THE INDIAN MEDICINE CHIEFThe Medicine Man is not necessarily a healer, although healing may be one of his duties. The Indian has long applied the word medicine to any mysterious force which is beyond his understanding. Primarily the Medicine Man is a holy man, one who can speak with the spirits, who knows the ways of the gods.
The more advanced Medicine Man who specializes in healing has in addition to his magical powers some knowledge of medicine and surgery. These priest-seers are also masters of hypnosis and mental suggestion; modern scientists have acknowledged their excellency, and there is everything to indicate that in their knowledge of the suggestive arts they are far ahead of the white man.
Sitting Bull, one of the most celebrated of the Medicine Priests, whose visions enabled him to surprise and annihilate General Custer's troop at the Little Big HornCHAPTER 2: THE AMERICAN INDIAN MEDICINE MANPRIEST, PROPHET, AND HEALER -- MIRACLES UNDER EVER WATCHFUL EYES -- METHODS OF THE SPECIALISTS IN HEALING -- SUFFERING AS PUNISHMENT -- RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND THE GOOD SPIRIT -- MASTERS OF HYPNOSIS -- THE INDIAN HOPE OF THE MESSIAH -- SITTING BULL AND THE MIRACLES -- HOLY MEN OF MEDICINE -- HEALING BY SAND-PAINTING -- INTELLECTUAL BIRTH BY 'FLYING SEEDS' -- CONCLUSIONS OF THE MISINFORMED AND UNINFORMED -- GUIDANCE THROUGH PRAYER.PRIEST, PROPHET, AND HEALERTHE dictionary does not distinguish any difference in meaning between the terms Witch Doctor and Medicine Man, but assigns the first to the African Voodoo worker, and the second to the mystery priests of the American Indian tribes.
In reality, the two represent distinct stages in the development of occult practices. The Witch Doctor came first, and only through a long and complicated process of evolution was he developed into the Medicine Man.
To describe the Indian mystic as a Medicine Man is a singularly unfortunate choice of words. Semantically speaking, it causes, through association of ideas, an entirely erroneous conception of the whole structure of Indian metaphysics. With the term so fixed in the language that it is impossible now to change it, the need is to clarify as much as possible the natural confusion which results from the use of a familiar word in an entirely unfamiliar sense.
We think of medicine as a medicinal substance used in the treating of disease, and so a Medicine Man would be one who gives medicines -- a physician. In this sense, however, it conveys no adequate conception of the American Indian holy man. The term was bestowed some two hundred years ago by ignorant whites, with definite intent to disparage; and later, Medicine Man came into still further disrepute when the term was assumed by itinerant quacks, unscrupulous white men who peddled various 'infallible Elixirs' and 'Snake-bite Cures,' supposedly genuine Indian remedies, but in actuality, utterly worthless concoctions.
The dictionary recognizes that medicine is a synonym for magic, as applied to magical forms of healing. This meaning, while a little closer to function, is still misleading.
The Medicine Man is not necessarily a healer, although healing may be one of his duties. The Indian has long applied the word medicine to any mysterious force which is beyond his understanding. When the American army began to use repeating rifles against the Indians, these rapid firing guns were described among the tribes as 'powerful medicine'; because the Sioux did not understand how the rifles could be loaded so rapidly.
To the Indians, the Medicine Man was one who possessed supernatural powers as prophet, seer, thaumaturgist, priest, physician, spiritist or spiritual healer. He might be only one of these, or he might combine several of the offices in his person. Primarily he was a holy man; he was one who could speak with the spirits, he knew the ways of the gods. Frequently he was also the tribal historian, for most of these priests possessed remarkable memories.
MIRACLES UNDER EVER WATCHFUL EYESModern skeptics inclined to discount the supernatural powers of the Medicine Man will do well to remember the conditions under which he worked. This prophet-priest lived his years and performed his miracles under the ever watchful eyes of his fellow tribesmen. They knew his life from the beginning; they had seen the mystic look come into his eyes; they had known that he would choose the way of the seer; they remembered his first visions, and many times they had seen him come back from his long vigils by the sacred fire.
It would be difficult indeed for a man to be a deceiver from his infancy, especially when other watchful and sometimes jealous Medicine Men were ever present to try the spirits.
The wonder-worker was continually being called upon for various kinds of services, and if he failed in his enchantments he did not continue long in popular respect. Nor could he remove to some other community if his failures caught up with him. For the Medicine Man to remain in good standing throughout a long and eventful life, his experiments had to be successful in considerable number. The more highly advanced Indian nations were far too intelligent to be easily deceived, and it was among these that the mystery priest came to his greatest power and developed to full flowering his supernatural arts.
If the tribe needed rain, it was the Medicine Man's duty to find some way of producing it; excuses might work for a time, but there nevertheless must be rain, or there would certainly be a new Medicine Man.
If a prominent member of the tribe was taken sick, the Medicine Man was expected to discover and administer the necessary remedies. Too many failures in this line would also be disastrous, and this magician could not hide behind the declaration of an ailment being incurable, as the modern physician can and does. Nothing is impossible to one possessing supernatural powers; the desired cure is the only satisfactory end to the sick call.
