Ramapo Walls and Stone Mounds at Harriman Park, NYS--Part V The Sacred and Profane

Unfortunately the luster and spiritual energy that once must have permeated these sacred grounds at the Ramapo Walls is long gone.The vibe, the reading of the imprints of the intentions left behind, was neutral at best. Sad.

An old hunter's tree stand by a stone mound. Hunting was prohibited decades ago within Harriman.

We found a hunter's stand next to one of the stone mounds. We also found shot shells, beer cans and other debris. We did pick up a few shot shells. Hunting casts a pall over sacred sites. Again ask yourself if you would want someone sitting in your place of worship or a chair in your living room thinking about killing for hours on end?

So revelers, hunters and curiosity seekers have desecrated this once holy site.

But that is not all as I said in the intro. Lenik in his write-up of the Ramapo Walls writes,

In 1969, the North Jersey Highlands Historical Society, in cooperation with the New England Antiquities Research Association, began investigating the "Supposed Prehistoric Walls" in Ramapo, New York. This site is a massive complex of stone walls that meander over some 200 acres of ground along a hilltop overlooking the villages of Sloatsburg and Ramapo. Some sixteen massive stone mounds, basically conical in section and circular in diameter, are within the network of walls....
In 1973, archeological excavations were undertaken at the Prehistoric Walls site in an attempt to learn its temporal and cultural placement as well as its function. Three features were excavated at the site, namely, the suspected well, the stone fireplace, and a section of one stone mound. These features seemed to offer the best possibility of definitive material being found.
The stone filled depression, or suspected well, was excavated first. This feature is located along the eastern edge of the site, 100 ft. off the old road and 40 ft. east of the stone wall. The area was carefully cleared of surface leaves and brush and a 10 ft. by 10 ft. square was laid out around the depression. Excavation proceeded with great care and the soil was removed by trowel and sifted. All stones encountered were left exactly in place as found with the exception of a few which appeared to have tumbled into the center of the depression.

Wow!

I understand that people want to investigate and learn; but at what expense?

Again ask yourself if you would want someone coming to your place of worship, sacred and holy ground, and begin digging up the pews and tearing up your sacred texts and testing them with chemicals to better understand why you built them?

This sort of  voyeurism is bad for the vibe and goes contra to the love and positive intentions that once blanketed this holy area. It destroys what makes a sacred site holy and sacred.

NEARA prides itself on protecting and preserving stone structures in greater New England. But doing an archaeological dig of a sacred site without knowledge of its function and purpose is not going to assure proper reconstruction.

As noted previously stone structures can be very intricate in design. In the picture above a manitou stone is located behind Pepper.  I am concerned that the stone structures dissembled by  the North Jersey Highlands Historical Society and NEARA were not properly reconstituted.

NEARA does have many dowsers amongst its membership but science and traditional archaeology drive much of its decision making. No doubt they do good work in preserving the physical structures at a sacred place. But what of the spiritual component? How can science come to understand sacred space and Indigenous People that loved Mother Earth and worked to create stone structures to enhance Her?

They cannot!

A sacred site needs love, prayer, ceremony and good intentions. The makes its vibe well. Science is an anathema to spirituality. 

And if you have read my work before you know that I believe that it is all about the vibe. The stone structures are often mere ornaments that adorn a powerful sacred sites. I expect that certainly was the case at the  hay day of the Ramapo Walls.

Archaeologists, hunters, revelers, groups like NEARA, ghost hunters through their intent and actions not only destroy the vibe of a sacred area but its ultimate purpose; a mystical experience, a union with Great Spirit/God, an answer to a difficult question or the chance for a vision or great insight.

We did find a remnant that the Ramapo Walls was once treated as a sacred area with prayers, ceremony and contemplation.

There was a water dome still located on the grounds. When we pray, meditate, do ceremony and act in a sacred manner we may draw water to a location Yes just as we attract energy/prana above ground we attract water underground.  A water dome is water that has attempted to well up from the bowels of the earth and has reached an impediment and cannot go any further. So water pushing up on the earth begins to form a dome, a mushroom shaped structure that fills with water. Water veins eventually form on the side of the dome.

