Our English word hell is connected with the goddess Hel,[[77]] and to kill is in Norse at slaa ihel (i-Hel). The faith in this goddess is not yet perfectly eradicated from the minds of the people. Her dog is yet heard barking outside of houses as a warning that death is near. She wanders about from place to place as a messenger of death. In the story of Olaf Geirstada-alf it is a large ox, that goes from farm to farm, and at his breath people sink down dead. In the popular mind in Norway this messenger of death is sometimes thought to be a three-footed goat, and at other times a white three-footed horse. To see it is a sure sign of death. When a person has recovered from a dangerous illness, it is said that he has given Death a bushel of oats, for her wants must be supplied, and Hel wandering about in the guise of a goat, ox or horse, may accept oats as a compromise.
It may also be noticed here, that the so-called Black Plague, or Black Death, that ravaged Norway as well as many other European countries about the middle of the fourteenth century, assumed in the minds of the Norsemen the form of an old hag (Thok, Hel, Loke), going through the realm from parish to parish with a rake and a broom. In some parishes she used the rake, and there a few were spared; in other parishes she used the broom, and there all perished, and the parishes were swept clean.
SECTION V. THE NORSEMEN’S IDEA OF DEATH.[[78]]
The Norse mythology shows that our ancestors had a deeply-rooted belief in the immortality of the soul. They believed in a state of retribution beyond the grave. The dissolution of the body was typified by Balder’s death, and like the latter it was result of Loke’s malignity, just as the devil brought death upon Adam and Eve, and through them upon all mankind.
But while we find the belief in the imperishableness of the soul firmly established, the ideas regarding the state of existence after death were somewhat unsettled. We are soon to present the Eddaic doctrines of future life, but in connection with Hel it seems proper to give some further explanation of the ideas that our forefathers entertained of death. Hel’s gate is open, or ajar, said the old Goths, when the shades of death went out through the darkness of night and terrified all; but it is also open to receive the child with rosy cheeks as well as the man with hoary locks and trembling gait.
The future state was regarded as a continuation of our earthly existence. This is proved by the custom so prevalent among the Norsemen of supplying the dead with the best part of their property and the first necessities of life. A coin was put under the dead man’s tongue, that he might be able to defray his first expenses with it on his way to his final abode. Of course the dead went either to Odin or to Hel, but the relation between Valhal and Helheim presented difficulties which the Norsemen strove in various ways to solve. It was said that they who are slain in battle go to Odin in Valhal, while those who die of sickness or old age go to Hel in Helheim. But according to this it would be the kind of death alone which decided the soul’s future state; only those who fell by weapons would ascend to the glad abodes of heaven, while all who die of sickness would have to wander away to the dark world of the abyss, and there were people in whose eyes nothing except warlike deeds was praiseworthy. But the Odinic mythology, taken as a whole, presents a different view, although it must be admitted, as has before repeatedly been stated, that bravery was a cardinal virtue among our Norse ancestors.
We remember, from a previous chapter in this book, that the spirit or soul of man was a gift of Odin, while the body, blood and external beauty were a gift of Loder, who afterwards separated from the trinity of Odin, Hœner and Loder and became the mischievous Loke. Thus the soul belonged to the spirit-world, or Heaven, and the body to the material world, to the Deep. The two, soul and body, were joined together in this earthly life, but at its close they were separated, and each returned to its original source. The soul, with its more refined bodily form in which it was thought to be enveloped, went to the home of the gods, while the body, with the grosser material life, which was conceived to be inseparable from it, went to the abodes of Hel to become the prey of Loke’s daughter. Thus man’s being was divided between Odin and Hel. Odin, whose chief characteristic was god of war, seems to have claimed his share chiefly from those who fell in battle; and this probably may suggest to us some reason why Balder went to Hel. Balder is not a fighting god, he only shines, conferring numberless blessings on mankind, and death finally steals upon him. Odin seems not to have much need of his like. Thus death by arms came to be considered a happy lot, by the zealous followers of the asa-faith, for it was a proof of Odin’s favor smiling upon them. He who fell by arms was called by Odin to himself, before Hel laid claim to her share of his being; he was Odin’s chosen son, who with longing was awaited in Valhal, that he, in the ranks of the einherjes, might assist and sustain the gods in their last battle, in Ragnarok. In accordance with this theory we find in the ancient song of praise to the fallen king Erik Blood-ax, that Sigmund asks Odin this question:
Why snatch him then, father,
From fortune and glory?
Why not leave him rather