Continued from last issue.

The Haudenosaunee address to the Western World

Geneva, Switzerland Autumn 1977

Introduction

It was not long ago that the Haudenosaunee, or Six Nations, were a powerful people, occupying a vast territory stretching from Vermont to Ohio, and from present-day Quebec to Tennessee. At the period of first contact early during the 17th Century, the Haudenosaunee occupied hundreds of towns and villages throughout the country.

“Haudenosaunee” is a word which means “people who build” and is the proper name of the people of the Longhouse. The early history, history before the Indo-Europeans came, explains that there was a time when the peoples of the North American forest experienced war and strife. It was during such a time that there came into this land one who carried words and plans of peace. That one would come to be called Peacemaker.

The Peacemaker came to the people with a message that human beings should cease abusing one another. He stated that humans are capable of reason, that through the power of reason all men desire peace, and that it is necessary that people organize to ensure that peace will be possible among the people who walk about on the earth. That was the original word about laws – laws were originally made to prevent the abuse of humans by other humans.

The Peacemaker travelled among the people, going from nation to nation, seeking those who would take up this way of peace, offering with it a way of reason and power. He journeyed first among the Ganienkehaga – the people of Flint Stone – (Mohawks) where he sought to speak to the most dangerous of these people, offering them his message.

He travelled for a long time among the Mohawks; the People of Standing Stone (the Oneidas) the People of the Hills (Onondagas), the People of the Swamp (Cayugas), and the People of the Great Hills (Senecas). Eventually, those five nations were the initial ones to take up the offer of peace. The nations gathered together in council and there they set down the principles of what is called the Gayaneshakgowa, or the Great Law of Peace.

It is impossible to overstate the power of thought that emerges from that document. Today, it is almost impossible for us to recreate the scene of its birth. But centuries ago, a natural world people gathered together at the head of a lake in the center of North America’s then virgin forest, and there, they counselled. The principles that emerged are unequalled in any political document which has yet emerged in the event – they evolved a law which recognized that vertical hierarchy creates conflicts, and they dedicated the superbly complex organization of their society to function to prevent the rise of internally hierarchy.

Secondly, they looked into their own histories to discover the things which cause conflict among people. They saw, for example, that peoples sometimes struggle over hunting territories, and they did a curious thing. They abolished the significance of such territories and guaranteed the safety of anyone entering the country of the Haudenosaunee. And they established universal laws about the treatment and taking of game, because the taking of game sometimes caused conflicts. In the country of the Haudenosaunee, all people were free, all had a right to protection under what the Peacemaker called the Great Tree of Peace.

The basic principles of peace went further than the simple absence of conflict. An ordered society which has the capability of protecting people against abuse and which is, at the same time, dedicated to a containment of hierarchy, is a complex society. The People of the Longhouse sought to carry the principles of peace far from the council fires, into every dwelling in the country of the Haudenosaunee. Thus does the Great Law establish more than a code of conduct – it is also the beginning point for the modern clans. It embodies the foundations of all the customs of holding meetings, of exchanging messages on wampums, and of assigning titles to leaders.

Continued in next issue.