A long, long time ago, some Indians were running along a forest trail that led to their village. Suddenly a rabbit jumped from the brush onto the trail and sat up just a few yards ahead of them.
Upon seeing the rabbit, the Indians abruptly stopped in their tracks. They reached for their bow and quickly launched several arrows at their target, but strangely the arrows veered just before reaching the hare and fell harmlessly to the ground. Mystified but undaunted, the Indians each drew arrows for a second volley, but the rabbit suddenly vanished. Instead, an old man stood in the trail. He seemed to be weak and sick.
The frail old man feebly asked them for food and a place to rest. The Indians ignored him and his plea and resumed their trek back to their tribe’s camp.
Slowly the old man hobbled behind them, down the trail toward the tribe’s village. Upon arriving, the old man paused and glanced about the community. He noted that in front of each wigwam a skin was placed upon a pole. This he realized was the sign of the clan to which the occupants of each tent belonged.
First he stopped at a wigwam where a wolf skin hung. He called out in front and asked to enter, but was met with only a gruff retort. “We want no sick man here,” the occupants shouted several times.
He slowly trod to another wigwam. Here a turtle shell was hanging on the pole outside. Again he pleaded to enter, but the response was the same. He was told to move on.
He went to wigwams where hung hawk, deer, snipe and heron skins, but tent after tent he was treated in the same unkindly and unwelcome manner and turned away.
At last he came to a tent where a bear skin hung.
“I will ask once more for a place to rest,” he mumbled to himself.
And here a kind old woman lived. She welcomed the gaunt and sickly man into her home, brought food for him to eat, and spread soft skins on the ground for him to lay on.
The old stranger thanked her. He told her that he was very sick and instructed her on what plants, roots, and herbs to find and gather in the surrounding area to treat him.
This she did without question. She prepared several poultices with the items she gathered once again following his instruction and guidance and soon he was healed.
A few days later the old man relapsed and was once again taken ill, this time with different symptoms and an even greater severity. Again, he told the woman what herbs and plants to gather in the nearby woods and how to prepare and administer each. She did as she was told, and soon he was well again.
Many times the old man fell sick. Each time the illness was different. Each time he instructed the woman as to what plants and herbs to find to cure him. Each time she remembered what she had been told.
Soon this woman of the Bear clan knew more about healing than all the others of her tribe.
One day, the old man, now fully recovered from all of his various maladies, revealed to her that the Great Spirit had sent him to earth to teach the Indian people the secrets of healing.
“I came, sick and hungry, to many a wigwam entry. No blanket was drawn aside for me to pass in. You alone lifted your blanket and bid me to enter,” he spoke with a soft and soothing voice.
“You are of the Bear clan, therefore all other clans shall hereafter come to the Bear clan for help in sickness. You shall teach all the clans what plants, roots and leaves to gather that the sick might be healed. And the Bear shall be the greatest and strongest of all the clans.”
The old Indian woman lifted her face to the Great Spirit and thanked him for this great gift and knowledge of healing and vowed that she would open her tent to all who sought relief. When she turned again to the man, he had disappeared.
No one was there, but a beautiful, glowing rabbit was hopping swiftly down the trail toward the woods.
For it is in giving that we receive. – St. Francis of Assisi
Have an AWE-full Weekend!
William “Bill” Bacque