Flying with Shamans in Fairy Tales and Myths E-Book

Nana Nauwald

• Herausgeber: Books on Demand
• Kategorie: Fantasy und Science-Fiction
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2021

Seitenzahl: 252

Beschreibung

Full of exciting journeys through the shamanic worlds of many different cultures, Flying with Shamans in Fairy Tales and Myths is enchanting as well as instructive. In addition to an introduction to the world's shamanic beliefs, Nana Nauwald provides background information about the culture from which each fable comes. On this enchanting flight with the shamans, you'll learn about the three worlds, the world tree that connects them all, and the magical shape-shifting and healing powers of the she- and he-shaman. You'll journey through ancient Europe, Siberia, Japan, North and South America, discovering how the magic of human imagination conjures images that people in widely separate parts of the world hold in common. Fairy tales and myths until today are carrier of information about the knowledge of the interrelation of all life. By reading the reader is creating the world and happenings anew in her or his mind. In this book many "stars" contained in the rich pot of shamanic cultures are sparkling for you!

Leseprobe

Note from the author:

All stories in this book are retold or from copyright-free sources from the author's own collection.

"The World Tree" on page → is adapted from a story in Karl Kauter, Unter dem Weltenbaum (Berlin: Der Kinderbuchverlag, 1981), used by kind permission.

"The Tree of Dreams" on page → is adapted from Dietmar H. Melzer, Regenwaldmärchen (Friedrichshafen: Idime Verlag, 2000) used by kind permission.

All our legends are people's experiences.

These are true stories.

The myths of our ancestors are not fanciful stories or

lies. If people of our age believe that many of these

episodes are not true, it is only because they have less

concentrated life juices than the Elders from whom we

quote them.

The Greenland folk storyteller Oasarkak

The Sorcerer of the Les Trois Frères cave, Southern France.

16,000 years old

Contents

The Myth of the Origin of All Life

Hidden Knowledge

Tales of the First Shamans

The Swan Woman as Ancestor Mother of the Shamans

How the Raven Children Became Shamans

Tales of Traveling in the Worlds

Traveling in the Underworld

The Bear Hunters in the Underworld

The Call of the Birds

The Master of the Mountains

The Three Swans

About Traveling in the Middle World

The Flight of the Shaman

Tales of Traveling in the Upper World:

The Man Who Flew to the Upper World

The Man Who Went Searching for His Missing Wife

The King Vulture's Daughter

Tales of the World Tree

The World Tree

The Miracle Tree

Tales of Metamorphosis and Transformation

The Magic Gift of the Animals

The Red Finch Man

The Magical Doctor

A Woodpecker in Human Form

Tales of the Human Relation to Animals

The Roe Deer Man

The Young Reindeer

The Bear with the Human Heart

Fairy Tale of the Toad

The Heart of the Reindeer

Tales of Fire and Wind

The Genesis of the Winds

The Lord of the Winds

The Raven and His Sons-in-Law, the Winds

The Mistress of the Fire

Tales of the Magic Rattle and Shaman Drum

The Shaman Drum

The Seven-Drums Elder

The Magic Rattle of the First Shaman

Tales of Death and Initiation

The Juniper Tree

The Man Who Died Three Times

Fitcher's Bird

The Man Who Fell Asleep

Tales of Healing

The Tree of Dreams

The Man Who Smiled

Selected Bibliography to Shamanism

The Myth of the Origin of All Life

Many people rather not work with or think about the

intangible, and maybe that is why we still know so little

about the heavens and the earth,

of the origin humans and animals. Maybe, maybe not.

Because it is hard to fathom what will happen to us and

where we shall go once we are no longer alive, there is a

dark veil over all first beginnings and endings. How can we

learn more about the most impressive mystery that

surrounds us and keeps us alive, about all that we call air,

heaven, and sea, and the meaning of human life in all the

comers of the earth, as well as that of the animals, birds, and

fish in all the land, seas, and lakes?

