66 pages • 2 hours read
Sigrid UndsetKristin Lavransdatter
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1920A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
The Vanity of Sin and Guilt
As a religious novel, Kristin Lavransdatter is concerned with the way in which sin and guilt govern the lives of the characters. Kristin’s life, for example, is shaped by concerns about sin—whether those concerns are her own or those of her relatives and neighbors. The suggestion that she may have betrayed her betrothal to Simon by having sex with either Arne or Bentein, for example, prompts Lavrans and Simon to send her to a convent for a year. They fear even the suggestion that she has sinned. Ironically, by sending her to the convent, they create the situation in which she meets Erlend and actually commits the sins they feared most. The suggestion of sin is enough to drive Kristin into sin, then she spends the remainder of the novel attempting to atone for the transgression of giving herself to Erlend before they are married. Each child, to Kristin, is a reminder of this sin, which causes her to make a pilgrimage with Naakkve still in her arms and forgive others who have been tempted by the same sins that tempted her. Kristin’s identity is built on guilt, as she attempts to navigate the aftermath of her perceived sin. Sin shapes Kristin’s life, as she struggles to assuage her guilt. At the same time, however, she does not seek to impose guilt on those who have been tempted by the same sin. Her understanding of her own sin makes her sympathetic toward those she sees as fellow sinners. She seeks atonement, for herself and others, out of a sense of guilt that she should be so tempted to transgress.
In contrast to Kristin’s perpetual guilt, Erlend has no doubts about his immortal soul. He knows that he is a sinner but does not care. This is a significant difference from Kristin, whose religious guilt motivates her actions and leads her to resent of the man who led her into sin. Erlend has spent so long with his sins that he has learned to live with them. People think that he is a sinner, he reasons, so he may as well indulge their expectations. He is as reckless with his soul as he is with his actions, refusing confession and last rites while on his death bed because he cannot subjugate himself before a priest who spread malicious rumors about his wife. Erlend feels guilt, but only for the real harm he has done to others, not for violating religious norms. He is a very proud man, so he refuses to apologize to Kristin or Simon, but he carries this guilt with him. Erlend is immune to the idea of sin, but not to guilt. In either sense, however, he does not allow his life to become beholden to guilt or sin, caring not for what happens after he dies.
At the novel’s conclusion, Kristin finally arrives at a similar lack of self-regard. Having lived a life consumed by the fear of sin and divine retribution, she comes to see this as a form of vanity, an excessive self-consciousness that is ultimately un-Christian in that it prevents her from serving others. Her use of a pagan ritual to heal Simon’s son is the first step on this path of realization. Later, she follows the example of the nuns, sacrificing her own life to care for those who are sick with the plague. In doing so, she loses all concern for the state of her soul, caring only for the suffering she sees around her.
The Tension Between Pagan and Christian Beliefs
Medieval Norway is caught in a tangle of religious tensions. Though the country is largely Christianized at the time Kristin Lavransdatter takes place, many people still remember the old pagan traditions, which are now considered to be heretical. The sacrifice of animals (and even people) to the old gods is one of the ways in which, during difficult times, people search for help. In their desperation, they turn to their ancestors’ spiritual practices. As well as sacrifice, such practices also include superstitions, folklore, and healing rituals. These are less obvious and more difficult for the Christian hegemony to eradicate, as they have been a fundamental part of Norwegian culture for so long. The Christian priests police such actions, but these rituals are never truly eradicated, leading to syncretic beliefs that combine pagan practices with an overarching Christian cosmology. This syncretic belief system makes a cohesive whole out of beliefs that are fundamentally in tension with one another, as pagan beliefs and practices are passed down in increasing secrecy from generation to generation, lingering in the Norwegian culture as vestigial examples of what once was. The tension between the old and new can never be truly resolved.
These tensions exist at a communal as well as an individual level. Predictions for the future of Norway as a country are couched in Christian terms of sin and guilt, but the local lords’ belief that good harvests and good fortune are rewards from God for their actions suggest a strong pagan element still present in their understanding of Christian theology. Times of famine and plague, similarly, are seen as punishment for societal sins, much as they would have been in the time before Christianity. Official Church doctrine holds that sin leads to spiritual consequences—danger to one’s soul, not to one’s wheat crop. In the syncretic faith of this medieval Norwegian community, however, God’s wrath is expressed in the natural world just as the wrath of the old gods would have been. This blending of religious influences becomes even more starkly apparent when the Black Plague comes to the town. Terrified and grieving, at a loss for what to do, the community finally turns to the long-abandoned practice of human sacrifice, preparing to ritually kill a child to appease the old gods before Kristin intervenes. By promising to tend to the body of the child’s dead mother, Kristin effectively sacrifices herself in the child’s place, resolving the tension between theologies for the time being.
