Day 4
I am grateful for my Ancestors
Hwæt! Listen!
Ne sorga, snotor guma; selre bið æghwæm
þæt he his freond wrece, þonne he fela murne.
Ure æghwylc sceal ende gebidan
worolde lifes; wyrce se þe mote
domes ær deaþe; þæt bið drihtguman
unlifgendum æfter selest.
Grieve not, wise king! Better it is
for every man to avenge his friend
than mourn overmuch. Each of us must come
to the end of his life: let him who may
win fame before death. That is the best
memorial for a man after he is gone.
– Beowulf, 1384-1389, translation by Howell D. Chickering, Jr.
I debated as to the order of the days of thanksgiving. So far I have gone in a concrete order. Day four would naturally be Scriptures, but after writing about the Holy Ghost I felt strongly compelled to speak to something that I am deeply grateful for. Something that has marked my entire life. I love my ancestors. I love them all with such a love that binds me—their son—to my parents of all generations of the earth that have passed away.
My kindred dead have given me so very much. From the horse riding, Steppe dwelling, and conquering Indo-Europeans to the tall fair haired Nords and their longboats afar, I have been blessed with a noble ancestry. Not better or worse than any other, but mine. Through them I am here. Their works are manifest in the culture that I have now and I honor them by learning of their culture, their stories, their lives, good and bad.
But more than that. As they wander in the after life not all of them know the truth. Not all of them are yet saved, lacking the saving ordinances that have been revealed to us only relatively recently. So very many generations have past to dust without full knowledge. They are waiting for a balm, wandering the spirit world.
Hwæt! All is not lost! God, in His mercy, allows me to save them. And I will do what I can to save them. It brings me to tears to think that I can help my pagan ancestors come to know Christ Jesus. That they can be baptized, endowed, and sealed through me. I can act as proxy and bless their afterlife in ways that were not open to them in their living life.
Their music, their stories, their journeys, all the lives they led, bless me. I am not alone in this life. They are with me. And I celebrate them in all ways I can. I honor them, remember them, pray for them, and when the time comes, help save them. Enjoy some tunes from Harald Foss, a modern musician retelling ancient tales in bardic fashion: