What did the GODS fear…

“Even gods fear the absolute, for it stinks of something larger than themselves.” - Sotha Sil (Elder Scrolls)

I'd like to point out that Kali is not sticking her tongue out. She's actually biting her tongue. A common Indian expression when we make a mistake. In this context, she made the mistake of stepping on Shiva who is laying down in front of her because that was the only way to snap her out of her bloodlust. Great video as always!

In Tolkien's Middle Earth cosmology you had the Nameless Ones, those creatures that lived in the deep underground tunnels. They existed since the very beginning and even Sauron and Melkor gave them a wide berth. You see this same kind of theme in the Cthulhu mythos. We're in an endless cosmic ocean and there's always a bigger fish.

I love the idea of gods requiring belief to be alive and that they can’t die but if they are forgotten they go into deathless slumber.

In a recent retelling of the Ragnarok myth, Matt Larkin envisions Odin and his family as a mortal tribe. Odin receives hints of a vision of the end of the world and begins his pursuit of immortality in order to head off the chaos coming. Of course, he is unable to hold it off forever and some of the steps he takes to do actually bring it closer. Fascinating stuff. Thanks, Jon!

Another interpretation of Gleipnir, I think, is that, rather than impossible ingredients, it is made from things that we can no longer find because they've been put into the chain. The Norse, like many other cultures, used some of their myths for 'just so' stories. For example, why is the sea salty? Because there's a mill that produces unlimited salt that fell into it, of course. Why do salmon have weird body shapes? Because Loki, in the form of a salmon, got grabbed by the tail and his body stretched. So why don't cats make noise or women have beards? Well, they did, but then those things got taken to make Gleipnir!

Kali is got this scary aspect, but if you get to know her, she is very funny and goofy. She really knows how to get a head in this world.

1:25: 😱 The video explores the terrifying creatures in different mythological cosmos and why the gods fear them. 7:56: 🌟 Kali and Tiamat are powerful and complex mythological figures associated with destruction and creation. 15:58: 🐺 The mythological creature Fenrir, also known as the wolf of Loki, was responsible for the destruction of the cosmos and the death of Odin. 23:55: 🔥 Zeus defeats Typhon in a battle between order and chaos. Recap by Tamm

I wonder how many of the ancient apocalypse myths, gods and monsters, may have come from the eruption of the supervolcano Toba in Indionesia ~67,000-75,000 BC. It's an event that would have been heard and felt around the world, and could easily have inspired myths from Kali to Typhon. The description of sounds regarding Typheus could easily be attributed to a great eruption, and I would suspect ancient peoples struggling through the aftermath of an ancient natural disaster would be terribly afraid of it happening again in the future. Tales passed from spoken word would likely have been greatly bastardized and embellished over time, but the core idea of the destruction would have been central to the stories.

In my D&D world I'm making, the mythology has the three main celestials (earth, moon, and sun) as fighting against creatures of void and shadow as they move their way through space. The fight goes until mysterious circumstances force the creatures into different realms, but one gets a final parting shot at earth with a meteor, causing an extinction event.

Typhon, father of all monsters, once defeated zeus and ripped out his tendons. I'd say if that thing ever came back, zeus would probably get PTSD. Python, on the other hand, is a serpent that apollo defeated only after firing 100 arrows, and while nothing more of import is stated of it in the original greek myths, Rick Riordan portraywd appolo as being deathly scared of the serpent python ever since.

Wow I never knew that about Kali being the TIME goddess. No wonder all fear and revere her. She's unstoppable and omnipresent and we are all always in the sphere of her influence.

This concept of gods being killable is why I think they’re done so well in the Malazan book series. When you put all powerful Gods into fiction you start to think, why don’t they just interfere? Why don’t they just do what they want? In Malazan the gods have great power but they can also be killed, and in some ecases quite easily. So they still have to be careful in how they maneuver so it adds much more depth to their character and the story.

Just wanted to share my gratitude for your videos. By no means am I a scholar, nor am I pursuing a future involving ancient history/mythology. But anthropology has always been an interest of mine, and I enjoy your videos especially because of how accessible they are, while still being extremely in-depth. Thank you for bringing some much needed knowledge and professionalism to this platform, and I look forward to watching your videos for years to come! :) (PS- would love a deep dive on astrology and it's impact in the middle east.)

The Typhonomachy sounds so badass. I would pay to watch this animated

With each of your videos, I become more and more convinced these monsters are all describing various aspects of catastrophic volcanic eruptions, possibly dating back in human memory to as early as the Toba eruption 74,000 years ago. All of these details describe various aspects of the events leading up to, the eruptions themselves, and the aftermath, including possibly years of winter and other disruptions to the weather.

Ohhh new video! Thank you!

Thank you for touching on this topic. There's an interesting series of videos mostly about traditional Indo-European history talking about this, especially the one titled "the way where the fire of death blazes" that observes the role played by the emotions in the ultimate divine rule. I recommend it to anyone keen on these subjects

I always love to idea of there being entities above gods. It gives me a cosmic dread...like if gods fear these beings then what can we mortals do?

Thank you for making videos like these and the mythology database and linking references. Learning and reading knowledge is the key for all humanity