Balder was one of the gods in the norse mythology. He was the god of light and joy, purity, innocence and reconciliation. He was son of Odin and Frigg.
Everyone loved Balder with his shining beauty and his gentle, soft spirit. Friendly and good to everyone, he was considered the best of the Gods, although he was actually not powerful.
One night Balder began to have evil dreams, dreams of his own death. He came to his mother Frigg and told her about these dreams. Wise as she was, she knew that dreams were to be taken seriously. Something had to be done. Frigg sat out to protect her son from the fate that seemed to await him by travelling the lands to make everyone and everything promise that they would not hurt Balder. She got an oath on this from everything - gods and humans, plants, stones, poisons, deseases, metals, just everything.
Now the gods in Valhalla invented a game.They would stand around Balder and shoot at him with their bows, and see how the arrows would always just find their way around him. Nothing could hurt Balder.
There was just one little thing. The trickster god Loki did not like Balder. He was jaleaux, and hated how Balder was popular, and how everyone just liked him so much. Loki changed his apperance to that of an old woman and cam to Frigg and asked about if there was really not a single thing in the world that could now harm Balder. Frigg, suspecting nothing, admitted that there was one thing. A little tree in the west, called the mistletoe, had been too small and too unimportant to ask for an oath. So then Loki immediately travelled west, and got his hands on a mistletoe. Of the mistletoe he made an arrow.
The gods still played their game, standing around Balder throwing knives and aiming arrows at him. One man standing in the area was the brother of Balder, the blind Hod. Loki tricked Hod into shooting at Balder with the little mistletoe arrow. Aiming at Balder with the guidance of Lokis hand, he shot the arrow. The mistletoe hit Balder directly. Balder died, pierced through the heart.
All laugther stopped, all joy vanished. It was like the earth stood still. In the midst of party and good times, Balder, the kind god of light, was dead. Sorrow and despair now surrounded the dead god. And the dead god now had to go dark and misty way to the land the underworld ruled by the dark goddess Hel.
Everyone was in sorrow for Balder, and in his dispair, Odin sent his other son Hermod to Hel, to plead for mercy for Balder. The goddess finally agreed on letting Balder remain alive, letting the light god stay in the lands of light, where darkness had fallen, but on one condition. Everything had to make an oath again, everything, dead or alive, had to weep for Balder. With this message. hermod returned to Valhalla. Now Frigg sat out on another journey through all the lands, making everything, dead or alive, promise to weep for Balder. As everything loved the light god, everything willingly promised to weep for him. But as the last thing, Frigg came to the house of an old witch named Tøk, that would not promise to weep for Balder. Tøk was again Loki in a disguise. Because of this, Balder now had to remain in the underworld.
The gods took the dead god and placed him on a funeral pyre dressed in crimson cloth, and set him aboard his ship Ringhorn. It was the largest ship of the world. Balders wife Nanna, having died of a broken heart, was placed beside him. Also, Balders treasures and horse were put on the ship. The pyre was now set on fire, and the giantess Hyrrokin pushed the ship to the sea, so that it would sail to Hel.
Loki did however not remain unpunished, as his crime was easliy discovered. Hod was killed by Vali, son of Odin and Rind, born just for the purpose. With the dead of the god of light chaos, conflict and darknoess arose everywhere in the world. This was the beginning of Ragnarok, the big end of everything.
From the ashes of Ragnarok, and the last root of the tree of life, Yggdrasil, which had not been destroyed, a new world would arise. From here everything, also Balder and Hod, would come back to life again, and the world of light and darkness would once again be restored.
Of all the twelve round Odin's throne
Balder, the beautiful, alone
The sun-god, good and pure, and bright,
Was loved by all, as all love light
(J. C. Jones, Valhalla)
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