New in Juneau: Alaska senators bow heads for prayer for ‘magic and truth’ to Norse god Odin

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The Alaska Senate usually starts out its floor sessions with a prayer or sometimes a thought for the day from a non-religious member. On Tuesday, the prayer was offered by one of the Senate pages, Ollie Zaldivar of Anchorage, who beseeched wisdom from a Norse god named Odin.

He offered the prayer that asked that he know magic and know truth. He referred to the god as “Allfather.”

Described as a wise, one-eyed old man, writes the description in Wikipedia, “Odin has by far the most varied characteristics of any of the gods and is not only the deity to call upon when war was being prepared but is also the god of poetry, of the dead, of runes, and of magic.”

After the prayer, typically Sen. Lyman Hoffman asks, in the tradition of the Senate and House, that the prayer “be spread across the journal,” but this time he did not make the request.

Instead, Hoffman looked over at Sen. Gary Stevens, who rose and did the deed, asking for the the traditional “spread across the journal.”

Sen. Gary Stevens ask that the prayer be spread across the journal.

As a legislative floor staff, Zaldivar is one of several who work for the entire Senate.

Oddly related, Sen. Bert Stedman has a wooden bust of Odin that sits in the Senate Finance Committee on a shelf overlooking the table that the committee members gather around to decide on legislative matters coming before them.

A wooden bust of Odin, Norse god of war and magic and other things, sits in Senate Finance.

46 COMMENTS

  1. Magic and Truth would be exposing Hunter Biden and his nefarious dealings with the Chinese and Russian Oligarchs. Also exposing who the “Big Guy” is and how much money they have pilfered from the American taxpayer.

  2. As long as we are going down the road of pluralism, multiculturalism and polytheism, this all seems fair enough to me. For many years in Scandanavia and Iceland, people covered their bets after the conversion to Christianity with stave churches bearing ornaments and images similar to the Norse gods. I have given thought, upon my ultimate demise, to going out Viking style by having my remains placed on a raft of trees and burned in a fjord as we have here.

  3. Magic. Illusion. Sleight of hand. Yeah, the Alaska Legislature has likely been praying to Odin for years, because they’ve been masters of illusion all along.

    • Odin actually was a rather queer character – he practiced and was heavily associated with Seidr, which was considered women’s magic. To do this as a man would have one be labeled ‘ergi’, which is pretty similar to modern slurs and insults toward effeminate men. Odin also on occasion dressed and moved through the world as a woman.
      Somewhat relatedly, Loki, who is generally presented as male, transformed into a mare and gave birth to Odin’s eight legged horse Sleipnir. All of the Norse deities were really rather queer by our current standards, despite what white supremacist ‘Odinists’ would have you believe. They’re a lot more interesting and varied than their hyper masculine conception.

  4. You all just want judgment upon America!? This nation is founded on a biblical foundation. There is NO room for idols here and stone gods that can’t feel, talk, smell, nor taste. Look what happened to sameria and judah! They went into exile because of this very same thing idolotry. Bunch of nuts! Crazy! loco! Praying to a dumb god who can’t even feel! A figment out of someone’s imagination.

    • Strong words from someone who likely consumes the flesh and blood of their demigod in a room full of chanting elders… Isn’t there something about a plank in your eye or something from you lot?

  5. End-of-America, anti-Christian heathenism!

    “History fails to record a single precedent in which NATIONS SUBJECT TO MORAL DECAY have not passed into political and economic decline. There has been either a SPIRITUAL AWAKENING to overcome the moral lapse, OR a PROGRESSIVE DETERIORATION leading to ultimate national disaster.” – Douglas MacArthur

    “Perfect FREEDOM consists in OBEYING the dictates of RIGHT REASON … where licentiousness begins, LIBERTY ENDS.” – Samuel West

    “While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but once they lose their virtue, they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.” – Samuel Adams

    “Without virtue there can be no liberty.” – Benjamin Rush

  6. I would’ve expected this behavior in Petersburg. A majority Scandinavian community… Except that the Scandinavians who migrated here were all Lutheran. Thanks toots, your contribution really lit up the comment section and derailed my point.

    The Alaskan senate will next focus on the nonexistent communist Venezuelan community and appropriate the rest of the PFD in respect to the socialist gods they ran from and requested asylum against.

  7. This is just another reminder that there are all “kinds” of folks within our midst. But we all have constitutional rights here in the United States of America, even those who we consider to be fanatics and ignoramuses! That aside, it behooves us to read Matthew 7:21-23 (RSV) as a cautionary–or exclusionary–clause before going berserk!

    As a person who is all too human, the story made me laugh! I’m a “Paradise Lost” man myself!

  8. And so many wonder why we are the poster child of dysfunction.

    State vegetables and praying to Odin.

    They really should be praying to the unions and each other. Those are their true deities.

  9. 50 bucks says…..
    There is a bust of Lo•Ki
    Somewhere in the Anchorage assembly chambers…

    Wait for it…

  10. The 17th of May is Norwegian Syttende Mai. Juneau’s closest neighbor to the south celebrates the day as it was founded by Norwegians. A little context and it actually feels a little more culturally appropriate for the melting-pot that America is.

  11. As near as I can tell, he missed a golden opportunity to call upon Odin to deliver some magic for his hairdo…

    • I’m inclined to agree. I’m extremely doubtful this was anything more than a surface level diversity action. The idea of freely communicating with a God is mostly a fabrication of Judeo-christian faiths. Most Heathens would not consider this at all proper or fruitful. It seems entirely disengenuos and for show.

