Study Guide - Chapter 2

MC, matching, & short answer

Divination

Divination

The use of various techniques for gaining knowledge about an individual’s future or about the cause of a personal problem

Axis Mundi

The “center of the world”

Diviners

• Ritual practitioners of the African Yoruba religion

• Requires years of training

• Role usually passed from parent to child

Inktomi

• “Spider”

• Trickster of the Native American Lakota tribe

• Mediator between supernatural & human worlds

• Taught the first humans their ways & customs

• Its mistakes & errors of judgment offer important moral lessons for children

Esu

• An orisha & trickster of the African Yoruba religion

• Good & evil

• Mediates between heaven & earth

Quetzalcoatl

• The Toltec god of the Mesoamerican Aztec tradition

• Believed to have presided over a Golden Age of cultural brilliance

• Created & ordered the world, especially humans

• AKA the “Feathered Serpent”

• Invented the calendar

Sweat Lodge

• Utilized by Native American people throughout North America

• Used for ritual purification & cleansing of the body before someone goes on a vision quest

• Also used for the Sun Dance

Taboo

• A system of social ordering that dictates specific objects & activities used by the Australian Aborigines

• Are set aside for specific groups & are strictly forbidden to others

Religion

• Described as indigenous & “cosmic”

• Is fully recreated in the present through myths & rituals

Tenochtitlan

• Mesoamerican Aztecs lived here

• Now present-day Mexico City

• Designed to be the center of their world (AKA axis mundi)

Totem

A natural entity that symbolizes an individual or group & that has special significance for the religious life of that individual or religion

Trickster Figure (in general)

A mischievous supernatural being who tends to disrupt the normal course of life

Vision Quest

• An indigenous religious tradition of the Native Americans

• A means to seek spiritual power through an encounter with a guardian spirit or other medium, usually in the form of an animal or other natural entity

The Dreaming

• The foundation of Australian Aboriginal religion

• AKA Eternal Time of the Ancestors

• The world was originally formless

• Supernatural beings (Ancestors) emerged & roamed about the earth

  • Gave shape to the landscape & created various forms of life (including the first human beings)

  • When Ancestors had finished & departed from the earth, they left behind symbols of their presence in the form of natural landmarks, rock paintings, etc.

Orishas

• The many lesser, but still significant, deities of the African Yoruba worship

• Function as mediators, Olorun, & human beings

• Are sources of sacred power & can help or harm human beings depending on how rituals are designed

Sun Dance

• One of the Native Americans’ most important rituals

• Occurs at the beginning of summer

• A celebration of the new year

• In the past, also functioned as a preparation for the great annual bison hunt

• A sacred leader (a woman of outstanding moral character) presides over this ritual

• To prepare, all tribes must build a Sweat Lodge made from a cottonwood tree, which is where the ceremony is held

What is the purpose of the African Yoruba religion?

To maintain the balance between the human beings of earth & the gods & ancestors of heaven while guarding against evil deeds of sorcerers & witches

What is the spiritual essence of the Ancestors for the Australian Aborigines?

Various symbols left behind by them

What is the Mesoamerican Aztec’s understanding of the axis mundi?

Perceived spatial world as having 4 quadrants extending outward from the center of the universe

What is the African Yoruba’s belief about heaven?

• One of the 2 separated worlds

• The invisible home of the Gods & ancestors

Briefly explain Wakan Tanka.

• Great Spirit or the Great Mysterious

• Translated to “most sacred”

• Refers to 16 different deities of the Native American Lakota Tribe

For most indigenous religions, boundaries between human & supernatural realms are believed to be what?

Easily crossed over

Describe the role of religion in indigenous societies. What aspects do most indigenous religious traditions share?

• Generally originated with non-literate people

• Don’t depend on scriptures or written teachings

• Instead, depend on the transmission of oral material (myths or stories) from generation to generation

• Tend to belong to tribal people organized in small groups that dwell in villages

• Share totemism, taboo, the trickster figure, the vision quest, & the axis mundi

• The secular & sacred aren’t separate

• Constantly change → very adaptable

What is the purpose of Australian Aboriginal initiation rituals? Give a specific example of such a ritual & explain its symbolism.

• Awaken young people to the spiritual identity & redefine their social identity within the tribe

  • Bring about the symbolic death of childhood, which prepares for the spiritual rebirth that’s necessary for adulthood

• Wilyaru - the main initiation ritual

  • The dried blood that’s caked on the initiate serves to connect the boy symbolically with his relatives

  • The boy’s scars from the strikes symbolize death as well

Describe the concept of the axis mundi, & explain how it functions in the cosmology of the Native American & Mesoamerican Aztec traditions.

ESSAY QUESTION

• The “center of the world”

Native Americans

• The cottonwood tree used to construct the Sweat Lodge, as part of the Sun Dance, is the axis mundi

  • Serves as the connecting link between the earth & the heavens as well as represents the supreme being

  • Sweat Lodge is constructed of 28 poles, representing the 28 days of the lunar month, placed in a circle around the tree

  • The finished Sweat Lodge presents the universe with its 4 compass directions

Mesoamerican Aztecs

• Understood spatial world as having 4 quadrants extending outward from the center of the universe

  • Designed Tenochtitlan to be the center of their world

  • The point where the 4 directions met stood the Great Temple, known as the Serpent Mountain

• Also is the Feathered Serpent Pyramid