Forseti - God Of Justice

Throughout history we see that the sence of justice among the many cultures of the world varies a lot and it has been evolving fortunately. One of the first peoples to seek justice in a reasonable way without bloodshed, where the Greeks, but it took a lot of time and effort to change an entire culture in accepting a peaceful way to do justice. But justice has been among us in many forms, not all of them had blood involved and speaking of the Norse peoples, one way to do justice without bloodshed was to ban the convicted from the society, away from any social grounds, sent to the unknown and dangerous wild world. The convicted had to rely on him/her self and couldn't come closer to any village, if the person did so, those who saw the convicted could hunt him/her, the law/rules stated that. This is actually one of the most ancient types of justice without spilling blood, ancient humans from the paleolithic  and neolithic did this.

Anyway, justice is a common thing that we all seek and all cultures had at least one deity of justice. To the Norse, that deity is Forseti. We all need justice, the world it self and nature, seeks justice.

Justice is often a feeling you are eager to "feed" because it asks for it, but you want it to calm down and be at peace, and in order to do that, you have the need to seek out that peace, you need to finish all the business, so you can go forth with your life. Nothing will please you more, then having justice done when some wrong was given to you, deep inside we all know what justice means and when to seek it, and why, but we have to think deep on it, without casting yourself in madness and anger.

Forseti is the Norse god of justice and also judgment, reconciliation and mediation. He is the son of Baldr the god of light, beauty, naivity and innocense, and his mother is Nanna. His hall is called Glitnir, the hall of justice, which I have written about in another post about the places and halls of Asgard. Unlike Tyr who is also a god of justice but turned to warfare judgments, Forseti is the god who helps in all kinds of problems dealing with the law, mutual respect, mediation, fair agreements and so on. Being able to judge and resolve problems so that both parties leave his hall satisfied.

They chose the latter, and prayed for help as they drifted. According to the story, a thirteenth man suddenly appeared on their boat with a golden axe over his shoulder. He steered the boat using his axe as a rudder and brought them to land, then split the land with his axe and a spring came forth. He identified himself as Fosite, taught them all new laws, and then vanished. The shrine was later defiled by St. Willebrord.

Historically speaking, there are some evidence that the worship of this deity came from the Persians, sea people who spread this cult to others. It is thought that there was once a shrine to Forseti on an island between Denmark and Frisia. There is a legend involving the cult of this deity and the Frisians. The Frankish king Charles Martel wanted to change the laws of the Frisians so he turned to the law-speakers of that people and forced them to conform to his laws of they would be killed or turned into slaves, but there was another option, being set adrift in a boat on the ocean. Their fate was the latter, being adrift in the ocean. These were twelve men praying for help while their way in the vast ocean was uncertain. According to the legend a thirteenth man appeared to them, on their boat, wielding a golden axe. He helped the men and brought them to land where he split the land with his great axe and a spring came forth, which the men made it a shrine to this figure who later told them that his name was Forsite, a Frisian deity. He taught them new laws and then he disappeared.

Forseti is one of the youngest deities in the Norse pantheon, all the older Aesir gods are turned to war, vengeance and magic. Forseti marks the changing of the minds of the Norse people, when reason started to come before the deadly stroke of a sword.

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Conversion of Scandinavia and Olaf Tryggvason

Charlemagne was the king who helped christianity spread more quickly through Europe, by force, by his armys and slaughtering many who wanted to keep their old faith and the beliefs of their ancestors. After his death, the empire that Charlemagne created, started to fragment, and so for a time people stood still and there was a considerable peace, the Frisians had been converted to christianity and the Franks had their own empire by the cost of many inocent lifes. There was peace now in the countries of scandinavia.


Along the ninth century, churchmen were afraid from the people of the north that still remained faithful to the old gods, and so they prayed to be relieved and be guarded from the fury of the vikings, that to these churchmen,  the peoples of the north were even more terrifying because they weren't christians, they were heathens, and for the church, these pagan people worshiped the devil and themselves were demons.


As the north countries and its people began to settling instead of raiding and pillaging, the church saw this as a good opportunity to bring the new faith into their northen neighbors, and many norse princes that were in refuge from the wars with the south and with the christians, saw this as a good  opportunity as well, because they realized that conversion to the religion of the kings with whom they had taken refuge, could win them suppot and alliance.


Denmark was the first country to fall under the new faith, king Harald Bluetooth took christianity and imposed it to his people, those that did not want to embrace this new faith and refused the orders of Harald, were forced to do so.


