Two Spirit Myths: How the Earth Was Created

Two Spirit Myths: How the Earth Was Created [1]

In the beginning the world had no land. Only water.

The Creator came down here and there was nowhere to walk. Then He saw a little bass swimming around down in the water. The bass was tired of swimming all the time. He wanted to rest. So he started diving down to the bottom, getting a grain of sand and putting it on a pile of other grains of sand. After a long time the pile of sand came up above the surface of the water and the little bass could rest on it. That gave the Creator an idea, because He was tired of wading around in the water. So he told the bass: “You go down again and bring me up four grains of sand.” And the bass did it.

On the coldest Florida winter a young female Florida manatee calf floats by

Then the Creator saw a sea cow (manatee) and He told her: “Take one of the grains of sand and hit it with your tail to the West.” So the sea cow hit the grain of sand with her tail and it rolled out to the West, and where is rolled the land formed behind it, and as the land formed there was thunder and the world shook. The He told the sea cow: “Take the second grain of sand and hit it with your tail to the South.” So she did it, and again the land formed and the thunder shook. Then she did it with the two other grains of sand, to the North and to the East.

This is how the world started.

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[1] Arden, Harvey & Wall, Steve, Wisdomkeepers: Meetings with Native American Spiritual Elders, Beyond Words Publishing, 1990. Stories by the Seminole medicine man, Buffalo Jim, page 80-83.

[1] Arden, Harvey & Wall, Steve, Wisdomkeepers: Meetings with Native American Spiritual Elders, Beyond Words Publishing, 1990. Stories by Buffalo Jim, page 80-83.