Religion of the ancient Slavs
Introduction
The ancient, pre-Christian religion of the Slavic peoples is far from known to us enough. Scientists began to take an interest in it from the end of the 18th century, when national consciousness was generally awakened among many Slavic peoples, and an interest in folk culture and folk art began to manifest itself in European literature. But by this time all the Slavic peoples, who had long been converted to Christianity, had managed to forget their ancient beliefs; only some of the folk customs and rituals that were once associated with these beliefs have survived. Therefore, in the writings of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. about the ancient Slavic religion more romantic fantasy than historical facts. These are "A Brief Description of Slavic Fables" by Mikhail Popov (1768), "Dictionary of Russian Superstitions" by Mikhail Chulkov (1780), " Ancient religion Slavs "by Grigory Glinka (1804)," Slavic and Russian Mythology "by Andrey Kaisarov (1804). More critical and meaningful is Peter Stroev's "A Brief Review of the Mythology of the Russian Slavs" (1815); Even much later, already in the 60s of the last century, the authors - adherents of the mythological school allowed a lot of romantic hobbies and conjectures when they wrote about the beliefs of the ancient Slavs. The best example is “Poetic views of the Slavs on nature” by A. N. Afanasyev (1865-1869); here a very large amount of factual material has been collected and carefully systematized, but in his conclusions the author does not always rely on factual data, and therefore makes unfounded assumptions. Only from the end of the XIX century. Attempts began soberly and seriously, on the basis of reliable sources, to consider the preserved information about the pre-Christian beliefs of the Slavic peoples - (A. Kirpichnikov, A. N. Veselovsky, E. V. Anichkov, N. M. Galkovsky, V. Mansikka, L. Niederle and etc.); at the same time, however, it was not without hypercriticism and unjustified agnosticism.
1. Sources
The sources of the study of the pre-Christian beliefs of the Slavs are, firstly, written records dating back to the 6th-12th centuries, secondly, archaeological monuments, and thirdly, remnants of ancient beliefs and rituals, preserved until recently and described in ethnographic literature. The first two categories of sources are very scarce, and the latter presents great difficulties in terms of solving the question: which of those described in the 19th - 20th centuries? rituals and beliefs have survived from pre-Christian times, and which ones appeared later? However, with all the difficulties of the study, the essential features of the ancient Slavic religion can be considered established.
If the former scientists strove to recreate a certain original single common Slavic religion, then the newest researchers hold a skeptical view on this score.
The ancient Slavs were never united either politically or economically, and they could hardly have common gods, common cults. Obviously, each tribe had its own objects of worship, and even each clan had its own. But, of course, many things were the same or similar among different tribes.
2. Funeral cult and family-clan ancestor cult
The Slavs had a patriarchal clan system for a very long time. According to the Kiev Chronicle, "I live my kojo in my own country and in my own places, owning my kojo my kind." Therefore, it is natural that they also retained a family-clan cult in the form of ancestor veneration associated with a funeral cult.
Throughout the territory in which the Slavic tribes lived, there are numerous burial grounds and burial mounds. Funeral customs were complex and varied: cremation (especially among the eastern and partly among the western Slavs; among the southern ones it was not attested), corpses (everywhere from the 10th - 12th centuries), they were often buried or burned in a boat (a relic of a water burial). A mound was usually poured over the grave; different things were always put with the deceased; during the burial of noblemen, they killed a horse, and sometimes a slave, even the wife of the deceased. All this is connected with some kind of idea of \u200b\u200bthe afterlife. The word "paradise" - a pre-Christian common Slavic word - meant a beautiful garden, which apparently depicted the afterlife; but it was probably not available to everyone. Pre-Christian origin, undoubtedly, and the word "hell" (literally heat, fire), perhaps, meant the underworld, where the souls of the wicked burn. Subsequently, the Christian doctrine of the "future life" overlapped these ancient ideas; perhaps only the Ukrainians have preserved a vague mythological belief about some blessed country - viriy (iriy),where birds fly away in autumn and where the dead live.
On the other hand, beliefs about the relationship of the dead to the living were held amazingly firmly, and they are completely different from Christians. The dead were divided very sharply into two categories. This division, preserved in beliefs at least among the Eastern Slavs, was perfectly defined by D.K.Zelenin: one category - "pure" dead, who died a natural death: from illness, old age, - they were usually called, regardless of age and gender , parents;the other - "unclean" dead (ghouls, hostages),those who died an unnatural, violent or premature death: killed, suicides, drowned, opoyans (who died from drunkenness); this also included children who died unbaptized (the influence of Christianity!), and sorcerers. The attitude towards these two categories of the dead was fundamentally different: the "parents" were revered, looked upon as patrons of the family, and they were afraid of the "ghouls" and tried to render harmless.
The veneration of "parents" is a real family (and earlier, obviously, clan) cult of ancestors. It is attested by medieval authors (Titmar of Merseburg: "domesticos colunt deos" - "they honor the gods of the household") and has been partly preserved as a remnant to our days. Russian peasants commemorate their parents on certain days of the year, especially on parental Saturday (before Shrovetide, as well as before Trinity), on the rainbow (after Easter week). Belarusian peasants celebrated a holiday several times a year dzyadov(that is, Grandfathers, dead), especially solemnly - in the fall (mostly on the last Saturday of October). They diligently prepared for the holiday, cleaned and washed the dwelling, prepared ritual meals; The dziads were invited to take part in the meal, which was always very solemn. Serbs and Bulgarians are still coped with - and not only by peasants, but also by townspeople - soul mates,commemoration of the dead in cemeteries, where food is brought, eat and drink at the graves, and some are left to the dead. It is unclear whether the dead are viewed as patrons of the family. But before, no doubt, they looked like that.
A relic of the ancient family-clan cult of ancestors must be considered the custom of celebrating family glory (krsno name).Glory celebrates on the day of the Christian saint - the patron saint of the family; but the very character of the holiday and its origin are undoubtedly pre-Christian, and before it was celebrated, apparently, in honor of the ancestors - the patrons of the family.
Another trace of the ancestor cult that once existed - a fantastic image Churaor Schura.It is very likely that this was a revered ancestor-ancestor. His cult has not been directly attested, but convincing traces of it have been preserved in the Slavic languages. Exclamations "Chur!", "Chur me!", "Chur, it's mine!" apparently meant a spell, calling Chur for help; now it is preserved in children's games; Ukrainian (and Polish) "Tsur tobi" - also in the sense of a spell. The verb "to shun" - to keep aside, that is, as if to be protected by Chur. And the word "too much" clearly comes from the concept of Chura, as it were, protecting some boundaries, the boundaries of the ancestral land, probably. That Chur-Shchur was exactly the ancestor is evident from the word “ancestor”, the ancestor. Perhaps the images of Chur were made of wood, which is hinted at by the Russian word "churka" - a stump of wood.
Finally, the last vestige of the ancient family-clan ancestor cult is the belief in brownie,preserved to this day, especially among the Eastern Slavs, where the patriarchal family way of life lasted longer. Brownie (housekeeper, lodger, owner, susedkoetc.) is the invisible patron of the family; according to popular belief, he is in every home, he usually lives under the stove, behind the stove, under the threshold; humanoid; monitors the economy, patronizes hardworking owners, but punishes the lazy and careless; demands self-respect and small sacrifices - a little bread, salt, porridge, etc.; loves horses and looks after them, but only if the color is to his liking, otherwise he can ruin the horse. A brownie can appear in the form of an old man, a deceased owner, or even a living one. In his image, as it were, the well-being and trouble of the family and the economy was personified. The preservation of this image from the ancient era is explained by the stability of the patriarchal way of life in Russian and Belarusian peasant families; among the Ukrainians, this way of life was preserved weaker, and therefore the belief in the brownie faded. Western Slavs have similar images, for example, skrzhitekthe Czechs.
3. Unclean dead
The attitude towards the "unclean" dead, who had not the slightest relation to either the family or the clan cult, was completely different. The unclean were simply feared, and this superstitious fear, obviously, was generated either by the fear of these people during their lifetime (sorcerers), or by the very unusual cause of their death. In the superstitious ideas about these unclean dead, apparently, there are very few animistic elements: the Slavs were afraid not of the soul or spirit of the dead, but of himself. This can be seen from the fact that until recently there were popular superstitious methods of neutralizing such a dangerous dead person: in order to prevent him from getting up from the grave and harm the living, the corpse was pierced with an aspen stake, a tooth from a harrow was driven in behind the ears, etc .; in a word, they were afraid of the corpse itself, and not the soul, and believed in its supernatural ability to move after death. Bad influence on the weather, such as drought, was also attributed to the unclean dead; to prevent it, they dug up the corpse of a suicide or other ghoul from the grave and threw it into a swamp or flooded the grave with water. Such unclean dead were called ghouls(a word of obscure origin, maybe purely Slavic, since it is found in all Slavic languages), among the Serbs - vampires,the northern Russians - hereticsetc. Maybe an ancient word "Navbe "(" naviy ")meant just such unclean and dangerous dead; at least in the Kiev Chronicle (under 1092) there is a story about how the pestilence (epidemic) that happened in Polotsk was explained by the frightened people by the fact that "se navye (dead) beat Polotsk people". In one of the ancient church teachings ("The Word of John Chrysostom"), it is also said about some rituals in honor of these dead: "They do it for a long time and sang in the midst of pouring." Bulgarians and now navii- these are the souls of unbaptized children. Hence, probably, the Ukrainian navki, mavki.
4. Communal agricultural cults
Along with the family-clan forms of worship among the Slavs, there were also communal cults associated primarily with agriculture. The evidence of them in early written sources, however, is scarce. One church teaching says: "Ov require you to do something on students (at the source - ST), djda (rain) claims from him" - an allusion to the magical rite of making rain. In the Kiev Chronicle it is said that the meadows were formerly pagans ("trash"), "living with a lake, a well, and a grove." In another place of the same chronicle (under 1068), we are talking about some kind of festivities, apparently associated with agriculture.In later times, the Slavs preserved numerous and very stable remnants of an agrarian cult in the form of religious and magical rites and holidays timed to the most important moments agricultural calendar and subsequently merged with Christian church holidays: Christmastide,) falling at the time of the winter solstice (Christmas-New Year cycle); "Shrovetide in early spring; spring rituals now attributed to Christian Easter; summer cycle of holidays, partly timed to coincide with the Trinity day, partly for the day of John the Baptist (Ivan Kupala); autumn brothers - communal meals after harvest. All these customs and rituals of the agricultural cycle are very similar among all Slavic peoples, as well as among non-Slavic peoples. They once arose, in all likelihood, from simple meals, games and holidays dedicated to the beginning or end of certain agricultural works (this was well shown in his studies by V.I. Chicherov), but magical rituals and superstitious ideas were intertwined with them. Agricultural magic was either initial ("magic of the first day" - customs and fortune-telling on New Year's Eve), or imitative (ceremonies during sowing, for example, burying a chicken egg in a furrow, etc.). These magical rites persisted until recently.
Much less clear is the question of those personified images of deities - the patrons of agriculture, which the Slavs undoubtedly had. In literature, however, there are names of some mythological creatures supposedly patronizing agriculture (Koleda, Yarilo, Kupala, Lel, Kostroma, etc.), and former authors wrote a lot about them, especially supporters of the mythological school. But all these images are very dubious: they were either formed under the influence of Christianity (Kupala is John the Baptist, because the people associated Christian baptism with bathing; Lel - from the Christian "hallelujah"), or are a simple personification of holidays and rituals (for example, Koleda - from the ancient holiday of calendars, which coincided with the Slavic winter Christmastide).
5. Ancient Slavic pantheon
Written sources have preserved the names of the ancient Slavic deities, and some of them - later lost - had, apparently, something to do with agriculture. Such were, I suppose, the solar deities Svarog, Dazhdbog, Hora. Apparently, there was a cult of the goddess of the earth, although it was not directly attested. It is possible that the god of thunder, Perun, was also associated with agriculture (this name seems to be an epithet and means “striking”), who later became a princely god in Russia; whether he was revered by the peasants is unknown. The patron saint of cattle breeding was undoubtedly Veles (Volos) - the cattle god.
The female deity Mokosh, mentioned in Russian sources, is very interesting. This is not only almost the only female image, attested in the ancient East Slavic pantheon, but also the only deity whose name has survived among the people to this day. Mokosh is apparently the patron goddess of women's work, spinning and weaving. In the North Russian regions even now there is a belief that if the sheep molt, it means that "Mokosh shears the sheep"; there is a belief that "Mokusha bypasses houses with great fast and worries spinning women."
The religious and mythological significance of the Family and Rozhanitsy, which, according to various sources, was worshiped by the ancient Slavs is unclear. Some researchers see in them the ancestral spirits (Genus - the ancestor), others - the spirits of birth and fertility. According to BA Rybakov, Rod in the pre-Christian era managed to become the supreme deity of all Slavs; but this is doubtful.
In general, did there exist common Slavic deities? There has been a lot of debate about this. Many authors, in their romantic-Slavophile hobby, considered almost all known mythological names, even the most dubious ones, as the names of all-Slavic gods. Subsequently, it turned out that some gods are mentioned among the eastern Slavs, others - among the western, and still others - among the southern. Only the name of Perun is repeated among different groups of Slavs, but, as already mentioned, this is just an epithet of the thunder god. Common Slavic is often considered Svarog (Svarozhich) and Dazhdbog, sometimes Veles; but this is all unreliable.
The cult of the tribal gods can only be talked about presumably. Some names, apparently, tribal or local gods of the Western, especially the Baltic, Slavs are cited by medieval writers and chroniclers Titmar of Merseburg, Adam of Bremen, Saxon Grammaticus and other authors. It is not excluded that some of these tribal gods received wider fame and became, perhaps, intertribal. Such was Svyatovit, whose sanctuary stood in Arkono, on the island of Ruyan (Rügen), and was destroyed by the Danes in 1168; Radogost was the god of the Lyutichi, but traces of his veneration were preserved even among the Czechs. Triglav was the god of the Pomorians. Also known are the tribal gods Rugevit (on Ruyan), Gerovit, or Yarovit (in Volgast), Prov (among the Vagrs), the goddess Siwa (among the Polabian Slavs), etc. The Serbs believed that the tribal patron was Dabog, who later turned into an antagonist Christian god. Many other names of deities have survived, but they are doubtful.
6. « God» , "Demon" and "devil"
The word itself "God"primordially Slavic, common to all Slavic languages, as well as related to ancient Iranian baga and ancient Indian bhaga. The main meaning of this word, as the language data show, is happiness, good luck. Hence, for example, “rich” (having God, happiness) and “poor” (“y” is a prefix meaning loss or removal from something); polish zboze - harvest, Lusatian zbozo , zboze - livestock, wealth. Over time, ideas about luck, success, happiness, luck were embodied in the image of a certain spirit that gives good luck. At the beginning of the 15th century. in Moscow, at the royal wedding, one boyar said to another, arguing with him about the place: "Your brother has a god in a kik (that is, happiness in a kich, in a wife), but you have no god in a kick": the brother of the second boyar was married on the king's sister. Another common Slavic designation for a supernatural being is demon.This word, apparently, meant at first everything supernatural and terrible (compare Lithuanian baisas - fear, Latin foedus - terrible, disgusting). Until now, the words "mad", "rage" are preserved in the Russian language. After the adoption of Christianity, the word "demon" became synonymous with an evil spirit, equivalent to the concept of the devil, Satan.
The same fate befell the idea of line.But the pre-Christian meaning of this image is unclear, just as the etymology of the word is not entirely clear. "heck".Of the various attempts to explain it, the most plausible is the old assumption of the Czech Karel Erben: he elevates it to the Old Slavic krt, which sounds in the name of the West Slavic god Krodo , in the names of the domestic spirit among the Czechs kret (skriter), poles have skrzat , latvians have krat . Apparently, the same root is in the word "Krachun" ("korochun"),which is also known to all Slavs and some of their neighbors. The word "krachun" ("korochun") has several meanings: the winter holiday Christmastide, ceremonial bread baked at this time, as well as some spirit or deity of winter, death. "Korochun got him" in Russian means: he died.
One can think that the ancient Slavs believed in a certain deity of winter and death, perhaps the personification of winter darkness and cold. There are traces of some kind of bifurcation of the image krt - crt , may be associated with the rudiments of a dualistic idea of \u200b\u200blight and dark beginning. But the root "krt" has almost disappeared, and "chrt" - devil - has been preserved in almost all Slavic languages \u200b\u200bas the personification of every evil supernatural power. The devil has become synonymous with the Christian devil.
7. Growth of tribal cults into state
When the Slavic tribes, as class stratification began to pass over to the state forms of life, conditions arose for the transformation of tribal cults into national and state ones. Perhaps the cult of Svyatovit among the Pomor Slavs spread precisely in connection with this. Among the Eastern Slavs, an attempt to create a national pantheon and state cult was made by the Kiev prince Vladimir: according to the story of the chronicle, in 980 he gathered on one of the hills of Kiev a whole host of idols of various gods (Perun, Veles, Dazhdbog, Khors, Stribog, Mokoshi) and ordered pray to them and offer sacrifices. Some researchers, hypercritical (Anichkov), believed that these "Vladimir gods" were from the very beginning princely or druzhina gods and their cult had no roots in the people. But this is unlikely. The solar deities Hora, Dazhdbog and others, the female goddess Mokosh, apparently, were also folk deities; Vladimir only tried to make of them, as it were, the official gods of his principality in order to give it ideological unity. It must be assumed that the prince himself was not satisfied with the attempt to create his own pantheon of gods of Slavic origin - just 8 years later he adopted Christianity from Byzantium and forced the entire people to do so. The Christian religion was more in line with the emerging feudal relations. Therefore, although slowly, overcoming the resistance of the people, it spread among the Eastern Slavs. The same happened among the southern Slavs. The Western Slavs, under great pressure from the feudal-royal power, adopted Christianity in Catholic form from Rome.
The spread of Christianity was accompanied by its merger with the old religion. The Christian clergy themselves took care of this in order to make the new faith more acceptable to the people. Old agricultural and other holidays were timed to coincide with the days of the church calendar. The old gods gradually merged with Christian saints and for the most part lost their names, but transferred their functions and attributes to these saints. So, Perun continued to be worshiped as a thunder deity under the name of Elijah the Prophet, the cattle god Veles - under the name of St. Blasius, Mokosh - under the name of St. Paraskeva or Holy Friday.
8. "Lower mythology" of the Slavs
But the images of "lower mythology" turned out to be more stable. They have survived almost to the present day, although it is not always easy to discern what in these images really comes from ancient times, and what lay on them later.
