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Author: C .T.

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Dominion (book) Emperor Julian So-called saints

Dominion, 4

Or:

How the Woke monster originated

For previous instalments of this series, see here, here and here.

When I first read Nietzsche when I was seventeen, I was very confused. At the time I wanted to rebel against my father’s traumatic Catholicism the way normies did and still do: through modern freethinker thought. I didn’t understand why Nietzsche fulminated against believers and non-believers alike. As a teenager, I never imagined that even the most militant atheists were still, axiologically, Christian.

I didn’t start to understand Nietzsche until, alarmed by the Islamisation of Europe, I read the aggregations of a Swede that I would eventually collect in the entry ‘The red giant’ (to honour Nietzsche, since 2021 this article has been available in German). The following quotes from Holland’s Dominion are taken from the chapter ‘Charity: AD 362’:

The shock of this cut Flavius Claudius Julianus [Emperor Julian] to the quick. The nephew of Constantine, he had been raised a Christian, with eunuchs set over him to keep him constant in his faith. As a young man, though, he had repudiated Christianity—and then, after becoming emperor in 361, had committed himself to claiming back from it those who had ‘abandoned the ever-living gods for the corpse of the Jew’. A brilliant scholar, a dashing general, Julian was also a man as devout in his beliefs as any of those he dismissively termed ‘Galileans’. Cybele was a particular object of his devotions. It was she, he believed, who had rescued him from the darkness of his childhood beliefs. Unsurprisingly, then, heading eastwards to prepare for war with Persia, he had paused in his journey to make a diversion to Pessinus. What he found there appalled him. Even after he had made sacrifice, and honoured those who had stayed constant in their worship of the city’s gods, he could not help but dwell in mingled anger and despondency on the neglect shown Cybele. Clearly, the people of Pessinus were unworthy of her patronage. Leaving the Galatians behind, he did as Paul had done three centuries before: he wrote them a letter.

‘My orders are that a fifth be given to the poor who serve the priests, and that the remainder be distributed to travellers and to beggars.’ Julian, in committing himself to this programme of welfare, took for granted that Cybele would approve. Caring for the weak and unfortunate, so the emperor insisted, had always been a prime concern of the gods. [pages 137-138]

One of the problems with us apostates from the Christian faith is that we fail to realise that this mania for helping the dispossessed is also Christian, even in non-Christian contexts. On this site, I have generally spoken well of Emperor Julian, but like all apostates, he probably never realised that, axiologically, he was still a Christian…

The heroes of the Iliad, favourites of the gods, golden and predatory, had scorned the weak and downtrodden. So too, for all the honour that Julian paid them, had philosophers. The starving deserved no sympathy… The young emperor, sincere though he was in his hatred of ‘Galilean’ teachings, and in regretting their impact upon all that he held most dear, was blind to the irony of his plan for combating them: that it was itself irredeemably Christian. ‘How apparent to everyone it is, and how shameful, that our own people lack support from us, when no Jew ever has to beg, and the impious Galileans support not only their own poor, but ours as well.’ [page 139]

The reversal of Greco-Roman values was already taking place at the time of the reign of the house of Constantine, i.e. the descendants or relatives of the first Christian emperor.

The wealthy, men who in previous generations might have boosted their status by endowing their cities with theatres, or temples, or bath-houses, had begun to find in the Church a new vent for their ambitions. This was why Julian, in a quixotic attempt to endow the worship of the ancient gods with a similar appeal, had installed a high priest over Galatia and urged his subordinates to practise poor relief. Christians did not merely inspire in Julian a profound contempt; they filled him with envy as well. [page 140]

There was no human existence so wretched, none so despised or vulnerable, that it did not bear witness to the image of God. Divine love for the outcast and derelict demanded that mortals love them too… ‘The bread in your board belongs to the hungry; the cloak in your wardrobe to the naked; the shoes you let rot to the barefoot; the money in your vaults to the destitute.’ The days when a wealthy man had only to sponsor a self-aggrandising piece of architecture to be hailed a public benefactor were well and truly gone. [pages 140-141]

In the following pages, Holland informs us that the quixotic Emperor Julian perished fighting the Persians, and gives us further evidence of how values were reversed:

And if so, then Martin—judged by the venerable standards of the aristocracy in Gaul—represented a new and disconcerting breed of hero: a Christian one. Such was the very essence of his magnetism. He was admired by his followers not despite but because of his rejection of worldly norms. Rather than accept a donative from Julian, he had publicly demanded release from the army altogether. ‘Until now it is you I have served; from this moment on I am a servant of Christ.’ Whether indeed Martin had truly said this, his followers found it easy to believe that he had… By choosing to live as a beggar, he had won a fame greater than that of any other Christian in Gaul… [pages 146-147]

