The word "Akhazangr", has been translated as "religion, way of life, customs, etiquette, and ceremonies", and "traditions as handed down by the fathers". Akhazangr certainly has the authoritative heaviness of the Jewish "Torah" or the Roman Catholic "Scripture and Tradition", except that it does not claim divine revelations but rather the authority of a succession of sixty-four generations of patrilineal ancestors during the ldong journey from Tibetan borderlands into China, Burma, and Thailand.
Another characteristic of Akhazangr is that it indeed includes the whole of Akha life at all levels, in other words, the whole of what American anthropology calls "culture". It describes when, where, and how forest has to be cleared and burned; rice and vegetables have to be planted and harvested; hunting by traps or driving have to be performed; villages and houses have to be founded or built; husbandry tasks have to be taken care of; game and animals have to be slaughtered and divided; food has to be cooked; children have to be conceived and brought up; and transactions have to be managed.
Akhazangr also contains prescriptions indicating how to relate to many different categories of groups and persons within the Akha milieu, including family, lineage, and clan, in matters concerning marriage, penal and judiciary rules, as well as outsiders. zangr meticulously describes proper daily behaviour: when to get up in the morning and in which order to proceed; how to allocate labour; how to hold a bamboo teacup or whisky container in the part of the year dominated by spirits and the part dominated by humans; which line males, and which line females have to follow when weeding the fields; in which direction to hold your dibble-stick while making holes (for males) and how to put the rice seed in the holes (for females); and how to hold your machete or sickle when walking to the fields. In other words, it contains the whole elaborated system which we call etiquette, except that, in daily Akha behaviour, interaction and language have no marked traces of a court or upper class, from which so many "good manners", "courtesies" and words (including the word "etiquette") in class societies have been derived.
Outsiders have often translated "Zangr" or "Yang", pronounced in different ways by Akha/Zaqnyiq and the Hani in the Maekhong and Red River areas, as "Religion", "Customs" or "Ceremonies". But this seems to be incorrect.
"Zangr", in contrast, has to be translated briefly as "Law" or "Customary Law" or "Kotmai", in Thai. For cultural specialists, reciters/teachers and the older (non-Christian) Akha/Zaqnyiq generation in Thailand it is a main frame of reference for their personal and village-life; In Laos, certainly for Akha/Zaqnyiq in the Muang Sing area, its also still alive in the younger generations.
"Zangr", being legislation, consists of an elaborate set of rules and regulations regarding all aspects of Akha/Zaqnyiq life and culture. At its core we find all the elements of our modern national democratic constitutions and human rights legislations and which in many villages are still sanctioned by village-courts, or yaxa da-eu. Until now, in many villages the final judge of such legal procedures is the dzoema, to be translated as the word says: the (village)-leader.
As such we find it consistently in the archaic texts, adding that the main job of the traditional hereditary dzoema is: to be a judge.
This word dzoema, or sometimes dze-ma/dze-maw in Hani and Yi areas still had until mid-century the much heavier connotation of "ruler"(sometimes appointed by the Chinese as T'ssu or local tribal chief). A translation as "village-priest" is thus completely beside the point.
As for the concept of "zangr": It contains, besides legislation in our modern sense also rules and regulations for daily behaviour, marriage, economic activities and rules for ceremonies, on which we will elaborate later. It is traditionally also the dzoema's and the council of elders (abaw caw maw) task to coordinate these on a village-level.
"Zangr" has originated, according most Akha/Zaqnyiq of the older generation, over hundreds of years from the experiences, including learning from mistakes, of the ancestors, in their efforts to survive as a marginalized group. "Zangr" has remained in its main points quite unified amongst the Akha/Zaqnyiq groups in the Maekhong Quadrangle areas. Also between Akha/Zaqnyiq and Hani groups from the Red River area many similar elements of customary law, including also texts, songs and ceremonies can be found. This is quite astonishing, as these different groups have separated from each other for several hundreds of years already. This might suggest, that it could have a former unified chiefdom or state-system, f.i. of Yi-origin at its historical base. Hani and Akha both are believed to have originated from Southern Yi (or Lolo) related groups. The Nan Chao Kingdom, 750-1225 A.D., which originally had its center in Ching Tung, near contemporary Kunming belongs to one of the possibilities. But there have been several Yi chiefdoms and state-systems in the Yunnan and Szechuan areas before the Han Chinese gradually colonized them.
