CHAPTER V. DAKOTA AND ASSINIBOIN CULTS.

ALLEGED DAKOTA BELIEF IN A GREAT SPIRIT.

§ 92. That the Dakota tribes, before the advent of the white race, believed in one Great Spirit, has been asserted by several writers; but it can not be proved. On the contrary, even those writers who are quoted in this study as stating the Dakota belief in a Great Spirit, also tell us of beliefs in many spirits of evil. Among the earlier writers of this class is Say, who observes:

Their Wahconda seems to be a protean god; he is supposed to appear to different persons under different forms. All who are favored with his presence become medicine men and magicians in consequence of their having seen and conversed with Wahconda, and of having received from him some particular medicine of wondrous efficacy.

The same writer records that “Wahconda” appeared sometimes as a grizzly bear, sometimes as a bison, at others as a beaver, or an owl, or some other bird or animal.[84] It is plain that Say mistook the generic term, “Wahconda,” for a specific one. (See §§ 6, 21-24.)

Shea says:

Although polytheism did not exist, although they all recognized one Supreme Being, the creator of all, * * * they nowhere adored the God whom they knew. * * * The demons with which they peopled nature, these alone, in their fear they sought to appease. * * * Pure unmixed devil-worship prevailed throughout the length and breadth of the land.[85]

§ 93. Lynd made some very pertinent remarks:

A stranger coming among the Dakotas for the first time, and observing the endless variety of objects upon which they bestow their devotion, and the manifold forms which that worship assumes, at once pronounces them pantheists. A further acquaintance with them convinces him that they are pantheists of no ordinary kind—that their pantheism is negative as well as positive, and that the engraftments of religion are even more numerous than the true branches. Upon a superficial glance he sees naught but an inextricable maze of gods, demons, spirits, beliefs and [counter-beliefs], earnest devotion and reckless skepticism, prayers, sacrifices, and sneers, winding and intermingling with one another, until a labyrinth of pantheism and skepticism results, and the Dakota, with all his infinity of deities appears a creature of irreligion. One speaks of the medicine dance with respect, while another smiles at the name—one makes a religion of the raw fish feast, while another stands by and laughs at his performance—and others, listening to the supposed revelations of the circle dance, with reverent attention, are sneered at by a class who deny in toto the wakan nature of that ceremony.[86]

In common with all nations of the earth the Dakotas believe in a Wakantanka or Great Spirit. But this Being is not alone in the universe. Numbers of minor deities are scattered throughout space, some of whom are placed high in the scale of power. Their ideas of the Great Spirit appear to be that He is the creator of the world and has existed from all time; but after creating the world and all that is in it He sank into silence and since then has failed to take any interest in the affairs of this planet. They never pray to Him, for they deem Him too far away to hear them, or as not being concerned in their affairs. No sacrifices are made to Him, nor dances in His honor. Of all the spirits He is the Great Spirit; but His power is only latent or negative. They swear by Him at all times, but more commonly by other divinities.[87]

Yet Lynd is not always consistent, for he says on another page (71) of the same work: “No one deity is held by them all as a superior object of worship.”