Early Slavs - Ethnogenesis - Religion

Religion

Further information: Slavic paganism, Saints Cyril and Methodius, and List of Slavic mythological figures

Little is known about Slavic pre-Christian religion because of the scarcity of evidence and artifacts dating to the period before the Christianization of Kievan Rus’. After the Slavs’ conversion to Christianity, the Christian authorities wiped out many records of the old religion. Some evidence remains, though, including evidence found in apocryphal and devotional texts, the etymology of Slavic religious terms, and the Primary Chronicle. The existing evidence allows scholars to piece together information about the early Slavs’ pre-Christian religion.

The early Slavs were relatively uniform in their religion. The religion was animistic, anthropomorphic and nature-inspired. Often Slavs developed cults around natural objects – such as springs, trees, or stones – in reverence to the spirit, or demon, within. The Slavic pre-Christian religion was polytheistic with no organized pantheon, though this changed over time. The earliest Slavs seemed to have a weak concept of “god” but the concept developed until the Slavs had a variation of monotheism, where a “supreme god in heaven over the others”. They also had no concept of fate or predestination. And although the pre-Christian Slavs did believe in an afterlife – as evidenced by their burial practices – their religion did not include a concept of heaven and hell as Christianity would.

The pre-Christian Slavs believed in spirits and demons, both of which could be the spirits of the deceased or their own entities, of home or of nature. Forest spirits, though, were almost exclusively not spirits of the dead; instead, they were their own entities and served as the wild and highly-venerated counterparts of home spirits. Pre-Christian Slavic demons and spirits could be either good or evil, suggesting that the Slavs’ pre-Christian religion had the concept of dualism. All spirits and demons were revered, and were often given sacrifices and gifts.

The pre-Christian religion of the Early Slavs was syncretistic, combining and sharing with a variety of other religions. Aspects shared with Teutonic religions can be found in the Slavs’ pre-Christian beliefs. Also, linguistics show that part of the Slavic pre-Christian religion developed when Baltic and Slavic languages were the same; thus, pre-Christian Slavic beliefs contained elements of Baltic religions. After Slavic and Baltic languages diverged – also evidenced by etymology – the Early Slavs interacted with Iranian Indo-Europeans and acquired elements of Iranian spirituality. For example, both Early Iranian and Slavic supreme gods were considered givers of wealth, unlike the supreme thunder gods in many other European religions. Also, both Slavs and Iranians had demons – given names from similar linguistic roots, Daêva (Iranian) and Divŭ (Slavic) – and had a concept of dualism, of good and evil.

While evidence of pre-Christian Slavic worship is scarce – leading scholars to suspect that the Slavic pre-Christian religion was aniconic – religious sites and idols exist; they seem most plentiful in Ukraine and Poland. Slavic temples and indoor places of worship seem rare. Outdoor places of worship are more common especially in Kievan Rus’. These outdoor cult sites were often situated on hills and included ringed ditches. Indoor shrines did exist, though. “Early Russian sources…refer to pagan shrines or altars known as kapishcha”; these were small and enclosed structures with an altar inside. One was found in Kiev, surrounded by the bones of sacrificed animals. Written records tell of pagan temples being destroyed during Christianization.

Records of pre-Christian Slavic priests, like the pagan temples, appeared later. No explicit earlier evidence of priests among the pre-Christian Slavs has been found, but the prevalence of sorcerers and magicians after Christianization suggests that the pre-Christian Slavs did, in fact, have religious leaders. Slavic pagan priests were known to commune with the gods, being able to predict the future, and to make preparations for religious rituals. The pagan priests or magicians – called volkhvy by the Rus’ – resisted Christianity, even after Christianization. The Russian Primary Chronicles discuss a campaign against Christianity in 1071, during a time of famine. The volkhvy were well-received nearly one-hundred years after Christianization, suggesting that pagan priests held an esteemed position – both in 1071 and in pre-Christian times.

Christianization began in the 9th century, and was not complete until the second half of the 12th century. The Christianization of Bulgaria was a result of the khan's shifting political alliances with the kingdom of the East Franks and the Byzantine Empire, as well as his reception by the Pope of the Roman Church. Because of Bulgaria's strategic position, both the Greek East and the Latin West wanted Bulgaria's people to adhere to their respective liturgies and be aligned with them politically. After some overtures to each side, the khan aligned with Eastern Orthodox Christianity. Through them, he achieved his goal of gaining an independent Bulgarian national church and having an archbishop appointed to head it. There is some evidence of early Christianization of the East Slavs, but the Kievan Rus' remained largely pagan, or relapsed into paganism, until the baptism of Vladimir the Great in the 980s. Also in the 10th century, the Baptism of Poland began with the baptism of Mieszko I of Poland in 966. The last remnants of Slavic paganism persisted into the 12th century, on the north-western fringe of the Slavic world, in Pomerania. Here, Christianization took place in the wake of the establishment of the Duchy of Pomerania within the Holy Roman Empire, in 1121. This process was mostly completed with the Wendish Crusade of 1147. The final stronghold of Slavic paganism were the Rani, with a temple to their god Svantevit on Cape Arkona, which was finally taken in a campaign by Valdemar I of Denmark in 1168.