The myth of the “Eternal
Feminine” could give an illustration of an alternative societal model, in
my searches conveyed through deep insights aiming to spread out the knowledge
of Iroquoian culture and its political structure focused on women pivotal role
in every aspects of life. Citing the Goethe in the Faust: "The
Eternal feminine attracts us to the highest", reducing it to a gateway
of salvation, a way of redemption from suffering and evil, and not forgetting
the words of the Pope John Paul II that affirmed, “God is Father, and even
more, He is Mother”, born from Holy Mary, beyond the dogmas or legends about
her Virginity and Immaculate Conception, “the Quintessential Woman”, “the
mystic rose”, revealing the maternal face of the god of boundless love, in an
emphasis of the importance of women in society, blending spirituality with a
compelling sense of poetry, magic, enchantment, transfiguration and mystery.
An early discovery of this myth clamorously started, before Christ, since
the times of the Ancient Greeks and their way to hand down to posterity the
legends of many goddesses they worshipped, as Aphrodite, goddess of love,
beauty, desire and fleshy pleasure, Artemis, goddess of the hunt, the
wilderness, the animals, the forest and the moon, protectress of the virgins
and the births without pain, Athena, goddess of cleverness, peace and
military strategy, Demetra, goddess of the harvests and nutrition, and the way
they looked at them as a source that cannot be renounced bearing in mind their creative
and generating power and, for this reason, affecting collective
unconsciousness.
My essays mean to be an inspirational muse and a critical spectrum for
political debates about new institutional models. In the Iroquoian culture,
Gantowisas are the essential depositaries of the gifts allowed by our Universal
Spiritual Mother, giving us a clear explanation of the meaning of this
assumption, their necessary endorsement of responsibilities, their intrinsic
mission to feed, to spawn and to develop human gender and species.
The myth in question has assumed many faces: the sanctity of a
mother, the purity of a virgin, the fecundity of the earth and the womb, and
this wording, "eternal feminine" has been coined by Goethe to point
out the timeless, unchangeable essence of feminine appeal, highly appealing
because of her presumed divine origin, body and soul healing and her spiritual
powers. Thus, femininity intended as a specific and distinctive sign,
indicating a full array of qualities and skills, shrouding a wide multiplicity
of peculiar behaviors and attitudes, that doesn’t need to be hindered, as it
could be thought in a chauvinist mentality, behind a shelter, not being at all
fragile creatures, thus inferior ones, but that, on the contrary, can and have,
even more so, all the rights to effectively carry out any political, social,
ecclesiastical tasks. Out-of-the-box examples of historical embodiments of this
myth can be, i.e., Jeanne d’Arc[1], a religious
legendary figure and visionary warrior during the Hundred Years’ War, in the
XIII century, aspersing blood and death in the fight for liberation of France.
She represented the only example of a woman to be both condemned and canonized
as a Virgin Saint from Catholic Church, and that, following the example of his
Christian God, even arrived to martyrdom because of her beliefs.
It’s, thus, clear that Gantowisas can be included among feminist studies
and the work done by many feminist movements in North America, both Usa and
Canada, and in the world. On the other side of the ocean, we can’t forget
France Simone de Beauvoir, pioneer of the ’68 French movement, with her “The
Second Sex”[2], or “Le Deuxième Sexe”, whose literature
mainly concerned sex-gender biological distinction in the social and historical
stereotypes and that upturned the Sartre existentialist mantra[3], according which l’ésistence precede
l’essence, into a new feminist one, “One is not born but become a
woman”, “On naît pas femme, on le devient”, against all forms of
patriachalism and dependency from men, in favour of a social redemption, an
equal education and balanced role in relationships.
Another determinant element contributing to the history of female women
rights, has been Emmeline Pankhurst that, at the beginning of XX century,
founded the movement of the suffragettes to uphold the right
of vote for women in public elections, finally achieved.
It’s been mainly following this pathway that the author wants to turn her
interpretation of Iroquoian culture, mixing spirituality, legends, what can be
described as historical examples of possessed people, explaining what can be
meant as possess, with Gantowisas, that even descending their sacred powers
from Sky Woman, are perfectly rooted on planet Earth. What’s real and
what’s transcendence, imaginary in their powerful healings and mystic realms?
