The lecture "The shaman work with the kin in the traditional Buryat shamanism"

The traditional shamanism and the work with the ancestors. The importance of the work with the kin as is understood in the Burayt shamanism. The account of the shaman techniques and the rites in which each interested in such work with the kin can take part.
The lecture is given by Marina Choizhalsanova, a Buryat shaman in the thirteenth generation. She is chairman of the shaman society, the Transbaikalian region. The physician - psychiatrist, psycho-therapeutist.
Original video: https://youtu.be/rXZy-ROhjF4


The English translation of the lecture


Good evening, dear listeners! My name is Marina Choijalsanova. I am a hereditary Buryat shaman. I am a representative of the Institute for trance – oriented psychology in the city of Moscow, where Alla also gave a talk before I did. There are the two faculties: the first is concerned with the regression in accordance with the former life and a shaman line that involves the rite and trance poses, or as I might call it: a ritual, traditional shamanism. 

I am giving a talk in this format for the first time therefore I’d like to offer my apologies for some roughness and uneasiness. We’d better make use of such a way of communicating as questions and answers. Judging from what I see in front of me I cannot say that this is the case…, but I think it’s going to be quite a brief lecture on some issues of the traditional Buryat shamanism.  

The ancestral or gender rites of our tradition, i.e. the East-Siberian line, so to say, is foremost a traditional connection with the ancestors. As we are now in the European part of Russia the connection is basically interrupted. It is fully lost, one might say, to 100 per cent.

Well, in other words, which of you know the ancestors, at least five ancestral or generic lines? It might be hardly so. But I present the line, we’ve got the hereditary shamanism, yes, my father’s line. In principle, it’s the thirteenth line. That is, here’s the closest to me spirit who I work with, in my father’s line. We can’t follow the two lines: that of the mother’s and the father’s. We follow one line at a time. Take, for instance, a representative of the white shamanism when shamans follow father’s line. At present I deal with my thirteen lines but generally I dispose of 25 lines that have been officially revealed for now.  In my mother’s line it is, say, the seventh or eighth line and plus those from 1825.

Therefore the energetic of the kinship relations is sufficiently very high, and it is really of great necessity to a man because today we are somewhat torn off from life. Actually we are sort of torn off from some strength. Very individual, sole. We break through with our own body, our own mind, although it might be done much easier and in a more simple way if there is your kinship behind you. And if there are the two kinships, those of the father’s and the mother’s line, then it is just remarkable. For the root strength comes from the mother and the movement forward from the father’s energy. 

And the necessity in the kinship rites has always been from the times immemorial, for the conditions of life were no doubt much harder than here. Those were the endless steppes, they pastured the cattle and often the man was all alone, imagine, a boundless steppe and one yurt. To tell the truth, I can’t imagine how they lived. From all the sides there was danger, either beasts or robbers and where to run, who rely on? And most frequently the people hoped in the kin defenders, appealed to the shaman, each tribe or kin had its shaman.   

We have got in our line the eleven kinships,  generally I am a representative of the Khori-Buryats. The Khori Buryats are in south-east Russia. We have got the eleven kinships that came from Mongolia. Each kin had its own kinship shaman. And just those shamans had a council of the elders, besides there was head of the elders. One of my ancestors from the eleventh generation was the leader of the Khori-Buryats of that time that were spread in the vast territories. And owing to the fact that the shamans always defended their kin, helped it, there had always been defense on the part of the kin ancestors. The people lived quietly, in principle, in those conditions.

Today the world is a little different, one must say, that even in the times of the Soviet power shamans secretly performed some ritual actions to help people. The people addressed them and felt that it was impossible to tear off the ties, there had always been some grandfathers or grandmothers who were the elders and observed the customs and were the conductors between the ancestors’ spirits and the descendants of the living. Such elders, who were mostly men, those old men were just taken as if they were living between the sky and the earth. They, even those living here, were referred to as those of the other world. They were the representatives of the world of the dead, of the world of the spirits. They had always been playing an honorary part for they knew all the ritual actions.  The rites were as follows: the birth of the children, the marriage ceremonies, moving from one place to another, following some traditions, keeping of the hearth. This all enabled the young to get support from the elders and treat them with honor and respect. This all is not observed now. We try to tear off because we can as if handle our affairs all by ourselves. Therefore there is more joy than horror here. And today everywhere in Buryatia, I know in Khakassia, Yakutia and Tuva there began to be revived and vividly displayed some of those kin rituals. 

Generally a shaman per se and his chief mission is to guard the kin. How and in which way? By way of praying, addressing the spirits of the ancestors. You know, now shamanism is quite popular, it is often spoken of. Sometimes the people fear the shamans. The knowledge of shamanism is sometimes rather superfluous. But today the shamans are socially adapted people. Earlier there was an idea that the shamans were some psychologically abnormal people with the hallucinatory symptoms, with some elliptical fits. But today there came a clear understanding that such a shaman could not be an elder in the kin. You’ll agree that a kin shaman is endowed with quite a great responsibility,  he must be of good mind and memory, safe and sound, he must be a psychologist, he must be a warrior at the same time. Therefore the idea that the shamans are psychologically and mentally defective, impaired people is quite an obsolete, distorted and perverted perception.

And above that there is an idea of the shamans that they are black, therefore the people are afraid that they might do something improper, that they communicate with the dead and might do some harm to you. Yes, there are such. In principle, this is not denied. Nevertheless, there is a category of the white clear shamans who on the contrary pray and do a lot of good. They help an individual or a family.

I cannot say anything about the kinship, because today, you know yourself, we do not know our brothers, sisters, we do not practically recognize the cousins, we almost do not know our second cousins. There are very few connections that are conserved when the brothers and sisters... Therefore not a kin but at least the family come and address the white shaman and he opens, there is a well-spread phrase “opening the roads”.  The shamans are concerned with opening the roads, calling for well-being and so on.

