Description
One of the Four Sacred Medicines, tobacco (Nicotiana sylvestris) is most often used in prayer among Native American tribal communities. Meetings or gatherings typically began with smoking and sharing tobacco as a way of praying to put the participants in a right state of mental and spiritual being for collective conversations. Tobacco can also be carried and gifted in small pouches to be burned. The smoke from the plant symbolizes carrying up one’s prayers to the Creator.
Audio Transcript
Tobacco was traditionally grown in our gardens. Many tribal communities across North America that were cultivators grew tobacco varieties that were appropriate for their region, for their environments. This medicine was used most often in prayer. So when we think about the use of tobacco as a stimulant, it definitely has that effect, but we were not misusing it as a stimulant. When you were smoking, you were in prayer. So it was often incorporated into ceremony to carry your prayers. So when we think back on like media portrayals of Native people and they smoke the “peace pipe,” that’s kind of a European recreation and misunderstanding of why that tobacco is being smoked. It’s not necessarily a peace pipe, as in there’s a, the peace pipe is not a symbol that we’re smoking it to bring peace. What you’re actually doing when you are smoking from that pipe is praying.
So when meetings or gatherings would begin with that smoking and sharing of tobacco, it was because everyone should be praying to put themselves in a right state for the conversations that are going to be had, for the agreements that are going to be made, and you’re asking Creator to be among you when you’re doing this really difficult work.
So that’s why tobacco gets incorporated in those sacred spaces. So you’ll see tobacco and the smoking of it at the beginning of ceremony. That is carrying your prayers up to Creator, the smoke that comes out of that is carrying your prayers up. So it’s readying for something, whether it’s for a celebration gathering or whether it’s for a physical healing that’s going to take place, you are carrying your prayers to Creator in that moment through that smoking of tobacco.
It also doesn’t have to be smoked. It can just be burned. So oftentimes, little pouches of tobacco were carried, gifted, and they were just meant to be placed into the fire to burn, and the smoke from that would carry your prayers to the Creator. So it doesn’t always have to be smoked.
end of tour: History of Tomaquag Museum