Charles Kovacs - Norse Mythology

The stories I am going to tell are very special. They are wonderful stories of strange beings called gods and of giants and dwarfs, stories of magic spells and of mighty battles. Before I can tell you these stories I must first tell you how they came about. These stories were not just made up; they came about in a different way. So that you can understand how this was, lets think back to the Old Testament stories and the story of Adam and Eve how they ate the forbidden fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, and how they were driven from paradise. As long as Adam and Eve were still in paradise they could see God and speak to God every day. Just think what a wonderful thing this was: to see the Lord God in all his might and glory, just as you now see people. Then Adam and Eve disobeyed God and were driven from paradise and they could no longer see God every day, but they could still see him sometimes; he sometimes appeared to them.

Then came the children of Adam and Eve, and their childrens children; they could still see God, but not very often. As time went on, there were only a few people who could see God at all: people like Abraham, like Moses, like some prophets and they could only see him sometimes. The more people became used to living on earth, and the better they became at building and farming and making things, the less they could see God. Only a few could still sometimes see him.

Something else happened: people could not see the Lord God in his might and glory, but very many of them, not just a few, could see the angels. They saw angels that made the seasons of the year, the cold of winter and the warmth of the summer. They saw angels that worked in wind and weather, in rain and clouds, in the growing of plants and even in the light that came from the sun and moon and stars. In our time we do not even have that ability; but in the old days, a long time ago, people did not just feel the wind, they saw a wonderful being that made the wind. They did not just see the light of sun or moon; in the light there were beings, the angels.

What happened was this: the people who could no longer see God thought that each angel was a god, and so they came to worship the angels as gods, and they prayed to the angels as gods and made sacrifices to them. The only people who did not worship the angel-gods but remained faithful to the true God were the Israelites, the people of the Old Testament, and that is why Christ was born among them. The other people in the world worshipped the many angel-gods because thats what they could still see. But the true God, in his love for mankind, wanted to help the people who could no longer see him, and so he let his angels guide them.

There were many peoples in the world who worshipped the angel-gods, and they had wonderful stories about them. The most wonderful stories were told amongst people who are called Norsemen, which means men from the North. These Norsemen really did come from the North from Sweden, from Norway. They were a proud people and so brave that they were only happy when there was danger. That is why they went to war and fought: to have the joy of danger. That is why they sailed their small sailing ships across the seas and into the wildest storms: because it was dangerous. The Norsemen came to every land: to Germany, to France, to Britain. Many settled in these countries, so there is hardly anyone here who does not have, among his ancestors his great-great-great-grandparents from very long ago one of these brave warriors, one of the Norsemen. They were all warriors. They carried spears and swords and shields and they knew how to use their weapons well.

When these brave, fierce Norsemen had fought a battle, they came home to celebrate their victory with a great feast a banquet. The most important part of the feast was when a man called a bard took a harp and sang or recited a poem, a long poem about the gods and the deeds of the gods. These bards could see the angel-gods better than the others, and they could understand what the angels said better than the others. This is how the stories I am going to tell you came about. They are stories that these wise bards amongst the Norsemen heard from angels, from the angel-gods.