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Nunani

December 6, 2002 - Deity (Part two of two)
December 13, 2002 - Shape-shifter (Part one)
December 20, 2002 - Shape-shifter (Part two)

Nunani

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December 6, 2002

Deity (Part two of two)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

Necessity is the key to the lack of gods in Inuit cosmology.

Mythologically, any god or goddess is an elemental figure; it represents a fundamental feature of the world, such as earth, water or fire. Deities were always the figures that represented the orderly systems human beings observed in the world around them. When that order was upset, or when humanity feared it might be, the appropriate god was entreated to restore it. Crops failed, and a crop deity was prayed to. War was afoot, and a war god was prayed to.

In other words, gods ruled systems. They made recognizable models work, almost fulfilling the roles that scientific bodies of knowledge do today. Why try to propitiate some corn god when agricultural science will better secure the harvest?

Pre-colonial Inuit, however, did not live in a world of reliable systems. They were nomads, and even from the earliest days of the Thule, were pioneering new lands, their survivalist tendencies or sheer curiosity ranging them far and wide. Theirs was a never-ending odyssey.

What most people forget is that the Arctic is varied. No single area is completely like another. The animals never settle for long, and each area has its seasonal population, ever shifting and changing, like a great biological tide. Early Inuit had to be able to adjust. In doing so, they developed a very fluid culture, ready for unexpected tricks the land might throw at them. There was nothing reliable enough to be identified as a constant system. So Inuit culture began to depend upon only one thing: that nothing could be depended upon. Their culture itself became the only reliable system.

This is linked to Nuliajuk’s (ie. Sedna’s) superficial resemblance to a goddess. Over time, the closest thing to a predictable system that Inuit could identify was sea-mammal hunting, eventually necessitating the invention of a figure that commanded such animals — a figure that could be appealed to if necessary. This partly explains why Nuliajuk features most prominently in the lore of strongly seal-dependent Inuit groups, such as the Netsilingmiut.

Yet even seal hunting was not an entirely reliable lifestyle. Inuit were mobile opportunists, subsisting in any way they could, depending on what seasons and places offered them. Even Nuliajuk, therefore, was not a being that featured in their everyday lives. Factoring her into common existence was simply not practical, and so Nuliajuk never quite took on the status of a goddess.

Early Inuit were nevertheless deeply spiritual, inspired by the land and sense of mystical awe that it instilled in them. They generally regarded nature as permeated with a life of its own. They perceived will in it, though not always a conscious mind in the sense that man understands it. And they believed that this mysterious will — the very air an expression of its breath — regarded man with neither favour nor disfavour. All life, humanity included, drew life from this force (which was sometimes actually referred as the "sila," or the sky); but there was no way to relate to it mind-to-mind.

This sort of cosmology even resembles those of nomadic peoples genetically similar to Inuit. The Mongols, for example, believed in a sky god called "tengri" — a word that has been recorded as meaning "heaven," "god," and "sky." Early Mongols referred to the tengri in a way akin to which many pre-colonial Inuit referred to the sila. After their conquest of China, the Mongols eventually dropped belief in the tengri, instead adopting Chinese deities, which better suited their new city existence. Their needs had changed.

This makes sense. It is the state-dweller’s way to rely upon systems, the nomad’s way to rely upon the self. This is why few pre-colonial Inuit believed that there was any point in exploring relationships with nebulous forces. Inuit were concerned with whatever gave them a practical edge, practising a humanistic, even somewhat scientific, observation of nature. Their preoccupation was mastery, not propitiation, of their environment.

Pre-colonial Inuit have been haphazardly labelled "animistic" in the past, mainly under the assumption that all "primitive" peoples worship spirits inhabiting rocks, plants, etc. But Inuit not only did not worship spirits, they did not even worship gods. Comically, early Inuit cosmology more closely resembles the rationalistic religious movements of 17th- and 18th-century Europe.

If anything, Inuit relied upon only one, simple philosophy:

What will you do once you know?

Pijariiqpunga.

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December 13, 2002

Shape-Shifter (Part One)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

Pray thee, what’s his disease?

A very pestilential disease, my lord;

They call it lycanthropia.

In those that are possessed with it,

...they imagine

Themselves to be transformed into wolves,

One met the duke, ‘bout midnight, in a lane

... and he howled fearfully;

Said he was a wolf; only the difference

Was, a wolf’s skin was hairy on the outside,

His on the inside...

— JOHN WEBSTER, The Duchess of Malfi

Long have humans recognized the powers that different animals possess, which we do not. Our modern aeronautics are of course inspired by the birds, whose ability to fly we have always envied.

But it doesn’t stop there. Inuit have longed for the deadliness of the polar bear, the stealth of the weasel, the speed of the caribou. Europeans have admired the power of the bull, the light tread of the cat, the gentility of the lamb. All of us wonder what it would be like to swim and breath underwater, unimpeded, or to resist the cold without the aid of clothing.

As every culture has admired the abilities of the animals, so have imaginative people within each culture proposed ideas of what it would be like to become such animals. This has resulted in the richest sorts of stories; stories that have had an immeasurable effect on custom, religion, language, art, and almost every other aspect of culture. The animals that a culture recognizes — even in the most industrialized society — form the basis of its archetypes, one of the pillars upon which the society’s ideals rest. Just think of how often animals are still referred to in everyday speech. We still communicate, as we always have, by using their traits as metaphors.

Ever since humans have admired animal traits, we have been trying to acquire them. We have always dressed up as animals, or worn symbols associated with them, in order to take on their "feel" — as though whatever they possess can somehow be transferred to us through sympathetic magic. A more extreme way of trying to assume an animal’s trait is to ingest it (most usually a special part of it). But the most extreme way of assuming animal traits is to convince oneself that one has become the animal — a phenomenon that has never quite managed to disappear.

