This remarkable book lets readers hear Maya myths as they are told today in the mountains of Guatemala. First published in 1993, Breath on the Mirror is now available only from UNM Press. "A fascinating literary and anthropological excursion into the mental universe of the modern Quiche Maya and their forebears. The stories and myths so compellingly recounted here turn our own world upside-down and remake it in the Maya image. Reading this, one can understand why and how Maya culture has survived five centuries of oppression."--Michael D. Coe, Yale University, author of The Maya

Ifa: A Forest of Mystery by Nicholaj de Mattos Frisvold is a major study on the cosmology, metaphysics, philosophy and divination system of Ifa, written by a tradition holder and member of the council of elders, known as the Ogboni society, of Abeokuta, Nigeria. Ifa - an alternative name for its prophet Orunmila - is a religion, a wisdom tradition and a system of divination encoding the rich and complex oral and material culture of the Yoruba people. The Yoruba culture is grounded in memory, an ancestral repository of wisdom, that generates good counsel, advises appropriate ebo (sacrifice) and opens the way to develop a good character on our journey through life and in our interactions with the visible and invisible worlds. The work is a presentation of the first sixteen odu of the Ifa corpus of divination verses explained in stories, allegories and proverbs reflecting the practical wisdom of Ifa. The work is both a presentation of Ifa for those with little knowledge of it, and a dynamic presentation of the wealth of its wisdom for those already familiar with Ifa. The deities and key concepts of Ifa metaphysics are discussed, including: Obatala, Onile, Sango, Ogun, Oya, Osanyin, Yemoja, Esu, ase (power), egungun (ancestry), iwa (character), and ori (head/consciousness/daimon). Notably, Dr Frisvold has created a work which celebrates the Yoruba wisdom tradition and makes a bridge with the Western world. It is of value for the light that it casts on the origins and mysteries of Esu and orisa, and an important source for those practicing Quimbanda, Palo, Santeria, Vodou and the African Diaspora religions. Yet its lessons are universal, for it is the art of developing character, of attracting good fortune and accruing wisdom in life. "Ifa is a philosophy, a theogony, theology and cosmology rooted in a particular metaphysic that concerns itself with the real and the ideal, the world and its beginning. It is rooted in the constitution of man and the purpose of life and the nature of fate. Ifa is a philosophy of character. The philosophy of Ifa lies at the root of any religious cult or organization involving the veneration of orisa. [...] Through stories and legends, divinatory verses and proverbs, this philosophy will be revealed piece by piece until the landscape has been laid open before you." - Nicholaj de Mattos Frisvold

*Contains never-before-released talks by Rolling Thunder preserved by the Grateful Dead's Mickey Hart as well as accounts of remarkable healings and weather magic from famous personalities who knew him*Explains that in order to heal Nature's afflictions we must first restore balance and unity in ourselvesCherokee-Shoshone medicine man Rolling Thunder (19161997) was a healer, teacher, visionary and activist who rose to popularity in the 1960s and '70s through his friendship with artists such as Bob Dylan and as the inspiration for the Billy Jack films. Eyewitness accounts of his remarkable healings are legion, as are those of his ability to call forth the forces of nature, typically in the form of thunder clouds. Yet it was his equally uncommon gift as a prophet and living representative of Native American wisdom that truly set him apart from other spiritual teachers of that era. Thirty years before most people had ever heard of global warming, Rolling Thunder described in graphic detail the signs of encroaching planetary doom and campaigned for environmental harmony. The key to healing nature's afflictions, he maintained, is to first restore balance and unity in ourselves. Containing never-before-released talks preserved by the Grateful Dead's Mickey Hart, this book shares the teachings of Rolling Thunder in his own words and through inspiring interviews with psychologist Alberto Villoldo and other famous personalities who knew him. Collected and edited by his grandson, Sidian Morning Star Jones and longtime friend, Stanley Krippner, this book allows you to incorporate Rolling Thunder's wisdom into your own life.

This Is A New Release Of The Original 1921 Edition.

Christian churches erected in Mexico during the early colonial era represented the triumph of European conquest and religious domination. Or did they? Building on recent research that questions the ""cultural"" conquest of Mesoamerica, Eleanor Wake shows that colonial Mexican churches also reflected the beliefs of the indigenous communities that built them. European authorities failed to recognize that the meaning of the edifices they so admired was being challenged: pre-Columbian iconography integrated into Christian imagery, altars oriented toward indigenous sacred landmarks, and carefully recycled masonry. In Framing the Sacred, Wake examines how the art and architecture of Mexico's religious structures reveals the indigenous people's own decisions regarding the conversion program and their accommodation of the Christian message. As Wake shows, native peoples selected aspects of the invading culture to secure their own culture's survival. In focusing on anomalies present in indigenous art and their relationship to orthodox Christian iconography, she draws on a wide geographical sampling across various forms of Indian artistic expression, including religious sculpture and painting, innovative architectural detail, cartography, and devotional poetry. She also offers a detailed analysis of documented native ritual practices that - she argues - assist in the interpretation of the imagery. With more than 260 illustrations, Framing the Sacred is the most extensive study to date of the indigenous aspects of these churches and fosters a more complete understanding of Christianity's influence on Mexican peoples.

This comparative study of African and Hindu popular religions in the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago charts the development of religion in the Caribbean by analyzing the ways ecstatic forms of worship, enacted through trance performance and spirit mediumship, have adapted to capitalism and reconfigured themselves within the context of modernity. Showing how diasporic traditions of West African Orisha Worship and South Asian Shakti Puja converged in their ritual adaptations to colonialism in the West Indies, as well as diverged politically within the context of postcolonial multiculturalism, Keith McNeal reveals the unexpected ways these traditions of trance performance have become both globalized and modernized. The first book-length work to compare and contrast Afro- and Indo-Caribbean materials in a systematic and multidimensional manner, this volume makes fresh and innovative contributions to anthropology, religious studies, and the historiography of modernity. By giving both religious subcultures and their intersections equal attention, McNeal offers a richly textured account of southern Caribbean cultural history and pursues important questions about the history and future of religion.