If the hunting was poor,
the Medicine Man was consulted as to the exact location of the game, and when he had made his pronouncement, the hunters started out. It is difficult to say what might have happened to the unhappy shaman had the animals not been there, and the hunters had to come back empty handed, for the simple reason that all available accounts state that always the game was in the place that the priest had indicated.
At various times the tribe might be expecting trouble from some other band of Indians, or later, from the menacing white men. Then there would be a council, with
the Medicine Man required, upon demand, to describe the enemy war party, state its whereabouts and its strength. Often the survival of the entire tribe might depend upon the accuracy of the priest's mystical vision; he had to be correct in every detail, although the enemy might be a hundred miles away.
These were the daily tasks of the venerated seer, and the whole tribe stood judgment over the results.
How many of our most highly trained scientists could qualify for the office of Medicine Man in a tribe of American Plains Indians? Only results counted; excuses were buried with the dead.
METHODS OF THE SPECIALISTS IN HEALINGThe more advanced Medicine Man who specialized in healing had in addition to his magical powers some knowledge of medicine and surgery.
His physiotherapy included massage, sweat-baths, sun bathing, counter irritation, and local pressure with the hands and feet. He also set broken bones, performed blood-letting, pulled teeth, and bandaged wounds. Dieting and fasting were practiced by most primitive peoples and the Medicine Man prescribed these whenever indicated. Herbs have been used from the earliest times, and the experienced practitioners compounded herbal medicines, and in some cases made use of animal and mineral substances.
Medicine as science was highly developed among the Indians of Yucatan and the Central American areas in the two thousand years prior to the coming of Columbus. These people fitted false teeth and artificial limbs, they perfected a number of surgical instruments, and they performed the Caesarean section long before the birth of Julius Caesar.Many important changes had to take place in the structure of ancient society before the dominion of the Witch Doctor was left behind and the Medicine Man became the keeper of his people. The most significant of these changes came gradually in the sphere of religion.
The God concept emerged, to put in order the spirit world of primitive man.The processes which brought this about can be studied among such peoples as the Egyptians; they had a large and complicated pantheon of divinities. The spirit guardians of powerful tribes gained prestige as these rose to temporal power.
The conquered accepted the spirits believed in by their conquerors, and these victorious spirits gradually assumed the proportions of gods. There were gods of peace and war, gods of towns and villages, gods of earth, and air, and fire, gods of the living and of the dead. As the nomes, or provinces, increased in strength their gods took on national influence and in the end the most successful deities became the superior gods and the less fortunate assumed the estates of tutelaries.
With the belief in God came the transference of the tribal virtues to the person of this Invisible Being, the strong and loving protector of his children. Thus God became good, because the ways of the tribe itself were always good. Man made his God in his own image, or in the image of that which he, man, desired to be. The tribal God was a great chieftain, a glorified extension in space of the physical chief. This spirit chieftain was the master of all the lesser spirits and ghosts and they had to obey him.
This belief, that malignant agencies were no longer free to wander about afflicting at will, put the world in order. For now, if an evil being sought to do harm, the good God would come to the aid of his people and punish the offending ghost. The bad spirits resisted this loss of power of course, and tried in many ways to outwit the God, but this was not possible, because the God who knew all things could offset the evil purpose of the wicked spirits.
It was the good God against the bad ghosts, and the struggle resulted in anthropomorphism, the doctrine of God and devil fighting for control over the world.Soon, good men in this world tried to help the God, and lived according to his will; and after death their spirits could still help him; and also aid in protecting the tribe. Evil men, who disobeyed the God, continued after they had died to plague the living; and so it became necessary for the God to punish them. Thus good and evil came into being, White Magic and Black Magic were divided; and the sorcerer came into ill repute.
SUFFERING AS PUNISHMENT
Then came a culminating psychological realization that was to modify the whole course of human effort. This was the belief that suffering was punishment for disobeying the good God. That made it necessary for all who were afflicted by sorrow or sickness to make an atonement for their sins in the form of an offering to the God.This conviction did not work out so well, for the reason that both the virtuous and the vice-ridden were subject to many of the same misfortunes. But the belief had been set up empirically, so the facts had to be altered to fit the preconceptions. When no fault could be found in the unfortunate sufferer that would explain his ailment, an appropriate vice was manufactured.
Such beliefs as that of the sins of the fathers being visited upon the sons, and "With Adam's fall we sinned us all," are remembered examples of endeavors to explain the misfortunes of the virtuous man.
It was suspected, too, that evil spirits or ghosts might try to lure men away from the good God by various temptations; or, because of his personal goodness might afflict him out of spite. This became a popular notion, and one that was to be complicated by the further involvement that the God himself might tempt his children, to discover how true they were in their devotion. Saints wrestling with Satan, and Job plagued with boils are illustrative of these viewpoints.
From primitive man's floundering about trying to fit the facts of his living into the structure of his beliefs came some of the world's most unpleasant and unconvincing religious doctrines.
