Thunder Shaman

As a “wild,” drumming thunder shaman, a warrior mounted on her spirit horse, Francisca Kolipi’s spirit traveled to other historical times and places, gaining the power and knowledge to conduct spiritual warfare against her community’s enemies, including forestry companies and settlers. As a “civilized” shaman, Francisca narrated the Mapuche people’s attachment to their local sacred landscapes, which are themselves imbued with shamanic power, and constructed nonlinear histories of intra- and interethnic relations that created a moral order in which Mapuche become history’s spiritual victors. Thunder Shaman represents an extraordinary collaboration between Francisca Kolipi and anthropologist Ana Mariella Bacigalupo, who became Kolipi’s “granddaughter,” trusted helper, and agent in a mission of historical (re)construction and myth-making. The book describes Francisca’s life, death, and expected rebirth, and shows how she remade history through multitemporal dreams, visions, and spirit possession, drawing on ancestral beings and forest spirits as historical agents to obliterate state ideologies and the colonialist usurpation of indigenous lands. Both an academic text and a powerful ritual object intended to be an agent in shamanic history, Thunder Shaman functions simultaneously as a shamanic “bible,” embodying Francisca’s power, will, and spirit long after her death in 1996, and an insightful study of shamanic historical consciousness, in which biography, spirituality, politics, ecology, and the past, present, and future are inextricably linked. It demonstrates how shamans are constituted by historical-political and ecological events, while they also actively create history itself through shamanic imaginaries and narrative forms.

As a "wild," drumming thunder shaman, a warrior mounted on her spirit horse, Francisca Kolipi's spirit traveled to other historical times and places, gaining the power and knowledge to conduct spiritual warfare against her community's enemies, including forestry companies and settlers. As a "civilized" shaman, Francisca narrated the Mapuche people's attachment to their local sacred landscapes, which are themselves imbued with shamanic power, and constructed nonlinear histories of intra- and interethnic relations that created a moral order in which Mapuche become history's spiritual victors. Thunder Shaman represents an extraordinary collaboration between Francisca Kolipi and anthropologist Ana Mariella Bacigalupo, who became Kolipi's "granddaughter," trusted helper, and agent in a mission of historical (re)construction and myth-making. The book describes Francisca's life, death, and expected rebirth, and shows how she remade history through multitemporal dreams, visions, and spirit possession, drawing on ancestral beings and forest spirits as historical agents to obliterate state ideologies and the colonialist usurpation of indigenous lands. Both an academic text and a powerful ritual object intended to be an agent in shamanic history, Thunder Shaman functions simultaneously as a shamanic "bible," embodying Francisca's power, will, and spirit long after her death in 1996, and an insightful study of shamanic historical consciousness, in which biography, spirituality, politics, ecology, and the past, present, and future are inextricably linked. It demonstrates how shamans are constituted by historical-political and ecological events, while they also actively create history itself through shamanic imaginaries and narrative forms.

Eyewitness accounts of Rolling Thunder’s remarkable healings, legendary control over the weather and animals, and inspiring teachings • Includes accounts of Rolling Thunder by his grandson Sidian Morning Star Jones, Stanley Krippner, Alberto Villoldo, Larry Dossey, William Lyon, Jean Millay, John Perry Barlow, Stephan Schwartz, Ed Little Crow, Leslie Gray, Oh Shinna Fast Wolf, Jürgen Kremer, and David Sessions, among others • Shows how his teachings and powers have transcended his death and how many of his climate change predictions have come to pass One of the most celebrated and controversial Native American medicine men of the 20th century, Rolling Thunder (1916-1997) was known for his remarkable healings and for his ability to call on the forces of Nature, typically in the form of thunder clouds. He was also a passionate activist who worked to trigger social change on behalf of Native American tribes. Sought after as a lecturer and workshop leader, he used the money he earned from teaching to construct Meta Tantay, a community in the Nevada desert. In this book, edited by his grandson Sidian Morning Star Jones and longtime friend Stanley Krippner, we hear directly from people profoundly changed by Rolling Thunder, whether through direct experience or through his teachings. We learn of his legendary interactions with animals and the forces of Nature and hear from witnesses to his remarkable healings, including the healing of a young boy where a “mist wolf” was seen by several people. We learn of Rolling Thunder’s inspiring impact on men and women now devoted in service to humankind and the Earth and read stories both insightful and humorous from friends that prove his climate change predictions true. Revealing his trickster teachings, his legendary shamanic powers, his devotion to the Earth, and how his impact did not stop with his death, these stories of Rolling Thunder from a variety of sources demonstrate how transformation can come even while walking gently on the Earth.

