Part 4

When Odin, according to Vegtamskviða [Baldurs draumar], resolved to get reliable information in the lower world in regard to the fate which threatened Baldur, he saddled his Sleipnir and rode thither. On the way he took he came first to Niflhel. While he was still in Niflhel, he met on his way a dog bloody about the breast, which came from the direction where that division of the lower world is situated, which is called Hel. Thus the rider and the dog came from opposite directions, and the former continued his course in the direction whence the latter came. The dog turned, and long pursued Odin with his barking. Then the rider reached a foldvegr, that is to say, a road along grass-grown plains. The way resounded under the hoofs of the steed. Then Odin finally came to a high dwelling, which is called Heljar rann. The name of the dwelling shows that it was situated in Hel, not in Niflhel. This latter realm of the lower world Odin now had had behind him ever since he reached the green fields, and since the dog, evidently a watch of the borders between Niflhel and Hel, had left him in peace. The high dwelling was decorated as for a feast, and mead was served. It was, Odin learned, the abode where the ásmegir longingly waited for the arrival of Baldur. Thus Vegtamskviða:

2. Reið hann niður þaðan
Niflheljar til,
mætti hann hvelpi
þeim er úr helju kom.

3. Sá var blóðugur
um brjóst framan,
og galdurs föður
gól um lengi.
Fram reið Óðinn,
foldvegur dundi,
hann kom að hávu
Heljar ranni.

7. Hér stendur Baldri
of brugginn mjöður.
En ásmegir
í ofvæni.

Vegtamskviða distinguishes distinctly between Niflhel and Hel. In Hel is the dwelling which awaits the son of the gods, the noblest and most pious of all the Asas. The dwelling, which reveals a lavish splendour, is described as the very antithesis of that awful abode which, according to Gylfaginning, belongs to the queen of the lower world. In Vafþrúðnismál 43 the old giant says:

Like Vegtamskviða, so Vafþrúðnismál also distinguishes distinctly between Hel and Niflhel, particularly in those most remarkable words that thither, i.e., to Niflhel and the regions subject to it, die "halir" from Hel. Halir means men, human beings; applied to beings in the lower world halir means dead men, the spirits of deceased human beings (cp. Allvíssmál 18:6; 20:6; 26:6; 32:6; 34:5 - í helju, with 28:3 - halir). Accordingly, nothing less is here said than that deceased persons who have come to the realm called Hel, may there be subject to a second death, and that through this second death they come to Niflhel. Thus the same sharp distinction is here made between life in Hel and in Niflhel as between life on earth and that in Hel. These two subterranean realms must therefore represent very different conditions. What these different conditions are, Vafþrúðnismál does not inform us, nor will I anticipate the investigation on this point; still less will I appeal to Gylfaginning's assurance that the realms of torture lie under Niflhel, and that it is wicked men (vondir menn) who are obliged to cross the border from Hel to Niflhel. So far it must be borne in mind that it was in Niflhel Odin met the bloody dog-demon, who barked at the Asa-majesty, though he could not hinder the father of the mighty and protecting sorceries from continuing his journey; while it was in Hel, on the other hand, that Odin saw the splendid abode where the ásmegir had already served the precious subterranean mead for his son, the just Baldur. This argues that they who through a second death get over the border from Hel to Niflhel, do not by this transfer get a better fate than that to which Hel invites those who have died the first death. Baldur in the one realm, the blood-stained kinsman of Cerberus in the other - this is, for the present, the only, but not unimportant weight in the balance which is to determine the question whether that border-line which a second death draws between Hel and Niflhel is the boundary between a realm of bliss and a realm of suffering, and in this case, whether Hel or Niflhel is the realm of bliss.

This expression in Vafþrúðnismál, hinig deyja úr Helju halir, also forces to the front another question, which, as long as it remains unanswered, makes the former question more complicated. If Hel is a realm of bliss, and if Niflhel with the regions subject thereto is a realm of unhappiness, then why do not the souls of the damned go at once to their final destination, but are taken first to the realm of bliss, then to the realm of anguish and pain, that is, after they have died the second death on the boundary-line between the two? And if, on the contrary, Hel were the realm of unhappiness and Niflhel offered a better lot, then why should they who are destined for a better fate, first be brought to it through the world of torture, and then be separated from the latter by a second death before they could gain the more happy goal? These questions cannot be answered until later on.