Blue Highways: Oraibi, Hopi Reservation

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapWilliam Least Heat-Moon (LHM) sees Oraibi, one of the oldest communities in North America.  The Hopi are a people extremely rooted to their place.  In this post, I'll examine what that may mean both in their context.  I'll also speculate on the lessons our modern society can learn from them.  Click on the thumbnail of the map to match Oraibi to your sense of place.

Book Quote

"Clinging to the southern lip of Third Mesa was ancient Oraibi, most probably the oldest continuously occupied village in the United States. Somehow the stone and adobe have been able to hang on to the precipitous edge since the twelfth century. More than eight hundred Hopis lived at Oraibi in 1901 - now only a few. All across the reservation I'd seen no more than a dozen people, and on the dusty streets of the old town I saw just one bent woman struggling against the wind. But somewhere there must have been more."

Blue Highways: Part 5, Chapter 2

An old photo of Old Oraibi. There aren't many new photos of Old Oraibi, and I assume it's because the Hopi issue licenses for its use (like many other tribes). Photo at dennisrholloway.com. Click on photo to go to site.

Oraibi, Hopi Reservation

All of the current pueblos of Arizona and New Mexico are very old, with roots that stretch back to the 11th or 12th century, and many abandoned villages and towns throughout the Southwest attest to older settlements that go even farther back.

There is some dispute among the pueblos as to which pueblo has the oldest continuous settlement in North America.  The first pueblo I ever visited was Taos Pueblo, when I was on vacation in New Mexico in 1999.  They claimed that they had the oldest continuous pueblo settlement in North America.  Naturally, I took them at their word - I didn't know anything about them at the time anyway.  However, after I moved to New Mexico, I visited Acoma Pueblo and they claimed to be the oldest continuous settlement.  They even prefaced their assertion with "Taos will tell you that they are the oldest settled village in North America, but...".  The tour guide at Acoma said that Taos was abandoned for a few years, while Acoma always had some residents, thus Acoma was the oldest.  And now that I've done a little research, the Hopi settlement at Oraibi also makes a claim for oldest continuous settlement in North America.  Which is true?

The answer probably is that we can't truly know, and to me it doesn't matter much anyway.  That these settlements are old is unquestionably true.  They were established for hundreds of years by the time that the Spanish arrived at Zuni Pueblo looking for the seven cities of Cibola.  In what almost seems to be a hilarious case of trying to get an unwelcome guest out of the house, the Zuni people, after the Spanish were disappointed to not find a gleaming city of gold, told the conquistadores that there was a cluster of seven cities farther to the northwest, thus sending them to the Hopis.  The Hopis were willing to consider that the Spanish fit into their mythology of the return of the Pahana, the long lost white brother to the Hopi people, but soon became disenchanted when all of the expected signs and symbols of the Pahana didn't materialize through the Spanish.

In the Hopi mythology, the Earth Caretaker spread the people far and wide but told the Hopi that after a period of migration they would, upon viewing a giant star, establish a village named Oraibi.  The location of the village would then be where the Hopi became a prosperous people benefitting forever from their surroundings.  The Hopi are therefore very tied to place.  In fact, all the pueblo tribes appear to be very connected to their surroundings.  Unlike a lot of Native American tribes, which were nomadic or semi-nomadic and followed the game that sustained them, the pueblo peoples rooted down, built dwellings, and dry farmed.  In one section of this chapter of Blue Highways, LHM writes that he's not sure how the Hopi live in such a "severe land."  A trip to Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, ancient ruins of the ancestors of the Hopi, or Bandelier National Monument in the same state, or Mesa Verde in Colorado, or Walnut Canyon in Arizona, seems to only reinforce this mystery. These places today are very dry and hot.  The answer is twofold.  First, the climate was a little wetter back in the time that these places were being established.  However drought and climate changes occurred that severely affected the ability of those communities and in some places led to the abandonment of many settlements.  Second, the people perfected the art of dry farming.  Dry farming is farming without the use of irrigation - the dry farmer learns to farm where there is little natural rainfall, saving a surplus in abundant years for those years that are lean.  Unless there is severe drought, dry farming can sustain small communities.  By subsisting on agriculture, a people must become attached to their chosen place because it is the soil and the climate that will sustain them.

Oraibi is also the locus of the return of the Pahana, the lost brother of the Hopi upon whose return they expect to gain much wisdom from what he will teach them.  The Hopis have been awaiting the Pahana for some centuries - he was prophesied to return sometime in the 16th century.  Many contenders, first Spanish and then American, who have visited the Hopi have not proved to be the Pahana.  However, this belief in the Pahana's return also ties the Hopi to their place.  If they leave, how will the Pahana find them?

