Wyrd and the Consequences of Deeds

No one begins with an empty world. Before a child can speak, a household already has its history; there are people upon whom it depends, skills and possessions it may pass on, and difficulties which the child had no part in making. The circumstances of birth give some things freely and place others beyond immediate reach. Every life begins among the consequences of lives already lived.

In Fyrnsegen, orleag names the first-laid conditions from which a life or undertaking begins. For a person, these include ancestry, the circumstances of birth, and the earliest relations of dependence. They give the life its starting ground; later deeds cannot make that beginning never have happened. What grows from it nevertheless remains open to further action, within the possibilities and limits that inheritance provides.

Wyrd is what has come to pass and now stands among the real conditions of further life. Orleag belongs within it, but Wyrd continues to accumulate as deeds are done and their consequences enter the world. A promise kept, a neglected repair, a friendship established, and an injury left unanswered all change the circumstances in which someone must next act. Their effects can persist even when the people responsible have been forgotten.

Consider two households. One receives a sound home, useful skills, and the help of trusted neighbours; another begins with damaged property and few people upon whom it can call. The same effort may carry them very different distances. The advantage of the first household was established before its present occupants could earn it; the difficulties of the second may owe much to circumstances beyond their control. Both must work from what is there, though the work required of them will differ.

This leaves a substantial place for choice. A damaged house may be repaired, neglected further, or left behind; the available answers depend upon resources, knowledge, assistance, and the condition of the building itself. The repair changes what those living there must face. It becomes a further deed within Wyrd, carrying the house into a condition which another household may eventually inherit.

A promise shows the same movement between people. Once given, it allows someone else to plan in reliance upon us; our words have already changed the relationship, although the promised work remains to be done. Fulfilment gives that person reason to trust us again. Failure may leave the task unfinished, put a burden upon others, and make our next assurance harder to believe. What we do becomes part of the ground upon which later promises are received.

A damaged reputation shows why amendment requires more than a change of intention. Someone who has repeatedly failed to keep his word may sincerely resolve to improve; those who relied upon him still have reason for caution. Through better conduct he can give them new grounds for judgement. Earlier failures remain part of what happened, while the deeds of repair change what may reasonably follow from them.

Religious life carries this responsibility across generations. The holy place someone maintains, the custom a household teaches, and the promises a cynn keeps all become conditions received by others. We inherit the labour and judgement through which the tradition reached us; our own keeping will affect whether those who follow encounter something sound, something neglected, or something they must first learn to repair.

To understand Wyrd is therefore to take seriously the reach of a deed. Our conduct forms habits in ourselves, changes what others can expect, and leaves consequences beyond the moment in which we act. We have some power to preserve what has served us well and to answer what has gone wrong; in exercising that power, we help determine what the next person will have to begin with.

For a fuller treatment of Wyrd, inheritance, obligation, and the consequences of deeds, see Brian Smith · Cynemund, We Are Our Deeds: The Elder Heathenry, Its Ethic and Thew, third edition, based on the work of Eric Wódening.