Book Report on, *The Raven's Gift.*


“Every creature is a word of God.”  Meister Eckhart

An old guy Jon Turk kayaks to Siberia and meets 96 yr old indigenous Koryak holy-woman Moolynaut who asked Kutcha Raven-god to heal Jon's pelvis shattered in an avalanche--and so he was healed. Koryak life was lived among Raven Reindeer Salmon Mink Wolf Rabbit Bear River Fox Ice Tree Ocean-Being for thousands of years until the czar's soldiers and priests came from the west and took most of the Reindeer and Furs every year and the czar's priests called them savages and devils so some of the Koryak began wearing brassiere and drinking vodka but other Koryak moved farther into the Wilderness to preserve their lives and culture. years later stalin's soldiers came and took away the czar's priests but also the rest of the Reindeer and furs and proclaimed that all Koryak were now comrade-citizens of the great soviet socialist republic!  so the Koryak had no more Reindeer and their life was violently shattered and the Koryak went hungry or were forced to work in factories and many killed themselves or died from rotten livers. but some few remained on the Tundra and meagerly survived hunting Rabbits and fishing Salmon.  but then again officials from moscow arrived but now they were capitalist and they announced that all the Koryak were now subjects/citizens of a democratic republic, and they possessed many papers (and weapons) proving that all the Salmon and furs were now fungible commodities entirely owned by rich overlords in giant cities thousands of kilometers to the west and then factories invaded on boats tracks planes and they took all the Salmon Fox Mink and cut down Trees so the Koryak could not hunt or fish or breathe. the capitalists priests returned also and preached to the Koryak that their Raven-god was a devil and must be destroyed and since the western men were great destroyers, the few survivors now pray inside wood boxes with colorful pictures of a strange god on the walls.  but it was the men from the west who had killed their own god not the Koryak so they ask why should the Koryak be made to suffer? Moolynaut is the last Holy-woman of the Koryak and she worries that no one will follow her in the way of the Tundra and Kutcha the Raven-god.  there was one other holy-woman even older than Moolynaut from the area of Magadan but 2 years earlier she knew she would soon die so when she could find no young woman willing to learn her wisdom she embraced the sacred Tree and prayed, 'my power came form Kutcha Raven-god and now i return it.'  then the Tree exploded as if struck by Lightening and she and the Tree fell shattered and dead among the smoldering splinters and so her power returned to her creator.  I fear when Moolynaut dies something immensely good, holy, and life-channeling will be lost from this world; not like when the dinosaurs went extinct or a tsunami kills thousands, we may grieve through the loss caused by an ocean storm and still come to dwell in a greater wholeness, but how to we come to abide the transformation of the whole Earth into a murder/suicide crime scene?

Much obliged.


* List of some of the tribes of the northwest coast of usamerica where I live:

Tlingit
Nisga's
Bella Coola
Nuu-chah-nulth
Haida
Tsimshian
Gitxsan
Kwakiuts
Haisla
Makah
Heitsuk
Nuxalk
Salish
Quileute
Chimakum
Nootka
Nisqualli
S'Klallam
Wilapa
Chinook
Makah
Tilamook
Wuikinuxv
Shuswap
Nuxalk
Haisla
Quinalt
Kwakwaka'wakw

"Jesus told his followers a parable: The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed planted in a field.  It is a small seed yet it grows into a great tree and becomes a home for all the birds who come to shelter in its branches."  Matthew 13:31-32.