Various crises in my life have driven me back, time and again, to nature. On more than one occasion after the tragic loss of a friend I have fled to the woods. When faced with life-changing decisions I often sought an open field where I might trudge restlessly, or shaded bank where I could sit and meditate. Sometimes in periods of intense loneliness I have wandered through a darkened landscape, releasing feelings into the soft compassion of the night.
In hindsight I believe I returned because nature always responded to my anguish or confusion. I was rarely consciously aware of this action, but the healing was consistent. I believe these intense episodes may relate to the most ancient known form of religious experience: shamanism.
Classic shamanism
This term is widely used by the practitioners of many forms of newfangled spirituality, whether for profit or true enlightenment. But ethnological purists maintain the practice can be specifically described.Its definitive form is found among Northern Asiatic tribes such as the the Evenki, formerly known as Tungus, of Siberia, Mongolia and China. Their language, in fact, gave us the word shaman.
Ecstatic voyage
The career of a shaman often began in adolescence through an experience of life-threatening illness or trauma such as being hit by lightning. Entering a trance-like unconsciousness, he or she would leave the physical body and venture on a spiritual journey to discover the cause of the malady. Upon return, the patient would heal himself and take his role as medicine man to the community.A shaman did not derive insight or spiritual power by cognitive learning, but through ecstatic voyages. He walked with one foot in the natural world, and one in the spirit world. His role was to heal the sick, ease childbirth, guide the dying on their voyage to the afterlife, and gain insight and secure good fortune for the hunt.
Spiritual prototype
Shamanism is associated with the earliest form of human culture, hunter gatherer societies. It predates any form of religious organization or heirarchy, or social class structure. Siberian and Mongolian tribes who practiced classic shamanism into the 19th century were still nomadic at that time.The phenomenon of shamanic ecstasy may have been widespread among ancient cultures. The practice was carried throughout North and South America by the first migrants across the land bridge from Asia. Later influxes continued to transfer Asian influence.
Once cultures established permanent settlements and adopted herding and farming as a way of life, shamanism invariably became replaced by religious
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