Warriors Of The Rainbow: Strange And Prophetic Indian Dreams

William Willoya, Vinson Brown

• Publisher: Normanby Press
• Year: 2015
• ISBN:
  9781786256621
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Social Sciences

Strange & Prophetic Dreams of the Indian People. This is a touching story of a great grandmother instilling the Indian spirit in her great grandson. It gives guidelines for a glorious future: 'We have had enough now of talk. Let there be deeds.'In the words that follow we have written simply and wholly what we believe, believing that only God is the Knower. That men should love one another and understand one another is the great message of the visions of the Indian peoples told about in this book, nothing of selfishness nor vanity, nothing of narrowness nor pride. We write what we feel deep in our hearts, and the bulk of the book is the expression of this feeling. On the other hand, we wish to write about only what is reasonable and intelligent, so, in the appendix at the back of this book, we give what we consider reasonable and intelligent answers to why the study of prophetic dreams has value, how they fit patterns, and how it may be possible to understand them.

III. INDIAN PROPHETIC VISIONS

We believe there is a great strength in the earth and in nature that the old Indians knew about, but which is almost all lost to present generations.{3} This power of the spirit gained from the wilderness most people who live in cities know nothing about. The farmer who loves the soil in which he works has some of this feeling, for the spirit of growing things becomes deeply meaningful to him. He senses their needs and works to meet them, which produces a successful farm.

We who have lived in the wilderness for long periods, as have both the writers of this book, experience after a while a strange feeling of kinship with the life there that causes one’s whole being to become sensitively attuned to both wild life and plants. After a while, if the heart expresses love towards the wild creatures, more and more of them will begin to befriend you and the harmony of all life becomes visible.{4} The Indians, if we can believe the stories of the ancient wise ones, went a step beyond this to the point where the human spirit in some way, possibly never measurable by scientists, used the animal spirit as a tool in reaching the Source of the World and in purifying the soul.{5} The great, pure-hearted chiefs of the olden times achieved their spiritual power by the most difficult self-discipline, fasting and prayer, including the utter emptying of the heart of all earthly desires and the tuning of the inner ear to the whispers of the wilderness. This was not idol-worship, as many who did not understand them often believed, but something far deeper and more wonderful, the understanding of the Spirit of Being that manifests itself in all living things. From this deep understanding we believe they sometimes had actual flashes of insight into the future of their people and the world. These prophetic visions of times of great trouble to be followed by a time of world harmony and peace form the remarkable patterns of thought and beauty that you will find in most of the stories that follow.

A. PROPHECY OF MONTEZUMA, AZTEC KING

The Aztecs were a civilized but warlike Indian people of central Mexico who inherited their culture from the wonderful Toltec Indians. The Toltecs had been given a religion of kindness and goodness by their prophet-king, Quetzalcoatl. It is too bad the Aztecs did not fully learn this religion. Instead, they began to change it and introduced human sacrifice. They cut out the hearts of thousands of their enemies to sacrifice to their war god, Huitzilopochtli.

Montezuma II was the king or emperor of the Aztecs when the white men, the Spaniards, came. Like most of the Aztecs of that time, he took part in the wars, bringing thousands of captured warriors to be sacrificed at the great temple of the war god. For a time he was a cruel king, glorying in his power over other Indians. But when the Spaniards, led by Cortez, came and captured Montezuma, they treated both him and his people badly. He began to turn again to the religion of Quetzalcoatl. More and more he became troubled and sick in his heart as he saw the white men killing thousands of the Indians in the name of Christ, cutting them down with their guns and steel swords.

When Montezuma tried to stop the fighting, he was badly wounded by one of his people. As he lay dying, the Spirit sent to Montezuma a wonderful vision of the future, which the king told to his favorite daughter, Tula. Later Tula passed on the story of this vision to Iztlilzochitl, a noble Tezcucan Indian, who wrote this prophecy down in a book.

“To the world I have said farewell,” said Montezuma. “I see its vanities go from me one by one. Last in the train and most loved, most glittering is power,—and in its hands is my heart. A shadow creeps upon me, darkening all without, but brightening all within; and in the brightness, lo, I see my People and their future!

“The long, long cycles—two,—four,—eight—pass away, and I see the tribes newly risen, like the trodden grass, and in their midst a Priesthood and a Cross. An age of battles more, and, lo! there remains the Cross, but not the priests; in their stead is Freedom and God.”

“I know the children of the Aztec, crushed now, will live, and more,—after ages of wrong suffered by them, they will rise up, and take their place—a place of splendor—amongst the deathless nations of the earth. What I was given to see was revelation. Cherish these words, O Tula; repeat them often, make them a cry of the people; a sacred tradition; let them go down with the generations, one of which will, at last, rightly understand the meaning of the words FREEDOM AND GOD, now dark to my understanding; and then, not till then, will be the new birth and new career.”