    • I like you Bob! People, be more like Bob ? You do you. I’ll do me. We won’t do each other… Probably. ?

  12. The state legislature sending appeals to a Norse god seems only fitting, seeing as how they have collectively gone Viking on us by robbing, raping and pillaging the people of Alaska.

  13. Far less embarrassing to have the Alaska Senate praying to Odin than to have the Juneau Mayor and Assembly giving government grants to “teach drag queen lessons.” The latter is not only embarrassing but disgusting.

  14. The Senate could use a lot of magic and wisdom as they deal with wisdom-less House members in the Conference Committee on the PFD. Maybe Odin will help, if he’s in town now.

  15. Why not?
    .
    The Anchorage Assembly has a land acknowledgement. It does exactly the same amount, and it is based on the same logic.

  16. The Norse murdered infants, children and adults to Odin. So it seems completely appropriate that prayers and statues to this demonic cult should be front and center in the Juneau Cartel. Really, why stop with Odin? How about Baal, Kali and Moloch too? The Juneau Cartel is showing us all how they really feel about other humans besides themselves.

      • Good point Bob. Shall we list off the atrocities committed by Christians in the name of their God and Demigod? There are plenty, but alas I’ve better things to do such as tending to those I for, honoring the spirits of the land, and building reciprocity with my gods thru sacrifice.
        Fire, read up a bit rather than just believing what you see in movies. Human sacrifice was generally frowned upon in a society where one less set of hands in the winter might mean death for an entire household, or village.

  17. See that little wooden square-rigged boat on fire in Gastineau Channel? Your P.F.D. is on that boat.

  18. More like cultists than legislators, which explains a lot.
    .
    An Office Odin… to whom a novennial sacrifice of lobbyists is offered in keeping with sacred tradition?
    .
    The same Wikipedia associates Odin with royalty, the gallows, knowledge, battle, victory, sorcery, poetry, frenzy… which explains even more about Alaska’s lobbyist-legislator team.
    .
    Plundering the PFD makes sense now… plundering’s what Vikings do.
    .
    The Holy City of Juneau, too easily conflated with Juno Lucina, goddess of childbirth, nemesis of Planned Parenthood, should henceforth be known as “Asgard”, home of Norse gods, which it mostly is anyway, no?
    .
    The Sacred Place at 120 4th St Juneau, AK 99801, should henceforth be known as “Valhalla”, where Odin houses those he deems worthy of dwelling with him, no?
    .
    Speaking of holy and sacred… using China flu panic to close churches makes sense now… closing churches is what pagans do.
    .
    Was it a campaign promise… voters elected these characters to renounce their Christianity and bow to paganism?
    .
    Christians aren’t allowed to pick and choose which Commandment to obey, including the one beginning with “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image…”, so what are these characters?
    .
    Looks like we have a brand new invasive species: self-styled Viking-Christians, conspicuously lacking courage and character of either Viking or Christian, so pathetically desperate to be different from their peers that they embrace a culture infamous for pillage, rape, slaughter, and paganism?
    .
    The good news is that mass conversions to Christianity led to the end of Viking dominance, which may be a clue about what it takes to fix this problem.

    • I will agree on the 7th & 9th points. The kung-flu hysteria was absurd and closing churches, or any establishment, was definitely the wrong action. As for the “viking-christian” act, I’m inclined to agree. This doesn’t look like anything a knowledgeable practicing norse heathen would do. The idea of freely communicating with a divine being/spirit/demi-god is really a judeo-christian fabrication. When we communicate with our Gods it’s a personal communication with a God or Gods that you have built a relationship with. That is why we practice ritual, it’s akin to picking up the phone to call a friend’s several states over, vs just shouting to that friend and expecting them to hear you. Plus I think most certainly wouldn’t end with “amen”. This, to me, feels very showy and disengeniuous the more I think on it.

    • I’d also perhaps caution against the accusations of pillage, rape, and slaughter. I seem to recall some crusades as well as myriad other unsavory events in the name of Christianity. Yeah, bad people do bad things from all walks of life. For every one of them, there are hundreds of kind gentle souls that openly practiced the values of heathenry, just as there were those that ommited atrocities as Christian, and there are generous practicioners such as I’d assume you to be. Don’t class an entire group for the actions of a small portion.

  19. Something wrong! This bad thing is happening because the capital is in Juneau. Let’s move the capital of Alaska to Anchorage.

  20. Well,
    We do come from the land of ice and snow with the midnight sun and the hot springs flow…

  21. My norsemen forebeares were devout, exacting Lutherans here in Alaska in the mid-1800’s.

    • I, myself, can’t get too carried away since my own forebears were banished from the Garden of Eden and left paradise wearing only fig leaves. With regards for those us who are “here,” we will remain here for the total duration of our “time.” As for the “spiritual” proclivities of men–Norsemen, Odin-ites, and “exacting Lutherans” included–well, as with life in general, it’s each man to his best judgement: it doesn’t get more conservative than that!

      • Dead-on dude! I’m a norse heathen conservative, bet I agree with you on more than I do with any of the loons in that building. Lol

        As you seem sensible, check out some of the actual practices of heathenry and tenants of our faith. It’s interesting, even if only from a scholarly viewpoint. Dr. Jackson Crawford is an excellent resource on YouTube, he is not a practicing pagan, but a college professor and old-norse expert.

          • Too often religion has been used by the self-serving to visit unholy designs upon the unwary and the innocent. I presume you have something in mind, but for clarity you need to add more thought to your “one-word paragraph.” Oh, the atrocities that have been committed upon the humbled and the cultivated by many of the religious in service for the greater glory of God!

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