All Slavic peoples have marked beliefs about the spirits of nature. Perfume - the personification of the forest is known mainly in the forest belt: Russian devil,belorussian leshuk, Pushchevik,polish duch lesny borowy . They personified the fearful hostility of a Slav-farmer to a dense forest, from which he had to reclaim land for arable land and in which a person was in danger of getting lost, perishing from wild animals. Spirit of the Water Element - Russian water,polish topielec , wodnik (topielnica, wodnica), czech vodnik , lusatian wodny muz (wodna zona) and so on - inspired much greater fear than the relatively good-natured joker goblin, for the danger of drowning in a pool, a lake is much more terrible than the danger of getting lost in the forest. The image of the field spirit is characteristic: Russian noon,polish poludnice, lusatian pripoldnica , czech polednice . This is a woman in white, who seems to be working in the field in the midday heat, when the custom requires a break from work: noon punishes the violator of the custom, turning his head or in some other way. The image of the midday is the personification of the danger of the Sunstroke. In the mountainous regions of Poland and Czechoslovakia there is a belief about the spirits of the mountains guarding treasures or patronizing miners: skarbnik the Poles, perkman (from German Bergmann - mountain man) among the Czechs and Slovaks.
More complex and less clear image pitchfork,especially common among Serbs (among Bulgarians - samovila, samodiva);it is found in both Czech and Russian sources. Some authors consider it to be primordial and common Slavic; others are still only South Slavic. Pitchfork - forest, field, mountain, water or air maidens who can behave both friendly and hostile towards a person, depending on his own behavior. In addition to beliefs, the pitchfork appears in South Slavic epic songs. The origin of the image of the pitchfork is unclear, but there is no doubt that different elements are intertwined in it: here is the personification of natural elements, and, perhaps, ideas about the souls of the dead, and the power of fertility. The word itself is apparently Slavic, but its etymology is controversial: from the verb "Viti"- drive, fight, or from "Power" -rush about in a stormy dance (Czech vilny - voluptuous, lustful, Polish wit - scarecrow, scarecrow, wity - nonsense, crazy antics).
The question of the origin of the image is clearer mermaids,although the latter is even more complicated. The image of a mermaid, or at least some analogous one, is known among all Slavs. They argued a lot about him: some considered the mermaid to be the personification of water, others believed that the mermaid was a drowned woman, etc. The word itself was deduced from "fair-haired" (light, clear), then from "channel" (river), etc. n. Now, however, it can be considered proven that the word is not of Slavic, but of Latin origin, from the root « ros».
The most detailed research on East Slavic mermaids belongs to DK Zelenin; he collected an enormous amount of factual material about these beliefs, but his view of their origin suffers from one-sidedness. Already from the time of the works of Miklosich (1864), Veselovsky (1880) and others, it became clear that it is impossible to understand the beliefs about mermaids and the rituals associated with them, if we do not take into account the influence of ancient and early Christian rituals on the Slavs. Among the peoples of the Mediterranean, the spring-summer holiday of the Trinity (Pentecost) was called domenica rosarum , pascha rosata, in the Greek form povublib. These Greco-Roman mermaidswere transferred along with Christianity to the Slavs and merged with the local spring-summer agricultural rites. Until now, Bulgarians and Macedonians know mermaids,or mermaid,like summer holidays (before Trinity day). The Russians also had their Rusal week (before the trinity), as well as seeing the mermaid; the mermaid was portrayed by a girl or a straw stuffed animal. The very mythological image of a mermaid - a girl living in water, or in a field, in a forest - is late: it has been attested only since the 18th century; this is to a large extent the personification of the holiday or ceremony itself. But this image merged, apparently, with the ancient purely Slavic mythological ideas, moreover, quite diverse: here is the personification of the water element (the mermaid loves to lure people into the water and drown people), and the idea of \u200b\u200bwomen, girls who died in the water, of unbaptized dead children (unclean dead), and beliefs about the spirits of fertility (mermaids in the South Great Russian beliefs walk in the rye, roll on the grass and thereby give a harvest of bread, flax, hemp, etc.). Obviously, this new and complex image of a mermaid supplanted the original Slavic ancient images. beregin, waterand other female water spirits.
The modern Slavic peoples have preserved many other superstitious ideas about supernatural beings, partly hostile, partly benevolent to man. They personified either the fear of the elements of nature, generated by the underdevelopment of material production, or social conditions. Some of these concepts date back to the pre-Christian era, others arose in relatively new conditions of life; among the later are, for example, Ukrainian beliefs about sinister- small spirits, personifying the unfortunate fate of a poor peasant. Under church influence, most of these mythological images were united under the collective name evil spirits(among Belarusians, for example, impure).
9. Sorcery and healing magic
Undoubtedly, the roots of healing magic go back to the most ancient era, which among the Slavs, like all other peoples, was associated with folk medicine. The church teachings mention, albeit very unclearly, medical and magical rituals, they also speak of the animistic images associated with them: “... sickness is treated with magicians, and noses (with amulets - S. T.),and by enchantments, by the devil, they bring the devil, the verb shaker, they create, driving away ... ". As you know, the use of healer remedies was preserved among the Slavic (as well as other) peoples until modern times. Various symptoms of the disease were personified in the form of special evil creatures mentioned in medical conspiracies: "shaking", "fire", "yellowing", "lameya", etc.
10. Ancient - Slavic cult and its servants
The question of the ancient Slavic clergymen, performers of religious rituals is very unclear. The ritual of the family-clan cult was carried out, most likely, by the heads of families and clans. The public cult was in the hands of special professionals - magi.The word itself has not been satisfactorily clarified despite numerous attempts. It is believed that it reflected the ties of the Slavs with the Celts (volokh, shafts- the former designation of the Celts), or with the Finns (from the Finnish velho - sorcerer), or even with the Germans (volva - a prophetess). In any case, the connection of the word "sorcerer" with the word "magic", "magic" is undoubted. But who were the wise men? Simple sorcerers, shamans, or priests of the gods? Were there any differences, ranks, specialization between the Magi? It is difficult to answer this. However, other designations for performers of religious and magical rites have survived: sorcerer, sorcerer, prophetic, bay iron, sorcerers, sorcereretc.
There is news that after the adoption of Christianity in Russia, the Magi acted as defenders of the old faith and at the same time as leaders of anti-princely and anti-feudal uprisings (for example, in 1071). And this is understandable, for Christianity came to Russia as a purely feudal-princely religion. In later times, all Slavic peoples retained sorcerers, sorcerers, warlocks, who were attributed secret knowledge, intercourse with evil spirits. But along with them, specialists in healing magic associated with traditional medicine, healers, have survived from the ancient era. (whisperers, witches).In popular beliefs, they differentiated themselves from sorcerers and often opposed themselves to them, claiming that they act with the help of the power of God, and not of evil power.
It is very characteristic that the Russians considered foreigners to be stronger sorcerers and healers: Finns, Karelians, Mordovians, etc. This phenomenon, however, is known to other peoples as well.
In the ancient Slavic religion, undoubtedly, there were sacred and sacrificial places, and in some places there were real sanctuaries and temples with images of gods, etc. But only very few are known: the Arkon sanctuary on the island of Rügen, the sanctuary in Retra, the pre-Christian sanctuary in Kiev (under Church of the Tithes).
It is difficult to judge with certainty what the cult itself consisted of. But the main part of it was undoubtedly the sacrifice. “They are laying demands,” “they are putting on a meal,” “they are eating,” “the Korowai are praying,” etc. - such expressions are not uncommon in ancient sources. Not only animals were sacrificed (“slaughtering chickens”, etc.), but in important cases people were also sacrificed. In the "Tale of Bygone Years" there are several references to human sacrifices: about the inhabitants of Kiev it is said that they led to the images of the gods placed on the hill, "their sons and their daughters and the greedy (sacrificed - ST) by a demon" ; After the successful campaign of Prince Vladimir against the Yatvingians in Kiev, it was decided, according to the old custom, to bring a human sacrifice to the gods, outlining it by lot.
11. The question of mythology and the general nature of the Slavic religion
Unfortunately, ancient Slavic mythology has not survived at all, although it probably existed. In church teachings, some "koshchuns" are repeatedly mentioned: this word translated the Greek word "myth". The scarcity of the remnants of the ancient Slavic religion prompted some researchers to consider this religion pitiful, squalid in comparison with the religions of other ancient peoples. "The paganism of Russia was especially wretched," said E. V. Anichkov, for example, "her gods are pitiful, their cult and customs are rude." But the matter, apparently, is simply in the insufficient study of the religion of the ancient Slavs and in the paucity of sources. If we knew about her as much as about the religion of, for example, the ancient Romans, the Slavic religion would hardly have seemed to us more wretched and pathetic than the Roman.
the jealous, pre-Christian religion of the Slavic peoples is far from known to us enough. Scientists began to take an interest in it from the end of the 18th century, when national consciousness awakened among many Slavic peoples, and interest in folk culture and folk art began to appear in European literature. But by this time all Slavic peoples, who had long been converted to Christianity, had managed to forget their ancient beliefs; some of them have preserved only individual folk customs and rituals that were once associated with these beliefs. Therefore, in the works on the themes of the ancient Slavic religion of the late 18th and early 19th centuries, there is more romantic fantasy than historical facts. It was only at the end of the last century that attempts began to soberly and seriously consider the preserved data on pre-Christian peoples. The sources of the study of Slavic paganism are, firstly, written records dating back to the 6th-12th centuries, secondly, archaeological monuments, and thirdly, remnants of ancient beliefs and rituals, preserved until recently and described in ethnographic literature. The first two categories of sources are very scarce, so the main, defining material for the study of paganism is ethnographic: rituals, round dances, songs, conspiracies and spells, children's games, into which archaic rituals have degenerated, fairy tales that have preserved fragments ancient mythology and epic; the symbolic ornament of embroidery and woodcarving is also important. Elucidation of the evolution of religious ideas over many millennia requires the introduction of a chronological principle into ethnographic materials. Comparing folklore data with reliable chronological reference points at the disposal of archeology (the beginning of agriculture, the beginning of metal casting,iron, the time of the construction of the first fortifications, etc.), you can catch the dynamics of pagan ideas, identify the stages of their development. Studies of the history of paganism have shown that the evolution of religious ideas did not take place through their complete change, but through the layering of the new on the remaining old. As a result, the ethnographic material revealed relics of the ideas of Paleolithic hunters (the cult of bear paws, "proboscis monsters" - mammoths in fairy tales, etc.), the Mesolithic (solitary forest hunters), the first farmers of the Eneolithic and much more from the subsequent, closer to us time.
In the middle of the 2nd millennium BC. an array of Proto-Slavic tribes began to take shape and separate in a wide strip from the Oder to the Dnieper. Their religious ideas, as far as can be judged from archaeological data, fit into the general scheme of primitive agricultural tribes. This means that the primitive religion of the Proto-Slavs is a cult of deification of nature (with the remnants of totemism observed in it), developing on the basis of animism and magic, and as the economy grows, there is a transition from the cult of the animal ancestor to the cult of the human ancestor. In Slavic paganism, much of what should be attributed to the general Indo-European unity was deposited; some of the earlier hunting ideas have survived, although all this still does not bear exactly the Slavic specifics; it is acquired during the evolution of paganism.
At the very beginning of the XII century. Russian writer, contemporary of Vladimir Monomakh (maybe a pilgrim, Abbot Daniel) gave an interesting periodization of Slavic paganism, dividing it into four stages:
1) the cult of "ghouls" (vampires) and "bearers" - the dualistic animism of the primitive hunters of the Stone Age, which inspired the whole of nature and divided spirits into hostile and benevolent;
2) the cult of the agricultural celestial deities of the Family and "women in labor". Historically, two "women in labor" precede the Rod; these were the goddesses of the fertility of all living things, who later became matriarchal goddesses of agrarian fertility (Eneolithic). Genus is a further, patriarchal stage in the development of the same ideas, which were reborn in the Bronze Age into primitive agricultural monotheism. Author of the XII century. believes that the cult of the Rod was inherent not only to the Slavs, but also to many peoples of the Middle East and the Mediterranean. It is assumed that in the sources the Rod appears under the name of Svarog (literally "Heavenly" - an archaic form) or Stribog ("God the Father" - a form known from the 10th century). In all likelihood, another of the images of the supreme heavenly deity was the Indo-European Dy. The cult of two "ro-zhanits" survived the cult of the Rod,
3) the cult of Perun, who in ancient times was the god of thunder, lightning and thunder, and later became the deity of war and the patron saint of warriors and princes. When the state of Kievan Rus was created, Perun became the first, the main deity in the princely state cult of the 10th century.
,4) after the adoption of Christianity in 988, paganism continued to exist, moving to the outskirts of the state.
Among the Slavs, the patriarchal-clan structure was very long. Therefore, it is natural that they also retained a family-clan cult in the form of reverence for ancestors, associated with a funeral cult. Throughout the territory in which the Slavic tribes lived, there are numerous burial grounds and burial mounds. Burial customs were complex and varied: cremation (especially among the eastern and partly among the western Slavs; among the southern ones it was not attested), corpse position (everywhere from the 10th-12th centuries), they were often buried or burned in a boat (a relic of water burial). A mound was usually poured over the grave; they always put different things with the deceased; when the noble was buried, they killed a horse, sometimes a slave, even the wife of the deceased.
All of this has to do with the idea of \u200b\u200ban afterlife. The word "paradise" - a pre-Christian and common Slavic word - meant a beautiful garden, which apparently depicted the afterlife; but it was probably not available to everyone. Pre-Christian origin, undoubtedly, and the word "hell" (literally "heat", "fire"), possibly meaning the underworld, where the souls of the wicked burn. Subsequently, the Christian doctrine of the future life overlapped these ancient ideas. On the other hand, beliefs concerning the relationship of the dead to the living were held remarkably firmly, and they are not quite like Christians; distinguished those who died a natural death ("clean" dead) and those who died an unnatural death ("unclean" dead). The former were called "parents" and were revered, and the latter were feared ghouls. The veneration of "parents" is a real family (and formerly clan) cult of ancestors, it is attested by medieval authors (Titmar of Merseburg wrote: "They honor the domestic gods");
partly it has been preserved as a remnant to the present day. Suffice it to recall the Russian commemoration, Belarusian dzyady, Serbian and Bulgarian soul mates, when the dead are commemorated in cemeteries. ,
Another trace of the ancestor cult that once existed is the fantastic image of Chur (or Schur). The exclamations “Chur!”, “Chur me!”, “Chur, this is mine1” meant, apparently, a spell, calling Chur for help. Perhaps the images of Chur were made of wood, which is hinted at by the Russian word "churka" - a stump of wood. Finally,
the last vestige of the ancient family-clan ancestor cult is the belief in the brownie, which has survived to this day where the patriarchal-family way of life lasted longer.
The attitude towards the shady corpses, who had not the slightest relation to either the family or the clan cult, was completely different. The unclean were simply feared, and this superstitious fear was generated either by fear of these people during their lifetime (sorcerers), or by the extraordinary cause of their death. In the superstitious ideas about these unclean dead, there are obviously very few animistic elements: the Slavs were not afraid of the soul or spirit of the dead, but of himself. This is evident from the fact that until recently there were folk superstitious methods of neutralizing such a dangerous dead person: in order to prevent him from getting up from the grave and harm the living, the corpse was pierced with an aspen stake, a tooth from a harrow was driven in behind the ears, etc .; in a word, they were afraid of the corpse itself, and not the soul, and believed in its supernatural ability to move after death. The unclean dead were also attributed to bad influence on the weather, for example, they could cause drought; to prevent it, the corpse of a suicide or other ghoul was dug out of the grave and thrown into a swamp, or the grave was flooded with water. Such unclean dead were called ghouls (a word of obscure origin, perhaps purely Slavic, since it is found in all Slavic languages), among the Serbs - vampires, among the northern Russians - heretics, etc. Maybe the ancient word "navye" 1 ("naviy") meant just such unclean and dangerous dead, in any case, the Kiev Chronicle contains (marked in 1092) a story about how a plague (epidemic) that happened in Polotsk, a frightened people explained by the fact that "se navier (dead) beat Polotsk citizens." In the ancient church teaching "The Word of John Chrysostom" it is also said about some rituals in honor of these dead: "they do it for all and sang in the midst of the pour." For Bulgarians even now, Navi are the souls of unbaptized people. Hence, probably, and Ukrainian Navka, Mavka. Against all these vampires, ghouls, navias, conspiracies and magical means have long existed.
Written sources have preserved the names of ancient Slavic deities, and some of them - later lost - had something to do with agriculture. These included the solar deities Svarog, Dazhdbog, Hora; there must have been a cult of the earth goddess, although there is no direct evidence to support this assumption. It is possible that the god of thunder, Perun, who later became the princely god in Russia, was also associated with agriculture; whether he was revered by the peasants is unknown. Veles-Volos was the patron saint of cattle breeding, at the same time
There is an assumption about the opposition that existed in antiquity between reality (existing, daytime, solar) - and chav (night, dark).
god of the underworld and the dead, it was his name that was sworn in. Whiter was considered the god of wealth and trade; from here it is clear why his statue was on the trading square in Kiev, Veliky Novgorod, Rostov, and obviously in Kazan.
On the island of Ruyane (Rugen), the intertribal god of war, called Svyatovit, was revered. He lived in the heavily fortified village of Arko-ne, in a shrine full of treasures, had a white horse and a squad of three hundred mounted warriors. Another god on Ruyan was Rugevit, in the temple there was a statue of him with seven faces; there was also a statue of Porevit with five heads, and in another shrine there was a statue of Porenut with five faces. In Szczecin and Volyn, the three-headed god Trigla-va was revered. Yarovit was worshiped in Wolgast and Havelberg. The common feature of these seaside deities is their belligerence, their attributes are a warrior's shield or sword, a war horse, and their emblems are military banners. All of them patronized the Baltic tribes in their struggle against the German invasions.
From the messages of an Arab author of the second half of the 9th century. Ibn Rust knows that all Slavs worshiped Fire - according to Massudi (10th century), they worshiped the Sun. The Slavs revered both earthly and heavenly fire in the form of a flaming solar disk, calling the fire deity Svarog, and the sun Svarozhich, and the middle name may refer to the son of Svarog. The latter was worshiped by both Western and Eastern Slavs as a divine blacksmith. There is nothing surprising in the fact that in the pantheon of early medieval Slavs the main places are occupied by Svarog and Svarozhich.
The goddess of happiness Sreka among the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes, apparently, is a rather late mythical creation; she borrowed some features from Fortuna and Tyche. She acts as destiny, like Fatum and parks; libations were made in her honor during festivities, and coins were donated to her in commercial transactions.
Modern studies of the ancient Slavic pantheon testify in favor of the existence of Thracian Rus. V. Shcherbakov, who was mentioned in the previous edition, in his works "Asgard and the Vani", "Asgard is the city of gods" writes the following: "All the gods of the Eastern Slavs (in Kievan Rus) are the gods of the Trojan-Thracians: the Thracian Per-Kon is Perun, Stribog is the god of Satra of the Thracian tribe of Sat-dv, Dazhdbog is the Asia Minor Tadi, Dazh, Tadaena ... Kupala is the Phrygian Cybele, etc. "
The tall, physically strong Thracians (who called themselves Russes) believed in the immortality of the soul. It was difficult to fight with such a people (as well as with the Celts); it is clear that they were part of the Roman legions. At the beginning of the new era, the stream of Thracians moved north, occupying all land suitable for agriculture, up to the banks of the Dnieper (
thousands of treasures of the 1st-2nd centuries, in which there are many Roman awards to the Thracian legionnaires) It was on the right bank of the Dnieper that Kievan Rus was formed later - a semblance of Thracian Rus.