No, no one can know anything for sure about the beginning

of all life. But those who have eyes and ears and remember

what the Elders tell us still have at their disposal some kind

of wisdom that can feed the hungry mind. That is why we

are always listening with open ears when someone tells us

about the experiences of passed generations. And through all

those ancient myths, which we keep alive from our

ancestors, the dead are talking. We communicate with all

sages from long ago. And we, who apparently know so little,

will listen willingly to them.

—Adapted from the storytelling of Inuit Apakak of the Noatak

River, written down by Knud Rasmussen

1. Hidden Knowledge

In times past, there lived in the North a shaman named

Nauja. Nauja wanted to shamanize in order to fly to the

land of the great tides. Suddenly, the drum jumped at

Nauja’s left big toe and attached its handle there with a

firm grip. The drum began droning ominously, its

drum-head shuddering. Suddenly it moved forward as

if seized by a giant force. While vehemently hissing and

rustling violently it took Nauja high into the air, all the

way through the smoke hole, and three times around

the house. He sang in complete ecstasy, still attached to

the drum. Nauja flew over the house, surrounded by a

shimmering rain of sparks.

—Nauja’s Flight to the Land of the Great Tides. Inuit myth

The inner and outer travels in the shaman’s worlds have been an important part of my life for more than thirty years. I have experienced wonderful things, heard incredible things, seen inexplicable things. I tried to understand, explain, and reason it all with my familiar thinking patterns for a long time. But this did not lead me to a real understanding of the living shamanism of indigenous peoples.

On one occasion, during a nightly healing ritual at the Rio Negro, it became clear to me that shamanism, in its varied ways, could be distilled into explanatory models, but in reality there is only one way to really grasp it: by personal, direct experience.

Shamanism, probably the most ancient art of structuring the worlds, is a way of experiencing. The art of experiencing is invariably connected with the person who is going through the experience. The cultural and personal heritage, the willingness and candor in letting oneself go with the flow of the spiritual life principles of the shamanistic culture, determine the profundity of the experience.

Although each ethnic group living with a shamanistic worldview has a unique shamanistic practice, all share, along with the shamanistic cultures of the past, the same basic worldview. The world structure is anchored in various layers, each with its own structure and life qualities, in the under-, middle and upper worlds. The passing of time is experienced as a rhythm of continuous renewal. Everything in existence has a soul, and is interwoven with all the visible and the invisible. Likewise, humans are also part of this living, ever-renewing and recreating fabric of life.

The keeper and renewer of the community’s knowledge and communication with the spiritual worlds is a person who has distinguished him- or herself through a special vocation or apprenticeship. This specially gifted person is still called a “shaman” (male or female) in Western usage, while each of the still-living shamanistic peoples has their own words in their language for these “exceptionally gifted people.”

The connection with the spiritual world of ancestors, plants, and elemental forces enables the shaman to work within his or her community, always dealing with the renewal of harmony within the individual, and accordingly within the whole community as well. Shamans regulate the relations between worlds, realities, and their expressions in life through their ways of communicating with visible and invisible forces. This ability is based on the mastery of deliberately shifting through consciousness and worlds, independent of our concepts of time and space, apart from the ego.

The modern reality of our Western society is miles away from this life determining concept of shamanism. And still— or because of this—the experiential knowledge of shamanism is increasingly drawing the attention of the medical professions, psychologists, therapists, artists, and spiritual seekers.

The occasions for this growing interest are manifold, but at the same time it boils down to one universal focus: the desire for a renewed contact with the original spiritual and cultural roots, the wish to reconnect with the “knowing of the Elders,” in which we do not standing apart from the universal life force, but participate in the bigger whole. This “timeless knowing of the Elders” is based on the understanding that all-that-is—visible or invisible—is related, and is affecting one another.

As a guest in communities that still keep this “knowing of the Elders” alive, I have heard incredible things in nightly storytelling circles: about shamans who were able to live under water, could change into animals, were able to travel in the world of the dead, heal the sick with their songs, and still many more miracles.

To be all ears entails an “imaging” listening, which does not only involve the ear, but is an experience through all senses. Listening brings both a premonition and an awakening of body memories that have always been there. This way, from the “incredible,” no faith, but a knowing, arises.