Reciting/teaching of old texts and legal codes is referred in Hani and Akha/Zaqnyiq genealogies to at an much earlier stage, and is supposed to have started by a "mythical" ancestor, called "Thoma" or the "Great Reciter". He is located before Sm-mio who is seen as the founder of the Hani/Akha peoples. In Yi and related tribal groups in Yunnan, until the beginning of this century still such people could be found, called "Pe maw "or "Be maw", that is reciters/teachers and who sometimes were able to write. It seems that the Akha/Zaqnyiq words of pirma and Boemaw refer to the same category. They were not seen as mediators between spirits and people, and even less "priests", but mediators between the legal systems of the higher classes of a state-system and the common people and whom we would call teachers. They remind us of the original mandarins in the Confucian system.
As for unity we find in "zangr": popular stories, known to all Akha/Zaqnyiq groups locate the origins of a more unified "zangr" to a previous State or Chiefdom, when several Zaqnyiq clans united into an "alliance" under a ruler with the name Jaw Bang. He and his dynasty are not said to have started "zangr", but to have unified and increased it. This story cannot be found-however-in the Hani traditions.
We thus can say that Akha/Zaqnyiq Zangr and Culture do have their roots in as far a past as 1500 years or more. They can boast on a civilization and "cultural experience" older than most European countries and even incomparable with countries like the USA.
The translation as "Religion" or "Superstition" for "Zangr" does not seem correct, for many reasons. In "Zangr" there is no opposition between Nature and Super-nature, as in mayor religions; nor is there worship or are there prayers to higher beings. Zangr is a pragmatic system of rules for survival, in which man and his community try to insert themselves in nature with its visible and invisible forces.
Zangr also has rules as how to relate to other surrounding ethnic groups and with the often-oppressive surrounding political systems of majority peoples. It is/has been basically a system for the sustainability and continuity of the Akha/Zaqnyiq as a marginalized people. Zangr with its many rules is adapted to smaller communities, which are ecologically and politically vulnerable, and also would be easily prone to internal conflicts.
Like so many Asian philosophies and even (original) Buddhism it is not a religion and also not to be confused with "Ceremonies" or "Customs", which are only a small part of it.
"Zangr" is mainly composed of rules for morality, common and private law, rules of daily life, for traditional knowledge, like of plants, medicinal treatments, ecological conservationist laws and knowledge. It also contains rules for economy and business, agriculture and last but not least- educational knowledge and wisdom. It is even possible to make an educational "curriculum", like in modern society, out of the several fields, covered by traditional "zangr".
In the villages it is/was the Council of elders, with the "cultural specialists", like the dzoema (village-leader), the pirma or boemaw (reciter/teacher), the baji (Technician), who had the knowledge of archaic texts and were in charge of meticulous interpretation of the law. These also had their "schools" of pupils dzoeza, phiza etc) who were trained over years before taking up their function.
Most of traditional zangr can be found in the several and lengthy recitations of the pirma or boemaw. In general it has the form of teachings, by examples and not by commanding. Akha/Zaqnyiq have the saying that those who are commanding easily loose authority.
Cultural specialists and particularly the pirma/boemaw had and sometimes still have "iron memories", comparable to modern hard disks or tapes. Writing down of the funeral texts alone, fills several volumes and reaches more than a 700 pages of texts. Texts are memorized by pirma/boemaw and their students in frequent nehvq keuq keuq or remembering sessions. They have to be recited literally, as handed over by generations of teachers, less cosmic disturbances will follow. This way they seem to have been handed over from generation to generation quite literally over a long period of time. Comparing texts as known by several older pirma/boemaw still alive in Thailand, texts prove to be basically the same. Comparison of pirma/boemaw texts between Akha/Zaqnyiq in China, Laos and Burma brings us to a same conclusion.
