Ancient Wisdom
What if there was a type of ancient wisdom that our ancestors beheld that we have since forgotten or lost? What if our predecessors understood more than we do today? We have science, you might say. But there is a recent trend in science that seems to confirm or at least bolster some ancient ideas that we have mostly tossed by the wayside.
You can’t pay attention to science nowadays without coming away with the notion that everything is incredibly complex and interdependent. Did our ancestors understand that? At least on a macro level? Maybe they didn't understand it on the granular level we do today, but they seemed to grasp it broadly. Have we lost our way in the last few thousand years and forgotten how intricately interwoven the fabric of our reality is? Maybe we are re-learning?
Maybe our ancestors, because they lived much more in tune with nature, had special understandings of the intricacies of what made their existence possible. They had to. Their lives depended on it. They couldn’t just go to the store and buy what they needed to survive.
Using their senses, they needed to rigorously observe and track the rhythms of the seasons, of the months, of the days, of the hours, as they pertained to all the natural systems that the ancestors relied on to survive. Maybe these sensory observations enabled intuitions about how the natural systems work, leading to a visceral understanding of the principles of complexity and interdependence. As the ancestors navigated survival, maybe they had a naturalistic and experiential understanding of what we have long since forgotten.
It took hundreds of years of science to reteach us some of these principles.
Did these principles lead to an understanding of just how tenuous their survival was, along with every other living being? And to comprehend that they needed to be careful with what they had? That they couldn’t be sure what kinds of impacts their actions might have on the delicate balance of the environment upon which they completely depended? Was it a mindset of humility, gratitude, and care? Maybe even reciprocity?
Are some of these understandings still around today? On the fringe, maybe? Are they leftovers from the indigenous cultures that hundreds of years of “western civilization” and colonization have directed every effort toward wiping out?
In Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer (her other book about the wondrous miniature world of moss is also fascinating) writes about the indigenous concepts of reciprocity, the gift economy, and the “Honorable Harvest,” which all seem antithetically opposed to the take-too-much mentality of western culture. Describing the Honorable Harvest Kimmerer writes:
Know the ways of the ones who take care of you, so that you may take care of them.
Introduce yourself. Be accountable as the one who comes asking for life.
Ask permission before taking. Abide by the answer.
Never take the first. Never take the last.
Take only what you need.
Take only that which is given.
Never take more than half. Leave some for others.
Harvest in a way that minimizes harm.
Use it respectfully. Never waste what you have taken.
Share.
Give thanks for what you have been given.
Give a gift, in reciprocity for what you have taken.
Sustain the ones who sustain you and the earth will last forever.
Maybe because our distant ancestors saw the economics of their lives as gifts of nature, they felt impelled to act in ways to reciprocate the favor, rather than plunder every last drop of every resource. Profit motive was probably not part of ancient wisdom. Look where it has gotten us.
What if this ancient wisdom was cross-cultural? Surely, indigenous North Americans were not the only people to embody such ideas. The Taoists teach of the Great Separation, when humans began to see themselves as apart from nature. Before that, the Taoists believe that humans lived in harmony with nature. Hinduism and Jainism teach that all beings are interconnected. The Buddha taught that all things were mutually interdependent. Shintoism taught that humans could not exist apart from nature, that all of nature — including humans — were members of the same family. The Maori of New Zealand also understood the interdependence of all living and non-living things. There are probably other ancient traditions with similar mindsets.
I wonder if rekindling such a mindset would help us live more in tune with the natural world. If we adopted ideas such as humility, reciprocity, gratitude, and care, would we think more about our actions and their effect on the environment we depend on? Would we be better ancestors to the generations yet to come?
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Is ancient wisdom at its core a formulation of The Oneness Principle?