As you may know, the history of Hungary is that it became a country that affirmed Christianity and aligned itself with Roman Catholicism.
However, within Hungary there was a Protestant Reformation, Calvinism, Lutheranism, the Unitarians, as well as Greek Catholics, some Uniates, and Jewish beliefs, in particular Hassidic Jews. There were Masons (Freemasonry) which I think of as a religion too. There must have been people who didn't have faith or believe but, my guess is, felt the pressure to conform.
This blog respects that acknowledgement of Christianity by Hungary and the Christian seasonal calendar - Easter, Christmas, Saint Stephen.
Through my rather intensive work in genealogy and reading of documents I feel I've acquired more knowledge of Hungary and Hungarians than many Americans, except perhaps those were raised with the traditions or who are more recent immigrants here. I acknowledge my heritage while being American.
I've become aware that as part of cultural awareness and pride in Hungary a New Pagan movement is happening. While I'm sure participants in Neopaganism or Native Faith around the globe research far more than me, in order to discover ancient lifeways, I'm also sure creativity is used to reimagine rituals and observances and values.
It's also confused in the usual mysterious origins of the people who evolved to self identify as Hungarian or Magyars today. Certainly there must have been multicultural influences along the way.
After reading around the subject of ancient Hungarian / Asiatic notions of human life and relationship to spirit, I feel it has much in common with certain tribal Native American notions.
So, over the next few posts, I'm going to do a series of posts about Magyar Paganism.
I'm going to add my modern take on some of these, while trying to imagine a life lived so close to and subject to the natural world.
C 2021