The experience of the living, shamanistic knowing in indigenous cultures of South America helped me to change and refine my filters of perception. I followed a rising passion and curiosity to search for correlations with this “knowing of the Elders” in our European cultures. Equipped with this new lens of conception, directed inwardly and outwardly, I discovered, in addition to references to early, shamanistic-oriented European cultures in archaeological findings, still living roots of these primeval times in the ancient heritage of fairy tales, covered with layers of dust from the ages and banished for the main part to the nursery room.

Some wind was blown through the dust, some adjustment was needed in the filters of perception—and see how, in the amply filled pot of fairy tales, many “stars” are twinkling with knowledge about the reality behind the “real world,” the “other world,” and the “world behind, above or beneath the world.”

Shamanistic wisdom doesn’t lie behind every fairy tale, but the magic stick in some fairy tales, even today, stands for the well-known shaman wand. The “sleep” of the fairy-tale hero can refer to an extraordinary state of consciousness, a “clairvoyant sleep,” enabling a meeting with “beings from the other side.” Hidden behind this is the knowledge that a “voyage of the soul” is possible, acquiring experiences that may lead to solving questions of the “waking reality.”

The helpful animals in fairy tales can indicate the spiritual animal helpers of the shamans. Human metamorphosis into an animal points to the gift of the shaman’s transformation. The motive of transformation— maturing by way of dying and reviving—is a way of describing the core of shamanistic aspiration, the ritual death as transformation process.

Amid the rich field of the spiritual heritage of fairy tales I would like to awaken the curiosity, the researcher’s mind, and the joy in those who are interested in shamanism and are searching for traces of the more or less hidden knowledge of the shamanistic heritage in order to be touched by it.

Fairy tales and myths are carriers of knowledge about correlations with structural frameworks of life philosophies through all ages since the beginning of language. For a long time, clever researchers of fairy tales have been able to read, decipher, and structure this information. One of these researchers who devoted himself especially to finding correlations between fairy tales and shamanism is Heino Gehrts in Germany. About the shamanistic contents of our fairy tales he wonders if the narrators of these fairy tales were aware of the fact that they contain hidden meanings and how long did they know it. He deduces that they knew it, as long as there still remained a consciousness of this second reality beyond their own of this fairy-tale world that is real to the shaman in his soul flight. This leads to the conclusion that our fairy tales were understood in their essence, up to the day when the last witch was burned. And that was not so very long ago. . . .

The especially “good stories” do not supply intellectual information to the listener or reader; they primarily appeal to his or her senses and emotions. Stories—in whatever way they are presented to us, as myths, fairy tales, legends, or folk stories—are interwoven into the listener’s actual reality through the oral legend. “Good stories” are more than just entertainment; for the listener, they open doors to a congruent atmosphere for “co-experiencing” that may lead to personal scopes of experience. The terms “fantasy” and “imagining” become less important when, during the listening process, there is a close encounter with the person’s own reality. Touching the versatility of the personal reality by means of “stories” not only causes the hero or heroine to jump into other worlds; the emotional touch of the narrated happening has the power of to make the reader or listener become part of the ever-newly fantasized “flying carpet” of a complete reality. Neither analysis of the story nor characterizing it as a “shamanistic” fairy-tale will do this.

“He found himself in a giant hall, with ceiling, floor, and walls lavishly painted with animals, birds, and peculiar signs. There were images of mysterious beings he had never seen; stories were told in colorful images, fantastic signs were glittering in all the colors of the rainbow . . . ‘All these images tell about the past, they are speaking to you,’ said the old sage. ‘They are telling you a story, the story of your ancestors and the story of your children. Memorize them well, pass them on to your children, so they may learn from the stories of the ancestors. Watch the sun, because it gives you the power of life; preserve the sea and you will never suffer from scarcity. Now go down to the village and tell what you have seen.'"1

Experiences have to be told, because by word of mouth and the absorbing senses of the listeners, “the world” and its history will be created, again and again. This does not only happen in concepts like “dream-time” in far-away cultures, but also in the middle of a high-tech society like ours—new realities can arise from old roots.

