This extraordinary series of beautifully illustrated hardcover books with accompanying audio CDs was edited by Bradford Keeney for the Ringing Rocks Foundation, which supports the survival and future development of global healing wisdom through education, research, and special projects. The first eight volumes in the series are now available; six more are planned.
Keeney, an internationally acclaimed scholar, teacher of psychotherapy, and the author of Everyday Soul, speaks of the spirit animating this project: "Profiles of Healing was created to help bring forth the experience of sitting with a traditional healer and encountering the way she or he chooses to teach their cultural ways. Our ongoing book series enables the voices of traditional shamans and medicine people to be heard unfettered by Euro-American explanations and theory."
The time is ripe for this series given the modern world's catastrophic assaults on the Earth and general lack of reverence for nature. Indigenous peoples have long seen themselves as guardians of Mother Earth and the collectors of wisdom about her dowry of curative wonders. Shamans and medicine people always set healing within the larger context of their community and the Earth. Equally important are the rituals and sacred instruments used in their work.
"Shamanism is the medicine of the imagination," Jeanne Achterberg has observed. Keeney and others responsible for this project have picked up that truth and carried it into the design of these multimedia resources. Each volume contains soul-stirring quotations, personal narratives from traditional healers, and luxurious photographs. Accompanying each volume is a compact disc of prayers, sacred songs, ceremonies, and teachings. This is very appropriate given the importance of sound in the healing rituals of indigenous peoples.
• Lakota Yuwipi Man focuses on the spiritual journey of Gary Holy Bull, a Lakota healer who has become a leader of the Sun Dance.
• Ikuko Osumi, Sensei: Japanese Master of Seiki Jutsu zeroes in on the energy practices of one of the most legendary healers in Japan.
• Kalahari Bushmen Healers contains accounts by twenty Africans who have mastered this art blending ritual, dance, and drama.
• Guarani Shamans of the Forest focuses on two shamans from the rainforests of Paraguay giving special attention to their healing songs.
• Vusamazulu Credo Mutwa: Zulu High Sanusi presents the life story of one of Africa's foremost traditional healers, a man who has made it his mission to retrieve the secrets of ancient sangomas and healers.
• Walking Thunder: Dine Medicine Woman revolves around this Navajo healer and her work with plants, paintings, and other curative tools.
• Shakers of St. Vincent examines the stories and rituals of a mystical experience called "mourning" as practiced on this Caribbean island.
• Ropes to God: Experiencing the Bushman Spiritual Universe showcases Bushman doctors from Namibia, Africa, who talk about their encounters with ropes and lines of light that enable them to ascend to the ancestors and the Big God in the sky.
Some Native American traditions proclaim that ancient wisdom must be maintained until Earth's children grow listening ears. This impressive series is a wonderful step in that right direction.