But there is a difference between the various forms of shamanism, I always say there are the clairvoyant shamans who can see and work at the level of the dead and there is the ritual shamanism when the spirits of the ancestors… Well, the word “spirits” might seem to mean some energetic substance. Actually those are the spirits of the ancestors, the spirits of the shamans who lived and were once acting living people. But owing to their merits and good deeds that they did very many good things they ascended onto the skies and became the representatives of the Eternal Blue Sky, that is, of the divine shamanism. And there are the shamans who lived just the way they could but owing to the fact that they had not grown up as high as the divine level but at the same time they are not plain common people they stayed on the earth and became the hosts of some locality. They became then the host of some mountain, some part of the river, etc. Then just such spirits of the shamans, they give or impart their vision to the shaman who lives in that locality and he can address him. And as soon as the spirit of an earthly level knows much therefore when you want to go to some shaman you first make clear what you want. It is the gift of clairvoyance you want or the concrete changes in the fate. 

The ritual ceremonial shamans, they most often do not see that all, they do not need that, because they address straight their higher, superior spirits so that they looking from above could correct some of our mistakes, certain difficulties, so that they could give us the assistance needed.

Most often the clairvoyant shamans prompt and often work together in pair, for there are the clairvoyant shamans and the ritual ones, the clairvoyant see something and the ritual one performs something.

Actually the theme of my talk is “The kinship Buryat rites”. Are you interested in the Buryat rites? That is, would you like me to give the description of the structure, what they do and what is expected.

[What kinds of techniques? What is the difference between a ritual and a clairvoyant shaman?]

The chief task of the clairvoyant shaman is to see the reason, he is not able of correcting the situation if it a very deep level of causality, suppose, the karma cause in the kin… That’s why the kin shamans… further we’ll come up to… And what he does next is to see who can help that man, that is, this is how the classical shamans work. He might say there is a woman over there and there, she suits your kin, she can help on condition that your kin shaman got lost, he is out and the man remained alone but he needs solve his problems. Suppose, the clairvoyant shaman saw a problem and sent to the ritual shaman and the latter proposes to hold a kin ritual. You have to strengthen your connection with your kin and in that case that shaman will correct the unfavorable situation. In which way is this to be done? For the beginning to this effect an informational ritual is to be performed, that ritual is to reveal the ancestors of the family that will give assistance. According to the Russian tradition those are the angels-saviors. So our saviors that are close to you will be your guides or conductors. And according to the Buryat tradition that is the spirit of the shaman who knocks and wants to be heard and to be accepted, received and it is just he who can fully help you. But he will be able to help only in case you receive him with full esteem and provide the treatment desired in that case.

And when completing the informational rite this is what he does: he determines that  spirit, the first one who came here and asks what he needs, what should be provided for completing the rite. The spirit says his wishes and the people start getting ready for completing the kin rite. That is a whole action.

Generally earlier they prepared for practically a year. That takes place with the sacrifices, with the erection of the so called “golden tethering post”. I will tell you my own experience. I am a physician – psychiatrist, and when I was told that the problems in my life are rooted in my being of a shaman kin I took steps to avoid it for 5 years. That is, I did not want that. Then when it came to me that it is needed, yes, there was no way out. I asked the shaman-informer, he told me that you belong to such and such kinship, they were such and such, great and so on. I remember up to now the words that he told me although fifteen years passed. He said that my kin sat on the gold, walked on gold, ate from golden cups. I was sitting at a loss I had lost all, and I ask: “Well! And why don’t they help me?! I am their direct descendant, they are to help me, aren’t they?!” And there was the first rite to be completed, the shaman looked at me, gave a smile and said: “Marina, and where is the tethering post? They arrive on horseback, don’t they, and so that they could help you there must be a tethering post where they could tie up their horses, get off their horses and then help you. What have you done for that?” We live in a city, where can I have that tethering post?

As a matter of fact in the contemporary conditions we set them up in the dachas, illuminate them. That is a real ritual. The ritual of erecting a “golden” tethering post! And then when I completed the rituals for the people the presence of the ancestors was clearly felt. They came when it was necessary and prayed. We made the treatment.

Remember in the fairytales when a hoof is buttered, then the gates get open, so you butter the hoof, then the gate is open, they help you, just something to do with Baba-Yaga. You see, in those fairy-tales there is very much of interweaving, intertwining, well, you oil the tethering post, it does come alive and then your spirits come down and help you in your doings.

[And what if there is no dacha?]

Then it is done on an informational level. Now let’s pass over to the ritual itself. When the shaman did all on the informational level he says that it might be done by means of this or that ritual. A person is to thoroughly get ready, it is desirable to get the family convinced because they might say you have wheels in the  head and not agree. Then you begin preparations.

What is to be done, I continue to answer the question where it might be possible to set up the tethering post, this is done on the birch. Today and always on the birch… Even here in our territory there were the South American Indians, a whole group came, and when they saw how we ran around the sacral birch grove during the consecration ritual, they said that they also have such trees. Imagine even in South America as they say there are the same trees and they also used to run around them. Although it might seem strange, just the two different continents.

A birch tree symbolizes the celestial ladder, the trunk is white, it symbolizes the purity,  the root system goes down wherein there is the mother’s side and the top indicating that of the father, the Eternal Blue Sky. The three birch trees were put: the first symbolized the kin tree, the birch had been dug out together with the root, it was put in a certain direction where from the ancestors came and at that informational ritual it becomes clear from which side the spirits came down, to which invocations, upon which places. This all is shown by the clairvoyant shaman. This birch is put to the side of the ancestors and there in the northern side they complete all the actions, when they set it in the northern part they tie up a ribbon not to mix up the place and in order to locate it in such a way that it should be oriented to the North. The roots should not be damaged, the personification is performed symbolically, so that the birch is rooted in order to connect the family with its kin. The second birch is Zalma Modon.

The sense expression of the second birch is well being, prosperity. A very nice birch should be chosen, the birch should of certain parameters: it should be slender, without any crutches or forks, it should be thin, two or three years of age, all the branches should be intact. That zalma is that second money tree that must bring a lot of prosperity, well-being. And that tree should be the most fluffy, bushy, the most beautiful, it may be not too tall  and there must be very many leaves on it that would signify the money potential, the future of that family.

And the third is just that birch that is exactly the serge or the tethering post, that very golden tethering post,  the  Golden Tether. It is set up at the edge and the birches are rooted at a certain distance in the direction from where the ancestors come down and get descended… , the birches are tied up with a red tape and they come down through the tethering post along the red thread and the spirits get seated just namely upon that kin tree. When they leave they go away along the same red thread, shower the middle tree with gold and wealth and along that middle birch and that very tethering post they go upward.

