Enter The Warrior

Caveat: please read first comment before reading… Or not. Whatever floats your boat or sinks your dinghy.

Every day I do a little time in my gym, but for the odd Sunday when my body feels beaten down by the week’s business. In my gym, down cellar, I keep some drawings and such, things to draw my focus in theory even if I hardly look at them in practise. Shocking no one, are some of my favourite Goddess and such drawings – fertilitykult, baby. But I also keep some heroic art and the like. In my mind, at least, fertilitykult and warrior ethos theoretically pair well. But I talk a lot about that fertilitykult business. (And why not?) Still, channels of the Masculine Divine cross my mind more or less as frequently. I don’t do as much with it because I figure, it’s popular, and somebody somewhere will be doing it better. After all, there is no shortage of content dedicated to the warrior, such as he is. History of war. Bloodshed in the air. So, there’s nothing for me to contribute, I think, no perspective I have that hasn’t been angled.

 But on the other hand, maybe that isn’t the case. I consider myself at least somewhat inspired by things and orders such as the Armanen, but also the chivalric societies dedicated to Ostara one might read about in Fans of the Era, Deutschland. I don’t have to ignore my own bloodline, the English championed chivalry and one can argue laid quite a few bricks toward the re-emergence of a sheerly Northwest (and maybe Pan-) European outlet, a reclamation of the organic, classically virtuous spirit for the Folksoul.

 It occurs to me that as with many things, our perceptions of warriors, soldiers, heroes, champions, und so weiter, are skewed. One, at the risk of sounding cheeky – there are words for each of the above, and more, with good reason. They were not all the same. Each has a different flavour or connotation in their cultural context. But today, in an arguably de-radicalised, un-martial society, the words are thrown into the blender. Why would it be otherwise, when the vast majority does not fight? I don’t fight. There’s a high probability that you don’t fight. The words and their use are retained for convenience, but the idea is almost thoroughly amalgamated. Begetter of violence. That is the seeming attitude. It is forgotten that violence is the end-stage of an informing spirit, it would seem. But not all spirits are equal, are they?

 And, no. I don’t stand here on my soapbox and preach from experience. The most martial experience I’ve had was finishing fights started with me in school by louder (not stronger) kids who thought I was a nerd and would therefore fold upon being prodded. In my adult life, all my conflicts have been resolved through diplomatic and intellectual means. It has now been 20 years since I’ve been in the position of hitting a bully with a brick. 24. 26. Damn. Point is. I am not a warrior. I don’t pretend to be a warrior. I don’t need to be a warrior. That is neither my motivation nor my source of confidence. As a preliminary aside, I think this focal obsession with warrior this and hero that is a failing point in Dissident Culture. For the same reason I think that it’s silly that so many folk expect they will be the next Führer, or Ill Deuce or Big Man or whatever. There is an organic component of modelling that gets lost. When our “E-Celebs” are seen having their gay little tiffs, this movement hates that one, this leader PWNS that one… all because nobody can get in line, or get out of the way, it sets a precedent. All the children in the audience want to grow up to be like, I don’t know, who’s big now? It was Richard Spencer mouthing off, for a while, back in my day. Jordan Peterson? Jiminy Cricket? Nobody wants to be Jiminy, not even me.

 I know. I called out Richie. I own it. But I ain’t no E-Celeb, and nobody cares what I think. There’s maybe a dozen people in the flesh who do, and what you think of me online is unverifiable at best because you could be Agent Rick or an A.I. Bot for all I know. No. I don’t have great clout. That isn’t false humbleness, it’s an acknowledgement of a plain and simple fact. Chips fall into place, Fate allots you what you need, if you align yourself correctly. If my Wyrd was to have big clout energy, I would have been born an egomanic who feels he has the right to be in charge. But I don’t. My fate lies elsewhere. When your Wyrd and Örlög are out of whack, you need to straighten it out. Sometimes it means course correction, but that also doesn’t mean backslide into drama. Life makes it easy, discipline makes it hard. Anyway.

