In the indigenous jungles of America there existed a superior race that marched day by day in the way of God, impregnated with a truly superior philosophy, which embodies the fundamentals of life itself.

The epoch in which the God Yurupari was shining in the heavens has passed.

There was an oral tradition passed from father to son which told of how one day a beautiful bird, called Mitu, with silver plumage appeared flying from the south, bringing with him a beautiful indigenous priestess.

The bird perched on a Jacaranda tree and placed the Indian there. It was late when she climbed down the tree and collected some Zarzaparilla vine and when the indigenous Kivaras tribe saw this they called her Vicharachia which means "daughter of the moon".

The Kivaras took to her with great affection and she gave them her wisdom that followed all the ethics of God, full of natural feeling and based on an inexhaustible fountain of health.

Vicharachia travelled through Apoporis and visited all the tribes of Vaupes and Vichada that had been with the Guaranias Indians. Wherever she went she gave the message that corresponded to her mission.

Amongst the Kivaras she taught the sacred mysteries and instructed the Priestesses. She taught them about the natural medicine of different plants that could be used to heal many illnesses.

She went on a journey with the wise Indians and their priestesses and along the borders of the Amazon they saw a Chuchuguaza tree. Vicharachia took the seeds and scattered them along the banks of the river Inirida. This is how she taught the Indians to propagate plants in the jungle. All the plants that Vicharachia blessed and baptised were immediately magical.

One night they lit a bonfire with Nandipa wood and took a huge drum to the foot of the Nandipa tree and there made ritual dances until dawn.

In the morning Vicharachia served breakfast to the Priestesses, the like of which they had never tasted before, seasoned with the oils of the Murumuru plant.

She also taught the oldest and wisest Indians how to use the wax of the Cainarnaruba palm to shine wooden objects.

Amongst all the many plants that Vicharachia taught about she gave special blessings to the plant Yaje, a plant that contains the wisdom of good and evil in its cup. She also blessed Yoco and prepared it as an invigorating drink. One day when Vicharachia was teaching about these plants she gave one priestess a cup of the juice of Yaje, after having thrown onto the fire the seeds of Guanaru, and all night the priestess predicted what was going to happen in the future of the jungle. In the midst of the marvellous wisdom of Yaje she foretold that white men would come looking for rubber trees to extract the rubber and enslave the indigenous and take their lands. She also foretold that the mother of the jungle would devour these men and that they would die of hunger.

She foretold that after many years had passed, the whites would return again and want to dominate the jungle but the mother jungle will also attack them with her mosquitoes, ants, locusts and grasshoppers and other plagues that will destroy their crops and little by little the intruders would be wiped out.

Later, she prophesised, men with more humility would arrive who would want to live with the Indians for love of knowledge and humanity without any other motives other than love and service.

As predicted these men came and uncovered part of the secrets of the jungle and they found positive ways to dominate the jungle thanks to their force of will. Yet there still remain many infinite secrets to know in order to make a better world.

One day Vicharachia went to wash in the lake Uba alone. Much later she had still not returned and the Indians thought that she may have been lost in the jungle and many set out to look for her. They navigated the rivers looking right to their source and eventually they found her in the flowing waters of a river that is now called Vichada in remembrance of Vicharachia.

She told them that she was now very old although she still appeared to be young. Then she revealed to them that in the jungle further to the south there lived an Indian who was the son of the sun and as we know she was the daughter of the moon and so she was to go and live with him. She told them that the bird Mitu would sometimes appear at the top of the Jacaranda trees, and that this is very rare and is a sign from the Divine that something extraordinary will follow.

So she returned with her friends the Kivaras to their tribe and was very active in completing her mission. She consecrated groups of priestesses in different tribes to teach the ethics and morals of the way of God in the midst of the elementals of the jungle. She was a great master and it is certain that her ethics and morals were in accordance with nature; it is not possible to go directly to the heights where the God Yurupari dwells if you do not have the foundation of an inexhaustible fountain of health and life.

Vicharachia explained that the God Yurupari has his temple wherever life manifests in all his splendour and that he is present in all the plants of the jungle and in all things.

Vicharachia taught how to know the soul of things and so how to know the soul of the jungle. She prepared all the Caciques (chiefs) in this way and told them that there would be twelve priestesses in each generation. And so it was in those times but the greater part of the true knowledge was lost and the Indian women abandoned their level of priestess, forgetting the teachings of humility of their great Master.

