TERMINOLOGY STUDY GUIDE: EXAM #3
Read, REL300/MLS488
Any of the following terms and concepts could appear on your exam:
Al-Biruni, India: (973-1048/49, Iranian Muslim in Court of Ghazni, Scientist, Comparativist, Historian)
Barriers Separating Muslims & Hindus: According to Al-Biruni the barriers include (1) language (2) they totally differs from us [Muslims] in religion, as we believe in nothing in which they believe, and vice versa. Their [Hindus] fanaticism is directed towards outsiders. They [Hindus] consider as impure anything which touches fire and the water of a foreigner. (3) they frieghten their children with Muslims, with our dress, and our ways and customs, and as to declare us to be devil’s breed and all our doings as the very opposite of all that is good and proper. (4) the repugnance of the Hindus against foreigners increased more and more when the Muslims began to make their inroads into their country. (5) there are other causes, the mentioning of which sounds like a satire-peculiarities of their national character: there is no country but theirs, no nation like theirs, no kings like theirs, no religion like theirs, no science like theirs. According to their belief, there is no other country on earth but theirs, no other race of man but theirs, and no created beings besides them have any knowledge or science whatsoever.
Nature of God: Hindus believe with regard to God that he is eternal, without beginning and end,
acting by free will, almighty, all-wise, living, giving life, ruling, preserving; one who in his sovereignty is unique beyond all likeness, and that he does not resemble anything nor does anything resemble him.
First Cause: The Hindus differ among themselves as to the definition of what is action. Some who make God the source of action, consider him as the universal cause; for as the existence of the agents derives from him, he is the cause of their action, and in consequence it is his own action coming into existence through their intermediation.
Others [Hindus] think that only the First Cause has real existence, because it alone is self-sufficing, whilst everything else absolutely requires it; that a thing which for its existence stands in need of something else has only a dream-life, no real life, and that reality is only that one and first being (the First Cause).
Vulgar Views (common)/Educated Views: According to India by Al-Abiruni (14) he states that the educated Hindu believes God is “self sufficing, beneficent, who gives without receiving. They consider the unity of God as absolute, but that everything beside God which may appear as a unity is really a plurality of things. The existence of God they believe is a real existence, because everything that exists, exists through Him. It is possible to think that existing beings are not and that He is. But it is impossible to think that He is not and they are.
“If we now pass from the ideas of the educated people among the Hindus to those among the common people, we must first state that they present a great variety. Some of them are simply abominable.” Even in Islam we decidedly disapprove i.e. the Jabriyya sect, the prohibition of discussion of religious topics...Every religious sentence destined for the people at large must be carefully worded...Some Hindu scholar calls God a point meaning to say thereby that the qualities of bodies do not apply to him. Now some educated man reads this and imagines that God is as small as a point and he does not find out what the word point in this sentence was really intended to express. He will not even stop with this offensive comparison but will describe God as much larger and then say, ‘He is 12 fingers long and ten fingers broad.” Praise be to God, who is far above measure and number! Further if an uneducated man hears what we have mentioned, that God comprehends the universe so that nothing is concealed from him, he will at once imagine that this comprehending is effective by means of eyesight, that eyesight is only possible by means of an eye and that two eyes are better than only one, and in consequence he will describe God as having a thousand eyes meaning to describe his omniscience.
Purusha/Soul: Purusha is described as a primeval gigantic man, not unlike the Norse Ymir or the Greco-Roman Zeus and from whose body the world and the varnas (class) are built. He is described as having a thousand heads and a thousand feet. He emanated Viraj, the female creative principle, from which he is reborn in turn before the world was made out of his parts.
In the sacrifice of Purusha, the Vedic chants were first created. The horses and cows were born, the Brahmins were made from Purusha's mouth, the Kshatriyas from his arms, the Vaishyas from his thighs, and the Shudras from his feet.[2] The Moon was born from his spirit, the Sun from his eyes, the heavens from his skull. Indra and Agni emerged from his mouth.
The parallel to Norse Ymir and Greco-Roman Zeus is often considered to reflect the myth's origin in Proto-Indo-European religion.
Hule (shapeless thing)/Matter: Next follows the general matter, i.e. the abstract hule, which they call avyakta, i.e. a shapeless thing. It is dead, but has three powers potentially, not actually.
Time: Day & Night of Brahman: The period between the dissolution and the active life of the Universe which is called in contrast the "Day of Brahma". A period of equal duration, during which Brahma. is said to be asleep. Upon awakening he recommences the process, and this goes on for an AGE of Brahma composed of alternate "Days", and "Nights", and lasting 100 years (of 2,160,000,000 years each). It requires fifteen figures to express the duration of such an age; after the expiration of which the Mahapralaya or the Great Dissolution sets in, and lasts in its turn for the same space of fifteen figures.
Brahman's life stages: Hinduism recognizes four main stages of life. Like the goals of life, these can be divided into three plus one, with the three deriving from the "life is good" strand of Hinduism, and the one deriving from the "life is bad" strand. The first three are the student, the householder, and the retired person, while the fourth is the ascetic (also known as a sannyasin or a sadhu).
