Religious Movements

1. Religious Movements Inevitable change for survival as distinct cultural entities.

2. Contact • Disruption was violent, far-reaching, and often sudden. • Within a single generation, a people’s way of life could change radically. • New diseases decimated populations • Forced relocations disrupted family lives and shifted groups to unfamiliar landscapes which did not figure in their sacred stories • Displacement led to confrontation with whites and other tribes

3. Traditions Change for Survival • Pan-Indian religious movements arose • Millenarian movements predicted the end of white ascendancy and the return of the Old Ways • Other spiritual movements saw survival in terms of a continuation of the intimate relationship between people, nature and spirit.

4. Maintaining Traditional Ways • In spite of change, the core beliefs of Native peoples remain today. • Creator made the world, ordained the laws of nature and the animals, and instructed the people in the ways of the sacred (which do not change). • No matter the changes in the world, the sacred cycles of nature continue and the ancestors and the sacred past is always close at hand.

5. Maintaining Traditional Ways • No amount of interference or upheaval can alter the important elements of Native life: • One’s people • One’s family • One’s sacred relationships with the animal, plant, and spirit worlds • Sacred objects also contribute to the maintenance of traditional ways. • Sacred bundles may contain items said to go back to the First People and thus encapsulate the entire history of a clan or tribe.

6. Dreams and Visions • Are of great significance to most Native traditions and have proved important in helping Native people confront the challenge of white intrusion. • Dreaming is believed to be a source of spirit power which may be used to guide one’s actions. • Spirit guides, songs, taboos, and guidance could all be obtained through dreaming.

7. Nativistic Movements • Many spiritual movements stemmed from a need to come to terms with the upheaval caused by the arrival of whites. • Nativistic movements are attempts by Native peoples to ensure the survival of traditional culture in the face of pressure to assimilate. • Nativistic movements aimed to reaffirm and validate Native values, especially when changes rendered traditional ceremonies meaningless. • Anthropologists refer to these movements as “nativistic” because they represent an attempt by Native people to ensure the survival of their cultures.

8. Nativistic Movements • There are two types of nativistic movements: • revitalization • millennarian • Both types of movement are syncretic, meaning that they adopted some of the beliefs and practices of the dominant culture – but to differing degrees. • The movement allowed a core of traditional belief to survive, camouflaged in the dogma of Christianity.

9. Revitalization Movements • Revitalization movements allowed Natives to defuse white criticism of traditional values by adopting some Christian forms and symbols and eliminating traditional elements that missionaries denounced. • Handsome Lake Movement • Native American Church • Congregational form • Such movements allowed a core of traditional belief to survive almost by camouflage within the trappings of Christianity. • Revitalization movements were often headed by prophetic figures.

10. Handsome Lake Movement • The Longhouse Religion arose in the northeastern woodlands in 1799 among the Seneca, a tribe of the Iroquois League. • After the American Revolution, Seneca lands were confiscated, sold or stolen. Food became scarce and alcohol hastened the threat of social collapse. • Handsome Lake, the brother of a chief, dreamed of an encounter with spirits who advised him to direct the people to give up alcohol, make peaceful relations with whites, and practice a Worship Dance.

11. Handsome Lake Movement • Weekly worship meetings were held in a longhouse and members who believed the “good message” met regularly. • The movement included a heaven and hell only for Indian people. • The religion has been very successful and continues to be practiced today.

12. Native American Church • The Peyote Church is estimated to have over 300,000 members and is considered a Pan-Indian movement. • The Native American Church originated in Mexico and initially spread across the Plains after the collapse of the Ghost Dance. • Church members ingest parts of the peyote cactus as a sacrament during meetings. • Meetings are held from dusk to dawn and incorporate items and elements of tradition such as whistles, rattles, and feather fans. • Church doctrine is a mixture of Christianity and traditional belief.

13. Millennarian Movements • Millennarian movements arose as confrontational responses to the rapid subjugation of traditional culture by whites, so rapid that traditional culture was in danger of immediate collapse. • Some scholars suggest that Indian nativistic prophets arose as a result of contact with the Christian prophetic tradition. • Other scholars argue that Native prophets had their roots in a type of pre-contact ceremony called a “Prophet Dance.” • Prophets usually arose in the worst of circumstances.

14. Millennarian Movements, cont. • Millennarian movements almost always began with a prophet preaching an imminent and sometimes cataclysmic end to the current world and a return to traditional ways. • The Bole Maru • The Shaker Church • The Ghost Dance

15. The Bole Maru • The movement combined traditional tribal values with Christian-inspired dualistic ideas (heaven and hell/God and Devil). • Individuals known as Dreamers, who were privy to messages from the Creator, conducted Bole Maru rituals and assumed many traditional diagnostic and healing functions. • An important feature of the Bole Maru tradition is that dances, songs, and costumes brought about by the Dreamer must cease to be used with her death. • New or revived ceremonies must come only with a new Dreamer recognized by the entire tribe. • The movement is still active among some California tribes, especially the Pomo.

16. The Shaker Church • The Shaker Church claims to receive power directly from God during trances characterized by first of trembling. • The movement arose during the 1880s and is still active among some tribes. • The Church emphasizes faith healing using songs that combine Indian melodies and a mixture of traditional and Christian lyrics. • Major ceremonies coincide with Christian holidays (Easter).

17. The Ghost Dance • The Ghost Dance is the most popular and widespread of all millennarian movements. • This movement started among the Paiute tribe and became a series of similar revitalization movements as it spread eastward. • Common features included a circle dance in which the dancers were said to visit dead relatives in a visionary trance. • The version stemming from Wovoka claimed that all whites would be swept away, the dead and the buffalo would return, and a new world would come into being.