No longer was Greco-Roman statuary, which so beautifully displayed the superb Aryan beauty, the benchmark for honouring the Aryan Gods. Now that the god of the Jews was in charge, it was necessary to admire their antithesis:

The first monk in Gaul ever to become a bishop, he was a figure of rare authority: elevated to the heights precisely because he had not wanted to be. Here, for anyone bred to the snobbery that had always been a characteristic of Roman society, was shock enough. Yet it was not only the spectacle of a smelly and shabbily dressed former soldier presiding as the most powerful man in Tours that had provoked a sense of a world turned upside down, of the last becoming first… As a soldier, though, he did have his heavy military cloak; and so, taking out his sword, he cut it in two, and gave one half to the beggar. No other story about Martin would be more cherished; no other story more repeated. This was hardly surprising. The echo was of a parable told by Jesus himself. The setting, as recorded in Luke’s gospel… [pages 147-149]

This image in a museum in Bamberg, Germany, which also appears in full colour in Holland’s book, shows Christ watching Martin sharing his cloak with a beggar. Holland then takes us to the year 394 to discuss the conduct of a billionaire, Meropius Pontius Paulinus:

Paulinus would present himself as a visual reproach to their extravagance. Pale from his sparse diet of beans, and with his hair roughly cropped like a slave’s, his appearance was calculated to shock. His body odour too. In an age when there existed no surer marker of wealth than to be freshly bathed and scented, Paulinus hailed the stench of the unwashed as ‘the smell of Christ’. [page 151]

As Hitler saw, Christianity was a religion that introduced spiritual terror into the Aryan soul. In the following paragraphs Holland explains the causes of such behaviour in a Roman who would once have used his wealth to honour Aryan beauty:

…he [Paulinus] far preferred another passage from the gospels. The story had been told by Jesus of a rich man, Dives, who refused to feed a beggar at his gates named Lazarus. The two men died. Dives found himself in fire, while Lazarus stood far above him, by Abraham’s side… Such was the fate that haunted Paulinus—and that he was resolved at all costs to avoid. [page 153]

In the final pages of the chapter, Holland informs us how the church reacted, thanks to the rationalisations of its African theologian, St Augustine, to reconcile the church’s love of riches with these Gospel passages. Yet Holland informs us that Clovis, the founder of the Merovingian dynasty, used to pray to St Martin: something which shows that even the most powerful warlord was already bowing down to a so-called saint.

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Peter Schiff

Bailouts will devalue the dollar

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Der Ring des Nibelungen

The Ring of the Nibelung, 14

Brunhild’s immolation

When Siegfried fell, pierced by Hagen’s weapon, everyone looked at each other in astonishment. No one could explain the iniquitous act of the prince’s half-brother. Only the prince knew the murderer’s intentions. Under the pretext of avenging Brunhild, Hagen was killing the hero by wounding him in the back. Gunther did not agree with this sinister plan, but he was too weak to oppose the decisions of his devious half-brother. When he saw his stepbrother finally achieve his purpose, he could not hide his regret. He was convinced of Siegfried’s innocence. He knew that it had all happened because of the loss of the hero’s memory, caused by the filter that Hagen poured into the wine that Gutrune offered to the guest the day after his arrival when they prepared the intrigue.

The prince gave the order to bring the hero’s body to the palace. The march through the forest was slow. Before the funeral procession reached its destination, Hagen announced it with his hunting horn.

Gutrune waited for the sound of Siegfried’s horn to follow.

A few moments passed, and the waiting became anxious. With a horrible thought, the princess went out to meet the retinue and rushed weeping over the hero’s body. Then, standing before Gunther, she rebuked him fiercely:

“How could you do this, brother, to avenge the outrage done to your betrothed wife, you have killed the man who loved me!”

With a sad accent, the prince replied:

“Disbelieve yourself, sister: there was no outrage at all. Brunhild could not be my betrothed, for she was already Siegfried’s wife. All this is the work of our half-brother. The evil filter he poured into the wine you offered our guest caused him to lose all memory of his past. But he fell in love with you and offered to win his own wife for me. Having lost his memory, he acted like a blind child. So do not speak of revenge. I had no part in Siegfried’s death. I am incapable of such cowardly action as you suppose.”

At that moment Hagen stepped forward and said in a firm and imperious tone:

“No revenge was the motive for the hero’s death. A wild boar rammed him from behind and stuck its tusk into him.”

“You were the boar, traitor!” Gunther burst out then, at the height of despair. “You wounded him from behind to carry out your sinister plans! But you won’t get away with it, wretch! You will not seize the magic ring!”

“The ring is mine,” said Hagen. “It belongs to me by inheritance. It belonged to my father, Alberich; it was craftily taken from him by Wotan, and now I, his son, have it back; and it can never be taken from me!”

“You will not touch the hero’s hand!” said Gunther, standing up before his half-brother, as the latter, with the fury of a wild boar, thrust his sword through his chest, killing him. Gunther fell heavily, to the horror of his sister Gutrune.