 Not everybody is a warrior. That’s the preliminary aside. If that shit we’re all smelling gets around to being thrown at the fan by our apemen in chief, you probably won’t wake up the next day into Fallout 5, New England, with katana skills and ninja star skills downloaded into your fedora. It isn’t going to be like getting hired on as a Madmax stunt double. If you didn’t have the guts before, you won’t be getting any glory. You’ll be the same jackass you were yesterday, with less of a social safety net and a higher probability of being raped and murdered for the contents of your sweet baked bean pantry. What most of us are, is potential survivors. Survivors by nature are not necessarily chivalrous and as necessarily more ruthless. They above most will recognise moral convenience as a, yes, social construct built for them by natural elites. Chivalry is, yes, a privilege. If the internet should fail and the infrastructure burn, it isn’t going to be my luxury. Luxuries for survivors will be gritted teeth and bearing it, hopefully for daily bread and new days for self and family.

 Think about that before you log onto the internet and try to see yourself in the reflection Generic Hero One. That ain’t me baby. That ain’t you. There is nothing more pretentious than the mere citizen who fancies himself a warrior. The bully I bludgeoned with the brick in the third grade said he knew street fighting, learned it from bigger, stronger bullies. So, he reasoned, you don’t know shit. Maybe that meant they flushed his head down the toilet and punched him in the liver repeatedly while calling him a nancy. Maybe that was his street training. The point is, I hit him with the brick with all that fancy talk circling the drain between my ears didn’t mean shit. I didn’t need to say a word beyond my warning that he leave me alone, not touch me, or get in my face. What I did was not honourable, but I didn’t leave the backstreet with bruises and I could see straight. I could exonerate myself with the Havamal and remind myself that honour was never universal before the papists invented globalism. The Norse reserved honour for their own, there was no dishonour in tricking or shaming enemies who meant to trick and shame you. Honour was amongst kith and kin, it was regarded that among foreigners with alien values, there can be no “equality.” So hitting the bully who had tricked you before and tried to chlorine you in the eyes, maybe wasn’t so bad a thing. Nobody tried to start anything with me until my family moved to the town I’ve been in ever since.

 But that was a long time ago. Maybe the nature of bullies and dirty fighting have changed. The cool thing about more eternal truths is that they don’t change. The ancient warriors, heroes and soldiers live with Urd drinking from the Well of Mimir. Yes, they are slipping from the folksoul, but that doesn’t change what was, only what’s coming. A neat little lesson we learn from the Norns, past shapes future. Forgetting things like Chivalry and Honour has led us to a very dark day whose dawn I do not pretend to imagine. I think there are quite a few years of grey twilight yet. Uncertainty. Doubt. Despair. Society has chosen the path of the niðingr. When one tallies the seeming mechanisms of reincarnation, then you are left with a grim impression. As with some sciences, an object in motion must be stopped by exterior forces. The dishonour in society is clearly self-replicating. It was for this reason that malcontents were bogged, if they were allowed to reincarnate as such than so with them would magnify their bad luck, just as a noble man reincarnates back into the folksoul and magnifies it, the Niðing only degrades. Anyway. I keep some drawings in my gym space that remind me of my own conceptions of nobility.

 The drawings I keep in my gym depict a small variety. There stand warriors, heroes and soldiers. Named are a drawing of Arthur, and Hermann. There about them unnamed are a Berserker, a Jarl, and a Spartan. It’s ironic for someone who talks a lot about Germanic Religious and Cultural Revival to look to Arthur first, but I do. When I think of the Warrior, I think of Arthur first.

 Yes, I know, the “literal” “figure” of Arthur is not what most want him to be. That is to say, “real.” He may have been a series of historical figures thrown into the blender, if approached generally. I personally believe he is not a man so much as a forgotten God, his name meaning “bear,” and Merlin being an obvious Shamanic figure which may tie both into a prehistoric Bear Cult about which I am presently equipped to write little, other than there is an attested Artio or Artia who may have once been a feminine consort or antecedent. What remains is that Arthur is an Archetype. Characteristics collected and grafted like skin onto the ghost in the shell. Nothing prevents the Folksoul from constructing Archetypes, it is how the Folksoul evolves and overcomes. It is how “Arthur” can exist as a multiplicity of truths at once, without betraying one another. Unless you are a modern, nihilistic scholar incapable of grasping multivariance. In which case, you should be pitied. Arthur is an English Hero, as well as a Welsh one. Arthur is a British Hero, as well as a French one. To each a flavour, and each a snippet of truth. But each sliver of truth teaches us more about the folksoul of the torchbearer than the bearer we want Arthur to be, and that does not invalidate any of Arthur’s claims.

