Christmas time, or Holy Days, is the period that comes after the Orthodox celebration of the Nativity of Christ (January 7) and lasts until the feast of Baptism, or Epiphany, which is celebrated by Christians on January 19.
Even before Christianity came to Russia, Christmas time was celebrated in January by pagans. In honor of the god Svyatovit, or Perun, the Slavs staged wide walks with an abundance of delicious food, which they hoped to appease a formidable deity. It was believed that during the holy period, Perun descends to the earth and generously endows those who glorify it.
After the baptism of Rus and the widespread dissemination of the Old and New Testaments, the celebration of Christmas time acquired a new religious character. Saints, or holidays, from now on were dedicated to the great event - the Nativity of Christ. These days, they prepared special food - kutia, lit a fire or lit a candle symbolizing the light of the Star of Bethlehem, sang the Christmas troparion.
Despite the emergence of new rituals and traditions of the holiday, the old sacred principles were forgotten with difficulty. From year to year, from century to century in the period of Christmas time, the inhabitants of Russia continued, like their grandfathers and great-grandfathers, to observe certain customs and honor signs. So, in order to avoid terrible heavenly punishment, it was impossible to work, especially spinning. On the table after dinner, it was necessary to leave leftovers of food: for deceased relatives, whose souls, according to legend, visited the living in early January. Food was also scattered under the windows, and bonfires were burned at the cemetery gates so that the dead would not get lost.
Struggling with the remnants of paganism, the Orthodox Church in the time of Peter the Great forbade ", on the eve of the Nativity of Christ, to continue Christmas time, according to ancient idolatrous traditions, to play and dress up in idol's clothes, to dance and sing seductive songs on the streets." It was about the famous carols, which have survived in our days, and to which today the priests are more tolerant.
Another serious ban of the church was imposed on fortune-telling, so common among young people in the holy age. However, this tradition turned out to be tenacious: to this day, from January 7 to 19, girls pour molten wax into the water in Russia, trying to make out the shape of their future in it, and ask in the evenings on the street the name of the first man they met: according to legend, they will bear the same name betrothed.
