The Sun Dance

August 3, 2010 by Becki Baumgartner
Filed under Meditation, Motivational

These are not my words but thought I would pass them along to a few that may be of interest and to my Sun Dance supporters to stir there memories.

After this Friday evening I will be leaving to go to the Sun Dance site to start my purification. I do not know for sure if I will have contact with anyone after that. It is just the briefest of description of the Dance with a few facts. ~Leo ‘Circling Bear’

The Sun Dance was banned in Canada in 1880 and in the United States in 1904.The Christian missionaries along with the federal government sought to prohibit the dance after seeing of the practices that were executed in the ceremony, especially the piercing of the young men’s chests. They failed to comprehend the spiritual significance of the practices and the dance.

The Sun Dance is again legal through the passage of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1978

Annual Sun Dance was held in some form or another by many American Natives of the Plains Indian tribes. It was performed in the summer, usually in late July or early August, after the buffalo hunts. The Sun Dance is again legal through the passage of the American Indian Religious Freedom Act of 1979

The Sun Dance ceremony has both spiritual and physical significance for the individual dancer, traditionally male but presently females are included in some tribes but do not undergo piercing.

In a Lakota / Sioux ceremony, women dancers are never pierced because according to the Sioux the woman is recognized as already having endured her pain in childbirth. This pain is considered greater than any faced during the Sun Dance because bearing children may cause women to die and certainly facing death is considered the greatest challenge.

After the dancers spend four days in purification. On that fourth day in the afternoon (which is when the dancers actually start there four day dance ending four days later) we ceremoniously take the tree never letting it touch the ground until it is carried to the arbor. This requires the efforts of the hole tribe with great effort. The dancers tie there ropes and flags to the tree and it is raised and planted in a pre-dug hole in the center of the arbor. Once this is done the dancers put there 607 prayer tie’s on the tree and any supporters that have prayer ties are added.

The next morning before sun rise the dancers are call to do the morning sweat lodge. After that at sun rise the ceremonial procession is led by the Sun Dance chief, followed by the holy men, and woman and a man carrying a buffalo skull. This begins the Sun Dance. The Sun Dance is an annual thanksgiving to the Great Spirit and to all of the powers between the breathing ones and Wakan Tanka.

At the end of the day the dancers are lead to the Sweat lodge for another sweat.

This is repeated for four days.

The Sun Dancers supporters that come from the dancers tribe, the band, or Tiyospaye work around the camp to keep things running smoothly and assist the dancers needs in camp. The dance could not go on without the physical and spiritual help of the supporters. We are are all one with a common goal of this an annual renewal ceramony. Everyone has there part to play.

If a man is called to pierce the dancer signifies to the holy holding his wooden pegs he is ready.

During the piercing the man thinks of the tree, realizing that it is a tree of life, without it and others like it man could not live on Earth. He also concentrates on its decorations symbolizing the powers of the four directions, the red, yellow, black, and white banners, plus the green and blue ones for Mother Earth and Father Sky. He thinks about all those he is doing this for. This concentration also takes the man’s attention off of the pain that he is enduring and will endure when the holy man inserts the pegs, which is more painful than the insertion of the blade.

To the protruding ends of the pegs the holy man attaches a rope fasten by a thong. This signifies the umbilical cord which attaches the man to his mother, Mother Earth.

The man is then helped to his feet by an assistant and with his wreath of sage with two spiked feathers placed on his head. The man fully realizing the badge of honor which has just been bestowed upon him. Carefully holding onto the rope he takes his position again in the Sun Dance, and gradually adds his weight on to the rope and into the pain in his chest as he begins dancing and pulling on the rope.

At the direction of the Sun Dance chief the dancers, including those who were pierced, move toward the tree four times, each time touching the tree with their palms. This is the powerful moment when the tribe is deep in prayer; the prayers become a spiritual wind sweeping down and over the backs of the Sun Dancers penetrating in them, trough their arms and hands, into the tree and upward to the ultimate powers and to Wakan Tanka.

Following the fourth touching of the tree, the dancer leans back harder against the ropes. They are now free to seek their Sun Dance vision. Simultaneously the tribe, and all in attendance, is seeking its vision. This is the essence, the heart, of the Sun Dance, which is the gathering of the tribe, the band, the gathered Tiyospaye, acknowledging the spiritual and physical relationship to all that is the cante, that is, the essence of survival.

After Four days, the dancers have finished their connection with the tree of life the Sun Dance chief leads them from the circle which ends the dance. Then they are met by tribes gratitude for their appreciation for they know their spiritual tradition had once again been renewed.

Source: Leo Circling Bear, Glasgow Reiki Meetup Group . Personal Communication. August 3, 2010.

The Sun Dance

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