The three stages of life that come from the life-affirming, Vedic side of Hinduism, were initially designed with the caste system in mind (of course). In particular, they were set up to apply to members of the three Twice-Born varnas: the Brahmin, the Kshatriya and the Vaishya. Other castes and jatis have adopted them in different ways, transforming them to meet their needs.
Brahman, Ksatriya, Vaisya, Sudra: The Indian caste system. Brahman are priests, Ksatriya are considered the ruler, warrior, or landowner, while Vaisya are the merchants, and Sudra are artisans and agriculturalists.
Pilgrimage: Darsan means seeing in Hindu religion and when people go to a temple, they say they do not go to worship but rather for darsan - they go to see the image of the deity. The pinacle act of Hindu worship, is to stand in the presence of the deity and to look upon the image with their eyes, so as to see and be seen by the deity. The deity is believed to actually be within the image, and beholding the deity image is a form of worship where through the eyes one gains blessings.
A pilgrimage is a religious journey; people undertake pilgrimages so they can worship at special places which are connected to their religion. Journeying to holy places of pilgrimage are generally carried out as acts of faith and devotion in accummulating religious merit or to atone for sins. Pilgrimages are also regarded by Hindus as a religious duty from which darsan can be attained.
Idols: It is well known that the popular mind leans towards the sensible world, and has an aversion to the world of abstract thought which is only understood by highly educated people. The Hindus honor their idols on account of those who erected them, not on account of the material of which they are made.
Clifford Geertz, Islam Observerd (Symbolic Anthropology, Comparative Religion)
Indonesia:
Flexibility: Moroccan Muslims are more rigid. Indonesia are more mystic. All people don’t approach a religion the same. A culture does not always conform the same to a specific religion, so the Religion flexes itself to a culture.
Syncretism:is the meeting and assimilating of two different cosmologies. In the case of Indonesia, the gentry, deprived of Indic ritualism but not of Indic pantheism, became increasingly subjectivist, cultivating an essentially illuminationist approach to the divine. The peasantry absorbed Islamic concepts and practices; combining ghosts, gods, jinns, and prophets together into animism. The trading classes developed a compromise between what flowed into them along this line and what they confronted in Java to produce a religious system not quite doctrinal enough. The overall result is what can properly be called syncretism, but it was a syncretism the order of whose elements, the weight and meaning given to its various ingredients, differed markedly, and what is more important, increasingly, from one sector of the society to another.
Theater State & Divine King: The Gupta Empire was a good example of a “theater-state” this is a state that acquires prestige and power by developing attractive cultural forms and staging elaborate public ceremonies to attract and bind subjects to the center. A divine king is a monarch who is held in a special religious significance by his subjects, and serves as both head of state and a deity or head religious figure.
Illumination of Indic Mysticism: Another theosophical system, that of illumination, was developed by Shihab al-Din Suhrawardi (executed in Aleppo in 1191). He taught that all things exist as varying degrees of light, beginning with the Absolute Light, the Light of Lights who is God himself. Light then spreads out from God in ever weaker degrees (angels), each reflecting the light above it to those beneath it. The whole world of being is composed of innumerable angels of light spreading out in geometrical patterns.
Morocco:
Fundamentalism: The term fundamentalist has since been generalized to mean strong adherence to any set of beliefs in the face of criticism or unpopularity, but has by and large retained religious connotations.[6] The collective use of the term fundamentalist to describe non-Christian movements has offended some Christians who desire to retain the original definition.[who?] In addition, some writers, editors, and scholars believe that calling Muslims, Jews, Hindus, and Buddhists "fundamentalists" makes very little sense. In this case then, perhaps it is better to say that Islam leans toward scripturalist approach in Morocco.
Orthodoxy: The rise of Islam presented a major challenge to Orthodoxy. Beginning in the seventh century, major portions of the Orthodox heartlands (in Syria and Egypt) fell under Muslim rule. By the fifteenth century, most traditionally Orthodox lands were controlled either by Muslim or Roman Catholic rulers, with the exception of northeastern Russia (the Grand Principality of Moscow) and the Ethiopian highlands. The Orthodox generally accepted rule by non-Orthodox governments, provided that freedom of worship was guaranteed. In Ottoman lands, governed under the millet system (by which people were grouped by religion rather than nationality), Orthodox bishops also served as Ethnarchs (political rulers of their communities).[1] Ottoman implementation of the devsirme tax system witnessed Orthodox children of the rural populations of the Balkans, the flower of Orthodox Christendom, conscripted before adolescence and brought up as Muslims. As their empire declined, the Ottoman Muslims became decreasingly tolerant of Orthodox Chrstians.
Because the Sufis regarded the mere observance of religious law as a matter of outer conformity, they encouraged a desire for inner, personal experience of the Divine, through meditation (dhikr: remembrance) and other means.
Warrior-Saint: Examples of a Warrior Saint are Arjuna in the Bhavada Gita. Joshua in the Old Testament. Rama in the Ramayana. These are inspired leaders of war in direct contact with deity who guides them. Morocco: it's mentioned a number of times, defines who Lyusi is. Try first two chapters.