At the sight of the prince’s fall, the bystanders made ready to take up their weapons, but Hagen stopped them with a resounding voice:

“With this sword, I will defend my rights; woe to him who dares to oppose my designs! He shall fall as Siegfried fell, and as my half-brother fell; no foe shall escape my hatred and the strength of my arm, now that I wield this invincible sword!”

The warriors, overpowered by the imperious tone of Alberich’s son, drew back in fear, while Gutrune continued to shed bitter tears over the corpse of her beloved.

Brunhild appeared, who had seen and heard everything from inside the palace. With slow steps, she approached the group with the expression of a sleepwalker.

Before the Valkyrie reached Siegfried’s body, Hagen tried to tear the ring from Siegfried’s finger. But the hero’s hand was raised threateningly, and the evil one recoiled in terror.

Amid the general stupor, Brunhild’s voice rose solemnly:

“Let the wailing and weeping to cease! gather together the oldest and most stout trunks! Light the most gigantic pyre that ages have seen, so that the glow of the flames that are to consume Siegfried’s body may reach Valhalla, and with the ruin of the divine abode bring about the twilight of the gods!”

When the first tongues of flame reached the hero’s corpse, Brunhild climbed up to the place where the body had been laid and took the magic ring. Turning to the waves of the river, on the banks of which the pyre was burning, the Valkyrie said aloud:

“Listen, daughters of the Rhine, listen! Soon the ring forged from the gold that has been taken from you will return to you. I will put it on my finger, and when my body, together with Siegfried’s, turns to ashes, advance over the remains of the bonfire and drag us all down into the murmuring waters…”

For long night hours, the logs burned. When the ashes of the hero’s and the Valkyrie’s bodies mingled with the last remnants of the burning logs, the waves of the Rhine surged towards the pyre.

Hagen, who had been attentive, rushed forward in search of the ring before the waters carried it away. But at that moment the Rhine daughters rushed forward and swept him to the bottom of the river. Thus perished Hagen, the evil genius, swallowed by the waters, along with the ashes of Siegfried and Brunhild.

As the Valkyrie had foretold, the flames from the pyre reached the heavenly heights and set Valhalla on fire. The gods could do nothing to save the divine abode. Wotan watched the hurricane of destructive fire grow and pondered the causes and reasons for this ruinous end.

The perfidy of men had also taken hold of the minds and hearts of the gods. He himself had been unjust, driven more than once by anger. Now he saw Valhalla collapsing, consumed by the fire of evil passions. With the last glow of the fire in the high abode of the gods, the gods were entering their final decline. The darkened world had only the hope of a new dawn.

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How this crisis could play out

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Der Ring des Nibelungen Videos

The Ring of the Nibelung, 13

Siegfried’s death

Everyone waited anxiously for Siegfried to explain the valkyrie’s accusation, but the hero stated emphatically:

“I swear that what Brunhild says is false!”

So saying, he gave his arm to Gutrune, and the two lovers made their way to the palace, followed by a court of ladies and gentlemen.

On the terrace stood Hagen, Gunther and Brunhild.

Gunther looked dazed. His eyes questioned his half-brother, who had remained unmoved until then, and Hagen thought it was time to strike the decisive blow against the hero. He approached Brunhild and whispered in her ear:

“If you trust me, you can have your revenge.”

“You don’t know who he is. You can never harm him.”

“I am not ignorant of his courage and strength, but he will have some weaknesses.”

“He is invulnerable from the front. Only from behind can he be hurt; but he never turns his back on the enemy.”

The feast lasted all night. Great bonfires were lit, and the time passed with singing, shouts of joy, and libations of wine and mead in honour of Siegfried and Gutrune.

At dawn, Hagen organised the hunt according to his sinister plan. He would kill Siegfried from behind and claim that the hero’s death had been caused by a wild boar’s lunge.

The morning was cold. The air was dry and biting. The Rhine looked like a broad silver ribbon in the pale light of dawn.

The hunting party set off into the forest, preceded by the eagerly running dog tracks, tracking the prey.

Siegfried led the way. As soon as he saw the silhouette of a bear he broke away from the group and ran in pursuit of the beast with his bow drawn, ready to shoot the flying arrow. He passed through thickly wooded areas in pursuit of the bear, and after a strenuous march, he found himself back on the river bank. He sat down to rest and watched the eddies formed by the current as it crashed against the rocks. Suddenly the hero saw a blonde hair emerge from one of the reefs. It was Flosshilde, one of the Rhine’s daughters, who began to swim facing the rising sun. After a few moments, Siegfried heard the voice of the undine calling to her sisters:

“Come, the sun is up, its rays are warm! Come out, sisters, from the bottom of the river, which no longer has the gleam of gold since it was taken from us!”