We have to appreciate the spiritual problems of half-civilized mankind: Man obeyed his God, and suffered; he disobeyed his God, and suffered; he made offerings to his God, and still he suffered; or if he sold his soul to evil spirits, even then he suffered. Regardless of everything he suffered, he sickened and he died. Is it to be wondered at that in the end he decided that God wanted him to be miserable, and that there was something very wicked in being happy or comfortable?
In this state of things there was no rest for the mind, and the ancient pressed on miserably in search of some liveable code. He had reached the inquiring stage by now, and the after-death condition of the soul began to intrigue his mind.
As late as Homer, ninth century B. C., the Greeks believed that the departed dwelt forever in a gray shadow-land, so that the poorest living mortal was more fortunate than the most illustrious dead. But, it seemed obvious that God must live somewhere, and since he was invisible, his house must be invisible also; and so the invisible hut of the good God marked the beginning of our conception of the other world. These were days when greatness was measured in strength, skill, and physical possessions. God resided in the best hut, had the finest cattle, and the most desirable slaves -- was not God the mighty chieftain above all chieftains? So, heaven came into being.
The Valhalla of the strong, it was adorned always in the best, in terms of the things most desirable to men, as witness when gold was introduced as the symbol of wealth, heaven was promptly paved with it.
Heaven became the great escape for poor suffering mortals who had no peace in this world -- But that puts us ahead of our story, for
the Medicine Man came before theology had set itself in the doctrine of terrestrial misery and celestial bliss. He belonged to that pagan order of things that held to the belief in joy and in living the full life; he was not one to moralize too deeply about the origin of disease. He did believe in the good God, and in his simple way he came much closer to a sufficient natural religion than those who were to deeply involve themselves in theological complications. He was never influenced by the conception that mankind was so wicked that it stood in constant need of salvation; and he was so respectful of the various religious beliefs of his neighbors that he could not be agitated by such questions as which of several faiths was the most inspired. What he knew was, his faith was suitable to him; he assumed that others had the same sense of security.
RELIGIOUS BELIEFS AND THE GOOD SPIRITIt is not possible here to discuss fully the various Indian beliefs, for these were distributed among the many tribes and nations. But it may be said that
most of the American Indians believed in one God, or Great Spirit, who communicated with his children through the visions and dreams of the priests, and sometimes through those of the laity.After death the soul might go to some Happy Land, or, as in the words of Chief Seattle: "When the last Red Man shall have perished from the earth and his memory among the white man shall have become a myth, these shores will swarm with the invisible dead of my tribe." Some Indians believed that the spirits of the departed remained among the living to serve and protect them in time of need.
To the Witch Doctor all spirits were evil, but the Medicine Man regarded most spirits as good.The Medicine Man brought forward many of the practices and beliefs of the Witch Doctor, but in every case with refinements and a marked improvement in the mental outlook. The mask, the rattle, and the drum remained, but all these implements were now parts of an integrated religious viewpoint. In some sections of the country the Medicine Men still had to fight the wizards and the witches, but these adherents to Black Magic had lost caste and were ostracized by the respectable. Rites changed into rituals as the magical ceremonies were explained in terms of religious symbolism. Every song and dance took on a definite meaning, one understandable in the light of tribal tradition. The spiritual leader was now entering into the time of his leadership.
As priest he became the servant of his God, doing the will of the Great Spirit as revealed through an inner communion.
The Medicine Man still sought his God in the old magical way, through dreams, visions, and trances. Most great leaders of the Indian nations from Hiawatha to Geronimo gained their strength from visions, for on occasion these might come to those who were not actually priests. The celebrated warrior Crazy Horse had a spirit experience in his younger days, and it is known that because of this he believed that he could never be slain in battle; and he was not. His death was brought about by treachery, under a flag of truce.
During the Custer wars when one Medicine Man rode up to the American soldiers they fired several volleys at him from a distance of less than a hundred feet; but neither the Indian nor his horse was touched. When the magician returned to his own warriors he shook a number of bullets from his war shirt.
Some tribes, like the Ojibway, required long periods of special training for those who would be medicine priests; but it was more usual for the youth to select the career himself and then rise to fame and authority by virtue of his powers alone. In a few cases the gifts of the spirit have been regarded as hereditary or prenatal. Men too have been called by their visions late in life; but usually the visions began in childhood, and by the time the boy was twelve or thirteen years of age it was the common knowledge of the tribe that he would be a priest. Sometimes he studied with older Medicine Men, but this was not necessary as the visions taught him all the things that he should know.
The finest book that has come to my attention on the subject of the mystical experiences of a Medicine Man is Black Elk Speaks, the life story of a Holy Man of the Ogalala Sioux. The work is autobiographical, and was given through an interpreter to John G. Neihardt.
Black Elk's great vision came to him when he was nine; the experience required twelve days, and during that entire time his body was lying in a deep coma, and his life was despaired of. He remembered that on his return from the spirit world, he saw his own body lying in the tepee, and as he came near to put on his body again, someone was saying, "The boy is coming to; you had better give him some water."
Many years later Black Elk was part of a troupe of Indians taken to Europe on a theatrical venture. While on the other side of the Big Water, this priest made a spirit journey to visit his parents on their reservation. This mysterious trip required three days, and during that time his body was in a deep trance and it was difficult to detect any breathing. These accounts may sound extravagant, but the Indian is a truthful man, especially in the matters of his religion.
