World Religions Report

Indigenous Religions

© Steve And Donna O’Meara/National Geographic/Getty Images

First Encounter

As it is for most visitors, your first stop in Hawaii is crowded Waikiki, on the island of Oahu. *

After four days of swimming, sightseeing, and viewing the sunsets, you fly to Maui for a few

days, and then on to the much less populated island of Hawai`i—called the Big Island by local

residents. From the airport in Hilo, you begin to drive upcountry, toward the little town of Volcano. The area around Hilo, on the rainy side of the island, resembles the tropical paradise of
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fantasy: the leaves of the trees are bright lime-colored flames, and the yards of the houses are

planted with vanda orchids and fragrant white-flowered plumeria trees.

• Note: The ‘okina (glottal stop mark) is used throughout this book in the spelling of certain

Hawaiian words. It is indicated by a backward apostrophe.

As you drive inland and upward, lawns and homes yield to fields of beige grass and clusters of

dark brown rock. Banyan trees give way to small, silver-leaved ohia lehua bushes, as delicate

as their red flowers. Now you are closer to the volcanoes that are still producing the island. The

land here is raw and relatively new. You check into the old lava-rock hotel near the volcanic

crater and look forward to settling in for the night. After supper you listen to ukulele music in

front of the big fireplace in the lobby and watch a man and two women perform a slow hula for

the guests.

The next morning, after a good sleep, you walk out to the rim of the crater. You are a bit startled

by the steam rising through cracks and holes in the rock. You hike down a trail that leads to a

bed of old lava, passing yellow ginger and tiny wild purple orchids on the way. The lava in the

crater at this spot is dry; it crunches underfoot. Here and there you see stones wrapped in the

broad leaves of the ti plant and wonder why they’re there.

On the way back up the trail, you fall in step with a woman who explains that she was raised on

the Big Island but now lives on another island. She is here just for a few days, to visit the

volcano area and to see old friends. She tells you about Pele, the goddess of fire, whose place of

veneration is the volcano. “When I was young I learned that Pele came from the island of Kaua`i

to Maui, where she lived in Haleakala Crater before she moved to this island. Nowadays, people

here are mostly Buddhist or Christian, but they still respect Pele. I know a man who says Pele

once appeared to him. He told me she had long hair and was surrounded by fire. Other people

have seen her on the road. Pele gets a lot of offerings—mostly ti leaves and food. But when the

lava is flowing toward Hilo, people also bring out pork and gin,” the woman says with a laugh,

“and my friends tell me that the offerings work.”
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The lava, she explains, is active now at the other end of a series of craters, closer to the ocean.

She suggests that you drive to the lava flow before dark and adds, “Be sure to have good walking

shoes, as well as a flashlight in case it gets dark before you go back to your car. And don’t take

any lava rock away with you. They say it brings bad luck, you know.”

In midafternoon, you drive down the curving black asphalt road, past old lava flows, to the

highway near the ocean. You stop and park near the cars of other lava watchers and then begin

hiking with a few people across the fresh lava, toward the ocean. About half a mile in, you

encounter yellow caution strips and overhear an officer warning one man to stop. “Farther on it’s

just too dangerous. It looks solid on top, but you can slip through the crust.” You and the others

crowd up next to the barriers and see steam rising on the right up ahead. Through the rising

steam you glimpse a bright orange band of molten lava underneath the dry crust as the lava falls

into the ocean.

Sunset comes quickly, and even more people arrive, some with blankets around their shoulders.

As darkness falls, the flowing lava becomes more visible, and the steam takes on a reddish glow.

“Look over there,” someone says. In the distance a bright stream of orange lava slides down a

hill, a slow-motion waterfall of fire. You watch at least an hour as the sky becomes completely

dark. Now the only light comes from the flowing lava and a few flashlights. It is, you think, like

being present at the time of creation: this land is being born.

The next morning in the lobby you see the Hawaiian woman again. “Well, did you see Pele last

night?” she asks, smiling. You smile back. For the rest of your stay you wonder about Pele,

about what else might remain of native Hawaiian religion. Isn’t hula, you ask as you think back

over what you’ve read, an expression of Hawaiian beliefs? Why do people make offerings of ti

leaves? How much of the ancient religion lives on?

