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ing tale from the Bible. The twelve tribes of Israel are in the desert squab
bling about who should become high priest. Moses asks Yahweh what to
do, and Yahweh tells Moses to make a wooden rod for each of the tribes:
And Moses laid up the rods before the Lord in the tabernacle of
witness, and, behold, the rod of Aaron for the house of Levi was
budded, and brought forth buds, and bloomed blossoms, and yielded
almonds. And Moses brought out all the rods from before the Lord
unto all the children of Israel: and they looked, and took every man
his rod (numbers 17: 8–9).
Egill’s extended metaphor has in common with the biblical tale that cut
wood is brought out of a temple and has blossomed. In the Bible it is by
the action of the Holy Spirit, in the poem it is through the inspiration of
the poet. the allusion to the Bible suggests a spiritual dimension to the art
of the poet. It is in a way divinely inspired.27
This adds one more religious aspect to the portrait of Egill, which is
also, as most representations of the past in Icelandic medieval literature,
informed by an Au gus tinian vision of history as a story of fall and redemp
tion. God establishes co ven ants with humanity at different times: with
Abraham, Moses and then in the Incar na tion of God as man in jesus
Christ. When this Christian historical schema is trans posed to nordic his
tory, it is seen to parallel Biblical history. the pagan past of the north is
part of mankind’s march towards redemption, the Conversion being paral
lel to the Incarnation. This was very important for the evolution of
Icelandic culture since it allowed the construction of a positive image of
pagan ancestors. Despite the fact that they had not had access to the
Revelation, they were nevertheless noble heathens and even eligible for
being saved at the end of time.28 One consequence of this was the possibil
27 for a more detailed exposition of the implications of this biblical material in Sonatorrek
for our understanding of the poem, see my „the Conversion of Sonatorrek,“ Analecta
Septentrionalia. Beiträge zur nordgermanischen Kultur und Litteraturgeschichte, ed. W.
Heizmann, K. Böldl and H. Beck (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, Reallexikon
der germanischen Altertumskunde, ergänzungsbände 65, 2009), 698–711.
28 for a more detailed presentation of the impact of Augustinian history on the construc
tion of a pagan past in old norseIcelandic literature, see Gerd W. Weber, “Intellegere
historiam. typological perspectives of nordic prehistory (in Snorri, Saxo, Widukind and
tHe SeLf AS otHeR