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The Native American Church

Runt

Well-Known Member
“The root is of nearly medium size, sending forth no branches or leaves above the ground, but with a certain woolliness adhering to it on account of which it could not aptly be figured by me. It appears to be of a sweetish taste and moderately hot. Ground up and applied to painful joints, it is said to give relief. Wonderful properties are attributed to this root, if any faith can be given to what is commonly said among them on this point. It causes those devouring it to be able to foresee and to predict things."

These are the words that Dr. Francisco Hernández, personal physician to King Philip II of Spain, used to describe Peyote all the way back in the 1600s. Peyote use has a long-standing history, leading up to the founding of the Native American Church in the United States.

To understand how peyote came to be used in the United States by the Native American Church, we have to go back to ancient Mexico. According to a late 16th century Spanish historian, Fray Bernardino de Sahagún, Peyote may have been known and used by the Chichimeca and Toltec Indians almost 2,000 years before the arrival of the Europeans. More modern historians, however, that the Tarahumara Indians, living where Peyote abounded, were the first to discover its use and that it spread from them to the Cora, the Huichol, and other tribes. And Carl Lumholtz, a Danish ethnologist who did pioneer work among the Indians of Chihuahua, suggested that Peyote use is far older than 2,000 years. Recent archaeological evidence supports his claim, such as specimens of Peyote found in dry caves and rock shelters in Texas, that have been radiocarbon dated to 5,000 B.C.E.

Regardless of when it first began to be practiced, Peyote religion was firmly established by the time the Spanish arrived. The Spanish historian Fray Bernardino was one of the first to describe Peyote use. Observing the Chichimeca Peyote ceremonies, he commented, “Those who eat or drink it see visions either frightful or laughable. This intoxication lasts two or three days and then ceases. It is a common food of the Chichimeca, for it sustains them and gives them courage to fight and not feel fear nor hunger nor thirst. And they say that it protects them from all danger."

The Cora tribe was using Peyote as well by the time of the Spanish arrival. According to a missionary in Nayarit, the Cora would dance from five in the evening until seven in the morning. Ground up peyote would be available in tea form at the ceremonies and the participants would drink it to keep themselves from becoming weakened by long hours of nonstop dancing.

According to Fray Bernardino, the Teochichimecan Indians also used Peyote in their religious rituals. They would gather in the desert some three-hundred miles northeast of their homeland in western Mexico, sing all day and all night, cry, and use Peyote. The Teochichimecan ceremonies are believed to be reflected in modern Huichol Peyote rituals.

It is not surprising that Spanish Jesuits in Mexico condemned Peyote as “satanic trickery”. One seventeenth-century Jesuit reported that Peyote use was forbidden and punished with torture and death because it involved “heathan rituals and superstitions” and “diabolic fantasies”. People who used Peyote were placed in the same moral category as cannibals. Priests questioning new converts would ask, "Have you eaten the flesh of man? Have you eaten Peyote?" as if they were equivalent. Another priest, Padre Nidolas de Leon, similarly examined potential converts: "Art thou a soothsayer?“ he asked. “Dost thou foretell events by reading omens, interpreting dreams or by tracing circles and figures on water? Dost thou garnish with flower garlands the places where idols are kept? Dost thou suck the blood of others? Dost thou wander about at night, calling upon demons to help thee? Hast thou drunk Peyote or given it to others to drink, in order to discover secrets or to discover where stolen or lost articles were?"

Despite efforts to eliminate Peyote use, Peyote religion continued to spread. The Carrizo people, who once occupied the area that extends from Laredo to the Gulf of Mexico in what is now Texas, seem to have passed it on to their western neighbors, the Lipan Apache. In turn, the Lipan Apache began teaching Peyote religion to the Kiowa, Kiowa-Apache, and Comanche.

By the 1880s, Peyote had become an accepted remedy for social and spiritual ills among many different Oklahoma tribes. This period of development of Peyote Religion was accompanied by--and probably facilitated by-- cultural disintegration caused by the removal of Native Americans to reservations. Unable to practice their own religion and not quite willing to practice the religion of their conquerors, many Kiowa and Comanche Indians turned to Peyote as an alternative to both tribal and Christian religion.


Three men influenced the spread of Peyote Religion.

The first was John Wilson, a Caddo-Delaware man who was also a Ghost Dance leader. According to legend, Wilson went into the forest and ate large quantities of Peyote for 2 straight weeks. During these experiences he was taught holy songs by the Peyote. When he emerged from the forest he began preaching the Peyote Road.

The second man was Quanah Parker, a Comanche chief. According to legend, he became deathly ill, and the attempts by doctors and medicine men to cure him failed utterly. While lying in his tepee dying, a Tarahumara curandera visited and administered Peyote tea to him. After a few days Parker made a full recovery and devoted the rest of his life to spreading the teachings of Peyote. He brought Peyote religion to the Delaware, Caddo, Cheyenne, Arapaho, Ponca, Oto, Pawnee, Osage, and other tribes.

The third man was James Mooney, an archaeologist from the Smithsonian Institute. In 1891 he traveled to Oklahoma to participate in Peyote ceremonies and became convinced of the need to unite the Indians and protect their religious freedom. In 1918 he wrote the charter for the Native American Church.

Although the Native American Church has existed for nearly a century, there have been many efforts by both white Christians as well as Native American groups to put a stop to Peyote use. In 1940 the church was declared illegal by the Navajo Tribal Council, which saw it as a threat to Navajo culture and to Christianized Navajos. The church flourished underground, however, until 1967, when the tribe reversed its decision.

Laws banning Peyote were enacted in 11 Southwestern States. Three Kickapoo Indians were arrested in 1907. Although their punishments were not severe--each individual was fined $25--this action, and others, prompted courts to finally put an end to Peyote oppression in 1960. Yale McFate, an Arizonan Judge, ruled that Native Americans were guaranteed access to the peyote sacrament under First and Fourteenth amendment rights.




Works Cited


The Columbia Encyclopedia. “Native American Church.” The Columbia Encyclopedia Online. Sixth Edition. 2001-05. <http://www.bartleby.com/65/na/NatvAmCh. html>

Fikes, Jay. “A Brief History Of The Native American Church.” Council On Spiritual Practices. 1996. <http://www.csp.org/communities/docs/fikes-nac_history.html>

Schultes, Richard Evans and Albert Hoffman. “A Brief History Of Peyote”. Plants of the Gods - Their Sacred, Healing and Hallucinogenic Powers. 1992. <http://www. peyote.org/>
 
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