Hunting as a Spiritual Exercise with the Earth Essay

Hunting as a Spiritual Exercise with the Earth - Essay Example Nature keeps the indestructible force or the whole universe and possesses the superhuman strength to heal itself – plants, animals and humans. Opposing the forces of nature for example inflicting with its rhythm through damaging the soil with pesticides, emitting carbon dioxide, dumping wastes, and killing uncontrollably animals for food or trophies destroys the balance between Earth and human beings. People have lost the vision to embrace and harmonize their life with nature and invested enormous efforts to modulate the environment in a way which opposes the holiness of the natural surroundings. Hunting uniquely carries in itself the self-actualization, wholeness and expression. These needs are more compound than simply protecting and feeding the tribe. Hunting connects people spiritually with their past and themselves. Shepard (1999) examines the people’s relationship with the natural work and how wildlife and hunting predators had shaped in developing human intellige nce. Shepard (1999) believes that hunting as a defense mechanism benefits humanity as it stabilizes the inner spirit of belonging to community. Hunters are actors into the rhythms of life and death, they bear the feeling of the ecological imagination (Shepard, 1999). Shepard (1999) has the strong determination that hunting is the act of organic relationship with the wildlife and insists that through hunting people inevitably reach out for their spirituality. What he claims in his essays (1999) is that hunting was the instrument which transformed the "tropical forest-dwelling prehumans" into an intelligent being. Hunting embodies the honest relationship between humans and nature, and the fact that hunters are in the border line between life and death. Hunting brings people in contact with the natural world through the most natural way - sacredly kill an animal and justify it as hunters have the responsibility to secure the food. Petersen and Williams (2000) point out that in our mass culture few are the tribes in the worlds that perform hunting as part of their cultural heritage and in the authentic role that hunting conceals - namely the fact that we kill an animal in order to feed ourselves. Hunting was a tribal ritual, which both unified the men against the animal and made it easier for the group to survive. Nowadays, hunters, despite their location, religion, or culture united so as to enjoy the pristine feeling of the "sacred game" - the instinctive and inexplicable moment of subordinating life to our power. Hunting is perceived as commercial and recreational pursuit, however, it is deeply hidden in our cultural heritage and brings its essence. Hunting is an ancient game. Hunting is the ultimate source of gaining power over nature and establishing a relation between the group of hunters and the prey and the hunters and other members of their society - women and children. Petersen and Williams (2000) explain that humans have an intrinsic yearning to hunt and fish. Moreover, he notes that the forest green colour is universally perceived as peaceful and reassuring, whereas the blood like red colour as bringing excitement and agitation. We can not miss mentioning that hunting involves a cycling element, because each species have to chase their prey and to victimize it in order to survive. The cycling element is that you have to kill in order to restore the balance in nature. Hunting also has a natural selection component. The strongest will predominate over the weakest, thus the strongest will pass their genes to the new generation and will secure that they will outlive. Hunting has profound