There was a water dome at the Ramapo Walls.

Peter Shell with dowsing rods tracing out the spiral of the water dome whose center is marked by my backpack

Because the only co-creation with Mother Earth that we found was one water dome I had many questions. I know energy vortices can come and go; but what about water domes? Were there many more water domes in this large sacred area? Do water domes dissipate slower than Energy Vortices, or do they never disappear once formed? These are only a few of the questions I posed and discussed with a few seasoned water dowsers.

We did say some prayers, spread tobacco and did a ceremony. Unfortunately because we were in hurry we could not meditate and spend the time in spiritual activities the way we do in places closer to home in Syracuse.

There is more reason to believe that the Ramapo Walls and its surrounding area was a sacred place as I will discuss in the next section.

Continue to the Next Section
Ramapo Walls and Stone Mounds at Harriman Park, NYS--Part VI Sacred Ground

In a Sacred Manner--It's all about the VIBE!!!

In my talks and in my books, especially Sacred Sites in North Star Country I speak about the Vibe and how critical it is for a sacred space. A good vibe enhances space, a bad vibe diminishes it.  Mother Earth needs us to achieve Her Fullest Potential and we need Her to achieve ours. A good vibe can significantly improve a space, and in the process increase the amount of consciousness, energy, or essences emitted by Mother Earth there. In other words if we are going to make a better world we need to enhance Mother Earth so that she may better nourish us and raise our consciousness.

To maintain and improve the vibe when visiting a sacred space I tell people to Act in a Sacred Manner. Below is an article I wrote for Awareness magazine on the west coast in 2009 to better help understand how to Act in a Sacred Manner.

In A Sacred Manner

“The native prophecies from all lands … speak of major changes… They speak of people who will survive, human beings who will want to take a sacred path in harmony with the earth… Wise people will know what to do and will move in a sacred manner to make the changes necessary for their own survival and for the survival of others.”1

Major earth changes that Sun Bear and Wabun Wind talked about almost twenty years ago are playing out. The polar ice cap is melting, bees are dying and some ecologists say that we are close to a tipping point where we cannot reverse the effects of global warming. The world is most certainly close to the brink.

Sun Bear and Wabun Wind say there will be survivors who will help themselves and others because they will know how to move in a sacred manner. So how do we begin moving in a sacred manner to save ourselves and Mother Earth? While there are many interpretations of what it means to move in a sacred manner, I think it begins by being aware of your spiritual footprints (thoughts and actions), both good and bad, and making an effort to focus on the positive. Each thought we have and action we take leaves an impression on us and upon Mother Earth.

When we think and do bad things we bring more of the same into our lives and into the world. Conversely when we think and do things out of love and compassion, we not only bring that into our lives, we bring it to others and to Mother Earth as well, facilitating healing. Controlling your thoughts and focusing on the positive in a sacred manner will help reduce the mental pollution you create with negative thoughts.

The Native Americans talk about doing things in a “sacred manner,” particularly ceremonies and efforts to connect with the divine. This means your intention is focused in a way that gives honor, respect and love. Black Elk in Black Elk Speaks and The Sacred Pipe talks about doing things in a sacred manner. In preparing a purification lodge as part of lamenting for a vision, Black Elk says, “In a sacred manner you must also gather the rocks and sage.”2

Black Elk tells us that sacred manner includes blessing and honoring that which one takes to create the purification lodge: “First you should build an Inipi lodge in which we shall purify ourselves, and for this you must select twelve or sixteen small willows.

But before you cut the willows remember to take to them a tobacco offering: and as you stand before them you should say: ‘There are many kinds of trees, but it is you whom I have chosen to help me. I shall take you, but in your place there will be others.’ ”3

The act of honoring the willow tree that has been cut down helps reduce the consequences of destruction by counterbalancing it with a positive thought and action. It is a far cry from our modern-day world where it is all thoughtless take, cut, burn, excavate and various other forms of destruction. We should always try to avoid the negative, but if something happens we should counter it with a positive thought, or prayer.