Would Joan of Arc fit the bill as an example of a Warrior Saint? If so further characterizations of these types I got from the text, besides the contact with the deity thing, are hero like qualities – noble in their justification for their actions <for the ultimate reason, directed by a deity, an evaluation of their actions is almost unnecessary>. A prototype for King Arthur and Superhero types that would show up in literature in years to come – Silver Surfer in marvel comics for example.
Islam Observed, p.8-9
The “leitmotivs” of Islam in Morocco were “strong-man politics and holy-man piety…” these leitmotivs were fulfilled when the two traits were fused in 1 person – the axial figure became the warrior-saint and his presence was particularly apparent at great transitional points in Moroccan history. Ex: Idris II, the 9th century builder of Fez, the first significant king of Morocco, a descendant of the Prophet, a strong military leader and a religious purifier.
Geertz says that Idris II would not have amounted to much as any ONE of these had he not concurrently been the other two. The combination of strength and piety was essential to lead Morocco.
Because leadership and piety were fused, political upheavals led to national spiritual dislocation. Which in turn invited the rise of another warrior-saint who could reunite the country politically and spiritually under his rule. (Ex: first Maraboutic Crisis: chaos caused by local holy men all over the country clamoring for power)
[YEAH MEG]
Maroboutism: A murabit is a man tied, bound, fastened to God, like a camel to a post, a ship to a pier, a prisoner to a wall; or, more appropriately, as ribat, another derivative, means a fortified sanctuary, a place of marabouts, like a monk to a monastery. Originally referred to Sufism.
Sufi Mysticism: The original Sufi were basically mystics - people who followed a pious form of Islam and who believed that a direct, personal experience of God could be achieved through meditation and self-discipline. Sufi mysticism endeavoured to produce a personal experience of the divine through mystic and ascetic discipline. Sufism has come to mean those who are interested in finding a way or practice toward inner awakening and enlightenment. This movement developed as a protest against corrupt rulers who did not embody Islam and against the legalism and formalism of worship which paid more attention to the form rather than content of the faith. Many of the sufis became ascetics, began to gather disciples around themselves and developed into religious orders, known as dervishers. Others forsook the orders and became mendicants, traveling around the country side, living off the charity of others. Many sufis were outstanding men of saintly stature.
Comparative Method's purpose of arriving at larger conclusions
Method: Historical Particulars and Fieldwork ("Thick Description"); Themes in Context; Social Order
Kalidjaga & Sukarno: Islam Observed (1968) is an attempt to “lay out a general framework for the
comparative analysis of religion and to apply it to a study of the development of a supposedly single creed, Islam, in two quite contrasting civilizations, The Indonesian and the Moroccan” (Geertz 1968:v). In this short work, Geertz traces the development of Islam in Indonesia and Morocco through key figures and symbols that explain the evolution of Islam in the two countries. For example, Sunan Kalidjaga represents the “classical” form of Islam in Indonesia. Kalidjaga is born into the royal culture of a Hindu-Buddhist kingdom and spends his early life gambling, drinking, and whoring. After meeting a Muslim holy man with great spiritual power, Kalidjaga meditates (on the instructions of the holy man) for years. When the holy man returns, he tells Kalidjaga that as a result of the latter’s meditations, he now knows more than the holy man. He (Kalidjaga) had become a Muslim without ever having seen the Koran, entered a mosque, or heard a prayer – through an inner change of heart brought on by the same sort of yoga-like psychic discipline that was the core religious act of the Indic tradition from which he came…His redemption…was a self-produced inner state, a willed mood. And his Islam, if that is what it should be called, was but a public faith he was assigned” (Geertz 1968:29). Sukarno: president of Morocoo, used within Geertz’s work as an example of a theater state where the president creates ritual and pageantry to move and motivate the people.
Lyusi & Muhammad V: According to the study by Anthony F. Wallace on The Prophetic Personality, in a situation of cultural crisis, a prophet will arise to lead the human community into a revitalization movement culminating in social and religious progress. Geertz’s model of Moroccan maraboutism portrays Lyusi as the prophetic hero who arises and promotes progress in face of crisis, by means of confrontation, “strong-man politics” and the pious “virtue of a saint” (33).
In contrast, Indonesian illuminationism portrays a prophetic hero, who would be considered unmanly in Morocco. Kalidaga is the Indonesian prophet who resolves the cultural crisis of Indonesia by means of stillness. Geertz’s unique strength in the study of religion surfaces in the above examples. He shows that religion does work; that religion is a process that creates change, progress and growth, that religion modifies, to try to help make society work. In relation to the Indonesian and Moroccan culture, the sacred symbol of the prophet changed, because those types of forces were necessary to bring about progress in their specific cultures, even though both cultures were Islamic. Geertz shows a concrete example of how sacred symbol, even though changing, links religious belief (ie. the image of the prophet) to ethos (the type of action a people deem justifiable in order to achieve progress and resolution of cultural crisis).
Durkheim: Geertz builds of Durkheim’s definition of religion.
