The Ragnarök is an ancient story that describes the cataclysmic overthrow and death of those legendary Norse gods such as Thor, Loki, Freyr, Odin, and others in Norse mythology. According to the Ragnarök, the sun in those days lost its light and even the stars in the sky disappeared. People lived their lives in this unhappy gloom as if they were characters in a Lord Byron poem. At an appointed time, says the Ragnarök, powerful demons and giants were summoned from the four corners of the world for a final battle. Völuspá, aka (The) Sibyl’s Prophecy, which was written around the year 1000 A.D., predicted that as the demonic hordes gather and twilight approaches, winters will grow colder and the Kingdom will fall into moral decay. From this story, Götterdämmerung arises. A sample from the runes reads:

“Brothers will fight and kill each other,

sisters’ children will defile kinship.

It is harsh in the world, whoredom rife

—an axe age, a sword age—shields are riven—

a wind age, a wolf age—before the world goes headlong.

No man will have mercy on another.”

– Völva

Brothers killing brothers? Whoredom rife? Merciless men? A typical day in America.

According to the Sibyl, the gods will meet the legions from Hell bravely and engage them even as these Norse heroes of yore stumble to their knees and fall like dominos, never to rise again: Thor, Loki, Freyr, Odin, Týr, Heimdallr and their kind met their fate on this killing field even as Arthur and Lancelot likewise perished. But that was another battle and another prophecy.

False gods

There are false gods and then there is the true, triune God we know as Yahweh. False gods are often idols, fetishes, occasionally places, spirits, etc. who or which are credited with supernatural powers (See works by Johann Blumhardt, John Nevius, et al.) An example in the news recently is the “Seshyo-seki” or killing stone in Nikko National Park, Japan. The stone was believed to have imprisoned a fox spirit which is now on the the loose since the stone broke apart. The relationship between touching the stone and being stuck dead has not been empirically demonstrated, however. Meanwhile, any powers from such pagan artifacts come from the beliefs of the people and the homage paid to the resident spirits. Certainly not because of any deity present by any means. You cannot compare God to the devil or demons because God is, and these cheap imitations (knockoffs) are created beings. Created beings who will someday bow at the name of Jesus (Philippians 2:10, 11.)

Götterdämmerung II?

Most countries have a personification as part of their national identity. For England, it is Britannia. For France, it is a revolutionary spirit (in a very general sense of the word) named Marianne. Then there is Mother Russia, Hellas and Europa for Europe. The United States has Columbia. Some countries have patron saints. And each of these personifications has a past, a personality that is unique to the history and aspirations of that nation. This is not to be confused with national caricatures such as John Bull or Uncle Sam.

Certainly, Britannia and Columbia are not gods or demons, but they are our heroines, nevertheless. Given the somber mood today as the people of Ukraine are suffering under the boots of Russian, Chechen, Syrian and mercenaries affiliated with the Wagner Group, as brothers fight to kill their brothers and man has no mercy on his fellow man, I thought of Richard Wagner, the composer so popular during the Third Reich. He is best known for his “Ring” series set to opera, namely “Der Ring des Nibelungen,” which was loosely based on Ragnarök. Then, I thought of the related theme Twilight of the gods. Can there be a contemporary application of this today?

I wondered about Putin’s threat of nuclear war, where some nations (i.e., heroines) might fall in battle like the Norse heros of old. PIcture a mortally wounded Columbia, or a Europa on her knees struggling to breathe. Certainly in that case, Mother Russia might also perish as surely as Freyr. Imagine being persued on a field of battle. You, the last warrior standing, with no where to hide. Are we staring into the face of our own twilight of the gods? Into Nietzsche’s abyss? Is a political realignment currently in the making even as an economic realignment is taking shape? Hopefully, dear Lord, there will be no nuclear doomsday, but the fact remains that nations (Britain, America, China) rise while other empires (Egypt, Babylon, Greece, Rome, Portugal, Spain) fall.

There was an ancient legend in Jewish mythology that said that each nation on earth had an angel that stood with the angels of other nations before God’s throne. As one angel fell out of favor, so did his country (or maybe it was the other way around.) Of course, that is what’s called sympathetic magic (“as above, so below”) and we as Christians disown that. But the imagery is striking in any event.

Slouching towards Gomorrah

This essay is just an exercise in speculation. Yet, these are dangerous times. The real final battle will be as it was revealed to the Apostle John at Patmos and in the book of Revelation. In that battle, the forces of good overcome the forces of evil. Yet, that battle may be centuries away, and strangely, America is absent from eschatological (end-times) prophecies. This has always made me wonder why. Maybe we’ll fall by the wayside long before then?

Still time to change

It is not too late to turn this planet, your country, your lives around from impending disaster, be it social, cultural, environmental, or nuclear. As the prophet Joel wrote long ago about another final battle:

“And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my Spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams, and your young men shall see visions. Even on the male and female servants in those days I will pour out my Spirit. “And I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke. The sun shall be turned to darkness, and the moon to blood, before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And it shall come to pass that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved.”

Joel 2:28-32