The word god itself is primordially Slavic, common to all Slavic languages, as well as related to ancient Iranian boga and ancient Indian bhaga. ") And" y-god "(" y "is a prefix meaning the loss or removal of something); Polish zboze - harvest, Lusatian zbozo, zbze - cattle, prosperity Over time, ideas about luck, success, luck were embodied in the image of a spirit that gives good luck. At the beginning of the 15th century in Moscow, at a royal wedding in Moscow, one boyar said to another, whose brother was married to the tsar's sister, arguing with him over the place: “Your brother has a god in a kik (that is, happiness in a kitsch, in a wife), and you have no god in your kick. "
Another common Slavic designation for a supernatural being is a demon. This word, apparently, meant at first everything supernatural and strange (compare the Lithuanian baisas - fear, Latin boedus - terrible, disgusting). Until now, the Russian language retains the words "mad", "mad". After the adoption of Christianity, the word "demon" became synonymous with an evil spirit, equivalent to the concept of the devil, Satan. The same fate befell the concept of the line. But the pre-Christian meaning of this image is unclear, just as the etymology of the word "devil" is not entirely clear. Of the various attempts to explain it, the most plausible is the assumption of the Czech Karel Erben. He traces it to the Old Slavic krt, which sounds in the name of the West Slavic god krodo, in the names of the domestic spirit among the Czechs kret, among the Poles skrzat, among the Latvians krat. Apparently, the same root is in the word "karachun" ("korochun"), which is also known to all Slavs and some of their neighbors. This word has several meanings: the winter Christmas holiday, ceremonial bread baked at this time, as well as some kind of spirit or deity of winter, death. "Korochun grabbed him" in Russian means: "he died." Probably, the ancient Slavs believed in a certain deity of winter and death, the personification of winter darkness and cold.There are traces of some kind of bifurcation of the image of krt - trt, perhaps associated with the rudiments of a dualistic idea of \u200b\u200blight and dark beginning. But the root "krt" almost disappeared, and "chrt" - devil - was preserved in almost all Slavic languages \u200b\u200bas the personification of an evil supernatural power and became synonymous with the Christian devil.
During the formation of the early feudal Slavic states, through the absorption of various tribes, a reorganization of the pagan cult took place, the transformation of tribal cults into state ones. The official cult concentrates the entire ensemble of deities from
separate tribes, among which the god of the tribe, which carried out political consolidation, dominates, and it is interesting that this process falls on the 10th century
According to Tietmar, a number of deities headed by Svarog are concentrated in the metropolitan Radogoshche Veles in one sanctuary. Among the Pomor Slavs, the cult of Svyatovit, obviously, spread precisely in connection with this socio-political process of state formation. Among the Eastern Slavs, an attempt to create a nationwide pantheon and state cult was made by the Kiev prince Vladimir. According to the chronicler Nestor, in 980 he gathered on one of the hills of Kiev a whole host of idols of various gods (Perun, Veles, Dazhdbog, Khors, Stribog, etc.) and ordered them to pray and bring sacrifices to them. Some researchers believe that these Vladimirov's gods were from the very beginning princely or druzhina gods and their cult had no roots in the people. However, the solar deities Hora, Dazhdbog and others were also folk deities, as the history of the religion of the Slavs testifies; Vladimir only tried to make of them, as it were, the official gods of his principality, in order to give it ideological unity.
But the prince himself was not satisfied with the attempt to create his own pantheon of Slavic gods, and just eight years later he adopted Christianity from Byzantium and forced the whole people to do this, since the Christian religion was more consistent with the emerging feudal relations. Although slowly, overcoming the resistance of the people, it spread among the Eastern Slavs. The Western Slavs, under great pressure from the feudal-royal power, adopted Christianity in the Roman Catholic formThe spread of Christianity was accompanied by its merger with the old religion. The Christian clergy themselves took care of this in order to make the new faith more acceptable to the people. Old agricultural and other holidays were timed to coincide with the days of the church calendar. The old pagan gods gradually merged with Christian saints and for the most part lost their names, but transferred their functions and attributes to these saints. So, Perun continued to be worshiped as a thunder deity under the name of Elijah the Prophet, the cattle god Veles - under the name of St. Blasius, etc.
However, the images of "lower mythology" turned out to be more stable. They have survived to this day, although it is not always easy to discern what in these images really comes from ancient times, and what lay on them after.
All Slavic peoples have beliefs about the spirits of nature. Spirits - the personification of the forest - are known mainly in the forest belt: the Russian goblin, Belarusian goblin, Pushchevik, the Polish spirit of the forest, pine forest.They embody the fearful hostility of the Slavs.
to a farmer to a dense forest, from which they had to reclaim land for arable land and in which a person was in danger of getting lost, perishing from wild animals. The spirit of the water element - Russian waterman, Polish waterman, Lukitsky water husband (water wife), etc. - inspired much greater fear than the relatively good-natured goblin joker, for drowning in a pool, a lake is much more terrible than the danger of getting lost in the forest. The image of the field spirit is characteristic: the Russian noon, the Lukitsa nature, the Czech polodnitsa, etc. This is a woman in white who seems to be working in the field in the midday heat, when the custom requires a break from work: noon punishes the violator of the custom by folding his head or as - something else. The image of noon is the personification of the danger of sunstroke. In the mountainous regions of Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia there is a belief about the spirits of the mountains, guarding treasures or patronizing miners.
The image of the pitchfork, especially widespread among the Serbs, is more complex and less clear; it is found in both Czech and Russian sources. Some researchers consider it to be all-Slavic, others still only South Slavic. The pitchfork is forest, field, mountain, water or air maidens who can behave both friendly and hostile towards a person, depending on his own behavior. In addition to beliefs, the pitchfork appears in South Slavic erotic songs. The origin of the image of the pitchfork is unclear, but there is no doubt that different elements are intertwined here: the personification of natural elements, and, perhaps, ideas about the souls of the dead, and the power of fertility.
The question of mermaids is clearer. This image, even more complex, is known among all Slavs. It arose as a result of the influence of ancient and early Christian rituals on the Slavs. The mythological image of a mermaid itself - a girl living in water, forest or field - is late: it was attested only in the 18th century; this is to a large extent the personification of the holiday or ceremony itself. But this image merged, apparently, with the ancient purely Slavic mythological concepts:
the mermaid loves to lure people into the water and drown people, mermaids embody the women and girls who died in the water, etc. Obviously, the new complex image of the mermaid has supplanted the primordially Slavic ancient images of bereinas, crows and other female water spirits. All these mythological representations of Slavic paganism still live in folklore and literary works.
The roots of healing magic go back to the most ancient era, which among the Slavs, like other peoples, was associated with folk medicine. The church teachings mention, albeit very unclearly, medical and magical rituals, they also talk about the animistic images associated with them: “... sickness is treated with magicians, and nouzit (amulets - V.P.), and chara-
ki, by the devil, the demands also bring the devil, the verb shaking, they create, drive away ... ”(E. Anichkov). As you know, the use of witch doctors was preserved among the Slavic (as well as other) peoples until the Newest time. Various symptoms of the disease were personified in the form of special evil creatures mentioned in medical conspiracies: "shaking", "fire", "yellowing", "lomeya" and etc.
Protective magic was also widely practiced among the Slavs - the use of various kinds of amulets was widespread, for example, the punched teeth of a bear, already revered by the Pre-Slavs, or Easter eggs, symbolizing the reviving life. For divination, horses were used in the Szczecin, Radogoshch and Arkonian shrines. They bewitched by a variety of signs, threw wooden cubes with marks, led the horse between spears driven into the ground. It is clear that here it was impossible to do without sorcerers-priests. ^
The question of the ancient Slavic clergymen, performers of religious rituals is very unclear. The ritual of the family-clan cult was most likely performed by the heads of families and clans; the public cult was in the hands of special professionals - the Magi. It is possible that even with the emergence of grandiose common tribal sanctuaries in the VI-IV centuries. BC. among the Proto-Slavs there were some groups of priests-magi who organized the ritual “events”, guided the process of pagan worship and performed fortune-telling. They made wise calendars, knew "lines and cuts", kept in memory myths dating back at least to the Bronze Age. The Magi were close to the tribal nobility, and, perhaps, were part of it; Probably, the "light princes" "of the tribes also held the supreme priestly power.
The common name of the Slavic priests was "magi" or "wizards", but judging by the ramified terminology, there were many different categories in the entire priestly estate. There are known cloud-perpetrators magicians, those who were supposed to predict and create the weather necessary for people with their magical actions. There were magi-healers who treated people with traditional medicine; the churchmen recognized their medical successes, but believed that it was a sin to contact them. There were magi-custodians who supervised the complex work of making amulets-amulets and, obviously, ornamental symbolic compositions. The creativity of this category of Magi can be studied as archaeologists by numerous
The Polish "priest" comes from the same basis as the Russian "prince", but does not mean a secular, but a spiritual leader, it is possible that the roots of this dichotomy go back to the times when secular and spiritual power was concentrated in the same hands
ancient jewelry, which served both as amulets, and ethnographers on surviving themes of embroidery with the goddess Mokosh (the patroness of women's work, spinning and weaving) and the goddesses of spring, riding horses "with a golden plow", and on numerous symbolic patterns.
It is quite possible that the magi of the highest rank, close to such temples in their knowledge of pagan cosmology, directed the creation of complex and comprehensive compositions such as the famous Zbruch idol. In addition to the wise men, there were also women-sorceresses, witches (from “to know” - to know), enchantresses, “connivances”. An interesting category of magi was made up of blasphemous magi, storytellers of "koshchun" 1 - myths, keepers of ancient legends and epic legends. The storytellers were also called button accordions, charmers, which is associated with the verb "bayat" - to tell, sing, conjure.
In the ancient Slavic religion, there were undoubtedly sacred and sacrificial sites, and in some places real sanctuaries and temples with images of gods, etc. But only a very few are known:
Arkon sanctuary on the island of Rügen, sanctuary in Retra, pre-Christian sanctuary in Kiev (under the Church of the Tithes). In sacred places, a cult was performed, the main part of which was the offering of sacrifices, sometimes human.
"Slavic" kotyup "can go back to the word" bone "- one who manipulates bones, a sorcerer.
The religion of the ancient Slavs, which historically existed in Slavic cultures, is a form of religious life that arose in the pre-Christian period as the original religion of the Slavs and after the introduction of Christianity passed into the position of an “unofficial,” popular belief. The religion of the ancient Slavs is a set of religious beliefs and attitudes that developed in pre-Christian Slavic culture, as well as ways of organizing spiritual experience and behavior. Historically, the religion of the ancient Slavs goes back to the religion of the most ancient Indo-Europeans. It acquired a relative integrity and originality in the era of Slavic unity, which lasted until the second half. 1st millennium AD The gradual resettlement of tribes from the Proto-Slavic homeland (the lands between the Vistula and the Oder) led to the formation of differences in religious beliefs and cults of the southern, western, Baltic and eastern Slavs, which, however, retained the features of
indigenous community. As new lands were developed, some forms of religious life borrowed by the Slavs from neighboring peoples were added to the ancient Indo-European mythology and to the Proto-Slavic religious tradition. The religion of the Eastern Slavs included fragments of Iranian, Finno-Ugric and some other beliefs. In the X century. some ancient Slavic religions, for example, Kievan Rus, reached the stage of early state religion.
The Slavs' ideas about the sacred are rooted in the Indo-European primordial basis: from the Indo-European root * k "uen- (* k" wen-) originates a large family of Slavic words with the element * svet-, meaning sacred. Indian, Iranian and Baltic linguistic data show that Indo-European ideas about the sacred were originally associated with the idea of \u200b\u200bsuperhuman strength, life-giving and filling existence with the ability to grow. Related meanings of strength, growth, increase are established for Slavic words that expressed ideas about the sacred.
Holiness the Slavs endowed heaven and earth, water sources, plants, fire, certain areas of space, periods of time, forms of activity and a number of other phenomena that had a special life value in their perception and in which they saw the presence of an extraordinary power of growth, abundance, life-giving. The element svet-, denoting the corresponding qualities, was part of many Slavic names: Sventovit is the name of the god of the Baltic Slavs, Svyatogor is the name of a mythological hero, Svyatoslav, Svyatopolk is the names of princes, etc. The ancient Slavs possessed a developed system of concepts about other-human beings, secretly present in the world and showing, if necessary, their anthropomorphic, zoomorphic or theriomorphic appearance and their power. The highest category of such creatures were the gods.
The very word god existed among the Slavs already in the pre-Christian era and,
judging by the related words of the Indo-European group, it initially denoted a share, a lot, happiness (this meaning is retained in Russian, poor - "deprived of a share", rich - "having a share"), as well as the bearer of the share. The Slavs stood on the positions of polytheism, and the composition of the gods, their names, functions in different areas of Slavic culture differed significantly, although there were common Proto-Slavic gods.
Sources undoubtedly testify to the worship of the Slavs to the God of Thunder, the earliest mention of which dates back to the 6th century. (Dig Caesarea. War with the Goths). The god of the stormy sky, typical of common Indo-European religious mythology in the East Slavic culture, is known under the name of Perun. Among the Eastern Slavs, Perun is a warrior god, patron of the princely power and squad, military craft. Perun was given a distinctly anthropomorphic appearance of a formidable warrior, sometimes equestrian; attributes of Perun were lightning, "thunderous" arrows, axes and other weapons, the sacred tree of Perun was an oak. According to the "Tale of Bygone Years", the Eastern Slavs in the pre-Christian era revered Beles (Volos) as one of the main gods, whose cult has its own correspondences in other Slavic religions. Whiter - "cattle god", ie. god of offspring and harvest, god life-giving forces land. The power of Beles over the life-giving juices of the earth indicates his involvement in the underworld, which was perceived by the Slavs not only as the "world of the dead", but also as the foundation of the earthly world, the root of its vital forces. As the patron saint of cattle, Beles was associated with wealth, and therefore with gold, therefore, red and yellow colors acted as attributes of Beles; another attribute of this god is wool, a symbol of wealth. In the views of the Eastern Slavs, wool and furry indicate the relationship between Beles and the bear.
We can talk about the East Slavic cults Dazhbog ("the giving god") - the sun god, Stribog - the god of the winds, Svarog - the god of fire, possibly heavenly, solar fire, Rod - the god who personified
continuity and integrity of generations descending from one ancestor. The Baltic Slavs worshiped Sventovit - a warrior god, honoring a sword and a white horse as his attributes, Svarozhich (Radgost) - the god of the sun and military success, Triglav - the god of magical knowledge and some other deities. There is little reliable information about other gods of Slavic religions, their names, functions, statuses, degree of prevalence. There is practically no exact data about the ancient gods of the southern and western Slavs, although scientific reconstructions indicate the existence of images that corresponded to the common Slavic ones. Some cults were borrowed by the Slavs from neighboring peoples, such are the East Slavic cults of the gods Khors and Simargl, taken from Iranian beliefs.
Along with male deities, the Slavs worshiped female deities associated primarily with marriage, birth and handicrafts. Among the Eastern Slavs are women in labor and the goddess Mokosh (Makosh), the patroness of spinning and household worries, whose anthropomorphic image was retained by tradition until the 19th century. Female deities have formed marriage pairs with male deities, but exact matches have not yet been established.
In 980 of Kievan Rus, Prince Vladimir, in the course of a religious reform, attempted to streamline the hierarchy of gods within the national pantheon. He established for official worship the cults of Khors, Dazhbog, Stribog, Simargl, Makoshi, under the leadership of the princely druzhina god Perun. The state cult established by Vladimir did not stand the test of time and a few years later was canceled by Vladimir.
In addition to the clearly personified images of the gods, the Proto-Slavic religious consciousness developed an idea of \u200b\u200bthe divinity of the sky, perceived as a masculine principle, and the earth endowed with a feminine nature. The sacred marriage of heaven and earth was thought of as the source of life for all that exists. In the religion of the Eastern Slavs, the earth acted in an anthropomorphic
the image of the progenitor - Mother Earth, Mother of the damp earth, nurse, patroness and - what is especially remarkable - compassionate permissive of sins.
The worship of heaven and earth was supplemented in the Orthodox religion by the worship of water elements, certain species of trees and species of animals, which, as a result of personification, could acquire a personified appearance or receive the status of impersonal forces and spirits. Such personified creatures also represented the good or ill-fated states of human life - such are, for example, fever, mara, - or certain habitats - house, wood goblin, water, etc. Together, they constituted the lowest category of Slavic mythology in relation to the gods - pandemonium. The evil characters of the Slavic pandemonium were called demons.
The ideas of gods, good and evil spirits were subordinated to the idea of \u200b\u200bthe dualism of light and darkness, good and evil, truth and falsehood, characteristic of the religious worldview of the Slavs.
The Slavs had widespread ideas about the origin of the entire human race from the ancestor earth, which at the same time acted as a participant and henchman of each new birth of a human being. Human life was considered initially predetermined, while the mythological image of fate among the Slavs, like most other Indo-European peoples, had a thread that was spun by divine spinners at the time of birth (in Russia, perhaps, women in labor and Makosh). The religion of the Slavs, however, was not reduced to absolute fatalism, for a person was recognized as having the right to compete with the immutability of fate.
The Pre-Slavs shared a belief rooted in Indo-European antiquity in the existence of an immortal soul, which is separated from its corporeal shell under special circumstances (in the case of a witch, during witchcraft,
for example), as well as at the time of death. According to Slavic beliefs, which are very discordant in this part, the world of the dead, into which the soul went after death, could be located both underground and in heaven. The Slavs thought of this world as a fertile land, a place of peace after earthly troubles. There was no idea of \u200b\u200bhell in the Proto-Slavic religion. Serious sinners, people who died an unnatural death, the dead who were left without burial, could not go into the afterlife, becoming, according to Slavic beliefs, evil spirits, navias, ghouls. The beliefs of the Slavs allowed the idea of \u200b\u200bthe posthumous reincarnation of the soul both in the human body and in another, first of all, zoomorphic guise. It was also believed that some people have a witchcraft ability to shape-shifting: such are, for example, wolf-lacquers-wolf-men.
Belief in the immortality of the soul and posthumous existence was the basis of the Slavic ancestor cult. According to Slavic ideas, relatives who passed into the "other world" received access to the controlling elements of non-human beings and forces, before which they can act as intercessors for their kind; on the other hand, the ancestors themselves acquired special power in their posthumous existence, good or evil. The Proto-Slavic cult of ancestors included memorial days, rites of remembrance, rituals of seeing off to the “other world” and “meeting” the souls of ancestors, veneration of cult images, etc. Until the XI century. in the Slavic environment, the ritual of the killing of old people was widespread, due to the belief in the magical power of the creatures of the "other world" and the hope for their protection.
