Why Was a Baby Devil Born: The Legend about a Blasphemous Communist, Monstrous Births, and the Limits of Religious Didactics

Abstract

In 1923, the Russian ethnologist and archaeologist Vasily Smirnov published an article entitled “A Devil is Born. (Contemporary Legend)”. The article dealt with an unusual demonological legend that had appeared short time ago in Soviet Russia. It told a story of a baby devil who was an offspring of one communist. In his commentaries, Smirnov pointed at some parallels between European folk narratives, legends about miraculous icons, the story about the burning bush in the Book of Exodus, beliefs related to succubi and incubi, legends about the birth of antichrist, and Christian eschatology in general. However, those observations require certain corrections. In fact, the narrative about the baby devil is an international legend, and its history can be the ground for general discussion about evolution and functions of didactic stories in Christian culture.

Keywords

• anthropology of blasphemy and sacrilege
• popular demonology
• baby devil
• monstrous births
• migratory legends.