They complete such rituals for the three years running in order to consolidate. That is to say, at first the kin spirits get acquainted with you, the next year they strengthen the ties, still more ancestors come. For the beginning one spirit-protector might come, the ancestor of that family. The next year there might come some more, they have already opened the way and the third year they may leave saying: “Live well!”, and on the average they live quietly on, …the spirits do not bother them for fifty or one hundred years. They do not bother the people who have performed the ritual during fifty to one hundred years.

But it might be so that the shaman kin has already been revealed, then in the third year revealed is the member of the family who is to be head of the genealogy in future, it will be the shaman who will perform the ritual offerings, the shamanistic rites, the treatment, the shamanistic rituals for the ancestors to be happy that the kin got revived and they might help someone else who will address with the request. 

During that ritual except for erecting the birches a sacrifice sheep is to be slaughtered, we live in a steppe zone, therefore our main meal was mutton. The sheep is selected in a certain way, it should be a castrate ram, of two or three years old, of white color, the horns are cut off so that it should not pierce the sky with its horns, then it is cooked.

Each year we hold the rites on the island of Olkhon which is taken to be a sacral site for shamanism, once some western cinema or TV company arrived and they gave a description of that event, they said that it was a sacrifice, that it was some pagan, dreadful, bloody event, that they tear out the heart with hands and that all is done when the animal is still alive and so on. They gave an account in dreadful colors. But in reality it is a very impressive ritual and according to our custom the sheep’s soul …it is a very quick death, in the first place, well, that is, really they make a cut. But before the procedure the shaman offers his prayers for the sheep’s soul. He sends it to be reborn and that is the only chance for an animal to proceed from the animal world to the world of humans. Well, just imagine, this is a chance for a sheep’s soul to be then reborn as a human being.

I with my certain physician’s mind when I first witnessed all that I came to understand why there are so many “sheep” around. There are the people that do not really understand anything. They do not really understand what they do here. And it is next to impossible to prove anything to them. I understand that these are the young souls that … Now the number of the sacrificed animals is still growing, now they perform so many rites and therefore the number of the people with such souls is ever growing around us. And if you see such a man, if fate brought you together, do not be angry with him, he does not understand anything in this world. Be a little more indulgent.

So this is how a sheep is made ready for the rite. Besides there is a good treating during such a ritual. It is basically white meal. During the various rites, with different families and clans there was the white food of about five to nine kinds, the most delicious dish was the milk skin…  The milk was regarded as the sacral heavenly food. Thus from five to nine kinds of white food was offered. They make a big cake. A ready white tart is usually not bought because it is factory-made but it should be made by women with their own hands, basically such a dish is made of the biscuits, bread, dry cake, marshmallow, it sometimes resembles kind of pyramid or tower. They think the taller, the better, the more beautifully it is decorated the better as it signifies the honor and respect, and the ancestors in their turn take it with favor.

Besides at the informational ritual it becomes clear which spirits are in fact lacking. Because when the heavenly representatives of the kin awake after fifty or one hundred-year of sleep they look downward and see that their descendants are atheists or got assimilated with some other people. Some go to the other kinships, now many people get married and become mixed and there is no one to treat the ancestors, no one to make the spirits a present, no one who could do a favor, honor, respect. And thus they become forlorn and forsaken. What do they do in such a case? They begin to appeal to their descendants. Most often for the beginning they start to cause some obstacles in life. They close the road, do not give job, very often there is alcoholism, drugs, sterility, cancer diseases, no private life, no children. Those are just the implications that they began to little by little as we call it “press”. They begin to jam, squash the kin. Quite frequently the people ask: “What is the use of pressing us?”  It often happens so that a person remains alone, a woman is left alone and she has no variants at all: neither children, nor anything else. Yes, the spirits are like those. They are ready to go up to the end, “let me die out but I’ll finish with you”. If he does not see return on the part of his descendants. There are the spirits that kill their kin, simply destroy it.

[Are those the demonic forces?]

We do not have the word “demonic”, those are just your kin ancestors, your grandfathers and grandmothers you do not treat, esteem, even do not know. And what do they do? They are very angry with you and send on you such misfortune. Because, why should they need you if you do nothing in their favor, it is easier for them to finish you from indignation. It is not of the demons.

When we are in the positive, we hear them, they are dressed in the like way as the usual people, eat the same. They need some handicraft things, some of them had favorite smoking pipes,  some had their favorite high boots. And by means of the informational rite they ask to send them up by means of the fire… The women may ask for a piece of cloth, kerchief or scarf, beads, decorations, just such usual everyday things that are physically burnt on the fire and energetically those substances go to them upwards. And they eat plenty and are full up, become stronger. 

The first rite performed for myself was that of a kin and was performed by a shaman. Merely one grandfather of the seventh generation came and said: “The rest will come in a year. It is with this sheep that we’ll feed ourselves (a sheep will do for a whole year), gain strength and then we’ll come to you (this is a trance state, the shaman takes in my spirit)”. But before that he scolded us for a long time, he said that we forgot our foundation, our kin, that we profess not the belief that we should (we have Buddhism, so it means that was [about  Buddhism]). No one says [a word against the other beliefs], you worship anything you choose but [shamanism] is your root belief. This is yours, bone of the bone and flesh of the flesh. Then we’ll be with you. If not we are angry with you.

Some other articles of clothing are sent, the men sometimes ask for the tools, the high boots are often [asked for], but we do not send the boots themselves, in the sense that one does not need burn the real high boots. They are most often cut out of wood, made with one’s own hands and sent there.