At the general tribal and tribal level, the cult of ancestors took shape in the veneration of ancestors, ancestors, genealogical heroes who founded a community and performed miraculous deeds for the benefit of descendants. In the East Slavic culture, the genealogical heroes attested by the "Tale of Bygone Years" are Kiy, Schek and Khoriv; among the Novgorod Slovenes, the memory of their ancestors - the founders was preserved in the legends about Slovenia and
The most important Proto-Slavic rituals were closely associated with agricultural labor, with natural cycles, forming a circle of calendar rituals in their interweaving. The basis of the calendar rituals, which were performed at certain times - holidays ("holy days"), was agrarian magic.
When performing the rituals, ritual objects were used, among which the most important role was played by cult images of gods and ancestors, often voluminous idols (Old Russian cap).
Significant events in public or private life were accompanied by occasional rituals designed to ensure a favorable outcome of the case. Household (family) rituals, which were performed during the performance of everyday activities - food, work, etc., filled the everyday life of the ancient Slavs.
Proto-Slavic rituals knew "rites of passage", the implementation of which is mediated by the change of a member of an archaic collective of his social position. Rites of youthful initiation (which, however, did not leave a deep mark in Slavic culture), wedding rituals were built on the idea of \u200b\u200bthe symbolic death of the main characters and their subsequent revival in a new capacity. These ceremonies involved ritual tests, demonstration of relevant knowledge and skills by applicants. As a "rite of passage", the funeral was arranged, sending the soul of the deceased to the "other world" to reunite with the community of ancestors.
Proto-Slavic rituals included prayers, spells, magical actions using fire, water, amulets or other ritual objects. The rituals of sacrifices were of particular importance. Under some circumstances, human sacrifices were performed. But usually, as a gift, the Slavs offered sacrificial animals, cereals, alcoholic drinks, money and other values \u200b\u200bto the gods. Often the sacrifice took the form of a ritual feast. In the context of ideas about
the sacrificial meal, in which the god invited by prayer participated simultaneously as host and guest (Proto-Slavic gostb), the Old Slavic gospodb was formed with the meaning “guest and host of the sacrificial feast”.
A significant place in the Proto-Slavic religion was occupied by the rites of fortune-telling, the most important of which were timed to the "borderline" states of time - to the dates of the winter solstice, to the transition from winter to spring, etc. Ancient sources indicate that the Slavs guessed by the behavior of the sacred horse, by the lot, by signs, by prophetic dreams and in other ways. Many gods were associated with the practice of fortune-telling, for example, Sven-tovit and Svarozhich among the Baltic Slavs.
Family rituals were performed at home, the most important of them - in specially designated places in the house. For the administration of collective divine services, especially remarkable sites were used - river banks, groves, etc., as well as specially equipped sanctuaries - temples. Some rituals, on the contrary, gathered participants in "wild" places - at road crossings, in abandoned dwellings, etc.
The religious community of the Slavs did not represent a single whole either from the point of view of a harmonious agreement of beliefs, or in terms of organization. Religious differences, local characteristics already existed among the most ancient Slavic tribes. As the Slavs settled from the historical ancestral home, these differences were assimilated. However, within specific communities, the orderliness of religious life was quite strict.
The primary cell of the religious life of the Proto-Slavs was the family or a consanguineous community of families - a clan united by the cult of common ancestors. The head of the family was the main protagonist in performing domestic rituals. The worship of common gods, genealogical heroes, and local spirits united clans and families within a settlement or tribe. Originally, the most important rites at this level were administered by elders and princes. Tribal unions and early state formations
established state cults, created sanctuaries and temples to worship the common gods - such are the temple of Perun near Novgorod, the Kiev sanctuary of the six Vladimir gods, the Sventovit temple in Arkona, etc.
Gradually, in the Slavic environment, a special layer of people stands out (among the Eastern Slavs - magi), professionally engaged in the administration of the main rituals, the storage and transmission of religious knowledge. The Eastern Slavs revered the Magi as intermediaries between people and gods, as soothsayers and sorcerers.
The organization of religious life reached the most developed forms among the Polabian-Baltic and Eastern Slavs.
The development of the religion of the ancient Slavs was interrupted by Christianization, which began in the Slavic environment in the 2nd half of the 1st millennium AD. The Polabian-Baltic Slavs fought for the longest time for the preservation of the original beliefs, who saw in the Christianity spread by the missionaries-papists a phenomenon hostile to their national independence, for the missionaries accompanied the German feudal lords who seized the Slavic lands. During the uprisings against German rule, forcibly baptized Slavs destroyed churches, expelled and killed priests, reviving pre-Christian beliefs and ritual practices. The last attempts to return to the original religion took place in the XIV century. in the lands of the Lusatians. Such persistence in upholding former beliefs is explained, in addition to political and social reasons, by the fact that the religion of the Polabian-Baltic Slavs by the beginning of Christianization was quite highly developed and firmly merged with ethnic self-awareness.
In other Slavic lands, the preservation of Proto-Slavic beliefs was to a lesser extent associated with the processes of mass irreconcilable opposition to Christianity from the standpoint of the primordial religion. Here, after baptism, the original religious traditions move to the position of "unofficial", folk beliefs and continue to exist in complex
relations of confrontation, mutual influence with Christianity for a long time. As a result of the interaction of the Proto-Slavic religion and Christianity, a kind of religious phenomenon was formed, called "dual faith". The most deeply and thoroughly "dual faith" took root among the Eastern Slavs. In the culture of the Eastern Slavs, "dual faith" is a form of organization of religious life, syncretically combining primordially Slavic beliefs and customs with the Orthodox.
In the culture of the Eastern Slavs, the formation of "dual faith" took place on the basis of the counter-development of pre-Christian ideas and those aspects of Orthodoxy that were in close contact with popular religiosity. So, under the influence of Christianity, primarily Christian heresies (Bogomils, etc.) and apocryphal literature, the pre-Slavic ideas about the dualism of creative principles that create human destiny were further developed, and the cosmology, mythological images and some others inherited from antiquity, changed in the direction of rapprochement with Christianity. sides of the traditional Slavic worldview. Significant changes have taken place in the East Slavic pantheon and pandemonium. In particular, the cults of the Family and women in labor have come to the fore; under the influence of biblical mythology, the image of the Sort, judging by the medieval written evidence, acquires the features of God - the creator of mankind; solar images of Yarila - the god of the spring sun and love passion, Kupala - appear in personified form. The East Slavic pandemonium is replenished with some images borrowed from Middle Eastern and Greek demonology. It is characteristic that the Proto-Slavic deities and spirits, losing their former place in the hierarchy with the introduction of Christianity higher powers, retained in the popular consciousness the signs of possessing the quality of holiness in its ancient understanding - they were ascribed to the presence of superhuman strength, life-giving or deadly.
For its part, Russian Orthodoxy went to meet the Proto-Slavic
beliefs, combining the images of Christian saints with the images of the ancient Slavic gods (Elijah the prophet with Perun, Blasia with Beles, etc.) or assimilating the images of Proto-Slavic mythology as "demons", matching the church calendar and rituals with the agrarian magical practice of rural population, as well as allowing other serious and insignificant deviations from the canonical norms, which ultimately took the form of the so-called "popular Orthodoxy".
Mutual concessions and mutual influence of the primordially Slavic religion and Russian Orthodoxy led to the formation of syncretic religiosity, which organically combined with the foundations of folk spirituality and folk life, coexisting until the 20th century. next to church life, and sometimes in it itself. The doctrinal positions of this syncretic religiosity received their most systematic presentation in spiritual verses.
At the beginning of the XX century. in Russia, in the circles of the creative intelligentsia, interest in pre-Christian Slavic beliefs has sharply increased as a phenomenon that can play a positive role in modern spiritual development. Throughout the XIX century. the cultural prerequisites for this kind of religious quest were formed. Domestic ethnographers and folklorists collected and published a huge amount of material on the history of the spiritual culture of the Slavs, which revealed the ideological wealth, ethical and aesthetic merits of traditional folk religiosity. Literary and pictorial works appeared that poeticized Russian antiquity in its pre-Christian or “two-faith” form. Romanticism gave national antiquity the status of an ideal state and purity of the national spirit. On the basis of these cultural prerequisites, a significant part of the creative intelligentsia turned to the "primordial" and "genuine" culture, untouched by the influence of Christianity. Pre-Christian beliefs were presented as the elixir of youth, capable of returning "aging" Europe to "freshness" and "clarity" of the world. A tribute to this passion, mixed with mysticism, theosophy
and other fashionable trends at that time, gave V. Rozanov, D. Merezhkovsky, M. Prishvin and many other writers and artists of the "Silver Age".
In the 80s. XX century again there was a tendency towards the revival of Slavic paganism. It is primarily due to the growth of Russian ethnic self-awareness and increased interest in the historical past of the Fatherland. In its most radical forms, Russian "neo-paganism" is associated with a certain type of Russian nationalism, from the standpoint of which Christianity as a supranational religion cannot become the spiritual basis of national self-affirmation. "Neopaganism" refers to the images of the Proto-Slavic gods (especially willingly - to the images of Perun and Rod), makes extensive use of ancient symbolism (for example, the image of lightning - "Perun's arrows", stylized images of birds, pitchfork-mermaids, etc.), tends to the revival of the details of the traditional Slavic costume and pre-Christian rituals. The mythology and doctrine of Russian "neo-paganism" is largely based on the "Veles book", which is regarded as a reliable ancient primary source. Meanwhile, the dating and authenticity of this text have been questioned by modern science.
Shinto
Syntonism developed in the 6th-7th centuries. The term "Shinto" ("path of the gods") appeared in the Middle Ages. The mythological tradition contained in the first Japanese written records reflected the complex path of the formation of the system of Shinto cults, which included the deities of the Northern Kyushu tribes who came to Central Japan, and the gods of the local population who lived here.
Local gods were pushed aside, the supreme deity was the "solar" goddess Amaterasu, who "created" the Japanese islands and sent her grandson Niniga to earth, who laid the foundation for the "divine" imperial dynasty.
The ancestral deities - "udzigami" ("uji" - genus, "kami" - deity) were of paramount importance for the ancient Japanese. The functions of the "ujigami" included the protection of the family, patronage of the life and various activities of its members. In addition to ancestral deities, the deities - the rulers of the natural elements: earthquakes, hurricanes, rain and snow, as well as numerous landscape deities, with which the Japanese inhabited the entire world around them, were of great importance. Any mountain, hill, forest, river, waterfall had its own kami - a guardian god, whose power of action extended precisely to this region and, as a rule, here exceeded the capabilities of the main deities of the Shinto pantheon.
In the cult of the goddess Amaterasu, there are three "divine" regalia - a mirror, a sword and jasper pendants. According to the mythological tradition, the sun goddess passed them on to her grandson Ninigi, sending him to earth with instructions - to illuminate the whole world and rule over it, conquering the rebellious. -There was also an interpretation of regalia adapted to life practice as symbols of the most important virtues: a mirror is a symbol of honesty, jasper pendants - compassion, a sword-wisdom. The highest embodiment of these qualities was attributed to the personality of the emperor. - The main Shinto temple complex was the sanctuary in Ise - Ise Jingu (founded, apparently, at the end of the 7th century). Ise Jingu is considered to be the Amaterasu shrine, where her cult as the supreme deity and deity-progenitor of the imperial house, and through him all the Japanese, is sent.
At the end of the V-beginning of the VI century. in Central Japan, the struggle between the heads of clans for influence in the general tribal association intensified. The process of transition from an early class society to an early feudal one intensified and expanded. The internecine struggle reached the greatest aggravation in the relationship between the Soga clans and the coalition of the military clan Mononobe with the priestly Nakatomi. In their quest for power, Soga used a foreign religion - Buddhism. First mentions of penetration in sources
buddhism date back to the beginning of the 6th century. In 538, the embassy of the Korean kingdom of Baekje, which arrived in Yamato, presented the king with several Buddhist sutras and a statue of the founder of Buddhism, Shakya Muni, but information about Buddhism was known to the Yamato population much earlier.
Confucianism also spread in the country. Confucian ideas of the cult of Heaven found fertile ground for their perception among the royal elite and its aristocratic environment, cultivating their "unearthly", "divine" origin. The ethical program of Confucianism with its clear hierarchical division of society and strict fixation of the place and duties of each in it fully corresponded to the desire for power of the clan clans. The principle of filial piety and filial duty attracted special attention of the Japanese in Confucian ethics - for the lower strata this principle was unambiguously realized in the cult of ancestors, for the higher ones it was equally unambiguous - in the unquestioning and all-embracing submission of subjects to the "divine" dynasty of rulers.
Confucian ideas were widely used in the concrete reproduction on Japanese soil of state institutions borrowed from the mainland, but in the struggle for power for Cora in 587, Buddhism began to spread widely, numerous Buddhist monasteries and temples were built, they were given lands, slaves, and significant funds were allocated from treasury.
Buddhas and bodhisattvas were endowed with the same magical properties as the kami, they were addressed with specific requests: to heal from diseases, to send a rich harvest, to protect from evil, “to be the guardian of some locality, village, etc. By this time, in the vast pantheon of Shintoism, the division of the gods into "heavenly and earthly" had appeared, reflecting the desire of the Yamato kings to strengthen their religious prestige: the "heavenly" gods living in the "Heavenly Land" were declared the progenitors of the royal house, the "earthly" - the ancestors of the conquered, subordinate clans. Buddha and
bodhisattvas naturally entered this pantheon as new gods. At the same time, the sphere of relations between different strata of the population and nature belonged to Shinto. Shinto, which arose as a religious practice of the agricultural community, was a reflection of collective views and requests, while Buddhism had in mind an individual person, appealed directly to an individual. Local beliefs and Buddhism shared the life practice of the Japanese: bright joyful events - birth, marriage - remained in the jurisdiction of the ancestral gods, headed by the "solar" goddess Amaterasu; death, interpreted by Shinto as filth, took under the protection of Buddhism, presenting the concept of "rebirth", "salvation in the Buddha's paradise."
This is how the merging of the two religions gradually took place - syncretization, in Japanese terminology "Ryobusinto" - "the path of Buddhism and Shinto". Government activities that provide official support to local cults were also important. The Taihoryo Code of Laws (701) noted the creation of a special jingikan department (Office for Celestial and Terrestrial Deities), whose functions included Shinto rituals during state religious celebrations and control over the activities of large state shrines. Another way of supporting the interaction of the two religions was government decrees about local kami as protectors of Buddhist deities. By order of Shotoku, a combination of Shinto and Buddhist rituals takes place, even in such a main and secret ceremony as “eating the fruits of the new harvest” - Buddhist monks are invited to it. The construction of a huge statue of Buddha Vairochana during the construction of the Todaiji temple in Nara is also significant, when, before starting work, they asked Amaterasu for "advice". Local Shinto gods "suggested" a place in the north of the country, where the missing gold for casting the statue was mined. But the highest form of religious syncretism was the concept of "honji suijaku", according to which the deities of the Shinto pantheon can be considered as a temporary embodiment of the Buddhas
and bodhisattvas. Thus, the sun goddess Amaterasu became the embodiment of the "Diamond Light" Buddha Vairochana.
A stage in the development of Shinto was the emergence of the concept of "Ise Shinto", the main goal of which was to strengthen the cult of the emperor. One of the reasons for the emergence of this concept was the strengthening of the authority and influence of the sanctuaries, especially the Ise Jingu, during and after the Mongol invasion (1261-1281). Then the cult of the "progenitor" of the imperial house Amaterasu, who "lived" in Ise, grew unprecedentedly and helped her descendants - the divine wind "kamikaze", twice scattered the attacking fleet, averted the threat. The development of Ise Shinto in the second half of the 16th century. led to the emergence of a new cult, allowing the deification of a person during his lifetime, while the basis was not belonging to the imperial family, but major political and social deeds. This reflected the general situation in the country that had developed at the end of the 12th century, when the military feudal nobility (samurai) came to power, which actually made the power of the imperial house nominal, limiting it to the sphere of the Shinto cult. The feudal dictator Oda Nobunaga (1533-1572), who fought for the unification of the country, declared himself a god and demanded worship as a kami. His associate, the dictator Toyotomi Hideyoshi (1536-1598), was also deified. According to the will of the shogun (head of the military-feudal government) Tokugawa Izyasu, it was necessary to build several shrines and a chapel to worship his spirit.
During the reign of the Tokugawa dynasty (1603-1687), various streams of Confucianism enriched Shinto with ethical ideas, creating a broad basis for the activation of Shinto - Confucian syncretism. Schools were formed that set the task of substantiating the cult and institution of imperial power on the basis of historical material. Relying on ancient mythological vaults, these schools expanded and meticulously expounded the idea of \u200b\u200bthe authenticity of the origin and actions of the divine dynasty of Japanese emperors, emphasized the role of the tenno (emperor) as a source and bearer of the “national”
identity. The forgotten wisdom of the ancient "Way" - "miti" (Chinese "dao") of Japan was revived, the "Shinto of antiquity" ("fukko shinto") was restored.
The ideas of protecting the emperor and restoring the imperial power became the ideological basis of the opposition movement for the overthrow of the shogunate system.
Discovery of the country in the middle of the 19th century. after two and a half centuries of seclusion and the appearance of foreigners, the flow of Western culture that poured into the country, deepened the crisis of feudal society and worsened the situation of the majority of the population. The slogan "sleepy joi" ("veneration of the emperor, expulsion of the barbarians"), put forward by scholars of the Mito school at the beginning of the 20th century, primarily by its prominent representative Aizawa Seishisai (1781-1863), found a response and support in various social strata, including in opposition samurai circles. The anti-foreign and anti-Shogun movements came together under one slogan. Many thousands of protests against the shogun were launched by pilgrims to Shinto shrines in the fall of 1867 and became the first stage of the Meiji bourgeois revolution (1867-1868).
The end of the struggle that led to the collapse of the shogunate system and the restoration of the imperial power meant the choice of a new path - the modernization of the country, the transformation of all social life, including the sphere of religious consciousness. However, in order to fulfill the assigned tasks, the new government bodies had to reckon with the historically established traditional structure of the national social organism, including the specifics of culture. The principle "wakon yosai" - "Japanese spirit, European knowledge" seemed to be optimal.
In March 1868, a decree was published on the return to the unity of the system of religious ritual and the administration of state affairs (the unity of religion rt politics). The jingikan, the Office of the Celestial and Earthly Gods, was restored; 660 BC - the date of the accession to the throne of the emperor of the mythological period of Japanese history Jimmu - was
declared the beginning of the chronology from the "founding of the Japanese Empire". At the same time, ancient Shinto rituals began to be restored to enhance the religious and political authority of the imperial house. The cult of the emperor - Tennoism - became the center of the state Shinto, which actually replaced many gods with one "living god". The theoretical substantiation of Tennoism was a complex complex of concepts - "kokutai" (roughly translated "national essence", literally - "body of the state"). The components of kokutai are the "divine" origin of the Japanese and their state, continuity in the centuries of the imperial dynasty, national identity embodied in the special character of the Japanese with his moral virtues, loyalty and filial piety. The ideology of tennoism, using the traditional concept of a "harmonious state", contributed to the strengthening of nationalist tendencies, and ultimately - in the upcoming wars - the consecration of militarism (propaganda of the "divine mission" - "hako iti u" - "the whole world under one roof").