Now is come a generation of Indians that can understand Montezuma’s prophetic words FREEDOM AND GOD. A great new spirit is now spreading over the world that rises above the petty misunderstandings, prejudices and hates of the past. To find the truth of this Spirit, each person must cast out of his mind and soul the walls of religious misunderstanding that keep men apart, and search freely, independently and joyously for the truth. In earlier ages it was necessary to have special religious leaders who led the human flocks and did most of their religious thinking for them, but in this age of greater maturity we must all grow up and think and seek for ourselves until we find the glorious light of brotherhood that awaits us.

{6} B. VISION OF PLENTY COUPS, CHIEF OF THE CROW

Indian dancer being decorated.

Photo of drawing made for Bureau of Ethnology Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.

Plenty Coups was a very wise and great leader of the Crow or Absarokee Indians of Montana and Wyoming. He was not only successful in leading his people through the troubles of war but also through the even more difficult troubles of peace after the white men had conquered the west.

When Plenty Coups told the story of his life to the plainsman and mountain man, Frank B. Linderman, he told also the story of his great vision. Plenty Coups was about nine or ten years old when the dream came to him. He had gone into the Crazy Mountains in Montana to seek a vision, and fasted for several days. He grew very weak, but still had no dream. Finally, in desperation, remembering how the great Crow warriors of the past showed their courage, he cut off a joint of his index finger and forced it to bleed. He fell asleep and then seemed to wake up to find himself surrounded by war eagles. Later a spirit person came to him and led him through a long tunnel underground in the direction of the Arrow Creek Mountains, and he found himself surrounded by many buffalo jostling against him in the tunnel. At first he was very much afraid they would crush him, but the spirit person told him to walk straight ahead and have no fear.

When the spirit being led him out of the hole into the sun-slight, the spirit person shook a large red rattle and sang a queer song four times. “Look!” he pointed, and Plenty Coups saw thousands of buffalo coming out of a hole in the ground, blackening the plains. Then suddenly they seemed to disappear. Now, out of the same hole, came great herds of spotted and horned animals, that he understood later were white men’s cattle. These bellowed and snorted, but differently from the buffalo, so that he was frightened by their appearance and sounds. Soon they too disappeared, but accomplished the change by going back into the great hole in the ground.

“Do you understand this which I have shown you, Plenty Coups?” asked the Spirit Person, but the boy answered “No!”

The Spirit Being led Plenty Coups back through the hole in the ground to a place that is now on the Crow Reservation in Montana and showed Plenty Coups an old man sitting feeble and alone in the shade.

“This old man is yourself, Plenty Coups,” said the Spirit Being, who soon disappeared along with the old man.

Now Plenty Coups saw a dark forest with a black storm coming. The four winds struck the forest with a great roaring and the boy felt pity for the living things there. The winds tore down all the trees except one, which stood tall and straight. “What does this mean?” whispered the boy.

“Listen, Plenty Coups,” said a spirit voice. “In that tree is the lodge of the Chickadee. He is least in strength but strongest of mind among his kind. He is willing to work for wisdom. The Chickadee-person is a good listener. Nothing escapes his ears, which he has sharpened by constant use. Whenever others are talking together of their successes or failures, there you will find the Chickadee-person listening to their words. But in all his listening he tends to his own business. He never intrudes, never speaks in strange company, and yet never misses a chance to learn from others. He gains success and avoids failure by learning how others succeeded or failed, and without great trouble to himself. There is scarcely a lodge he does not visit, hardly a person he does not know, and yet everybody likes him, because he minds his own business, or pretends to.

“The lodges of countless Bird-people were in that forest when the Four Winds charged it. Only one is left unharmed, the lodge of the Chickadee-person. Develop your body, but do not neglect your mind, Plenty Coups. It is the mind that leads a man to power, not strength of body.”

After this Plenty Coups wakened and was helped by his friends back to the Crow camp. All the wise men of the tribe gathered together in a great lodge and called Plenty Coups to come there and tell them about his vision. As he told his story, he could feel the excitement in the air for this was a very unusual dream. They sat silent for a while, smoking; then, Yellow Bear, the wisest, slowly rose and spoke:

“He has been told that in his lifetime the buffalo will go away forever, and that in their place on the plains will come the bulls and cows and the calves of the white men. I have myself seen these Spotted-buffalo drawing loads of the white man’s goods—

“The dream of Plenty Coups means that the white men will take and hold this country and their Spotted-buffalo will cover the plains. He was told to think for himself, to listen, to learn to avoid disaster by the experiences of others. He was advised to develop his body but not to forget his mind. The meaning of his dream is plain to...

Table of contents

• Title page
• TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Dedicated to:
• FOREWORD
• I. THE RETURN OF THE SPIRIT
• II. STRANGE DREAM OF THE OGLALA SIOUX PIPE BAG
• III. INDIAN PROPHETIC VISIONS
• IV. AN ESKIMO IN SEARCH OF GOD
• V. THE TASK OF THE WARRIORS OF THE RAINBOW
• APPENDIX
• BIBLIOGRAPHY
• ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
• ABOUT THIS BOOK AND ITS AUTHORS