 My best friend has a monologue of sorts he uses to explain multivariance to people using Arthur as an example. It is concise and scientific, unlike mine, which is sprawling and poetic. I cannot do the monologue justice, so if he should end up reading this and be so inclined as to give the monologue in comments – I’d be grateful. Regardless, the spirit was in regards to how Arthur can be simultaneously English and Breton, historical and allegorical, while in no-wise being untrue despite in point of fact being an obscure Welsh tribal warlord. A “fact” which is just as debatable, and yet summarily true, as any other. I air-quote “fact” above because Authoress Annie Dieu-Le-Veut made in one of her books on my shelf the compelling case of Arthur originally being a Scythian Legend, eventually being rebranded by the indigenous Britons and such. In the event *she* is reading, by all means, she may feel welcome to make that case below as it will be done more gracefully than I who studied the Scythian expanse only tangentially, but can accept that Scythian and Aryan could be conceptually identical, barring aesthetic preference which I hold for the more familiar term Aryan. Anywho.

 The story of Arthur has multivariate meaning to me. But it is mine. Men should personalise myths and make them theirs. Coming from humble origin, was Arthur, fated for more. He had no inkling of this. It was under the auspice of an accident of fate that he was directed to the sword. For me, his drawing of the sword from the stone represents a chivalric idea. Dogged determination, fearless trust in fate allows his triumph. Other men, crippled by delusion, failed. But Arthur, the heedless, did not weigh himself down with petty egodrama. His mind was clear. Unencumbered. Hence, he did not fail in his mind before he began, nor likely did he succeed in his mind – his mind was in the moment, focused on the deed and not the abstract. But that’s the exoteric story, which I will die saying it, is always the beginning, not end, of the iceberg. And as the iceberg summarily melts into the ocean when exposed to the heat of focused attention, the esoteric is always corralled and shaped by that exoteric, reformed into the iceberg. All truth has infinite value, and so the folksoul like the alchemist, continually reforms the infinite into crude matter. Arthur is an example, in his multiplicity.

 Another thing I can tie this into is Chivalry, Grail – that kind of thing. Edward III, an “English” king (scroll my archives for esoteric Edwardianity) is broadly responsible for the Englishing of Arthur. He was also largely responsible for bringing Chivalry to the British Isles and laying the seedbed for the Romanticism of Britain that I all know and love. And, by that token, providing New England with her own folksoul, and impetus to a mythopoetic tradition being radically redefined by the scumbags ruining culture. SO, in effect, really, behind every Arthur is an Edward. Inasmuch as my New England and my Old England are concerned. We can see the development of the Arthurian Cult into Grail Mythology, at least in part, as a projection of King Edward’s own psychic will. While extant symbols, Chivalry and Arthuriana are from my vantage hard to split. The Chivalric Order saw the Goddess in the Everywoman. The Devine Feminine, exalted. Arthur was initiated by the Lady, and so in his way was Edward – courtly love was paramount.

 We understand all life is a prolonged act of procreation. Sex is the very, very sweet cherry on top. Delicious, saccharine cherry, the finest fruit hanging low from the tallest tree. Life. The polarity of man and woman, life and death, yin and yang, all in syncopatic motion. Edward, through Arthur, knew and understood this. He grasped at the straws of the eternal and almost singlehandedly turned Gefjon’s Plough, as it were. England through a skun and borrowed Welshman filled with the English soul, reclaimed and refilled the English grail. And this was done by hitting a series of Welshmen with a series of bricks. So perhaps I’m not that bad a guy. Anyway. The warrior serves. That is his charism. What is man without woman? What is life without love? These romantic notions form a cornerstone of all valid myth. How could they not?

