iDIDJ Australia Didgeridoo Cultural Hub

Hi,
Albeit I always am a supporter of positive sciences, I read many times things like people being cured by Yolngu mystically. Richard Trudgen even mentiones that without giving too much detail in his book that he once was cured by Yolngu for which Western medicine could do nothing. The other example was from Lars Wallin ,which is also in his book I think. that he saw Blanasi in front of his eyes being treated. Despite being agnostics about such things, I wonder what you guys think about such news,

M.

Hi Mahir,

I think this is a tricky subject because our own skepticism can unduly color our opinions. Without delving too far into the matter, I have no doubt that traditional medicines and healing practices are viable and beneficial to those who practice and use them. In the matter of Trudgen, I don't recall that specific passage though it does sound familiar- and I would say that bush medicine (and the intimate knowledge of country that accompanies it) probably hold many secrets and truths compared to Western medicine.

Jason

I believe there are bush medicines being used in Arnhem Land that are, if not unknown to modern science, at least not widely known. We in the West have lost much of our knowledge base when it comes to this sort of thing and it can often seem 'mysterious' or 'magical' when such treatments are witnessed by us.

A friend of mine was treated by a well known Yolngu elder when he had a condition that in our society would have required surgery. In the end a poultice made of the inner bark of a native Arnhem Land shrub did the trick!

I've seen traditional healing practices used to great effect to help restore range of motion to a man whose neck was broken and was formerly paralyzed. Incidentally if you're interested in Yolngu traditional medicine, check out: The Healing Place

Best,
Phil

'The Healers of Arnhemland' and 'Aboriginal Men of High Degree' are excellent books on this subject.

Hi again,
I certainly agree that bush medicine is working (which is used not only by Yolngu but ohers as well ) and we in the west have lost this to a great extent. However, my question is more about the things like Phil gave an example of. I mean, could the degree to which bush medicine works be so great that even the paralyzed
is cured?
What would Guan and Peter say?

Just to clarify, the man I saw receive treatment at the healing place this past July had already recovered from paralysis before the treatment. He could walk again, but had difficulty holding onto things and could not run or jump. After his treatment however, he clearly had better motor control for holding onto things and walked with much more spring in his step. It was a really impressive thing to see.

Phil

Bita says;

I don't have any first hand experience of such healing (although I have to say some pretty freaky things have happened when I've been in Ramo - things of a paranormal bent..) but there is mention by others in various books - Jennifer Isaacs and Penny Tweedie both recount stories of how their children were healed of very serious conditions ( sorry I can't recall the details and my copies of these books are at home). Penny's son Ben was only 2 yrs old at the time and seriously ill in Ramo – he was healed by a famous painter & sorcerer (now deceased) George Malibirr (Milp**ru*u) and Jenny's son? in Sydney - I think Wandjuk was the healer on the latter occasion ??

In both cases it wasn't so much bush medicine as I recall - which is clearly efficacious in many instances and there are many publications that deal with the active constituents and biochemistry involved in a range of natural products (remember that we all used such things once - aspirin, for example, originally came from willowbark).

Belief in the deeper forces that drive the cosmos and act to bring about healing vary from individual to individual and across communities but certainly it still exists in the minds of many and there are people that seem to be equipped with special skills that detect forces and heal where others fail. I have an open mind about such things as there is much yet to learn about the power of the mind to heal oneself and the suggestive skills some people possess.

Having said that I don't like the way many "westerners" have taken to using the didj as a "healing tool" purporting to have had such skills handed to them by "traditional healers" - but that's a can of worms......

There's an online ABC interview of sorts with John Cawte here;

http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ockham/stories/s20.htm

I'll leave it to Guan to tell you about the person playing the role of galka in those photos in the book....

Bush medicines are one thing and 'mystical' treatments another.

Medicines derived from plants and other biological resources are pharmacological in their workings and there's nothing strange or unusual that there are some pretty powerful medicines to be found in the 'bush', not just in Arnhem Land, but the all over the world. There has been bio-prospecting done in Arnhem Land by some of the major pharmaceutical companies, and commercial products released as a result of that - one of which was an anaesthetic or analgesic from the nut of the pandanus tree if my memory serves me correctly.