Scripturalism & Secularism: The three forces whose impact is found (during the Scripturalist interlude) in both civiliztions are “the establishment of Western domination, the increasing influence of scholastic doctrinal…scriptural Islam, and the crystallization of the activist nation-state. These three processes of cultural, social change together have changed the “old-order” Indonesia and Morocco. ‘A step backward often emerges before a leap itself is taken’ ” (69). Both civiliztions have responded to social changes by stepping back into a re-discovery of the Scripture. Scripturalism surfaces as the adaptive change of religion in response to the impact of social change. Sacred symbols once again link the new frameworks of belief and ethos. Secularism: Western influences upon Islamic states seen as invasive and not compatible with Islam.
Hermeneutics & Paul Ricoeur: Hermeneutics is the study of interpretation theory.
Traditional hermeneutics - which includes Biblical hermeneutics - refers to the study of the interpretation of written texts, especially texts in the areas of literature, religion and law. Contemporary or modern hermeneutics encompasses not just issues involving the written text, but everything in the interpretative process. This includes verbal and nonverbal forms of communication as well as prior aspects that impact communication, such as presuppositions, preunderstandings, the meaning and philosophy of language, and semiotics.[1] Philosophical hermeneutics refers primarily to Hans-Georg Gadamer's theory of knowledge as developed in Truth and Method, and sometimes to Paul Ricoeur
Worldview & Ethos: A worldview is a theory of the world, used for living in the world. A world view is a mental model of reality — a framework of ideas & attitudes about the world, ourselves, and life, a comprehensive system of beliefs — with answers for a wide range of questions. Ethos: the distinctive spirit and attitudes of a people, culture, etc. The Worldview goes to Ethos through experience or mystics that interact with the “Real” symbols. Through praxes and action, the movement works itself back from Ethos to Worldview through the interpretation of the mystics symbols to the common people.
Religiousness & Religious-Mindedness: Religiousness is the mystical experiential side of spirituality; Religious Mindedness refers to following of the religion itself in order to a society.
Struggle for the Real: Reaching for the ultimate Truth or Reality that transcends religions and society.
Sam Gill, "Prologue" & "Bear Ceremonialism" (History of Religions, J.Z. Smith):
Columbus and the "Invention of America": As Edmundo O’Gorman has so brilliantly shown, these facts amount to a quite different understanding of events than historians have given us. Instead of attributing to Columbus the “discovery” of America, we must recognize that America wasn’t discovered at all; it was invented. No one knew that American was out there. “One cannot discover what one cannot imagine as a possibility. [I would question this.]
Los Indios/Indians/Native Americans: Columbus called these people (those in America) “los Indios,” a term apparently used at the time to refer to all peoples east of the Indus River. To make such a designation simply placed or identified these people among the known descendents of Adam and Eve. The other possibility was not to see them as people at all.
Sepulveda Juan Gines de Sepulveda gave a three-hour presentation of his case to the “Council of the Fourteen” that met in Valladolid at the summons of Charles V which was formed in regard to matters dealing with the conquest of the New World. Sepulveda’s view of the New World was very negative and was linked using Aristotle’s definition of natural slavery in order to argue that the Indians were slaves by nature…which led to their use as slaves.
Las Casas - Bartolome de Las Casas = Dominican, spent 45 years in New World. Believed they were noble people developed in arts, language, government, gentle and eager to learn.
Dirty Dogs/Noble Savages: The debate (from above) took place during the first half of the 16th century, and according to the insightful analysis of Lewis Hanke, the debate had split into two camps. One side viewed the “Indian” as a dirty dog (Sepulveda), while the other as a noble savage (Las Casas).
Unity of Mankind: Even though the earliest explorers, colonists, and historians note differences between the native tribes they encountered in terms their physical structure, food habits, skin color, and friendliness & hostility, the image of the “Indian” had a unitary characteristic. The first factor was a “we/they” relationship, the second is the failure to distinguish between biological and cultural classifications, and finally the counter image we have created for the “Indian” is that of pagan or heathen, which we construe as meaning those without religion.
Homo Religiosus: the term religion is a western concept. There are few words (if any) that approximate religion in the Native American language. Many Native Americans have abhorred the use of the word. They associate it with the grossest of European misunderstandings of their cultures and with the most flagrant violations of their privacy and way of life. During Columbus’ era, he considered religion to be equal to “creed and church.” They equated religion with Christianity.
Study of Religion: The study of religion begins and ends with the ideas that we are investigating the nature of the subject and hence are not wholly knowledgeable about it. Nonetheless we begin with certain assumptions, which suggest that we have a sufficient definition of our subject to determine at least what data are relevant to our study.
Ojibwa Bear Ceremonialism: Bear ceremonialism is traditionally common in northern parts of the world, including the Great Lakes region. Among the Menominee, Ojibwa, Ottawa, and Potawatomi the bear commanded considerable respect and played a substantial part in their religion, notably in the Medicine Dance.
When they were hunted, bears were shot, trapped in deadfalls, and occasionally captured in pitfalls. They could be lured to these traps using apples, pork, beaver musk, or other sweet-smelling or oily substances, but magic lures were also essential. Traditionally, hunting bear was a way a young man could prove his bravery, especially if he ventured into the cave in the spring and killed the bear by hand.