 If the warrior does not safeguard the Devine Feminine, he is not a warrior. If the worship of life through the exaltation of a kind of divine dimorphism is not an aesthetic high point, then what? Through his exercise of Chivalry man can glimpse the kinds of beauty which he can but admire. The flowering fields of femininity, in her endless sea of expressions… a kind of wisdom, raw and primal… a kind of prophetic edge, dark and mysterious… Who would not see the value in putting these on the pedestal? It is the polarity which makes the fit, the rugged discipline, the singular purpose, the mortal force of the man can keep the walls of the Utangard from wilting the flower. And that sweet lady is not merely your wife, or a Goddess, but also your homeland which was always shown with the masque of a Goddess. In that body is a diversity of beauty which encapsulates the many shades of love between man and woman, so many means of finding it in Her infinite sea. So. Arthur, pretty cool thought, full of the kind of abstracts that lubricate the old throne of spergery. Brain, guy. Arthur, being an idea, becomes in a way far more applicable. Historicity is a fine thing, but it is exoteric. This is a poignant truth embodied by Asatru, Perennialism and the Holographic Universe. Whatever. What you see is only the beginning of what you get.

 Again with Edward. Edward I spearheaded the work of taking England from being a backwater muckrake for the Frenchies and turning it into a Land to be reckoned with. In a way, he was like Alfred the Great before him – dreaming not merely of a unified England, but of a unified Britannia. He knew that a National identity was needed, and the Normans had ably shattered the purely Anglo-Saxon ideal. In a way, he led to the creation of the Englishman as Anglo-Saxony’s inheritance. He more than most turned the ship around, saved England from becoming France. Edward III sped the sails. Edward I had seen himself as the inheritor of Excalibur, and mixed notions of chosen kingship and destiny. Edward III came to see that king as chosen by the Land. Divine sponsorship. Sovereignty, all that good stuff. And so the relationship of the English King, married to England, was not a stone’s throw from the Lady of the Lake selecting, initiating Arthur. The notion of the Once and Future King, or the Hero who would come in England’s darkest hour. These ideas became marvellous nation building tools. And this began with the projection of great souls into the emptied vessel Arthur had become, which is a transformation many myths undergo, repossession by the folksoul. In this, England is very much like the archetypal Arthur – unassuming, unpossessed of higher knowledge of greater destiny and yet nevertheless slated for her own epoch. There was a Pax Britannica, say of it what you will. It passed into Pax Americana, and now we have Pax Globalistica. Or something. The point is, the Anglo-Saxons did not set out consciously to create England, it happened, because they reforged their folksoul in shaping their new land. When enough of a crystallisation of the soul happened, then did the English folksoul spawn her champion. Alfred’s process, interrupted by William’s, in a sense was resurrected but changed in the blink of an eye by Edward. Of course by then it was never going to be so simple as hoisting up an Anglo-Saxon hero for the New English, ergo Arthur who in his otherworldliness never fails to belong, because his true past is so keenly veiled to all but the slightest few. So it goes.

 Another aspect of this which might be illustrative is a tie to Vilhelm Grønbech, who wrote of the flexibility of the Teutonic Soul in his seminal book Culture of the Teutons. The transformation of Arthur from whatever he was into a Celtic phenomenon to an English one is an example of the magickal work of shapeshifting. The name Arthur bears weight, but itself was a vessel, which was hulled out. Adopted, Arthur became English propaganda, and synonymous with the English power behind the primitive United Kingdom. Slowly the mysticism was extracted and assessed by the Edwards and reinjected into the name, as like refilling a grail. In this way, the folksoul of England was able to capitalise on a situation in which she was almost wholly overlorded by the alien, by ironically naturalising something found in the old uncanny valley. I stake this claim: in America, the Anglo-Saxon Folksoul can stand to be revived by Asatru. Consider: in America, Asatru speaks English, worships Teutonic Gods who with a nudge can be regiven English names, enshrines the 9 Noble Virtues which were conceived of by Britons in observation of Teutons. Even if, for example, today’s Asatru is overwhelmingly represented by ethnically Celtic adherents, they will generationally become culturally Germanic, specifically English. This sort of thing isn’t without precedence. There’s a lot of Celtic DNA in Iceland, but it doesn’t matter because the Germanic folksoul has conquered a physical vessel, reshaped it to suit the needs of the folk.

