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The Question (ID Number 468)...

In Ishmael you state the Takers dependence on prophets. The Lakota had a prophet, White Buffalo Calf Woman. She gave the Lakota "laws" to live by. How about the Cheyenne, who have Sweet Medicine, he was a prophet. So how can I argue with people who say that the Leavers had prophets as well as the Takers?

...and the response:

What Ishmael says is as follows: "What makes it so striking is the fact that there is absolutely nothing like this among the Leavers—UNLESS IT OCCURS AS A RESPONSE TO SOME DEVASTATING CONTACT WITH TAKER CULTURE, as in the case of Wovoka and the Ghost Dance or John Frumm and the Cargo Cults of the South Pacific. Aside from these, there is no tradition whatever of prophets rising up among the Leavers to straighten out their lives and give them new sets of laws or principles to live by." I've never read of ANY Leaver people who NEEDED to have their lives "straightened out"--until contact with us made it impossible for them to follow their traditional ways. Only the sick need doctors.

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