The two months I spent in Australia this summer were a welcome vacation from our upside-down Middle East. Cool winter weather, friendly people, exotic animals like the echidna all the components of a needed break.
Nonetheless, there were unfortunate reminders of home. Despite legalized prostitution there is unbelievably illegal trafficking in Asian women. There is an ongoing drought and concern about water in this continent, which is 90 percent desert and as big as the United States. The Bali Aborigine bombing brought home the fact that its nearest neighbor (Indonesia) has the largest Muslim population in the world and physical isolation is no ironclad guarantee of security.
The most telling reminder of home, however, was how I identified with the struggle of the numerous Aborigine (indigenous) tribes to maintain their ancient culture on their ancestral lands. Vastly outnumbered in their region and adhering to a language and culture different from the surrounding majority, they are a threatened minority with few friends and little power in the governmental chambers before which their cases are heard.
Like us at the United Nations. They have seen their lands whittled away, as we feel when taking a look at the crash diet our borders have undergone since the British Mandate. Still, they have forsaken violence, opting for a negotiated settlement to their land claims. At least no one disputes their ties to the land. On occasion another ancient Aboriginal rock painting is discovered that reminds the newcomers of who was there first.
Like the German archeologists who have just verified that Hezekiah’s Tunnel is indeed more than 2,500 years old, not from the Second Temple period as revisionist historians erroneously claimed.
On the cultural front, some natives have made peace with the fact that history has passed them by. I visited the Tjapukai Aboriginal Cultural Park in Tropical Northern Queensland. There we saw aspects of classic indigenous culture enacted (like how to start a fire with two sticks), and heard a new song they’ve composed: “Proud to Be an Aborigine.” This may be a more meaningful way to make money than the casinos American Indians operate, though surely less profitable. Still, it is difficult to imagine that such parks will succeed in preserving a living culture for subsequent generations of Aborigines outside the park. This educational challenge was the theme of one of the summer’s hit movies, “Whale Rider, “from the Maori tribes of adjacent New Zealand.
On the political level, the classical Zionists were right: In the modern world, the best bet for physical survival and vibrant continuity is political independence — despite the heavy costs.
The cultural showcasing most meaningful to me was the historic Sydney Observatory. No longer in use, it has been turned into an interactive museum of the science of stargazing. Amid the exhibits on how radio telescopes work, and the compass Captain Cook used to discover Australia for the Europeans is the screening of animated films of Aboriginal tales about the heavens. That’s where I heard the story of the Guri Guri bird.
Long ago in the Dream Time (of prehistory), there was a large bird that searched out lost children, those who’d wandered too far from their campsites. He’d land and offer them a ride home. Once the children hopped on his back the Guri Guri flew to his mountain lair, where he ate his naive victims.
In one such encounter a young boy noticed the bird was flying toward the mountains, not toward his home. A quick thinker, he pleaded with the bird to fly lower, as he was afraid of heights. “Lower, lower,” the boy urged. Finally, as they passed over a sandy area, the boy let go of the bird and fell safe back to earth. The bird, which hadn’t felt the boy slip off, returned to his lair and became enraged on discovering he’d lost his prey.
In the meantime the boy heard his father calling for him and they were happily reunited. That evening around the communal campfire, the elders heard the boy’s tale and decided it was time to put an end to the intolerable predations. They climbed to the bird’s remote lair and lay in wait for him to return. When he fell asleep they lit their torches and set fire to the bird. Shrieking in pain, the bird flew away searching for a river in which to extinguish the flames, all the while trailing sparks and burning feathers. Thus was formed the Milky Way and the lesson for bush children to beware of the Guri Guri bird.
A charmingly gruesome tale, it shows the wisdom of folk culture in educating the young for one of life’s harsh lessons: While we want to trust everyone, beware of devious mortal enemies who prey on the weak and gullible.
To be a leader is to act forcefully to protect the community from mortal danger.
Like the Aborigines, we Jews believe that the stories of the ancients are our link to the wisdom of the ages. In this season, let’s hope for the fulfillment of the High Holy Day prayer that recalls the end of the parallel to the Guri Guri: “Let all evil vanish like smoke, as all malicious government is swept out of the land.”
David Resnick is a senior lecturer at the School of Education at Bar-Ilan University. This column previously appeared in The Jerusalem Post.