 Such a suggestion is not outside the confines of what Grønbech and his book suggest. Clan adoption was a very real phenomenon. While the Teutons were racially sensitive, they were not above assimilation, assuming the assimilation could occur. In the Havamal it says to be careful upon entering a new home, not knowing to what race or tribe the host belongs. This would suggest that at the time of composition, the tribes were physically alike enough that they could share in a folksoul with minimal conversion. So I believe it will go with Asatru here, in the U.S., a phenomenon which is currently on the rise, and has been exponentially since the 1970s. At least.

And more recently I framed an image of Hermann/Radboud (I’m still not decided Whomst, although both share powerful images of rebellion against tyranny) and hung it in my gym above Arthur. It is true, I don’t have as much investment in Hermann/Radboud as I do Arthur, and I say again of the irony that it is great. But still. In the Hermannsdenkmal Statue in Germany, there is an idealised Hero. A great man with his sword raised to the sky. A romantic notion. Something to aspire to. You might think of the Edwards as successors to these great men, here. In that the Plantagenet Kings were of Normandy, yet, led to the liberation of England. They had scope and faith and vision besides. But Hermann, in my book, is the antecedent, and one cannot regard one without acknowledging the former. Anyway.

For me, Hermann as well as Radboud symbolise a kind of faith. More Hermann than Radboud, not to discount his heroism. Hermann believed in his People. He held Troth with his Folk. He had a cause which formed a higher order. Man must have a purpose, a goal. For Hermann it was the liberation of his Tribe from Rome. Long held in thrall by the Roman machine as foederatii, the Cheruskar were, like all historical tribes in such positions, of mixed mind. Some Germans voluntarily joined with Rome, seeing a better life. Others vilified the imposition, which came with taxes and obligations that did not need consent to be enforced. However, Hermann knew. He had a singularity of purpose. To defy Rome for him was to defy all the world, and without absolute conviction, he could not have done so.

 Rome was changing the face of Germania. Her Gods, were changing. Her ways, were changing. And it was not wholly by the Will of the Folk, the People. And so Hermann endured years as a Roman equestrian, rising in rank until he learned the secrets of Roman might, the weaknesses of their machines. He did as Odin would, and lived double lives, immersed fully in the lore, learning of another nation. And like Odin he kept his soul on a tether, so that he would not be lost. Hermann had been a soldier. A masked arm wielded by the Empire, but he threw of his masque and the anonymity of nationality and became a Warrior – leading his own, true people in a bid for liberation.

 I imagine his sword thrust to the heavens was an act of worship, acknowledging the Gods of Victory which blessed his day. And I reckon also the sword held high was a warning. What goes up, comes down. The sword that’s lifted, can just as easily fall. The message was received; Germania was never fully confederated. Indeed, the reverse is true. Among Hermann’s descendants would be those who picked the corpse of Rome clean, dead upon submission to Christianity and worn like a skin-suit. The Germans, Goths, and so many others, who had bidden their time, would take up Rome like a coat and wear it. In some ways, Civilisation – a Roman word – does this today. But Hermann is there with his sword, reminding us that no matter how great the Empire, there are creative solutions. Not just for freedom, but for annex. But this requires faith – that it can be done, and shall be done.

 Radboud was also a warrior. I’ve discussed him elsewhere. However, I think that despite their differences in getting there, he and Hermann came to the same conclusion. Autonomy of Soul is a very important thing. Radboud fought a deteriorated, counterfeit Rome. But the imperialism hadn’t change, only intensified and become more savage, unforgiving and vile. In some ways, Radboud fought a far crueller villain than Hermann. The Trv Romans could see their Gods in the conquered, their selves in the slain. “Christian” “Rome” embodied disembodiment, they did not see their god in the Gods of the conquered, nor their selves in the slain. It was a case of join or die, but without the Serpent of Truth & Wisdom to act as a guide.

 So Radboud, for me, is a titan for a different reason. He had been a survivor, as any of us would hope to be. He was fighting a battle of attrition, like Hermann, against what may as well have been all the world. He made sacrifices. He negotiated with his honour. He considered the betrayal of his ancient faith to save his future race. The circumstances were that dire. From a Havamal perspective, this wasn’t a crime. A false conversion to a cruel imposition was not a sin. The sin would have been throwing away the lives of his people on petty pride. And yet, in the end, he realised it would never end. To submit meant more than loss of life, but loss of soul. He realised, he had come to the logical end of subversion and reached the need for rebellion.