Finally, Hopi ceremonies and traditions further bind them to their place in the universe, though as modernization continues, traditions die out.  According Scott Peterson, in his book Native American Prophecies, the traditional ceremonies of some Hopi villages have disappeared, though the Kachina ceremonies have remained in all villages.  This may be a sign of koyanisqatsi - a loss of balance in the world.  Such a sign may signal the imminent return of the Pahana, and perhaps the dawn of a new world.

Most of us in one way or another are tied to place, whether it's the home where we grew up or where as adults we make our meals, lay down to sleep and raise our families.  Some of us "light out for the territories," to quote Mark Twain, in order to find a place that we are pointed toward that we hope will be our physical, mental, and spiritual home.  Some of us await the day, on a personal level, when we will be visited by inspiration or the answer to our inner questions about ourselves and our lives: a revelation or, perhaps, our personal Pahana?  Some of us await the arrival of a prophet or a Messiah or some other spiritual leader who will purify the world, elevate those of us who are elect and create a new one out of the ashes.  On a more mundane level, we go about our daily lives, doing what we need to do, some more successfully than others, and in the end we hope that our lives are meaningful to one or to many.  We cultivate our salaries, others' wisdom, personal learning, understanding, others' love and assistance.   We hope to store up a surplus of those things for the lean years.  When life gets out of balance, we suffer.  Some of us remain in our pain and misery.  Those of us with insight and courage strive to put the world back into balance and our lives right once again.

The Hopi, perched on the edge of mesas in the desert, have much to teach us about ourselves and our societies through their beliefs and their prophesies.  If we don't heed their lessons, however, we benefit anyway because, as Peterson writes, "the practice of Hopi religion is considered to be absolutely essential for the survival of everything on earth....That is why Anglos and other visitors have traditionally been permitted to view many of their ceremonials which are held throughout the year.  Because the Hopi dance and pray for everyone."

The Hopi stand large for the burden they take on for the rest of us.  It's not often that a whole culture advocates with the cosmos for the well-being of all their fellow humans.  The Hopi do it every day.  For that, and for myself, I thank them.

Musical Interlude

This group came to mind as I was doing this post.  The San Antonio Vocal Arts Ensemble (SAVAE) did a an album called Native Angels, which was music written in the Aztec language, in many cases taking Christian themes.  It has the distinction of being some of the first Christian music ever performed in the Western hemisphere. While the Hopis, to the frustration of missionaries, never completely converted to Christianity, the language of this music is Nuahatl, the language of the Aztecs and related to the Hopi language.

If you want to know more about Oraibi

Ghosttowns.com: Oraibi
TheNaturalAmerican.com: Basket Dance at Old Oraibi
Southwest Crossroads: Oraibi Before the Split
Wikipedia: Oraibi

Next up: Hotevilla, Hopi Reservation

Blue Highways: Hopi Cultural Center, Hopi Reservation

Unfolding the Map

Click on Thumbnail for MapWe stop with William Least Heat-Moon (LHM) at the Second Mesa where the Hopi have their Cultural Center.  While you rest there, I will muse and ponder on some religious, philosophical questions, based on a little knowledge of Hopi myth, about balance in self and world.  I humbly beg your indulgence, and hope it might cause you to think about balance in your own life.  Are you able or not to keep balance in your life?  Click on the thumbnail of the map to your right to see where we are currently balanced on our literary journey.

Book Quote

"Like bony fingers, three mesas reached down from larger Black Mesa into the middle of Hopi land; not long ago, the only way onto these mesas was by handholds in the steep rock heights.  From the tops, the Hopi look out upon a thousand square miles.  At the heart of the reservation, topographically and culturally, was Second Mesa.  Traditionally, Hopis, as do the eagles they hold sacred, prefer to live on precipices; so it was not far from the edge of Second Mesa that they built the Hopi Cultural Center.  In the gallery were drawings of mythic figures by Hopi children who fused centuries and cultures with grotesque Mudhead Kachinas wearing large terra-cotta masks and jackolantern smiles, dancing atop spaceships with Darth Vader and Artoo Detoo."

Blue Highways: Chapter 5, Part 2

View from Second Mesa near the Hopi Cultural Center. Photo by Susie Vanderlip at Legacy of Hope. Click on photo to go to site.

Hopi Cultural Center, Hopi Reservation

To prepare for this set of posts, I read a little on Hopi prophecy.  Okay, I happened to be at the library, saw a book on Native American prophecies, Native American Prophecies by Scott Peterson, opened it, and found a chapter on the Hopi prophecy of Pahana.  It was quite fortuitous, because I really wasn't sure what I was going to write about since I have never been to the Hopi Reservation, and my knowledge of some of the other pueblos to which they are related was only going to go so far.

After reading a synopsis of the Hopi creation story, and about the prophecy that helps define their culture and how they view the world, and then how historic and modern events play into or jar against that prophecy, I am left with some broader philosophical questions.  Perhaps these would be answered by a visit to the Second Mesa and the Hopi Cultural Center, or perhaps not.  But, since I am not really taking a trip but am riding shotgun with LHM by reading about his journey, I hope you will indulge me a little philosophical speculation and musing.