The group of undines then emerged from the bottom of the father Rhine, and their hair looked like rivers of gold on the silvery waters.

Siegfried gazed at them in rapt attention, and to attract their attention he sounded his hunting horn.

“Welcome the hero!” cried Flosshilde.

“Let him come to the shore!” cried Woglinde.

“Let him give us back the ring!” added Wellgunde.

So said the daughters of the Rhine, as they swam towards the shore.

“Are you the ones who hid the bear I was chasing? When it reached the river, the bear disappeared as if by magic.”

The undines made their noisy laughter heard. They mocked the hero.

“What reward will we get if we give you back your prey?”

“I have nothing to offer you. I never carry anything with me.”

“What about the ring that glitters on your finger?” Wellgunde boldly suggested?

“Yes, that’s right! Give us the ring on your hand!” repeated the Rhine’s daughters in chorus.

“To get the ring,” answered Siegfried, “I had to face a terrible dragon.”

“How could you steal it?”

“I did not steal it. I took it from him.”

“We don’t believe you, Siegfried. It is no easy thing to snatch a ring from a terrible dragon.”

“True: it was not easy for me. The struggle was tremendous. More than once I thought I would succumb: but I finally defeated him, and now his body lies at the entrance to his horrible cavern.”

“How? Did you slay the dragon?”

“Yes, it was the only way to get hold of the ring.”

“Oh! And did you touch its blood?”

“Yes, I dipped my lips in it; that’s why I understand the language of the bird of the forest.”

“Poor Siegfried!”

“Unhappy hero!”

“What fate awaits you!”

So said the undines, pitying the sad end that awaited the invincible hero. The latter did not understand their lamentations and asked:

“Ah, you want to trick me into getting rid of it!”

“It is true what we say! That ring was made with the gold that Alberich stole from us. When it was stolen from him, the Nibelung put a curse on anyone who came into possession of it. You snatched it from the dragon; well, you must get rid of it before the misfortune that hangs over your head threatens to cut the thread of your life.”

Hearing the story and the threat contained in the tremendous prophecy, Siegfried was irritated. Unfamiliar with fear, it was not easy to make him believe in misfortunes near or far and in dangers present or future. Rather, he believed that all the chatter of the undines was intended to convince him to part with the ring forged from the gold of the Rhine, stolen from his sister nymphs.

He stood arrogantly on the rock and replied to the three swimmers:

“Your prophecy does not frighten me. I will never part with the ring.”

“Reflect, Siegfried! Our prophecy will be fulfilled. The ring brings misfortune. Throw it into the waves. The river-father will thus regain the gold that was taken from him, and you will be able to ward off the curse.”

“I have fought the dread dragon for the jewel; I have broken the spear of a god with the sword that I tempered myself; so shall I win and come out victorious from the plot of fate.”

“Pride blinds you, Siegfried. You are an invincible hero, you have broken the spear of Wotan; but you cannot escape your destiny, which is preparing a fateful end for you.”

“The dragon also spoke to me thus, but I cut off his talk with the edge of my sword. In the same way, I shall be able to defend myself against my enemies.”

“Is this your last word, and shall we return to the sad depths, orphaned of the gleam with which the gold that was taken from us illumined it?”

“Neither flattery nor threats, neither augury nor doom, can determine me to give you back the ring that shines in my hand. That is my will.”

In the face of this unexpected refusal, the undines, saddened, decided to sink once more into the waters of father Rhine. Before disappearing, they sang, in a sorrowful voice, a song that sounded to the hero’s ears like the prelude to a funeral march:

Fate has woven the web
from which no one can escape;
not even the hardest heroes
its iron meshes can break.

Thou, Siegfried, hast tempered a sword,
and with it you slew the dragon;
but the ring that is in thy hand
carries with it a curse.

The day is at hand
for the death that awaits you.
Soon your body will be ashes
in the flames of high fire.

Siegfried listened for a long time to the chorus of the Rhine daughters, until the voices were drowned out by the muffled murmur of the river waves.

Suddenly there came the echoes of hunting horns. The hero then decided to re-join his companions. He went back into the forest and, guided by the sound of the horns, came to a clearing in the jungle, where the other hunters were waiting for him. He was greeted with shouts of joy and cordial words, which ceased when they realised that he had returned without having taken any game.

“You don’t have any prey?” asked Hagen, approaching him with mock friendliness.

“No, I can’t add to the morning’s haul. Perhaps I shall have better luck in the afternoon’s raid.”

“Tell us something of your life, Siegfried,” said one of the hunters.

“Tell us, tell us!” insisted the crafty Hagen, while prince Gunther made a gesture of displeasure. He knew that his half-brother was trying to make the hero talk to learn all his secrets.

Siegfried noticed that everyone was interested in his story and began to narrate. His memory was slowly clearing as the effects of the brew prepared by Hagen, which the hero had drunk the day before, mixed with the wine that Gutrune had offered him, were wearing off.