The mystical experiences described by the Medicine Men, when they will speak of such things -- which is not often because of the ridicule with which such theories are received by most whites -- are identical with those recorded among other nations which have developed elaborate occult traditions.
The Indian mystics can see auras about the bodies of persons, can enter and leave their own bodies at will, can travel long distances in their spirit shapes, can converse with the dead and help them to find their way in the other world, can meet the fathers and grandfathers of their tribes who have gone long before, can see the future in clouds, can describe words as flames of light coming from men's mouths, can feel themselves possessed by spirits and intelligences, and can understand the languages of animals and birds.It is important at this point to realize that most of the Medicine Men cannot speak any language but the tribal dialect of their people. It is not possible for them to have studied the metaphysical systems of India, China, or Egypt. It is more than interesting therefore, that they should describe their occult power in exactly the same way as do these other, far separated races.
If there are genuine occult phenomena anywhere in the world they are present with the Medicine Men of the American Indians.
MASTERS OF HYPNOSISThese priest-seers are also masters of hypnosis and mental suggestion; modern scientists have acknowledged their excellency, and there is everything to indicate that in their knowledge of the suggestive arts they are far ahead of the white man. In Medicine and Mankind, Eugene H. Pool, M. D., President of the New York Academy of Medicine, describes a medicine sing he attended which was given for the benefit of a young girl suffering from an advanced case of tuberculosis. "At the completion of the sing," he writes, "I said to the medicine man that I thought he worked much harder for his fee than I usually did. With a genial smile and a pat on my back he responded that he did his patient a lot more good, too. Perhaps he was right."
In the same book Dr. Pool also pays tribute to the Indian knowledge of suggestive therapy, in these words:
"They have used hypnotism and suggestive treatment far more effectively than we have, and quackery is now no more prevalent among them than with us. They have so combined religion and medical practice that both are respected among them and both are respectable."The modern physician of course has far greater knowledge of anatomy, physiology, and chemistry than the Indian, but the red man excels him in all the metaphysical aspects of the healing arts. Furthermore, the Medicine Man in most cases has been given his healing formulas in his visions, which may mean a great deal in the final consideration of the cure achieved. From any standpoint the subject is strange and fascinating, and will sometime mean a great deal to the non-Indian doctor in his search for medical truths.
It was my good fortune, some years ago, to see a fire-eating ceremony given by the California Indians. This was in no sense of the word a theatrical performance; it was put on by the tribe solely for religious purposes. A large heap of coals was prepared in advance, and an important Medicine Man came in from the desert to preside. After prayers and chanting that lasted well into the evening, the priest led his followers to the coals, and kicking the embers loose with his foot, he picked up a glowing coal with his hands and put it in his mouth. The others followed his lead, and soon a dozen or more were dancing about with the glow of the coals in their mouths showing weirdly through their cheeks in the darkness. The excitement spread to Indians who had gathered to see the ritual, and in a few minutes men, women, and children were holding the coals in their mouths. When the embers ceased to glow, the Indians spat them out and selected new pieces. Among the participating fire eaters were two men with badges that showed they were reservation police, but
the ceremony was otherwise given in great secrecy because of the violent opposition of church missionaries.This ceremony belongs to the same general type as the famous Fiji Island fire-walking rites. In the Fiji ritual a long trench is dug and fires are burned in it for several days to make ready a bed of coals about six feet in width and from twenty to thirty feet in length. The heat is so great that it is impossible to approach the sides of the trench nearer than ten feet. The fire-walkers, after special preparation and sanctification, step into the fire pit and slowly walk the entire length. An occasional fire-walker will carry in his hand a piece of raw meat. When he has finished the fiery journey the meat is burned to a crisp; but neither the native nor his white body cloth is injured in any way. Examination of the bare feet of the fire-walkers fails to show even the slightest sign of scorching or blistering, yet the heat in the pit may exceed 2,000 degrees Fahrenheit.
If the power of the mind can prevent a man from being destroyed by such heat, it is time that the subject was given consideration in a much more useful way than merely as a study of personality complexes. To dismiss such miracles by the statement that they are the result of mass hypnosis, and that the audience only 'thinks' that it sees the fire-eating or the fire-walking, is a ridiculous evasion of the observable and provable in the actual happenings. Nor can these native rituals be compared with modern theatrical performances whose wonders are accomplished with the aid of advanced chemical knowledge and devices.
A remarkable Medicine Man on the Blackfoot Indian Reservation at Gleichen, Alberta, has been described by Chief Buffalo Child Long Lance.
The name of this mystic was Wolf Head; in 1928 he was still alive at the age of eighty-three years. Chief Long Lance writes: "That Wolf Head has a unique power that is unexplainable even to a highly educated white man is admitted by the present Blackfoot Indian Agent, George H. Gooderham, a graduate of Toronto University, a white man who was born among the Indians and has no queer notions about what they can, or cannot do."
