In the initial segment of Kasskara: The Other Sunken Continent, Hopi elder Oswald "White Bear" Fredericks describes the Hopis' epic migration story as it unfolds through eons and on several continents, a couple of them now on the seafloor. Their mythology, which I explain more fully in the initial report, essentially envisions a series of "worlds" through which the human being, personally and collectively, must pass -- these worlds corresponding generally to vast periods of time and changing configurations of global geology. White Bear describes a succession of cycles through which human societies develop then self-destruct because they have fallen out of harmony with the intelligent universal force from which all life springs.
According to Hopi mythology, the First World, Tokpela, was destroyed by fire. The Second World, Tokpa, was destroyed by ice. Both conditions may have come about through disturbances in the earth's orbit and polar shifts. In "Kasskara: The Other Sunken Continent," a temple priest at Sais tells Solon that "a great conflagration of things upon the earth, which recurs after long intervals," caused the sinking of Atlantis, a notion consonant with the Hopis' world view. Kasskara (Lemuria) was coeval with Talawaitichqua (Atlantis) and was destroyed by water, White Bear said, in the following manner:
"Kickmongwuity, the queen of Atlantis, had been threatening Kasskara with destruction from weapons that could be fired from space. Our people had knowledge comparable with those (people) of Atlantis, but we used it only for good and useful ends. As I already said we studied the secrets of nature, the power of the Creator in the living things", White Bear said, explaining that his ancestors did not seek revenge and avoided killing even to defend themselves. The Hopi culturally embody Jesus's admonition not to resist evil: "Turn the other cheek."
"If there is lightning, it reaches our shield, and there it explodes. It does not cross the shield. I remember well how my grandmother showed me the way in which the shield acts. One day when I was still a child she took a basin and turned it over and said, 'Now you are under the basin. If something falls on it, it will not hurt you.' Perhaps I should tell you that she wanted me to repeat all the stories that she told me", White Bear said. "When I made a mistake she stopped me, and I had to start all over again. It's why I know by heart all of what my grandmother told me."
We
might, in our modern sophistication, feel tempted to disregard or
trivialize White Bear's grandmother as a credible source of
information, but consider that the matrilineal Hopis respect the
wisdom and knowledge passed down by elders. His grandmother would not
intentionally lie to him, and her insistence that he repeat minor
details he hadn't easily recalled suggests that she took seriously
the transmission of this knowledge to her grandson. This transmission
is the basis of all oral traditions. The Hopis' cycles of ceremonies
reenact these stories because they consider them too important to be
forgotten.
"All the bombs or whatever it was exploded far above our heads, and the shield protected all people who were to be saved and had been gathered in a certain area. Only we were saved. Cities were attacked and many people perished. And then -- as my grandmother said -- somebody pressed on the bad button and the two continents sank", White Bear explained. "However, the destruction was not universal; the entire Earth was not destroyed, and not all men were killed. But Atlantis disappeared very quickly in the ocean and our Third World, Kasskara, disappeared very slowly."
One of the interesting features of Hopi religious mindset is its similarity with certain eastern religions. The Hopis embrace the idea of reincarnation. They acknowledge "Kundalini energy" and the vortices of psychic vitality called "chakras", and they also recognize the universal law of karma, the spiritual equivalent of Newton's third law of motion: "For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction." The law of karma is expressed eloquently in the Biblical admonition, "As you sow, so shall you reap." White Bear explained the Hopi view of karma:
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