It’s evident how the power of mind and suggestions between thaumaturge and
patient, or on their own, have a regenerating power, and how it can be amped
up, galvanized in collective rites and ceremonies, between the shamanism and
the religiosity, in addition to the undeniable efficacy of natural
remedies in comparison with ordinary medicines. Solutions that have far
distanced the progress of modern traditional science and that have attracted
proselytes and caused many pilgrimages from all over the world.
Thus, it seems to be the broader comprehensive feminist philology to lie
into a disentanglement of the conflicting categories of sex, as proposed by
Europeans, to place it under the Haudenosaunee “balance” in the replication of
the Twinship principle, according which in Sky Epoch there were two outstanding
examples of bonded pairs: on one side, Sky woman and her mother Lynx,
symbolizing motherhood, and, on the other one, her and the two Twins,
symbolizing brotherhood. Both Twins were the creator of abundant life, as
well as their female elders before them[4].
My personal perspective dares to be quite transcendental too,
compelling myself to use a cross-cutting lens to substantially attract
the attention on the importance of the rights of women claims, often victims of
abuses, tortures and suffering sterility, metaphorically encompassing all sorts
of unproductiveness and unfruitfulness. These, in facts, although currently
protected and proclaimed by the international community standards all over the
world, are still hardly implemented in many contexts, without mentioning
the rights of Indigenous people that fortunately in Canada has had a better
treatment than in the USA or other parts of the world. My utmost desire has
been that of sheding light on what represents the inner essence of life, the
straight sensitivity residing in every human being, made of a right
balance game between its male and female components, and to widen the
perspective about what “Mother Nature”, Iroquoian culture and the mentality of
dialogue, openness and inclusiveness have to teach to all of us.
Gantowisas represents the propelling power that makes everything in society
work well, in harmony and in peace, from economics, essentially trade, to
politics, from the administration to legislation and justice, other than above
all in the smallest but closest existing societal nucleus, represented by
families.
She’s an active agent, not a passive victim; kinship is traced through the
female line; children are raised up and adopted by women; she owns the lands,
the crops and the longhouses, enjoys more privileges and greater freedom if
compared not only with other American Indian women, but also with the so-called
civilized nations. They run local Clan Mothers, hold all the lineage wampum,
nominations belts and titles, detain exclusive rights over naming and impeach
wrongdoers.
In the words of a Cheyenne saying, in fact, “A nation is not conquered
until the hearts of its women are on the ground”[6]. Although the European conquest of Native
America, Native women’s hearts are still
beating. Moreover, also in the male dominant Lakota believes, women have a high
status, not forgetting that for them the sun (Universal Father) and the Earth
(Universal Mother) were parental symbols of all organic life and the main
element of the Great Spirit: creation. Nevertheless, plains women were more
passive and dependent than Iroquois women and other matrifocal tribes[7].
The Sacred Hoop, or Medicine wheel, is another female
element, according which “life is a cycle and everything has its place in it”.
It represents the sacred circle of
life, its basic four directions, and their associated elements. Each
direction of the wheel offers its own lesson, color and animal spirit guide.
Animal totems serve as guardians or ambassadors of each of the directions[5].
The Sacred hoop and circular perspective encompass all it could be
considered as beauty, goodness and well-being in completeness, beyond any
Manichean partition considering what’s coming from a God as good and from a
Devil as evil, rejecting concepts as original sin, redemption, faith, heaven
and hell. The hoop is a field containing energy, in order to make it won’t be
dispersed, and that could gather in an indissoluble uniqueness the whole world,
including both physical and spiritual creatures. In this holistic –
biocentred American Indians vision all the parts are interconnected
according to the law of reciprocity. In Native Amerindian culture there’s a keen
sense of respect towards all forms of flora and fauna, not only as the main
mean of subsistence, but also in the belief that their preservation constitutes
the base for the longevity of the planet. The hoop is sacred to them because it
opens up the way of awareness. The shamans heal sick people by the use of what
are considered by European people just simply magic gifts, not special
medicines, through wizard powers in which are intrinsic a sort of “mystic
potence”.
The nature of Native minds is global-holistic for its ability to identify
themselves with all the complexities and to maintain these structures in
a dynamic equilibrium. He/she’s (God) is considered as just one of the
living human beings, not a divinity. Indians don’t conceive the conception
according which the being should be distributed along a
vertical-hierarchic scale, including a lower level for plants, an higher one
for animals and with humans at the top. All creatures are considered as
brothers and sisters, sons of the Great Mystery and Mother Earth. They don’t operate any dualistic partition
between what is spiritual and what is material, as both are seen and conceived
as expressions of the same reality. By the use of the sacred hoop,
they demonstrate how the Cosmogony works, how the laws of nature and the cosmos
rule all human beings, the mysteries of life and death, the mind and the
individuality of the Self[8].
