Nourish the Word

  I have loved turtles since I was a teenager. Maybe even before that. I’ve loved them since before I understood they have significance to any American culture. And my very favorite of all the turtles are the green sea turtles. Catching a glimpse of these gentle giants unexpectedly in their element has always been a moment of excitement and awe for me. At the beginning of this year, I snorkeled at the beach of an island. It was our first time trying out full face snorkel masks. My hair was braided to keep it manageable in the water, but in the undulating waves it would snake in expected directions, and a time or two it’s frayed end had startled me, mistaken for a curious fish or eel that had ventured too close to my face. At the beckoning of family members on shore, I began to return to the sand with my children, fresh from an octopus sighting. Before I reached it, I discovered one of these beautiful creatures swimming between me and the shore, to the East. I pointed it out with ch...

I ended  Part 1  of the Seven Fires Prophecies topic with a note that there was more I hadn't addressed and that I had yet to understand how to explain. I think I am ready to do this now. This post also is Part 4 of my Re-creation and Rebirth series that I began with. It was originally going to be titled Turtle Island. Both these topics run together here, though, so they have been combined. The complete combined seven prophecies can be found in the video link in part 1, in Edward Benton Banai's The Mishomis Book , or found on different internet sites, including  this wikipedia page . One important part I have noticed in the prophecies begins in the very first prophecy. "In the time of the First Fire, the Anishinabe nation will rise up and follow the sacred shell of the Midewiwin Lodge. The Midewiwin Lodge will serve as a rallying point for the people and its traditional ways will be the source of much strength. The Sacred Megis will lead the way to the chosen ground...

"To satisfy my own curiosity I have sometimes interpreted to their old men, portions of Bible history, and their expression is invariably: 'The book must be true, for our ancestors have told us similar stories, generation after generation, since the earth was new.'" History of the Ojibways by William Whipple Warren   This quote is interesting to me, given its time period and given William W. Warren's background. He lived from 1825-1853. He had the benefit of being raised in two cultures, that of his native mother's (before that culture would be entirely repressed) and his European father's. He comments more than once in his book of the similarities he found between the two, and developed the opinion that either his mother's people were part of the lost tribes of Israel, or had communed with them at some point. One of these similarities I see is in the creation performed by Kitche Manitou. Kitche Manitou (also Gitchie Manito) has been interpreted a...