Ragnarök

Ragnarök is by far the most misunderstood event within Norse mythology. It’s frequently misinterpreted as the eschatology or “end-times” of the Norse on account of the fact it involves a bloody war where all the forces of the world, including the gods, meet their demise. However, the word ‘Ragnarök’ simply means “the fate of the gods,” and the disaster it symbolizes is the result of the gods’ own actions.

The myth of Ragnarök begins with Odin consulting a seeress (völva) to learn what the future holds for the gods. The seeress gazes into the past, present, and future and describes what she sees. But the future is a harrowing sight: Balder is dead and Loki is bound in the earth; Fenrir is confined to the Ironwood, and the serpent Jormungandr encircles the earth. The serpent releases his tail from his mouth and causes the world to shake, freeing everything. All the dead rush from Helheim, all the fire-giants escape Muspelheim, and Loki and Fenrir break free from their prisons. All of them wage war against the gods. Loki rides to battle on the ship Naglfar, and he and Heimdall slay one another. Thor and Iormungand fight and kill each other. Odin is swallowed by the wolf Fenrir. The gods perish, the sun and moon are swallowed by wolves, and the cosmos crumbles into flames. The heavens sink into the ocean, and a new world is born from the wreckage.

Odin becomes fearful of this future. He’s especially terrified when one day Loki arrives home with three children he has with Angrboda—Hel, Iormungand, and Fenrir. These children are still small, but Odin nevertheless banishes them. He sends Hel to underworld, where she lives in a hall that collects the unhappy dead. He throws the tiny Jormungandr into the ocean, who eventually grows to immense size without their awareness. As for Fenrir, he is raised by Tyr for a while, until the Aesir grow wary of his size, strength, and pride. They bind Fenrir with Gleipnir, an unbreakable cord made of impossible things, and leave him in the Ironwood, where he grows more resentful with each passing day.

The Aesir then continue their lives in the same way they always had: By cheating, breaking oaths, and swindling the giants and dwarves out of their wealth, skills, time, and property. The Aesir threaten Loki’s to fix things every time his pranks cause problems. Eventually, Loki becomes so fed up with this treatment that his pranks turn malicious; he tricks Hod into killing Balder and afterwards slanders the gods publicly during a feast. Loki runs away but the gods capture him and bind him beneath the earth.

All of these behaviors eventually manifested the reality Odin sought to avoid. It was not the prophecy that brought about the downfall of the gods, but the conditions they created themselves based on their own greed and carelessness. Rather than being an end-times apocalypse, Ragnarök is a cautionary tale that warns us about the kinds of behaviors that lead to the disarray and eventual collapse of a society.