After we had planted the birches, prepared the sacrificial food, the sheep to be sacrificed, the white dishes, the shaman starts completing the ritual. And he invites at first his spirit with whom he commonly works. The spirit sees whether all is all right. Because if there is any inexactness …

The birch is also decorated with the pieces of gold and silver. In the earlier times they decorated it with real golden and silver bars but maybe not bars but something like that they used to hang on the trees. The upper part of the birch that goes to the elder grandfather the Sky, was decorated with the golden coins, nowadays that might be the yellow and red ribbons of printed cotton, sateen, silk that are made specially as embodiment of gold. And the lower part that is the mother’s, that of the earth [is decorated] with white and blue bands. In that way the kin, the family shows that we present you with the gold and silver, decorate the birch with the gold and silver and when the birch is burnt, a little going further, those yellow-red and white-blue semelge, thus called are [those ribbons], are sent onto the sky, then the spirits send down namely in the money equivalent, i.e. they send prosperity to those people who completed such a ritual.  

The shaman performing the rite takes in his own spirit, the curator, and that one sees to whether all was done correctly. It is that there might be the broken branches, the trees might be incorrectly planted,  something might be done incorrectly with the sheep. He points out the imprecision, what should be corrected. Because the one who is to come, who was there forsaken is quite dangerous. He just looks for something to find fault with, anything, in order to show his anger. That’s just what does occur sometimes. All the same the features of a human being’s disposition were taken there and it is unknown which kind of temper he was of previously.  And therefore all should be done very scrupulously so that the spirit who is to come down could not find any faults. It is important that he should see that the children did all properly. Then it gives him comfort like a balm on his soul forsaken, forgotten. And the rite will proceed favorably.

After the spirit of the leading shaman gave a positive answer for the ritual he says who will descend: the grandma or the grandpa. It is impossible to ask them to come down, whether the grandma or the grandpa. Why? Quite frequently our appeals to our ancestors do not reach them because they should be addressed by their name, patronymic. Generally it is desirable to address them by their name. Why, because when we go to the shamans they ask for the genealogy. And from that genealogical tree they select the protectors that are endowed with the energetic power that might give assistance to that family.  Today those genealogies as we have already found out are forgotten. We do not remember them. Therefore the shaman-informer can say the name of the ancestor, he can tell us which sky he is on and which locality he descends onto, where his habitual place is: it is either the burial place or the place of birth, or the plot of the earth where he had settled and periodically …  You probably read in the stories and legends that the gods descend onto some certain locality, some definite plot of land, onto their favorite place. That [ritual] is called “dudalga”- invocation or “prizyvaniye” in Russian. 

The invocation is performed by the spirit of the leading or the informing shaman. The invocation is addressed to a certain grandfather, grandmother from among the mass of this very kin hearth that is in the state of readiness and is waiting when he is invoked with the esteem. He enters also the body of the shaman and it is then that the action itself starts. He then begins to get acquainted with his children, begins to set forth which claims he has got. He says what he did not like there and of great use here now is talmach (the interpreter), in other words, the second shaman, and in case there is no second shaman-assistant then all may end very sadly and tragically. Because the task of the talmach is to please the ancestor in rage, who has been forgotten and abandoned. He has to explain that the children did their best, they did this and that, brought all with the respect to you. Sometimes the spirits are in such rage that they say just at the rite that they will take all with them, so that you all die and so on, there’ll be no good both to me and to you. And just here it is the most important task of the helper to explain that all is well, that the descendants did call you and please be more indulgent. Very often the spirits, of course, are a little frightening. This is like teaching a lesson, edification that you don’t forget, that is possible.

Then after he is propitiated he is seated in a special place and treated; quite often the spirits come down onto the earth just to try the taste of the physical food. Usually they are treated to tea, vodka, milk, commonly the white food. It is important to know what that ancestor liked. Because there were the rites when the spirit of the ancestor lived once at the bank of the Baikal and ate fish. It was his food at that time, he ate it more often than meat. Now when the descendants moved to the steppes of Transbaikalia where there is no water at all, and in principle the Buryats do not eat fish much. And because there is no fish there arises the problem again for he is very angry and he says: “Is there no fish in the river?!  No beast in the forest?!”  When the kin was a hunting one, they asked the meat of the game, say of the deer, goat. Therefore the people try to offer them their most favorite food, forestall all the requirements of theirs. 

I had an example, there is in our place such a shaman, of a shaman kin that took its beginning from Arkhangelsk. But they were not shamans, they were rather sorcerers, witch doctors, healers. The kin was dying out of cancer, there was the only boy remaining, he suffered from alcoholism, to my mind, from the psychic outburst of energy. He was quite solid, he broke all round, when that spirit wanted to force his way here, he demanded for attention, he came with no permission, got into the body of that young man without any permission. And he broke everything in the flat. It happened periodically or depending on the moon, or if there were some stress situations, and with the lapse of time when all was found out, he turned out to belong to a very strong kin of the healers and as I know, he acquired a taste for treating and was consecrated by the Buryat shamans… because the trance conditions were preserved basically in the Buryat tradition. He began to actuate his late grandfather in trance and when his grandpa was treated, it was as I saw for the first time so rich that the whole table was covered with the various dishes: there was the borsch, kvass and what not. He ate much, he was full up, once a month he was invited down onto the earth, they held the rites, he blessed them, protected. Owing to the fact that they found such a way, the man recovered, all the fits of the aggressive conduct, loss of consciousness ceased, he married, all is OK, he found his way, stopped taking alcohol.         

After we acquired the kin ancestor all was quite all right since. Say, the kin spirit liked the treatment he blesses the whole kin and gives permission that all we have prepared including all the objects prepared, all the food was sent to his place through the sacrificial fire. And he says: “All right, call me, I’ll be looking after you”. The first year they most often gain strength. And the ritual finishes with the ritual burning… the fire is put out, the birches are heaped together according to the ritual. The shaman in charge of the ritual sings and opens the celestial gates so that the gifts were accepted by the kinship clans for whom the treatment was meant. Burnt in a certain order are the birches, the sheep, the white food that all go upward. It is very interesting to note that whatever the direction of the wind, but the smoke is sure to go in the direction of the kin. It is invariably so. If to look, if it is the western side the wind will blow on the contrary to the opposite side, the smoke will go despite the physical weather conditions.

Besides when taking the picture of the fire one just can see the deities of the fire, how content and rejoicing they are, this all is shown through the fire. Very many pictures were taken depicting the kin rites. And you certainly have an idea of what the plasmoids are. Just such luminous balls, they are very many, and they are located not wherever one happens to be… the pictures are taken now…  most often the better part of the spirits is just located on the sheep sacrificed. Or on the birches, on the shaman’s table, all the space around is usually empty.

