Krisnji is another deity taken over from the Vedic religious system that found its place in the mythology of Slavic Vedism. Although the name of this god appears in the Russian language, there is no evidence that the pagan Slavs worshipped Krisnji. We will therefore, in one part of the analysis of this god’s functions, focus on the characteristics of the Hindu god Krishna, whose counterpart is the Slavic Krisnji.
            According to legend, Krishna came to being when god Vishnu pulled out two hairs from his head. From the black-coloured hair Krishna was made (the meaning of his name is "the dark one"), and from the white hair was made his brother Balarama. Krishna's coming was expected even before his birth due to a prophecy which said that a hero would come that would save the people from the tyranny of the evil king Kamsa. Even as a boy, Krishna was revealing his divine nature by pulling out trees and once eve lifting up the holy mountain Govardana. Young Krishna was a great lover and his dearest love was a shepherdess named Rada. Disguised as the charioteer, Krishna gave the book Bhagavadgita to the hero called Ardjuna, whom The Book of Veles also mentions. The Hindus consider Krishna to be one of the ten avatars of Vishnu, that is, one of the ten earthly manifestations of this god. According to this belief, Krishna is actually identical with Vishnu, only that his appearance is restricted to a certain period. The last of Vishnu's avatars is thought to be Kalki, an entity that is prophesied to cleanse the world of all its sins.
            Krisnji, as a Slavic version of Krishna, played a similar role in Slavic-Vedic mythology. He vas also an avatar or a manifestation of the one and only god – Svevisnji. At this point we should mention that Slavic Vedism had some of the characteristics of monotheism, which makes it different from the pagan religion of the Old Slavs. Gods of Slavic Vedism thus became just manifestations of the supreme god, and the same goes for Slavic goddesses. We can give Koledo as an example – he was also Svevisnji that appeared in one of his forms in a certain period. He appeared to give people the knowledge of the nature of the Universe preserved in Koledo's Golden Book, the book that contains everything that the ancient Aryans knew on astrology. Zlata Maja had her manifestation or avatar as well – that was Maja Zlatogorka. Rod was also one of the avatars of the supreme god who had the role of the progenitor ("rod" means "kin" in Serbian).
            Since Krisnji was described in Slavic Vedism as one of the variants of Krishna, many characteristics of this Vedic deity were ascribed to his Slavic counterpart. Krisnji was also the possessor of the Vedic knowledge, so he too, like Krishna, passed on to the people the wisdom of the gods. But while Krishna gave to people the knowledge in the form of the holy book Bhagavadgita, Krisnji transferred the divine wisdom to people in the form of the holy drink – surica. In Slavic Vedism, surica was not considered to be just an appearance in the material world, but it was something spiritual as well. It contained the very essence of Slavic spiritualism and a certain form of spiritual energy that enabled the Slavs to endure all kinds of misfortune that waited for them during their lifetime. As we have already said in the text on Slavic Vedism, surica was a kind of solar energy that had both material and spiritual aspects. As for the characters featured in the legends concerning Krishna (Rada and Ardjuna), they too found their place in the system of Slavic Vedism. Rada became Slavic Radunica, and Ardjuna became Or or Ariji – legendary progenitor of the old Aryans mentioned in The Book of Veles.
            Krisnji is mentioned quite rarely in The Book of Veles, only in a few sentences. He was considered to be a member of the Little Triglav – holy Slavic trinity composed of three different deities. All Slavic-Vedic gods and goddesses were grouped in Triglavs. Some of the Triglav groups are: Svarog-Perun-Svetovid, Horz-Veles-Stribog, Visnji-Lela-Letenica, etc. Krisnji was a part of Radgost-Krisnji-Koledo, a Triglav that was related, among other things, to the winter part of the year. Krisnji himself was the ruler of January and February, that is, the time of the year that is under the influence of the constellation of Aquarius. We come now to an interesting theory of Slavic astrology formulated by Alexander Asov. According to this theory, all Slavic gods are connected to constellations of the zodiac, and the constellations stand for the rulers of the cosmic epochs, or the zodiac eras. The era of Krisnji is the era of the Aquarius that will, according to Asov, start in the year of 2496.

by Vesna Kakasevski
translated by Snježana Todorović