{"id":9357,"date":"2022-10-16T21:54:53","date_gmt":"2022-10-16T19:54:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/?p=9357"},"modified":"2022-10-16T22:05:17","modified_gmt":"2022-10-16T20:05:17","slug":"rozhodujte-se-jmenem-prichazejici-sedme-generace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/rozhodujte-se-jmenem-prichazejici-sedme-generace\/","title":{"rendered":""Decide on the name of the upcoming seventh generation...""},"content":{"rendered":"

Fragment from the interview The Leadership Imperative <\/em>(The Leadership Imperative), with Oren Lyons, who led Bary Lopez (ORION, January 2008); translated by Ji\u0159\u00ed Zem\u00e1nek.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIn an era of self-promotion, Oren Lyons represents the antithesis of celebrity. When he speaks about serious issues, there is no indomitable ego, no desire to be seen as important or wise. His voice is just one of a long line of voices, as he sees it, and the wisdom does not belong to him but to the tradition for which he speaks. His approach to issues is unusual in modern social commentary because his insights are not driven by any overriding sense of the importance of human presence. Instead of a philosophy of progress, he emphasizes fidelity to a set of spiritual and natural laws that have successfully guided human social organization throughout history. The appeal of his particular ethic in seeking solutions to contemporary environmental and social problems is easy to see. Importantly, however, this is not a wisdom rooted in a belief in human perfection; it is based on a recognition and acceptance of human responsibility that extends to all forms of life.\u201d<\/p>Barry Lopez on Oren Lyons<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Lopez Bars:<\/strong> Indigenous elders are often seen as environmentally knowledgeable or knowledgeable about spiritual matters, but they are rarely credited with expertise in governance. Why aren\u2019t Indigenous elders sought out for their wisdom on how to govern well, how to serve people well?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oren Lyons: <\/strong>Simply put, our worldview, our perspective, and our process of governance are at odds with private property. Private property is a concept that is incompatible with our understanding of life and, we would say, with the reality of life. Private property is an idea, a human idea, that amounts to personal greed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there's the spiritual side that you mention. You can't see the spiritual side... but you have glimpses of it. Any hunter will tell you that you can see it in the eyes of a deer, that bright spark, that life, that light in its eyes, and when you kill it, it's gone. Where did it go? It's the same light that's in the eyes of children or in the eyes of old men, old women. There's life in them, there's spirit in them, and when you die, when your body gives up the spirit, as the Christians say, the spirit goes away. We believe that.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We believe that everything we see is created by the Creator. That is indeed what we call the highest power. Shongwaiyadisaih. The Creator of all life. The Giver of life. The Almighty. We see Creation \u2013 everything \u2013 as what the Giver of life has created here. And if we believe that, which we do, then we must respect it. It is a spiritual Creation and it demands such respect. So when I see people, they are manifestations of the Creator\u2019s work and I must respect them. It doesn\u2019t matter what color they are \u2013 anything living.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thousands of years ago, when the Peacemaker brought us the Great Law of Peace, Gayanahshagowa, he established a great tree as our symbol for the Haudenosaunee Confederacy and said, \u201cThis shall be the symbol of your work and your law: a great white pine with four white roots of truth reaching out to the four directions. And the people who have nowhere else to go will follow the root to its source and come under the protection of the Great Law of Peace and the great long leaves of the great tree.\u201d Then he admonished the tribal leaders and the people, saying, \u201cNever question the spiritual law. Never question it, for you cannot prevail.\u201d That is a direct instruction for leadership.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lopez Bars: <\/strong>It seems to me that the federal government in the United States is reluctant to bring Native Americans to the negotiating table because, as you just said, you can't have effective leadership without spiritual law, and you can't talk about good governance without environmental awareness. Yet we need\u2014we all need\u2014the councils of chiefs who successfully addressed issues of social justice long before Western culture complicated them with the idea of industrial progress. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Oren Lyons: <\/strong>After the Peacemaker had gathered the five warring nations\u2014the Mohawks, the Oneidas, the Cayugas, the Senecas, and the Onondaga\u2014and after much effort and great cohesive work, through the power of the unity of good minds, this confederation based on peace was able to be unified. And after the Peacemaker had taken the tribal leaders and sat them down under this great tree on the shores of Onondaga Lake and taught them the process of leadership, the principles of leadership, the meaning of identity, and the importance of government and law, he said, \u201cNow that we have planted this great tree, I place all life in your hands. The protection of all life is now in your hands,\u201d and when he said all life, he literally meant all life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And that's the lesson that we carry with us today. We feel responsible for the animals, we feel responsible for the trees, we feel responsible for the fish, we feel responsible for the water. We feel responsible for the soil and all the insects and everything that's on it. And when he talked about the four white roots reaching out in the four directions, I think he was talking to all people. Not just the Haudenosaunee. It's a lesson for all people. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But after all of that, a woman said to him, "And how long will it last?" And he said, "That's up to you." So it's entirely up to us whether we want this creation to continue and whether we want to participate in it, whether we want to be part of this whole recycling, this whole renewal of life, and whether we want to celebrate it and enjoy it, and whether we want to preserve it, whether we want to continue it and protect it for future generations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In one of his many instructions, the Peacemaker declared: \u201cCounselors, leaders, now that we have raised you here, now that you are what you are, when you counsel for the welfare of the people, do not think of yourselves, nor of your family, nor even of your own generation.\u201d He said: \u201cDecide on the name of the seventh generation that is coming. You who see far into the future, that is your responsibility: to take care of those future generations who are helpless and who are completely at our mercy. We must protect them.\u201d And that is excellent advice in this day and age if we want the seventh generation to be here and have what we have.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Excerpt from The Leadership Imperative interview with Oren Lyons, who led Bary Lopez (ORION, January 2008); translated by Ji\u0159\u00ed Zem\u00e1nek. \u201cIn an era of self-promotion, Oren Lyons is the antithesis of celebrity. When he speaks about serious issues, there is no indomitable ego, no desire to be seen as important or wise. His voice is just one in a long line of voices\u2026 Continue reading "Decide on the name of the upcoming seventh generation..."<\/span><\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9354,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[57,75,43],"class_list":["post-9357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nezarazene","tag-barry-lopez","tag-oren-lyons","tag-rozhovory","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9357"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9357\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9364,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9357\/revisions\/9364"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/potulnauniverzita.cz\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}