Lecture on Slavic Paganism
PART I - Main
Slavic Pantheon
Slavs are people that are considering themselves as
offsprings of their Gods. Gods are their ancestors,teachers and parents. That's
why they bath 5 times a day, so they can come clean to their Gods and celebrate
them with 'poems, songs, play and laugh'.
Swarog: is
"all god", sky, apsolute. He's not personification, but he consists
of all Gods. But, main Slavic trinity consists of: Swarog[Svarog],
Sviatovid[Svetovid], and Perun[Creator,Protector,Destroyer].
Sviatowid:
Protector: 'Enlighter'. His symbol is: horn full of ambrosia[which helps
visiting spheres of light, and breaking psychic bonds]. His holy tree is Oak.
Byelobog: means
"white god," and so he appears as an old man with a long white beard,
dressed in white and carrying a staff. He is a giver of light, traveling only
in the daytime. He leads the lost out of dark forests, bestows wealth and
fertility on all, and helps reapers in the fields. He fights with Chernobog
every winter and summer solstice.
Czarnobog: means
"black god." He is the opposite force of Byelobog, the lord of
darkness, the bringer of calamities and destruction.
Suriya or Horos: two
names for Sun God. We know that Sun is giver of light so He[Sun] is greatly
admired. Horos is also Sun God in
Stribog: is
the god of wind, storms and dissension. He brings the frost and cold. He is
called the grandfather of the winds, and sometimes the distributor of wealth..
Radgost: God of hospitality. He's expression of respect
of every human being, like part of manifestation of God. His symbols are: bread
and salt.
Chislobog: God
of numbers and measure. He takes care of order of the cosmos. His symbol is
mandala that consists of primar geomethrical shapes. They presents perfecy and
harmony.
Yaro: He's
symbol of youth,spring. Atributes: hospitality, prayer,bath. Herbs: Flowers.
Lada:
Bride, protector of family and personal etiquetes. Symbol: Flower with six
leaves.
Vesna: is a
spring goddess.
Veles:
Simargal: God
of fire.
Mokosh: is an
earth goddess. She rules over fertility and midwifery. She is commonly called
Mati-Syra-Zemlya, or "Moist Mother Earth." Mokosh spins flax and wool
at night and shears sheep. She also spins the web of life and death. She
wanders during Lent disguised as a woman, visiting houses and doing housework;
at night strands of fleece are laid beside the stoves for her. She may have
originally been a house spirit concerned with women's work. Evenrually, her
worship was transmuted to the modern widespread reverence for Mother Russia.
Mokosh is dark, like good, black soil.She is portrayed with uplifted hands,
flanked by two horsemen.
Mora: is
the god of the sea, and the father of Lada in one story.
Morena: is
the Slav death goddess.
Svarozhich is
the personification of fire, and a son of Svarog. He gives life to the newborn
winter sun. He is often seen as warrior, clad in armor on a horse, with a
bird-shaped helmet, a bison on his breastplate, and holding a shield and a
double-axe. At harvest time, he kindles a fire to dry the corn and wheat before
threshing.
PART II - MAIN
SLAVIC HOLYDAYS[SABBATHS]
Winter Solstice (or Yule) from December 22nd -- This
is the ritual where we celebrate the beginning and the welcoming of the winter
solstice. It is the time when Czarnobog is the most apparent. The winter
solstice marks the shortest day of the year. But it is also a celebration of
the life that is born in the womb of death. For though Bialobog shines most
briefly at this time, and winter is most apparent, from this time forward it
will increase its light day by day. For this reason, while Czarnobog is honored
at the Yule celebration, it is also the festival of the birth of Bialobog.
Maslenitsa (or
Maslenica) from Marsh 22nd -- Maslenitsa is a very ancient
festival, the Sabbath of the spring equinox and the end of the winter frosts.