In general, the state Shinto complex included: dynastic Shinto, which was the property of the imperial family; tennoism - the cult of the emperor; temple - in which the veneration of both general Japanese and local gods is essential; home - with a kamidan - a miniature analogue of a temple place of worship.
After Japan's defeat in World War II, in conditions of a general democratic upsurge, the course of democratization of the country began. Measures were taken to eradicate militarism and Tennoism. In 1946, in a New Year's address to the people, Emperor Hirohito renounced his divine origin. Were carried out progressive reforms in the education system, abolished "moral education" in schools, based on the cult of the emperor. The 1947 Constitution changed the status of the emperor, now he was declared "a symbol of the state and the unity of the nation."
However, the position of state Shinto was not fundamentally changed. The main direction of the policy of reviving Tennoism is the attempts to restore Shintoism in the status of the state religion. In 1946, the highest Shinto leadership established the Association of Shinto Shrines - Jinja Honcho, which allowed the preservation of a single centralized management system for the shrines. The Association includes a significant part of them - more than 78 thousand. This made it possible to achieve the transfer to the ownership of the sanctuaries of the vast land plots occupied by them, which previously in most cases belonged to the state.
Already in 1952, the rituals of the imperial court acquired the character of official state ceremonies. As a state act, Shinto ceremonies were held for the elevation of Akihito (son of the reigning emperor Hirohito) to the rank of heir to the throne and his wedding in 1959. An equally important stage in strengthening the idea of \u200b\u200bstate Shinto was the revival of the obarai, a rite of great cleansing of the entire Japanese nation. The state's symbolic participation in the rite of the highest religious person emphasized the unity of the national religion and the imperial power.
In 1966, the Kigensetsu holiday, the day of foundation of the state, which is celebrated annually on February 11, was restored, canceled by the 1947 constitution. The school textbooks re-included the mythological era of history with information about the “divine” origin of the imperial dynasty and people. A special place in the effort to restore Tennoism is occupied by the Yasukuni Temple, built in 1868 in Kyoto in honor of the soldiers who fell for the emperor, and after the bourgeois revolution was moved to Tokyo. The sanctuary was administered by the Ministry of the Army and the Navy.
In 1969, on the basis of the Association of Shinto Shrines, the Shinto Political League was created - an organization that for the first time after
the elimination of state Shinto openly set the political task of participating in the government. In January 1989, Emperor Hirohito passed away. The Shinto system defined the entire varied complex of ceremonies in the ritual of the throne of inheritance. The creed of "divine regalia", state and imperial seals, the first reception by the emperor of high-ranking officials by decision of the government were carried out not only as a purely religious ceremony, but also as a state act.
Conclusion
National religions are religions that are widespread and addressed to a certain nation, nationality, ethnos. These religions often accompany the process of formation and development of an ethnic community and, as a result, act as components of its history. Sometimes they are associated with the formation of national statehood, their functioning is intertwined with the functioning of state bodies, which gives reason to call them national-state (Confucianism, Judaism). For the sake of objectivity, it should be noted that in the development of the state of this or that nation can play an important role and world religion (for example, Islam in the Arab world), that is, not only the national religion, but also the world religion can be state, therefore the term “national-state religion” is not entirely legitimate. The category “national religion” itself is often used to define religions that can be classified as transitional religions (for example, the religion of the ancient Greeks), or local, that are widespread in a certain region, but are not addressed to a certain people or nation (for example, zaraostrism ). In the first case, they forget that a nation is a product of a sufficiently high level of development of society. Since it is impossible to talk about the ancient Greek whether the ancient Egyptian nation, then the religion of the Ancient
Egypt and Ancient Greece to national it is impossible Even if we recognize the existence of the ancient Egyptian and ancient Greek nationalities, these religions do not adequately meet the national criteria. Based on this, some researchers distinguish between early national religions (which include the same religions of Ancient Greece, etc.) and later ones, which can hardly be considered correct. By recognizing local religions, the criterion here should be the answer to the question of whether that community, to Gregory Morris Japanese candles, veka balconies, where religion, nation, ethnos, people are addressed. This approach helps to clearly recognize and determine whether this or that religion is really national or early national (with all the ambiguity of such a term) or local, etc. Some scholars use the terms "ethnic" and "folk" religions to define certain types of national religions.
Based on the etymology of the Greek word etnikos (generic, folk. Pagan), folk religions are identical, in fact, ethnic in the narrow sense of the word. Popular religions are traditionally considered to be the so-called natural religions, that is, those that arise naturally as a result of the gradual and long-term development of the ideological ideas of a particular ethnic community about the natural and supernatural world, which are presented in the form of myths, traditions, customs, rituals, cults. A certain ethnic community arises and is maintained thanks to a single genetic (blood-spoken) origin, common territory of residence and language of communication, shared historical memory, which are recorded in the ancestral legends about the origin of the people and are constantly reproduced during the implementation of collective rituals. Some researchers even equate ethnos and ethnic religion, considering the components of an ethnos to be what constitutes its ethnic religion.
Folk religions include such religious complexes that arose among the early ethnic groups and corresponded to their spiritual, ideological, cultural needs. These are, first of all, ancient Iranian, ancient Egyptian, ancient Indian, ancient Greek, ancient Slavic and other religions, which were transmitted to the more developed religions of state ethnic groups-peoples (Zoroastrianism, Greek or Roman polytheism, the religion of the Aztecs or Incas, the religion of the East Slavic tribes of Kievan Rus, etc. ). Folk religions are manifestations of autochthonous traditions that not only preserve them, but also develop and improve them. Folk religions are mandatory for members of certain ethnic communities. As a rule, they are not chosen, they are born into them.
The characteristic features of national religions include:
1. The presence in one form or another of the idea of \u200b\u200b"God-like" of a given people.
2. The presence in one form or another of restrictions on contacts (joint activities, marriage, etc.) with representatives of other confessions.
3. Specific ritual (cult).
4. Ritualization of everyday life (transformation into a ritual of some kind of everyday action, for example, “mekva” in Judaism).
5. National religions reflect the socio-political living conditions of a given people (Confucianism and the imperial system in China, Hinduism and the caste division of society in India).
6. National religions reflect the mentality and psychology of their people.
Main:
1. Lebedev V. Yu. Religious studies. - M .: "Yurayt", 2013. - 629 p.
2. Yablokov I.N. Fundamentals of Religious Studies. - M .: Gardariki, 2002 .-- 511 p.
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Slavic religion
Introduction
Slavic religion (Slavic paganism, Slavic mythology) is a complex of views, beliefs and cults of the ancient Slavs that existed before the introduction of Christianity in 988 by Prince Vladimir Svyatoslavich, still preserved in the culture of the Slavic peoples as traditions, and the original foundations of ancient culture.
The term "paganism" has a Christian bookish origin and is applied to the beliefs of various peoples. In relation to the mythology and religion of the Slavs, the use of this term is fully justified by its Slavic etymology. The word "language" also meant "a separate people, a tribe." The Russian chronicler, talking about the history of the Slavs, was of the opinion that all Slavs descended from a single root: “There was one Slavic language: the Slavs who sat along the Danube<...> From those Slavs they dispersed across the earth and were nicknamed by their names, from the places where they settled ... And so the Slavic language spread ... ". Thus, the word "paganism" can be used as a synonym for the folk, tribal religion of the Slavs.
1. Formation of Slavic paganism
Slavic mythology and religion were formed over a long period in the process of separating the ancient Slavs from the Indo-European community of peoples in the II - I millennium BC. e. and in interaction with the mythology and religion of neighboring peoples.
Historians identify a significant layer of Indo-European vocabulary, which was used by pagans as sacred. Among the parallels: Svarog and Swarga, Makosh and Moksha, rota (oath) and rita (in Sanskrit "order"), prophetic and Vesta, witch and Vedas, Divas and Virgins, etc. Among the most ancient cults that have common Indo-European and European roots, one can call the twin myth, the cult of the bull and the horn, the worship of the moon and the sun. Since the Middle Ages, the identification of Slavic deities with the gods and characters of Greco-Roman mythology, which have much in common, has traditionally been.
In the 1st millennium BC. e. and in the first half of the 1st millennium, the religion of the Slavs was significantly influenced by the Celts and Scythian-Sarmatians. The paganism of the Western (Lusatian) Slavs was influenced by the Celts, in particular, the architecture of religious buildings was formed. The Eastern Slavs had in their pantheon deities of Iranian origin - Khors, Semargl and others.
The beliefs of the Slavs and Balts were very close. This applies to the names of such deities as Perun (Perkunas) and Veles. There is a similarity in the names of the gods of the Slavs and Thracians (most often they cite Dazhbog as an example). There is also a lot in common with Germanic, in particular Scandinavian, mythology (the motive of the world tree, the cult of dragons, etc.).
In the same period, with the division of the Proto-Slavic community, tribal beliefs of the Slavs began to form, which had significant regional differences. Along with the common Slavic deities (Svarog, Perun, Lada), each tribe formed its own pantheon of gods, the same gods received different names. It can be argued that in the early Middle Ages, the beliefs of the western Baltic Slavs and the eastern Dnieper ones were divided, while the paganism of the southern, eastern and also Polish Slavs largely retained unity.
When settling the Slavic tribes in the VI - IX centuries. their culture mixed with the beliefs of the local Finno-Ugric, Baltic and Turkic peoples.
2. Worldview of the Slavs
2.1 The nature of beliefs
Slavic paganism belongs to polytheistic religions, that is, the Slavs recognized the existence of many gods. A pagan, using the word "god", meant a specific supernatural being, a representative of the Slavic clans, who had reached the spiritual level of the Creator and was able to operate with the processes of the universe. The Slavs say: "Our gods are our ancestors, and we are their children."
A feature of Slavic paganism is often the allocation of its main deity for each tribe. So in the treaties of Russia with Byzantium Perun is called "our god", "in whom we believe." Helmold speaks of the worship of Svyatovit, "to whom the temple and the idol were dedicated to the greatest splendor, ascribing to him the primacy among the gods."
At the same time, the Slavs, like the Balts, had an idea of \u200b\u200bthe supreme deity.
Procopius of Caesarea (6th century) describes the faith of the Slavs: "They believe that only one god, the creator of lightning, is the ruler over all, and bulls are sacrificed to him and other sacred rites are performed."
Helmold (XII century) writes: “Among the diverse deities ... they recognize the only god who dominates others in the heavens, they recognize that he, the almighty, cares only about the affairs of heaven, they [other gods], obeying him, perform the assigned their duties, and that they come from his blood, and each of them is all the more important, the closer he is to this god of gods. "
A distinctive feature of Slavic paganism is its dualism. If among the Scandinavians, for example, it is difficult to identify the "good" and "evil" gods, then the Slavs distinguished and contrasted the black and white principles of the world, dark and light, earthly and heavenly, feminine and masculine principles. Such opposition is known for Belobog and Chernobog, Perun and Veles, Svyatovit and his night enemies. The researchers noticed that neither Veles, nor Svarog, nor Rod, the most important gods that opposed Perun, entered the pantheon of Prince Vladimir.
Paganism is often called the deification of natural forces. Slavic pagans praised their ancestors and the surrounding nature (thunder and lightning, wind, rain, fire). The Slavs are characterized by the veneration of animals (bear, wolf, lizard, eagle, horse, rooster, duck, tur, wild boar). But totemism is practically unknown.
Kirill Turovsky (XII century) writes, denouncing the pagans: "Do not call yourself a god either on earth, or in a river, or in students, or in birds, or in the air, or in the sun, or in the moon, or in stones."
In "The Lay of Igor's Campaign" (XII century), Yaroslavna, in her "lament", addresses the forces of nature, calling them masters: "Oh, wind, sail! Why, sir, do you forcibly blow! ... Oh, Dnepr Slovutitsyu! ... Take care, sir, my harmony to me ... Bright and crackling sun! Everyone is warm and red. What, sir, extend your hot ray on the fret howl? In a waterless field, do I thirst for beams tied together, tight for them tuli? "
Also, paganism is denoted by the word "animism", that is, they call it the animation of nature, plants, animals and inanimate objects. In addition to the personified gods in the form of idols, the Slavs worshiped various kinds of lower beings, or spirits. These were the spirits of nature: goblin, mermaids (berechens, pitchforks, samodivs), kikimors. And the spirits of buildings: brownies, villains, barnmen, banniks. There was a whole host of other anthropomorphic and zoomorphic creatures: wolf laks, ghouls, maras, giants (asilka, velet), bogus, diva, lizard, flying snakes (dragons).
Procopius of Caesarea, 6th century: "However, they revere rivers, nymphs, and some other deities and offer sacrifices to all of them, and with these sacrifices they perform fortune-telling"
A lesson against paganism, XII - XIII centuries: "... and starting to the idol and beginning to eat lightning and thunder, and the sun and the moon ... for the pitchforks and ... for the grunts and the shores, they also call the distant sister"
"The word of a certain Christ-lover", XII century: "to pray under the barn and fire and pitchfork"
"Word of St. Gregory", c. XII century: "by the same God they demand kladout and do, and the Slovenian language, vilam, and mokosh, diva ... oupir and beremynyam, and pereplutou, and trustingly they drink emou in a rose, and they pray with fire and a friend, and make mev create ..."
The Slavs knew ideas about the macrocosm (nature) and the microcosm (man, his clothes and dwelling). Hair, eyes, mouth and other parts of the body had analogies in natural objects. Nature and woman were especially closely interconnected. According to pagan beliefs, a woman (especially a pregnant woman) could absorb the surrounding nature into herself (fish, food, fire, the health of other people), and the unburied body (of a witch or sorcerer) could disintegrate into insects, frogs and snakes. Associated with this belief in werewolf. A man or a god could turn into a wolf, bird, bear, pike, snake, tur, ant.
Paganism is also characterized as ancestor worship. This is in particular connected with the deification of people.
And yes there was reason? Are there many people? Qi, and they won’t enter into greatness, imaginatively there are many gods: Perun and Khors, Dyya and Troyan, and other people, for it’s like that people were day old? ? x, and Khors in K? pr ?, Troyan byashe the king to Rome ?. “The word and revelations of St. apostle ", XVI century.
Of much greater importance in Slavic paganism were the cults of fertility and procreation. Most of the Slavic gods are associated with these cults: Veles - "cattle god"; The clan and women in labor were very revered in Russia; Makosh is the goddess of fertility; Lada, and Kupala and Lelya were her daughters - the deities of family, marriage, love, procreation and fertility; Dazhdbog - the god of the sun and rain; etc.
2.2 The universe of the ancient Slavs
The Slavs divided the world into three tiers. The upper tier is the sky, the world of the gods. The middle tier is the human world. The lower, underground tier is the world of spirits and shadows. Each tier had a digital designation (1,2,3) and was symbolized by birds (sky), wolf and bear (earth) and serpent (underworld). The lower tier included several parts, it was possible to penetrate underground and return back through wells, rivers, lakes and seas.
All three tiers were united by the world tree, or the tree of life: with its roots it went underground, the trunk and the hollow in it - in the world of people, and the branches - in the sky.
In the "Lay of Igor's Campaign" (XII century), a figurative description of the tree is given: "Boyan is a prophetic one, even if anyone can sing a song, then Mysiya spreads along the tree, like a gray wolf on the ground, like an eagle under the clouds." Many people see in the word "cape" the image of the squirrel Ratatosk, running along the trunk of a tree transferring a squabble between an eagle and a dragon, known in scandinavian mythology... However, this word is usually translated as “thought”, and the tree in the text is also called “mental tree” (figurative image of Boyan's gusel).
The world tree is also mentioned in the Joachim Chronicle. The Cyrillic letter "Ж" ("belly", "live" - \u200b\u200blife) is associated with the image of the tree. According to scientists, the Slavs had an oak tree as the world tree.
The sun, moving around the world of people along its own path ("the path of Khors"), visits both the sky and the underworld (the night Sun). A special place is occupied by the moments of sunrise and sunset (images of the evening and morning Dawn).
The Slavs distinguished four or eight cardinal points. The most significant were the west, as the orientation of the body of the deceased in the grave, and the northeast, as the orientation of the temples to the point of sunrise on the summer solstice.
For the Slavs, the element connecting the universe was fire. It was used in sacrifices, at funerals, at holidays, for protective purposes, etc. Fire was a symbol of eternity. The personification of fire was Svarog. Researchers call Svarog the god of the universe. Arab authors call the Slavs and the Rus fire-worshipers.
It is believed that the Slavs had ideas about "paradise", which in East Slavic folklore is called Iriy (Vyri), this place is associated with the Sun and birds, is located in the south or underground (under water, in a well). The souls of the departed move there. There are also ideas about Buyan Island, which is also identified with the other world. In medieval Novgorod, there was the idea that paradise could be reached by sea, and that supposedly one of the Novgorodians did it by going east. Ibn Fadlan (X century) conveys the views and vision of paradise during the funeral among the Russians as follows:
And there was a certain Rus man next to me ... and he said: “You, O Arabs, are stupid ... Truly, you take the most beloved person for you and from you the most respected by you and throw him into the dust, and eat his dust and vile, and worms, and we burn him in the blink of an eye, so that he enters paradise immediately and immediately. "
The Eastern Slavs associate the origin of people with Dazhbog, the son of Svarog. In the "Lay of Igor's Host" (XII century) he is called the ancestor of princes and the Russian people in general, and in the "Sofia time" (XIII century) - the first tsar of the Slavs.
The Slavs considered the Danube lands their ancestral home. Procopius of Caesarea (6th century) called the ancestral homeland of the Slavs "the country of Sporaden", the Bavarian Geographer (9th century) left the following legend about the Danube region of Zaryania: “The Zeruyans (Zeriuani), some of whom have a kingdom and from whom all the Slavic tribes, like them affirm, occur and lead their own kind. " In the chronicles of the 17th century, in the legend of the ancestor Slovenia, Zardan is named among the Danube ancestors. Some historians also note that among the Slavs there were ideas about the Carpathians as the Holy Mountains, where their ancient ancestors ("foremothers") lived. The epic giant Svyatogor is a personification of such ideas.
Each tribe told about its resettlement from the ancestral home, naming the ancestors: Radim and Vyatko, Kriv, Chekh and Leh. Legends were passed about the founders of dynasties and cities - Kie, Krak (Kroke), Piast.
The Slavs believed in life after death, believed in immortality, and according to some researchers, in reincarnation.
3. Periodization of the development of Slavic paganism
In the Ipatiev Chronicle under the year 1114, there is a story based on the chronicle of John Malala, in which the Greek gods are identified with the Slavic ones. Based on this text, B.A. Rybakov created his own periodization of the development of paganism.
1st stage. People live in the Stone Age, they fight with clubs and stones ("well, more with clubs and stone byahusya"), they only know group marriage ("byahu aky cattle is fornicating") and before the appearance of Svarog, they obviously do not know a single god. At that time, there was a lunar calendar ("it was not in the day of honor the number, but the ovii chtyahu on the moon, and in the days of the day I chtyahu").