The purpose of “The Great Law of Peace”, the oral Haudenausonee
Constitution, written on wampum belts, is to help us remembering the natural
laws of creation fundamentally derived from Sky Woman, the spirit that informs
equality and order other than beauty, health and goodness. In it is
recalled the Tree of Peace, or Tree of the Great Long Leaves, under which
the Council of Fire of the Confederacy of the Five Nations, can sit to discuss
their affairs. The Tree has four roots, the Great White Roots, one pointing at
north, one at the south, one at the east and finally one at the west,
symbolizing peace and strength. A certain numbers of shell (wampums) strings
are given to each of the female families in which the Lordship titles are
vested. In USA these strings represent the completeness of the union and
certify the pledge of the nations (Mowaks, Oneida, Tuscarora, Onondaga, Cayuga
and Seneca) that all formed, into a unique body, the Union of the Great Law.
They are also the symbol of the Council Fire. Moreover, the right of bestowing
the title is hereditary in the family of the females legally holding them and
the strings are considered the token that the females of the families have the
right of property. The women heirs of the Confederacy Lordship title are called
Royaneh (Noble) for all the time to come, and the Women of the Fifty Royaneh
Families shall be the heirs of the Authorized Names.
Wampum belts are
also used for storytelling. In these black lands surrounded by
rocks and cliffs, among the hills of god and spirits, brightened up by the
moon, they breath in the nature each day greater and greater sensations,
instilling in them an unsoundable poetry that they can’t refrain to unavoidably
transmit to the world. The used symbols narrated a story
in the oral tradition or spoken words. Since there was no written language,
wampum was a very important mean of keeping records and passing down stories to
the next generation, and were created to record treaties or historical
events. Wampum was durable and so could be carried over a long distance.
They were also used as money.
The greatest part
of Indian tradition is oral, although the European attempts to record and trace
it, and, as such, so unclassifiable and uncategorizable, becoming
for its fluidity and hard reachability, unlikely to be sifted through a
partisan or homologating critic. They are the outright free thinkers, unmindful
even of the use of pen, they don’t need. Even poetries and songs, often
onomatopoeic, move along the notes of nature. Even prayers, that they rattle
off as a breath, are free. Thoughts that go beyond the walls. They don’t know
repetitive novenas lo learn by heart or to brainwash themselves. The same sense
of freedom invests their dances, and the so called rituals, that are never identical
one another but are expression of a pure creative art form. They have given
origin to the highest form of religious apostasy: the denial of indoctrination.
In the excursus of the juridical Iroquois panorama could
be interested having an outlook on the main treaties binding them with Canada
Federal Government and the International Treaties about the rights of the
Indigenous people, minorities and women rights.
Furthermore, it could be interesting to analyze the fashion trends (the
quirky and closely tribal Iroquoian outfits, especially for women, with their
shawls, beads, furs, bangles and ethnic tailored costumes) and even more
their lifestyle, traditional music and folklore.
Iroquoian culture, music and dance are all
about celebration of life and thanksgiving to natural bless, brotherhood with
all human beings and flora and fauna species, whose mimic and recalling is
interpreted and somehow imitated bringing with them a sense of fusion and
belonging to the land. Furthermore, they are sensitive about the impact dance
movements can have on animals and their relationships with other people and the
environment, the landscapes watching. American
Indians see all creatures as relatives, as we all were the same children of a
unique Mother, and as necessary they feel to be parts of an ordered balanced
life, in a continuous search for the being fullness and completeness.
Perceiving reality in a different way than common intended societies,
conceiving time as a transcendental subsequence of Epochs, departing from the
fall of Sky Woman on the Earth, if compared with its Roman Catholic
measurement, that could seem not easily definable and not specifically
quantifiable, they believe instead in something cyclical, they worship
everything is rounded, spherical, rejecting linearity and In force of that,
stemming from this circular, dynamic concept of universe in which all things
are related and belongs to only one family, each song and ceremony tells the
Indians that any creature is part of a whole and that all these parts are
intertwined one another by virtue of their integral and effective
participation. The healing chants and rituals are intense invocations of the
restoration of wholeness and harmony, against the breakouts, splittings and
derangements that can cause diseases and sickness. “Beauty is wholeness. Health
is wholeness. Goodness is wholeness. And they are symbolized in the sacred
hoop, which, not coincidentally, is a female symbol” as “life is a cycle and
everything has its place in it”.
