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Abenaki - Beliefs & Way of Life

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A brief description of Abenaki's tribe, culture, and society will be examined in this writing. 

Abenaki - Native American Tribe

The Abenaki are a Native American tribe and naturally, an Algonquian-speaking people of northeast North America. The Abenaki are variously known as Abnaki, Wabanaki, or Waponaki; a plethora of names that are significantly symbolic of the life and culture of the people. Accordingly, the word ‘Abenaki’ means “The people of the dawn land.”

The Abenaki consider themselves as ‘Alnombak’, a tribal term that means “the people”. As early as their perception of self-determination, the Abenaki were part of the Wananaki Confederacy of the five Algonquian-speaking tribes that prospered between the mid-1600s and mid-1800s and occupied in the New England area of the United States and Quebec of Canada.

Alongside the Algonquian people, Abenaki people shared a belief in Midewiwin (or Midewin), which is the name of the Grand Medicine Society (a secretive religion of the indigenous people) of the Anishinaabeg that included the Potawatomi people who were notably, the historic occupants of this part of Illinois.  

With the advent of the French, many converted to Christianity, however, still many practised Midewiwin or a form of syncretic practice of Midewiwin and Christianity.  Like most native religions, the Abenaki religion has some mythological underpinnings, with different kinds of beings.

Various Belief Systems 

Below are the different names of these beings with their different roles. The culture, beliefs, and life of the people are so much like the biblical story of creation by God, the creation of Adam and Eve, free will, the choice between good and evil, and freedom:

Tabaldak - the creator … Gluskab - the "transformer" being the most significant. Tales had it that Tabaldak, the creator god, made humans and then Gluskab and Malsumis sprang from the dust on his hand. Gluskab and Malsumis both had the power to create a good world, but only Gluskab did so. Malsumis continues to relentlessly seek evil to this day.

Like the biblical Jubilee, “Year of Release”, from Hebrew, “a trumpet blast of liberty”, from Latin, “shout of joy”, they claimed that Gluskab founded the ‘Golden Age’ which was a period the people lived and enjoyed the peace and did not have to work because the earth provided them food in abundance.

Gluskab founded the Golden Age of the Earth by rendering the evil spirits of the Ancient Age smaller and safer, as well as teaching humankind how to hunt and fish, build shelter, and all the Abenaki knowledge of art, invention, and science.

The concept of protecting the environment was embedded within the cultural and religious structure of their lives. Hence:  

Gluskab realized the strain hunters can cause on an ecosystem. He asked a woodchuck spirit for help, and she gave him all the hairs off her belly, woven into a magical sac. Therefore, woodchucks have bald bellies.

The traditional tales marginally repeated the biblical deluge and the rescue engendered by Noah’s Ark.

Gluskab saved the world from a frog monster that swallowed all the planet's water. When Gluskab cut open the monster's belly, some animals jumped into the water and became fish.

Finally, it imagined the narratives of redemption as well as the Parousia. Gluskab's departure ended the Golden Age, though he is prophesied to return and renew it again.

Further Reading

Gale, T., 2008. ‘Abenaki’ in UXL Encyclopedia of Native American Tribes – HighBeam Research.

New World Encyclopedia contributors, "Abenaki," New World Encyclopedia, https://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/p/index.php?title=Abenaki&oldid=973934 (accessed 3/12/2020).

Abenaki - Religion and Expressive Culture, https://www.everyculture.com/North-America/Abenaki-Religion-and-Expressive-Culture.html (Accessed 04/12/2020)

 

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