Þorgeirr Ljósvetningagoði

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Þorgeirr Þorkelsson Ljósvetningagoði (born ca. 940) was an Icelandic lawspeaker in Iceland's Althing from 985 to 1001.

In the year 999 or 1000, Iceland's legislative assembly was debating which religion they should practise: Norse paganism, or Christianity. Þorgeirr, himself a pagan priest and chieftain (a goði), decided in favour of Christianity after a day and a night of silent meditation under a fur blanket. Pagans could still practise their religion in private. After his decision, Þorgeirr himself became a Christian and threw the idols of his gods in a waterfall, for which that waterfall is now known in Icelandic as Goðafoss, the "waterfall of the gods."

Þorgeirr's story is preserved in Ari Þorgilsson's Íslendingabók.

[edit] External links

• Christianity, from a site on the Icelandic parliament.