Goddess of the Week

This week's Goddess is the Norse grain Goddess Sif. This is the third time She has come up, having last appeared in October, and before that, as close to an exact year ago as possible, on last February 7th.

Sif was famed for Her beauty and Her long golden hair; She is usually taken to be a Goddess of the grain because of this. By an unnamed first husband She had a son, Ullr, the God of winter and skiing, Who inherited Her beauty; Her second husband was Thor, the thunder God. She was said to be a prophetess.

She is mainly known for the tale in which Loki, the troublemaker of the Gods, sneaked into Her chamber one night as She slept and cut off all Her hair. When She woke She was extremely upset; and it didn't take even Thor very long to figure out Who was behind it. So He set to threatening Loki, Who promised a replacement head of hair; this He got from the dwarves with a bit of conniving. They made it out of actual gold; but when given to Sif it magically grew to Her head just like real hair.

Her story can be seen as an allegory of the golden grain that is cut at its peak of ripeness and beauty.

There is a rumor floating about that She once had an affair with Loki; however as this rumor was also started by the selfsame Loki take it for what that's worth.

So. We have a Goddess associated with autumn or late summer, the harvest-time, showing up the first week of February, just like she did a year ago. I mean fair enough, Her showing up in October; that makes sense as far as harvests go. But now? And a year ago exactly, too?

Well, She is the mother of Winter, after all, Her son being Ullr, Whose name means 'Glory'. But that's up here, in Her north. In the southern hemisphere they have just passed Lughnasadh, the first of the harvest-festivals; perhaps Her presence this week is a reminder that as one part increases another decreases, the whole being held in perfect, living, balance.

So, then, look to the hidden, the corresponding equal and opposite reaction to what is going on with you, the negative space surrounding you, the invisible piece that completes. It is there, or the shadow of it is there; see if you can't get a good look at it, now. It is important to recognizing the wholeness of the situation and yourself, and for feeling supported. What feels like it is missing now? It is there, though not where you might look for it.

Sif is literally the mother of glory. What glorious work is being birthed by you right now? What glorious things surround you that you have perhaps not acknowledged? The sun is getting noticeably stronger now, up here in the north; and sunlight on snow can be dazzlingly bright. The darkness is beginning to lose its grip, though the cold will certainly be around a space longer, at least up here in New England. Still, it is the time of the year when we can first make out the light at the end of the tunnel.

Use your inner sight to see if you can make out these shadowy forms the light is now beginning to shine upon. Peer deep within the winter to see the seeds of spring.

She is canny, and shrouded in white:

The world begins in ice, in cold, in winter. I am winter's mother; how old does that make me then?

I See it all because I am older than it all. I see the unseen, the spark struck off ice to make fire, the living warmth within the animal, the woman hidden within the tree, the family gathered around the fire. All waiting to emerge, to come into being. In time.

But first, winter.

What do you think?

Goddess of the Week

Sif's name means 'kinswoman' or 'relative'; it is related to the English word sibling, meaning 'brother or sister.' The meaning of Sif's name is a little more precise, however; it is the singular (and Her name is the only time the singular is used) of the plural Old Norse noun sifjar, which means 'relatives by marriage.'

Marriage, not blood. In the myth, Sif is the mother of the God of Winter Ullr; His father is never named, just said to be a frost-giant. Her second husband, then, and the one She was most associated with, is the famous Thor. It is always very carefully pointed out that Thor is Ullr's step-father, and Ullr Thor's step-son.

Which all has to do with the complicated ways the Norse defined types of kinship; as far as I can tell, and I'm looking at this, as ever, through a very feminist lens, this particular and careful distinction was a way of favoring the male line over the female. Because Ullr's mother married Thor, Ullr's father was discounted, to the extent that He has remained nameless in myth.

I suppose one might argue that maybe Ullr's father was never named because it wasn't a big deal, and it was more important to identify Him with Sif; I don't think the Norse thought like that, though. I don't know how old Sif is within the culture, and it may be that the relative by marriage aspect of Her is the main or original one.

On the other hand, it would seem that Ullr, Whose name means 'Glorious One' was once a very important and very old God in the Norse pantheon, though by the time the sagas &c. were written down He is only sparsely mentioned. He was, like His mother, said to be very very beautiful. And it would make sense that a Very Important God like Ullr might just have a Very Important Mother; so perhaps all that past glory of Ullr's might also indicate a greater past measure of glory for His mother. By Thor Sif did have a daughter, Þrúðr (Thrúdr), Whose name means 'Strength;' whether that reflects on the mother's or father's strength I don't know.

The thing is there just isn't a whole lot known of Sif, beyond that She had the gift of prophecy, and that story about Loki cutting off Her long golden hair; it has been assumed that because of said hair She may have Her origins in a fertility Goddess, specifically a grain Goddess.

And it does make sense that Sif, the Goddess of the Grain and its harvest, which happens in autumn, would give birth to Ullr, Winter.

Now, Her appearance this week may be just another note to add to the ongoing theme of harvest, going on in the Northern Hemisphere at this time; it would certainly be timely. And that may be what's going on in the background of things, in a sort of general sense.

But given all I just wrote above, I'm inclined to wonder about how autumn gives birth to winter; how one season transforms into the next. Samhain, after all, which is only a couple weeks away now up here in the north, is when autumn turns to winter, life into death; that moment of liminality, literally that threshold. It's not here quite yet, but Autumn is pregnant with Winter now; Life is pregnant with Death.