Discovering Indigenous Religions

The practice of native religions takes place throughout the world. Among the Ainu of far

northern Japan, the Inuit (Eskimo) of Canada, the aboriginal peoples of Australia, the Maori of

New Zealand, and the many indigenous peoples of Africa and the Americas, religious teachings

have been passed on primarily by word of mouth rather than through written texts. In some areas,

the ancient religious ways of traditional peoples may not be easily apparent, but certain

characteristics live on in local stories and customs.

There is no agreement on how to speak of these ancient religious ways. Various terms include

traditional, aboriginal, indigenous, tribal, nonliterate, primal, native, oral, and basic. Each term

is inadequate. For example, although the word native is used frequently in the Americas, that

term in Africa—with memories of colonial offices of native affairs—can be offensive. The

words oral and nonliterate describe correctly the fact that most indigenous religions were spread

without written texts. But there have been exceptions: the Mayans and Aztecs, for example, had

writing systems, and even many native religions without writing systems have had their sacred

stories and beliefs written down by scholars at some point. The distinction between oral religions

and others is also blurred by the fact that religions that have written texts are also, to a large

degree, transmitted orally—for example, through preaching, teaching, and chanting. The term

traditional would be suitable, except that all religions but the very newest have many traditional

elements. Some terms, such as primal and basic, may be viewed as derogatory (like the older

term primitive religions). The word indigenous has the advantage of being neutral in tone;

however, it means the same thing as native, except that it comes from Greek rather than Latin.

There is no easy solution. Although indigenous comes closest to capturing these ancient

religions, we will use several of the preceding terms interchangeably throughout the text.

Indigenous religions are found in every climate, from the tropical rain forest to the arctic tundra,

and some are far older than today’s dominant religions. Because most of them developed in

isolation from each other, there are major differences in their stories of creation and origin, in

their beliefs about the afterlife, in their marriage and funeral customs, and so on. In fact, there is

as much variation among indigenous religions as there is, for example, between Buddhism and

Christianity. In North America, for instance, there are several hundred Native American nations

and more than fifty Native American language groups. The variety among indigenous religious

traditions is stunning, and each religion deserves in-depth study. But because of the limitations of

space, this book must focus on shared elements; regrettably, we can barely touch on the many

differences. (You can complement your study of basic patterns by making your own study of a

native religion, especially one practiced now or in the past by the indigenous peoples of the area

in which you live.)

Past Obstacles to the Appreciation of Indigenous Religions

Up until the early part of the twentieth century, scholars focused more on religions that had

produced written texts than on those that expressed themselves through orally transmitted stories,

histories, and rituals. This lack of attention to oral religions may have been due in part to the

relative ease of studying religions with written records. Religions with written records don’t

necessarily require travel or physically arduous research. Moreover, when scholars have

mastered reading the necessary languages, they can study, translate, and teach the original

writings either at home or to students anywhere.

There has also been a bias toward text-based religions because of a misconception that they are

complex and that oral religions are simple. Greater research into oral religions, however, has

dispelled such notions of simplicity. Consider, for example, the sandpaintings of the Navajo

people and the ceremonies of which the paintings are a part. “In these ceremonies, which are

very complicated and intricate, sandpaintings are made and prayers recited. Sand-paintings are

impermanent paintings made of dried pulverized materials that depict the Holy People [gods]

and serve as a temporary altar. Over 800 forms of sandpaintings exist, each connected to a

specific chant and ceremony.” 1

Indigenous religions have, of course, created much that is permanent, and sometimes even

monumental. We have only to think of the Mayan pyramids in Yucatán and the great city of

Teotihuacán, near Mexico City. But native religions often express themselves in ways that have

less permanence: dance, masks, wood sculpture, paintings that utilize mineral and plant dyes,

tattoo, body painting, and memorized story and chant. Perhaps we have to begin to see these

transitory expressions of religious art as being equal in stature to more permanent sacred writings

and artistic creations. In speaking of African art, one scholar has called it the “indigenous

language of African belief and thought,” even saying that African art “provides a kind of

scripture of African religion.” 2 We also have to see that indigenous religions have sometimes

blended with more dominant religions. For example, elements of Mayan religion live on in the

Catholicism of Mexico and Guatemala, and elements of belief in nature gods live on in the

Buddhism of Myanmar (Burma). This blending has made the existence of indigenous religions

less obvious, but sometimes it has also made their continued existence possible.

