Aboriginal Beliefs and Spiritualities

• The Dreaming


  A complex concept of fundemental importance to Aboriginal culture.

  Embracing the era of creative activity when the world was formed, as well as the present and the future.

  The centre of Aboriginal spirituality, life and culture
• Each nation has its own paritcular plant/ animal which is a totem for that nation
• Kinship


  close relationship with a spirit and the spiritual owners of that area of land.
• Each nation has its own particular dreaming
• Ritual actions and ceremonies differ from nation to nation
• The dreaming is the essence of their being and permeates ever aspect of Aboriginal life
• Everything that lives is conencted and a part of a living system
• All life must be preseved to keep a relationship between all living things through a totemic system (Flora and Fauna)
• aboriginal people live WITH the land therefore, they do not exploit the land
• There is no dreaming without the land
• Rituals ensure that the spirit of those who died return to the spirit world
• The land is a physical link to the invisible, eternal, spiritual world
• The dreaming sets moral and social bonds
• dreaming demonstartes the unbreakable link between humans, ancestral beings and spiritual world
• The dreaming occurs on the land
• Songlines are the paths of their ancestors
• Aboriginals speak of the land as part of their identity
• They are part of the living environment, not superior to it
• All physical action must take into consideration the spiritual effects and effects of the land