Our article about humans in wolf shape is based on Finnish belief narratives which were collected and archived a couple of decades before and after the beginning of the twentieth century. We make some comparisons between Finnish and Western European ideas about the wolf shape and point out some common motifs with different or even opposite interpretations. Our emphasis, however, is on the Finnish meanings of the wolf shape as suspension from the human community. Finnish belief narratives about humans turning into wolves involve both voluntary and involuntary transformations. First, cunning folk can transform themselves voluntarily into wolves, as well as to other animals, to possess temporarily the animal’s useful abilities. These stories link to shamanistic traditions of northern areas. These include a belt motif, but with a different meaning than in Western European werewolf stories: if a witch in a wolf or bear shape is killed, the hunters recognize it to be a human because he has a belt with a knife under the fur skin. These stories reflect the magical practitioners’ ambiguous status in the society. They can be appreciated for their ability to find thieves, to ward off supernatural harm or to heal wounds and diseases. However, when they function outside the social norms, they may not be treated as members of the human society. Second, a person with sufficient magical ability can turn others into wolves as a punishment. Here, two legend types dominate. First, a witch or a beggar who is not invited turns a whole wedding party into wolves. Second, a cunning man who is asked to punish a thief turns him into a wolf. In this latter case, the suspension only lasts a predetermined period, e.g. two years. A man who has formerly been a wolf is left with a mark of this incident. He has a stub of a tail and needs to have a hole in his seat even in the sauna or on the church bench. We interpret these stories as examples of wrongdoers being suspended from their full membership in the community and carrying a stigma for the rest of their life. It is emphasized in the stories that these beasts are not real wolves and that they cannot behave or hunt as wolves. When they are finally returned to their human shape, they complain that they did not get anything to eat except some northern wind and a single cat. They are in a pitiful, liminal stage in which they do not belong to any group which would support them. They are also recurrently portrayed as crying. They can join the human community again if someone gives them food or otherwise treats them kindly. There are various motifs concerning the knife with which a human hands some bread to the wolf. The main point of our text is to present our interpretation of wolf shape as a symbol of morally grounded social otherness in Finnish texts. However, we will also investigate the meanings of certain motifs and their intertextual connections with Western European and Estonian tradition, such as the belt, the cat, the knife, and the wedding as a rite which unites ‘us’ with ‘strangers’.