1 In: Christof Heil, Der Zauber der Zypressen. Märchen und Mythen aus Mallorca: Edition Orient, 1992

2. Tales of the First Shamans

In an infinite void I set out for

a journey without distance.

On my way from star to star,

on heavenly tracks,

I meet the higher power.

I fill my hand with stardust,

I touch the edge of the moon,

I return to the earth

on the green meadow.

The powers of the heavenly spheres

will rush in and help me.

—Song of a shaman of the Chukcia,

from Juri Rytchëu, Der letzte Schamane (The Last Shaman)

All statements about a “culture-creating” human activity and about the spiritual world behind this thing called culture are but guesses. These presumptions have constantly changed over the course of history according to the research of the time and the spiritual attitude of those who did the research.

Look at life today in the very few existing “original” indigenous communities doesn’t give us any better clues concerning the origin of human community life. Would we understand more about the origin of our humanity if we could exactly date and classify the “first shaman”?

The old myths and stories about the acts of “special” people, “the divinely inspired,” can permeate and connect us with the time behind the boundaries of our own lives, with those “deeds.” This inner connection enables us to consciously enter the unique personal experience of the reality of a “multiverse.”

Also, pictures and carvings of people who, according to what they tell us, were divinely inspired—such as the “Bird-man of Lascaux” or images of the world- and shapeshifter Odin with his two ravens on Scandinavian image-stones— tell stories that let us drink from the well of memory of the spiritual worlds and our ancestors’ knowledge.

In almost all stories and images that speak of the “first shamans,” the shape of the bird as messenger of the shape-shifting and shamanistic flying ability plays an important role. Even now, the feather of a “shamans crown” in shamanistic communities stand for the ability of the bearer to magically fly. In some cultures, feathered ritual vestments of the shamans resemble “bird’s clothes,” as a visual expression of the ability to move to and fro among all cosmic spheres at will, from life to death and vice versa.

The Swan Woman as Ancestor Mother of the Shamans

In the Far East, in the land of the Burjates, there once lived a young man named Tangkalsingh. One day, Tangkalsingh heard the wing-flap of a big bird above his dwelling-place, and he saw five swans flying across the sky to alight on the nearby lake. At first he thought, “Those are migrating birds, heading north.” Then curiosity got the better of him and he decided to take a closer look at these birds. He went to the lake, crept unnoticed toward the birds, and hid behind a shrub. There, Tangkalsingh saw that they were not really migrating birds, but five most beautiful maidens, who had taken off their swan gowns in order to take a bath. He waited for the right moment, snatched away one of the blossom-white feather gowns, and hid again behind the bush.

After the maidens were done with their bath, they all went to the waters’ edge, put on their gowns and immediately transformed again into swans. But one girl was without her gown and was looking desperately for it. She could not find it anywhere and started crying bitter tears. She called out, “Whoever took my gown, just give it back to me!” For without her blossom-white feather gown she could not fly. The four other swan girls hurried to take off and flew away. But the fifth swan girl remained behind, naked on the lakeside. Again the swan girl cried out, “Whoever took my gown, just give it back to me! He may ask of me whatever it may be; I will give it to him.”

At this, Tangkalsingh came into sight from behind the bush and told her that he was the one who took her clothing. He brought her the underwear, but kept the white bird gown. Then he proposed: “Become my wife.” In her distress she finally agreed, and followed Tangkalsingh to his dwelling place. He hid the swan gown in an iron-bound chest and locked tight.

She was a good wife to her man and gave birth to five sons and five daughters. Not only was she a good wife, she was a clever woman, too. One day, the swan woman said to her husband, “Husband, I have been your wife such a long time, and I gave birth to so many children. Come, bring tarassun; we will drink to that.” The man prepared the milk-brandy and they started drinking. Then the woman said to Tangkalsingh, “So many years we have lived together, so many kids we have. Now you may easily show me my swan gown that you took from me long ago, for now I shall never fly away.” Tangkalsingh had already drunk much tarassun, so he went to the chest, opened it and gave her the swan gown.