“I was born in the cave of a dwarf of the Nibelung stock, named Mime. He raised me with great care and taught me the art of metal smelting and steel tempering. He planned to make me strong and brave so that I could face the dragon of the forest. That dragon was the custodian of this ring and a magic helmet. When I reached the age when I could accomplish the task, Mime gave me two pieces of a sword. This had been my father’s; only with it, I could defeat the terrible dragon.

”The dwarf had tried many times in vain to put the two pieces together. When I had succeeded in remaking and tempering my father’s sword, Mime took me into the forest and pointed out the cavern where the ring and the helmet were. It was a hard fight with the dragon that guarded it.

”At last, I killed it, and my hand was bathed in its blood. As I brought it unwillingly to my lips, I had the impression that it increased the power of my senses. I realised that I understood the language of a forest bird. This bird guided me for a whole day through the forest. When we reached the foot of a high rock, it told me to climb to the top. In the middle of the path, a passerby stood in my way and tried to stop me. He blocked my way, but with a blow of my sword, I smashed his mighty spear to pieces. To reach the top I had to pass through a ring of fire, in the middle of which lay a sleeping maiden.”

Siegfried stopped again. A dense fog again obscured the panorama of his memories. Hagen then malignantly inquired:

“Did you wake the sleeper?”

“Not at once. I gazed at her for a long time. I took off her helmet. I kissed her on the forehead…”

“And you made her your wife, didn’t you?” insisted Hagen.

“Yes, I made her my wife and entrusted her with the ring when I left. But now I see that it must all have been a dream because the ring is still shining on my finger. I don’t understand! I don’t remember!”

“You didn’t come back after your departure? You didn’t take it off by force?”

“Yes! I remember now that I took it off violently. But why? Yes, yes, Brunhild is my wife! She is still waiting for me on the rock; I’m going to look for her!”

Remembering the name of his beloved, Siegfried set out at once. After a few steps, he thought he heard the voice of the forest bird. He stopped to listen, and at that moment Hagen approached him, wielding his javelin. With a mighty thrust, he hurled it at the hero’s back, and he fell like an oak cut down by lightning.

“Farewell, Brunhild!” were Siegfried’s last words.

 

Editor’s Note:

So the original story ends in tragedy, not drama, like Tolkien’s tale, published about a hundred years after Wagner began writing his tragedy.

‘Frodo’ (who in Tolkien’s tale looked about thirty years old; not the teenager that Peter Jackson filmed for an increasingly infantilised white audience) doesn’t throw the ring. The hero keeps it, with fatal consequences not only for himself but for all his kindred, as we shall see tomorrow.

(Remember that the music we hear in the clip above, Siegfried’s death and the funeral march by the end of Götterdämmerung, was played by the Nazis just after Hitler died. It was a sign of the dark blackness that would cover not only Germany, but the entire West.)

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Der Ring des Nibelungen

The Ring of the Nibelung, 12

The Betrayal

The days passed, slow and monotonous, and Brunhild waited anxiously for Siegfried’s return.

Attentive to the slightest rumour, she thought she heard every moment the distant sound of the Grane’s hooves. Deep melancholy darkened her face as she saw that her beloved was taking longer than promised.

One day she heard someone approaching on horseback. At once a Valkyrie appeared before her.

“Sister, have you come to visit me in disobedience to our father, or have you come down to earth with his permission? Has the wrath of the wrathful Wotan abated?”

“I have come down without permission to implore your help.”

“What is the matter?”

“Happiness no longer reigns in Valhalla. All is sadness up there. Over our father Wotan and all the gods, there is the anguish of great desolation.”

“I belong to the earth. The gods and Valhalla are indifferent to me. Besides, what can I do for the gods and the sons of the gods?”

Towards evening the sound of a horn was heard coming from the deep valley.

“Surely it must be Siegfried’s horn,” thought Brunhild. And her heart swelled at the impulse of her immense joy. She saw an arrogant figure advancing through the fire. It could be none other than her lover; what would be her astonishment when she saw that the features were not those of the hero!

“I have conquered the power of fire and conquered you!”

Thus spoke the stranger to her, taking her by the arm.

“Who are you, that you dare to approach the wife of the strongest hero in the land? My husband is Siegfried, and the ring he left me as a pledge of his love will give me strength to resist your daring.”

“I am Gunther, prince of the Gibichungs. I have conquered you and you will follow me. If that ring is an obstacle to my will, I will take it from you by force.”

Brunhild resisted bravely in order not to be deprived of the jewel, but her resistance was in vain.

The knight who claimed to be Prince Gunther was in fact, Siegfried. According to their pact, he had taken the countenance of his friend using the magic helmet. The hero, having forgotten all his past through Hagen’s brew, conquered Brunhild for the second time to hand her over to Gunther.