Besides the texts, recited at the occasion of a funeral and which describes all phases of human life, with related rules, there are several texts known by the pirma/boemaw for the different stages of life (like growing up; marriage and the older rain-field-lady), healing texts for diseases, depressions or disasters and texts related to several yearly ceremonies. The dzoema, or village-leader, traditionally knows several archaic texts, related to his function as judge and agricultural activities during the year which the families have in common, besides ceremonies related to them. The baji, or village technician also knows several archaic texts, related to his function as blacksmith and technical advisor when building houses, bridges, swings and so on.
A negative aspect of this old system of Akha/Zaqnyiq "Zangr" has been, however, that it was mostly in the possession of the male cultural specialists and elders, who also were the main leadership. Women were kept out of leadership and also out of the more sophisticated knowledge of "zangr".
Another negative point proved that many of the archaic texts of old origin are not understandable for the Akha/Zaqnyiq "lay-person".
Besides that the cultural specialists until very recently were very protective and secretive about their knowledge, not only to the "outside" but also to a great deal of the Akha/Zaqnyiq population itself. Many of the pirmas and other specialists texts have been used however öuntil recentlyö in daily life as songs, in ceremonies or daily proverbs and sayings.
It also has to be mentioned that the women, from their side, have developed their own systems of transfer of knowledge. Examples are: knowledge of: medical and foodplants, agricultural practices, methods of coloring and embroidery, methods of healing and songs. These often are also transferred from generation to generation.
The Nyipa or shaman (not mentioned in the older texts) is also often a woman. Some parts of their texts are however also derived from the old pirma/boemaw -texts.
Finally: Ceremonies in the traditional Akha/Zaqnyiq year are many, and also time-consuming. Some of them have been formalized too much, like in the old Confucian and Tao systems. Many of the yearly ceremonial texts are also based a great deal on the traditional rice-subsistence agriculture, which often has changed into cash crop production. Except the swinging ceremony during Yeh ku dza-eu, the Gadzangr gha-eu New Years ceremonies and Xm shui Xm mi law-eu or Spring festival most ceremonies are not anymore attractive for a younger generation, now being in touch with the modern world. Most youngsters also never had acces to the real meaning of texts and ceremonies. Schools have replaced the traditional training by cultural specialists, who are left without students. For those who urbanized in the cities there is no agriculture left. An International Hani/Akha cultural revival movement has tried to adapt Akha-zangr to modern situations, but starting from study of the traditional meaning of the old archaic texts, before they are lost.
As in Thailand, Burma and China much of the "Old" Hani/Akha system has eroded - at least in its traditional form - by the enormous shock of the so called modern times, it still can be found in some parts of Northern Laos as it was elsewhere, in its somewhat hidden form, 60-100 years ago.
The paradigm of the road.
a. Another characteristic of Akha/Zaqnyiq thinking is, that it is dialectical. This means that - at least traditionally - Akha/Zaqnyiq and also traditional texts tend to think in oppositions between two "poles" and overcoming them. For those, who don't understand "dialectics" we refer to examples given later. This way of thinking in opposites and overcoming them is not uncommon in the South-East Asian and Southern Chinese areas. It can even be found in the modern thinking of Chairman Mao and contemporary Chinese leadership. Ying and Yang (cold /warm; water/fire; man/woman; choosing a middle road between to extremes etc.) thinking as it is also called has factually spread over most of Eastern Asia, but seems to have its origin or philosophical expression in the Tao Tse Kung of the mythical Lao Tse, estimated to have lived 600 years B. C. It is said that Lao Tse"s thinking originated from the "Barbarians" in Yunnan, being probably ancestors of the Tibeto-Burmese Yi and related tribal groups, being its inhabitants at that time.
