The Hunting Code Only the human animal has the latitude to prey on any creature whatever, from ants to whales, even microscopic entities such as amoebae. The capacity to prey on all creatures indicates one of Gaias exceptional conditions for her problem species: they have no pre-selected prey. Because humans can adapt to any environment, from the Arctic to the Sahara, they can range far and wide in search of prey. They can hunt the animals specific to any habitat they explore. No other animal can do this. And there is more to the unique status—exceptional, but not superior—of the human species regarding the prey-predator relationship. For all other creatures prey is hunted to be eaten. Gaia sets up instinctual programs coded with specific prey-predator bonds so that the predators can survive on the guarantee of having other species dedicated to their nourishment. Lion-gazelle, for instance. The gazelle population far exceeds the lion population. Lions are guaranteed a due portion, a quota, of the gazelle population, given they keep their hunting skills honed to high capacity. The arrangements of these bonds, lion-gazelle, lion-zebra, lion-jackal, are closely and delicately calculated by Gaia. These bonds may also be called pacts because they comprise a cross-species agreement with specific boundaries binding to both parties. There is much to learn about how these bonds or pacts are leveraged (next essay in this trilogy). That is, how Gaia plays the odds. Exceptionally, human predators have the latitude, not only to seek any prey they choose, but to prey gratuitously, without the need to so do for nourishment. they may do so for sport, in the spirit of play, or to satiate murderous lust. It is often said that humans stand at the top end of the food chain. This is an arrogant and precarious claim. If indeed humans do occupy this position, they do so at their own risk, due to the danger of violating the balance of nature posed by such a presumption. Through history, and more and more into modern times, humans have acted as out-of-control predators who kill for the thrill of it, without respect for the prey and without needing the nourishment the prey can provide. In the American West, native people honored the buffalo as a sacred animal who supported their life in many ways: giving nourishment by its flesh and organs (preserved for shaman-warriors of the hunt), providing clothing with it skin, offering ritual and practical uses for its antlers and bones. Everything of the animal was used. The prey-predator bond of buffalo-human was deeply integrated into the cultural and spiritual life of the people. But when the European white man came to America, he indiscriminately slew the buffalo herds, leaving their bodies to rot on the plains. Men shot the animals from moving trains just for the kick of it. In Avatar, the Artemis-like huntress Neytiri teaches Jake Sully how to kill for survival and thank the slain animal for the trade of its life. she calls the kill of a forest wolf an execution. The hunting ritual depicted in the film follows the norm of all indigenous peoples. Hunting by the human species observes the symbiotic order of Gaia, the planetary animal mother (PAM, if you like). Or at least it originally did. Because the human species has no naturally selected prey, it can choose intentionally what creatures to hunt and not to hunt. Selection of prey is the mark of the human species which, among all creatures, has no preselected prey. Among all indigenous cultures, selection of prey and exception to predation are the two conditions that determine the strict parameters of the hunting code. Exception to predation means that the totemic animal of a clan cannot be hunted except in special instances. Gaia does not lay down these parameters in human instinctual programs, but relies on the genius of the species to devise them. In the 2012 essay on the Manitu, the Guardian of the Wilderness, I proposed the term symbiotropism for the natural tendency to move toward and bond with that which enhances life by the sharing or exchange of life. Native peoples in Australia, for instance, exhibit symbiotropism tthat allows each Aboriginal clan to identify its totemic animal and bond in symbiosis to that animal. they do not eat their totemic animals except on special occasions, feast days, moments of special commemoration. The bonds formed by symbiotropic affinities are held to be sacred in all societies where humans have developed in close proximity to, and attunement with, nature. Our species does not have strictly bounded instinctual programs like other animals, but Gaia provides us with symbiotropic affinities as guidelines or schemata in forming inter-species bonds. Such schemata (multivalent floating indicators in the arcane language of anthropology) are loaded with symbolic and magical cues and skills. Real, effective magic is only possible to the human species through its bonding with animal power, the animations of the kingdoms of Gaia. Left to ourselves alone, fixated by the drama of self-reflection and trapped in the maze of cultural constructs, we cannot achieve shamanic magic. John Lash
Posted on: Sun, 04 Jan 2015 00:05:17 +0000