The Two Row Wampum*
Last spring several members of our congregations went out to the Cayuga Share Farm to listen and learn from some of the Tribal chiefs and clan mothers. They referred again and again to the Two Row Wampum, a treaty between the Haudenosaunee ancestors and the white settler ancestors. They asked us that the spirit of our relationship begin with this treaty, a treaty which has been broken again and again by our US government, and by us settlers, and even by the churches, even the Unitarian Universalist church. Because the key to the treaty is sovereignty- that the ship and the canoe peacefully coexist along side one another. We settlers know some of the history of the violence, the genocide that was part of the way we broke the peace of that treaty, though the more the chiefs talked about our shared history, the more I understood how thin my knowledge was.
The reason the two row was called again and again, was to affirm this agreement “The boats will travel side by side down the river of life. Each nation will respect the ways of each other and will not interfere with the other.” In part we remembered the Two Row because we had come together because of the active interference by the US Government Bureau of Indian affairs by choosing Clint Halftown as their representative, in violation of tradition and sovereignty. But we also remembered the 2 row so that it could guide how we were together. Many allies had gathered there that day because of the displacement and injustices in recent months, but the allies had a certain way of doing things, “Let’s hurry and fix this now” was the spirit of the allies. One of the clan mothers responded “this is urgent, so we must go slowly.” “Let’s call the press” said the settler allies. But the clan mothers asked that we respect their right to control their own narrative. They mentioned there were several Facebook pages, Kickstarters and websites that had been created by allies around the current struggle with Halftown, without consulting the clan mothers or the chiefs. They wanted the allies to be allies, to enter into relationship, to know one another, to ask for direction and confirmation before taking it upon ourselves to save or fix or “take charge.”
So this week as many of us prepare to celebrate the American holiday of Thanksgiving, and a national day of mourning[i]
I invite us to remember the Two Row Wampum treaty, the canoe and the ship side by side. And consider- how we might live into that treaty today:
“In one row is a ship with our White Brothers’ ways; in the other a canoe with our ways. Each will travel down the river of life side by side. Neither will attempt to steer the other’s vessel.” “Together we will travel in Friendship and in Peace Forever; as long as the grass is green, as long as the water runs downhill, as long as the sun rises in the East and sets in the West, and as long as our Mother Earth will last.”
*A summary of the treaty is here from the Onondoga Nation
The Dish With One Spoon**
I’m a huge fan of Dr. Robin Wall Kimmerer[i] who is a professor up at SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse, New York and founding Director of the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment. She wrote that book Braiding Sweetgrass, that spoke right to my heart and spirit. As a botanist, she loves and notices and understands plants, and helps weave the connections between western science and traditional knowledge. I have often preached on things I learned from her writings and talks. So when I saw she was giving a talk at Cornell last month I was dropped everything to join by zoom. Most if this reflection today is an amplification of her words and ideas from that day.[ii]
It was there that I learned about the treaty of the Dish With One Spoon. She taught us that the treaty, which binds together both her nation the Potawatomi, and those people on the lands here where we live - the Haudenoshonee, was a way we could imagine living together with the land- one land, one bowl shared by all of us, feeding all of us.
She noticed that in our western thinking the land was a resource to be used, material to be extracted for commodities. She described another way of understanding the land, the way she grew up with- nature as relatives, as family. Land as the source of identity, as sustainer, as connection to our ancestors, as library, teacher, pharmacy, home… as moral responsibility.
How we think about the land makes a big difference in the health of our ecosystems. We know and have often lamented here in worship the biodiversity that is being lost, the great extinction going on all over the world right now. Kimmerer mentioned that on land under the care of Indigenous people, biodiversity is not crashing. How we think matters, has real impact on our world.
I had been wondering what the Two Row Wampum called me, in the ship, to do. And Kimmerer had some clear ideas- to work for justice, yes, but justice for who? Not just which group of 2 legged should have how much power, but justice for the land, for all the beings. Kimmerer invited us to be part of the rights of nature movement, growing in countries, cities and towns all over the world to extend legal protections to rivers, mountains, ecosystems acknowledging their right to “exist, persist, maintain and regenerate its vital cycles.”[iii]
The Two Row invites us to work together to make sure first nations peoples have places to practice their traditional ways, to honor their relationship to land, to care for and be grounded in their sacred places. The Two Row Wampum also calls us to gather in meaningful consultation about the great environmental problems and a vision of the future that concerns all of us in the canoe and on the ship.
Kimmerer suggested that what all of us can do is to change our minds- the slow work of changing how we see the land, how we see our siblings of all species, our other than human relatives. This harmonizes with our Unitarian Universalist 7th principle which challenges us to Respect “the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.” It is one small thing we can do to honor the Two Row Wampum.
This Thanksgiving as we gather in gratitude for the bountiful Autumn harvest, let’s remember the bowl with one spoon, how the land feeds us all. And whether we celebrate with a big table of relatives, or a simple quiet meal, let us remember all the relations with whom we share this web of life. Let us live well in our place and love the land who is our relative. Let us receive her gifts in gratitude, and give back in reciprocity.
** a helpful article about this treaty is here: "The Two Row Times: A paper serving the dish with one spoon territory – Great Lakes Region. September 4, 2013 "
End notes:
[i] https://www.esf.edu/faculty/kimmerer/index.php
[ii] https://cals.cornell.edu/land-justice-engaging-indigenous-knowledge-land-care
[iii] https://www.garn.org/rights-of-nature/
[i] https://blog.nativehope.org/what-does-thanksgiving-mean-to-native-americans
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