ABSTRACT
Arctic Indigenous religions tend to share distinctive common features: an environment imbued with spirits, respect toward the bodies and souls of animals, reincarnation of animals and humans, and a vertical cosmology with shamanic trance and soul-flight. Hunting is surrounded by many taboos. Animals are often controlled by a spirit owner or manager and have human-like consciousness. The moral tension between guilt over killing and the necessity of eating is mediated through ideas of respect and gratitude, with careful treatment of the animal’s remains so that it will be reincarnated in new flesh. Humans may have several kinds of soul, or be reincarnated from ancestors. Shamans in addition often have animals as helper spirits. Colonialism was generally hostile to Indigenous religions throughout the Arctic, introducing writing and schooling, with Christian or Marxist ideologies. Christianity is now the dominant religion, leading to varying forms of rejection or adaptation of earlier theologies and religious sensibilities. Today, there are many revival movements involving Indigenous artists, scholars, and activists. Traditional religious ideas may be deployed politically, acquiring a new validation as “Indigenous knowledge” in the fight against mineral extraction and the destruction of sacred sites and using modern media such as newspapers, websites, and social media.
