Religious specialists (Native American culture)

Tribes affected: Pantribal

Significance: Religious specialists such as shamans, priests, elders, and, at times of cultural upheaval, prophets, have all been crucial in guiding and maintaining tribal cultures

Observers of American Indian religions from Western traditions have often focused on aspects of supernaturalism in Indian religions, but that is only one way of approaching it. Another viewpoint emphasizes religion as maintaining harmony and reflecting the interdependence of all life. Both views can provide insights into the roles of religious specialists in Indian cultures.

Specialists and Otherworldly Religions

The supernatural is the realm beyond the natural world of the senses. The natural and supernatural worlds are linked by spirits that move back and forth between the two worlds. These spirits have power to change things in the natural world, and their presence may be sensed through the power inherent in special (sacred) things, people, times, places, words, and actions.

Religious specialists can interact with the spirit world through the use of sacred symbols in a manner that respects both the natural and supernatural worlds. The religious specialist’s title differs from tribe to tribe. The following discussion will use terms (such as shaman and priest) devised by academic theorists to describe Native American religions as they existed before contact with European Christian religions and, in the case of prophets, as they changed after contact.

Shamans

Mircea Eliade’s 1964 description of the shaman has left its imprint on all descriptions of religious specialization. He described religious specialists who, through the use of trances, leave their bodies to go to a supernatural world to bring back techniques for dealing with the problems of the everyday world. Shamans may be selected a number of ways. Their own ecstatic experience may mark them as shamans; they may inherit the role from a parent or other ancestry. They may also be chosen by the people themselves. Once they are chosen, they are taught how to interact with the spirit world through dreams, visions, or trances and through traditional techniques learned from other shamans.

In general, a shaman undergoes an ecstatic experience in order to gain a spiritual status so as to practice divination and healing. In North America, however, ecstatic techniques are seldom used outside the Subarctic and Pacific Northwest as a consistent technique for dealing with the spirit world. Nevertheless, a set of common traits can be offered which more or less are found in certain people in each tribe. It should be noted that shaman is not a word often used by American Indians to describe these people.

Certain individuals profess to have a supernatural power that they use in this natural world. Sometimes this power is obtained in an initiatory vision. Such initiatory visions are especially found among the Inuit, where the shamans describe themselves as going to a supernatural world and, through great trial, gaining certain knowledge and techniques which are beneficial to their people. Part of this knowledge and technique is reflected in the use of esoteric language and rituals that are used to manipulate the spirit world and its powers. This power, as expressed in esoteric formulas, charms, songs, and certain objects, is often translated into English as “medicine.” “Medicine” therefore is the power of the supernatural world as found in these words, chants, rituals, and objects. Many of these objects are beautiful and could be considered works of art; others are rather common looking. The Crow medicine bundle might contain feathers, bird and animal skins, animal and human bones, teeth, herbs, pigments, and minerals. Outside the tribal religious context, these things appear valueless. Yet within its religious context, such a bundle contains the history, power, and authority of an ancient people.

This power and knowledge are used by the shaman to predict the future and decide a course of action for individuals or the entire tribe. A shaman is thought to be able to control the weather, game animals, the course of war, and the search for lost objects. Among the Inuit, for example, Sedna, who lives under the sea, is the mistress of animals. The shaman helps control the hunt by going to Sedna and caring for her. The shaman many times has to clean her hair, which has become filthy because of the people’s breaking of taboos, so that she will allow the animals to be captured.

The ability to tell the future is demonstrated by Plains shamans in the Shaking Tent Ceremony. In this ceremony the shaman enters a tent and reads the messages communicated by the spirits through the shaking of the tent. Among the Algonquian peoples, divination many times occurs by scorching an animal’s shoulder blade and reading the resultant cracks and spots to determine the future.

There are other individuals who use supernatural powers to deal with sickness and wounds. Within a supernaturalist perspective, sickness results either from some object entering the body or from one’s spirit leaving the body. The shaman has techniques to deal with either of these causes of illness. The object in one’s body may be there either because a person put it there or because an illness, with a spirit life of its own, enters the body. The common ritual for withdrawing the evil object is to suck it out, with a tube, a horn, or one’s mouth. Sometimes the extracted object is shown to everyone; sometimes it is not. Contending with the spirit life that somehow is not in the body is a more complex affair. The shaman many times must go into a trance, enter the spirit world, and fight for the person’s life spirit to deal with this type of illness. These trances involve dramatic rituals that usually fill spectators and patient alike with a sense of awe and mystery.

