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Woodruff's Guide to Slavic Deities
A new and refreshing look at the ancient beliefs of the people that lived in the Slavic lands. A religion rooted in balance, connection and the Earth. Explore these different faces of deity: Veles, the teacher of magic and lord of the animals; Zhiva, the radiant goddess of life, love and justice; Mat Zemla, who is the “moist Mother Earth” and more! Approximately 32 million people in the United States identify as having Slavic heritage and yet most of them have probably never heard of the native gods of their homeland. As more people look to find their own connection to earth spirituality they have only to look to the indigenous religion of their heritage. There is little available in English on these beliefs and the little that has been published is often tainted with white supremacist agendas. Come learn about the deities of the Slavic lands. Woodruff is an academic, an interfaith minister and a practicing Lemko bosorka. Her intense research and multi-disciplinary approach has broken new ground and resulted in same amazing new discoveries about this ancient religion.
- GenresSpirituality
268 pages, Paperback
Published September 2, 2020
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
June 21, 2022
This book is far from a good guide. The research is poorly put together and reads as a selective view aiding only to enforce the author's narrative of partnered gods and goddesses.
September 10, 2020
This is *not* a Rodnovery book. It looks back further in time and without any nationalistic agendas nor white supremacist slant. Using a multi-disciplinary approach to reveal things long hidden in the names of plants, fairy tales, or the tattered remains of traditions throughout the entire area of Old Europe.
January 16, 2024
This book is amazing. I am a tad biased as I have responded to the author and I am part of the Facebook group she dedicates the book to.
This is a treasure trove of information that the author has generously shared in the group, but this was much more meaty.
My ONLY complaint was the lack of an index or table of contents made it difficult to look up certain deities… I had to book mark A LOT.
I hope she keeps with the proposal that this is the first in a series, because I am really looking forward to reading more.
This is a treasure trove of information that the author has generously shared in the group, but this was much more meaty.
My ONLY complaint was the lack of an index or table of contents made it difficult to look up certain deities… I had to book mark A LOT.
I hope she keeps with the proposal that this is the first in a series, because I am really looking forward to reading more.
February 21, 2024
The Short Version: I don't recommend buying. So much information is incorrect or needs to be double checked, you may as well just do your own research for cheaper and better results. This book is not about Slavic culture, it's a Wiccan book wearing a vyshyvanka.
I went into reading this book feeling quite apprehensive, as I have awareness of the author's background and have read her dissertation. I want to be gentle in this review, however, this book baffled me with its inaccuracies. The introduction alone had me reeling. I would like to note that I am a Lemko person, the same ethnic group the author is. I found it incredibly disheartening to see her be so misinformed of our culture, using spiritual words coined by our Hutsul cousins or our Siberian counterparts to describe a role that doesn't quite exist within our culture (as far as we know); I was willing to provide some grace here due to how difficult Lemko culture can be to research, especially if you have not been raised within it. Despite this, I was even further disheartened by the fact that she uses incorrect terminology to describe Lemkos, referring to them as "White Russians", when Lemkos have never been referred to as such in historical records. We are possible descendants of a group called the White Croats (although this theory is not well-substantiated), but White Russians refers to either Belarusian people or a political group within Russia that opposed the establishment of communism. Using incorrect naming has been a often used historic method to suppress and/or erase Lemko culture, so I found it hurtful that one of our own engaged in this failure to correctly name us.
As for the rest of the book, it taught me that no matter how much reading, traveling, and research you do, if you have a preconceived notion or narrative that you approach it with, you can miss an INCREDIBLE amount of understanding.
The author's linguistic additions are weak at best and outright false at worst (i.e. claiming Devanna's name means something in Hindi, when it does not).
She inserts many pseudo deities that she suggests must exist, because she is Wiccan, and therefore all pantheons, regardless of any information, must have a male and female counterpart for each concept. This idea resulted in the author deciding that the wind god Stribog's counterpart, the Stribog who was likely significant not only to East Slavs but to Poles, must be a figure named "Striga", as if the striga (properly spelled Strzyga) isn't already a figure that is highly vampiric and dangerous, a concept that stretches back to pre-Christian mythos. This incompetence is also apparent when she suggests that there is a female equivalent to Yarilo and one of her "sacred items" are intimate toys. I'm no pearl clutcher, but that notion is just unbelievable and unsubstantiated.
Another ridiculous conclusion that is brought about due to this need to have matching gender roles for each concept (which is inherently problematic, especially when dealing with a culture that does not engage with this concept. You cannot complain about Christian colonialism and then proceed to insist on this idea being universal. It is not.) is the idea that Baba Jaga and Koschei the Deathless are a paired couple. In MANY of Baba Jaga's stories, across Slavic cultures, she is noted to be an old and unmarried woman and KtD's only appearances in Slavic tales involves him kidnapping young women to marry. On top of this, there is a clear line that traces the Russian Koschei to a Turkic leader discussed in The Tale of Igor's Campaign. This character in the epic was likely warped into Koschei the Deathless as a negative commentary against the Kuman people, as they were not considered allies or friendly by Russians. The figure of Koschei the Deathless is, at his root, a political caricature.
Even with deities that are noted to exist by oral tradition, archaeological data, or otherwise, the author fundamentally falls flat with getting a grasp on deities, she tries to create a pan-Slavic picture of the pantheon, which is just fundamentally incorrect. Not only Slavic paganism, but most other paganisms, have highly localized deities, and treating them as simply a "face" of a greater deity. I take great issue with this due to the fact that a common Western misconception about Slavs is that we are a monolith, when that is the opposite. The absorption of local deities into this pan-Slavic layout does not do Slavic cultures the justice they deserve, which, again, understanding that the author is Lemko, is frustrating to see.
