Rain Dancing - A Blissful Ritual To Invoke Rain

By : Sharon Supriya

I love dancing in the rain with my arms wide open to catch the soft showers. As they kiss my tender skin, with a warmth of love, it creeps me into the world of romance, with the nature. The blissful smell of the wet earth, the soft and cold wind seems to breathe in life again to the dry land and to my darkened soul. Such is the magic of monsoon. Although monsoon sweeps in romance in many regions of the planet without any notice, there are some places in the world it needs to be invoked to kiss the Earth. The method of instigating its love to the land is done from centuries throughout the globe with a splendid dance. Read about the most ancient ceremonial dance – Rain Dancing.

The ceremonial dance is performed in order to invoke rain and to ensure the protection of the harvest. It is found in many cultures from Ancient Egypt to certain Native American tribes. They could still be found in the 20th century Balkans, in a ritual known as Paparuda (Romanian) or Perperuna (Slavic).

The dance is performed with a particular make- up and attire. For instance the rain dance performed at the Pueblo of Zuni on August 19th, man and women are masked completely. The men have long, waved hair; the women wear the hair wrapped at each side with colored worsted around an oblong of cardboa. In addition to preparing their face and body with the proper 'rain dance' makeup and costume, they hop, skip, bounce, jump, juggle snakes, chant, scream, shout, yell and immerse their entire beings into playing in the rain. For a second, you will surely think they are not praying for rain, they are already playing in the rain!

Believe it or not, many a times their vibrant dance of invocation has brought rain to the drought lands. Experts believe that it invokes rain because it invokes the power of the law of attraction vibrantly, powerfully, passionately, vigorously, fervently, and with conviction

How it came into being?
Here are the two reasons

* An ethnic Native American tribe called, 'the Cherokee tribe' from the Southeastern United States, including Southern Appalachia, performed rain dances to both induce precipitation and to cleanse evil spirits from the earth. According to the tribes legend the rain summoned by the tribe contains the spirits of dead tribal chiefs, who, upon awakening from the clouds, battle evil spirits in the transitional plane between our reality and the spirit world. The tribe also believed that such elaborate rain dances could inspire the participants and the audience, to partake in extreme acts of spiritual worship.

* There is a story behind, how the term “rain dance" came into being, during the days of the Native American relocation, certain religious ceremonies (amongst them the Rain Dance and Ghost Dance) were banned by the government. Thus the tribes in suppressed areas were forbidden to perform the Sun Dance. The Windigokan, a nominally cannibalistic sect, told federal representatives that the dance being performed was not the Sun Dance, but the Rain Dance, thus preventing any prosecution or federal intervention.

(first published in living.oneindia.in)