 We can see the truth laid bare like so many of Cybele’s breasts when we look at those who pocketed the One Ring, or shook hands with Sauron. They lost more than they bargained for. Paganism survived sight unseen in pockets, but over the generations lessons were lost. And those false conversions became real ones, after all that was known was the hyper-reality of the imperial faith. Something the false convertors would have been appalled to note. Yes, you can fake it and make it, but there has to be an end-goal.

 We survivors – if that – are like Radboud, biding time, but there will come the time to tell the bishop to go to his hell, and save the soul of our people. In that, while he may have waited until the eleventh hour, I think Radboud was of the cloth with Hermann. But even when he bid his time, was cunning as the snake, Radboud did nothing wrong. Those of us waiting in the winds for the winds to change, are not necessarily wrong. It is true, yes, that the problem facing the nationalism of our day is inaction. And there are many points and counterpoints. There needs to be organising principles. And there are. There are conflicting principles, and unchecked egos. And so, it is for this reason why people like me argue that now is always the time to check your conscience and corral your lesser nature. It doesn’t serve your higher cause. Everyone can aspire to the warrior and learn from his ideal, of setting aside ego and embracing higher calling. But the difference is organically knowing your place. I am not a leader, at best I can have interesting discussions with folk who are and perhaps, maybe, if the time is right, leave an impression. But I do not have a stage presence. I don’t need one. I believe the conflicting organising principles should be able to move independently and with instinctual cohesion toward a future goal. Set aside unproductive differences, cease making molehills and mountains trade places. The Big Tent isn’t the worst idea. Advocating temporary shelter under Big Tent doesn’t equivocate advocating that Big Tent become the bastard child of everybody in the shade, it simply means assessing and utilising cover until you can prove you’re the strongest, the wisest and best equipped. It says something in volumes and droves to they who are such prima donnas that they can’t do this simple thing. If survival is for the fittest, and you can’t make temporary truces and ceasefires while remembering your objectives than it seems to me you lack faith in your fitness.

 Anyway.

 I keep other such pictures in my gym space. The Berserker who symbolises the wild, savage, prehuman instinct in every-man that the Allfather cultivates and keeps in reserve. Like a werewolf, the Berserk can appear to have the trappings of a civilised man, but revert at whim to that State of Nature and savage his enemies with such an unrelenting brutality that legends are born. Pick a Berserker from Lore, any one, and he will be epic. The animal in the man. The lost art of shapeshifting, skin-walking, where it becomes reasonable to ask whether the man borrows the soul of the bear, or the soul of the bear borrows the skin of the man – where one begins and ends.

 Then there is the Spartan, who I respect as much as I revile. Were the Spartans short-sighted as some claim? I think not. Did they pursue Eugenic art to terrifying conclusions? Indeed, they did. And they act as a warning. They serve as a warning of what happens when the scales are tipped too far. There comes a point of no return. The hyper-masculine, warrior ethos without heed of the balancing archetypes becomes a brutish insensibility. And finally, a show for the civilised to gawk at. It is what happens when the rustic is worshiped at the exclusion of adaptation and progress. For example, in Asatru, those pure reconstructionists who wish to larp the bronze age back – they will be absorbed into or steamrolled by more adaptogenic groups like your A.F.A. or your Norroena Society Societies. The paleoconservative refusing to budge is just as obsolete as the neoconservative who has bartered away his past. Sic Semper Sparta, died in a zoo curated by Rome. Rome, absorbed into a museum which became the birthplace of Europe, some might say. Why? Failure to adapt, though not, in this case, through the hyper-masculine, but by the opposite, miscegenation. Sparta inbred to death, Rome outbred to death. But none of this denies the splendour, the majesty and will of the Spartan soldier and warrior. Rivalled by none, worth plenty of his enemy, he was a spectacle. No wonder the Spartan Helmet to this day is a symbol of vigour recognised unilaterally. There are few examples I can consider of masters of combat, than the Spartan, steely and unflinching.