The Modern Recovery of Indigenous Religions

We know about native religious traditions through the efforts of scholars from a number of

disciplines, particularly anthropology. One pioneer was Franz Boas (1858–1942), a professor at

Columbia University and curator at the American Museum of Natural History in New York.

Other notable contributors to this field include Bronislaw Malinowski (1884–1942), Raymond

Firth (1901–2002), Mary Douglas (1921–2007), and E. E. Evans-Pritchard (mentioned in

Chapter 1).
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These masked dancers in Papua New Guinea celebrate spirits of their ancestors.

© Fulvio Roiter/Corbis

The ecological movement has also made our study of indigenous religions more pressing.

Environmentalist David Suzuki argues that we must look to native peoples and religions for

insightful lessons in the relationship between human beings and nature. In his introduction to the

book Wisdom of the Elders, he writes that the earth is rapidly moving toward what he calls

“ecocrisis.” He quotes the ecologist Paul Ehrlich in saying that solutions will have to be “quasi-

religious.” Suzuki argues that “our problem is inherent in the way we perceive our relationship

with the rest of Nature and our role in the grand scheme of things. Harvard biologist E. O.

Wilson proposes that we foster biophilia, a love of life. He once told me, ‘We must rediscover

our kin, the other animals and plants with whom we share this planet.’” 3

Some of this interest derives, of course, from a sometimes romanticized view of native peoples

and their relationship with nature. We should recognize that some native peoples, such as the

Kwakiutl of the Pacific Northwest, have viewed nature as dangerously violent, and others have

seriously damaged their natural environment. Despite such cases, one finds in many indigenous

religions extraordinary sensitivity to the natural elements.

The development of photography and sound recording has helped the recovery of native

religious traditions. Photography captures native styles of life and allows them to be seen with a

certain immediacy. Ethnomusicology involves the recording of chants and the sounds of musical

instruments that might otherwise be lost. Gladys Reichard, a specialist who pioneered the study

of the ritual life of the Navajo (Diné), has written that chanters in the Navajo religion need to

memorize an “incalculable” number—that is, thousands—of songs. 4 The fact that listeners can

replay such recordings has no doubt added to the appreciation of this music.

Artists in many cultures, trying to go beyond their own limited artistic traditions, have found

inspiration in native wood sculpture, masks, drums, and textile design. Pablo Picasso (1881–

1973), for example, often spoke of the strong influence that African religious masks had on his

work. By the early 1900s, West African masks had found their way to Paris and the artists there.

A scholar describes the effect of one African work on several artists who were close friends.

“One piece… is a mask that had been given to Maurice Vlaminck in 1905. He records that
[André] Derain was ‘speechless’ and ‘stunned’ when he saw it, bought it from Vlaminck and in

turn showed it to Picasso and Matisse, who were also greatly affected by it.” 5 French artist Paul

Gauguin moved to Tahiti and the Marquesas to find and paint what he hoped was a fundamental

form of religion there, and some of his paintings allude to native Tahitian religious belief. 6

Gauguin thereby hoped to go beyond the limited views of his European background. The work of

such artists as Picasso and Gauguin helped to open eyes to the beauty produced by indigenous

religions.

In this old photo, we see women in Okinawa undergoing priestly initiation.

© Hitoshi Maeshiro/EPA/Newscom

Of course, the religious art of native peoples needs no authentication from outsiders. And

outsiders present a problem: they tend to treat native religious objects as purely secular works of

art, while people within an indigenous religious tradition do not make such a distinction.

Indigenous religions exist generally within holistic cultures, in which every object and act may

have religious meaning. Art, music, religion, and social behavior within such cultures can