People enjoy themselves, engaging in much feasting, dancing, wearing of masks,
playing on traditional musical instruments, and contests of strength, all to
enact spring unbridled, in action and fighting. Traditional pastries are also
baked, called blini, to symbolize the Sun. It is a celebration of the returning
light, a time of games and contests (especially horse racing), fist fights,
sliding and mock battles. It is a time for protection and purification rituals
and a time of gluttony, obscenity and dissolution. At the beginning of the
festivities a life-sized corn doll would be made as a personification of the
Sabbath. The doll would be invoked and welcome by the name Maslenica. Sometimes
a drunken person is chosen, instead, to represent Maslenica. That person would
either be dressed in the opposite sex’s clothing or in a costume sewn all over
with bells. The person’s face would be smeared with soot and would be seated on
a wheel resting on a pole within a sledge.
Rodonitsa on May 1st -- This is the third
great day of worship of our ancestors, a day of remembrance. Today we bring
beer, vodka and food to our dead. During the feast, celebrants call their
guests to stir from their sepulchers and eat and drink in remembrance of the
Goddess/God Rod’s honor. To celebrate the ancestors, usually the feasting and
celebrating occurs in the cemeteries, among much ritual wailing. Offerings,
often of eggs, are left to the dead. Also known as May Eve or Beltane, it
is essentially a fertility rite dedicated to both the woman and the man. This
was originally called Nav Dien (Day
of the Dead). Feasts are held in the cemeteries. Offerings of eggs, beer, vodka
and other food are left for the dead. The name of the festival may derive from
the Goddess/God Rod.
Midsummer from
June 22nd -- As the Sun reaches its fullest glory,
the summer solstice arrives, celebrated with the Sabbath known as Midsummer.
While the Sun is in its greatest splendor, it is a time to give honor to
Bialobog.
Svarog’s Sabbath from September 22nd -- This
is the autumnal equinox, the day of the God of fire and the sky. This is the
day to drink mead and honor Svarog.
Night of the Thin Veil on October 31st -- We
pray to the God Nyia and the Goddess Nav and all the Deities that are
associated with death and the Underworld, for the souls who are burden with the
weight of their sadness to enter finally the heavens with their loved ones.
This is the time of the Slavic Pagan Witch festival known as Halloween. As this
time, the veil that separates the world of the living and the world of the
spirit is considered to be at its thinnest. At Halloween, this veil is held
aside and the spirits of ancestors; family and loved one are invited to join
the celebration. It is a renewal of family bonds, a reliving of past loves and
a communion with those who walked a Slavic Pagan Witch path in the ages before
our birth. We observe the Feast of the Dead. Salt, eggs and bread are being
left on the doorstep for the indulgence of the departed spirits. This is one of
the most solemn yet festive of all the Sabbaths. We are visibly moved in
renewing the friendships and loves that death has curtailed. It is a time of
communion, of introspection, of learning, as well as a time for delight. On
this day, people’s thoughts are turned to the predecessors, who lay under the
ground. Cemeteries look like fields of pillar and tiny houses above the burnt
remains of every person. Relatives are used to bring presents like food and the
tradition is still alive. The magickal essence of the end of October is evident
to the Slavic Pagan Witches as well. Halloween as a celebration of fertility is
mirrored by the Slavic Mokosh Day, a veneration of Matka Syra Ziemia. Likewise,
the notion that tonight the barrier between the land of the living and the land
of the dead disappears is expressed on this day. According to the tradition,
tonight the ancestors shall return to visit their decedents. The Slavic Pagan
Witches use candles to light the Spirits’ way home. The Slavic Pagan Witches
prepare kasha and pour libations of vodka. Slavic Pagan Witches add extra
sittings to the table and spend the evening foretelling the future. This is the
fifth and final Sabbath.
PART
III MAIN SLAVIC PAGAN RITUALS
[Note] These Slavic rituals and practices can be done as solitary
or in coven. Some of these rituals and practices were taken from other Pagan
traditions or from spiritualities outside Paganism itself, or simply created by
me.
The Blot (pronounced “bloats”): this is the most
common spiritual ritual among the Slavonic Pagans; it is a sacrifice to the
Deities. In olden days, as with almost all spiritualities, an animal was
consecrated to the Deities and then made as a feast for the Slavonic tribe.