[What does that mean?]

It means that the spirits… you know, we have not only ten, nor fifteen, nor twenty generations, in general in each of us there are thousands and thousands of kinships that are combined within us. Today we are just that precious thing that lives and embodies… Well, what is genetics? How many chromosomes, how much information concerning the DNA are being deciphered.  It means that just these spirits that are so close today to the material world,  they come to be treated to some things, to get acquainted with us. Only one spirit enters the trance state, the one that is the chief conductor that day and the rest will simply partake of the meals. They do not display themselves but they are there for sure. And after that the rite is taken to be over. The people feel relief, the people feel very calm, just exactly some joy comes that falls like manna from heaven. Quite often those who could not get married, in a year or two get married and learn that they are expecting the children, their own descendants . Some diseases pass away, there comes just an idealistic life, harmony to a greater extent than worry and anxiety.

When those kinships start completing the rituals we give the lists of our relations and close people. I mean the mother, the father, then there come the brothers and sisters; the brothers and sisters have their families, children and so on. And quite often at the beginning it is maximum ten persons totally. By the end of the third ritual and further on, say, in some five years when you meet those people, they come to be thirty all in all in the list, already some five families, then it comes to be ten families. And at the beginning this is one, two, three families. That is, this is an implication that the kin began to see to, to bless their children, to help them. There is just less plugging in life.

[How should one behave with the spirits not to make them angry?]

It depends on which kind of spirits you deal with, there are lots of them, [do you mean] the kin spirits? There is such a notion as “praying for forgiveness of the kin”.  Well, when a person lives a poor life he begins to look for the cause, then he finds out that maybe his mother is ill, she suffers from, suppose, cancer and her mother died quite early, etc. He comes to understand that something is wrong in line of the kin. And the first practice that is frequently advertized including the ads in the Internet and the like is just the praying for forgiveness of the kin. That is, there are a lot of techniques in this line.  

But I have my own opinion in this respect and it is substantiated by the various sources. Remember, in the Christian religion there is a priest batiushka who is to pray for forgiveness of the kin. And there are very few such batyushkas, it is a very strong priest of high hierarchy. That is not an ordinary priest of the first temple that one comes across. There is one per one hundred who has the right of praying for forgiveness of the kin. Understand?  I.e. when you take up the task of praying for forgiveness of the kin, you are most often in the negative. Why? Because it looks like we’re taking up a great mission, that I’m the cleverest and praying for you. And you led a poor life, you lived an unrighteous life or you did something and something. And it comes that we assume responsibility for some unfair deeds. And then we are in charge of those obligations… That’s a good question indeed.

[Well, and just relating to the conduct with the spirits in everyday life, what can you say?]

Let's go on. And so if you will indeed, if you are really in need of finding such a priest-batyushka indeed, the one who will sure clean you kin. You’ll pass him the responsibility for yourself. How do we communicate with our ancestors? Up to now including the Caucasian people we treat the spirits. The kin rites, what is this?  This is the treatment, this is feast. We tell them, we are your children, we treat you, let’s rejoice. We are not crying over anybody, we are not praying, we are not doing anything”.

[A question concerning visiting the cemetery].

Categorically no! A cemetery … You can go to the cemetery only once a year, on the parents' day, that’s all. [Do not break this rule], never. Neither before the parents’ day, nor after the parents’ day. You could not go there, then treat them at home. That is the parents’ day, that is the day when all the saints create the gates for you, defend you from all kinds of the black that are a lot at the cemetery, from all kinds of the forsaken souls and then you under the protection of the angels, archangels enter the cemetery and you are waited for by your ancestors. And there the treatment is compulsory. Even you may have a glass of drink. But on any other day no one defends you, understand? You come and often after that say there’s something wrong with me, I’m not quite well. If a person is strong he might be unwell for three days, say, or even a week… then everything will be all right. As for a weak person he will begin to understand that he picked up something. And then one should go and clean, purify himself and the like.

In the Buryat tradition, in the eastern tradition, in the Caucasian tradition that is the treatment of the ancestors. Once a year, each year the kin or clan gets together, the families come, a sheep is sacrificed and the treatment is offered. Very many people come to the Buryats, I mean people of the various nationalities and I noticed that the most close nation to us is the Caucasians. They do that, they treat the neighbors, that’s a festival for all. That’s the way they treat.

Today I complete the kin rites in line of namely, well, it might be called, neo-shamanism.  In which way? Under the protection of the spirits, under the protection of the Baikal pantheon we invocate your kin spirits. That ritual is a three-folded one, the number three is a sacral one, for the three weeks running you come for the ritual, you bring your treatment for the father, that is, the father’s side, for the mother’s side. If your father and mother are alive, you ask them what the grandmothers and grandfathers on both the parts liked. It is commonly not a very big treatment, you should not lay a too big table, well, a plate on the father’s part, a plate on the mother’s part, the drinks that they liked. And to the sound of the drum I summon my kin spirits, the people are somewhat in trance, they lie down and to the sound of the drum under the cupola of protection they communicate with their ancestors. Why is it effective, operative? Because when we summon all by ourselves we are not heard, we do not know the names, we do not know whom we should address. Owing to the collective rites there appears collective energy. And when I summon our spirits they are in the kin locus, in the kin homestead and they see all who is there, in other words, they have connections, interrelationship. And I say that these people came to treat their own kin, call them, call their kinships. And owing to this channel that my ancestors create, those clans can come down to those who got together here.

Very often the people say we are holding the ceremony for the second year in a row and the first thing we feel after the first rite is the feeling that as if a wall arose behind us. In other words, a support appeared, a person had felt alone before. On the one hand, one might say that it is something to do with the psychological entities. But on the other hand, it is so real, and distinct, well, for instance, once we held the ceremony in such a hall that to drive to it was impossible. The fixed-run taxis or buses did not go, you had to go some twenty minutes more in some back alleys, secluded corners and so on. And the girl says I was brought up. When she was not aware of how to get to the hall, there comes up a fixed-run taxi, she comes up and inquires whether he goes that and that direction. What is the number of your taxi? But there is no number. And do you go such and such route? – Yes. The girl sees that there are very many people at the stop but taking a seat in that car is she alone. The driver closes the door and brings her straight to the doors of that hall. And then when she was going to the second ritual she began to wait for that bus, but in vain. That fixed-run taxi as it turned out did not go that route. And there are very many cases like that. In other words, this proves that we do not think of anything all by ourselves.