Wolf Head gained his medicine powers when struck by lightning at the age of seventeen, and the mystic faculties remained with him until he was converted to the Christian faith; then the visions ceased entirely. His most remarkable exploit involves Archdeacon Tims, a missionary to the Indians, who invented a method of writing the Blackfoot language. Wolf Head's spirit guide was called Boy Thunder, and one night this spirit appeared and taught the Medicine Man to write the Archdeacon's characters. The next morning the Indian priest amazed the entire tribe, and especially the Archdeacon, who had tried in vain to teach his system, by writing the new symbols perfectly without having had any normal way of learning them.
THE INDIAN HOPE OF THE MESSIAHAbout 1888, a mystical Messiah doctrine, based largely upon visions and metaphysical experiences, spread rapidly among the Plains Indians from Missouri to the Rocky Mountains. The prophet of this new dispensation was Wovoka, a young Paiute Indian, whose seership arose as he was lying dangerously ill with a fever. An eclipse took place, and during the eclipse Wovoka was in contact with a strange power: He believed that he had been taken into the Spirit World, there to be given a direct revelation by the God of the Indian peoples. Songs and dances being an important part of the new faith, the sect is often referred to as the cult of the Ghost Dance. According to Stanley Vestal, in Sitting Bull:
"The Ghost Dance was entirely Christian, except for the difference in rituals."
During the great Ghost Dance, given in September, 1890, an Arapaho thaumaturgist named Sitting Bull (not the famous Sioux Medicine Man) performed hypnotisms with the aid of an eagle feather. The miracle worker waved this feather slowly before the eyes of the assembled subjects, speaking strange words in a slow measured tone. In a few moments definite hypnotism resulted, eyes became set and glassy, bodies grew rigid, and the Indians fell to the ground in complete coma or trance. They remained in this condition for varying lengths of time. Sitting Bull warned against disturbing the entranced persons: they were seeing visions and conversing with the spirits. From the details of this account it is evident that this important leader of the Ghost cult was using methods for producing trance in no way essentially different from those employed by psychologists fifty years later.
Although the purposes of the Ghost Dance were entirely peaceful; and the sect was dedicated to nonresistance and brotherly love, the American government was determined to prevent the spread of the movement. The government attitude climaxed in the Massacre of Wounded Knee, when 370 Indians, who had just surrendered their arms, were slaughtered in cold blood by Hotchkiss guns. The dead included 250 women and children. Thus was ended the Indian hope of the Messiah who was to right the wrongs of the red man and bring peace to the nations.
SITTING BULL AND THE MIRACLESAmong the most celebrated of the Medicine Priests of the American Indians was
the other Sitting Bull. He was the Medicine Chief of the Hunkpapa Sioux.
Father Beede, who spent the greater part of his life among the Sioux, spoke their language and knew most of their leaders, who was finally converted to their religion and initiated into their Sacred Medicine Lodge, is authority for the statement that Sitting Bull was baptized into the Roman Catholic faith. If this is true, he was probably baptized in 1868 by Father Pierre Jean De Smet.
Stanley Vestal doubts the baptism, but mentions in Sitting Bull that Father De Smet "gave Sitting Bull a crucifix of brass and wood, which remains a treasured possession in the family. It may be seen on his breast in a well-known photograph of the Chief by D. F. Barry -- the one in which he wears a white buckskin shirt and a single feather in his hair."
On this point, Father (later lawyer) Beede adds: "I have it on good authority that Sitting Bull not infrequently prayed to Jesus, and that he spoke of St. Mary as a human incarnation of the mystical 'Mother' whom all old-time Dakotas were taught to adore."
The Reverend Father Beede's estimation of the metaphysical powers of Sitting Bull is a delightful record of personal struggle with his own mind to reconcile miraculous acts with the fixation he had acquired in years of devotion to the Catholic faith. In Sitting Bull-Custer he remarks:
"Sitting Bull, I think, did possess unusual powers in the heathen oracular divination. My sense of truth requires this statement. I study his well attested words and acts in the light of which I myself have seen among Indians. At times his soul seemed to leave his body in part, while his body became somewhat rigid, and traveled far away to regions where he beheld the movements of men and heard their thoughts as if they were speaking them in words. Difference of language seems to have been no impediment. Besides such an experience as this, there are many other things, including the foretelling of future events, which I can account for only on the ground that miracles of power and miracles of glory are allowed to occur among the heathen as well as among Christians. And I am inclined to think that such miracles occur more frequently among the heathen. In their lack of the one ever perpetuated miracle of grace, they have more painful need of other miracles. The power of Deity is not restricted."
Sitting Bull's name is most often associated with the surprise and annihilation of General Custer's troop at the Battle of the Little Big Horn River. According to James McLaughlin, in My Friend the Indian, Sitting Bull at the time was in the hills "making medicine," and his accurate foretelling of the battle enabled him "to come out of the affair with higher honors than he possessed when he went into it."
It is said that Sitting Bull never discussed the Custer incident with any white man, but among his own people he spoke more freely, and we have a most impressive account of how this great Indian seer went at night to the battlefield and sought out the body of Custer. He made medicine beside the body, and the spirit of the dead general appeared to him, and they conversed together.
