Re: Star Nation Teachings - Kachinas
What is a Kachina?
To survive in a waterless land, the Hopi developed a complex religion to secure supernatural assistance in fulfilling their needs. Kachinas are the spirit essence of everything in the real world. Their essence is inferred from the steam which rises from food and whose loss does not change the form of the food, to the mist rising from a spring on a cold morning or the cloud which forms above the mountaintop.
Kachinas are not deities, but supernatural beings who dwell in an invisible world until the are given form in the parallel human world. At appointed times during the winter, spring and summer, Hopi Men from age 10 don elaborate costumes and masks to impersonate their kachina counterparts. In the process, the kachina is believed to inhabit its human representative.
There are more than 200 kachina characters who possess characteristics of real life personalities or repesent plants or animals. The ceremony offers the children a real-life connection with the kachina spirits. Kachinas give the little girls kachina dolls as a remembrance of the ceremony and to help her remember the messages of the kachinas.
Carved from the roots of the cottonwood tree (the roots are what draws life-giving moisture), Kachinas can be classified in the following partial list:
Ogres of many types: Discipline the community and naughty children (teacher's favorite)
Bears and badgers: Best at healing(doctor's favorite)
Eagle: A protector
Animals: Many are hunters - also healers
Warriors : Ewiro, Ahote, and many, many others
Clowns: Koshari, Hano clowns, Koyemsi (mudheads), etc.
Chief : Eototo and Aholi, his lieutenant
Plants, birds, characters of other tribes (to draw thier powers), etc.
Kachinas