 And my Norseman, of course. My “Viking.” Vikings were my first love, in cultural studies. As a boy I dreamed of how cool it would be to claim Viking ancestry. Which as it turns out is easily done. I’m of English extraction, therefore Viking England and the Danelaw lurk in my veins as well. Even if, paradoxically, learning to love my English heritage overrode my love of the generic Viking. But there is your word, generic. Vikings were more than plundering seafarers. The Norseman was a pinnacle of self-sufficiency. Unlike many warrior breeds, a Viking man might build or fix his own ship – he had to if he expected to go a-viking. He was an amateur farmer, tracker. An all-around Jack of Most Trades. He could survive in a variety of arenas. Was a shrewd merchant and gifted craftsman. In fact, these civic aspects are far more enticing to me now than the still stunning explorative exploits. The Norseman roved far, but changed more. What would England be without the re-infusion of Norse blood in the form of Danish Vikings and again Norwegian Vikings pretending to be civilised “Normans”? What would Scotland be without the Norwegians proper? There would be no Russia were it not for the Swedish Vikings. Scandinavia has enormous influence over the European experience, sometimes without even swinging an uninvited sword. Like the English before them, the Vikings were often not uninvited guests. Bear this in mind. Anyway. Versatile. That is the Norseman. But like the Spartan, a bit too versatile. Can England or Russia today boast of the Viking spirit? For that matter, can Scandinavia? The adaptive powers of the Norsemen were such that they assimilated into obsolescence in places, and tragically in Scandinavia the children of the Northmen are assimilating to counterfeit ideals in their own homes, literally having been invaded by ghosts, followed by the mudflood the ghosts invited.

 Now I suppose I should do one of the things I set out to do. And that is differentiate some of the keywords I used before. I have given examples of warriors, really. Warriors being those spared the anonymity of nationality, their faces born to the enemy and their hearts borne of conviction. I think of the warrior as separate than a soldier. A soldier was a professional choice. It did not necessarily involve moralism. Does a carpenter believe in the moral superiority of the hammer over the screwdriver? He wants to be paid. A warrior fights for ideals, a soldier for pay. There may be intersections, but they are separate. I think.

 The Warrior, or even Aristocratic ideal exists by being propped up by the hoi polloi, as the Greeks called them. The smallfolk, as England called them. You and me. The little people as America calls us. This idea is a mortification of the Hero. Heroes were originally demi-gods, incapable of being other than heroic by virtue of belonging to an exclusive race besides. Whether produced by Gods or elusive Nefilim, it changes nothing. Heroes are simply – better than you. Of a higher order. The warrior is the closest mortal man comes to this. But in a way, ironically, the warrior is more heroic, at least where how we use the word today is concerned. The hero’s blood didn’t make him traditionally noble (read chivalric.) Hercules was often a savage. A hero was simply genetically superior. A warrior was morally superior. A hero was titanic, more than. This feeds also the notion of the champion. Champions would spare armies by fighting in single combat, as a nod and ode to the warrior and heroic age.

 You might suspect how these diverge from the soldier. Did the average Roman soldier believe in Pax Romana? Perhaps he did. But he still didn’t do it for free. Any more than the American soldier invading somewhere with sand believed in that cause. Certainly a soldier is made by convincing themselves they are heroic, but I can find little evidence of a slotted payscale for your Hermann or Radboud’s. A hero was unable to be anything but. When the war was won, the soldier returned to his farm and was regular again. He wasn’t divine, or even that special. Today there is a great hype of soldiers, conflation with the heroic and the warrior and the champion. And it is understandable why, but on the head, in truth, I think they are all different animals. Soldier, policeman are both professions afforded great prestige by the American populace, although beginning perhaps with Vietnam, the military and paramilitary is no longer so highly regarded and is now frequently the object of scorn.

