Elli
Appeal: Old Age, Wisdom, Elder,
Strength
In Norse mythology, Elli is a personification of old age
who, in the Prose Edda book Gylfaginning, defeats God Thor in a
wrestling match. She is the embodiment of the crone and the wisdom and strength of the
elderly.
There are a lot of strong Goddesses to be found in
Norse mythology, but Elli, nicknamed 'the Giant Crone,' takes the cake. She challenged the God Thor to a wrestling
match — and won. We have to be fair to
Thor though, as the whole thing turned out to be a bit of a trick. Elli, although the weakest of the giantesses
of Utgardr, was actually the personification of old age. After the giantesses told Thor about their
stunt, he obviously wasn’t too happy, even though the fact that Elli only
managed to get Thor down to one knee was a mark of his strength.
This serves as a valuable lesson not to
underestimate old people. We often think
of the elderly as unfit, forgetful and out of touch with modern times, but they
have a wealth of knowledge and can often give good advice. They are also not necessarily as helpless as
we imagine. There is a good story online
of this point. It was about a shoplifter
who had been apprehended. The manager
shouted "Stop! Thief!", as the criminal ran to the door with
something he had stolen. The shoplifter
tried to barge past an old lady without thinking. But it turned out the pensioner had a belt in
Judo. She grabbed the thief's arm,
twisted it and in an instant he was on the floor.
Elli
is not mentioned in any other extant source but the notion that not even the
Gods are immune to the effects of aging is supported by the fact that they must
consume the apples of Idunn on a regular basis in order to remain young.
Thou
wilt support us, both when little and even to gray hairs. When our strength is of Thee, it is strength;
but, when our own, it is feebleness. We
return unto Thee that from their weariness our soul may rise towards Thee,
leaning on the thing which Thou has created, and passing on to Thyself, who
hast wonderfully made them; for with Thee is refreshment and true strength.
This is a wonderful post about Elli!
ReplyDeleteThank You! I love reading about all the strong Goddess's for the Norse. And Elli was proudly one of them. She also has a chapter in the Blog Book, Who are your Divine Friends.
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