With desolation in her soul, the young woman descended into the valley followed by the false Gunther. In truth, he was on the bank of the river, in hiding.

Just as Brunhild was getting into the boat, the prince jumped on board and spread his sail. Meanwhile, Siegfried, who had returned to his true countenance, stood on the shore and watched the boat sail away. Then he embarked in a swift skiff and reached Gunther’s castle before the latter. Hagen greeted him with mock cordiality and asked him:

“Where is Brunhild?”

“She is in the boat with Gunther.”

“There were no problems?”

“None.”

“What did she say to the young man when she was found?”

“She resisted. She called out my name several times. But I don’t remember seeing her before.”

The hero made an effort to evoke something of his past and felt his mind grow duller and duller, like a morning with dense fog.

Then Gutrune arrived and laid her head on Siegfried’s chest. The latter was still enraptured by her through the effects of the sly Hagen’s brew.

“Sister!” said the latter to Gutrune, “if Gunther and Brunhild are coming, it is only right that you should call the people to come and meet them.”

“You are right, brother. All will rejoice noisily at the double marriage of their princes, Gunther to Brunhild, and Gutrune to Siegfried.”

On a mound, Hagen blew his horn.

From every corner of the land the villagers came so that when Gunther and Brunhild reached the boat, they were greeted with shouts of welcome.

The Valkyrie advanced towards the castle as if in a dream. She was as if disturbed.

“Hail, dear Brunhild,” exclaimed Gutrune, advancing towards her, “I am highly honoured to be your sister-in-law. I am sure my brother will make you happy.” Brunhild did not answer. She was as if stunned amid the crowd’s welcoming din.

Gunther took the floor to respond to her sister’s greeting:

“Hail Gutrune, to you and your noble husband Siegfried!”

At the sound of this name, Brunhild snapped out of her morass.

“Siegfried? Where is Siegfried?”

“I am here and welcome you, Brunhild.”

Brunhild looked into his eyes, amazed that her beloved could speak to her so coldly. As she looked at his hands, she discovered the ring that the false Gunther had taken from her a short time before.

“Ah, it was you! It was you, not Gunther, who broke through the circle of fire that protected me from intruders! You have conquered me twice! And for what? To give me to this presumptuous man, who has taken advantage of your fearlessness to make me his wife? And you lent yourself to this infamous game? Traitor! Infamous traitor!”

A surge of anger kindled in the hero’s fierce face as he heard these insults, but he could not understand why Brunhild said that he had conquered her twice. He remembered nothing of his former adventures. He strove to draw from the depths of his mind some light that would clear up the mystery. In vain!

Brunhild was weeping now. She wept bitterly. When Gunther approached her, she turned him away violently.

“Vile and cowardly,” she cried, rising with the ancient fierceness of the Valkyries, “this is a land of infamous traitors!”

“Why do you say that, Brunhild,” asked Siegfried; “why do you claim that I have conquered you twice?”

“Yes, one morning you woke me with a kiss on my forehead, and last night you tore off the ring that you yourself had left me as a pledge of your love.”

At those words, which the young woman uttered with a heart-rending accent, Gunther was startled. Gutrune was looking around, doubting everything, and Siegfried was still without understanding, without remembering.

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Friedrich Nietzsche

Postscript

I would like to add to what I said yesterday.

While it is true that suppressing the errors of both Wagner’s and Nietzsche’s worldviews, while assimilating their insights, produces a Hitlerian synthesis (by which I mean the critical view of Judeo-Christianity that the Führer confessed to his closest friends), the Wagner/Nietzsche thesis-antithesis was, and remains, extremely asymmetrical.

In my post yesterday I mentioned two German biographers of Nietzsche. I was referring to Curt Paul Janz and Werner Ross, whose voluminous treatises on the German philosopher’s life I own and are boring as hell, unless the reader has a passionate interest in Nietzsche’s tragic life (as I have). So, for those new to the subject, I recommend the more lyrical prose of an Austrian biographer of Nietzsche I have already linked to several times on this site. The Spanish translation of Werner Ross’ book, by the way, I read it all in 1995:

If there is one thing that emerges from all these biographies that I have read and conscientiously weighed up, it is the revelation that Christianity condemned Nietzsche, to use the poet-philosopher’s words, to a seventh solitude: absolute solitude that over the years annihilated him psychologically. That’s the tremendous asymmetry I was talking about, compared to the much famed and incredibly beloved Wagner by Europeans in general and Germans in particular. See for example this video about the famed composer:

One German gets all the glory and the other is condemned to the extent that nobody wants to listen to him, to the point of losing his mind. And it all has to do, of course, with the fact that the Aryans were Christians in the 19th century. And even in the 21st century the racial right loves those who echo Wagner’s anti-Semitism, but those who also blame Christianity are ignored.

