Controversies Surrounding White Sage: Overharvesting, Cultural Appropriation, Pagan Purification Ceremonies – How To Better Use, Preserve This Sacred Herb For Future Generations

Sage, sacred to Native Americans, is being used in purification rituals, raising issues of cultural appropriation

Note: White sage has been used since the 1980s, and possibly earlier, by practitioners of Wicca and Paganism. This use is one that honors Native American traditions and tribes, and also honors the Earth and the plants provided for humans. White sage is one of the most effective herbs for purification, and as such, it is often still used in Pagan ceremonies. As was discussed with Wil Meya from The Language Conservancy, if no one speaks the tribal languages, they will die. Similarly, if no one carries on the traditions of the Native American tribes, including but not limited to the use of White Sage, these traditions will also die. As discussed in that interview, many of the tribes understand this, and welcome people who are not members of a tribe to speak their languages and practice their traditions, so long as it is done with respect.

However, a very important caveat to all of this is the hazard of overharvesting, and of casual usage by ordinary people in American society who are not practicing Wicca, Paganism, or Native American spiritual practices. Much of the White Sage that grows wild in America has been overharvested, to the point where tribal peoples cannot find enough White Sage for their own ceremonies. Many unscrupulous companies harvest not only the leaves but the entire plant and root, thus removing it from the wild where it grows. Thus, Pagans and Wiccans wishing to use this herb in their practices should be certain to obtain the herb only from reputable vendors, where it is declared to be wildharvested or sustainably grown and harvested. This can help mitigate the issues that are occurring from overharvesting and overuse.

Even better than this would be to grow the herb in your own garden. Mountain Valley Growers offers White Sage plants, which will also attract large numbers of bees. In temperate climates, it grows well outdoors, and can also be brought in over the winter in harsher climates where it may not return the following year. It is a difficult herb to establish, and it may take several years of care for it to reach maturity. But the bee attracting properties, along with the harvest of White Sage leaves, makes the effort well worth it.

Individuals who are using the herb casually should also take greater care to ensure that it is ethically wildcrafted or sustainably harvested. The use of White Sage appears to have become a “fad” for at least a brief period of time, where people hear about its uses and then buy some online and use it to purify a new home, for example.

For such a sacred her,b, it would be a tragedy for it to disappear and become extinct. There is nothing better than white sage for purifying a space, and it should be preserved. However, as the author below states, it is not cultural appropriation for Wiccans and Pagans to use this herb, as their use does honor the Native American traditions from which it is derived.

Helen A. Berger, Brandeis University

White sage, which is sacred to a number of Native American tribes in the southwest United States, has been adopted by both some contemporary Pagans and New Age practitioners for purification rites. As Emily McFarlan Miller reported in a recent Religion News Service article, this is resulting in overharvesting and shortages of the plant, making it harder for Native Americans to find enough for their sacred ceremonies.

In her groundbreaking book “Purity and Danger,” anthropologist Mary Douglas illustrates how purity and its maintenance are central to religion. It is a way to keep danger at bay as well as provide a way to separate the sacred from the mundane.

As a sociologist of religion who has studied contemporary Paganism for more than 30 years, I am aware of how important both contact with the spirit world and purification are in this religion. Contemporary Paganism is a set of religions that base their practice on what is known about pre-Christian religions in Europe, mixed with literature, science fiction and personal inspiration.

Within these religions nature is viewed as sacred, to be celebrated and protected. The celebration of nature takes several forms, the most common being a series of rituals that commemorate the changing seasons. Cleansing is a way to provide a safe place to interact with the spirit world, which is always part of Pagan rituals.

Purification can be done using a number of substances, including salt, rosemary and sometimes white sage. When purification includes the use of sage, it raises the issue of appropriation, as it has traditionally been used by Native Americans in their rituals.

Protection and cleansing

Pagan rituals take place outdoors, when possible, or sometimes in people’s homes or in occult bookstores. There is no set liturgy that everyone follows, and it is possible for people to create their own rituals.

Because there is no dedicated sanctified place, cleansing and protection become particularly important within Paganism. More mainstream religions have buildings, such as churches or synagogues, where they maintain sanctuaries for religious purposes only.

Pagans, to the contrary, have ritual areas that must be transformed from mundane to sacred use. Possibly more importantly, rituals are meant to open up the individual to the spiritual or other world. Magic, the process of changing reality to your will through incantations, is done in this realm.

As I learned when I was doing my research, most Pagans believe entering this realm holds both great possibilities and dangers. The cleansing and purification of the place and the participants are meant to protect them by keeping out unsavory spirits.

Purification can be done in several ways. When I began my research in 1986, it was most commonly done using salt and water. At Pagan ceremonies that I attended as a researcher, those leading the ritual would “cut” a sacred circle. This entailed walking around the circle carrying a ritual knife known as an athame while chanting an incantation that marked the area as a safe place that only the spirits called would enter. They then used salt and water to purify the circle.

In some of the rituals participants were already standing in the circle when this part of the ritual was done; in others they entered afterward. The participants were also purified, with salt, water, smoke from a candle, incense or rosemary and a crystal or rock, symbolizing Mother Earth.

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White sage and cultural appropriation

Sometimes white sage was used for purification in a ritual. It was used because it was associated with Native American practice. As religious studies scholar Sarah Pike found among contemporary Pagans, cultural borrowing from Native Americans was seen as connecting the participants to the spirits that lived in the land around them.

Participants believed they were honoring the first people on the continent by incorporating elements of their spiritual practice. Some of the Pagan practitioners had received training from a Native American teacher. For many contemporary Pagans, Native American spirituality was a practice they wanted to emulate because of its connection to the land, to a spirit world, and because it predates Christianity and is native to the region. As contemporary Pagans often piece together different elements to create their spirituality, for many it seemed natural to include Native American practices.

As Pike notes, in the early 1990s Native Americans from several tribes began to express their rage at what they saw as “cultural strip mining,” the stealing and watering down of their culture and their spirituality, which they described as an extension of colonization that had stripped them of their original lands. The use of sage was not the only cultural artifact that these Native American spokespeople objected to being used by nonnatives. Traditional dress and eagles’ feathers were two other examples of commonly appropriated items.

As Pagans pride themselves on being sensitive to practices of diverse cultures, most quickly gave up the use of sage; the use of other Native American artifacts in Pagan practices became less common as well. Those who had been using sage returned to using either salt and water or rosemary for purification.

White Sage plant. Image Credit – Joshua Reddekopp

The use of sage by non-Native Americans is again becoming more prevalent. I noticed while doing my research in 1986 that white sage was sold at stores catering to the occult. It is now being more widely marketed by stores such as Walmart and Anthropologie.

The market has become larger as aspects of Pagan or New Age practices have seeped into more general practice and the number of Pagans has increased. It has become common, for example, for younger Americans to cleanse their homes of bad spirits with white sage even if they do not identify as Pagans. Added to this, those who are new to Paganism are often unaware of the history of appropriation and are repeating the errors of an earlier generation of Pagans and using sage in their rituals

Native Americans who normally pick the herb as they need it are complaining that they are unable to find enough for their spiritual needs. Fears have also been raised that overharvesting could result in the plant’s becoming extinct, resulting in the extinction of the animals that are dependent on it as well.

It would be both ironic and sad if in celebrating Mother Earth, Pagans helped to make a sacred herb extinct.

Helen A. Berger, Affliated Scholar at the Women’s Studies Research Center, Brandeis University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Banner Image: White Sage Smudge bundles. Image Credit – Ginny Rose Stewart

Helen A. Berger The Conversation