After a hunter had killed a bear, the head and the hide were laid out on a mat. Foods that bears are known to like, including maple sugar and berries, were laid out for it. If it was a male, a fine, beaded man's costume was arranged next to the hide; if a female, a woman's costume was used. A slice of the tongue was hung up for four days. The body was carefully disjointed with a knife rather than chopped up to show the respect for the animal. People were invited to the feast and, along with other foods, everyone also ate some of the bear meat. During the feast, a speaker talked to the bear village, pointing out the excellent treatment that the Indians had accorded the bear visitor and that other bears would be similarly and respectfully welcomed. After the feast the bones were gathered up and piled together: they were never left scattered about or disposed of where dogs could get at them because that would show a lack of respect for the animal.
Person/Chief of the Bears: The Person (hunter) would put the skull of the bear on a pole, the skin of the bear’s muzzle, and its ears. Offerings of tobacco and ribbons were hung on the pole. It was ritually prepared and left standing even, when the hunters moved on, a means by which the hunters showed respect fot eh slain bear and for the “chief” or owner of the animal species, thus assuring the continuity of success in hunting.
Grim & St. John, "Northeast Woodlands" (History of Religions, Eliade)
Winnebago/Siouan: A Native American people formerly inhabiting the Green Bay area of Wisconsin, with present-day populations in Wisconsin and Nebraska. The Siouan is the language of the Winnebago.
Ojibwa (Anishinaabeg/Chippewa)/Algonquians: The name of the Algonquian language family is distinguished from the orthographically similar Algonquin dialect of the Ojibwa language, which is itself a member of the Algonquian language family. The term "Algonquin" derives from the Maliseet word elakómkwik (pronounced [ɛlæˈɡomoɡwik]), "they are our relatives/allies".[2][3] Many Algonquian languages are extremely endangered today, while a number of others have already died out completely.
Cosmological Beliefs: Power (Manitou, Wakan) Manitou: is a term used to designate the spirits among many Algonquian groups. It refers to the concept of one aspect of the interconnection and balance of nature/life, similar to the East Asian concept of qi; in simpler terms it can refer to a spirit. This spirit is seen as a (contactable) person as well as a concept. Everything has its own manitou—every plant, every stone, even machines. [Power: expressed by the word MANITOU (a personal revelatory experience usually manifested in dreams or in visions of a spirit who is capable of transformation into a specific human or animal form. Efficacy of Power: symbolized as “medicine” either as (1) tangible object kept in a bundle, (2) intangible “charm” possessed internally] Wakan: can be loosely interpreted as "wakan" as "mystery" and "tanka" as "something great." God. And being the "creators," the Wakan Tanka also are Wakanpi, those things above mankind. They are never born and they never die. The Wakanpi, spirits, have power over everything on earth and control everything mankind does. There are benevolent Wakanpi that will bestow the wishes man asks of them, and evil Wakanpi that are to be feared.
Land: In many of the mythologies of the peoples of the Northeast Woodlands this cosmic power was intimately connected with the land. In their origin myth, the Menomini relate that they came into existence near the mouth of the Menominee River in Wisconsin; here two bears emerged from the earth and became the first man and woman. [The Land: cosmic power was intimately connected with the land. Siouan speaking Winnebago developed cosmologies in which the heavens above and the earth regions below were seen as layered in hierarchies of beneficial and harmful spirits. The highest power had different names (Great spirit, Master of Life, Finisher, Earthmaker by the Winnebago.]
Spirit Forces (sacred/recounted): Power and guidance entered human existence from the cosmic spirit-forces, from the guardian spirits and individuals and medicine societies, and from spirits of charms, bundles, and masks. Dreams in particular, were a vehicle for contact power and thus gaining guidance for political and military decisions. [Eliade suggests that profane objects might become sacred through a hierophany (A physical manifestation of the holy or sacred, serving as a spiritual eidolon (unsubstantial image – phantom) for emulation or worship.)]
Sacred Space/Time: The dialectic refers to the inner logic of the manifestation of numinous power through certain symbols. Profane objects, events, or persons might become embodiments of the sacred in moments of hierophany. This manifestation of the sacred in and through the profane frequently became the inspiration for sacred stories and mythologies that narrated the tribal lore.
A place of orientation that provides individuals or groups with a sense of both an integrating center and a cosmic boundary is called “sacred space.” The concept is exemplified by the Medicine society’s rite, which originated among the Ojibwa and was transmitted throughout the eighteenth century to the other tribes of the upper Great Lakes. A central pole in lodge became the “axes monde” for the tribe. [Eliade]
Ceremonial: Subsitance: Through substance rituals, tribes contact power to ensure the success of hunting, fishing, or trapping; gathering of herbs, fruits, or root crops; and agricultural endeavors. Among the Sauk and Menomini there were both private and public ceremonials for hunting that focused on sacred objects generally labeled “medicine.”