As only a Hitlerian synthesis between Wagner and Nietzsche would save the white race, the Aryan man, still clinging to Christian ethics, is lost. He is like Siegfried whose potion made him lose his ancestral memory to the extent of betraying Brunhild, as we will see in my post tomorrow.

The dialectical synthesis I was talking about yesterday could only be realised if a substantial percentage of JQ-conscious Aryans were also conscious of the Christian Question. But there aren’t, and on the racial right I see no willingness whatsoever to put the religion of our parents in the dock.

Categories
Der Ring des Nibelungen

The Ring of the Nibelung, 11

Part Four: Twilight of the Gods

 
The Insidious Hagen

A deathly silence reigned in Valhalla. A sad autumn light illuminated the abode of the gods. A deep sorrow gripped their immortal souls. Wotan refused the mead and fruit that Freia insistently offered him. He was sure that the hour of his death and the extinction of the divine lineage was at hand. He, the king of the gods, realised that for a long time he had nourished desires and envy and had acted in anger, like a common mortal.

What about the Nibelung Ring, had he done anything to restore it to the undines of the Rhine? Disguised as a wayfarer, he had tried to stop Siegfried in his ascent, but the latter had broken the mighty spear of the god. With the fragments of the spear in his hands, Wotan brooded over the past, awaiting the fatal hour of the ruin of Valhalla and the twilight of the gods.

Meanwhile, down below, on the earth, in a rocky cavern, Siegfried and Brunhild lived happily. Brunhild had given the hero the horse Grane, which had lost, along with her, its divine properties and therefore could not fly above the clouds.

Time passed slowly and smoothly for them, but Siegfried could not bear the quiet life and decided to run away for the world.

When he took leave of Brunhild, the hero entrusted her with the ring he had found in Fafner’s cave. He embarked on a great ship and sailed up the Rhine. He carried the Valkyrie’s horse and the magic helmet.

To live more safely and free from intruders, the Valkyrie preferred to wait for her beloved on the hilltop, surrounded by the ring of fire, as when she was asleep.

Along the course of the Rhine stretched the kingdom of the Gibichungs, ruled by Prince Gunther, a weak and vain man. His sister Gutrune, an unattractive young woman, lived with him.

When Siegfried’s boat arrived at the castle of King Gunther and Gutrune, the hero blew his horn. He was met by Hagen, the prince’s half-brother, a crafty man, fearsome for his cunning. He knew from his father, the Nibelung Alberich, that Siegfried had the ring of the Undines of the Rhine, so that as soon as he saw the hero he conceived the idea of stealing it.

 

______ 卐 ______

 

Editor’s note: Alberich, the dwarf who, according to some critics hostile to the Wagnerian legacy, personifies the Jew in the tetralogy, speaks to Hagen in this drawing by Arthur Rackham. In the Germanic language, Hagen is the name of a Burgundian warrior who appears in epic tales. Hagen is often identified as the brother or half-brother of King Gunther. He is the main antagonist of the hero Siegfried, for whom he feels great envy. The story of Siegfried, the Nibelungenlied and the Rhine Gold has been told in various languages, each with its specific characteristics. The main tradition is the Germanic one, the best-known and most famous version of which is the Nibelungenlied.

 

______ 卐 ______

 

Hagen brought the hero into the presence of his half-brothers and made the introductions.

“The strongest and bravest warrior, the fearless Siegfried, comes to honour our abode.”

And turning to him, he said:

“Gunther and his sister Gutrune are my half-brothers, who, I am sure, will be very happy to have as a guest a hero of your fame, O illustrious Siegfried!”

Siegfried was lodged with dignity, and that same night, while the traveller slept, the cunning Hagen made his half-brothers a proposition:

“My brothers: I think the time has come for you to marry. You, Gunther, must procure yourself a faithful wife, and you, Gutrune, a gallant and strong husband.”

“Have you thought of proposing to me a young woman from my village?” asked Gunther.

“No,” replied Hagen, “I know of a young woman worthy of you. Her name is Brunhild. She is in a deep sleep, surrounded by a ring of fire. Only a hero who knows no fear can pierce the fire and awaken her, and this hero is Siegfried, our host. He can undertake the enterprise and bring you Brunhild to marry her.”

“And do you think he will?”

“He will if you give him the hand of Gutrune.”

The girl was glad to hear the latter, but at once, expressing the thought that was in her mind, she asked her half-brother:

“Do you think Siegfried will ask for my hand? A young man like him will want a beautiful and graceful girl.”

“Trust me,” interrupted Hagen. I will prepare a filter that will cloud our guest’s mind, and then he will find you more beautiful than any of the daughters of men. You will see that he will fall in love with you; he will forget all his tormented past and dedicate his future life to you.”

The next day Siegfried, on rising, thanked Gunther for the cordial hospitality so generously extended to him, and placed himself at his command.

“I can offer you nothing in token of the immense gratitude and friendship that fills my heart, for I have brought nothing with me in the boat.”

