Read an Excerpt
Nature's Way
Native Wisdom for Living in Balance with the Earth
By McGaa, Ed HarperSanFrancisco
ISBN: 0060514566
Introduction
The term "Native American," the most recent gloss for North American aborigines, is now in disfavor with many tribal groups and individuals. The National Congress of American Indians, a powerful self-interest group, has passed a resolution opposing its use at their most recent convention. Throughout the historic Indian-white interface, such names as "North American Indians," "Amerindian," "Indian-American," and "First-Americans" have been in vogue at various times. In this essay, I use "Native American" and "American Indian" interchangeably. As for the focus of the essay, the Lakota, who are often labeled "Sioux," "Teton Sioux," "Western Lakota," and "Dakota" in the anthropological literature, I use the term "Lakota," for I am referring to the Western Sioux who speak the Lakota dialect of the Siouian language. I also use designations such as "Rosebud Sioux" to indicate the reservation as a social system to which one assigns oneself. This is accepted procedure by most Lakota Sioux.
I concur with my close friend and aunt in the Sioux way, Dr. Bea Medicine. I also will use phonetic pronunciation of the Sioux language. The English language uses the more practical phonic system. Why Siouian language has been reduced to the nonphonic method is indeed frustrating and extremely misleading for ordinary laymen.
I am an enrolled tribal member of the Oglala Sioux, also known as the Oglala Lakota. My tribe's history goes back to when our tribal grounds were in the Carolinas. After centuries, we finally ended up on a reservation in South Dakota, one of the last Indian tribes to be sequestered, five years after a battle you may have heard about involving a Colonel George Custer in 1876. I believe that it is because of my tribe's willingness to relocate and adapt to new environments that it has maintained its freedom to practice its rituals and traditions without too much dilution by an entity I will refer to as Dominant Society. In simple terms, Dominant Society is reflected in the beliefs and practices of the largest governments and religions. While indigenous people such as the Sioux tend to honor Nature, Dominant Society tends to view the natural world as an endless resource to be exploited.
I do not expect you to trade your set of beliefs for mine. I do not have all the answers. But in my tradition, we ask more questions and we share our honest observations. Hopefully, once you have completed reading this book, you will know what I know, and I am fairly sure you will see that a spiritual path that honors Nature is the only way out of the serious crises facing our planet. I call that path Nature's Way.
In this book, I attempt to portray how Sioux and other Nature-respecting societies have believed and practiced. Through their examples, I hope to show how Dominant Society can avoid disastrous consequences, overcome religious intolerance, treat women and men equally, preserve our environment, and live in peace. We can then progress onward to solving humankind's most serious problems.
It has been the tradition of our tribe to honor Nature in all its forms. Unlike Dominant Society, we regard more than the adult males of our tribe as valuable. Along with the Iroquois, we developed a form of democratic governance that truly honors the wisdom of all, including women, children, animals, plants, stones, and unseen spirits. As one holy man always used to tell me, in every being and in every event "there is a teaching." I believe Nature's Way is democratic. Democracy that respects secularism and views Nature as sacred is the strongest approach toward saving the planet.
I do not write from mythology when I reflect upon Native American spirituality in this book. In my opinion, mythology leads to superstition; and superstition has proved fatally destructive to many millions down through time. It is ironic, then, that Dominant Society accuses Native practices of being based on myth. Honest observation, which is what this book (and Native American spirituality generally) is grounded on, cannot be myth.
I write from real happenings, experiences I have witnessed, as well as from the wisdom I have learned from Sioux holy men I have been fortunate to meet personally. Many of those lessons were learned during the time of the brave Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. His catalyzing efforts for truth inspired renewed tribal-based efforts for social and religious freedom. We Sioux sought the return of our own spirituality after a century of deprivation. The U.S. government unlawfully, unconstitutionally banned our belief system in the late nineteenth century, through the coercion and lobbying of the Christian missionaries. Not until 1978 was the ban on our religious practices officially reversed by the United States Congress.
The rise of Dominant Society, the desacralization of Nature, and the complicity of institutional religion speak clearly to the most urgent needs of our time. If we hope to address those needs successfully, we need to sound a call for spiritual awakening, to create a new global culture based not on dominance over Nature for economic and political gain, but on values that endure for all times and all people.
One of the Sioux holy men I had the good fortune to know was Chief Fools Crow, also Oglala Lakota. He had some profound advice on what a person should do in order to be a force of positive change in the world. That advice? Become a "hollow bone."
To become a clean hollow bone, you must first live as I have, or if you have not done this already, you must begin to do it. You must love everyone, put others first, be moral, keep your life in order, not do anything criminal, and have a good character. If you do not do these things, you will be easily tricked, and will become a bone for the powers of evil.
Nature's Way is divided into two sections. In the first section, I will lead you through some lessons represented by animals and even a tree, to help make your "bone" clean and hollow ...
Continues...
Excerpted from Nature's Way by McGaa, Ed Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