It was then that Custer warned Sitting Bull that he would die by the treachery of the whites, in fifteen years. After the ghost of Custer had vanished, Sitting Bull covered the face of the dead officer with a silk handkerchief that "Long Hair" himself had once presented to the medicine chief. The details of this story are in Sitting Bull-Custer, by A. McG. Beede.
Sitting Bull remembered this warning; several times he mentioned it to his fellow tribesmen. The fulfillment was as startling as the circumstances of the prophecy. Fourteen years and about seven months later Sitting Bull was assassinated by agents of the government at Standing Rock. At the time of the murder Sitting Bull was not on the warpath; he was peacefully sleeping in his cabin. An order was issued for his arrest, then the affair was so arranged that it was almost certain that the Chief could not be taken alive.
Indians have claimed that the ghost of Sitting Bull has appeared on several occasions. On December 18th, 1890, three days after his death, the spirit of the great chief appeared to the Two Kettle Sioux in the hills by the Bad River. The story was told by Tom Hetlund two days later. He said. "Night before last some Indians were returning from a little social gathering when a sight met their eyes that chilled them to the bone. One of their number directed attention to the top of a bluff and there stood a figure in white perfectly motionless. Suddenly one of them cried out in Sioux: 'It's Sitting Bull!' ... The phantom suddenly commenced waving an arm as if motioning them to follow, and with the speed of a bird glided from hill top to hill top, finally disappearing in the direction of the Bad Lands."
It seems possible that the great Ghost Dance at Wounded Knee, that resulted in the terrible massacre, was directly connected with the incident of the appearance of the spirit of Sitting Bull. Among the Sioux he remains, to this day, a name to conjure with.
HOLY MEN OF MEDICINESince the establishment of the Indian reservations the Medicine Men have for the most part remained to themselves; they seldom hang about the towns as do other Indians. Nor do they depend upon their powers for a livelihood, but engage in some occupation common to their tribe, such as farming, cattle raising, or sheep herding. The American Indian priesthoods were not celibate orders, and many of the Medicine Men married and had families. In some instances, as among other nations, the holy men have chosen to remain single and devote their lives wholly to prayer and meditation. Medicine Men seldom interfere openly in the government of their people, but in other ways they exercise a very considerable influence in the composite life of the tribe.
The Indians of the Southwest present interesting problems to those interested in metaphysical healing. Many of their pueblos have been inhabited for hundreds of years. Community life for many generations moulded the consciousness of the tribe, and it naturally follows that problems of social adjustment -- the simple lessons learned by centuries of intimate living -- color the religions and philosophies of these old town dwellers.
It has been observed that whenever men live together in close and permanent association they come in the end to fear each other more than they fear gods or demons. And so, as might be expected,
witchcraft is regarded by the pueblo Indians as a principal cause of disease. Although demons and evil spirits are recognized as secondary causes of sickness, it is generally accepted that these malignant agencies have been set in motion by witches, or by witchcraft.
For example, disease may be caused by a wizard 'shooting' some foreign substance into the body of a person who has incurred the animosity of the sorcerer. The stuff shot into the victim may be small pebbles, bits of hair, sticks, or pieces of metal. The shooting is done by magic, and the unfortunate victim does not know that he has been so attacked until pain arises in the part affected.
The Medicine Man's search for the foreign substance is made with the aid of a magic eye, a bit of crystal or glass through which he looks as he examines the patient.
This experiment in pain-hunting has been tried upon white men and women, and in several cases these experimental patients have admitted that the Medicine Man, although told nothing, located the exact place where the pain was the worst.
Having discovered the place where the witch-shot entered, the next step is removal of the evil thing. The mystic healer places his mouth over the center of pain, sucks out the poisonous object. This he shows to the patient and then causes it to be thrown away or destroyed. The sick man immediately feels the improvement and the cure follows.
This seems to be a very literal application of the Hippocratic theory that disease is due to the presence in the body of some foreign substance. Unbelievers say that by sleight of hand the Medicine Man puts the pebbles, or other materials, in his mouth in advance of the treatment; if this is so, it is done so cleverly that such fraud is rarely discovered.
Accidents, in which no magical element is suspected, are treated in the same way. A boy, studying in a United States Indian School, slipped one day on a gravel path and received a most painful injury to his knee. Ordinary methods of treatment did little good and it was feared that the youth might be permanently crippled. In time, the boy, limping badly and in great pain, returned to his reservation, and his parents called in a Medicine Man. The healer diagnosed the trouble: a number of pieces of gravel from the path were still in the knee. These he proceeded to suck out, to the number of nine or ten, showing them to the boy and his parents. The knee improved immediately. The youth was soon back in school, completely healed.
In Oklahoma thirty years ago there was a famous Cherokee healer named Charlie Hughes. A ten year old boy was suffering from a very unpleasant bladder difficulty, and the white doctors were unable to do anything for him. In desperation his father finally sent for Hughes. The Medicine Man told the boy to strip to the waist, and while the lad was doing so, Hughes went to the fireplace and took a shovelfull of coals. He warmed his hands over these coals for some time and then placed his warm hands on the boy's back in the region of the kidneys. He rubbed the back softly, chanted some old healing melody, and then whistled a single note, which he repeated at considerable length. After some time he announced that he had finished and departed. His patient, now grown to healthy maturity, told me the story himself, and says that he has had no return of the trouble from that day to this -- more than thirty years.