Drawing on anthropologist Ana Mariella Bacigalupo's fifteen years of field research, Shamans of the Foye Tree: Gender, Power, and Healing among Chilean Mapuche is the first study to follow shamans' gender identities and performance in a variety of ritual, social, sexual, and political contexts. To Mapuche shamans, or machi, the foye tree is of special importance, not only for its medicinal qualities but also because of its hermaphroditic flowers, which reflect the gender-shifting components of machi healing practices. Framed by the cultural constructions of gender and identity, Bacigalupo's fascinating findings span the ways in which the Chilean state stigmatizes the machi as witches and sexual deviants; how shamans use paradoxical discourses about gender to legitimatize themselves as healers and, at the same time, as modern men and women; the tree's political use as a symbol of resistance to national ideologies; and other components of these rich traditions. The first comprehensive study on Mapuche shamans' gendered practices, Shamans of the Foye Tree offers new perspectives on this crucial intersection of spiritual, social, and political power.

The Medicine Wheel is a powerful spiritual compass that connects us to the Eight Directions, The Nine Worlds of the Tree of Life, The Five Elements and the Nine Streams of Life Force Energy. Various forms of this spiritual compass are found all over the world from the Americas, Asia, India and Europe. In the Americas, we know of it as the "Medicine Wheel" or the "Sacred Hoop." In China, it is known as the "Ba Gua" or "Eight Gates." In Europe, prehistoric peoples worshiped at Stonehenge and other standing stone circles . In India, it is known as "Dig Chakra" or the "Direction Wheel." In Slavic countries and in Scandinavia, it was known as the "Sun Wheel." What is most interesting is that in each of these indigenous, unrelated practices, the quality of Life Force Energy in each direction was identical in nature.In this book, practicing Thunder Shaman Michael William Denney, has decoded the Universal Medicine Wheel for modern Western spiritual seekers. The practice of the Medicine Wheel (or as Mr. Denney calls it, the Thunder Wheel), is something all cultures have used throughout time. In this book, you will learn about the universal qualities of the eight directions on the Thunder Wheel and their corresponding connections to the Nine Worlds of the shamanic Tree of Life. You will learn powerful shamanic exercises to summon and channel the powers of the Nine Realms of Spiritual Existence and the Five Elements. You will learn how to shamanically travel to each of the Nine Realms. You will learn how to receive gifts of Power from your spirit guides, including your own personal "song" which can be used to empower you on your personal spiritual path.Thunder Shamanism is a practical path of Power for anyone seeking to empower themselves, their families and their world. Awaken the Power of the Ancients with the science of the Thunder Wheel!

Rolling Thunder, the subject of this book, is a keeper of tribal secrets-a modern medicine man. After witnessing one of Rolling Thunder's healing rituals at a conference sponsored by the research department of the Menninger Foundation, Doug Boyd decided to open his mind fully to the mysteries of such secret healing powers as might be revealed to him. Boyd's book is an account by a contemporary white man of the inner experience of American Indians, an exploration into what some accept as the "real" world. To the believer or to the skeptic, Boyd's experiences form a penetrating and challenging story of a world that is little known to most Americans.

Lightning in the Andes and Mesoamerica is the first ever study to explore the symbolic elements surrounding lightning in Pre-Columbian religious ideologies.

Robert J. David's Spirit Fire and Lightning Songs makes a major contribution to the steadily growing body of research in the western United States that prioritizes indigenous voices, myth, and neuropsychological models to provide a fresh and innovative approach to decolonizing the past. As a Klamath Tribal member, David's scholarly and engaging writing style lends itself to the retelling of Klamath-Modoc myths and the interpretation of how these myths convincingly relate to rock art at 4-Mod-22, a complex Klamath Basin petroglyph site in Northern California near the former Tule Lake. David's work at 4-Mod-22 highlights three distinctive classes of rock art: iconic motifs, residual markings, and geometric figures. Information provided by a combination of Klamath-Modoc ethnography and myth suggests that these distinctive rock art categories denote two patterns of ritual use that include shamans' consultations with their spirit familiars, and shamanic power quests.