 I respect both the soldier and the warrior. Both are choices. You don’t have to be a soldier any more than I do a carpenter. But to be a warrior, and fight for ideals, for truths and purposes – is an extremely high calling. And it is symbolic. Far more symbolic than merely surviving, which is what we’re all doing. If we’re honest. Most of us aren’t warriors. Some of us aren’t even really survivors. And that isn’t made as a shameface statement. I don’t, in truth, believe there is much value in shaming anybody. Not even the enemy. Shaming is nothing more than emotional masturbation. Absolute castigation would be far more effective. Do you dislike the LTBBQ agenda and believe it is evil? You aren’t going to browbeat a faggot straight, or guilt-trip paedophiles into cancelling RuPaul with a brick trip to the ETERNAL BOG OF TRUTH. No. You really only feed their perverse, masochistic energy. And I say this as somebody who is thoroughly guilty of this and mocks what he hates. But the same applies to the whole body positive question. (Or anything else for that matter.) For those who hate fat bodies, attempting to heap scorn and shame on the heavy doesn’t make them shrink. It makes them guiltier inside, and thereby more likely to engage in copium. You just make them another pound fatter, the opposite of what you want. Without all the excess engagement, the whole LTBBQ thing would probably dry up and blow away, but the monster is fattened up to stunning effect with fake outrage, ineffectual threats and wowjustwowing. In reality, in the flesh, ignorance is bliss. Ignoring vile and stupid statements can send a louder counterstatement than coming up with cheeky one-liners. Silent scorn is incredibly powerful, and the cold shoulder still really hurts.

 I digress. Again. I don’t write any of this to shame anybody. Quite the opposite. Being a survivor is good, because life is good. Being “just” a citizen is good, if that’s what you are. Villages and cities need villagers and citizens. Pagan and Heathen were respectively Roman and Christian words to describe smallfolk. Paganus meant villager, from Pagus – meaning rustic settlement. Heathen referred to One of the Heath, the hinterland, the wilderness. Anyone calling himself a follower of the Old Ways doesn’t get to be an entitled, elitist snotnosed sack. Everyone, without exception, has their place in the fabric of Wyrd. But it is unreasonable to believe everyone is automatically going to ascend to the top shelf. Again. Without a hoi polloi, there could be no warrior. Sparta tried, Sparta died. The Romans kept the last Spartans in a kind of anthro-zoo and studied them. Can you think of anything more demeaning for a warrior race? If you are a citizen, that is still something to be proud of. It was just as incumbent upon the citizen to carry chivalric orders as the knight, if there was to be a kingdom worth defending.

 I think in many cases, the obsession with heroism can be, ironically, tacked onto a kind of spiritual laziness. To live in the humdrum world is toil, and work. Like the Gods of Babel, many don’t have the endurance. The idea of explosive, energetic conquest disinters one from the ideal of endless toil. The hero is summarised by his action, and not his process. It is the same reason I think the Doomsday Fetish is so vaunted amongst many disenchanted souls. Nobody talks about the afterparty, though. Just the escape from the mundane. Does anyone ever stop to think that, at one point, warriors that outlive their sword get old and sit around in easy chairs. Like that one king from the Jewish bible there, the one that did like, one real good conquest, and then go tlazy. When Ehud murdered him his sword arm went up to the elbow in viscera, it’s said, poor bastard couldn’t get the sword back. That’s a lot of retirement benefits. Insult to injury, dude’s assistants thought he was on the commode and left it alone. Big oof. Not what you’d think of as a warrior death, more like an ancient Elvis death sans peanut butter. No. The answer is no. Nobody thinks like that. Because the warrior, the hero, is associated with his action and not his process. The “Way” of the Warrior is never as popular as the warrior himself. But, again, anybody can learn from “the Way” even if they never go to war. Might help keep them from being stabbed in the retirement home by Jewish assassins. Sorry. Hebrew… Israelite, whatever – they tell me the Jews didn’t exist yet. Or was that Solomon? You know what, I don’t care anymore. If any C.I. are reading, go ahead and fix my O.T. timeline.

So you see, there is pride of place. Nobody is without their higher role, and sometimes that involves being the best of where you are. Because, really, whoever has decided they are a warrior, hero or champion and thus better than you, is ever going to stoop to their perception of a lower level. And we all know what happens when there’s too many chiefs and not enough Indians. Nothing good. But the question of hypocritical elitist thinking is another point for another day.

 Wassail, errybuddy. Happy Wednesday, everybody.

…

…

More on Edward(s): links in italic.

Bit of History

Bit of Cult

Bit of Crown

More on H&R:

Hermann

Hermann & Radboud

…

…

From my gym…

…

…

From my OTHER blog… some sketches, drawings, etc. Check it out, or not. Boat? Dinghy.

Warrior sketches (link.)

Advertisement