Life Cycles: examples of these peoples’ recognition that the passage through life’s stages required a structured encounter with power. These ceremonies included private actions that invoked power during menstruation, marriage, and birth. Other life-cycle ceremonials were marked by elaborate ritual activities such as naming, puberty, and death ceremonies. [Also Eliade and his feeling of cosmic cycles]
Individual, Clan, Group: Power objects given by the Manitou, such as medicine bundles, charms, and face-paintings, became the focus of personal rituals, songs, and dances. An individual evoked his or her spirit and identified with it by means of rhythmic singing, drumming, rattling, or chanting; one would then channel the power brought by the spirit to a specific need.
Religious Personalities: Shamans: the most important religious figure among the upper Great Lake and Ohio River native peoples. Primarily a healer and diviner, the shaman contact power by means of a trance and channels that power to specific needs.
Medicine People: the tribe’s recognized shamans and candidates initiated into the society as well as healed patients.
War Chiefs: religious personalities who led war bundle ceremonies and war parties. The Menomini chose hereditary war chiefs from the Bear clan and peace chiefs from the Thunderer clan. All Northwest Woodland tribes used the war and peace chief system.
Prophets: Occasionally singular religious figures appear in the ethnohistory of the Woodlands peoples. Prophets were exceptional personalities and ecstatic visionaries. Often these people called forth the native societies to reject western influences, reform (and acceptance) and revitalization of tradition.
Paul Radin, "Religion" (Franz Boas & Ethnography, Psychoanalysis)
Shamans/Intermittently Religious: The one place where it is possible, at least among the Winnebago, to obtain some idea of the emotional make-up and attitude of the intermittently religious man, is the fasting ordeal, and from the comparison of those experience it is quite clear that a sufficiently large number of people were not able to obtain that thrill which they had been taught to expect. It is also clear that the shamans and religious leaders recognized this fact and provided for it by advising such people to buy the requisite protection against the trials and misfortunes of life, or as they put it, “the crisis of narrow places of life.” Such a person would certainly not be regarded as one of the leaders of the tribe.
Mundane World: Religion is connected with the preservation of life values. It is not a phenomenon distinct from mundane life, but one of the most important means of maintaining social ideals: success, happiness, and long life are most important. The Indian does not interpret life in terms of religion, but religion in terms of life. In other words, he exalts the world around him and the multifarious desires and necessities of the day, so that they appear to him bathed in a religious thrill.
Deities/Spirits/Wakan: The Winnebago has no disinterested, unselfish love for the spirit or deity to whom he prays, except in so far as every man is likely to develop such an attitude at some crisis or when his mind is fixed intently on the attainment of some personal advantage. When the proper offerings were made in the proper way the spirits would bestow (mechanically) their blessings.
Localized Spirits: To the average Winnebago the world is peoples by an indefinite number of spirits who manifest their existence in many ways, being either visible, audible, felt emotionally, or manifesting themselves by some sign or result. From a certain point of view, all the spirits demonstrate their existence by the result, by the fact that the blessings they bestow upon man enable him to be successful, and this hold just as much for the spirit who manifests himself in the most intangible, emotional manner as for that one who is invisible to man (theromorphic and anthropomorphic). There are as many localized spirits are there are lakes, hills, etc.
Death/Reincarnation/Soul: Death is rarely, if ever, ascribed to the spirits. It likewise is a fact of existence and, when explained, is laid at the door of some evil man. Death at old age is clearly taken for granted. The Winnebago look at death in two ways—as being, first, a different kind of consciousness from what possessed in life, and secondly, as being a cessation of certain kinds of intercourse between individuals. Death is regarded as a “stumbing” after which the individual goes right on as if nothing had happened. He does not know he is dead until he sees his body. The individual is divested of all his corporeal investment and desires.
By the belief in reincarnation the Winnebago entirely bridge the gulf between life and death. In other words, we seem to have a cycle consisting of life (consciousness), after-life (unconsciousness from a corporeal viewpoint), and life (reincarnation). To live again is the greatest desires of the Winnebago, and practically every secret society holds this out as the lure to the outsider.
Soul: This concept is not clearly developed as a separate entity among the Winnebago on account of their strong belief in reincarnation. Their notion of the soul is merged in that of the noncorporeal ghost who eventually comes to earth again.
Contract Theory/Mechanical Relationship:If the Winnebago make the offering, the spirits must accept and bestow the blessings. Contract Theory = Introduced by the Shamans. Spirits possessed various powers which man needed for success. Man possessed tobacco, corn, eagle feathers, buckskin, etc. The contract: Man was to give the spirits tobacco; and the spirits were to give man the powers they controlled.
Sun: The sun is known to the Winnebago generally as ha bwire, orb of the day, and ceremonially as day-wanderer.
Earthmaker: Within the Winnebago religion, a great generalized spirit deity. Within the hands of the shamans, the Earthmaker almost became a true monotheistic deity, benevolent but unapproachable. Earthmaker is not supposed to bestow any definite blessings on man, but expected to give them life and is only in relation with man through intermediaries. Possessed tobacco.
Disease Giver: He is a very peculiar figure, being described as an anthropomorphic figure,
dealing out death from one side and his body and life from the other. He is preeminently a guardian spirit who only appears to the bravest and holiest fasters. His specific blessings seem to be connected with war and the curing of disease.