Still another example, there was a girl from England, she has Russian roots, she got to “The white clouds” quite accidentally. The first time she came to the other hall, the second ritual was in the “White clouds”. She came with a big stick. Well, if you saw Gendalf from “The lord of rings”, he had such a stick and the girl tells at the ritual that at night she had a dream after the first ritual that she attended, my kinship spirits came to her to say that she did all correctly and that we hand you the instrument of strength. And they give her such a stick, a brown one, she takes it in her sleep, awakes and has a feeling that is here but it is not there. And where am I to get it? It is knotty, not just sawed out. So she says she comes to the parking place and sees that standing next to her is a girl with such a stick.  Just one-on-one, the stick from the dream.

I, she says, come up to her and ask:
- Girlie, what is it with you?
- A stick, - she answers.
- And what are you going to do with it?
- I want to hand it over to someone. Probably,  to you.
- Are you sure you’ll hand it over to me? Should I give something to you?
- Oh, no. I am just waiting for you.

She gives her the stick and leaves. You see, such thing do happen. And she came to show the stick, just like the one that she saw in her dream.

Now concerning the question why our kinship shamans hold the rituals for the representatives of the other nationalities. The Buryats preserved the tradition of the trance states which is known as “ongon”. The ongon is the spirit of the ancestor who works with the shamans now. And that ongon, he has the right to work with the whole kinship stratum, in the space of namely that kin. And when people want to find their ancestors they address the Buryats. Just during this practice the Americans, the Germans came. But I was impressed by one of the stories. Those were the Cossacks living on the Baikal, a man completed a male ritual, there are the various rites, that was a blacksmith’s kin and those are very strong kinships of blacksmiths when you have in your clan a master: some write, some draw, some sing, some deal with the iron, some make repair, that is, they all are just some craftsmen. Those are most often the kinships of blacksmiths. Quite frequently among those belonging to those kinships there observed is a high degree of traumatism, early death, infarction or heart attack, alcoholism, some war actions. For those blacksmiths’ kinships are very rigid. They are very strong and when they not treated it is the male population, the male part of the family that they roll up. And here such Cossacks completed such a ritual, the man was clairvoyant and the elder in that family. When the leading shaman got their grandfather worked up, he happened to be from Buryatia. He thanked the Buryats for arranging a feast in that world. The tables were laid up and we are now not hungry and we do not stand near the meals not eating. The thing is, do you know why they get angry? The information reaches when one is in trance. Those whom you do not acknowledge there in the upper world they cannot come up to the common kinship table. There are such common feasts, kinship tables where all the kinships whose descendants respect them, are treated and remembered. All the treatment is here and they are sitting here as esteemed people. Those who are forgotten are also standing by. They cannot leave because it is the kinship stratum and at the same time they stand by and are very angry. And why they are angry because they cannot come up nearer, they have no right. Their descendants forgot about them and they begin to see who is left there, who can be jerked, who can offer me such a treatment.

And as for today when there is such a great necessity and the rites that we complete here and in the “White clouds” and with the help of the Institute for the trans-oriented psychology, that are the organizers of such events and activities. There were also very many treatments of the spirits, inquiries for obtaining their permission. And it is just today that all these actions prove to be quite fruitful, they justify themselves and are quite rewarding. Afterwards when a person feels the necessity in completing an individual ritual, he is free to address any shaman. Well, not any, but there is a choice, the Internet is at your service to help find the shaman. Generally I am myself a shaman and I recommend you that if you want to complete rites and select the one who might complete them for you, just visit two, three, four or five persons who can see. Including the shamans or clairvoyants and in case all the information proves to be reliable, only in that case you will know who will be the one to arouse and treat.     

[And there are the traditions of the Christian religion in Moscow, particularly, notes, the book of prayer].

We do not talk about the Christian tradition,  the thing is that prior to Christianity there was the pagan belief.  Persisting is the cult of the Mother-the Earth, the cult of the father, the high-ranking Eternal Blue Sky. It never disappeared. The cult of the ancestors does persist. You give credit in the first place to the Christian egregor and only some crumbs are likely to reach your ancestors. Understand? Therefore there is such a universal revival of shamanism. 

[And in the Caucasus they give them away to those who died…]

They do offer the treatment,  they show that they are well-to-do, that they are able of doing that. And those who go up think that we are so rich, we’ve got such a good kin. This is compulsory. Quite often the hierarchical stairs up over there depend on our doings. If you talk of shamanism then the shaman who performs the treatment each year or the kin that completes the ritual of treatment each year, the status of your ancestors is sure to invariably grow higher. 

Are there any other questions? There is a lot of information but particularly what are you interested in?

[All those spirits that come down, they are irritated and angry because they are hungry, aren’t they? Or they can come down and be quite benevolent?]

Look here once again, if your kin is fed up, there are such kinships that kept constantly treating and treating and then the spirits said that’s enough, you can take a rest. And they might not disturb you for as long as, say, two hundred years. Those descendants feel fine,  there is nobody whom they are to bow down. They might not know of this in principle. The time will come and something is to occur.  In any case they will wake up and demand theirs back. If you treated and you had an elder who completed all, it is not just you who is to complete that.  Your family is large including, for instance, the cousins, second cousins, some grandmother, grandfather who performed  (the treatment of the spirits). All the same they pray for the whole kin. With the eastern peoples they pray for the whole kin. The echo goes to you,  you don’t have to do anything.

But when do we appeal the kin?  When we feel quite unwell. The first sign is that I do not wholly understand something in this life, or leave something unfinished when I fail to do anything whatsoever. And above all I am unwell at that, with no work, with no money, with no roof over my head, there are some aggressive people around. And I understand that I am all alone. When my esoteric things are of no use to me whatsoever, when the work with the karma,  with my personal life do not help me, when I do all… The people go for the training courses for decades, I know some such people. For instance, there are those who reached very high degrees in the thin world  but that’s their individual achievement. They remain as lonely as they have been. No family,  and the family is the kin in a sense.