As already suggested, those seeking to take on an animal’s characteristics tend to be desirous of superhuman powers, as well as exceptionally imaginative. In Inuit culture, those marked by both such traits were angakkuit (ie., shamans). Therefore, the lore of animal transformation, in Inuit culture, is usually lore pertaining to shamans.

The following story is a fantastic example of how, to shamans, animal transformation was considered a manifestation of sheer power.

Taitsumaniquuq:

Once, there was a Netsilik shaman who met a Utku shaman. Despite any attempts to get along, two shamans meeting almost always spelled trouble, since they could not resist the temptation to talk about each others’ powers.

As they talked about their respective feats, each began to try to top the other. After all, others were listening, and reputations were at stake. Unfortunately, each began to offend the other, until at last a fight broke out.

The Utku shaman finally said,

"You are no shaman."

That was the last straw. The Netsilik shaman grinned evilly at the other, saying,

"If you’re so wonderful, how about a contest?"

"Fine. Suits me," said the other.

So they stood outside and the people watched, aghast, as the two shamans duelled. The Netsilik shaman turned with a flourish, snarling,

"Defeat this!"

With that, there were gasps from onlookers as his features began to flow and shift. His face elongated, cheeks widening. His shoulders grew thicker, stretching and at last bursting the seams of his clothes, as he fell forward and shook himself violently. White bristles had sprouted all along his body, but still he grew greater and greater in size.

When he was finished, he raised horrendous black claws to swat at the air, and snuffed loudly, from lungs like bellows. He had taken on the form of his animal, and become a polar bear.

Some of the local children screamed at the sight, bolting back to their homes. Of those that remained, all eyes of the on looking community turned toward the Utku shaman, wondering how he would answer the challenge.

(Continued in Part Two.)

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December 20, 2002

Shape-shifter (Part two)

RACHEL QITSUALIK

The Utku angakoq (shaman) tried to ignore the numerous eyes upon him, as onlookers waited for his response to the Netsilik angakoq’s transformation. He frowned, rubbing his hands together as his enemy paced before him, the great bear edging ever closer.

Suddenly, he stamped the ground with his foot. From the moment it touched down, that foot seemed to ripple and swell, rending boot and pant-leg asunder. His other foot followed, and his body. The fingers of his clenched fists seemed to melt together into twin, club-like extremities. He fell forward upon them, shaking away the last shreds of clothing to reveal an ever-growing, woolen form. Back and forth swept a head crowned with monstrous, curving horns.

He snorted violently, pawing at the ground. Just as his enemy had become a bear, so the Utku angakoq had taken on the form of his own animal — a muskox.

At the sight of the Utku angakoq’s transformation, the great bear seemed almost to hesitate. He stretched and crouched, gauging his enemy.

Like a typical muskox, the Utku angakoq stood his ground, horns lowered menacingly.

There was a scream from on-lookers as the bear bounded forward — a smooth, silent ghost — and the muskox stiffened, ready to slash. But the Netsilik angakoq/bear was clever, dancing away to one side. Speeding under the muskox’s flank, his powerful limbs embraced a rear leg, and he bit deeply into a haunch.

The muskox, more startled than hurt, nearly dislodged the bear with a kick. He wheeled with his horns. At the sight of them, the bear let go, tumbling away to safety.

So did the combat go for some time, neither angakoq able to gain any advantage against the other — until the pattern at last broke.

Some say that it was the Utku angakoq, the muskox, who gained the upper hand by charging forward with devastating sweeps of his horns. Others say that it was the Netsilik angakoq, the bear, who made a crucial mistake in trying to get over his enemy’s horns, to bite at the neck. One way or another, most agree that in a final, dire clash of the two, the Netsilik angakoq was caught exposed for a moment. Horns met flesh, and the muskox savagely gored the bear.

The fatigued Utku angakoq quickly became human again. He stood shivering for long moments, more from emotion than cold, watching the community gather around the fallen Netsilik angakoq. He too had shed his bear form, and now lay in a twisted, ruined heap. A ragged gash, streaming crimson, ran along one side.

Some kindly people gathered up the Netsilik angakoq, trying to nurse him back to health. It was of no use. He languished for days, before his life at last slipped away. The fight between the two shamans became legend, one of those stories that people tell in a hush, when it is time to speak of shamans and other dread things.

As I implied earlier, the folklore of animal-human transformation is the mark of an imaginative culture — to my thinking, a healthy one. It seems to me that one of the most tragic aspects of syncretism is that, in the past push to discourage traditional beliefs, the Inuit imagination has also been discouraged. And the Inuit cultural imagination has always been interwoven with its utter reliance upon all Arctic animals.

Think of the carvings Inuit used to make, the stories they used to tell, the cosmologies they used to invent! Inuit culture has only recently climbed out of a dark age of its creative spirit, a reticence to indulge traditional beliefs, brought on not only by past hardships, but by a distancing from the creatures that have shaped it.

Today, however, Inuit create art that is more skilled than ever before. They make films and write stories about traditional beliefs — free from fear of punitive theocrats. Elders break long silences, ever less shy about recording their old tales. And animals have, through some miracle, lost none of their importance to Inuit.

Ultimately, Inuit deserve to be proud. They exist in a state system, and have still maintained their connection to the land. Many cultures are not so lucky.

Like a final gift from traditional cosmology, Inuit culture has shifted its own shape, becoming some strange, wonderful, new animal of the world.

Pijariiqpunga.

(P.S. Merry Christmas!)

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