This was not seen as a bribe or as a method of capturing the power of the dying
animal. It is simply the way in which the ancient Slav shared their bounty with
a gift to the Deities. Currently, the animal sacrifice has been replaced by the
offer of beer, juice or mead. Afterwards, those present are either sprinkled
with the liquid, or drink it in sequence.
The Sumbel: This is a ritual drinking celebration, in which a horn
is filled with a drink is passed around the coven or tribe. Each person
delivers a greeting; a toast to the Deities, ancient heroes and heroines, or
one’s ancestors; or a story, song or poem. He or she then drinks from the horn.
Life value and nine noble virtues: By values the
Slavonic Pagan Witch reject any form of discrimination based on ethnicity,
gender, language, nationality, sexual orientation or other diverse criteria
within and outside Slavia. The family is greatly valued. Slavonic Pagan Witches
should, and must, follow the nine noble virtues with the utmost respect:
courage, truth, honor, fidelity, discipline, hospitality, industriousness,
self-reliance and perseverance.
Inukshuk (or cairn): The inukshuk symbolizes the
stone monuments that guides the people on the land a marked holy ground and
other special sacred places. In earlier times, throughout the world, people
built mounds or piles of stones -- the inukshuks or
In magickal thought, inukshuks
are places of power. They concentrate the energies of the stones used to create
them. Inukshuks are rooted in the Earth but lift upward to the sky,
symbolically representing the interconnectedness of the physical and spiritual
realms.
PART
IV Sacred Locations
This is the list of all the
sacred locations I could find in Slavia for a Pagan Witch of Slavonic
traditional path. This is more of a personal Book of Shadows; I gathered some
information here and there.
There is a mentioned place of a
Sorbian temple somewhere close to
These two temples are in the
Polish region of Swietokrzyski (
There are more tops-temples in
First of all, the biggest Pagan
Witch sanctuary in
Anyways, scientists in the 20th
century C.E. found that near the whole hill is surrounded by a ground-stone
wall 1.5 kilometer long. The wall (which was a half circle, it was not closed
or not everything was preserved) was about from 2 to 2.5 meters high. That is
what the archeologists believe it used to be. Three Deities might have been
worshipped at this place, but no one can confirm or say otherwise about this
information. The wall is very dim, you can only see long hill rocks, but the
whole place (the monastery itself too is seen as an art monument) is amazing.
You can see the whole neighborhood from the top. The wall is dated between the
7th and the 10th century, as the archeologists estimate
it.
Slavonic sacred places were not,
in the earliest times, buildings. They were open oracles found in nature. Built
temples came only in the 12th century C.E. with the arrival of
Christian influences. One Pagan Witch always is filled with some kind of
vibration there as this sacred place is always releasing magick.
Second place, still in
Third place is Grodowa Gora (mount/hill
castle) near Tumlin in
All temples have Deities ranging
from one to three. The three is a sacred number in Slavonic sacred locations,
since it symbolizes the three aspects of the Goddess and God.
Slavonic Pagan Witches were more
interested in fire and woods, but all of the today’s found ancient Slavonic
Pagan Witch temples were situated among or next to any big water-sources. Being
interested into trees, the Slavonic Pagan Witches went for fire more than
water. However, water sources were also significant to the Slavonic Pagan
Witches, primarily due to Rusalka and somewhat due to Vodyany with general
water factors such as lakes, wells and rivers (drowning victims are thought to
dwell in lakes). Some of the big finds have come from the bottom of lakes and
wells, presumably votive offerings (often of silverware and/or animal remains).
Water also is credited with healing powers; it used to be provided by the
temple itself (today, it is sold in the pharmacies), along with a wide range of
herbal remedies.
