Myth, Ritual And Religion, Vol. 2 (of 2)Lang, Andrew
Religion
Myth, Ritual And Religion, Vol. 2 (of 2)
Lang, Andrew
Myth; Mythology; Religion; Rites and ceremonies
Dr. Brinton, in his _Myths of the New World_ (New York, 1876), adopts
a different line of explanation. Michabo, he says, "was originally the
highest divinity recognised by them, powerful and beneficent beyond all
others, maker of the heavens and the world". We gladly welcome him in
that capacity in religion. But it has already been shown that Michabo is
only, in myth, the _reparateur de l'univers_, and that he has a sleeping
partner--a deity retired from business. Moreover, Dr. Brinton's account
of Michabo, "powerful and beneficent beyond all others, maker of
the heavens and the world," clashes with his own statement, that "of
monotheism as displayed in the one personal definite God of the Semitic
races" (to whom Dr. Brinton's description of Michabo applies) "there is
not a single instance on the American continent."* The residences and
birthplaces of Michabo are as many as those of the gods of Greece. It is
true that in some accounts, as in Strachey's, "his bright home is in
the _rising_ sun". It does not follow that the hare had any original
connection with the dawn. But this connection Dr. Brinton seeks to
establish by philological arguments. According to this writer, the names
(Manibozho, Nanibozhu, Missibizi, Michabo, Messou) "all seem compounded,
according to well-ascertained laws of Algonkin euphony, from the words
corresponding to _great_ and _hare or rabbit_, or the first two perhaps
from _spirit_ and _hare_".** But this seeming must not be trusted. We
must attentively examine the Algonkin root _wab_, when it will appear
"that in fact there are two roots having this sound. One is the initial
syllable of the word translated hare or rabbit, but the other means
_white_, and from it is derived the words for the east, the dawn,
the light, the day, and the morning. Beyond a doubt (sic) this is the
compound in the names Michabo and Manibozho, which therefore mean the
great light, the spirit of light, of the dawn, or the east."
* Relations, pp. 63, 176.
** Op. cit., p. 178.
Then the war of Manibozho became the struggle of light and darkness.
Finally, Michabo is recognised by Dr. Brinton as "the not unworthy
personification of the purest conceptions they possessed concerning the
Father of All,"* though, according to Dr. Brinton in an earlier passage,
they can hardly be said to have possessed such conceptions.** We are not
responsible for these inconsistencies. The degeneracy to the belief in
a "mighty great hare," a "chimerical beast," was the result of a
misunderstanding of the root _wab_ in their own language by the
Algonkins, a misunderstanding that not only affected the dialects in
which the root _wab_ occurred in the hare's name, but those in which it
did not!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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