They both became boisterous and drank more tarassun. They were sitting in the yurt, a round felt tent. In the center of the yurt there were three big stones where the keys and the distillery were kept. Suddenly, the woman put on her swan gown, cried three times in her swan’s voice: “Guu, guu, guu,” took off and flew up through the yurt’s smoke hole, and disappeared.

The man and the children ran out of the yurt. The swan woman flew around in circles above the yurt and called, “My children! My daughters, become shaman women! My sons, become shamans!” And then she flew away. Her children became the first shamans; they started shamanism. They were very mighty shamans. They were able to fly, could become invisible and split up their bodies and cut off their heads without dying. Our first shamans were extraordinary powerful shamans.

—Buryates, Siberia

The Buryates in the southern part of East Siberia belong to the Mongolian nomad peoples of Northern Asia. Today there are only some 300,000 Burjates left, and they have a distinct ethnic consciousness. They believe that the ghosts have appointed the shaman böö, who, through their “heavenly ancestry,” must have shaman powers at their disposal.

According to the Buryates, the shaman’s animal protector is called the chubilgan, which means “shape-shifting” or “transformation.”

All over the world there are stories about marriage between a human and a bird. Some Northern Asiatic peoples consider the swan to be a totem animal and a bringer of culture. The Ainu also have worshiped the singing swan for ages, because it was a female swan that guarded her people from extinction. This swan saved the last Ainu from the disturbances of war and bore him many children, who were considered to be the ancestors of today’s Ainu. In the Scandinavian world of sages, the god-mother Freya possesses a swan gown.

How the Raven Children became Shamans

Once upon a time, in the most Northern part of Siberia, there lived a little girl who was beautiful beyond words. The girl was aware of her magical beauty, and proudly turned down every proposal from the boys in her region; she married not one of them.

One morning, the beautiful girl went out to look for a herd of runaway mares. Then, from the east, on a spotless white horse, came a man who she never had seen before. When he stood in front of her on his milk-white horse, he rode once around her and asked: “What brings you this way?”

“I am on my way to find the mares, and drive them back home.”

“I saw your mares; they are not far from here. You can still see them from here.”

The strange man dismounted his white, spotless horse and said to the beautiful girl, “Come, let us sit down here and chat about this and that. Say, are you already married?”

The girl spread out the skin of a dappled horse, and both sat down on it. The girl answered, “No, I have no husband. But why do you ask?”

“Well, it happens that I am not married either, and have not been married before. Would you perhaps want to marry me?”

“Why not? If my mother and my father agree, I agree as well.”

The beautiful girl pleased the stranger very much, and the stranger pleased the beautiful girl. And because both of them had the same desire, they lost themselves in their love game.

Afterwards, the man asked, “Since you have given yourself so easily to me, who do you think I am? That I am somebody from another neighborhood, or do you know me?”

“No, I do not know you, but you just told me that you want to marry me, right?”

“Yes, that is what I said, but I will not marry you. I will return to my homeland. My homeland is the upper world; I am the firstborn son of the Chara-Seouroun, the Lord of the upper world. I descended from there only because I heard your name. I have given you two beautiful sons who will see neither death nor illness until a fixed point in time. From today, at the beginning of the eleventh month, you will give birth. When the moment comes, you will go to the small river with the name so and so; there, below a steep tongue of land, in the heart of a dense forest, you will notice a meadow with a little lake. On this meadow there is a tree with three trunks, a larch.

Lay yourself down on your dappled pelt, because it is there that you will give birth. You will bring two black raven children into the world. Just after birth they will shriek their raven’s cries, fly away and sit on the big, lower branches of the larch. Then you will have to circle the tree three times, and while doing this, you will hit the tree with your dress. This will cause the ravens to fall face down on the skin you set down. Wrap up your raven children in the skin, bind it with a dappled hair ribbon and hang this bundle into your yurt at the end of the lower, wall-aligning beam. The raven youngsters will change into lads; after just three days they will cry like human babies. When the firstborn boy reaches forty one, he will become a shaman. He will be able to fling a mother elk with her young ones into the air. The younger lad will already be a shaman in his fortieth year. He will become a mighty shaman as well; he will be able to make a haystack of ten arms length fly through the sky.”