In Norway, at this time, an other king called Harald Hairfair, remained heathen to his death, however, he had many sons who fought over the kingship and sometimes they found in the christian alliances a very useful tool to ascend the throne.
The oldest of his sons, Eric bloodaxe was baptized with his wife, during their exile in the viking lands of England. Harald's youngest son, called Hakon, was fostered by King Aethelstan of England, who raised him as a christian. Harald's great-grandson, Olaf Tryggvason, was introduced to christianity, when he was still a very young man, when he took refuge in Russia. After taking power in Norway, all these kings tried to impose the new religion to their countrymen.


Hakon was the only one of these kings, to be tolerant, and the only one to be called "the good". Hakon was called to the throne by the heathen jarl, when his older brother, Eric, proved to be a tyrant, so king Hakon was indeed a good king, he respected the rights of his own people. When he told his people that they should be converted to chirstianity, they responded that they thought he was bringing them freedom, but now he wanted to take them prisoners into a new and strange religion, and made them forget the beliefs of their ancestors. The people had so far tolerated their king's strange ways in a strange new religion, but wanted him to join them in the autumn feasts, and so he did, a christian amoung pagans, being friends and sharing the heathen drinks to Odin. So Hakon kept the loyalty of his people. He was such a great and good king, that after his death in the last battle, the skald Eyvind sang in the old faith about Hakon and his deeds in the poem called "Hakonarmál".


Olaf Tryggvason came to power, throughout these years, any men had allowed themselves to be baptized, in order to trade with the Christian Europe, or agreed to do so when they were forced by a christian overlord. Many chieftains welcomed christian missionaries and built churches to encounrage christian merchants to come and trade with them, but even baptized, the norsemen still returned to their old ways. King Olaf resolved to put an end to that, the people should be entirely christians, or no christians at all, the old gods and old faith, should be forgotten. Those that weren't persuaded by threats or promises, he slew them, some he maimed, and some he drove  away from the land. Olaf Tryggvason pillage the heathen temples and destroyed the images of the gods, those people who were considered to do magic, he drowned, or killed them by setting a bowl full of hot coals on their belly, for exemple, there was a chieftain who was killed by being forced to swallow a poisonous snake.


In the years that followed, the new religion was very much implemented on the land. Churches had been built on the old sacred places and above the mounds of the dead, on the sites of demolished pagan temples, and bishops became powers in the land. The holy feasts became saints' days.

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Forseti - God of Justice

We all need justice, the world it self and nature, seeks justice.

Justice is often a feeling you are eager to "feed" because it asks for it, but you want it to calm down and be at peace, and in order to do that, you have the need to seek out that peace, you need to finish all the business, so you can go forth with your life. Nothing will please you more, then having justice done when some wrong was given to you, deep inside we all know what justice means and when to seek it, and why, but we have to think deep on it, without casting yourself in madness and anger.
So this night i will talk about Forseti, the Norse God of Justice!

Who is Forseti ?

Forseti is the Norse god of justice, public judgment, mediation, and reconciliation. He is the son of Baldur, the god of Light, and his wife Nanna. He bears the axe as his symbol. His hall is Glitnir, the Hall of Justice, which is said to have golden pillars and a ceiling of silver, and radiated light for some distance. Folk of all kinds would come to Glitnir for mediation of their problems, and it was said that no one came away dissatisfied by Forseti’s judgments.
There is some evidence that the worship of Forseti came from Fosite, a Frisian god. Forseti’s name is something of a mystery – it may come from the word for “presiding” or “president”; it may come from “whirling stream” or “cataract” due to his worship by seagoing peoples, or it may come from “forbidding” or “ban”. Modern Icelandic bears a form of this name as the word for “president” today, a legacy of this God. (Another similarly constructed name, Veseti, means “person who is in charge of or presides over the ve” – the hallowed space.)
Supposedly, there was once a shrine to Forseti at a spring on an island between Denmark and Frisia, identified in one old source as Heligoland. In one legend, the Frankish king Charles Martel told the twelve Frisian law-speakers that they must conform to his laws or face death, slavery, or being set adrift in a rudderless boat on the ocean. They chose the latter, and prayed for help as they drifted. According to the story, a thirteenth man suddenly appeared on their boat with a golden axe over his shoulder. He steered the boat using his axe as a rudder and brought them to land, then split the land with his axe and a spring came forth. He identified himself as Fosite, taught them all new laws, and then vanished. The shrine was later defiled by St. Willebrord.

Forseti is one of the “younger” Gods of the Nordic pantheon, and it is telling that he is the son of one of the most famous murder victims in its history. Unlike other sons of Odin, or the older Gods, who embraced vengeance, Forseti turned to fair mediation in spite of his history of early pain. As a lawmaker and a lawspeaker, he embodies approaching wrongdoing as a complex, multilayered problem that requires humane solutions based on established laws rather than lashing out emotionally. Today, we need him more than ever in the battle against injustice.


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