Development of the Study of Religion in Latvia in the 20Th Century

Development of the Study of Religion in Latvia in the 20th Century

Jānis Priede

The oldest historically known population of the southern part of the region were speakers of Baltic languages (a branch of the Indo-European language family: present-day Latvian and Lithuanian; note that the term ‘Old Prussian’ in this chapter refers to the westernmost of these Baltic groups, and not to the later German state), and of Finno-Ugric languages (present-day Estonian) in the north. For most of the past thousand years, the region was however domi- nated by a German-speaking minority population, originating with the con- quest of the region by Teutonic Knights in the 13th and 14th centuries. This German ruling elite maintained its hegemonic position under first Swedish and then Russian rule down to the end of the First World War, but then gradually either emigrated or was absorbed into the local majority populations (Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian), and the German community was finally eliminated following the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in 1939. The Baltic region was the last pagan area in Europe, and even after official Christianization in the 13th–15th century, pagan beliefs survived among the non-German populations for a long time. Hence, the study of pagan pre-Christian religion has particular relevance in the Baltic region. For much of the German period, the region approximating to present-day Latvia and Estonia was known as Livonia; the western part was also known as Courland. Many places in Latvia went by other names in earlier centuries: in particular, by German names during the German hegemony, or by Swedish or Russian names under those countries’ regimes.1 The history of the study of religion in Latvia in the 20th century is marked by both chronological and geographical continuity and discontinuity. The modern academic study of religion in Latvia has developed on a much older basis, created by geographers, theologians and folklore scholars who explored and described the religious traditions of their own times in Latvia. The chronological continuity with the modern study of religion is manifested in the persistence of interest in the same religious phenomena between authors of

1 Where more than one name is mentioned in immediate parallel in this text, the present-day Latvian name is consistently given first, with the older parallel name in square brackets: e.g. Alūksne [Marienburg]. Subsequent references may make use of either of these names.

© koninklijke brill nv, leiden, ��5 | doi ��.��63/9789004292789_007 200 Priede previous centuries and those in the 20th century. The most important histori- cal link is that the study of religion in Latvia in the 20th century was always almost intrinsically linked with the analysis of sources from the past. The geographical continuity is important for delimiting the territory and cultural envi- ronment for the study of religion: the State of Latvia was established only in 1918, but the territory of present-day Latvia had close connections with the system of European education before and during the time when Latvia was part of the Russian empire. The chronological discontinuity was the consequence of an almost total interruption of these studies on Latvian soil during the Soviet occupation (1940–1941, 1945–1990), under the exclusive domination of the official ideol- ogy of scientific atheism. Works by Religious Studies scholars, especially those published in the 1920s and 1930s, were removed from libraries, and any study of religion that occurred was carried out underground. At the same time, a geographical discontinuity was generated through the fact that the Latvian study of religion continued in exile. Works published by leading Latvian Religious Studies scholars of the diaspora, as well as unpublished works written within Latvia, only became available for scholars in Latvia after the end of the occupation regime, when the chronological and territorial continuity of the Latvian study of religion was gradually restored. In order to understand the development of the history of religion in Latvia in the 20th century, it is necessary, first, to be aware of the sources provided by the pre-academic study of religion in Latvia, which were critically re-analysed and re-assessed by scholars of religion in the 20th century. Any attempt to introduce a strict chronological division between the pre-academic and academic study of religion in Latvia is arbitrary: two adjacent stages often include the same people, similar ideas are expressed and passed on, and reference is made to the same older and sometimes pre-academic authors. For similar rea- sons, it is difficult to separate the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century, and equally difficult to separate the work of Latvian scholars working within Latvia or abroad during the 50-year exile period, almost a lifetime.

1 Echoes of the Pre-academic and Early Academic Study of Religion in the 20th Century

Sebastian Münster was one of the earliest scholars who has left useful informa- tion about the population of present-day Latvia and Estonia—then Livonia— for the study of religion. In the first edition of his Cosmographia (1544), he noted a range of religious traditions in Livonia: e.g. some people worshipped