Who is Baldur ?
Baal, and Baldur - Are they the same God in different geographic regions ?
To understand the confusing parallels in full context, you only have to dig a little bit. The confusion of Baldur’s mystery starts immediately. The God of the Sun and Light is the son of Odin and Frigg and brother to Hodr / Hodur. That much is the Same in nearly all of the Icelandic, Norse / Germanic, and Saxon texts, after that it differs. Saxo Grammaticus, and Snorri Sturluson have very different tellings of his death, although both agree it was his brother Hodr that killed him. The Method according to Snorri was Loki, the God of Chaos tricked the blind god Hodr into shooting an arrow / spear with a mistletoe head, and it struck Baldur and killed him. In the Edda's, mistletoe was the only thing in all 9 realms that was overlooked by his mother Frigg on her quest to save her son, this was only done because when Baldur was a child he had dreams of his death, that he told his mother Frigg about. Baldur was such a handsome and radiant child, that Frigg traveled the world to get an oath from all known things not to harm him. In the version by Saxo Grammaticus Baldur was the god of Light, and the Sun just the same, but Hodr was was the God of Darkness and Winter. They were both Warriors and had their own Armies, Hodr wounded Baldur in a battle he died afterward from the wounds. That just starts the story, after his death it gets more interesting, and odd.
After Baldur’s Death the Stories begin to differ, then sync right back up again.
In both Saxo's, and Snorri's versions of Baldur’s story, the Guy goes through hell. In order to Get Vengeance on Hodr for killing his favorite son, the God Odin / Othinus devises a plan, he has another son. His name and conception vary between the 2, but at age 10 Odin takes him (Vali / Bous), and either over night, or several Wars later he becomes a skilled killer, and War Lord among several other things. So when Odin found him to be ready, he gave him his mission, to kill his Half brother Hodr. He was ready (Vali - Bous) became a God “born” of Vengeance and then was trained as an ultimate warrior. His father commanded him, so he goes on to exact that vengeance and kills Hodr. “side note (Ironically enough later in the Eddas Both Hodr, and Baldur are pulled from Hel for the battle of Ragnarok, and all of them survive with Vali, and Vidar, along with Thor's sons Magni, and Modi, and 2 humans Named Lif, and Lifthrasir.)” As you can see, his life and death have some very large differences in the trivial details around them, but according to both Authors and their source material, he was killed by his brother, who was his polar opposite. (Cain and Abel ?) Maybe. We can see his life, death, then later Resurrection have been carried down in all versions of the story.
The Etymology of Baldur
The Similarities between Baldur and several other deities in the vast Indo-European regional Pantheons are many, but none more prevalent than a Phoenician God named Baal, who's physical location we can trace back to modern day Lebanon, in an area named Baalbek, which literally means Land (town) of Baal, the conflict about the very Etymological Origin of his name is debated, and of course this varys greatly based on the sources bias, but here is an already simplified version.
The old Norse Bál meant - Fire
That had a root in Proto- Germanic bēla meaning Fire / Pyre.
Which had a root in Proto- IndoEuropean bel meaning Roar / White / Shine.
Then after understanding the etymology, we can take a look at the Phoenician God Baal and the Town of Baalbek. Baalbek means “town of Baal” in Lebanon we see a Temple at Baalbek that has a large foundation that predates its Roman Occupation, we can see this is at least 1,000+ years by looking at the erosion on two main periods of the building on that site. Baal was the Shining god of Light, and the sun. To some groups of the Phoenicians he was the primary Deity. But even he had a Father.
Here is where the Parallels between Baldur and Baal continue to get stranger. Both Baldur, and Baal had a Father that was known as a Grey bearded, and Wise Wanderer. Plus they were also known as the Fathers who created Mankind. Even their mother's Frigg, and Asherah were both associated with sacred Trees, and sacred Groves. Both also can be traced back to the Chalcolithic, and Early Bronze age, by artifacts.
Even the Artwork and Artifacts have some odd similarities, Both are Frequently Depicted with a spear that has plants blooming from the blunt end of it.
Image Above is a depiction of Baldur. Below is an Image of Baal, notice both carry a spear with plants on them, and both have long and “wavy” hair.
Were they the same being ?
What do you think ?
Links to sources and images.
Völuspá - Norse and Germanic Lore site with Old Norse / English ... - Voluspa.org https://www.voluspa.org/voluspa.htm
The Poetic Edda: Voluspo - Sacred Texts https://www.sacred-texts.com/neu/poe/poe03.htm
The Edda: I. The Divine Mythology of the North - Project Gutenberg https://www.gutenberg.org/files/13007/13007-h/13007-h.htm
Baal - World History Encyclopedia https://www.worldhistory.org/baal/
https://st-takla.org/bible/dictionary/en/b/baal-god.html
Baal (1) - International Standard Bible Encyclopedia https://www.internationalstandardbible.com/B/baal-(1).html
https://www.worldhistory.org/Edda/
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/Baal
https://mythopedia.com/topics/baldur
https://norse-mythology.org/gods-and-creatures/the-aesir-gods-and-goddesses/baldur/
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baal
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frigg
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Odin
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asherah#:~:text=Asherah%20is%20identified%20as%20the,maintain%20purity%20of%20his%20worship.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_(deity)