2. Dobrzeszowska
Gora near Dobrezeszow in
3. Grodowa Gora
near Tumlin
2. Sciop Stone
near Kraniki village in Dokshycy region
3. Piarun Stone
near Dubki village in Senna region
4. Volas Stone
near Kryzhouka in
5. Stone Idol
near Dauhinava village in Vilejka region
6. Stones With
Symbols in Staiki village in Lahojsk region
2. River
Certainly, there are plenty of
sacred places throughout Slavia. Unfortunately, with the arrival of the
Christian church and its influence, there were profanations throughout all
these places. But still … some unknown sacred places survived in today’s days,
still standing and being forgotten by time and by age. Will we, shall we,
discover more sacred places? Who knows … only time has the answer.
When
There were many stone-structured
temples in Slavia; but most of them were destroyed throughout the ages, along
with kurgans. In Slavia, a kurgan was a Stonehenge-type stone monument in
Slavia. However, there are still rock carvings throughout Slavia.
It is the duty for the Slavonic
Pagan Witch to conserve the remaining sacred places. They are part of our ancestral
heritage, part of our spiritual
SLAVIC BELIFES AND CUSTOMS PART V
To attract a
Domovoy
Go outside of
your house wearing your best clothing and say aloud "Dedushka Dobrokhot,
please come into my house and tend the flocks."
To rid yourself
of a rival Domovoy
Beat your walls
with a broom, shouting "Grandfather Domovoy, help me chase away this
intruder."
When moving
Make offering to
Domovoy and say "Domovoy! Domovoy! Don't stay here but come with our
family!"
To call a Leshy
Cut down an aspen
tree so that it falls facing East. Bend over and look through your legs saying
"Leshy, Forest Lord, come to me now; not as a grey wolf, not as a black
raven, not as a flaming fir tree, but as a man." The Leshy will teach the
magic arts to any whom he befriends.
Invocation to
Zorya (for protection)
O Virgin,
unsheath your father's sacred sword.
Take up the
breastplate of your ancestors.
Take up your
powerful helmet.
Bring forth your
steed of black.
Fly to the open
field,
There where the
great army with countless weapons is found.
O Virgin, cover
me with your veil.
Protect me
against the power of the enemy,
Against guns and
arrows, warriors and weapons,
Weapons of wood,
of bone, of copper and iron and steel.
Prayer to Mokosh
In August, go to
the fields at dawn with jars filled with hemp oil.
Turn East and
say: "Moist Mother Earth, subdue every evil and unclean being so that he
may not cast a spell on us nor do us any harm."
Turn West and
say: "Moist Mother Earth, engulf the unclean power in your boiling pits,
in your burning fires."
Turn South and
say: "Moist Mother Earth, calm the winds coming from the south and all bad
weather. Calm the moving sands and whirlwinds."
Turn North and
say: "Moist Mother Earth, calm the north winds and the clouds, subdue the
snowstorms and the cold."
Oil is poured out
after each invocation, and finally, the jar is thrown to the ground.
Ukrainian Egg
Designs for the Spring Equinox
Paint these
designs on hard-boiled eggs and then bury them in the ground for good luck and
fertility:
Superstitions
Never touch a
person or shake their hand over the threshold. If you don't wait until they are
inside, you will not see them for seven years and risk angering the Domovoy to
boot.
It is unlucky to
sit at the corner of a table.
If the cat is
cleaning herself it means that company is coming.
If you whistle
inside, you risk losing all your money.
Never begin a new
project on a Friday.
If you compliment
a person on their appearance or their baby's health, you must either knock
unpolished wood or spit three times over the left shoulder lest the fairies
take them.
Never shave or
cut your hair when a family member is in danger.
Never cut your
hair while pregnant or the umbilical cord will wrap around your baby's neck
When giving
flowers, give only odd numbers of flowers. Even numbers are for the dead.
If a bird hits
the window, someone will die.
If you break a
mirror, you can run the pieces under water to counteract the bad luck.
Never show a
newborn baby to a stranger until it is at least 40 days old.
Do not put keys
on a table. You'll lose money
Don't give knives
or handkerchiefs as gifts.
Never celebrate a
birthday early.
The Otherworld
· The
· Nav was the
underworld, realm of the dead.
