Native American Spirit Beings by Jeanne Nagle

Author:Jeanne Nagle
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-62275-400-7
Publisher: Britannica Educational Publishing
Published: 2015-11-23T16:00:00+00:00

Closeup image of a jimsonweed plant. A hallucinogenic drink made from the plant’s leaves is consumed by certain California tribes during religious rituals. Sam Abell/National Geographic Image Collection/Getty Images

Religions on the Colorado River differed slightly because they were not concerned with developing formal organizations and recruitment procedures. Individuals received religious information through dreams, and members recited long narrative texts, explaining the creation of the world, the travel of culture heroes, and the adventures of historic figures.

In the northwestern part of the culture area, there was another type of informally structured religious system. Its rituals concerned world renewal (as in the white-deerskin dance) and involved the recitation of myths that were privately owned—that is, for which the prerogative of recitation belonged to only a few individuals. One communal need served by these ceremonies was the reification (or, sometimes, restructuring) of relationships. The display of costumes and valuable possessions (such as white deerskins or delicately chipped obsidian blades) reaffirmed social ranking, and the success of the ritual reaffirmed the orderly relationship of humanity to the supernatural.

The use of supernatural power to control events or transform reality was basic to every California group. Generally magic was used in attempts to control the weather, increase the harvest of crops, and foretell the future. Magic or sorcery was deemed not only the cause of sickness and death but also the principal means of curing many diseases. Its practices were also considered to be ways to protect oneself, to punish wrongdoers, and to satisfy personal ends.

NORTHWEST

The religions of the Northwest Coast shared several concepts that provided the widespread bases for various kinds of religious activity. One concept was that salmon were supernatural beings who voluntarily assumed piscine form each year in order to sacrifice themselves for the benefit of humankind. On being caught, these spirit-beings returned to their home beneath the sea, where they were reincarnated if their bones or offal were returned to the water. If offended, however, they would refuse to return to the river. Hence, there were numerous specific prohibitions on acts believed to offend them and a number of observances designed to propitiate them, chief of which was the first-salmon ceremony.

This rite varied in detail but invariably involved honouring the first salmon of the main fishing season by sprinkling them with eagle down, red ochre, or some other sacred substance, welcoming them in a formal speech, cooking them, and distributing their flesh, or morsels of it, communion-fashion, to all the members of the local group and any guests. The maximal elaboration of this rite occurred in northwestern California in what have been called world-renewal ceremonies; these combined first-salmon rituals, first-fruits observances, and dances in which lineage wealth was displayed. Elsewhere the first-salmon rituals were less elaborate but still important, except among the Tlingit, who did not perform them.

Another religious concept was the acquisition of personal power by seeking individual contact with a spirit-being, usually through prayer and a vision. Among Coast Salish all success in life—whether in hunting, woodworking, accumulating wealth, military ventures, or magic—was bestowed by spirit-beings encountered in the vision quest.

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