Autumn thoughts, I suppose. I'd pay attention this week, though. I know these are the usual questions asked at this time: What is dying? What is being harvested? What dies now so you will live through the Winter?

And questions of family, too, especially the chosen family (even if you are not the one who did the choosing), the in-laws, the stepchildren. I am tempted to expand it out to your chosen family, the friends you consider family; but I think the definition here is actually the narrower one, going by the precision implied in Sif's name.

Also, and this is fairly random but is nagging at me to let it come through, perhaps do some scrying this week. Not just because Samhain, or Beltaine, is coming, but because of Sif's status as seeress.

Let's see if She can offer any clarification:

I am Mother of Strength and of the hard hard Winter. Beautiful, glorious, formidable, ice cold Winter. Our word for Earth up here? Is Rind, the Frozen One. That is the first state of things, and it will be the last.

The warmth you would find you must make yourself. The warmth you must have to survive you must make yourselves. Make it between and among you. Do not be fooled by my beautiful golden hair, my maiden appearance, my thundering husband Who drowns out my voice. I know more than he does. True, it is not difficult. But my first husband, my first love, was a creature of the ice and frost.

My hair curls like the precious breath that comes from the warm mouths of you fragile fragile humans. Yet that breath is strong; unbreakable Gleipnir was made in part from breath, was it not? And that will only break at the end of the world.

Which is coming, and is here now, and has passed.

Goodness. What do you think?



References:

The Category of Affinity (Mágsemð) in the Old Norse Model of Family Relations, by Fjodor Uspenskij

An Introduction to Viking Mythology, by John Grant

Goddess of the Week

Sif is a Norse Goddess Who is commonly assumed to be a grain or fertility Goddess. This is because She was famous for having very beautiful golden hair which reached all the way to the floor; this abundance of flowing gold has been equated with the ripe grain.

She was married to the Thunder-God Thor, who was Her second husband; by Her first husband, one of the Jötnar, or Frost Giants, She had had a son Ullr ("Glory"), the God of winter, hunting, and skiing.

Sif was very beautiful anyway, but Her extraordinary hair put Her over the top; and not surprisingly, She could be rather vain about it.

Now Loki, the God of mischief and fire, saw this; and always being one to mess with perfection, He snuck into Sif's chambers one night. Without waking Her somehow, He chopped all of Her beautiful hair off, leaving Her with a terribly unflattering, and rather uneven, buzzcut.

When Sif woke She was quite distressed, both by the loss of Her wonderful hair and the assault on Her person; and when Her husband Thor found out, all Hel broke loose, at least for Loki.

A good deal of roughing up later, Thor extracted a solemn promise from Loki that He would somehow restore Sif's hair. So Loki went to one of the dwarfs (Oh! Ow! As a Tolkien fan it really hurts to spell that plural correctly, especially given that the dwarf in question was named Dvalin), who were known for their outstanding ability in crafting things. He not only convinced Dvalin to make a new head of hair for Sif out of real gold, but also persuaded him to make a magic spear, Gungnir, and a magic ship, Skidbladnir. Loki was so impressed by both the dwarf's ability and gullibility that He decided to use these new wonderful things to trick an unrelated family of dwarfs to make their own, better, even more wonderful things.

Now this is Sif's story, not Loki's; but suffice to say that Loki's tricksiness almost cost Him His head, and He had to do a fair amount of undignified weaseling to get Himself out of it. As usual.

When He finally brought back the crafted golden hair, it immediately and magically affixed itself to Sif's head, and thereafter grew just like real hair.

One of the important points of that whole story is that that one impulse of Loki's--the one that could not stand stasis and perfection--led to greater rewards than He or anyone could have imagined.

Well, except maybe Sif Herself. For She is said to have possessed prophetic powers; and one wonders just how much She knew of the events that would be set in motion by the loss of Her hair. Myths about grain do tend to involve themes of sacrifice, as the grain is cut when ripe, at its prime; and given the famously poor soil of Scandinavia and the short growing season they must have being so far north, I'm not surprised that in the myth the price of the cut hair, that which is required to balance the loss, is so great.

So what does this card have to teach us this week?

I am a cautious type, myself, so I am reluctant to recommend schemes of the cockamamie kind; but were it not for Loki pushing His luck, and then being forced to His wits' ends when His scheming backfired, the results would not have been anywhere near as wonderful.

I don't know. On the one hand Sif is the catalyst, the perfection that brings about the balancing act of chaos, the still point that demands movement and change; but in framing it that way there is then an element of temptation, and of blaming Her as the victim for what Loki of His own free will chose to inflict on Her.

What does She say?

Don't bet on it. This is about the flow of riches, and can even represent changing a career; it will work out in the long run, but the short run is Hel. How much did I know? All of it, of course. Knowing it does not mean not reacting, though; I still cried when my hair was cut. A loss is still a loss, even in the name of the longer arc, the long view. Do not expect that you will not mourn these things.

But still, things will turn out better than you would have imagined, and when you look back on it all you will find one thing feeding into and leading into another, and it will all make sense. You must have faith in this, that you will see the pattern and the flow in the end; for you will not see it now.

I'm not sure what to do with that. It comes down to trust and faith, I guess, a good reminder to those of us stuck in the last half of a long winter; those of you in the southern hemisphere may perhaps relate better to the theme of harvest that runs through Her story. Either way, there is turning and change, though it may have its ups and downs.

What do you think?

To read more about Her, go here.