The
Trust is a Founding Member of the World Wisdom Alliance
ANCIENT
AND INDIGENOUS WISDOM
Why
should we care about ancient and indigenous wisdom? What could
we, in this high-tech age, learn from native communities or people
who lived so long ago? Why does it matter?
Never,
in the history of humanity, have we had so much knowledge at our
fingertips. Nor have so many of us ever had so much material wealth.
And yet it could be said that simple happiness has never been
so elusive and our great knowledge has not prevented us from endangering
the survival of the very planet we inhabit.
Without
the balancing nature of wisdom knowledge can be a destructive
and dangerous force. Wisdom looks at knowledge only in terms of
how effectively it serves the whole. It takes a 'whole-system'
perspective. And that is exactly how tribal societies and our
ancient ancestors had to view the world. Not because they were
any more clever than us, but because their very survival depended
upon actions that did not threaten the natural environment in
which they lived.
So
we suggest that wisdom is all about living in harmony with natural
systems. And an understanding of the nature and flow of the natural
world has been an essential focus of ancient and indigenous societies
for millenia.