First, a quick rundown of the Hopi creation myth and prophecy.  The Hopi believe that we all live in the Fourth World, and before that, humans lived in the Third World inside the earth.  They were happy until that world got out of balance due to selfishness, greed, power, and licentiousness that affected everyone from the leaders on down.  The leaders, seeking another and better world, sent out animal and bird emissaries, and a sparrow found a hole in the sky and flew through into our world, which was dark.  There the bird met the Earth's caretaker who initially refused the people's entrance into this world but eventually relented when told that only the good ones would come.  The people planted a bamboo reed and climbed inside it up to the hole in the sky and crawled through the sipapu into our world.  There, they were taught how to plant and to live simply and in balance with the earth.  The caretaker gave gifts of corn to all of the people, but only the Hopi showed the wisdom to choose the smaller ears of blue corn.  The caretaker then scattered the people to the different directions, and the Hopi were told that after a period of migration, they would see a star and the star would guide them to a place, on the backbone of the earth, where they were to build their village and live in harmony with each other and in abundance from their environment.

What really strikes me about this creation myth is that it seems to touch upon common themes that accompany many other creation myths.  It seems that there is a powerful message in these synchronous myths - one that we continually fail to heed.  The long and short of it, to me, is that humans once lived in an almost perfect state, and then we screwed it up.  Whether humans came out of the earth after messing up the Third World, or were cast out of Eden after screwing up there, or any other creation story where humans have to fall or fail before rising again, it seems that over and over we are reminded of how things once were better until we started getting arrogant and upsetting the balance.  Balance is important in the world, and we often forget the whole in our minimal perception of the part that affects only us.  The effects of our choices on our physical and social environment, even to those we cannot see, especially harmful ones due to our selfish actions, is something that is continually addressed in our creation myths, and we ignore them.

These creation myths also, for me at least, point to our inner selves.  We were born into a state of innocence.  At some point, when we start making choices, we lose that innocence, especially when we learn that a choice is bad and suffer some kind of punishment for it.  Sometimes, our innocence is taken by others.  Childhood abuse is a way we lose our innocence, for example.  Or when we are adults and some violence is visited upon us.  But at some point, even if we've had hardships in life, our choices become our own.  We've all known people that seem to create their own miseries.  They live out patterns that may have been started by a traumatic experience that is not their fault, but through their choices they continue to create trauma and drama in their lives and others' lives.  I relate to that, because I too was a victim in early life, but as an adult, I cannot fall back on that excuse any more.  My abusers can't be blamed for any of my decisions as an adult.  Any bad choices I have made of my own free will that have upset the balance in my life and have caused me pain, and I've made a few of them in my life, are my responsibility alone.

I'm beginning to understand that when we make choices, we start to live the lives we make.  Many of us can make happy lives, a few of us make ourselves miserable over and over again and put the responsibility on others.  We can cast blame about for the terrible things that have happened to us that are out of our control, but when we make choices we can continue the patterns of trauma or stop the self-destructive tendencies that permeate our lives and put us out of balance.  We are capable of making good choices or bad ones, and if we make bad ones, then what happens after the choice is made cannot be laid at anyone's feet but our own.

My sister, who is a sort of wiccan mystic and clairvoyant, told me that she believes that souls are reincarnated over and over because they are curious and want to explore almost every possible experience.  She tries to encourage my soul to move to a better place.  Buddhists, it is my understanding, believe that our actions in a present life determines whether we are reincarnated with more understanding and wisdom.  For Hindus, reincarnation allows us to move from lower lots in life to higher ones if we don't screw up - then karma will send us tumbling back.  Judeo-Christians, of course, believe that when we die, if we were good in life we will be rewarded with everlasting life in heaven.  All of these beliefs add up to a belief in a progression based on doing well, on staying in balance in our inner and outer lives.

Peterson's book says that the religious beliefs of the Hopi about inner and outer balance govern almost all of their actions.  I, for one, could learn much from their world view, because I suffer when my life gets out of balance, and I am happiest when it is in balance.  The Kachinas, which LHM mentions above, are the Hopi equivalent of saints who live among the mountains and fly down as clouds and take human form among the people.  They warn the Hopi of the consequences if they lose sight of the balance of world and self.  I could use some Kachinas in my life, especially during my times of distress.  Perhaps they are around me, and try to help me, but I just don't listen when they speak to me.

Musical Interlude

I wanted to put a different Bruce Cockburn song here, called Hills of Morning, which I thought actually fits a little better, but I couldn't find it online.  This one, Creation Dream, will do nicely.  Though sung from a Christian perspective, I think it captures the essence of creation...a power or reality beyond our imagining and all for good.  If creation is corrupted, it is we who corrupt it.

If you want to know more about the Hopi Cultural Center

Hopi Cultural Center Website

Next up:  Oraibi, Hopi Reservation