The Navajos form the largest Indian tribe within the United States. Their country stretches hundreds of square miles across northern New Mexico and Arizona. It is a land of arid, sage-studded wastes, awesome canyons, and rock-ribbed mountains. Scattered in secluded encampments and living in eight-sided, dome-roofed hogans, the Navajos get by tending flocks of sheep; making silver and turquoise jewelry, and brilliant-hued blankets; and growing corn, vegetables, and fruit trees in an occasional pocket where rainfall collects or a spring overflows.
Navajo religion, in terms of complexity and richness of ceremonialism, matches that of the neighboring Pueblos. Navajos seem to have borrowed, perfected, and incorporated into their own ritual patterns many aspects of supernaturalism belonging to the village Indians. Another thing worth mentioning is that Navajos were far away from the centers of Spanish settlement in colonial times, therefore were rarely troubled by Catholic friars. However, after 1870 they started to experience the inroads of American missionaries. Representatives of Protestant, Mormon, and Catholic groups competed against one another to attract the largest membership among the Indians. Although the missionaries have preached in Navajoland for a hundred years, their work can barely be considered a success. One needs to realize the fact that many aspects of Christianity are in direct contradiction to Navajo religious beliefs and taboos.
One thing that Christian teaching has not been able eliminate is the Navajos' fear of the dead and of ghosts, a dread that is close to a tribal phobia. In their belief, contact with the dead is considered to be the worst horror that can be experienced or imagined, that is why a great deal of ceremonial procedure is aimed at exorcising evil resulting from chance encounters with the bodies of the departed. Detailed taboos and ritual formulas are rigorously observed by all members of the tribe to counterbalance the harmful effects of an accidental brush with a ghost or witch or by tripping over a corpse. When seen in this light, it may be easily understood why the Navajos look with abhorrence upon a religion such as Christianity that portrayed its holy hero as a god risen from the dead.
Ghosts and witches appear in both Navajo religion and mythology, and since witches cause death through some kind of diabolic acts, they are treated with special revulsion. In Navajo teaching, the deities First Man, First Woman, and Coyote are responsible for introducing witchcraft. Leaving the Underworld the three of them went through different levels of the universe before reaching earth and wherever they when, they practiced witchcraft which made them very unpopular. In the Seventh World they came across Cat People who were witch themselves, but First Man humiliated them and claimed their evil power. When they reached the surface of the world, the deities saw the forebears of the Navajo living untrained and in total confusion and addicted to all shapes and forms of antisocial behavior. First Man and First Woman promised to provide them with stability and knowledge but, unfortunately, there is a price for everything under heaven. With such an organized world the Indians also had to accept witchcraft, disease and death.
More to follow soon.
One thing that Christian teaching has not been able eliminate is the Navajos' fear of the dead and of ghosts, a dread that is close to a tribal phobia. In their belief, contact with the dead is considered to be the worst horror that can be experienced or imagined, that is why a great deal of ceremonial procedure is aimed at exorcising evil resulting from chance encounters with the bodies of the departed. Detailed taboos and ritual formulas are rigorously observed by all members of the tribe to counterbalance the harmful effects of an accidental brush with a ghost or witch or by tripping over a corpse. When seen in this light, it may be easily understood why the Navajos look with abhorrence upon a religion such as Christianity that portrayed its holy hero as a god risen from the dead.
Ghosts and witches appear in both Navajo religion and mythology, and since witches cause death through some kind of diabolic acts, they are treated with special revulsion. In Navajo teaching, the deities First Man, First Woman, and Coyote are responsible for introducing witchcraft. Leaving the Underworld the three of them went through different levels of the universe before reaching earth and wherever they when, they practiced witchcraft which made them very unpopular. In the Seventh World they came across Cat People who were witch themselves, but First Man humiliated them and claimed their evil power. When they reached the surface of the world, the deities saw the forebears of the Navajo living untrained and in total confusion and addicted to all shapes and forms of antisocial behavior. First Man and First Woman promised to provide them with stability and knowledge but, unfortunately, there is a price for everything under heaven. With such an organized world the Indians also had to accept witchcraft, disease and death.
More to follow soon.
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