The relatively new United States was eager to spread its wings and influence. During the War of 1812, the republic provoked a conflict on two fronts: against its former adversary Britain and the western natives who stood in the way of the Americans’ plans for settlement. The Shawnee Prophet, Tenskwatawa and his brother Tecumseh refused to submit to their will by regalvanizing a religious movement and leading militant resistance to attempts to eliminate natives’ way of life. Tenskwatawa was instrumental in solidifying the spiritual foundation the defense of their homeland. His teaching were based on prophetic visions he received, although this was not unique or original to him. Although it peaked in the eighteenth century, the trend of spiritual …show more content…
The Shawnee Prophet owes much to the Trout who believed a war-club dance would “destroy every white man in America” and Handsome Lake who claimed there would be “variation of Sickness” for not adhering to his teachings (Dowd, 215). Had they not pioneered this method of religious inspiration, it is hard to see Tenskwatawa amassing any following. His rhetoric was clearly influenced by those before him with his prophecies of doom for Americans seizing land. He has claimed that Great Spirit promised to have a crab “earth driver” overturn the land to cover the white people and that “there will be an End to the World” should the United States not leave Greenville, Ohio, alone. Tenskwatawa derived another key part of his preachings from other tribes: separation theology. This belief that a separate creator other than the Great Spirit created whites and therefore they should not associate with the natives is an older belief that was prominent amongst the Wyandots before 1805 (Dowd, 217). On the subject, the Shawnee Prophet said, “The Great Spirit did not mean that the white and red people should live near each other” (Dowd, 218). This sentiment …show more content…
He saw the United States’ efforts to change natives’ way of life as attempt to rob the identity of Shawnee and tribes everywhere. White agents were attempting to “civilize” the natives as they saw fit by imposing Anglo-American behavior such as Christian faith and an agrarian lifestyle (Perdue, 224). Tecumseh also a staunch critic of the Christian religion, and used the story of Jesus to argue that white people were hypocritical for believing they possessed moral and cultural superiority even though their messiah was killed in a white society (Dowd, 218). Native men saw farming as a women’s occupation and were averse to participating in agriculture themselves (Perdue, 225). The resentment toward “civilization” helped Tecumseh rally support for the resistance. The aspect of the American’s plans that outraged him most of all, though, was the seizure and private ownership of land. Tecumseh articulated his belief that the west was “common property of all the tribes” in correspondence with Governor William Henry Harrison (Dowd, 217). Collectively owned land was not Tecumseh’s own concept, as it was held by many tribes before him like the Cherokee, but he reinforced it (Perdue, 227). On the subject of the Treaty of Fort Wayne, he asserted to Harrison, “No tribe has the right to sell, even to each other, much less to