From the Shenandoah to South Dakota

After spending several days trying various ways to embed a recording of Larry Swallow chanting the Lakota Creation story (hence how quiet it's been on this blog lately), I have given up and decided to do this the old fashioned way. Well, technically it's the new way, since Lakota stories come from oral history, but you get my point. Larry came and performed for us on Tuesday during our trip. He brought along his sister, a former Black Panther who I later found out was not a blood relation, but had been bound to him through a Lakota ceremony that turns dear friends into relatives.

It's been a few weeks since I heard him tell the story, but this is what I remember, with a little help from Larry's book, Tiikceka Tokaheya (The First Common Home). In my very American way, I've stripped out any part that I don't understand or doesn't seem to fit in the linear story. To purchase a copy of Larry Swallow's book along with a CD of his chants, call 605-441-1045 or write to P.O. Box 697 / Allen, SD 57714.

In the beginning, Iyan Tokaheya turned himself inside out, creating the world. He covered himself with the Ozone Layer, and from his blood came the oceans, from the rock of his body the earth. So the world was created half land, half water, born to satisfy His desire to create something beautiful from Himself.

And as Iyan Tokaheya created desire, the first creatures that inhabited the Earth were also selfish, driven only by instinct. These were dinosaurs and Neanderthals. So the lightning came down and struck down these first inhabitants, acknowledging that selfishness and desire would be forevermore part of the natural world. In their place, greater beings were created that had the capacity for compassion, intelligence, and prayer.

Among the four-legged beings was the buffalo, intelligent and powerful, formed in the heart of the Black Hills.

Among the two-legged were four races of man: Black, Red, Yellow and White. God gave each a prayer. To the Black people, He gave the prayer of water, for they are His blood, fluid and strong. To the Red, the earth, for they are His heart and healers of the land. To the Yellow people, he spoke the prayer of the air, so that they might be His breath. And to the White people, the fire, for they are His spirit. God spoke each of these prayers, and people came into being.

For a time, the people of the four races lived in harmony. But soon, selfishness began reappearing. People began to fight among themselves, each believing they had the better culture, or language, or prayer from God.

So Iyan Tokaheya sent the rain, and it rained for 40 days and 40 nights. The skies opened up. The Earth shook. At the end of the Great Flood, where there was once one land, now it was separate, with each race given a continent to develop their societies and keep the laws of God as they saw best.

And thus the world and its people came into being.