In Accordance With Divine Racial Law

Jacobsen and his circle also employed their radical racialism and adoption of Winsnes’s philosophy in order to attack Christianity. The Christian religion was the prime agent of racially alien influences in Norwegian society. For a thousand years, it had had dulled the Norwegian racial spirit and turned the people into the slaves of foreign powers. A racial awakening therefore made a return to Norse religion, although in a modernized form, a real necessity. And this was not an issue of marginal importance. The question of religion played a vital part in their propaganda. In fact, articles dealing with religious issues occupied a substantial part of the journal throughout its existence. In many ways their anti-Christian neo-paganism became the single most important ideological element, which set them apart from the more ‘moderate’ trends of Norwegian fascism. Also during the war, when censorship limited the possibility of open criticism, attacks on Christianity were often used as a cover for attacks against Nasjonal Samling and the German occupation regime.

This is not to say that the Ragnarok Circle did not take their neo-paganism seriously. In many respects their religious ideas were instrumental in forming their identity. To many, the fight against Christianity and for a modernized Norse religion was the single most important issue.

As with all other important issues, their thoughts on religion were shaped by their radical racialism. To them, race not only defined the outer form of religion – its rituals, myths and customs – but race and racial belonging also constituted the true object of religion. Race is seen as lying at the innermost core of all religion and representing its deepest truth.

In short, the Ragnarok Circle’s religious belief was a kind of ‘naturalistic pantheism’, where ‘God’ was a used in a very abstract way, as a synonym for the immanent ‘divine racial law’ governing nature, history, and human life. In many ways this law was identical to the ‘law of mortal danger’ developed by Winsnes. Salvation is regarded as the work of Man himself. It is achieved by realizing ones racial potential and in doing so live in harmony with the ‘divine law’. Incidentally, it is interesting to note how their violent rejection of Christian otherworldliness, its concept of sin, and the belief in miracles mirrors the critique launched at Christianity by the National Socialists’ own political enemies of the left.

Even though the symbols and myths of Old Norse religion were frequently used in their writings, it is a misconception to think that the Ragnarok Circle wanted to reinstate the former Norse cult of Thor and Odin. Rather, they offered a metaphorical interpretation of Norse religion, where myths and imagery where thought to express deep biological and racial truths. Behind the outer trappings of the old religion of the Vikings, lies the perennial wisdom of life.

How did then this perennial wisdom survive through the dark ages of Christian rule in the Germanic world? How was it transmitted? Even though it is quite vaguely expressed, it seems that they thought it to be contained within the blood – not to be understood in a strict biological sense, but rather as a metaphor for a kind of the collective subconscious shared by the members of the Germanic race. This in turn led to the idea that certain individuals where endowed with an extraordinary ability to tap into this collective racial sub-consciousness by ‘listening to the voice of the blood’.

Obviously, such charismatic gifts were the prerogative of a select few – the racial prophets. The validity of Norse religion could, however, be verified not only by this kind of mystical introspection, but also by quite straightforward and rational means. For – unlike the obsolete and refuted concepts of Christianity – the inner truths of Norse religion were entirety in accordance with the results of modern science. The perennial wisdom, which the Old Norse religion expresses in mytho-poetic language, is today presented in concrete and objective terms by modern science. Hence, their neo-pagan religion was to them rational, forward-looking, and in accordance with the needs of modern man.

– excerpted from “Neither Hitler nor Quisling: The Ragnarok Circle and Oppositional National Socialism in Norway” by Terje Emberland (2015)