“What do you mean, nothing? Have you not a ring in your saddlebags that is worth more than a treasure?”

“Yes, I have it; but I have it not with me; I have left it in pledge to a young lady. I have nothing here but this warrior’s helmet.”

“I know that with that helmet you can transform yourself into another being, if you like. A helmet with such magical virtue is a very valuable thing for a warrior like you. But let us leave treasures and valuables and drink.”

At that moment Gutrune approached, and offered Siegfried a cup filled with the wine that Hagen had enchanted just before.

As soon as the hero had drunk he felt a slight trembling in his legs and shortly afterwards his mind was clouded. He forgot Brunhild, and, looking at Gutrune, fell in love with her.

He no longer thought of continuing his journey and continued to enjoy the hospitality so generously offered him by Gunther, for all he could think of was Gutrune’s beauty. One evening, the young hero asked the prince if he thought him worthy to ask for Gutrune’s hand. Gunther replied:

“I will grant you my sister’s hand, but only on one condition, that you help me to get the wife I desire.”

“Who is she?”

“Brunhild, the Valkyrie asleep on the high rock surrounded by fire. Only you, my friend, can disenchant her and bring her out of her sleep. If you do so and bring her to me, I will give you my sister Gutrune to wife.”

“If I wake her,” said Siegfried, “you will have gained nothing, for she will not want to marry but me.”

Hagan, who was listening in hiding, and had been following all this conversation behind a thick trunk, came forward and said:

“That is very easily arranged, dear Siegfried. If you put on the magic helmet, you can take on Gunther’s countenance when you wake the Valkyrie, and she will come to life with Gunther’s image in her mind.”

“That’s right! I hadn’t thought of that.”

Once the pact was made, Siegfried and Gunther swore allegiance to each other, and in token of their friendship they drank again, thus sealing the pact.

At dawn the next day, the two young men set sail and followed the course of the Rhine to the Valkyrie’s rock.

The wicked Hagen bade them farewell on the shore, and stood there for a long time watching the travellers, and seeing the boat lost in the mist that hung over the silent waters of the river.

Categories
Friedrich Nietzsche Richard Wagner

Dialectic synthesis

On the eleventh of this month, I said that what moved me to present the story of Richard Wagner’s tetralogy was to try to elucidate a little more of Savitri Devi’s point of view, insofar as I consider her book, together with my footnotes, to be a kind of manifesto of The West’s Darkest Hour.

I’m still four entries short of completing the tetralogy’s story (the penultimate, which deals with Siegfried’s death, will be the longest in the series) according to the Argentine publisher who summarised the story when I was a child. I’ve already taken several images from those illustrated booklets, as can be seen here, here, here and here. But I would like, at once, to put down in writing some of my conclusions even before I finish translating the series.

I have just reviewed my thick biographical volumes on Friedrich Nietzsche, written by two German scholars. Nietzsche apparently lost his sanity on the last day of 1888. It is fascinating to note that his last essay before losing his mind was ‘Nietzsche contra Wagner’. Recall that, years before, Wagner and Nietzsche had been great friends. These are my conclusions:

Wagner was absolutely right to consider Jewry a parasite; and the later Nietzsche, i.e. the Nietzsche of the last months of 1888, was absolutely wrong to hate anti-Semites. But Wagner was completely wrong in believing that it was enough to baptise the Jews to make them good. For example, when for his last opera, Parsifal, he was assigned a Jewish conductor, Wagner rebelled and said that he would only accept him if he was first baptised. Such a stance reminds me of the American E. Michael Jones, although Jones is a Catholic and Wagner was a Protestant.

On the other hand, Nietzsche was right to condemn Judeo-Christianity as the key factor in the decline of Aryan culture, as we can see in this quote written before his upheaval. Precisely because of this, Nietzsche began to distance himself from Wagner when he began to see that the composer was making concessions to Christian morality.

The dialectic synthesis, so to speak, between the grave rights and grave wrongs of both Wagner and Nietzsche, provides a picture in which the contradictions of both are resolved. Resolving the contradictions of both positions is what I attempt on this site: unlike the latter Nietzsche we must be aware of the JQ, but, also, unlike Wagner we must be aware of the CQ.

All this has to do with Savitri’s book because, if our understanding of the cause of the dark hour isn’t perfect (Savitri wasn’t as anti-Christian as Nietzsche), we won’t be able to save the Aryan man. We will end up deceived by unscrupulous rascals like those who deceived Siegfried and eventually killed him. There is more I would like to say about the Wagnerian tetralogy but for tonight the above is enough.

(Incidentally, this image also appears in one of the booklets I used to leaf through as a child, which I still have in my library after so many decades of leafing through them for the first time.)

Categories
Painting

Painting of the day

Siegfried and Brunhild (1909)
by Charles Ernest Butler