Now, if we talk about marrnggitj in NE Arnhem Land, 'clevermen' who can heal by magical means, that's something different altogether. This is not about bush medicines or pharmacological treatments, but about special abilities that are beyond the reasonings of Western science. See pic below of a sharp bone wrapped in friable human hair that was extracted from Sylvia Gukuda. I took this pic in June 1995 when staying with Sylvia and her family. She had complained of pains in her body late one night and asked to be brought to see a Balanda nurse. We sat on the verandah outside her house not knowing exactly what to do... she couldn't get up to walk and was obviously in pain. A few moments later, Michael Dawu (one of the canoeists in Ten Canoes) flys past in a battered car with some of his mates. We hail him down and I explain to him what was going on. I knew Dawu was a marnggitj and thought he might be able to do something. He came over and spoke to Gukuda, asking her what was wrong. He then proceeded to massage her side with his hands, and then placed his mouth against her side and began sucking. When he was done, he spat blood from his mouth and then removed a long sharpened bone wrapped in human hair from within. There was no mark on Gukuda's body, no scar, no exit wound. The human hair was very delicate and broke into pieces when handled, almost as though it had been decomposing for some time. Gukuda felt immediately better and exclaimed that she was ok now. We woke her husband William Watirri who was furious that someone, a galka', had magically placed the bone inside his wife. He reckoned it happened at Elcho Island because of jealousy.

12 years later, Gukuda is still alive and well, as you can see in this unrelated YouTube clip:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKgz5k2N-MQ[/youtube]

Dawu lost his abilities as a marrnggitj however. Marrnggitj are literally 'little people' who sit on ones shoulders and bestow such people with powers. They're not visible to anyone except those who have been given this power. Just as one can acquire marrnggitj, you can also lose them... by becoming fully submerged in saltwater, by drinking too much hot tea, etc.

Anyway, you be the judge, the pic tells a thousand words as they say. Dawu had a collection of objects that he had extracted from people, mostly small stones. He kept them in a Coca Cola bottle filled with water and was quite a sight...

Guan

Yup, agree with you entirely!



Ummm, we won't go there.

Guan

I got some private messages about this post...

Just wanted to say a couple more things about this topic.

Do I believe in these sorts of things? I don't know really, I like to keep an open mind but I also know that seeing is not always believing. The incredible part of this story was that Dawu just happened to be driving around at that time of night... it was way past midnight and most people in the community were asleep, myself included before being woken up by Gukuda crying out for help. Could it be that individuals who proclaim themselves to be marrnggitj are really just fakes who always carry bones and stones around with them, with the hope that they get the opportunity to demonstrate their 'trick' when called upon to heal someone? That is a possibility, but it becomes a stretch of the imagination to think Dawu and other marrnggitj would be 'on guard' 24 hours a day. When I saw Dawu that night, it was like 2 am in the morning.

Also, the other thing is, if marrnggitj are real, then one might imagine that Yolngu could live for ever if people who are sick are treated by them. But as we know, mortality rates are shockingly high in Arnhem Land. And Dawu's father has passed away.

So I don't know really, but I'll happily admit that there are things in this world that we do not know about and cannot measure and analyse with our scientific tools.

Guan

Thanks for speaking your mind about it Guan,
greatly appreciated.

Hi there !

Just reading (not so) old topics.
Didn't see that marrnggitj story before.
Quite astonishing indeed !


Sure, as well as belief is not necessarily truth either.
But I guess believing can help one out of a bad situation... May it be rational or not.
Placebo effect pills is the best proof that even our scientists do believe into the power of belief (?!).


Well, in this case, Dawu wasn't curing somebody from a normal illness, desease, wound or from old age.
He cured Sylvia from another "sorcerer"s bad trick.
So maybe clevermen and marrnggitj do not have power against "natural" death (opposed to "supernatural").

I just saw this pop up and I thought I would comment even though its an old topic. In Micheal Harners book The Way of the Shaman he discusses the Shaman placing items in their mouth then sucking on the patient and claiming they sucked out the item in their mouth. This is a description from South America but its supposed to be pretty universal among tribal shaman the world over. According to him the shaman explain that the item in the mouth becomes the reservoir for what is sucked out. The sickness needed a bone and hair to come out into. A material container for a non material item, a representation of the disease. From the shaman's perspective when they hold the item and say it is the sickness, they are not simply lying, but they are showing a visual manifestation of the disease. I would imagine that a shaman would keep such items on hand. The whole thing works from a non-Western frame of mind. Obviously such a showy practice (there is a lot of showmanship in shamanism) would be very helpful in turning on the patients inner healing processes (placebo). It may work on yet unknown levels as well. One thing can almost certainly be guaranteed that the bone and hair was not physically sucked out of the patient.

Im not sure if ive got this thread correct but ill type this anyway from a point of view of healing and witch craft the power of the mind is very very strong if you take the example of voodoo in Hati and Africa a lot of the witch doctors/medicen mans power for healing and indeed cursses comes from the recipiants mind that it is going to happen the psycho samatic power of the idividuals mind, also mixed with that the power of the "natural" herbs, poisions etc used and the knowledge obtained there from over thousands of years has a strong influence mixed together I dont see how it can be any different in Oz, south america, africa etc.

just my thoughts

ta