[There is such a method now that the parents’ day is marked on your birthday for being here you complete the seven generations, the three generations. Therefore they (spirits) come to you on your birthday. For they all have their various days of birthday and death, and in this case your birthday is a connecting link of all your kin both in the mother’s and father’s line. They converge in you as if in a triangle. And the parents’ day, it is to mark all and it is just your birthday].

The parents’ day is chiefly in line of the Christian church, ours are buried in the cemetery, the monuments are erected, most often the funeral dirges over the dead are sung and that parents’ day before the Easter, when is it marked? Tuesday, this day is canonical for the Christian religion. You say now it is a holiday. They are happy that you were born. But in fact, on the one hand, you might say that it is so. Somewhere in Ossetia there was this: a man said that on that day there was a treatment, actually they made joint treatment on the father’s and mother’s part. When we went into the details, it became clear there was a conflict, the two kinships quarreled for they did not know where their treatment was. That is, you put the treatment to your parents on the one side and the others put their treatment to the parents on the other side.  If you feel such a call within you,  why not.

[I’ve got only one kin, on the mother’s part, no information on the other kin, all died, who could tell me]. The kin is lost. Can I learn anything of the father’s kin with help of the kin ritual?]

The ritual I complete here in Moscow, concretely in connection with it you do not know anything about that kin. But even not knowing the ancestors in line of that kin by the names, but offering the treatment you offer it to that very kin. It’s a plus. After a big individual ritual very often the people who had been looking for years for their genealogy, could not find it during many years… I had a case, after such a ritual for a man who was from among the Russians who came to Transbaikalia, not to Buryatia, but to Chita and he found out in the computer all the information needed…, I do not know how miraculously it all happened … but it was written there: who, where, how, of what he died. It is not clear at all how it all came. That man who was rector of one of the universities of the city of Chita had long been purposefully trying to find his kin, but in vain. After such a rite they went to the village founded by their grandfather. He comes from Belorussia. And there at the territory of the settlement the grandchildren completed such a rite with the dad. After that the father came home and once he pressed the button on the computer and all he needed came out all by itself, all the kinships. Before that he had been seeking for 7 years. I.e., things do happen, indeed.

Such a treatment is sure to reach (the spirits) for my kin spirits, they are the mediators,  they are the connecting link between your kin and you, just existing. And it is really so that the kin cannot but respond.

[Some people before having meals,  let it be either breakfast, or lunch or supper, put a plate with the treatment for the kin from the common table and then take it out into the street and give it to the birds. Is that correct?].

I’d say, not quite. That’s why we do it once a year and the birthday is once a year. It looks like you are bothering them all the time. What for? They’ve got their own things to do.

In October, 14 when there begins the feast of the Protection of the Holy, it is an official date when the heavens get closed, the spirits leave to have a rest,  just for the winter rest. And when the cuckoo starts singing, the leaves on the birches burst in blossom, only then they can come down to help. Therefore the kin rites are completed mainly in summer time till October 14.  Though  October  is not quite desirable. As soon as the leaves begin to grow yellow it’s better to have all done. Therefore to treat them each day is quite unnecessary.

[With the Buddhists there is also a tradition when the guests come and someone bought something they place it on the altar. Is it a treatment to the ancestors or not?]

This is the treatment for the deities of the Buddhist pantheon. The same, only in a different way. When we are the followers of some religion we always give 90 per cent of the energy to the deities of the religion we profess

[Can one order you that ritual?]

Yes, sure.

[Is it your phone number or that of the Institute?]

My phone number is here. In this sheet indicated is Natalia Kolotskaya, she’s just the administrator.

[How much will it cost?]

Generally the cost of the rite is sufficiently high. Because it is needed to find the place, it is needed to find a sheep and so on. The shaman’s activity is sure cost-based. I can’t say for sure because that all is just quite individual. That is, some have quite big prices, some regard it simply as a tribute, just as much as one can afford. All the same, it depends on the consumer’s welfare. If a person has no money and he gives 10 rubles. It’s his price. And he gave all he had. And if a person has got millions and he gives 30 or 50 thou rubles but he asks for more millions then one must understand what it is all about. If the shaman states some definite price it is also correct because the man who came with a request is ready to pay that sum, he is quiet because he takes off the responsibility as the shaman himself said the price. In this case you feel yourself whether you can pay that money.

Even if you have no money but you want that rite to be completed there are many cases that a man is in some way given the sum of money needed for the ritual.  Just not a penny more,  not a penny less. Say, 50 thou rubles are given for the ritual. And it happens that the money came but he decides to postpone the rite. And he begins to think, I have to pay for the flat, to have the car repaired, etc. All is in vain. It is that your ancestors want you to complete that ritual, therefore there occur such things. If the shaman stated the price which is three times as much than you can pay, then it is not your shaman. That is, the situation with the prices is complicated. Each has its own price. And you have your price too.     

[Briefly speaking, 50000 rub.]

Some 50,  some 150.

[Do you have your classes individually or in groups?]

I hold the kinship rites, now we’ll complete purely shaman rites that are written on the small pieces of paper. As it is now the New Year festive which is still going on till March 27, with us we celebrate the New Year till the 27th of March. And once a year we perform the rite of “opening the roads”. In the month of April we complete triple rites: the first is devoted to the shaman pantheon, to all the thirteen northern khats,  those are the hosts of those big localities, my kinship hosts. For them to open the road for the people there’ll be a small trance travel when you’ll be able to pass your wish personally, to ask them for prosperity.

The second rite will be… There are many people here, in the Moscow land, who are the newcomers, me too. And there is such a notion as the host of the city of Moscow, there is such a notion as the hosts of the localities. And at the second ritual we’ll perform the treatment to the host of Moscow and to the spirits of the localities of Moscow and the Moscow region.

The third rite will be the ritual-treatment to your ancestors. That is, at the first rite I ask for the permission of my spirits, they are treated on your behalf, on behalf of all those who came, then we ask for the permission here on spot.

