The Jesuit relations

¶ … Jesuit Relations: Natives and Missionaries in Seventeenth-Century North America edited by Allan Greer. Specifically it will consider the role the Jesuit missionaries played in the history of New France circa 1633-1665. This book is an important historical document because it preserves many of the practices and parts of the Northeast Native American culture that are now long gone. Reading this book is an excellent introduction to Native American culture and values in the early seventeenth-century, and it is valuable for research into the culture, beliefs, and values at the time.

The Jesuits were not in Canada and the Northeast to alter their way of thinking. Their main goals were to colonize and covert the areas to French Christianity. As the editor notes in the Introduction, "And of course, the Jesuits themselves were determined to reshape native thinking and behavior in conformity with Christian principles" (Greer 11). At the time when the Jesuits were colonized and creating missions to the Indians, they had a completely European idea of what was right and wrong morally, ethically, and spiritually. Many of the Indian practices were pagan to them, and they were not willing or even open to modify their European beliefs to accept different cultures. Some of the Jesuits grew close to the Indian bands, but they never totally accepted the way they lived. For example, Father Paul le Jeune wrote of the Native's good cheer, patience, proud bearing, and good nature, and yet he still could not call them anything other than "savages." He could not give up his own European notions of what made a "Christian" and what made a "pagan," even though he lived with these people and admired much of how they lived and worked. He even lamented their practice of not punishing their children, saying, "How much trouble this will give us in carrying out our plants of teaching the young!" (Greer 36). This attitude indicates how little the Jesuits really thought of the Natives, no matter how many kind things they wrote about them. The Jesuits did not care to preserve the Native culture or really understand Native ways, they simply were in the Northeast to convert, conquer, and settle, and the ways of Europe would always be foremost in their minds.

Some of the missionaries actually admired the Natives, even if they did not admire all of their beliefs and lifestyles, and these missionaries were more effective in relating to the Indians. In addition, some of the missionaries, like le Jeune and de Brebeuf lived with the Indians, learned their language, observed their customs, and made friends with some of them. While many of the missionaries admired the Indians and many of their ways, some of them seemed contemptuous of the Indians even in the way they wrote about them, and the Indians had to recognize the contempt these men felt. For example, Father le Jeune wrote, "They have so many different beliefs that you can never be sure exactly what they believe. Alas! How can certainty be found in the midst of error?" (Greer 120). Even though he lived with them and admired much of their culture, he was still contemptuous of them in some areas, and the Indians had to have recognized this. This would add to the ways the Indians would scorn them. They understood these missionaries cared nothing for them but to make them into Christians and thus manipulate them, and so, they did not admire these missionaries or work with them. Some of the French leaders also seemed like cruel men who manipulated the Indians into near slave labor and only cared about them as Christian souls rather than people. This would also be easy for the Indians to see and take note of and scorn. The Jesuits wanted to recruit and save the Natives, but the natives in no way thought they needed saving. In fact, they seemed to enjoy a decent life before the French came along. Many of the Natives were quite wise individuals and could see their way of life would disappear as the white men continued to come to their country. They could not help but scorn the people that would eventually destroy their culture, even if they did not recognize all that meant or entailed. The Indians were wise enough to try to hold on to their lands, and they worked with the Jesuits who were openly kind to them, and scorned those who were not.

The missionary motives of the Jesuits eventually led to the downfall of the fur trade, for a number of reasons. First, although many of the Indians came to rely on the trade with the French, the missionaries developed different relationships with the Indians than the traders had enjoyed. As the editor notes in the Introduction, the trappers "had to come to terms with native cultures and interact extensively with Indian peoples" (Greer 10). Thus, the trappers enjoyed a good relationship with the tribes, while some of the missionaries were extremely adversarial. For example, after the Iroquois signed a treaty with France, the missionaries forced them to come live in the Christian settlements and even build their church. One Jesuit notes, "Our chapel was build by the efforts of the Iroquois themselves, who applied themselves to the task with incredible ardor" (Greer 139). While they may have gone at the task with "incredible ardor," it was clear they were doing work unnatural to them and to their culture, and that the missionaries were constant in forcing the Natives to do the Jesuits' will. This could add to distrust between the Jesuits and the Natives that did not occur with the trappers. In addition, the white man was more used to exploiting the resources rather than using them and allowing them to replenish themselves, as the Natives were. Therefore, as more settlements were carved out of the forests and more people came to the area, the wild areas, and the beaver habitats diminished. Eventually, the fur trade would die out because of a lack of demand and because they had over-hunted many areas and decimated the wild populations. The Jesuits coming to the Northeast certainly did not help the fur trade, their purposes were at odds with the trappers, and so, their work was not an advantage to the trade.