritual “self”. Though the “subtle self” of an inanimate object may not be complex enough to be a true soul, it will nonetheless possess a measure of the spiritual life-force which pervades everything in the universe. Followers of our brand of paganism call this life-force æðm, which means “breath”. Some heathens learn to cultivate their æðm and focus it using certain esoteric disciplines to perform “magical” acts, or feats of seemingly superhuman prowess (mægen).

Germanic heathenry teaches that the soul has several parts, which are vitalised by æðm (breath, vapour) while a person lives. At the moment of death, the soul is separated from the body, and generally the greater part of the individual’s personal store of æðmis returned to the universe in undifferentiated form. What remains of the soul, the higher self, will make its journey to whichever otherworldly domain it best belongs, generally the realm of the dead, (Hel), or in some case to one of the heavenly halls of the Gods. It should be noted here that Hel, sometimes mistakenly associated with the western, monotheistic “Hell”, is not a place of torment. The word “Hell” is in fact borrowed from the Germanic tongues by the followers of the One God of the Book, who misapplied it to their own eternal places of punishment. Heathenry has no place for eternal damnation, as there is no evidence to suggest that any man, however base and evil, is wholly unredeemable. Germanic heathery teaches that imperfect or un-evolved souls reside in Hel until they may be born again, to further their journey toward ascension to Heaven, the plane of the Gods. Some heathens also believe that some souls are able to remain near the living after death, remaining to watch over their kin and loved ones. Other spirits remain in the land of the living for other reasons. The lore of spirit wights is the subject of another lesson; suffice to say the fate of the heathen soul upon the death of the body varies from individual to individual.

Anglo-Saxon paganism was a polytheistic religion, revolving around a pantheon centred on the god Woden. It is for this reason that the Christian Church labelled it to be a form of "paganism".

Due to the early Christianisation of England, Anglo-Saxon paganism is sparsely attested, and much more difficult to reconstruct than Norse paganism. Our main sources of evidence are toponymy, archaeology (especially burials such as the one at Sutton Hoo) besides sparse literary testimonies such as Bede's, and what can be glimpsed from surviving works of Anglo-Saxon poetry such as Beowulf. It has been resurrected in the 20th century through the form of the Neo-pagan religion of Theodism.

The pagan Anglo-Saxons were polytheists, believing in several different gods and goddesses. Most of these deities were associated with a specific aspect of nature, for instance, Þunor, was the god of the sky and thunder.

Being of their Germanic ancestry, the Anglo-Saxon deities were largely the same gods as were worshipped by the Norse and other Germanic peoples. The names vary slightly due to the differences in language among the Germanic people. For example, Þunor of the Anglo-Saxons was the same deity as Thor of the Norse and Donar of the Germans. Likewise, Woden of the Anglo-Saxons is the same as Óðinn among the Norse and Wodan of the Germans.

The Anglo-Saxons, (according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) comprised of tribes such as the Angles, Saxons and Jutes, arrived in Britain from southern Denmark, the Netherlands and northern Germany in the early-mediaeval period.

The last pagan king of Anglo-Saxon England was Arwald, who was killed in battle in 686 by the Christian king, Cædwalla of Wessex.

Pope Gregory instructed Augustine to "destroy the idols but use their houses for Christian worship" Many Anglo-Saxon pagan practises were transformed into Christian practices, for instance, the Christian festival of Easter was adapted from a previous Anglo-Saxon pagan spring festival devoted to the Anglo-Saxon pagan Goddess Ēastre.

Yule Feast is a Pagan Winter Festival (winter solstice).

Not a Christian Birthday Celebration

According to the Christian missionaries sent to proselytize among the Germanic peoples of northern Europe were instructed to superimpose Christian themes upon existing local pagan holidays, to ease the conversion of the people to Christianity by allowing them to retain their traditional celebrations. Thus, Christmas was created by associating stories of the birth of Jesus of Nazareth with Yule. From the biblical description, most historians believe that his birth probably occurred approximately six months after Christmas Day. One thing that all scholars agree on is Jesus was not born in December, since the bible records shepherds tending their sheep in the fields on that night. This is unlikely to have happened during a cold Judean winter. So why do we celebrate Jesus Christ's birthday on December the 25th? The answer lies in the pagan origins of the Feast of Yule (Beginning of Runic Year), missionaries found it convenient to provide a Christian reinterpretation of popular pagan holidays such as Yule and allow the celebrations themselves to go on largely unchanged, versus trying to confront and suppress them. The Scandinavian tradition of slaughtering a Boar at Christmas is probably salient evidence of this to this day. The tradition is thought to be derived from the sacrifice of boars to the god Freyr at the Yule celebrations. Yule Feast - Winter Solstice (Sacred to Odin and Freyr) and we also find Easter another Christian reinterpretation of the Pagan Spring Equinox celebrations Ēastre (that is, Easter) is the name of an Anglo-Saxon goddess Ēastre converted to English "Easter" to identify the celebration of Midsummer Day. The Spring Equinox celebrations are assimilated from northern European pagan festivals. Coincidence the rising of the Sun coincides with the resurrection of the Son of God?