Thunderbird: (wakonda) One of the most popular deities. He is easily approachable by man. He is distinctly theromorphic in form, causing lighting by the flashes of his eyes and thunder by the flapping of his wings. He blesses men with practically everything, but particularly with victory on the warpath.
Fasting: The story of the old man that begged his son to fast and told him the when Earthmaker created this earth, it made many good spirits and that he put each one of them in control of powers with which they could bless human beings. Earthmaker told the human begins to fast for these powers and then they would be rich and powerful. Fasting is a means to hear/feel/experience the sacred spirits; to converse with them.
Difference: In attitude, principal characteristic of which was a heightened religious feeling.
Fasting experiences that show what powers are supposed to be possessed by various spirits. Dealing with boys and girls of adolescent stage. Attitude varies from play to extreme religious intensity. Methods of Bringing the Spirits into Relation with Man: (1) Fasting, a) method of superinducing a religious feeling, b) this religious feeling in turn is bound up with the desire for preserving and perpetuating socio-economic life values, (2) Mental Conentration – effectiveness of a blessing, a ceremony depended upon “concentrating one’s mind” upon the spirits, the details of the ritual or the precise purpose to be accomplished. The blessing would be in direct proportion to the power of concentration. (3) Offerings and Sacrifices, offerings consisted of tobacco, buckskins and whatever the particular spirit liked. Animal spirits were given favorite foods. (4) Prayers, Objects of the prayer are always connected to happiness, success and long life. Prayers are accompanied by religious feelings when made by the religious man – but become more formulas in the hands of the lay Indian.
The concept of evil: 3 Causes of Evil: (1) Did not perform a rite in the prescribed way (2) Was not able to invoke the spirits for protection, (3) The evil machinations of other men.
Evil/Disease: It is extremely difficult to understand exactly what the Winnebago concept of evil is. The postulate the existence of evil and they have theoretically a host of evil spirits. Youth will be warned not to fast as certain times and children will be kept at home after dark. Yet in spite of all this, no definite idea of what these evil spirits are and what they look like can be obtained. The concept of evil spirits seems to be an older usage and reference and represent exterminating the human race (until culture heroes come to the rescue). Today, evil is due to improper performance of rites, the failure to invoke the spirits, of the evil machinations of other men.
The concept of disease is rarely ascribed to the spirits. Like lack of success, it is regarded as a fact of existence, and when it is explained it is believed to be due either to the carelessness of man in trying to pass through life without the aid of the spirits or to the evil machination of other men.
Gerald Vizenor, People Named the Chippewa (Anishinabe, Literature & Writing, Native Am. Studies)
Naanabozho/Trickster: In Anishinaabe mythology, particularly among the Ojibwa, Nanabozho is a spirit, and figures prominently in their storytelling, including the story of the world's creation. Nanabozho is the Ojibwe trickster figure and culture hero (these two archetypes are often combined into a single figure in First Nations mythologies). He was the son of Wiininwaa ("Nourishment"),[1] a human mother, and E-bangishimog ("In the West"), a spirit father. Nanabozho most often appears in the shape of a rabbit and is characterized as a trickster. In his rabbit form, he is called Mishaabooz ("Great rabbit" or "Hare") or Chi-waabooz ("Big rabbit"). He was sent to Earth by Gitchi Manitou to teach the Ojibwe, and one of his first tasks was to name all the plants and animals. Nanabozho is considered to be the founder of Midewiwin.
Great Gambler/Wiindigoo: a mythical creature appearing in the mythology of the Algonquian people. It is a malevolent cannibalistic spirit into which humans could transform, or which could possess humans. Those who indulged in cannibalism were at particular risk[citation needed], and the legend appears to have reinforced this practice as taboo.
Anishinaabeg/Ojibwa/Chippewa: The Anishinaabeg (an Ojibwe/Chippewa word meaning ‘The People’) of the Fond du Lac Reservation are primarily members of the Lake Superior Band of Minnesota Chippewa.
Dreams/Music/Oral Tradition: Vizenor .
Spirits speak to us in dreams and sometimes even give sacred names. Music______________
The oral tradition has no lexicon, of course, speakers remember what is heard and repeated. Written languages must impose what appears to be standard pronunciation when in fct most spoken sounds are seldom in absolute agreement with written words.
Anthropological and Historical Reinventions: Tribal people imagine their social patterns and places on the earth and feel that “to imagine the world is to be in the world.” Constrastingly, anthropologists invent tribal cultures and seek to end mythic time through objective methodologies (p. 27)
The Anishinaabeg have been invented by missionaries, colonist, anthropologists, and historians to be members of an inferior, savage race, romantic warriors, etc. Personal context and perceptions made those inventing the Anishinaabeg see what they wanted to see.
Boarding School & Indian Identity: much of the Indian Identity was lost as the colonialist worldview was forced on the young people that were taken from their homes and set up in residential schools. Vizenor tells the story of “Rogers” who attended a boarding school for six years. English replaced their language and writing replaced the oral traditions. Rogers began learning the forest, the lakes and river and he felt little the white man could teach touched his experiences in nature. Exemplifying the differences between the two worlds Rogers said he picked some turning leaves from ground, found some empty nests to bring to his mother because these are what pleased the teachers at school. Instead of being pleased, though, she scolded him. The nests she said was home to the birds, the leaves were there to beautify the forest. It was mean to take them away. The white man’s culture did not understand the spirituality of nature and so deprived the Native American children of their heritage.