Kristin also has a religious tension inside herself. The course of her life is dictated by her belief that she has sinned in having sex with Erlend before their wedding night and breaking her vows to Simon. Later, Kristin herself breaks from Christian teaching, recognizing that the responsibility of caring for others outweighs the responsibility to follow Church doctrine. As Simon’s son lies dying, she invokes an old pagan ritual to save his life. Whether through sorcery or coincidence, the child recovers, and Kristin repays the debt she felt she owed to Simon for breaking her vow to him many years before. Both Kristin and Simon feel significant trepidation at invoking this pagan ritual, which they understand as a major transgression against the authority of the Christian Church. Nonetheless, Kristin is willing to do anything she can to help the boy, and her actions here illustrate the degree to which pagan and Christian beliefs coexist in an uneasy but vital alliance.
The Cost of Honor
Lavrans Bjørgulfsøn is an exemplar of honor and duty in Kristin Lavransdatter, and his life is evidence of the cost that comes with living according to rigid, societally imposed codes of behavior. According to testimonies from numerous characters, there are few people as respected for their authority or their piety as Lavrans. He enjoys the respect of everyone in his community not because he has accomplished any great deed but because he lives his life according to the principles of duty and honor (as well as religious principles) that govern this society. In this sense, he functions as the community’s exemplar of duty and honor, recognized by others as the embodiment of these ideas. He is trusted to arrange land contracts and settle legal disputes. Though he has no real governmental power, his word and advice is trusted by the men who argue about political manners. Since they cannot contravene Lavrans’s interpretation of duty and honor, they do not try to argue with him. Lavrans embodies the ideals of duty and honor, but in doing so he creates an idealized version of himself against which Kristin can rebel. Lavrans has already experienced misfortune, having lost three sons at an early age. One of his daughters is terribly injured, while his eldest daughter has her reputation ruined when her choices contravene the community’s moral code. The only time when Lavrans is insulted, however, is when he discovers that Kristin had sex with Erlend before their marriage. The revelation of her pregnancy offends him because it suggests that he did not imbue her with his own sense of duty and honor. Through her actions, Kristin casts doubt on the defining principles of her father’s life. Duty and honor, so important to the society, threaten the close relationship between father and daughter.
Simon looks up to Lavrans, using his father-in-law’s life as a model for his own as he strives to act dutifully and honorably in all situations. For this, Simon is punished. He is betrothed to Kristin, but she abandons him for Erlend. His only request is that she be the one to tell her father, as Simon cannot tolerate the idea that Lavrans might have considered him to be anything less than an honorable man. Simon’s experiences teach him the nuances of honor, particularly that the most honorable men in society are not always the most successful. Simon acts honestly, while Erlend does not, yet Erlend marries the woman Simon loves, casting him into a life of honorable sorrow. Simon envies Erlend and covets Kristin’s love, yet he could never bring himself to violate the code of honor as Erlend has. This is strict adherence to a code of honor becomes laden with irony when Kristin performs witchcraft to save Simon’s son and Erlend saves his life in a bloody brawl. From Simon’s perspective, these are dishonorable acts that place Simon in the debt of dishonorable people. In a dutiful way, he is bound to the people who have wronged him most and who have repudiated his attempts to live honorably. Simon is shown that honor does not bring reward and that duty can be nuanced; neither duty nor honor, as important as they may be, bring him any joy. Meanwhile, both his life and the life of his son have been saved by those who were willing to disregard honor in service of a higher duty of care.
Honor and duty come in many forms, and duties often conflict with one another. As Simon learns, a person feel a sense of duty to their family, their church, their nation, or their community. When these duties come into conflict, it reveals that there is no single, objective measure of honor against which people can be judged. Honor and duty are social constructs, ideals that can shift according to the needs of the community or even according the whims of those in power. Ultimately, the only duty that matters is the duty to help others. Kristin’s use of witchcraft violates religious duty but upholds a stronger duty to Simon and his innocent, dying child. Erlend’s defense of Simon might offend Simon’s sense of honor, but it saves his life. When Kristin sacrifices her life to care for those dying of the plague, she shows that she has finally absorbed this lesson: The only real duty is the duty of care.
