CHANNING SHATTUCK

The Jesuit Relations

Introduction: Society of Jesus in Europe and Abroad

Jesuits are members of a religious group known as the Society of Jesus.

This society was founded in 1534 by a veteran named Ignatius of Loyola.

Jesuits felt threatened by the heathenism and paganism of the natives.

Jesuits made strong devotions to celibacy and fasting.

Jesuits were converted all over, from India to China and Japan and to the Americas.

Introduction: The Colonization of New France

Jesuits hadn’t arrived in North America until quite some time after colonies had been well established.

The French maintained allied relationships with the natives, and attempted to convert them rather than conquer them.

Jesuit missionaries worked independently to convert and educate the native populace.

Natives died of disease in masses and the Jesuits did not fully understand why.

Ch 2 Jean de Brebeuf on the Hurons

Jean takes into account the variety of differences between the natives culture and his own.

He expresses fascination with their language and finds it difficult to transcribe prayer into their native tongue.

He notices differences between the way men say a word and the way a women says a word.

Ch 2 Jean de Brebeuf on the Hurons

Jean confidently believes that the natives non-acknowledgement of a god has lead them to become savages.

He finds it hard to understand why the natives do not believe yet they are able to reason and think.

He tries to compare the similarities between the Huron myths and the Bible and believes that the natives at one time believed in their religion.

Ch 3 Disease and Medicine

Diseases that spread from the colonists to the natives was quick to kill many.

The Jesuits did no understand germs or immunity.

Their concept of medicine was very basic, such as sugar being a cure-all.

When epidemics struck, the Jesuits put their work into baptizing and converting, as they were not doctors and did not practice medicine.

Ch 3 Disease and Medicine

Natives had shamans who worked to help the sick recover using natural means.

The natives took disease to be a communal problem. The sick stayed with the community and therefore led to the rapid spread of the disease.

The natives had many ways of curing a disease. Sometimes they played lacrosse and other times they gambled.

Ch 5 Writing on the Natural Environment

They take into account the way the natives mix natural with supernatural without skipping a beat.

Paul finds these stories amusing but has a hard time understanding how people could take them seriously.

He recounts a fable that has to do with a boy who is orphaned because a bear and a giant rabbit kill his parents. He then uses trees as arrows to kill the bear.

Ch 5 Writing on the Natural Environment

Jerome speaks of animals and their natural hostility and need for vengeance.

He also speaks on the matter of earthquakes and auroras and how they are the heavens and earth speaking to the people.

He explains how they saw fire serpents in the air and a meteor come from the sky.

He also explains seeing three suns in the sky as well as a solar eclipse.

Ch 7 Martyrs and Mystics

Father Isaac Jogues was a martyr who suffered by the Iroguois.

He endured countless amounts of torture and pain from his native captors.

They tortured and killed his companions.

The father reminded all to stay strong and that their time would come when their God allowed it.

Ch 7 Martyrs and Mystics

Catherine Tegahkouita was a Iroquois convert who became a martyr.

She was regarded as a Holy Virgin.The author explains how her weakened

eyesight allowed to stay indoors and busy, so that she could be celebrant.

She held the belief of abstinence to almost extremist views; she tried to shun away from all natural and humanistic things due to her inner nature as an native to enjoy them.