My final issue with this book is the unclear method of citation. The author cites a plant as being used by "shamans" of a deity to have ecstatic experiences and the citation after that sentence connects to a WebMD article about the plant, rather than any source that details about the cultural/historic use about the plant. This broke what bit of trust I was trying to build in the book, and the later citations of blogs when the author's PhD is already from a university where you can receive a tuition discount just by telling your friends about the university didn't help.
Overall, I found this book beyond disappointing in its treatment of Slavic divinities, history, and peoples. It's clear the author is passionate about the subject, but her focal point as a Wiccan priestess overshadows any real information being provided by her research.
I went into reading this book feeling quite apprehensive, as I have awareness of the author's background and have read her dissertation. I want to be gentle in this review, however, this book baffled me with its inaccuracies. The introduction alone had me reeling. I would like to note that I am a Lemko person, the same ethnic group the author is. I found it incredibly disheartening to see her be so misinformed of our culture, using spiritual words coined by our Hutsul cousins or our Siberian counterparts to describe a role that doesn't quite exist within our culture (as far as we know); I was willing to provide some grace here due to how difficult Lemko culture can be to research, especially if you have not been raised within it. Despite this, I was even further disheartened by the fact that she uses incorrect terminology to describe Lemkos, referring to them as "White Russians", when Lemkos have never been referred to as such in historical records. We are possible descendants of a group called the White Croats (although this theory is not well-substantiated), but White Russians refers to either Belarusian people or a political group within Russia that opposed the establishment of communism. Using incorrect naming has been a often used historic method to suppress and/or erase Lemko culture, so I found it hurtful that one of our own engaged in this failure to correctly name us.
As for the rest of the book, it taught me that no matter how much reading, traveling, and research you do, if you have a preconceived notion or narrative that you approach it with, you can miss an INCREDIBLE amount of understanding.
The author's linguistic additions are weak at best and outright false at worst (i.e. claiming Devanna's name means something in Hindi, when it does not).
She inserts many pseudo deities that she suggests must exist, because she is Wiccan, and therefore all pantheons, regardless of any information, must have a male and female counterpart for each concept. This idea resulted in the author deciding that the wind god Stribog's counterpart, the Stribog who was likely significant not only to East Slavs but to Poles, must be a figure named "Striga", as if the striga (properly spelled Strzyga) isn't already a figure that is highly vampiric and dangerous, a concept that stretches back to pre-Christian mythos. This incompetence is also apparent when she suggests that there is a female equivalent to Yarilo and one of her "sacred items" are intimate toys. I'm no pearl clutcher, but that notion is just unbelievable and unsubstantiated.
Another ridiculous conclusion that is brought about due to this need to have matching gender roles for each concept (which is inherently problematic, especially when dealing with a culture that does not engage with this concept. You cannot complain about Christian colonialism and then proceed to insist on this idea being universal. It is not.) is the idea that Baba Jaga and Koschei the Deathless are a paired couple. In MANY of Baba Jaga's stories, across Slavic cultures, she is noted to be an old and unmarried woman and KtD's only appearances in Slavic tales involves him kidnapping young women to marry. On top of this, there is a clear line that traces the Russian Koschei to a Turkic leader discussed in The Tale of Igor's Campaign. This character in the epic was likely warped into Koschei the Deathless as a negative commentary against the Kuman people, as they were not considered allies or friendly by Russians. The figure of Koschei the Deathless is, at his root, a political caricature.
Even with deities that are noted to exist by oral tradition, archaeological data, or otherwise, the author fundamentally falls flat with getting a grasp on deities, she tries to create a pan-Slavic picture of the pantheon, which is just fundamentally incorrect. Not only Slavic paganism, but most other paganisms, have highly localized deities, and treating them as simply a "face" of a greater deity. I take great issue with this due to the fact that a common Western misconception about Slavs is that we are a monolith, when that is the opposite. The absorption of local deities into this pan-Slavic layout does not do Slavic cultures the justice they deserve, which, again, understanding that the author is Lemko, is frustrating to see.
My final issue with this book is the unclear method of citation. The author cites a plant as being used by "shamans" of a deity to have ecstatic experiences and the citation after that sentence connects to a WebMD article about the plant, rather than any source that details about the cultural/historic use about the plant. This broke what bit of trust I was trying to build in the book, and the later citations of blogs when the author's PhD is already from a university where you can receive a tuition discount just by telling your friends about the university didn't help.
Overall, I found this book beyond disappointing in its treatment of Slavic divinities, history, and peoples. It's clear the author is passionate about the subject, but her focal point as a Wiccan priestess overshadows any real information being provided by her research.
February 10, 2022
Very good introduction to the deities. Somewhat confusing as Dr Woodruff switches the names she uses to refer to each deity - understandably, as she wishes to acquaint the reader with the numerous names from various cultures, countries, and times that are used to refer to each deity, but could be easier to read if one name was stuck to throughout the book.
Very thorough, and provides an excellent foundation and beyond to understand the roles of each deity and their participation in the year.
Very thorough, and provides an excellent foundation and beyond to understand the roles of each deity and their participation in the year.
July 19, 2025
This is a valuable reference work, but apparently the source material for Slavic mythology is both scarce enough and confused enough that the information collected here is also a bit confused. Many of the deities seem composed from scraps of legend, and many gods have overlapping responsibilities and characteristics. Still, much is collected here, and the organization may simply reflect the splintered nature of Slavic culture throughout Eastern Europe. It is very interesting, either way.
October 19, 2020
This is a great resource and an absolute treasure. I paid a fair price for it and I am certain I will use it frequently. Highly recommend.
May 2, 2024
Terrible book. Poorly written, obviously poorly researched, not even compiled well. It’s even poorly printed.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews