CHAPTER 2

Cosmology

KONDIARONK : To be honest, I could hardly understand one word the Jesuit preached. And what’s most ridiculous, he teased me to get me to interpret his arguments word for word for my people, as if I could make the meaning of his words more intelligible. They don’t make sense in any language!

LAHONTAN : I sometimes dislike my job as an interpreter – it’s always about paraphrasing, about finding words that are acceptable to everyone.

KONDIARONK : You know I have travelled to the avant-garde cities of Paris and New York where I studied the customs and doctrines of the English and the French. I know what the Europeans think of us. The French generally regard us as savages, the Jesuits call us ignorant vagabonds. We also have our ideas about you–the difference is that we don’t insult you. I speak calmly and without passion.

LAHONTAN : Well then. There is a good reason why the Jesuits preach the gospel in your nation. It is to inform you of the true path to eternal paradise. God allowed the discovery of America so we could save all nations that abide by the laws of Christianity.

LAHONTAN : Holy Scripture describes a paradise that is seated above the remotest stars, where God resides. And hell, that is situated in the centre of the Earth, is where the souls who rejected Christianity will burn forever.

KONDIARONK : Ha! What’s the logic behind this? How can you imagine that the soul, an airy being a thousand times subtler and lighter than smoke, should move to the centre of the Earth, against all natural laws? It is more likely that it will move upwards and fly towards the sun.

Everyone is talking about borders, territories, and geographic information systems. The world is expanding with new names, places, plants, and languages yet to be inventoried. Everything is getting reconfigured. And still, everyone believes they live in the centre of things.

In truth, every world is surrounded by another world.

All people are imaginary to everyone else.

This chapter is a discussion about the Christian religion versus Indigenous beliefs. Lahontan explains that God allowed the discovery of America to save all nations that abide by the laws of Christianity, while Kondiaronk argues with the logic of natural law. [FN1] Contemporary cosmological concepts feel a lot closer to Kondriank’s views at the time than Lahontan’s vision of the cosmos. [FN2]

References

  1. [FN1] On the religious context of the doctrine of discovery, see Steven T. Newcomb, Pagans in the Promised Land: Decoding the Doctrine of Christian Discovery (Chicago: Chicago Review Press / Fulcrum, 2008).
  2. [FN2] On contemporary cosmovisions, see Marisol de la Cadena, Earth Beings: Ecologies of Practice Across Andean Worlds (Durham: Duke University Press, 2015).