Very often those newly arrived also cannot get settled here in Moscow. It is due to the various reasons but quite often it is because the land does not accept them. I have some information that earlier… the hosts of some settlements are commonly in the mountains. And there are the two mountains in Moscow: the Vorobyovy gory and the Poklonnaya gora.  I found the information that the Poklonnaya gora is the gate to Moscow city, that is the host is in the Vorobyovy mountains. Last year I completed a rite there but in such a way as not to attract the attention of the public and police as far as possible. The answer was positive.

As for the Poklonnaya gora the merchants arriving in Moscow as early as the XIX century in order to have a good trade completed the ritual of treatment on the Poklonnaya gora. In front of the gates they put the tables with treatment and they treated the host of Moscow, asked for the permission. And then everything was all right with those who made the treatment. They also treated the poor people who came there. In other words they laid the tables in honor of the host of Moscow.

[Each religion has its temples, mosques, synagogue and the Buryat people have such temples where the people get together, the Buddhist temple to study the canons of their religion].

In Transbaikalia with us there is such a settlement, Aginsk, and on the basis of the Aginsk datsan , our temple is called datsan, there is, for instance, a mosque, a church and with us it is a datsan, such a religious complex. There is the institute of tibetology, generally in each temple there are such educational institutions. But not everybody can study there. I remember vaguely that if you want to study  the Koran or the Qur'an you might come to the synagogue, we haven’t got that. With us the people come to pray, to perform the praying ceremonies, chiefly, and those wishing to take a training course are called “khuvaraks”, they take a special training as monks. Something like that.

[Do the shamans have disciples?]

The shamans, by the way, do not have temples. The shamans go under the Eternal Blue Sky. That is, they make a heap of stones, twice or thrice they go around it, commonly that is made in the spots of force. The shamans have disciples but of the shaman kinships. That is, they do not take a plain person who has no roots. He cannot become a shaman. That is, there must be a shaman root by all means. There is such a notion as the city shamans but those are mainly psycho-techniques, esoterics. The root is called “udkha”, that is the basic principle in shamanism. In the Russian, Caucasian and any other tradition… that’s why I said about the Germans… I was surprised when the Germans went to Buryatia and my teacher performed rites for them. And then when we studied it they appeared to be of the blacksmiths’ kins, those of the darkhans, darkhan is blacksmith, they complete initiation. Because the smiths are in Africa the smiths, they complete the connection with the kinship. And one of the darkhans … he is not a shaman even but he becomes the head of that kin and completes certain rites. Once a month he performs the ritual to the Heaven of the blacksmiths and treats them, then they give him strength. Most often the blacksmiths’ kins are noted for their healing art: they are bonesetters, it is massage, some work with the body. And owing to that they stood under the banner of their kinship, they get the strength of the kin and the quality of their work gets improved to a great extent.

The same concerns the sorceress, very often one might see that a Russian man works in that tradition, wears the mirrors or toli, he is as if an initiated shaman. That means that he is a descendant of something eastern, Siberian - Asiatic or he is a disciple because he is sure to be initiated in the kin. No one is not taken over. He works for his kin but his tutor and teacher may be a Buryat. That’s what the   traineeship, apprenticeship is, it often is the case with me too when I work… in Buddhism, for instance, or let’s better take an example with a yoga-teacher. You give up everything, become a yoga and follow that way. With us it is different, in our case if a shaman does take a disciple he at first gets connected with his kin and then when everything is all right with them and the ancestors allow that shaman to become a teacher he then takes tutorship over him.

[Does one register in this site for all the tree days? Will it last for a whole day or how many days?]

This is rather in the evening, about 3 or 4 o’clock. If it’s a working day, then since 7 o’clock and up to 11 o’clock.

[And what is the difference between the Buryat and Tuva shamans?]

Practically there is no difference, only in the ritual actions. The meaning is all the same, the connection with the ancestors. You sure know Valentina Kharitonova. She is the curator of the shaman trends. She is an anthropologist, ethnographer and she studied the shamanism in Russia in her official capacity. She is an initiator of the symposiums on shamanism, the people come for such conferences and symposia from the various places. She said that it was the Buryat shamanism that preserved this trend of traditional and trance entities. The brightest, is the Yakut shamanism. And the Buryat shamanism is the traditional, trance and ritual entities. This came from North Mongolia because the teachers came from there. The Buryat shamans in their time ran to Mongolia, when there were persecutions. And now the shamans , the Mongols of the Buryat origin come back. They are the main part of the teachers on the territory of Russia. Tuva is developing all by itself. I heard that it belongs to a small extent to neoshamnism.   

[And what about the mountainous Altai, do shamans also live there?]

Both in Khakassia and the mountainous Altai there are shamans. In general we do not have the word “shaman”, we say “boo” which means “chanting”. That is, the notion of  shaman  has largely come just from Tuva, Yakutiya from the word  “saman”. 

[Shaman is an Evenk word, and what about the evenks, do they have shamanism?]

Yes, certainly. Everywhere there are shamans. The only thing is that the ritual entity has become less pronounced in some places, it becomes more cultivated when closer to our time. Still, as I can see, more traditional is the shamanism with the Buryats.

[And the Altai hunters when they try to gain thick forest’s favor they tie up the tapes – is it a tradition or what? They do it for hunting to be successful, not to get frozen?]

The hunters have the right, they are hunters, they’ve got their own relations with the spirit of the forest, with the spirit of the locality. They are almost the same as the blacksmith’s kin, it is the indispensable right. But when there is something serious, for example, the beginning of the hunting, the shamans always complete the rites of the opening road.

[Yesterday I saw the movie in Internet before the winter Olympic games here in Moscow, a Buryat or Yakut shaman came, he called "oyun". And he completed a ritual for Russia to be chosen as the country for hosting the Olympic Games. It was before the Olympiad. He completed the ritual and Russia won in those competition, and was selected].

Oyun, he is rather a Yakut shaman.  They also have their own name. No wonder, he has got his own way out.

[The money was of help, I think there was a big bribe].

Now there‘s all that, only animals… do you remember, in some countries only animals cannot be bought and there’s no affecting the brains, it selects what it likes, which is energetically tasty.

[Thank you.]

Thanks to you that you listened attentively. Good luck to you!