Carl Jung on Wotan

Transcript of Jung's "Wotan"

Once more, before I move on

and set my sights ahead,

in loneliness I lift my hands up to you,

you to whom I flee,

to whom I, in the deepmost depth of my heart,

solemnly consecrated altars

so that ever

your voice may summon me again.

Deeply graved into those altars

glows the phrase: To The Unknown God.

I am his, although I have, until now,

also lingered amid the unholy mob;

I am his—and I feel the snares

that pull me down in the struggle and,

if I would flee,

compel me yet into his service.

I want to know you, Unknown One,

Who reaches deep into my soul,

Who roams through my life like a storm—

You Unfathomable One, akin to me!

I want to know you, even serve you.

—Friedrich Nietzsche, "To the Unknown God" (1864)

Then, at last, we shall know what Wotan is saying when he “murmers with Mimir’s head.”

Fast move the sons of Mim,and fate

Is heard in the note of the Gjallarhorn;

Loud blows Heimdall, the horn is aloft,

In fear quake all who on Hel-roads are.

Yggdrasill shakes and shivers on high

The ancient limbs, and the giant is loose;

Wotan murmurs with Mimir’s head

But the kinsman of Surt shall slay him soon.

How fare the gods? how farethe elves?

All Jotunheim groans, the gods are at council;

Loud roar the dwarfs by the doors of stone,

The masters of the rocks: would you know yet more?

Now Garm howls loud before Gnipahellir;

The fetters will burst, and the wolf run free;

Much I do know, and more can see

Of the fate of the gods, the mighty in fight.

From the east comes Hrym with shield held high;

In giant-wrath does the serpent writhe;

O’er the waves he twists, and the tawny eagle

Gnaws corpses screaming; Naglfar is loose.

O’er the sea from the north there sails a ship

With the people of Hel, at the helm stands Loki;

After the wolf do wild men follow,

And with them the brother of Byleist goes.