Great Spirit

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Great Spirit

The Great Spirit, also called Wakan Tanka
Wakan Tanka

In the Sioux tradition, Wakan Tanka is the term for the "sacred" or the "divine". It is often translated as "Great Spirit". However, its meaning is closer to "Great Mystery" as Lakota spirituality is not monotheistic....
among the Sioux

Sioux

Sioux are a Native Americans in the United States and First Nations people. The term can refer to any ethnic group within the Great Sioux Nation or any of the nation's many dialects....
, The Creator, or The Great Maker in English and Gitchi Manitou
Gitche Manitou

Gitche Manitou in more recent Anishinaabe culture means Great Spirit, God, the Creator of all things and the Giver of Life, and sometimes translated as the "Great Mystery." "Manitou" is an Anishinaabe language word for spirit, spiritual, mystery, mysterious or deity....
in Algonquian, is a conception of a supreme being

Supreme Being

The term wiktionary:Supreme Being is often defined simply as "God", and it is used with this meaning by theologians of many religious faiths, including, but not limited to, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Deism....
prevalent among some Native American

Native Americans in the United States

Native Americans in the United States are the Indigenous peoples of the Americas from the regions of North America now encompassed by the continental United States United States, including parts of Alaska and the island state of Hawaii....
and First Nations cultures. The Great Spirit is personal, close to the people, and immanent in the fabric of the material world. He ruled the Happy hunting ground

Happy hunting ground

The Happy Hunting Ground was the name given to the concept of the afterlife by several of the great plains Native Americans in the United States tribes, as well as the Iroquois, Cherokee and Algonquians....
, a place similar to Heaven. Chief Dan Evehema, a spiritual leader of the Hopi Nation

Hopi

The Hopi are American Indians in the United States people who primarily live on the 12,635 km? Hopi Reservation in northeastern Arizona. The Hopi Reservation is entirely surrounded by the much larger Navajo Reservation....
, described the Great Spirit as follows:

"To the Hopi, the Great Spirit is all powerful.

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Sioux

Supreme Being

Native Americans in the United States

Happy hunting ground

Hopi

"To the Hopi, the Great Spirit is all powerful. He taught us how to live, to worship, where to go and what food to carry, gave us seeds to plant and harvest. He gave us a set of sacred stone tablets into which he breathed all teachings in order to safeguard his land and life. In these stone tablets were inscribed instructions, prophecies and warnings."

The Great Spirit is generally considered the nearest equivalent in description to the God of the main monotheistic religions (such as Judaism

Judaism

Judaism is a set of beliefs and practices originating in the Hebrew Bible , as later further explored and explained in the Talmud and other texts....
, Christianity

Christianity

Christianity is a Monotheistic religion #Christian view religion centered on the life and teachings of Jesus as New Testament view on Jesus' life....
and Islam

Islam

Islam is a Monotheism, Abrahamic religion originating with the teachings of the Prophets of Islam Muhammad, a 7th century Arab religious and political figure....
). However the Great Spirit differs in that his panentheistic

Panentheism

Panentheism is a belief system which posits that God exists and interpenetrates every part of nature, and timelessly extends beyond as well. Panentheism is distinguished from pantheism, which holds that God is synonymous with the material universe....
nature is especially emphasized; he is embodied in everything. This more closely resembles the Hindu

Hinduism

'Hinduism' is the predominant religion of the Indian subcontinent. Hinduism is often referred to as , a Sanskrit phrase meaning "the eternal dharma", by its practitioners....
conception of the divine (Brahman

Brahman

Brahman is a concept of Hinduism. Brahman is the unchanging, infinite, Immanence, and transcendence reality which is the Divine Ground of all matter, energy, time, space, being, and everything beyond in this Universe....
), rather than the embodied concept of the Holy Spirit

Holy Spirit

In Christianity, the Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is the spirit of God. The term Christ , is also used to refer to this presence. That is, the Spirit is considered to act in concert with and share an essential nature with God the Father and God the Son ....
.