A further glimpse of sacred manner comes from Black Elk when talking about how we should always keep in mind and honor Great Spirit and Mother Earth: “It is the Earth, your Grandmother and Mother, and it is where you will live and increase. This Earth which He has given to you is red, and the two-leggeds who live upon the Earth are red; and the Great Spirit has also given to you a red day and a red road. 4 All of this is sacred and so do not forget! Every dawn as it comes is a holy event.”5

For example, when the Tree of Peace (white pine tree) we had planted on the shores of Onondaga Lake (Syracuse, NY) died and needed to be replaced, my Mohawk friend, John Sardella, said the process should be done in a sacred manner. I removed the dead tree and then brought it to his home.

A sacred sweat lodge was held honoring the tree and using it to fuel the fire that heated the rocks. Then there was a period of grieving before the new tree was planted. Finally John led the ceremony for planting the new Tree of Peace.

Doing things in a sacred manner means applying thought to what we do and how we think. It is about honoring God and Mother Earth, and all of creation. When we do things in a sacred manner we give greater strength to our thoughts and actions. We help foster healing, love and the unity that tugs at our soul.

The above article was adapted from The Way Home — Making Heaven on Earth (pages 194-195) by Madis Senner, due out with O-books in December. Visit: http://www.o-books.com/product_info.php?products_id=639

Footnotes: 

1. Sun Bear and Wabun Wind, Black Dawn Bright Day, A Fireside Book, New York, 1992; 29. 
2. Joseph Epes Brown, The Sacred Pipe, Black Elk’s Account of the Seven Rites of the Oglala Sioux, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, OK, 1953; 48. 2.Ibid. page 48. 
3. John Epes Brown notes that “the red road” is that which runs north and south and is the good or straight way, for to the Sioux the north is purity and the south is the source of life. This “red road” is thus similar to the Christian “straight and narrow.” page 7 
4.Ibid., 7.

Madis Senner maintains www.MotherEarthPrayers.org, an educational website about Mother Earth, her subtle body and soul.

  

Place Matters—Murder returns to the same place in my hood (Eastwood)

Murder struck my neighborhood this summer at the 2800 block of James Street in the Eastwood section of Syracuse. What made this murder so disheartening was that a murder had occurred at the exact same location 7 years earlier in 2008.While Eastwood has had its share of violence, murders are a rare event. I don’t believe that there was another killing in Eastwood between 2007-2015.

The fact that an act of violence would occur at the exact same place is not that surprising. The land retains an imprint, or memory, of what transpires at a particular place. If it is a very emotional event then the imprint will be much stronger.

Imprints like all thoughts encourage repetitive thinking, or behavior. Think of an earworm, a song, you could not get out of your mind. So it is with land imprints, they encourage and beckon us to repeat what has happened before at a particular place.

In Vortices and Spirals (page 21) I tell of an experience noted British archeologist and dowser TC Lethbridge had while collecting seaweed with his wife in Ladram Bay in England. Because the space gave them a queasy and uneasy feeling they decided to investigate the cliff above. While on the cliff they felt as though someone put a thought into their mind to jump off . Lethbridge felt that they were picking up the thoughts of someone that either jumped off the cliff, or wanted to. He also noted that five other people experienced the same urge, or thought, to jump off while at the cliff.

No doubt the murderers in Eastwood were in some way drawn to the 2800 block of James Street.

Land imprints encourage us to repeat the actions, or thoughts, that occurred at a particular place. That is why it is so critical to clean up places where violence or other bad actions occur—otherwise the violence that transpired there will reoccur again and get stronger with each incident. I did go to the prayer vigil held by Mother’s Against Violence in  2008; but unfortunately missed the one in 2015. I have since prayed for the space on several occasions.

Place matters—work to clean up places of violence and bad acts close to your home. Understand also that if you treat a space as being sacred it will bring out the divine in everyone that comes in contact with it. Spread the LOVE, MAKE SPACE SACRED!