And so passed all that was to pass and one beautiful day in spring the bird Mitu appeared in the tops of the Jacaranda trees and he sang from dawn until dusk. It was then that Vicharachia said goodbye, perfumed her body with Sarrapia, adorned her horse with Jacaranda flowers and tucan feathers and at nightfall, as the moon rose in the sky she left forever in the wings of the bird Mitu in order to be with her promised one, the Son of the Sun who had fulfilled a similar mission in another part of the jungle.

The day after Vicharachia left there appeared a rainbow in the sky of the jungle and the God Yurupari in the mountain peaks, his crown and sword of light shining.

Here we have unveiled one part of the indigenous mysticism, the way of knowledge and ethics, the path of God, the study of nature with all its mysteries. This is the wisdom of the races that are oppressed by the miracle of the civilisation of the white man.

This mystic vision of the plants and the celestial messengers connects harmoniously with other legends of Sionas Indians that are in an area of Colombia further to the south.

Messengers of the Light

When the Spanish arrived the indigenous already had the sacred science of Yaje. The history of Yaje began with God, the all embracing, known in the world and by the indigenous under different names: Yurupari, Bochica, Jaku, The Maker of Light etc, the plants, the fish, the birds, the Yaje are all expressions of Him. Riusu was the prophet sent by the God Jaku to the Sionas and Kofan tribes. He taught all the indigenous botanical science and he said: "In the centre of this wisdom you can find the knowledge and the place that I will dwell when I have completed my mission".

Riusu showed the way of purification, through the medicinal plants and how to use them. He also taught the form in which to prepare the sacred plant of Yaje, its myths and rituals, observing that Yaje was left to be the mother of the indigenous botanical science that contains the knowledge of good and evil.

For this reason for these tribes science is not written; for the Indian of the jungle science is given by Yaje and in this way they learn.

Riusu showed how to prepare and drink Yaje. Legend tells that once when Riusu was under the affects of Yaje he began to sing, dance, to give blessings and different levels and powers to the wise elders that were advanced in the levels of purification. He would sometimes fall to the floor with the intoxication of the Yaje. At times he seemed to be invisible and at others he would roll around on the floor showing that to drink Yaje is not an easy thing and that we need to suffer in order to know good and evil.

They say that it seemed that Riusu had lost consciousness; he took hold of his head and began to pull out his hair and throw it on the floor, each piece of hair that landed on the earth transformed into a medicinal plant associated with Yaje. In this way many different plants were born that are used to accompany the rituals and medicine of Yaje.

After all this Riusu got up and spoke with the tribe saying: "All that has happened here is blessed and has been given as an example of the depth of wisdom of Yaje, this is something very sacred and you should know some very precise rules in order to prepare yourselves".

Riusu advised clearly that Yaje should not be prepared in public; there should be a very special place for this. He also said that women that are pregnant or have their period should not walk in the areas where Yaje is being cultivated because this affects and attracts forces and spirits that can disturb the people that drink the Yaje and can possibly send them crazy.

Riusu established the foundation of the knowledge of Yaje in its absolute purity and prepared the more advanced Caciques handing over the keys to penetrate into the hidden universe. He taught them not to demonstrate the levels and powers that they obtained and he taught to love and respect the animals and only to kill them should it be necessary for food.

He explained that true wisdom consists in helping those that need it, to heal illnesses and to never cause harm to anyone. When Riusu had prepared the Indians of the tribes he informed them that he would be returning to the place where the great God Jaku lived but that his spirit would always be present in all the plants for the consecrated and that he would manifest through all those that carried out his teachings.

He too one day disappeared, rising to heaven, the home of the sacred Gods of the jungle.

Here we can see the great importance of the plants within the cosmological vision of life between the Indians and how, for the Amazon Indians, the Yaje is fundamental to their lives, it is the origin of their mysticism and religion, their folklore and traditions and the cultural base of the Amazon societies.

We are members of a civilisation of the written word, we come to religion and religious evidence through books, but the indigenous that belong to societies without the written word have the basis of their knowledge in direct confrontation with the supernatural in order to verify the reality of religion. This is the true work of the Caciques and Shamans.

VASUDEV

SHAMANIC AND ECOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION OF COLOMBIA

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