Dr. Eugene Pool, already quoted, in Medicine and Mankind has this to say about these unusual Indian healers: "The leading doctor within my boyhood memory, in the district in which my parents settled, was an old Sioux medicine man, whose services were considered by the territorial government so valuable that when his tribe was removed to a reservation he was asked to remain with his white patients, among whom were my own parents. I am sure that much of the medicine I received as an infant and child was derived directly from the lore of this fine, learned, and much respected old man." This statement from the President of the New York Academy of Medicine should be of significance to those who would dismiss the Medicine Man as an untutored savage.
HEALING BY SAND-PAINTINGAmong the Navajo and Hopi tribes, an important place in metaphysical healing is given to sand-paintings, or dry-paintings. These are traditional designs relating to divine matters, or to the mythical history of the tribe, and are regarded as bringing special virtues to the sick for whom they are made. These paintings are destroyed as soon as the ceremonies are finished; the designs are perpetuated by memory alone.
Some years ago it was my privilege to have as a guest in Los Angeles, the late Hosteen Klah, a distinguished Navajo sand-painter and healer. He drew for me, with his own hands, twenty-six of the sand-painting designs on large sheets of cardboard, and through an interpreter described the symbols and their meanings. He told me that in his healing work he made the sand-paintings large enough for the sick person to sit, or be laid, upon them, as part of the medicine ceremonies. Hosteen Klah, a noble Indian with the face of a sage and the manner of a scholar, said with all simplicity that when the ceremony was over the patient got well.
Because of the great respect in which he was held by the Navajos,
Lorenzo Hubell was permitted to make a complete motion picture record of a Navajo healing ceremony. The film, made about fifteen years ago, has never been publicly exhibited, but it was my good fortune to see a special showing at the Laboratory of Anthropology, Santa Fe, New Mexico. Miss Mary C. Wheelright, an authority on Indian religions, made a few opening remarks and occasional comments.
The picture is most revealing, and shows the importance of the healing ceremonies in the life of the Navajo people. In the film, the principal Medicine Man is a cripple who appears to have suffered from infantile paralysis, for he has lost the use of his lower limbs. Known as "The Crawler," he was brought from a considerable distance to officiate at the rituals. Close views of this holy man's face showed a fine sensitive expression and a look of deep spiritual understanding. He used very little paraphernalia and depended largely upon the power of his own personality to win the confidence of his patients.
Several other famous Medicine Men assisted The Crawler in the depicted healing ceremony, which lasted nine days. Others prepared the great sand-painting which was the central part of the ritual. Miss Wheelright made the observation that most Medicine Men are very poor, in answer to the often made accusation that the rituals are intended for profit. No one can see this extraordinary picture without arriving at the firm conviction that everyone involved in the ceremony was utterly sincere and without any ulterior motive.
In a recent book, Sandpaintings of the Navajo Shooting Chant, the author pays the following tribute to the healing priests of the Navajos: "My acquaintance with numerous medicine-men, the light in their faces, the conviction in which they speak of their belief, all suffice to convince me that their devotion is genuine ... A fact that is incontrovertible is that, when discord or disease overtakes one of them, no matter how much power he has in his own right, he submits himself to the ministrations of his fellow Chanters with complete faith in their ability to relieve him."
If, as many would have us believe, the medicine priest is one who merely puts on a show for the sake of his own fame, or some reward he might hope to gain, surely he would be loath to trust his life to others of his kind. It is well-known that the reputable modern physician if he becomes ill, is often a bad patient. Is this because he knows his own symptoms too well? Or is it because he knows his fellow doctors too well? The Medicine Man has no such qualms; he takes his own medicine with perfect trust, because it is the wisdom of his people, given in ancient times by the gods of the tribe.
INTELLECTUAL BIRTH BY 'FLYING SEEDS'Some of the Dakota tribes have a most curious and interesting belief about the origin of their Medicine Men. Before birth into the material world these priests come into intellectual existence in the form of thistle-like 'flying seeds.' These seeds are wafted about in the invisible spirit-world by the four sacred winds, until they come at last to the abode of one of the orders of gods. Here the spirit-seeds are instructed in magic and medicine, and also in the chants, feasts, dances, and sacrificial rites. This is accomplished by the process of the seeds 'dreaming' of the gods.
When they have completed their training with one group of deities the spirit-seeds fly on to another, and so continue until they have mastered all heavenly knowledge. At last, perfected in wisdom, these flying seeds make a great journey, the length and breadth of the earth, carefully observing the characters and usages of all tribes. In this way the spirit-priest decides where he will be born; and having made this decision, he enters into one about to become a mother, and thus incarnates in human form.
When his earthly labors are over the Medicine Man returns to the abode of the gods whom he has selected to serve. Here he receives further inspiration and wisdom; and then, is born again as a mortal.