Alcoholism: Craig MacAndrew and Robert Edgerton “set aside most common sense arguments about the effects of alcohol on tribal people and conclude “that drunken comportment is an essentially learned affair..
Nancy Gesterich Lurie says Indian people are most likely to get drunk when they feel thwarted in achieving Indian rather than white goals...Indian drinking is an established means of asserting and validating Indianness and will be either a managed and culturally patterned recreational activity or else not engaged in at all in direct proportion to the availability of otehr effective means of validating Indianness.
Two common themes are evident in most of the studies of tribal drinking, according to Michael Everett,...The first theme is that tribal drinking is somehow different from other drinking, and the second them e is that tribal drinking in spite of the problems and abuses of alcohol, has a number of positive aspects that are often ignored or denied”
For any one Indian or group of Indians it is difficult to separate racial prejudice, family disintegration, or economic oppression from alcohol in the genesis of various problems. However, Westermeyer emphasized, “the danger exists that if alcoholism is focused on as the biggest problem, urgent political and economic issues may be ignored. This is especially true because much of what is done regarding alcoholism is done at the individual level, ingoring improtant social, cultural, and intercultural problems...”
Edwin Lemert for example studied cultures on the northwester coast and emphasized the positive sue of alcohol in the revival of traditional patterns of tribal leadership and ritual when traditional behavior was denied by the white culture. Other studies conclude that tribal drunkenness is a positive approach to social integration, a method of survival under cultural duress and the stress of acculturation in the white world.
Wittstock and Miller conclude that “better treatment programs” should emphasize the need for “Indian staff and counselors, and making use of Indian culture and spiritual values in the course of treatment.
American Indian Movement (AIM): Founded in part by Dennis Banks in 1968 and established it to protect the traditional ways of Indian people and to engage in legal cases protecting treaty rights of Natives, such as hunting and fishing, trapping, and wild rice farming.
Dennis Banks/Wounded Knee: He also spearheaded the movement on Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in 1973 to oust the corrupt government-appointed chairman. These activities led to the occupation of Wounded Knee and a siege of 71 days, which received national attention. Banks was the principal negotiator and leader of the Wounded Knee forces.
"Religion"/"Sacred and Profane (Secular)": There is no word to denote what they call religion in Native American languages. But they do/did separate what is traditional or sacred and what is secular or profane. Tribal cultures reveal supernatural events and remember the past in oral traditional stories. The tellers of these stories were the verbal artists of the time...The stories have been recorded, translated, and printed as scripture, however, have altered tribal religious experiences. Published stories have become the standardized versions, the secular work of methodological academics; the artistic imagination has been polarized in print, the relationships between the tellers of stories and the listeners, the visual references to the natural world, are lost in translation. The formal descriptions of tribal events by outsiders, such as missionaries, explorers, and anthropologists, reveal more about the culture values of the observer than the imaginative power of spiritual tribal people.
Shamanism: Michael Harner in The Ways of the Shaman¸ writes that shamanism “is a great mental and emotional adventure, one in which the patient as well as the shaman-healer are involved. Through his heroic journey and efforts, the shaman helps his patients transcend their normal, ordinary definition of reality, including the definition of themselves as ill. The shaman shows his patients that they are not emotionally and spiritually alone in their struggles against illness and death. The shaman shares his special powers and convinces his patients, on a deep level of consciousness, that another human is willing to offer up his own self to help them. The shaman’s self-sacrifice calls forth a commensurate emotional commitment from his patients, a sense of obligation to struggle alongside the shaman to save one’s self. Caring and curing go hand in hand.
Shamanism is an uncommon religious experience that is not limited to place, time, culture. Shamans are intermediaries between the human and spirit worlds. They can treat illness and are capable of entering supernatural realms to provide answers for humans. He is a soul or a spirit doctor.
Jessakkid: The Ojibwa (Indians) have two kinds of shamans, the Wabeno ... and the jessakkid. . . . Both are capable of shamanic exploits. The jessakkid perform cures, the gods and spirits speak through their mouths
Cora Katherine Sheppo: There is, as well, Cora Katherine Sheppo, who "smothered her grandchild because he had been `spawned by the devil'" (146). Trapped between some vague knowledge of {78} tribal religion and Christianity and a psychiatric diagnosis of paranoid schizophrenia, Cora Sheppo will live out what remains of her life in a state mental hospital.
William Jones/Spirit World: A staff member of the Field Columbian Museum of Chicago. IN 1906, he presented a paper where he wrote: after the fourth day (following the death) the soul is said to return to the spirit world where it wanders about restless and without contentment. It is believed that the soul will be denied a life of happy existence in spirit world unless its mortal remains have received full funeral rites within a period of four years; therefore its special object is to liberate the soul and send it on its joyful way to the spirit world.
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