ABSTRACT
INSIDE HIS SIX-SIDED HOGAN in Winslow, Arizona, Jones Benally treated patients in the traditional Navajo healing ways. Like many other Navajo traditional healers (or “medicine men”), he crystal-gazed to discover the causes for their illnesses, and he tended to their symptoms using joint and muscle manipulation and the occasional herbal remedy. Sometimes Benally said traditional prayers over his patients, and he occasionally conducted minor ceremonies. Like all Navajo healers, Benally knew that his healing abilities were limited, and in certain cases he referred patients to a medicine man who could conduct some of the more complex healing ceremonies.1