Four is the sacred number of the Indian, and the medicine priest may be born four times into the physical life. After that he returns to space, according to Gideon H. Pond, in Schoolcraft's Indian Tribes of the United States.
Description of the human spirit as a flying seed reveals an extraordinary grasp of metaphysical doctrine; and must have originated in clairvoyant examination of disembodied entities. Inclusion of the factor of metempsychosis (the passing of the soul at death into another body) also indicates that these Indians were aware of the oriental belief in a plurality of lives.
In a discussion of Medicine Men, it is to be remembered that women also fulfilled the various duties of the medicine cult. Medicine Women were held in equal esteem with the men, and became famous as spiritual leaders. The women frequently specialized in problems of childbirth. Like the Medicine Men, they combined magic and simple herbal remedies.
CONCLUSIONS OF THE MISINFORMED AND UNINFORMEDThe modern intellectual has considerable difficulty in accustoming his mind to the spiritistic beliefs of older peoples. Dominated by the intensely materialistic viewpoint which is the present fashion, most writers on Indian religion and healing having assumed that the miracles attributed to the Shamans are merely cunning impostures. The objections of the misinformed have been sustained by the uninformed; and oddly, the evidence is regarded as conclusive.
In the discrediting of pagan miracles, and so-called 'heathen' lore, missionaries have played quite a part. These pious men seldom lose an opportunity to disparage beliefs that differ from their own. In the past, and to a lesser degree in the present, the churches have been moulders of public opinion, and it may be accepted without question that most Christian religious organizations have convicted the Medicine Man of every imaginable fault from simple charlatanism to infernal necromancy.
A recent writer on the general subject of knowledge observes: When it is necessary to find an explanation for some difficult problem in natural phenomena, it is usually wisest to accept the simplest solution that will reasonably cover the elements of the matter. Now, it seems to me, if this method of reasoning is applied to the known accomplishments of the Indian Medicine Man, the simplest solution is to admit that he possesses psychic or mediumistic powers.
Civilized man has departed from the ways of nature into artificial habits of his own invention. He has surrounded himself with a material, economic, and industrial system which is no part of natural law; it is an ersatz structure ever threatening to collapse upon its inventors. The modern intellectual giant, hypnotized by the superstition that he is not superstitious, is burdened by groundless notions that any intelligent savage would laugh to scorn.
Nature, wise in all her ways, bestows upon her creations the knowledge necessary for their survival. Man, in the process of becoming civilized, has dammed up his instincts and impulses, and thus has lost his psychic bond with universal life. He will blunder along, falling from one conceit into another. It is in this way that nature, in the end, outwits the human error, for man after long suffering will come to realize that only by listening to the voice of nature can he survive. This discovery is Wisdom.
GUIDANCE THROUGH PRAYERWhen the Medicine Man goes out into the night, builds his vigil fire on the top of some lonely hill, sets his prayer sticks in a circle about him, and smokes his medicine pipe to the six directions, he is one humble human being seeking to know the way of the Great Mother of all that lives. He brings no boasted learning of his own; nor does he come to criticize and condemn. He is alone with the stars. Raising his outspread arms to the skies and the mountains he breathes the simple prayer of a lonely creation wandering, it knows not where, struggling it knows not why:
"Great Spirit, show us the way."How does a man dare to say that there is no answer to this prayer?Will the Old Mother who guides the birds and animals, and teaches them to care for their young, and to build the simple nests and dens of their kind, will she remain silent to the need of the noblest of her creatures?
Will the world move on majestically amidst the harmony of the spheres, and the old man reverently waiting by his vigil fire, listen in vain for the voice of his God?Has the skeptic ever waited and fasted for seven days in the wilderness, while the low breeze tosses the feathers on his prayer sticks. Has the contemporary white man ever sought his way of life in humble waiting, pouring forth all the love and devotion of his heart into the air, cold with the gray of the dawn? If he has not, then he has no right to say that the Indian's prayer is unanswered, for he does not know.
It is in these long hours of silent communion that the Medicine Man hears the voices of the spirits, feels the powers of the air moving through his body, sees the visions that guide his way, and gains the strength to lead his people according to the will of the Old Ones who sit in the Rainbow Lodge of the Sky and send their voices down the spirit road of the Milky Way.
Here the priest learns the secrets of the soul and its powers and develops the mystic sight that enables him to see the spirits that float in the ethers like the flying seeds of the thistle.
In his raptures the old man feels himself slowly leaving his body to climb with floating feet the pathway of stars that leads to the Great Medicine Lodge, where the Manitos sit in council, each smoking his long pipe.We cannot do these things that the old priests do, because we have not the faith of the simple Indian mystic. But have we any right to deny his powers, merely because we live in another way, one that has taken us far from the little path that leads to the vigil hill?
We have our religion, but it is not strong in our hearts, and our priests have not stayed close to the way of the old gods. Our ways are those of the jarring sect, the clash of creeds, the many roads that twist about in endless confusion. But the Indian Medicine Man has kept to that other little path that leads to the high place, he has climbed it many times, and at the top of his hill of prayer are the voices and the visions, the spirit guidance of his people.