"Native American Spirituality"
Presented by Joyce Anderson
Nov.18, 2007 and March 1, 2009
What are the religious beliefs of the first Americans? Native Americans do not practice a single, uniform religion throughout North America. Instead a rich diversity exists among the different Indian nations and there is even a large amount of variation within each group. Therefore, generalizing is difficult. Americans today respect and admire Native spirituality.

In fact, with the New Age movement of the 70’s there was so much romanticizing of Native American spirituality that it drew the attention of the Native community. There were popular books by Carlos Castaneda, Lynn Andrews, and Frank Waters. New agers adopted Native American practices, such as sweat lodges and vision quests. These contrived, psuedo-Indian activities were very insulting to the Native Americans. They became very secretive about their religion. On our recent family vacation to the Southwest, one of our tour guides, Scott, told us about his interview with an Indian. He knew the son of this important Indian elder. He asked the son if he would put in a good word for him. He did and Scott was given a time to come out to interview the Indian. It was at least an hour’s drive. When Scott got out there, the Indian was not around. This happened several more times, but finally, after it was determined that he was a good guy and really wanted to learn, he was granted the interview. The Indian told him he would consent to be interviewed, but only on the condition that he not write about it! He didn’t want the rest of the tribe to know that he had talked to an outsider. Scott went ahead and interviewed him and has kept his word. Later in the trip Scott mentioned the writer Frank Waters and said that the Indians did not like his writing.

While no one defends the distortion and abuse of Native teachings, there are those who do hold that Native spirituality can be appropriately shared with non-Natives. Dorothy Blackcrow Mack, a white woman who married a Native American and is a former caretaker of the Blackcrow sun dance grounds in Wanblee, South Dakota, acknowledges that, without “living it and breathing it day by day,” non-Natives cannot understand Native spirituality, and may even think they can “play around” with rituals and ceremonies.” Still, she says, nobody can legislate worship: The Great Mystery is open to all who believe. Ultimately, difficult questions remain: Can a spiritual tradition that is so closely woven into a culture keep it's meaning outside of that context? And, if so, how can teachings be explored by outsiders so that the tradition is not compromised in the process?

I spoke of the rich diversity among the Indian nations earlier. This diversity is due, in part, to the fact that each tribe's rituals were tied to specific qualities of the land that the tribe called "home." Hence some tribes had rituals and festivals centered on the sun, while others were centered on the corn crop or buffaloes. Yet, in spite of all this diversity, researchers do make a few important generalizations about Native American religions. From my own reading I have come up with five elements that most Native American religions hold in common.

First, Creation: Europeans have a creation story in which God creates a man first and gives the man power over all the other animals. Native Americans do not give man dominion over animals. In the beginning, teaches the Indian, all beings on earth were in human shape. Then a change took place that turned many human beings into wild animals and birds. Only the ancestors of those who are human beings today retained their human form. Because wild animals and people all started as people, today a close connection exists between human beings and wild animals. We are sisters and brothers with the animals and it is our task as humans to respect and live in harmony with them. Unlike European belief, in the Indian creation story, no clear distinction exists between humans and animals.

One consequence of the close kinship between humans and animals is the tendency of Native Americans to imitate the animals in dress and religious ritual. For example, the feather-lined shirts, the feather ornaments for dancing and the feather plumes in the hair of American Indians are all measures to instill the spirits of birds in the human being. Feathers symbolize spiritual freedom and independence.

Second, Nature: The Europeans cut the forests and mined the hills for gold. Native Americans have a different perspective.

Native Americans pay far more attention to nature than European immigrants to North America. They care about trees because the trees give evidence of the supernatural. They care about the animals because animals may represent spirits. They care about the plains and the deserts because they may show the great spirits. (hoodoos.) The Native American view of nature is much more alive and filled with spiritual activity than the European view. In fact, they believe that the Spirit that first infused the world is still with us now and can be experienced as spirit that imbues all things.

The theme of Native American religion is of harmony, vitality, and appreciation of the world around them. We can see the harmony in their view of the universe. Indians usually divide the universe into three levels--heaven, earth and the underworld. The various levels are often united through the symbol of a tree. This symbolic tree has its roots in the underworld, stretches through the world of humans and animals and has its crown in the sky world. All these worlds function together in a cosmic whole. In other words, native religions of North America often have a belief in a cosmic unity. World order is founded on a balance of interrelationships between humankind, the universe, and the supernatural powers. Native Americans see it as their task to live in harmony with this universe. Sacred tree book?

Third, God: Europeans struggled with intellectual constructions and abstract definitions of God. Native Americans have a different perspective.

In contrast to Europeans, Native Americans emphasize an abundance of "spirits," instead of emphasizing one God. These spirits interact freely with humans, especially in dreams and visions. Indians usually believe that a heavenly spirit rules over the sky; that there are spirits who control the wind, the clouds, the rain and the snow; that there are spirits who influence human life on earth; and that there are spirits, including Mother Earth, who roam the subterranean world. Often Indians conceive of these spirits as different manifestations of an overall unity. Unlike European belief, no sharp contrast exists between God and humans, or God and animals, or God and the earth. In fact, they believe that the Spirit that first infused the world is still with us now and can be experienced as spirit that permeates all things, whether human, animal, or earth.

Fourth, Visions and Dreams: Europeans tended to believe that only the visions and dreams described in the New Testament were valid and true. Native Americans have a different perspective.

Dreams and visions play a central role in Indian religion. Most North America Indians believe that spiritual power has come to them in their dreams or in visions they have received in isolated places in the wilderness. This belief in dreams and visions is a characteristic feature of most Native American religions.

Indians generally connect the basic vision quest with a coming-of-age of boys into adulthood. Adults expect the boy to seek the aid of a guardian spirit to withstand the trials of existence including such activities as hunting, warfare, and love. The parents or elders send the boy out, usually with other males, into the forest or mountains to fast and suffer from the cold and the attacks of wild animals. During this fast he may have a vision of the apparition that becomes his guardian spirit.

Sometimes spiritual revelation comes not through a vision but in a dream. For example, the Iroquois in New York State gather in the morning to tell their dreams and decide their actions from interpretations of those dreams. And the Mojave in western Arizona and southern California construct their religious myths from the contents of their dreams.

Fifth, The Cycle of Life and Death: Europeans believed in a linear notion of time with a beginning and an end, a birth and a death. Native Americans have a different perspective.

Indians conceive of time not as linear but as a cycle. They understand time as an eternally recurring cycle of events and years. Some Indian languages lack terms for the past and the future, so that everything rests in the present.

This applies not only to the seasons but also to human beings. Each person makes a cycle of time from birth to death. This suggests that death is not an end but a beginning of a new life. The new life comes in one of three ways: reincarnation as a human, transmigration into an animal or a transcendent life in another world.

However, the question of a person's survival after his or her death has never been a prominent theme for American Indian speculation. Native Americans usually avoid the issue of death, thinking that nothing can be known for certain about death. In contrast to European religion that often focuses on salvation after death, the native religions of North America focus on this life.

This is a short introduction to a rich panorama of religion that features many diverse beliefs, ceremonies and ways of life. There is much here that we can learn from the five principles of Native American religion:

* Their story of creation teaches that we are sisters and brothers with the animals.

* Their view of nature teaches that we are responsible to the earth.

* Their view of God teaches that the Great Spirit exists in the trees and the animals, the plains and the forests, the mountains and the waters.

* Their view of dreams teaches us to remember our dreams and look at them as a source of understanding.

· And their view of death teaches us that we are part of a cycle of birth and death and rebirth, of spring, summer, fall, winter, and spring again.