#1Dec 2nd, 2008
So, here goes:Paganism – the ancient religion of our ancestors.
We live in an interesting time. Мы живем в интересное время. The Pisces era is gradually coming to an end, and the Aquarius era comes forth. Significant changes take place in many counties’ social, political and cultural life. This tendency doesn’t bypass the spiritual and religious spheres, as well. More and more people are giving up the conventional dogmas, prejudices and obsolete rites in search of a life-giving Power that would fill their existence and give it a new meaning. It is more and more often that many of us feel the desire to rediscover the true spiritual tradition of our nation – Paganism. But what do we know of it now? Christian religion, that had been artificially imposed upon us by series of violent acts centuries ago has blocked many sources of the ancient wisdom. Many people associate Paganism with human sacrifices, senseless and cruel rites, worshipping dark powers and ignorance. But just how true are these ideas? I will tell you – they are totally false.
Paganism is the most ancient religion. It was born at the time when humans lived in harmony with nature and everything around them. In ancient times humans conducted their relationship with the surrounding world on totally different principles than we do now. In contrast to the now existing exploitative attitude to nature, the people of those days realized that they are but a part of a huge, intelligent and living entity. They realized, that to survive they needed to understand the laws governing that entity, honor them and obey to preserve the universal harmony. Our ancestors were not the ignorant savages, who couldn’t write until the Christian monks Cyril and Methodius gave them the alphabet. It was quite the contrary. Our unjustly forgotten ancestors observed the surrounding world with respect, and studied it carefully. They highly valued the life in this world that the Gods had given them. They respected the way the Gods had created us. Their world had a proper place for every human manifestation. Thus self-knowledge and the perception of the world occupied a very important part in the lives of the ancient Slavonic people. Careful and unprejudiced observation, studying themselves and the world allowed them to accumulate a lot of knowledge that is almost fully forgotten nowadays. This knowledge was reflected in their religion.
Paganism is a certain dualism of inner manifestation of human nature and external Natural Powers. Pagan Gods are nothing other than a personification of some natural phenomenon or human attribute. This personification, meaning the creation of the image of some God, took place to allow the human awareness to grasp a very powerful, strong and large-scaled notion. For instance, let’s take Makosh, the Goddess of Earth. Earth is one of the fundamental powers in all Pagan religions. The Earth is our home, our provider, that gives us shelter, food and life. But it is so large and all-embracing, its manifestations and functions are so varying, that its complex image is very hard to keep in mind in ordinary life. That is why Earth was connected to the image of the Goddess Makosh. Consequently, when thinking of this Goddess or praising her, an ancient Pagan automatically praised the Earth in all its complexity and diversity. The connection between a man and Earth was strengthened by the image of this Goddess, that occupied a certain place in the human awareness. Moreover, further harmony was added to the relationship between men and Earth, as the Earth was no longer an inanimate mass of matter, but a living being, that deserved love and respect.
Not only the powers of nature were worshipped. So were different human attributes, such as love, hate, coveting knowledge or riches, marital relationships and adultery, hospitality, slumber, fear, joy, creativity, merriment, truth and lie, war and friendship, crafts and trades, and many others. Living in this world, a human being is not only influenced by the external powers that exist in it, but is also a power that influences the world. It is an eternal process of interchange between man and universe, a process that is beautiful in its harmony. Worshipping human attributes is thus another means to strengthen them, and another link between man and the surrounding world.
As I have already mentioned, the basis for Paganism is respect. Respect for the world, respect for your Gods and Ancestors, respect for the people you live with, self-respect, and most of all – respect for Life. Paganism is the joy of living. It is the spring awakening of every living thing. It is the dawn of a bright summer day. It is the rich autumn harvest. It is the peaceful rest in winter. It is the joy that bubbles up when life-force is filling you. How do we connect this with the notion of sacrifices, practiced in Paganism? From the time immemorial Pagans sacrificed fruit, grains, dairy products and animals to their Gods. After the ritual they used to cook food from the sacrificed products for the gathering and serve it during a feast to the glory of Gods and Goddesses. Human sacrifices were practiced only once in the Slavonic Pagan tradition – it was directly before the forced baptism of Russia by the prince Vladimir. It was a carefully planned political move. Prince Vladimir, who had betrayed the religion of his ancestors and exchanged it for a strange religion, needed a serious and indisputable reason to give up Paganism. To acquire it, he forced human sacrifices to be performed in just one cult – the cult of the God Perun. Most volkhvs, who worshipped this God, refused to sacrifice people, and the prince’s own people did that. Later the fact of human sacrifices was one of the main reasons to refuse Paganism that Vladimir stated. Paganism gave way to the “peaceful” Christian religion. The forced baptism of Russia, when whole villages were slaughtered for worshipping the true Gods, crusades, the inquisition that could burn 400 women at once – is this the peaceful and gracious Christian religion? Just think of this – 400 women are being burnt alive at the same time. Some of them are old, some are teenagers, and some are just small children. They are suffocated by the smoke, the cry and groan with pain, and the priests of the most peaceful religion ever, Christianity, stand around and calmly watch this. Who were all these people sacrificed to? To what powers? And isn’t this the real human sacrifice?