Shamans are essential to all tribes; some are recognized and honored for their role, while others are feared and avoided for the power they possess. The ichta among the Tlingit (in British Columbia and the Yukon) is an example of a shaman who lives at the edge of society. He is dirty, his hair is unkempt, and his dress is rags. He has a number of masks, however, each of which represents and attracts a particular spirit. His power depends upon his ability to control these spirits. By going into a trance and dancing like an animal, he achieves his objectives.

A shaman’s power can be used for good or for evil; it is beyond the ordinary or natural means of control. In many traditional North American cultures, the shamanic role is usually open to men and women. Males generally predominate except in California, where there are more female shamans. While the shamanic roles are, for the most part, played by individuals, there are some shamanic societies. The midewiwin of the central Algonquian is an example of a shamanic society. Depending on the tribe, these societies act as carriers of knowledge, as sharers of power, and as necessary helpers in achieving certain ceremonial objectives.

A quick survey of the various American Indian cultural areas reveals that among the Inuit the shaman is closest to the now-classic model of Eliade (Eliade based his model on the study of Siberian tribes). They work individually or in groups through the use of ecstasy and dramatic performances to cure, control the weather, and procure game. Among the Northwest Coast Indians, techniques of ecstasy are less common. There is a shamanic festival during the winter months among some tribes from the Northwest Coast cultural area in which dramatic canoe journeys are taken into the spirit world to struggle with the spirits to win back the souls of the sufferers gathered at the ceremony.

The Basin, Plateau, and Northern California areas find the sucking techniques of great importance to the shaman. The costumes assume more importance there than in other shamanic areas. Although visions and trances are expected of many individuals among the Plains and Prairie Indians, shamans stand out in how their spiritual power shows itself in their celebration of public ritual, tipi decoration, and the medicine bundles. The Southwest has a complex culture with a mix of various spiritual specialists, including priests.

Priests

Another type of religious specialist is the priest. The priest stands as a constant intermediary between the natural and supernatural worlds. In societies that emphasize hunting as a means of subsistence, there is a sense in which every hunter may be considered a priest. Through ritual action, the hunter balances the needs of both worlds so that the natural world sustains its ability to provide the tribe with food and security. Hunting is a sacred responsibility wherein killing animals is a religious act that makes the hunter into a priest. The hunter must be careful of taboos and must show proper respect for the spirits. The Blackfoot hunter, for example, gained his role in the tribe through a vision quest. In his vision or dream he found his role as hunter and his connection with the spirit world; the weapons became part of the spirit world revealed to him in the dream.

In an agricultural society priests play a unique role. The Pueblo Indians of the American Southwest, for example, are an agricultural society with a significant priestly class of religious specialists. Pueblo life is one of rich ceremony which is woven into every part of the day and is manifested in all tribal members’ relationships with others. Each Pueblo town has an independent society of priests in charge of the rituals.

A general rule, with many exceptions, is that shamans dominate hunter societies and priests dominate agricultural societies. There is another type of religious specialist who has helped American Indians to respond to the challenge of change in their way of life—the prophet.

Prophets

In 1925, sociologist Max Weber provided a topology used by many in discussing religious specialization. He wrote of three types of religious leaders: magicians, prophets, and priests. The description of the shaman used here includes many of the characteristics of what Weber would call the magician. Priests influence the spirit world by worship and petition; shamans influence it by the power of their spells and personal skills; priests are supported by the entire tribe and exercise their functions regularly; shamans work on an individual basis and do what is needed when it is needed; priests are powerful because of the class to which they belong and the techniques they learn; shamans’ power comes from their personal experience. Both priest and shaman are part of the everyday life of the tribe. In times of crisis there arises another specialist whom Weber calls the prophet.

Prophets are agents of change who take personal responsibility for breaking with the established way of doing things. Prophets claim to know what to do because of their visions. Much like shamans, prophets find their role in life through their visions; unlike shamans they receive no remuneration for what they do. The fulfillment of the prophet’s vision is its own reward.

There have been many prophets since first contact: San Juan Tewa of the Pueblo people (1680), Neolin of the Delaware (1750’s), Handsome Lake of the Seneca (1799), Tenskwatawa of the Shawnee (1811), Smohalla of the Wanapum (1855), Wodziwob of the Northern Paiute (1860’s), John Slocum of the Puget Sound Salish (1880’s). From these prophets and many more there came a common message: The ways of white culture were evil, a return to the ancient ways as described by the prophet was necessary for the salvation of the tribe, and strict codes of morality must be enforced. The message was ritualized in many different ways. The prophets and the religions which flowed from them have been a significant force in revitalizing the religions of American Indians.

