One thing that Germanic mythology teaches us is that Ragnarok is inevitable. The Norns spin the threads of Wyrd from the moment that we are born. We cannot escape our Wyrd but we can decide how we meet it and it is this aspect which determine the hero who is to become the Einheriar and the coward or nithing.
The Einheriar is by nature a lone wolf and stands apart from the crowd or the herd. Often he or she meets with a certain amount of hostility from others, particularly from the herds of human cattle or flocks of human sheep. For the lone wolf does not need the herd. He may at times seek out a pack of other wolves and combine forces with them for individual or collective strength but he does not instinctively need them. The purpose of the pack is collective security. The human sheep or cow however seeks to lose its individual identity amongst the collective out of sheer fear or psychological inadequacy. The weakling becomes subsumed by the shapeless mass. To reject the herd is to show real strength and individuality but it can also incur the wrath and hostility of weaker individuals because they come fact to face with their own weakness and inadequacy when they encounter the lone wolf. What the herd does not understand it fears and what it fears it attacks.
The herd by its very nature is stupid for it consists of stupid and weak individuals and they will go the way that Wyrd has dictated without any impact at all on the woof and weft of the web of Wyrd. The Einheriar cannot change his Wyrd anymore than the weakling and coward but he or she can have an inpact upon the web and consequently upon others.
Ragnarok is part of the Wyrd set for humanity, the gods and all of creation. It cannot be escaped but as Einheriar, called by Woden we can achieve for ourselves true immortality and become as gods in the coming Golden Age which follows Ragnarok.
Ragnarok has the etymological meaning of the final destiny of the gods from ragna[geneitive plural of regin-gods or ruling powers] and rok-end, fate]. The term was wrongly transcribed by Snorri Sturluson as Ragnarokr which has caused its general mistranslation into twilight of the gods[Wagner`s Goetterdaemmerung].
Woden chooses and calls out his Einheriar who have been destined by Wyrd to incarnate at a specific time and in a specific place in order to fulfill the will of the All Father.
It is not surprising that those who profess to be followers of Woden are strong individuals by nature who are distinct and seperate from the masses. It is these men and women who will one day share in the governance of the earth under the coming generation of gods.