The role of woman, essentially emphasized
and epitomized for being a life-giver, is associated with the springtime of the
community.
American Indians firmly believe that spiritual
relationships are much more stronger and tightening than any others, and these
strengthen blood ties, other than friendship and feeling of universal
brotherhood. Hence, the awareness derives first and foremost from the
relationship and dialogue with the Spirit, that joins the discrepancies, mends
the scratches and puts in harmony the bodies with the souls, not only healing
but unleashing a sense of lightness and freedom and instilling that impalpable
sense of joy allotting them to ride the wave of original and creative
rhythmical dances and to compose sounds that float them on the magical
enchantment of pleasure, caressing the fluidity of the fusion. All that can be
called as spirits or gods or metaphysical, occult forces inform in these little
corners of the world, often forgotten, every aspects of the institutional
frameworks and structures, interpersonal relationships, economy management and
policy making other than habits and commitments of people, nowadays as in the
past, since the mists of times.
Music and dance are especially intertwined with the elements of nature,
especially that of the animals (birds, like robins, and fishes –fish dance) to
underline the tie between heaven, land and water with the Universal Spirit.
They take place in “powwows”, social gatherings that showcase aboriginal
displays, food and crafts on reserves and urban centers across Canada, after
the choice of the lead singer and musical treatment by the Clan Mother. The
recognized festivals are the Midwinter, The Maple of Sugar-making, The
Raspberry, the Strawberry, the Complanting, the Corn Hoeing Thanksgivings, The
Little Festival of Green Corn, The Great Festival of Ripe Corn and the complete
Thanksgiving for the Harvest.
These forms of art help celebrating, not only the gift of life, but also
health, friendship and good times. They are joyful occasion useful to reinforce
relationships also with non-native people. Iroquois songs has deserved serious
consideration for long time. The children of longhouse have persisted in
singing their old-time songs without much attention from white people and
we must thank the modern generations of Iroquois for their willingness to
put them in records.
What can be deduced undoubtedly is that it can’t be
eluded and passed beyond, the strong Indians bonds with their lands, they even
resemble into the colour of their skins and with which they feel to be as one,
from which they stretch out, to which they take on luxuriance and even
dirtiness, adaptability and steadiness and, finally, in which they are firmly
rooted…the natural elements they are able to be tuned in, with which they continuously
talk in infinite returning, circular dialogues that disclose the
mysteries of the awareness, from which they keep on learning erudite lessons,
always different and new, whose they can read out the signs and secret messages
guiding their deeds and addressing their thoughts, reshuffling their wittiness
and intuitivity, with the slightness of the wind and the acumen of the eagle…whispers
of nature echoing sentiments of universal god’s love they try to translate and
remark in forms of beauty and art, imprinting the structural model of their
society on this rudimental basic pattern.
[1] https://www.jeanne-darc.info
[2] S.
de Beauvoir, The Second Sex, Gallimard, 1949
[3] Existentialism
is a philosophical movement taking roots from Kierkegaard straightly believing
that, adversely to Aristotelian school of thought, it’s responsibility of each
individual to live authentically its own existence, independently from
circumstances.
[4] Mann.
B.A., Iroquoian Woman, Peter Lang, 2011, p.88-89
[5] Native American
Medicine Wheel Legends and Traditions (learnreligions.com)
[6] Collins
J., The Status of Native American Women: a study of the Lakota Sioux”; Herring,
Roger D. and Portman, Tarrell Awe Agahe. “Debunking the Pocahontas Paradox:
The Need for a Humanistic Perspective.” Journal of Humanistic Counseling,
Educating & Development. Fall 2001: 185-200; Allen, Paula Gunn, The
sacred hoop: recovering the feminine in American Indian traditions, Boston,
Beacon Press, 1986; Jaimes, Marie Annette. “Towards a new image of American
Indian women” , Journal of American Indian Education [online] Oct
1982.
[7] Matriarchal
Studies :: The Americas
[8] Minnella N., “Il sogno , il rito, l’estasi. Le vie del
peyote degli Indiani d’America”, Massari Editore, 1998