2nd stage. Era of Svarog. The deity of heaven and fire, Svarog, appeared. People have come to know metal ("during the reign of its decline, kl? Sh? From heaven ?, begin to forge weapons"). Monogamy and cruel execution (burning) are established for violating it ("the law of the statute to wives for one husband to put up and walk and fasting, and those who are lovers, have led? Yours").
3rd stage. Era of Dazhbog (“And according to the reign of his son, the name of the Sun, he will be named Dazhdbog ... The Sun is the king, son of Svarogov, the hedgehog is Dazhbog, b? Bo man is strong”). A class society was established, people began to pay tribute to the tsars ("From the very beginning of mankind's tribute to the tsar"). And, in all likelihood, at this time, in connection with the cult of the Sun, the old account of the lunar months was replaced by a solar calendar of 12 months ("two bo for ten months later, I went away").
This periodization does not quite accurately reflect the chronicle text, since it deals with two periods - before and after the reigns of Svarog and Dazhbog. The first period is characterized by matriarchal orders, a lunar calendar and stone tools. The second is patriarchy, a solar calendar, metal weapons, the presence of princely power and faith in the gods.
The division of Slavic marriage customs into two types is found in the initial part of The Tale of Bygone Years:
Glades have the custom of their fathers meek and quiet, shy in front of their daughters-in-law and sisters, mothers and parents; they have great modesty before mother-in-law and in-law; they also have a marriage custom ... And the Drevlyans lived an animal custom, lived like a bestial ... and they never got married ... And the Radimichi, Vyatichi and northerners had a common custom: they lived in the forest, like all animals ... and they never got married ... the same custom was kept and Krivichi ...
There were also ideas about the Stone Age and the Iron Age. The legends about the giants asilk say that they did not know God and threw stone clubs into the sky. In the north of Russia there were legends about "divine people" who exchanged fur for iron things. As far back as the 6th century, the Slavs, according to Theophylact Simokatta, spoke about the production of iron as follows:
"They replied that they are Slavs by tribe and live at the tip of the Western Ocean ... And they carry the kifars because they are not trained to carry weapons on their bodies: after all, their country does not know iron, which makes their life peaceful and unperturbed ..."
There were also differences between tribes that had personified gods and those that did not have idols. Helmold (XII century) writes that some Slavs did not have idols:
“The Slavs have many different types idolatry. For not all of them adhere to the same pagan customs. Some cover the unimaginable statues of their idols with temples, as, for example, the idol in Plun, whose name is Podaga; others have deities inhabiting forests and groves, like Prove, the god of the Aldenburg land - they have no idols. "
B. A. Rybakov also draws attention to the ideas of the ancient Russian scribe that before the establishment of faith in Perun, the Slavs believed in Rod, and even earlier - only in ghouls and berekinas. Thus, paganism developed from beliefs with less personification of deities to idolatry. In the VI - IX centuries. part of the tribes retained paganism without the personalization of the gods and without idols, the other part - worshiped the idols of the gods.
The issue of idol worship in Europe was discussed back in the time of Pythagoras, who lived in the 6th century BC. e. Iamblichus (IV-III centuries BC) and other authors describing the life of this ancient Greek sage tell that a Scythian priest of Apollo named Abaris, who was interested in particular in the worship of the gods through idols, came to him:
"When Pythagoras was in captivity ... a wise man, a Hyperborean race, named Abaris, came to him just for a conversation with him, and asked him questions about the most sacred objects, namely about idols, about the most reverent way of worshiping ..."
The very first Slavic idols can be dated back to the 6th-7th centuries, although there are earlier dates of idols from the 2nd-4th centuries. D. N. Kozak and Ya. E. Borovsky are inclined to combine in a common branch of evolution all the monuments of paganism of the Zarubinets culture with the monuments of a later time, supporting the "Scythian" concept of B. A. Rybakov, who sees in the Scythian burial idols of the 7th-4th centuries ... BC e. statues of the Slavic-Scythian god Goytosir. Apparently, the personification of the Slavic gods took place in the second half of the 1st millennium BC. e., when the "Iron Age" began, and at the beginning of our era. By the 4th century, the Slavs knew both weapons (Pshevorsk swords) and a strong princely power (Prince of God), and, probably, the first gods. This is evidenced by indirect references to names derived from the names of deities. In the 5th century, the Vandals were headed by a leader named Radigast (Radogays), which was also worn by the god of the Baltic Slavs (Venets) Radegast. In the 6th century, among the mercenaries in Byzantium, there was a Slavic warrior named Svaruna, whose name contains the same root as the name of Svarog. In the description of Procopius of Caesarea (VI century), the main god of the Slavs and Antes is the thunderer, therefore, we can talk about the personification of Perun. There are also studies bringing together the already mentioned Apollo and Leto with Kupala and Lada, the personification of which was never completed, but took place from the earliest centuries of the development of Slavic paganism.
The third stage, highlighted by Rybakov, is recognized by the majority of researchers who are inclined to distinguish between pre-state paganism ("ancient Slavic paganism") and state paganism ("Ancient Rus paganism"). In the most general framework, this period is limited to the 9th - 12th centuries. So it is believed that with the advent of the state, Perun becomes the head of the gods of the Eastern Slavs, as the patron saint of the prince and the squad.
In addition, state paganism evolved into state polytheism, when the prince selected some gods into the pantheon and did not accept others.
And Vladimir began to reign in Kiev alone, and put idols on the hill behind the terem courtyard: wooden Perun ... and Khors, Dazhbog, and Stribog, and Simargla, and Mokosh ... Vladimir planted his uncle Dobrynya in Novgorod. And, having come to Novgorod, Dobrynya put an idol over the Volkhov River, and the Novgorodians brought him sacrifices as to God.
It is also necessary to highlight the period of development of paganism after the adoption of Christianity, when the latter significantly influenced traditional beliefs and mythology. This period, in the most general framework, can be limited to the XI-XIV centuries. This period is characterized by "dual faith", and for Russia of the XII-XIII centuries they even speak of a pagan renaissance.
In the future, open manifestations of paganism among the Slavs can rarely be found. Pagan beliefs become part of popular culture, relics that are found in Christian culture to this day, but are not considered as opposed to it (except for the church's struggle against superstition).
At the present stage, pagan beliefs are reviving in the form of neo-paganism, including Slavic Rodnoverie.
4. Myths of the ancient Slavs
4.1 Sources of information about myths
Quite a lot of texts, collections of myths, Russian fairy tales and significant pictorial compositions on mythological themes such as "The Tale of Oleg the Prophet" have survived from Slavic paganism. The "Tale of Bygone Years" says: "All these tribes had their own customs, and the laws of their fathers, and traditions, and each had its own disposition."
Scientists also reconstruct Slavic mythology from various other sources.
First, these are written sources. Texts by Byzantine authors of the 6th - 10th centuries: Procopius of Caesarea, Theophylact Simokatta, Constantine Porphyrogenitus, Leo the Deacon and others. Western European authors of the 9th - 13th centuries: Bavarian Geographer, Titmar of Merseburg, Helmold, Saxon Grammaticus and others. Arab authors IX- -XIII centuries: al-Masoudi, Ibn Fadlan, Ibn Rust and others. scandinavian sagas XIII century, in the Elder and Younger Edda, there is also information that can be used to reconstruct Slavic paganism. Russian, West Slavic (Kozma Prazhsky) and South Slavic sources of the 11th - 15th centuries: chronicles, teachings and instructions against the pagans (Kirill Turovsky, Kirik Novgorodets, etc.) and insertions into translated literature, including the apocrypha. A special place is occupied by "The Lay of Igor's Host", which reflected a significant layer of pagan myths mentioned by the heir and bearer of pagan culture - the anonymous songwriter. All these texts do not contain any holistic statements of mythology or separate myths.
Secondly, written sources of the 15th - 17th centuries. and folklore sources of the 18th - 20th centuries, which are less close to paganism, but contain a number of information from earlier sources that have not come down to us, as well as detailed records of legends, fairy tales, epics, conspiracies, bylichs and byls, proverbs and sayings by which it is possible to reconstruct ancient myths. A special role is played by the information of Polish, Czech and German authors and historians who wrote down the local legends of the Western Slavs, who preserved the information of ancient Russian sources. In Russia, XVI - XVII centuries. some information was recorded by Western diplomats, military men and travelers (Sigismund Herberstein, Olearius, etc.). Among folklore plots, epics about Svyatogor, Potyk, Volga (Volkh), Mikul are usually attributed to paganism; tales of Kashchey the Immortal, the Serpent Gorynych, Baba Yaga, Alyonushka and Ivanushka. The difficulty in interpreting these sources lies in the fact that later layers, the inventions of authors, storytellers, collectors of folklore, are layered on the ancient ideas. Among the authoritative researchers of folklore Sakharov I.P., Afanasyev A.N., Propp V. Ya. And others.
Archaeological sources are more reliable, but less informative: information from excavations of places of worship, finds of idols, ritual objects, jewelry, pagan symbols, inscriptions mentioning pagan gods or pagans, the remains of sacrifices and ritual actions. A significant contribution to the study of pagan antiquities was made by L. Nederle, A. Lyavdansky, I. Hermann, E. Kyassovskaya, E. Gyassovsky, V. Losinsky, A. Lapinsky, V. V. Sedov, P. N. Tretyakov, Rybakov B.A., Vinokur I.S., Tolochko P.P., Kozak D.N., Borovskiy Ya.E., Timoshchuk B.A., Rusanova I.P. and others.
No less important are the information of linguistics, comparative religious studies and the study of mythological subjects from other peoples. In addition to the worldwide authority in this area, Fraser D., one can name Tokorev S. A., Toporov V.N. and Ivanov V.V.Many Slavic myths are known from scientific reconstructions.
4.2 Mythological connections in "A word about Igor's regiment», XII in.
The songwriter Boyan of the 11th century (and, in general, guslars) are the grandchildren of Veles.
Chi Li was praised, things Boyana, Velesov grandchild ... About Boyana, nightingale of the old time!
Div, sitting on top of a tree (possibly the world tree), predicts trouble with his cry, like an eclipse of the Sun
The sun stepped in his way with darkness; night, moaning him with a thunderstorm, kill the bird; the whistle of the beast; zbisya Div, calls to the top of the tree
Stribog is the lord of the winds who act as executors of fate.
Behold the winds, Stribozhi vnutsi, blowing arrows from the sea to the brave regiments of Igor
In Boyan's words, he mentally moved through the fields to the mountains along the Troyan trail, seven centuries ago, to the land of Troyan (Rus). The myth of a great pagan era is transmitted - from its beginning with the advancement of ancestors along the path of Troyan to the failures of the prince-sorcerer Vseslav.
Would you ever tickle the Sia regiments, jumping ... the grove into the Troyan trail, the loins of the field to the mountains ... There were evenings of Troyan ... Resentment arose in the forces of Dazhdbozh's grandson, entered the land of Troyan as a virgin ... On the seventh day of Troyan, Vseslav I love my maiden.
Dazhbog is the common ancestor of the Russian people, the Rusichi are the grandchildren of Dazhbog. Strife is unnatural to the former unity.
Then, under Olza Gorislavlichi, it sows and spreads with strife, perishes the life of Dazhdbozh's grandson, in the princely sedition of vetsi people shrank.
Khors moves on its way day and night, its path can be crossed by moving south from Kiev to Tmutarakan (on the sea coast).
Vseslav is the prince of judging by the people, the prince of the castle, and he himself prowls like a wolf at night; from Kyev to doriskash to the chickens of Tmutorokan, to the great Khors and a wolf the path was interrupted.
Karna and Jlya care and cry for the dead, sadly lighting a fire in the horn (a hint of the rite of cremation and the rebirth of the bodies of the dead).
And Igor's brave regiment cannot be crushed! Behind him I will click Karna, and zhlya run across the Russian land, I will smear mychyuchi in a flaming rose. Ruski's wives burst into tears, arkuchi ...
4.3 The myth ofHoly
Saxon Grammaticus, XIII century:
In addition, he had a horse, completely white, from which it was considered wickedness to pull the hair out of the mane or tail. Only the high priest could feed him and ride him so that the ordinary bridle would not humiliate the divine animal. They believed that on this horse Svyatovit was waging a war against the enemies of his sanctuary. This followed from the fact that the horse, standing in the stall at night, was often covered in foam and mud in the morning, as if it had returned from a long journey.
4.4 Reconstruction of the myth ofRode and women in labor
Genus - the beginning of life, giving fertility, the predecessor of the gods (possibly the progenitor). "Word of St. Gregory", c. XII century:
they also began to put the Slovenians in rags, Rodow and women in labor, before their god Perone, and even before that they put the treasures to the Oupir and the Beremyns ... So it was also to the Slovenian doides of these words, and the Nachash to put the treasures to the Rod and Rozhanitsa, ... and all the Huptians put the demands on Nil and ogneve, the river Nile is a fruit-maker and a plant-grower.
4.5 Reconstruction of the myth ofSvarog andSvarozhichi
Svarog - the elder god, father of Dazhbog and Svarozhich (Radegast), the lord of fire (also Svarozhich
There is a certain city in the Redarians district called Radegost ... One of the most revered of them (gods) is called Svarozhich.
4.6 Reconstruction of the myth ofLada andLele
The existence of Lada was recognized by A.S. Famintsyn and B.A.Rybakov Lada - the mother of Leli and Poleli (possibly Kupala). First Lelya was born, and then Polelya's brother-sister. Lada is the patroness of love and marriage. Lelya - childbirth.
Innokenty Gizel "Synopsis", XVII century:
The fourth idol is Lado. This is the name of the god of joy and all prosperity. Sacrifices to him are brought to him, preparing for marriage, with the help of Lada, they imagine good fun and kindly acquire life. This delight from the most ancient idolaters of origin, some gods like Lelya and Polel, are worshiped, their bogomer name is still proclaimed in some countries on hosts of playhouses with Lelum-Polem singing. Likewise, both the mother to the left and the left to the left - Lado, singing: Lado, Lado! And that idol's old charm is devilish at marriage merriments, splashing hands and hitting the table, singing.
4.7 The myth ofVolkhe
Flower garden, 1665:
The big son of this prince of Sloven - Volkhov, a devilish and sorcerer, fierce in people then by demonic tricks and dreams, creating and transforming into the image of a fierce beast korkodel and lying in that river Volkhov waterway. And devouring those who do not worship him, devouring them in the drowning. For this, for the sake of people, then neveglasi (ignorant - author), the real god of the accursed one ... Put him, a cursed sorcerer, for the sake of dreams (ritual actions - author) and a meeting of demonic hail is small in place of a certain call of Peryn , where the idol Perun is standing. And they fable about this Magus neveglasi, saying: "He sat down in the gods" ... About this cursed sorcerer and sorcerer - as if evil was smashed and strangled by demons in the Volkhov river and the demonic dreaming of the cursed body was carried up this Volkhov river and ejected to the shore against this magical town, which is now called Perynya. And with many weeping from that neveglas, the cursed one was buried with a great feast for the bastard. And the grave poured over him is high, as if he were filthy. And for three days of that accursed throne, the earth wakes up and devoured the vile body of korkodelovo.
5. Deity cults
5.1 Idols, attributes gods, temples and places of worship
Sacred places among the pagans could be various natural objects. Pagans came to special stones with "footprints", went to sacred groves, made sacrifices from the labors of their hands to rivers and lakes, threw gifts at the bottom of wells, stuck objects into tree trunks, ascended to the tops of hills and mountains, mounds and barrow complexes were ancestral temples on which idols sometimes stood.
The simplest form of a specially organized cult place among the Slavs is cult sites with idols and sacrificial pits. Such places were presumably called "treasures", on which "treasures were performed", or "temples" - from "kap", that is, they performed what was necessary for the glorification of the native gods. The sacrificial pits were located on the outskirts of the villages and did not have fences. Sometimes, on cult sites, several idols-kapyas were located in a geometric order: in the center or behind there was the main idol, and around or in front there were secondary ones.
Idols (idols, idols, balvans, gods) were made of wood, metal, clay and stone. Small figurines of domestic gods are known, as well as idols from huge tree trunks several meters high.
Idols were vertical depictions with anthropomorphic features or amorphous. Anthropomorphic idols had heads, arms and legs. Sometimes body parts were only sketched out. Most often, idols had a head. Some idols had two, three (Triglav), four (Svyatovit) faces. The head was supplied with eyes, beard, mustache and other details.
The attributes of idols were their name, sacred number (indicated by other objects or signs), color and various kinds of things: hat, helmet, sword, mace, ax, shield, spear, horn, ball, stick, ring, cross - the most ancient symbol of fire , "Mountain arrow", bowls. Sometimes the attribute is individual objects that are associated with a specific idol: oak, hill, fire, horse, ants, dogs, bear.
Sometimes places of worship and idols were fenced off. The fence could consist of "stamens" on which the skulls of sacrificial animals were hung, or of pillars on which the curtain was attached. The fenced off place became a sacred area. The most common form of fencing was a rampart, a ditch and an artificial elevation. Some temples are oriented to the northeast, in which case the entrance was in the southwest, and entering the temple it was possible to watch the sunrise on the summer solstice.
In some cases, temples in the form of round platforms, fenced off by a rampart or a moat with fire, did not have idols (“swamp settlements” of the Krivichi).
In the temples, there is a division of the altar, on which the sacrament is brought, and which could be paved with stone, and the sacrificial fire, which was located on the side, behind the fence, and where various kinds of gifts were also burned.
In the last period of pre-Christian paganism, temple buildings and large complexes arose. Significant settlements with ditches, ramparts and a tyn were erected around the temple. Inside the settlement there is an unbuilt treasure where mass ceremonies are held, gifts are left, a fire burns. In addition, long houses are being erected for holidays and family meetings. Rybakov suggests calling these buildings temples (from "mansion" - "standing around"), but archaeologists are skeptical about such a classification. Temples in a narrow sense are called covered rooms with an idol inside. The Baltic Slavs called them "gontins".
Among the sanctuary settlements, large cult centers were distinguished, which included a trevische, several temples, sacral paths (roads to temples), temple buildings with idols, wells, springs and buildings for the holidays. On the territory of the sanctuaries there were ritual burials of senior members of the clan, which became objects of veneration.
See also articles: shrines of Arkona, Retra, Zbruch cult center, Temple of Kiya, temples of Perun, Zbruch idol, Svyatovit, Radegast
5.2 Cultists, Sacrifices and Divination
The sources contain references to special men and women who performed pagan rituals and took care of the temple. Their names, according to various sources, are as follows: Magi ("magi" - wolf, from "volokhaty" - shaggy, lost from the custom of putting on clothes with fur outside when performing certain rituals), princes (among the Western Slavs, it is close to "prince") , custodians (creators of amulets-amulets), supporters and indulgences ("indulgences" - secret ritual actions), cloud-perpetrators and wolf-lakers (from "wolf" and "skin"), blasphemers ("koshchi" - words at burial, keepers of the wisdom of the departed ancestors), sorcerers and sorceresses, sorcerers and enchantresses (from "charms" - ritual vessels and magical actions), button accordions ("bayat" - to speak, tell), "healers", witches, witches ("knowing mother" - a woman possessing generic wisdom) and prophetic (from "know" - to know and "news" - knowledge), magicians (from "kudesy" - tambourine), obavnitsy, kobniki ("kob" - fortune telling, fortune telling by flight birds, "kobenitsya" - unusual body movements), sorcerers (from "thief" - a fence), knots and knots (from "nauza" - knots tied in a special way). In synchronous Russian sources, the word "magi" was most often used.