Beyond the Supernatural: Harmony

A description of Indian religions from a supernaturalist perspective, while valuable and founded on large amounts of written material gathered by non-Indian researchers, is dualistic. It has a bias in that it tends to focus on what is, or was, important to the European Christian: God, spirits, the other world, the power to change things, and a deeply felt conversion experience. The supernaturalist description many times leaves one with the impression that Indian religions are dualistic, with the spirits “out there” in the supernatural world and the shaman, prophet, priest here in the natural world. This is a religious model very much dependent upon European Christianity. Indian religion can be better described not in a dualistic sense but by using a holistic model of harmony and interdependence. An essential characteristic of Indian religions has been their oral character. Any non-Indian religion had to adapt itself to this orality to make any deep and significant headway into the Indian way of life. An oral culture recognizes the need of interdependence and harmony among the generations for its continuance; the need to live in the circle of life for the continuance of life itself. This is best shown in the central role of the elders.

Elders and Other Specialists

One’s age is very important in Indian culture. Most tribes have some form of initiation of the young, for example, which often corresponds to the beginning of religious awareness and the acceptance of religious responsibilities. There are many rites of passage which give social form to the necessity of bringing the young more deeply into what is required for community survival.

Many tribes have formal religious societies into which individuals are initiated. These societies are sources of religious authority in the tribe. Members of the Crow Tobacco Society, the Winnebago Midewiwin, and the Tewa “Made People” bear enormous responsibility for religious actions.

Elders are especially important because with them resides religious wisdom, religious memory, and religious experience. In an oral culture the elders bring the “how, what, and why” of the past into the present in order to forge the future. Without the elders there is no religion and no purpose and direction to life; in a sense, without their guidance there can be no tribe.

An oral culture also places great emphasis on storytellers. These religious specialists tell the stories which provide explanations for the why and how of present living. There are the stories told by the elders, but in many tribes there are also individuals who specialize in storytelling. Among the Zuni an individual is appointed as Kyaklo, responsible for telling the creation story cycle. Once every four or eight years Kyaklo comes to a Zuni village to tell the story. No Zuni ever hears the entire story in one telling, yet the story is told. In an oral culture telling the story or stories is essential to religious life. Although these stories may deal with everyday life and the reasons for its existence, they are religious since they provide a purposeful direction and unity to individual and social living.

The same is true of the Indian sense of place and home. Land itself is important and central because it is coextensive with one’s sense of harmony and thus identity. “Here” includes the waters, the earth, the shape of the horizon, and the variations in the weather. That is why so many Indian tribes give a religious meaning to the four points of the compass. Directions enable one to know where one lives. The stories reinforce the sense of place. Those who tell the stories, build the homes, and provide for “home” are religious specialists. In the Tlingit religion, for example, the house is a ceremonial and spatial representation of the special landscape. The house is a holy place dwelt in by the most recent expression of the ancestor, the yitsati. The house is the male domain. The wife does not know the meanings of the carvings inside the house. Childbirth happens outside the house. The keeper of the house (yitsati) is a priest whose only task is to perform the rituals associated with the house.

Bibliography

Eliade, Mircea. Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy. Rev. ed. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1964. This is the classic work on shamanism.

Gill, Sam D. Native American Religions: An Introduction. Belmont, Calif.: Wadsworth, 1982. Gill is an exponent of how investigators have read into the written materials their own desires about Indian religion. He should be read to balance the exaggerated romantic claims for a historical pan-Indian religion.

Hultkrantz, Ake. “Spirit Lodge: A North American Shamanistic Seance.” In Studies in Shamanism, edited by Carl-Martin Edsman. Stockholm: Almquist & Wiksell, 1962. Various definitions of shamanism are reviewed which lead one to conclude, if one uses ecstasy as a normative, that the term “shaman” can be used only in a broad sense when dealing with North America.

Paper, Jordan. “Methodological Controversies in the Study of Native American Religions.” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 22, no. 3 (1993): 365-377. Argues that because of the dynamic character of Indian religion the individual religions adapted and shared what was necessary for survival. Thus there are common religious elements today among the various tribal religions.

Weber, Max. Economy and Society: An Outline of Interpretative Sociology. Translated by Ephraim Fischoff et al., edited by Günther Roth and Claus Wittich. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1978. Weber provided religious studies with practical categories for discerning religious leadership.