Jivaro Religion (ritual, soul, blood, experience, anthropology)

[Runt]

[A Note: The following is based off my notes on a lecture I heard in Anthropology class today. I don't know what my teacher's sources were, and thus cannot verify the accuracy of this information. However, I found the lecture interesting, and thought I'd share what I learned with you all. :)]

Jivaro Religion

Hallucinogens:

• Use 6 types of hallucinogens
• Believe that the state in which we live/exist is FALSE… the spirit world is the true reality, and drugs must be used to see past this illusionary world into the true world.
• All Jivaros use hallucinogens, ranging from the Tobacco Water used on a daily basis to the stronger hallucinogens used in ritual. Low-Alcoholic beer is also consumed by men, women, and children (possibly simply because the water is/was unclean to drink).
• Within a few days of birth Jivaro babies are given mild hallucinogens to help them see the real world. It is believed that they MUST be able to see truly in order to survive in the dangerous world.
• Older children are given slightly stronger hallucinogens when they misbehave, which shows them the reality upon which their parents base their authority.
• Even dogs are given hallucinogens, to help them hunt.

The Three Souls:

• The Jivaro perceive three types of souls.
  • True Soul: A Jivaro True Soul is born at the same time an individual is born. This soul resides in the blood of an individual, and therefore blood loss equates partial soul loss. When a Jivaro dies, this soul enters the spirit world and relives the entire life of the individual that it belonged to. After reliving this life, it becomes a forest demon.
  • Protecting Soul: Young boys must acquire protecting souls, which shield them from witchcraft. They acquire several over the course of a lifetime, which give the individual extra protection. To acquire this soul, a young Jivaro boy must go out into the forest for about five days. There, he fasts, drinking only tobacco water (which is mildly hallucinogenic), and waits for the soul to arrive. If he is successful, the soul will visit him at midnight one night. When this occurs, the moon and stars will disappear from the sky at midnight, and winds, thunder, and lightning will come. The boy must cling to a tree for dear life to overcome this storm. Then, he will see a vision of two animals—sometimes a jaguar and a cougar—that are fighting, rolling around in the forest floor, snarling. This is the protecting soul’s form. When it/they come within 20 to 30 feet of the boy, he must leave the protection of the tree, approach the beasts, and touch them. This takes much courage, and many boys have trouble doing it. Having done this, the boy is ready to return home. The next night the spirit comes to visit him in his home, and it settles in his chest. At that point, he is infused with an overwhelming desire to kill. Within a month or so he joins a killing raid (population control mechanism). Before the raid, all the men and boys tell one another about the visions they saw of their protecting souls. This quite possibly takes a while, since some of the men have multiple protecting souls, and thus multiple experiences to relate. This sharing of experiences works as a sort of strengthening and protecting spell, which helps them on their killing raid. They then go on the raid, and kill their enemies. After the raid, they must acquire more protecting souls (because the power of the old ones is diminished?)
  • Avenging Soul: (Must possess a Protecting Soul to have). When an individual is killed (such as in a killing raid) their avenging soul leaves through the mouth and proceeds to try to kill their murderer. Because the Jivaro engaging in killing raids, it is important for them to come up with a mechanism to stop the avenging souls from coming after them. This is why the shrunken heads are made. Basically, when a Jivaro on a killing raid slays an enemy, it is his duty to make a shrunken head to stop the avenging soul from coming after him. To make the head, he basically cuts it off, removes the skull (throwing it into the river), boils the skin, fills it with hot stones to shrink it, and puts charcoal on the skin so that the avenging soul cannot see out of it (and thus cannot attack)

Shamanism:

• • Illness and death are both attributed to witchcraft. There are two types of shamans.
  • Bewitching: these are the shamans who make people sick.
  • Curing: these are the shamans who curse the sicknesses caused by the Bewitching Shamans.
  • To become a shaman, an individual must become an apprentice. The shaman he is apprenticed to will give him magical darts, which are kept in the body. If he keeps these darts within him for some time and does not engage in sex, he will become a curing shaman. If he immediately sends the darts out to attack someone, he will become a bewitching shaman.
  • A shaman must feed the darts to keep them. He feeds them tobacco water (mild hallucinogen).
  • If a dart hits a victim and passes through them, they will die. If it gets stuck in them, they will get ill. A curing shaman’s job is to remove the offending dart to make the victim well.

[Green Gaia]

This is South Amercian, right?

[Happy]

Cool and thank you for the post. It was interesting.

[Runt]

They're located in Eastern Ecuador.

[niceguy]

I had heard that they shrunk heads and basically how it was done but not why they do/did it. Their constant drug use was unknown as well. I am curioues of a lot of things so thanks for the info.