The various names for pagan priests are associated with their status, the cult they served, and the actions they performed. Most often, the main duty of the priests was to conduct rituals, glorify the gods and offer sacrifices in accordance with the god in honor of the holiday. In addition, such designations of victims as "treat" and "treba" were used. Drinks (wine), food (cake), part of the harvest (grain, straw) were used as sacrifices, birds (roosters and chickens) were used to celebrate the day of Perun.
Victims are closely related to predictions. Procopius of Caesarea (VI century) writes about the faith of the Slavs and Ants:
They do not know fate and generally do not recognize that it has any power in relation to people, and when they are about to face death, whether seized by an illness, or who have fallen into a dangerous situation in a war, they make a promise if they are saved, immediately offer a sacrifice to God for your soul; escaping death, they sacrifice what they promised, and they think that salvation is bought by them at the price of this sacrifice.
Folklore sources even so speak about the presence of ideas about fate, which concerns love and marriage (hence the speaking words "betrothed", "bride", etc.). The southern Slavs had characters who, like the Greek moira, spun the threads of fate (hence the symbol of a guiding book in Greek mythology and in Russian fairy tales), in the epic about Svyatogor, a blacksmith forges marital fate. Slavic priests and gods possessed the abilities of predictions, fortune-telling and curses.
The methods of fortune-telling were different: visions during a sacred trance, interpretation of dreams, fortune-telling on the water, fortune-telling by the flight of birds, interpretation of celestial phenomena, fortune-telling by lot, by sacrifice, by runes, by multi-colored stones. The Slavs believed in “chokh” (sneezing of a person), “poking” (stumbling of a person and a horse) and “grays” of birds. Inscriptions on stones and other objects possessed predictive power.
Titmar of Merseburg (n.XI century) about fortune-telling in the temple of Radegast (in Retra):
When they gather there to offer sacrifices to idols or to soften their anger, they sit while the others stand by; secretly whispering to each other, they dig the earth with trepidation, and, casting lots, learn the truth in matters that are in doubt. Having finished this, they cover the lot with green turf, and, having stuck 2 pointed spears crosswise into the ground, with humble obedience lead a horse through them, which is considered the largest among others and therefore is revered as sacred; in spite of the already cast lot, observed by them earlier, through this, supposedly a divine animal, they again conduct fortune-telling. And if in both cases the same sign falls out, the conceived is carried out; if not, the saddened people give up. An ancient tradition, entangled in various superstitions, testifies that when they are threatened by the terrible danger of a prolonged rebellion, a huge boar comes out of the named sea with white fangs shining with foam, and happily wallowing in the mud, reveals itself to many.
Description of Saxon Grammar (XII century) divination in Arkona:
When it was supposed to start a war against any country, in front of the temple, according to custom, the ministers put three spears. Two of them were stuck with their tips into the ground and joined [the third] across; these structures were located at an equal distance. To them, a horse, during a campaign on a campaign, after a solemn prayer, was taken out in harness by a priest from the entrance. If the erected structures were stepped over with the right foot before the left, this was considered a sign of a successful course of the war; if he walked with the left before the right, then the direction of the campaign was changed. Speaking also at various enterprises, predictions were obtained by the first movement of the animal. If it was happy, they moved happily on the road; if unfortunate, they turned back.
Three wooden planks, white on one side and black on the other, were thrown into the pit as lots; white meant good luck, black meant bad luck.
"The Tale of Bygone Years" (XII century) about the Magi:
The same said: "The gods tell us: you cannot do anything to us!" ... When they were beaten and torn out with a split beard, Yan asked them: "What do the gods tell you?" They answered: “To stand for us in front of Svyatoslav ... But if you let us in, you will be much good; if you destroy us, you will accept a lot of sorrow and evil "... Such a sorcerer showed up under Gleb in Novgorod; told people, pretending to be God, and deceived many, almost the whole city, he said: "I foresee everything"
Scandinavian sagas about the mother of Prince Vladimir
So it is said that his mother was a prophetess ... It was their custom that on the first evening of the yule they had to bring her to a chair in front of the king's high seat. And ... the king asks his mother if she does not see or does not know any threat or damage hanging over his state, or the approach of any non-peace or danger, or an attempt by someone on his property. She replies: “I don’t see anything, my son, that I would know could harm you or your state, as well as such that would frighten off your happiness. Yet I see a great and beautiful vision. The son of the king was born at this time in Norega ... "
Magi differed from other people in clothing, long hair, a special staff (for example, in Novgorod - with the head of a god) and lifestyle. Only the priests in some cases could enter the sacred zone of temples, temples and sacred groves. The priests were held in high esteem among the people.
In individual tribes or among the priests of individual gods, a hierarchy has developed, high priests have emerged. Saxon Grammar about the priests of Svyatovit:
To keep the idol, each inhabitant of the island of both sexes contributed a coin. He was also given a third of the booty, believing that his protection would bestow success. In addition, at his disposal were three hundred horses and the same number of horsemen, who handed over everything obtained in battle to the high priest ... This god also had temples in many other places, ruled by priests of lesser importance.
Helmold on Ruyans:
They honor the priest more than the king. They direct their army, where the fortune-telling will show, and having won the victory, they carry the gold and silver to the treasury of their god, and divide the rest among themselves.
Ibn Rust about the island of the Rus:
They have sorcerers, some of whom command the king, as if they were their leaders (Rus). It happens that they order to sacrifice to their creator, whatever they like: women, men and horses, and even when the healers order, it is impossible not to fulfill their order in any way.
V.N. Tatishchev, extracts from the Joachim Chronicle about the uprising in Novgorod in 989:
The supreme over the priests of the Slavs, Bogomil, called the Nightingale because of his sweetness, strictly forbade the people to submit to forced Christian baptism.
BA Rybakov recognized the historicity of Bogomil and even attributed to him the Novgorod gusli of the 11th century with the inscription "Slavisha".
From the sources, only a few names of people are known that can be attributed to pagan servants. Firstly, this is Prince Vseslav of Polotsk, who, being a Christian, according to the chronicles, was born from magic, “in a shirt”, and “The Word of Igor's Host” endows him with such features of the Magi as the ability to guess about fate by lot, werewolf ( "Scoop away from them with a fierce beast", "scythe with a wolf") and guidance ("curse the blue light"). Another character is the Kiev witch ("knowing mother") Potvor, whose name is written on a spindle from a treasure of the 13th century. Together with the spindle, a knife was found, possibly of a ritual nature.
6. Holidays and ceremonies
6.1 Calendar Holidays
slavic belief paganism myth god
Calendar holidays of the Slavs were associated with the agrarian cycle and astronomical phenomena. There are a huge number of reconstructions of the calendar of Slavic holidays, while there are quite few synchronous sources on this issue. Archeology provides important information about the festive rituals, but all these data again have to be interpreted through the late folk calendar.
The pagan holidays by most researchers include Maslenitsa ("comedy"), Ivan (Yanka) Day Kupala, Kolyada. Less well known is Tausen (Oat), which belongs to a number of these holidays associated with the days of the solstice and equinox. The symbols of these holidays are associated with the sun, fertility and procreation. The burning of the effigy of Mara (the goddess of winter and death) on Shrovetide, round dances on Ivan Kupala record the ritual dances and marriage customs of antiquity. The Kupala cult is noted on the Slavic calendars of the 4th century from the village of Romashki and the village of Lepesovka, as well as on the Zbruch idol of the 10th century.
The Romashki calendar celebrates the holidays of Perun on July 12 and 20 - which was replaced by Christians with "Ilyin's Day". Veles Day (patron saint of wisdom and household) - was also replaced by Christianity on the day of St. Blasius (patron saint of livestock)
Also, the calendar records the holidays that lasted for several days or even weeks: "Russian week" and "Ladovanie", which preceded the Kupala holiday. A similar holiday is known to many peoples and at the beginning of autumn - "Indian summer", it lasted from one to two weeks.
Saxon Grammaticus describes in detail the feast in the church of Svyatovit, which took place in August:
Every year, after the harvest, a mixed crowd from all over the island in front of the temple of the god, sacrificing cattle, celebrated a solemn feast called sacred. His priest ... the small sanctuary ... carefully cleaned ... The next day, when the people stood at the entrance, he took a vessel from the statue, carefully observed whether the level of the liquid poured had dropped, and then expected a crop failure next year ... Having made a pie with round honey wine form, size is such that it was almost equal to human growth, began to sacrifice. Putting it between himself and the people, the priest, according to custom, asked if the Ruyans saw him. When they answered that they saw, they wished that in a year they could not see. With this kind of prayer, he asked not for his own or for the people of the fate, but for an increase in the future harvest. Then, on behalf of God, he congratulated the crowd present, for a long time called on them to venerate this god and diligently perform sacrificial rituals and promised the surest reward for worship and victory on land and sea. Having finished this, they themselves turned the sacrificial food into banquet food ...
6.2 Birth
At birth, women in labor and women in labor bow over a child-Three old women determine his place in the family and three virgins judge meetings on the way in life. Three maidens of the court-Dolya, Nedolya and Ustrecha. One prescribes all the good that the baby will meet, the second all the evil and the last, whose judgment you decide, averages the judgments of her sisters. Each born is given a share by Ustrecha Sudina. Three virgins / old women is a mythological image that goes back to ancient, common Indo-European roots. Compare with norns, moirs, etc. Old women in labor because they go back to the Clan, the embodiment of the concept of the unity of the descendants of a common ancestor, the common fate of the clan, the clan community. When the community-clan community changes towards statehood, i.e. with the disintegration of the tribal community and a decrease in its influence on the individual, the idea of \u200b\u200bthe separation of the life path from the place in the genus appears. The functions of the Court (not a criminal one, but the personification of an individual destiny) included the entire Rod. The tenth century in Russia just found Russia, as it were, two-thirds gone from the tribal community; this determines the image of women in labor as old women. In other words, it is personified that they are already out of date, but as harmful old women who do everything the old fashioned way and in spite of everything, they still interfere. Nevertheless, a person still, despite the individuality of his path, depends in many respects on the fate of his family and his position in it. But a fraction of the time can be foolish, if the family and conscience forget. And warlock people know how a good and good husband has a share of lime and how to speak a little thing, so that not a fraction of the heavens will pass with her. The share is careless; and both are whimsical. One thing is probably known, if someone tries to comprehend the share, then he will not see it, only for a little while it will be insidious.
So to be judged by the Court and to dress up as a Family is the fate of a baby born. If what is foretold over them, this cannot be avoided. In those days when the Judgment pours gold in its palace, a rich one will be born, when the clay shards are of heaven.
But not only women in labor and women in labor visit the baby. Also, the cries are bending over the cradle of the uninitiated. They make him scream heart-rendingly. They need to put their services in the house where the little child was born, as well as grandfathers. Grandfather's demands can bring him a glorious share in the future life, for he should honor a person with his grandfathers-ancestors of his kind.
6.3 Wedding customs
Wedding customs differed among different tribes depending on the type of marriage. The Slavic marriage was strictly monogamous, that is, it allowed only one wife or husband. The Tale of Bygone Years identifies two types of marriage and wedding ceremonies among the Slavs, which can be conditionally called patriarchal and matriarchal.
Patriarchal marriage:
Glades have the custom of their fathers meek and quiet, shy in front of their daughters-in-law and sisters, mothers and parents; they have great modesty before mother-in-law and in-law; they also have a marriage custom: the son-in-law does not go after the bride, but brings her the day before, and the next day they bring her for her - whatever they give.
Similar customs are described as early as the 6th century. Among the Russians, the payment for the bride was called "veno". Mention is made of the wedding ceremony of "blowing up" the groom.
Matriarchal marriage:
... And they never had any marriages, but the girls snatched by the water ... And they scolded in front of their fathers and daughters-in-law, and they did not marry, but games were arranged between the villages, and they converged on these games, on dances and all sorts of demonic songs, and here they snatched their wives by conspiracy with them.
At the end of May - June, there were round dances ("ladovanie"), representatives of different clans (villages) gathered at the fire on Ivan Kupala and chose brides and grooms from a different clan (such a marriage is called exogamous). Women played the role of the "elder child" in families; when the husband changed, the boys were sent to their father. The symbolism of such a marriage is two crosses, a wedding ring, wreaths, tufts of hair or a belt with which plants or trees were tied. Love conspiracies are considered traditional for the Slavs, with the help of which girls or boys could influence their fate, attracting the attention of the chosen one. A number of conspiracies (in different languages) are read in Novgorod's birch bark letters of the 11th - 15th centuries.
6.4 Funeral rites
Funeral rites of different groups of Slavs at different times were different. It is believed that the ancestors of the Slavs were carriers of the culture of "fields of burial urns" (II millennium BC), that is, they burned the dead, and placed the ashes in an earthen vessel and buried them in a shallow pit, marking the grave with a mound. Subsequently, the cremation rite prevailed, but the form of burials changed: volotovki (round mounds-hills with a wooden fence) - among the Slovenians, long ancestral mounds - among the Krivichi, cremation in a boat and a burial mound - among the Rus.
The Russian chronicle very briefly describes the funeral rite of the northerners, Krivichi, Radimichi and Vyatichi:
And if someone died, then they arranged a funeral feast on him, and then they made a large deck, and they laid the dead man on this deck, and burned, and then, having collected the bones, they put them in a small vessel and put them on pillars along the roads, as they do now vyatichi.
The described rite is recorded among the Vyatichi and some Baltic Slavs - archaeologists note the absence of burials, suspecting the "scattering" of ashes, but ethnographic data and some written sources speak of domina ("theaters of death") - burial buildings at the forks of roads where urns were kept from ashes. Outwardly, they sometimes resemble the "hut on chicken legs" of Baba Yaga of Russian fairy tales, and Baba Yaga herself is sometimes viewed as a priestess who carried out the cremation. By the 13th century, the Vyatichi began to build barrows.
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Chapter 10. Religion of the ancient Slavs
The ancient, pre-Christian religion of the Slavic peoples is far from known to us enough. Scientists began to take an interest in it from the end of the 18th century, when national consciousness was generally awakened among many Slavic peoples, and an interest in folk culture and folk art began to manifest itself in European literature. But by this time all the Slavic peoples, who had long been converted to Christianity, had managed to forget their ancient beliefs; only some of the folk customs and rituals that were once associated with these beliefs have survived.
The ancient Slavs were never united either politically or economically, and they could hardly have common gods, common cults. Obviously, each tribe had its own objects of worship, and even each clan had its own. But, of course, many things were the same or similar among different tribes.
Funeral cult and family-clan ancestor cult
The Slavs had a patriarchal clan system for a very long time. According to the Kiev Chronicle, "kozhu live by his own kind and in their places, owning kojo by his kind." Therefore, it is natural that they also retained a family-clan cult in the form of ancestor veneration associated with a funeral cult.
Throughout the territory in which the Slavic tribes lived, there are numerous burial grounds and burial mounds. Funeral customs were complex and varied: cremation (especially among the eastern and partly among the western Slavs; among the southern ones it was not attested), corpses (everywhere from the 10th-12th centuries), they were often buried or burned in a boat (a relic of a water burial). A mound was usually poured over the grave; different things were always put with the deceased; during the burial of noblemen they killed a horse, and sometimes a slave, even the wife of the deceased. All this is connected with some kind of idea of \u200b\u200bthe afterlife. The word "paradise" - a pre-Christian common Slavic word - meant a beautiful garden, which apparently depicted the afterlife; but it was probably not available to everyone. Subsequently, the Christian doctrine of the "future life" overlapped these ancient ideas; Perhaps only the Ukrainians have preserved a vague mythological belief about some blissful country - viry (iriy), where birds fly away in autumn and where the dead live.
On the other hand, beliefs about the relationship of the dead to the living were held amazingly firmly, and they are completely different from Christians. The dead were divided very sharply into two categories. This division, preserved in the beliefs at least among the Eastern Slavs, was perfectly defined by D.K. Zelenin: one category - "pure" dead, who died a natural death: from illness, old age, - they were usually called, regardless of age and sex, parents ; the other - "unclean" dead (ghouls, hostages), those who died an unnatural, violent or premature death: killed, suicides, drowned, drunkards (who died from drunkenness); this also included children who died unbaptized (the influence of Christianity!), and sorcerers. The attitude towards these two categories of the deceased was fundamentally different: the "parents" were revered, looked upon as patrons of the family, and the "ghouls" were feared and tried to render harmless.
The veneration of "parents" is a real family (and earlier, obviously, clan) ancestor cult. It is attested by medieval authors (Titmar of Merseburg: "domesticos colunt deos" - "they honor the domestic gods") and partly survived as remnants to the present day. Russian peasants commemorate their parents on certain days of the year, especially on parental Saturday (before Shrovetide, as well as before Trinity), on the rainbow (after Easter week). Belarusian peasants celebrated several times a year the holiday of dzyads (that is, grandfathers, dead), especially solemnly - in the fall (mostly on the last Saturday of October). They diligently prepared for the holiday, cleaned and washed the dwelling, prepared ritual meals; The dziads were invited to take part in the meal, which was always very solemn. Serbs and Bulgarians are still coping with - and not only by peasants, but also by townspeople - stranglers, commemoration of the dead in cemeteries, where food is brought, eat and drink at the graves, and some are left to the dead. It is unclear whether the dead are viewed as patrons of the family. But before, no doubt, they looked like that.
The tradition of celebrating family glory (krano ime), which has survived to this day among the Serbs, must also be considered a relic of the ancient family-clan ancestor cult. Glory celebrates on the day of the Christian saint - the patron saint of the family; but the very character of the holiday and its origin are undoubtedly pre-Christian, and before it was celebrated, apparently, in honor of the ancestors - the patrons of the family.
Another trace of the ancestor cult that once existed is the fantastic image of Chur or Schur. It is very likely that this was a revered ancestor-ancestor. His cult has not been directly attested, but convincing traces of it have been preserved in the Slavic languages. Exclamations "Chur!", "Chur me!", "Chur, it's mine!" apparently meant a spell, calling Chur for help; now it has survived in children's games; Ukrainian (and Polish) "Tsur tobi" - also in the sense of a spell. The verb "shun" is to keep aloof, that is, to protect oneself with Chur. And the word "too much" clearly comes from the concept of Chura, as it were, protecting some boundaries, the boundaries of the ancestral land, probably. That Chur-Shchur was precisely the ancestor is evident from the word "ancestor", the ancestor. Perhaps the images of Chur were made of wood, which is hinted at by the Russian word "churka" - a stump of wood *.
* (See A. G. Preobrazhensky. Etymological dictionary of the Russian language. M., 1958, pp. 1221-1222.)