Right now many people are afraid of Paganism due to the widely known habit of making sacrifices. But these same people are not at all afraid of Islam or Judaism, where sacrificing animals is a habitual and even ordinary practice. Kosher food in Judaism, and animals, killed according to strict regulations in Islam – what is it but sacrificing? And why does a Pagan who sacrifices a hen or a goat serve the dark powers, while a Muslim, who kills a sheep in a certain way and pronounces ritual words in the process just fulfills the requirements of his religion? Isn’t it time for us to give up these double standards?
During the long centuries of Christian dominations its priests did a lot to eradicate everything connected with Paganism from the peoples’ minds. Some traditions were fully destroyed, some were changed beyond recognition. The most striking example of this is the holiday of Ivan Kupala. It is an ancient Pagan holiday that survived to our days mainly due to the fact that Christians have changed it in their own way, making it the celebration of John the Baptist’s birth. Even the name of the holiday was distorted by the Christian influence – its proper name is Ivan and Kupava. Kupala (in Russian it means the bather) is an allusion to John the Baptist’s baptizing people by dipping them into water, or “bathing” them. And Kupava is the name of the Goddess of Summer, who was highly honored by all the Pagans. The Goddess Kupava did something for the human race that no other Goddess could. According to an ancient legend, the first human was created by the Gods Svarog, Dazhdbog and Veles. They made him out of dough and baked him in a furnace. Then Dazhdbog made his flesh come alive, Svarog breathed a soul into him, and Veles gave him knowledge. But since all the three Gods were male, they couldn’t create the female counterpart for the first man. So they addressed the Goddesses, asking one of them to refuse immortality and to become the wife of a mortal man and the progenitress of the human race. The Goddess Kupava agreed to fulfill this request. She gave up her immortality forever, but she kept her skills, abilities and knowledge. The human race was born of the first man Ivan and the Goddess Kupava. Kupava didn’t resurrect as a Goddess anymore, and left this world forever after her death. But her ancestors revere her memory. A part of her Divine being lives in every Pagan woman, and the summer holiday of love and fertility is devoted to her. Its’ correct name is Ivan and Kupava, and the harmony between the male and the female is celebrated during it.
You might say that all these ancient legends are very interesting and beautiful, but only from the historical point of view. Is there a place for Paganism in the modern civilization? Yes, there is. And to make sure of it, you only have to take a look at Japan. The country whose level of technical development is far higher than that of other countries, practices polytheism, which is Paganism. A modern Pagan is a person who lives in harmony with all the manifestations of the surrounding world. The desire to know the world is one of the most fundamental traits of Paganism – so how can we, for instance, refuse the Internet, that allows to find any necessary information in just a few seconds? How can we, with out thirst for knowledge, stay away from the scientific research, that uncovers new facts about the world that we live in. The Pagan religion is saturated with the joy and enjoyment of life, so how can we give up comfortable cars and home appliances, that make life so much more easy and pleasant?
и зрения. Есть ли место для Язычества в современной техногенной цивилизации? Да, есть.
The Ancient Pagan Gods are neither dead nor exiled. They are everywhere. In the song of the wind, in the murmur of water, in the tremendous thunder rolls and in the flashes of lightnings, in the caressing rays of the warm sun, in the fertile earth that gives us its fruit, in the graceful movements of the wild animals, in the mysterious glimmer of the stars, in the power of love that brings people together, in caring about small children. Just listen to the sound of their names – Veles, Makosh, Didilia, Svarog, Dazhdbog, Stribog, Perun, Lada, Lel, Yarila, Zhiva, pelen, Porevit, Radogost, Svetogor… Feel the anciency and power coming from these names. The Ancient Gods are with you. And they are still ready to give their wisdom and power to those, who address them!