· Ancestors
thought to dwell below earth, cracks and holes in earth thought to be gates to
underworld
· Otherworld
located in rainbow or Milky Way
· Must climb up
hillside of iron or glass to celestial land of goodness, so must save one's
nail clippings so that they would turn into talons after death for the climb to
the other world
Funeral Customs
· early Slavs
cremated the dead on pyre with earthly things, then put urn in cairn
· burial a result
of foreign influences
· after death,
windows and doors of house left open so soul can leave
· most Slavs
believed in a world after death, dead buried with articles for journey, food,
drink, coins
· soul traveled
across wide sea, buried with coins for passage-fare, burned or buried in boats,
boat-shaped coffins, or with boots for travel by foot
· Dead often
buried with heads to east or faces oriented east
PART VI - STORY
It was around
through the fall clouds. Andrij pulled his old coat a
little tighter and
bent down to dig up some more potatos.
- 'Andrij! Andrij! A voice called from the road.
It was Ivan, Andrij's neighbor running across the moist
field, jumping
awkwardly over the furrows and stumbling every so often
when he missed a
crest.
'You will not believe what I had just seen. I want to that
Christian church
this morning. Ah!. . . that God of theirs is powerful!'
- 'Puss on the new God, I say. Our Gods are much more
powerful', replied
Andrij.
- ' Well, my old friend, did you know that this new God can
throw you in
hell, where they will gouge out your eyes, for all
eternity'
- ' Gouge out my eyes?' - Andrij asked startled,
reflexively looking in the
direction of the new church.
- 'Yes!. . . But! . . . if you go to church and pray this
new God will put
you in heaven and they have some wondrous things there.
Aaaaand. . And great
riches!'
- 'Riches you say? Says Andrij speculatively, 'What kind of
riches?, looking
with interest this time, in the direction of the new
church.
- 'Well. . . let me tell you then' says Ivan, satisfied
that he finally has
Andrij's full attention - 'They have these beeswax candles,
as thick as my
wrist, my oh my how many hives it took to make those.
Aaaaand. You know how
foggy it was this morning and how the fire is hard to light
on the damp
earth and they just put up an ember and those candles
lighted up bright and
quick and with hardly any smoke and then later there was
this little pot the
priest brought out and there was this wondrous smell that
came out of it,
nothing like the herbs and leaves the old Olga burns. And
the priest said
that it was only a small piece of what awaits us in heaven.
Sooooo. I think
Andrij, my dear friend, you better come to this new church
too.'
Andrij thought about all of that he heard and replied, even
as his friend
shifted nervously from foot to foot, waiting for the
response.
- 'Ivan, my dear friend, I think that this new church is
trying to seduce us
with tales of heaven and frighten us with tales of hell,
away from our old
traditions. The candles and incense are only props, part of
the seduction.
The most important thing about them is that we can not have
them ourselves,
we can only experience them through this church. Also, I
can't help but
notice that the reward and punishment are much further away
- and so much
harder to verify. If we follow this new religion, we will
abandon our
individual connection to the Earth, which sustains us.
Frankly, I think that
our difficulties lie not with the Earth, but with the
feudal system, that
centralizes power in the aristocracy, which in turn
promises protection in
exchange for out toil. The priests will become like this
also,
intermediaries between us and our power, our spirit world
and will require
ever higher fees to intercede on our behalf, gathering
power to themselves,
even as we bankrupt ourselves spiritually, supporting their
vision and their
expansion. Ultimately we will have no power, working only
for others, while
this new church establishes a worldwide burocracy. '
-
Now it was Ivan's turn to be startled as he unconsciously
started backing
away from his friend.
- 'Andrij. . . you sound different. . . like something has
come over you. .
. are you. . . are you possessed?. . .well. . . are you? -
Ivan tried to
think quickly of the new sign of the cross the priest
taught them, but he
could only remember the old signs, so he clutched the
talisman he had
surreptitiously put in his pocket in the churn, and tried
to spit over his
left shoulder three times as he stumbled, running down the
field missing the
crests of the furrows and getting stuck in the damp, moist
Earth.
THE END…