Finally, the last vestige of the ancient family-clan ancestor cult is the belief in the brownie, which has survived to this day, especially among the Eastern Slavs, where the patriarchal family way of life lasted longer. Brownie (housekeeper, lodger, owner, susedko, etc.) is the invisible patron of the family; according to popular belief, he is in every home, he usually lives under the stove, behind the stove, under the threshold; humanoid; monitors the economy, patronizes hardworking owners, but punishes the lazy and careless; requires self-respect and small sacrifices - a little bread, salt, porridge, etc.; loves horses and cares for them, but only if their color is to his liking, otherwise he can ruin the horse. A brownie can appear in the form of an old man, a deceased owner, or even a living one. In his image, as it were, the well-being and trouble of the family and the economy was personified. The preservation of this image from the ancient era is explained by the stability of the patriarchal life in Russian and Belarusian peasant families; among Ukrainians this way of life has been preserved weaker, and therefore the belief in the brownie has faded. The Western Slavs have similar images: Skrzhitek - among the Czechs, Khovanets - among the Poles.
Unclean dead
The attitude to the "unclean" dead, who had not the slightest relation to either the family or the clan cult, was quite different. The unclean were simply feared, and this superstitious fear, obviously, was generated either by the fear of these people during their lifetime (sorcerers), or by the very unusual cause of their death. In the superstitious ideas about these unclean dead, apparently, there are very few animistic elements: the Slavs were afraid not of the soul or spirit of the dead, but of himself. This is evident from the fact that until recently there were folk superstitious methods of neutralizing such a dangerous dead person: in order to prevent him from getting up from the grave and harm the living, the corpse was pierced with an aspen stake, a tooth from a harrow was driven in behind the ears, etc .; in a word, they were afraid of the corpse itself, and not the soul, and believed in its supernatural ability to move after death. Bad influence on the weather, such as drought, was also attributed to the unclean dead; to prevent it, they dug out the corpse of a suicide or other ghoul from the grave and threw it into a swamp or flooded the grave with water. Such unclean dead were called ghouls (a word of obscure origin, maybe purely Slavic, as it is in all Slavic languages), among the Serbs - vampires, among the northern Russians - heretics, etc. Maybe the ancient word "navye" (" navi ") meant just such unclean and dangerous dead; at least in the Kiev Chronicle (under 1092) there is a story about how the pestilence (epidemic) that happened in Polotsk was explained by the frightened people by the fact that "se navye (dead) beat Polotsk people". Among the Bulgarians, even now the Navias are the souls of unbaptized children. Hence, probably, and Ukrainian Navka, Mavka.
Communal agricultural cults
Along with the family-clan forms of worship among the Slavs, there were also communal cults associated primarily with agriculture. True, there is no direct and clear evidence of them, but numerous and very stable remnants of the agrarian cult have survived in the form of religious and magical rituals and holidays timed to coincide with the most important moments of the agricultural calendar and subsequently merged with church Christian holidays: Christmastide falling at the time of the winter solstice (Christmas and New Year cycle); carnival in early spring; spring ceremonies now referred to as Christian Easter; the summer cycle of holidays, partly timed to coincide with the Trinity day, partly to the day of John the Baptist (Ivan Kupala); autumn brothers - communal meals after harvest. All these customs and ceremonies of the agricultural cycle are very similar among all Slavic peoples, as well as among non-Slavic peoples. They once arose, in all likelihood, from simple meals, games and holidays dedicated to the beginning or end of certain agricultural works (this was well shown in his studies by V.I. Chicherov), but magic rituals and superstitious ideas were intertwined with them. Agricultural magic was either initial ("the magic of the first day" - customs and fortune-telling on New Year's Eve), or imitative (ceremonies during sowing, for example, burying a chicken egg in a furrow, etc.). These magical rites persisted until recently.
Much less clear is the question of those personified images of deities - patrons of agriculture, which the Slavs undoubtedly had. In the literature, however, there are names of some mythological creatures supposedly patronizing agriculture (Koleda, Yarilo, Kupala, Lel, Kostroma, etc.), and former authors wrote a lot about them, especially supporters of the mythological school. But all these images are very doubtful: they were either formed under the influence of Christianity (Kupala is John the Baptist, because the people associated Christian baptism with bathing; Lel - from the Christian "hallelujah"), or they are a simple personification of holidays and rituals (for example, Koleda - from the ancient holiday of calendars, which coincided with the Slavic winter Christmastide).
Old Slavic pantheon
Written sources have preserved the names of ancient Slavic deities, and some of them - later lost - had, apparently, something to do with agriculture. Such were, I suppose, the solar deities Svarog, Dazhdbog, Khors. Apparently, there was a cult of the goddess of the earth, although it was not directly attested. It is possible that the god of thunder, Perun, was also associated with agriculture (this name seems to be an epithet and means "striking"), who later became a princely god in Russia; whether he was revered by the peasants is unknown. The patron saint of cattle breeding was undoubtedly Beles (Volos) - the cattle god.
The female deity Mokosh, mentioned in Russian sources, is very interesting. This is not only almost the only female image attested in the ancient East Slavic pantheon, but also the only deity whose name has survived among the people to this day. Mokosh is apparently the patron goddess of women's work, spinning and weaving. In the North Russian regions even now there is a belief that if the sheep molt, it means that "Mokosh shears the sheep"; there is a belief that "Mokusha bypasses houses with great fast and bothers spinning women" *.
* (G. Ilyinsky. From the history of ancient Slavic pagan beliefs. "News of the Society of Archeology, History and Ethnography at Kazan University", v. 34, no. 3-4. 1929, p. 7.)
The religious and mythological significance of the Family and Rozhanitsy, which, according to various sources, was worshiped by the ancient Slavs is unclear. Some researchers see them as ancestral ancestral spirits (Rod - the ancestor), others - spirits of birth and fertility. According to BA Rybakov, Rod in the pre-Christian era managed to become the supreme deity of all Slavs; but this is doubtful.
In general, did there exist common Slavic deities? There has been a lot of debate about this. Many authors, in their romantic-Slavophile hobby, considered almost all known mythological names, even the most dubious ones, as the names of all-Slavic gods. Subsequently, it turned out that some gods are mentioned among the eastern Slavs, others - among the western, and still others - among the southern. Only the name of Perun is repeated among different groups of Slavs, but, as already mentioned, this is just an epithet of the thunder god. Svarog and Dazhdbog are often considered common Slavs, sometimes Beles; but this is all unreliable.
The cult of the tribal gods can only be talked about presumably. Some names, apparently, tribal or local gods of the Western, especially the Baltic, Slavs are given by medieval writers and chroniclers Adam of Bremen, Titmar of Merseburg, Samson Grammatik and other authors. It is possible that some of these tribal gods gained wider prominence and became, perhaps, inter-tribal. Such was Svyatovit, whose sanctuary stood in Arkona, on the island of Ruyan (Rügen), and was destroyed by the Danes in 1168; Radgost was the god of the Lyutichi, but traces of his veneration were preserved even among the Czechs. Triglav was the god of the Pomorians. Also known are the tribal gods Rugevit (on Ruyan), Gerovit, or Yarovit (in Volgast), Prov (near the Vagrs), the goddess Siwa (among the Polabian Slavs), etc. The Serbs believed that the tribal patron was Dabog, who later turned into an antagonist Christian god. Many other names of deities have survived, but they are doubtful.
"God", "demon" and "devil"
Salu, the word "god" is primordially Slavic, common to all Slavic languages, and also related to ancient Iranian baga and ancient Indian bhaga. The main meaning of this word, as the language data show, is happiness, luck. Hence, for example, "god-aty" (having God, happiness) and "u-god" ("u" is a prefix meaning loss or removal from something); Polish zbože - harvest, Lusatian zbožo, zbože - livestock, prosperity. Over time, ideas about luck, success, happiness, luck were personified in the image of a certain spirit that gives good luck. At the beginning of the 15th century. in Moscow, at the royal wedding, one boyar said to another, arguing with him about the place: "Your brother has a god in a kick (that is, happiness in a kitsch, in a wife), but you have no god in a kick": the brother of the second boyar was married on the king's sister *.
* (See V. Klyuchevsky. Course in Russian history, part 2.1912, p. 195.)
Another common Slavic designation for a supernatural being is a demon. This word, apparently, meant at first everything supernatural and terrible (compare the Lithuanian baisas - fear, the Latin foedus - terrible, disgusting). Until now, the words "rabid", "rage" are preserved in the Russian language. After the adoption of Christianity, the word "demon" became synonymous with an evil spirit, equivalent to the concept of the devil, Satan.
The same fate befell the concept of the line. But the pre-Christian meaning of this image is unclear, just as the etymology of the word "devil" is not entirely clear. Of the various attempts to explain it, the most plausible is the old assumption of the Czech Karel Erben: he traces it to the Old Slavic krt, which sounds in the name of the West Slavic god Krodo, in the names of the domestic spirit among the Czechs křet (skřet), among the Poles skrzatx among the Latvians krat. Apparently, the same root is in the word "krachun" ("korochun"), which is also known to all Slavs and some of their neighbors. The word "krachun" ("korochun") has several meanings: the winter holiday of Christmastide, ceremonial bread baked at this time, as well as some kind of "spirit or deity of winter, death." Korochun sufficed him "in Russian means: he died ...
One can think that the ancient Slavs believed in a certain deity of winter and death, perhaps the personification of winter darkness and cold. There are traces of some kind of bifurcation of the image of krt-crt, which may be associated with the rudiments of a dualistic idea of \u200b\u200blight and dark beginnings. But the root "krt" has almost disappeared, and "chrt" - devil - has been preserved in almost all Slavic languages \u200b\u200bas the personification of every evil supernatural force. The devil has become synonymous with the Christian devil.
Growth of tribal cults into state
When the Slavic tribes, as class stratification began to pass to state forms of life, conditions arose for the transformation of tribal cults into national and state ones. Perhaps the cult of Svyatovit spread among the Pomor Slavs precisely in connection with this. Among the Eastern Slavs, an attempt to create a national pantheon and state cult was made by the Kiev prince Vladimir: according to the story of the chronicle, in 980 he gathered on one of the hills of Kiev a whole host of idols of various gods (Perun, Veles, Dazhdbog, Khors, Stribog, Mokoshi) and ordered pray to them and make sacrifices. Some researchers, hypercritical (Anichkov), believed that these "Vladimir gods" were from the very beginning princely or druzhina gods and their cult had no roots in the people. But this is unlikely. The solar deities Khors, Dazhdbog and others, the female goddess Mokosh, apparently, were also folk deities; Vladimir only tried to make of them, as it were, the official gods of his principality, in order to give it ideological unity. It must be assumed that the prince himself was not satisfied with the attempt to create his own pantheon of gods of Slavic origin - just 8 years later he adopted Christianity from Byzantium and forced the entire people to do so. The Christian religion was more in line with the emerging feudal relations. Therefore, it, although slowly, overcoming the resistance of the people, spread among the Eastern Slavs. The same happened among the southern Slavs. And the Western Slavs, under great pressure from the feudal-royal power, adopted Christianity in Catholic form from Rome.
The spread of Christianity was accompanied by its merger with the old religion. The Christian clergy themselves took care of this in order to make the new faith more acceptable to the people. Old agricultural and other holidays were timed to coincide with the days of the church calendar. The old gods gradually merged with Christian saints and for the most part lost their names, but transferred their functions and attributes to these saints. So, Perun continued to be worshiped as a thunder deity under the name of Elijah the Prophet, the cattle god Veles - under the name of Saint Blasius, Mokosh - under the name of Saint Paraskeva or Saint Friday.
"Lower mythology" of the Slavs
But the images of "lower mythology" turned out to be more stable. They have survived almost to the present day, although it is not always easy to discern what in these images really comes from ancient times, and what lay on them later.
All Slavic peoples have marked beliefs about the spirits of nature. Perfumes - the personification of the forest are known mainly in the forest belt: Russian goblin, Belarusian leshuk, Pushchevik, Polish duch lesny, borowy. They personified the fearful hostility of a Slavic farmer to a dense forest, from which he had to reclaim land for arable land and in which a person was in danger of getting lost, perishing from wild animals. The spirit of the water element - Russian water, Polish topielec, wodnik (topielnica, wodnica), Czech vodnik, Lusatian wodny muž (wodna žona), etc. - inspired much greater fear than the relatively good-natured joker devil, for the danger of drowning in a whirlpool, the lake is much more terrible than the danger of getting lost in the forest. The image of a field spirit is characteristic: Russian noon, Polish poludnice, Lusatian pripoldnica, Czech polednice. This is a woman in white, who seems to be working in the field in the midday heat, when the custom requires a break from work: noon punishes the violator of the custom by turning his head or in some other way. The image of noon is the personification of the danger of sunstroke. In the mountainous regions of Poland and Czechoslovakia there is a belief about the spirits of the mountains guarding treasures or patronizing miners: skarbnik from the Poles, perkman (from the German Bergmann - mountain man) from the Czechs and Slovaks.
The image of a pitchfork is more complex and less clear, especially widespread among the Serbs (among the Bulgarians - samovila, samodiva); it is found in both Czech and Russian sources. Some authors consider it to be primordial and common Slavic; others are still only South Slavic. Pitchfork - forest, field, mountain, water or air maidens who can behave both friendly and hostile towards a person, depending on his own behavior. In addition to beliefs, the pitchfork appears in South Slavic epic songs. The origin of the image of the pitchfork is unclear, but there is no doubt that different elements are intertwined in it: here is the personification of natural elements, and, perhaps, ideas about the souls of the dead, and the power of fertility. The word itself is apparently Slavic, but its etymology is controversial: from the verb "viti" - to drive, to fight, or from "viti" - to rush in a stormy dance (Czech vilny - voluptuous, lustful, Polish wit - scarecrow, stuffed, wity - stupidity, crazy antics).
The question of the origin of the mermaid image is clearer, although the latter is even more complicated. The image of a mermaid, or at least some analogous one, is known among all Slavs. They argued a lot about him: some considered the mermaid to be the personification of water, others believed that the mermaid is a drowned woman, etc. The word itself was deduced from "fair-haired" (light, clear), then from "channel" (river), etc. Now, however, it can be considered proven that the word is not of Slavic, but of Latin origin, from the root "rosa".
The most detailed research on East Slavic mermaids belongs to DK Zelenin *; he collected an enormous amount of factual material about these beliefs, but his view of their origin suffers from one-sidedness. Already from the time of the works of Miklosich (1864), Veselovsky (1880) and others, it became clear that it is impossible to understand the beliefs about mermaids and the rituals associated with them, if we do not take into account the influence of ancient and early Christian rituals on the Slavs. Among the peoples of the Mediterranean, the spring-summer holiday of the Trinity (Pentecost) was called domenica rosarum, pascha rosata, in the Greek form ρoυσαλια. These Greco-Roman Rusals were transferred along with Christianity to the Slavs and merged with the local spring-summer agricultural rites. Until now, the Bulgarians and Macedonians know Rusals, or mermaids, as summer holidays (before the Trinity day). The Russians also had their Rusal week (before the trinity), as well as seeing the mermaid; the mermaid was portrayed by a girl or a straw stuffed animal. The mythological image of a mermaid itself - a girl living in water, or in a field, in a forest - is late: it has been attested only since the 18th century; this is to a large extent the personification of the holiday or ceremony itself. But this image merged, apparently, with the ancient purely Slavic mythological ideas, moreover, quite diverse: here is the personification of the water element (the mermaid loves to lure people into the water and drown people), and the idea of \u200b\u200bwomen, girls who died in the water, of unbaptized dead children (unclean dead), and beliefs about the spirits of fertility (mermaids in the South Great Russian beliefs walk in the rye, roll on the grass and thereby give a harvest of bread, flax, hemp, etc.). Obviously, this new and complex image of a mermaid supplanted the primordially Slavic ancient images of bereinas, watercreepers and other female water spirits.
* (See D.K. Zelenin. Essays on Russian mythology. Pg., 1916.)
The modern Slavic peoples have preserved many other superstitious ideas about supernatural beings, partly hostile, partly benevolent to man. They personified either the fear of the elements of nature, generated by the underdevelopment of material production, or social conditions. Some of these concepts date back to the pre-Christian era, others arose in relatively new conditions of life; among the later belong, for example, Ukrainian beliefs about evil-doers - small spirits who personify the unfortunate fate of a poor peasant. Under the church influence, most of these mythological images were united under the collective name of evil spirits (among the Belarusians - evil spirits).
Ancient Slavic cult and its servants
The question of the ancient Slavic clergymen, performers of religious rituals is very unclear. The ritual of the family-clan cult was carried out, most likely, by the heads of families and clans. The public cult was in the hands of special professionals - the Magi. The word itself has not been satisfactorily clarified despite numerous attempts. There is an opinion that it reflected the ties of the Slavs with the Celts ("volokh", "valach" - the former designation of the Celts), or with the Finns (from the Finnish velho - sorcerer), or even with the Germans (vo "lva - prophetess). case, there is no doubt the connection of the word “sorcerer” with the word “magic”, “magic.” But who were the magi? Simple sorcerers, shamans or priests of the gods? Were there any differences, ranks, specialization between the magi? It's hard to answer. However, other designations for the performers of religious and magical rites have also survived: a sorcerer, a sorcerer, a prophetic, a bayan, a witch, a sorcerer, etc.
There is news that after the adoption of Christianity in Russia, the Magi acted as defenders of the old faith and at the same time as leaders of anti-princely and anti-feudal uprisings (for example, in 1071). And this is understandable, for Christianity came to Russia as a purely feudal-princely religion. In later times, all Slavic peoples retained sorcerers, sorcerers, warlocks, who were attributed secret knowledge, intercourse with evil spirits. But along with them, specialists in healing magic associated with traditional medicine, healers (whisperers, sorcerers), have survived from the ancient era. In popular beliefs, they differentiated themselves from sorcerers and often opposed themselves to them, claiming that they act with the help of the power of God, and not of evil power.
It is very characteristic that the Russians considered foreigners as stronger sorcerers and healers: Finns, Karelians, Mordovians, etc. This phenomenon, however, is known to other peoples.
In the ancient Slavic religion, undoubtedly, there were sacred and sacrificial places, and in some places there were real sanctuaries and temples with images of gods, etc. But only very few are known: the Arkon sanctuary on the island of Rügen, the sanctuary in Retra, the pre-Christian sanctuary in Kiev (under Church of the Tithes).
The question of mythology and the general nature of the Slavic religion
Unfortunately, ancient Slavic mythology has not survived at all, although it probably existed. The scarcity of the remnants of the ancient Slavic religion prompted some researchers to consider this religion pitiful, squalid in comparison with the religions of other ancient peoples. "The paganism of Russia was especially wretched," said E. V. Anichkov, for example, "her gods are pitiful, their cult and customs are rude." But the matter, apparently, is simply in the insufficient study of the religion of the ancient Slavs and in the paucity of sources. If we knew about her as much as about the religion of, for example, the ancient Romans, the Slavic religion would hardly have seemed to us more wretched and pathetic than the Roman.
* (E. V. Anichkov. Paganism and Ancient Russia. SPb., 1914, p. XXXVI.)