After having said this, the man from the upper world disappeared. The beautiful girl was not able to recall how he had left.

Everything happened like the spirit from the upper world had said: the beautiful girl gave birth to two raven youngsters, who shape-shifted and became powerful shamans—exactly like their father had predicted.

—Yakutsk, Siberia

The Yakutsk belong to the Altaic Turks and call themselves Sacha. At present, approximately 200,000 Yakutsk still live. Because they live in an area with rich mineral ore, they have been exploited consistently for ages, and their shamans were persecuted. A male shamans is called ojun; female, udagan. For approximately 20 years the Yakutsk have finally been able to have, after a long ban on shamanism, their summer celebrations with the whole community, including the traditional offering ritual under the leadership of a “white” shaman—an aji ajuttara.

Buryat she-shaman

3. Tales of Traveling in the Worlds

Horse to ride on, steed to ride on,

my hopeful wagon!

Wings to fly, golden storm wind!

Will rush through the highest heaven,

noisy, effervescently, raving.

From the edge of the purple cloud

I will chase, head down, into the distance.

From the gold edge of the clouds

I will fly, wings spread, into the distance.

Song from Hungary

The shamanism of all nations has as a central theme the image of a division of the cosmos into three worlds connected through the axis of the world tree. Upper world, middle world and underworld are levels of different states of being that can be traveled consciously by shamans for the well-being of the individual and, therefore, the community.

These shamanic travels lead to parallel worlds of consciousness, containing all information, all knowledge without the limits of time and space. Some shamanistic communities have detailed “road maps” of the other worlds. This way, the shamans can direct themselves in their work to the same topography of the world they wish to travel and when “traveling troubles” occur, they are able to help and advise one another.

The creation myth of Northern Europe also mentions the three worlds: Asgard (upper world), Midgard (middle world) and Utgard (underworld). In the advent of Christianity, these became heaven, earth, and hell. The concept of hell originates from the name of the underworld goddess Hel, which means light or bright, who became “Mother Hulda” in the sagas and fairy tales. She is the earth mother who stirs the cauldron of the lifeblood, on a fire deep in the mountain beneath the sea, and stores and protects life in the making and the life that was.

Often in the old stories the bear appears as a companion of the earth mother. This animal goes to her in the belly of the earth, lies next to her in the winter, and, in spring, reappears with new life—young bears—on the earth’s surface.

The underworld is, in the conception of many peoples, a place where the souls of the deceased dwell. This world is often situated under water or on the other side of a large body of water. The underworld is one that, in landscape and way of living, looks exactly like our own middle world, but without the sorrows and needs of our human world, and often it is all “the other way around” down there. The upper world is, in the cosmology of many shamanistic populations, often similar to the middle world of the people—with rivers, mountains, dwelling places of spirits. Rising to the upper world can often take place only through a small hole.

The classification of certain animals into one of the three worlds can vary from one shamanistic community to the next. In the stories from ancient Europe and some Siberian communities, snakes, dragons, and toads are often protectors of the underworld. With their flight, birds link the middle world with the upper world, while some other feathered creatures have a special role, for instance, the duck that lives in all three dimensions, and the swan that not only lives on the waters, but also carries the souls of the dead to the world mountain (as the Siberian Yakutsk tell).

In the Scandinavian myth of creation, the little squirrel is the messenger between the eagle on top of the world tree in the upper world, and the snake in the underworld. Numerous animals are able to shape-shift, traversing the areas of the middle world, including deer, horses, wolves, reindeer, and bears.

All of them can also be the shaman’s spirit animals that can be helpful with their special qualities when he prepares himself to “traverse the land of the great tides.”

A "Bear Shaman", figure modeled in Siberia

Traveling in the Underworld:

Then the girl jumped into the well. She lost

consciousness, and when she woke up and could focus

again, she found herself in a beautiful meadow, where

the sun was shining and thousands of flowers grew.”

—From “Mother Hulda (=Holle),” fairy tale of the Brothers Grimm

The Bear Hunter in the Underworld