Calico/Being Viking, 8. Asatru as Magical Religion

Contemporary Paganisms are often understood as predominately magical religions. In some ways, Asatru challenges that perspective by taking a more skeptical approach to magic. The chapter examines how its intellectual tributaries give rise to a more contested environment of magical practice. Many Heathens draw on the long magical tradition of the Norse and Germanic past to create contemporary magical cultures. Roles such as the völva and the vitki, and magical forms such as seið, have been given new life in the Heathen movement.