As elsewhere (in China and also with the Yao/Mien groups), this philosophy has developed into a real somewhat pantheistic "religion", with Gods to whom sacrifices are offered, this is not the case with the Akha/Zaqnyiq.
In the old texts Akha/Zaqnyiq see themselves often as the "middle-people": They see themselves located (as still is the case in Xixuangbanna) between two poles. Higher up-mountain (where gold and silver can be found), say also the archaic text, are the "Agh"aw" (Yi) or sometimes "Achang". Down, the lower areas (where there is plenty of water) are the "Bitsm" or "Atsm" (The Dai Lue); Sometimes "Law bi" are mentioned there. The Akha/Zaqnyiq or middle people don't have either gold or water. They have to overcome this by working hard. Some older people have even derived the name "Akha" from this.
Another example of thinking in oppositions can be found in the yeh ku dza-eu text: The rich man, after the rain has come to a peak in August, traditionally had to abstain from work and had his house stocked with meat and food to survive; The poor man had to look for wild potatoes and other food in the forest to survive, breaking the law (Zangr).
The rich man dies from hunger - however - because all his relationships come to eat his stock; the poor man survives as he has broken the law (Zangr) and has worked hard in order to find forest - food.
Traditional pirma/reciter Nehvq -to-to-eu texts, such as the "Oe-za-eu texts" (life-cycle of people, animals and plants), are almost completely composed by such oppositions with examples from nature. In these oe-za-eu texts, which are part of funeral and marriage ceremonies both there is also hardly any mention of "spirits", as has often been suggested.
b. Traditional thinking and texts are often also "cyclical", with processes of nature, repeating themselves, as a "paradigm" like in Tao-philosophical thinking. Cycles are also often described as "roads", like in the case of the sun, the moon (Gathang-pha-eu is an example; it"s the yearly change to the new road of the moon); Peoples lives are roads and after death they go back to where the Akha /Zaqnyiq came from: the "original Akha/Zaqnyiq ancestor-village". Akha/Zaqnyiq history is also a road (Gadzangr gha-eu, being the road of the ancestors) and this has often been leading to myths by outsiders, taking this literally.
Until today Akha and others still are described as "nomadic" or "semi-nomadic" although they have lived in Southern Yunnan/China for much more than 1500 years and only some spread quite recently in history a few hundreds of kilometers from their ancestral lands as a consequence of wars and violence.
But much of the underlying oppositional/dialectical and cyclical thinking still has survived and certainly is not "Old fashioned "or "Overcome by modern science, modernization, development and globalization". In fact, much of this "dynamic" thinking in oppositions and cycles has been taken over by modern Western philosophy, such as in Hegel and Marx, last century. This has deeply influenced modern European and Latin American thinking.
One reason for this has been the failure of "development" and "progress" philosophy in which human condition worldwide was thought to improve only. And on an equal scale for all. Evolution of man and culture seemed to bring them to ever-higher stages. In a world, where the 240 richest people own as much as the impoverished half of mankind and where conflicts, violence, oppression and disasters are rather on the rise many people have been looking for other models.
Thinking in cycles and oppositions, as the traditional Akha/Zaqnyiq know it thus is not "static", but a dynamic way of thinking and has helped the Akha/Zaqnyiq to overcome past, contemporary disasters and adapt to changes over time. As the poor Akha/Zaqnyiq boy sings to the rich girl: (free translation)
O, rich and beautiful girl,
You think that you are higher than others,
And you look down on a poor boy like me,
You also think that I am not beautiful enough,
But some day you will loose your wealth,
You will end up without a husband,
And waiting for the best boy,
Like an old spinster.
Come with me and lets work hard together.
That Akha/Zaqnyiq zangr and its rules can help to overcome this, in all turbulence and changes is clear from the following:
The lease of the buffalo changes,
The money purse changes,
Money comes and disappears,
The place where we plant is changing,
The place where we are allowed to live is changing,
But like the white ceremonial skirt of the old field-mother remains. Also Akha Zangr remains.
One occurring example of dialectical oppositions is the female/male opposition in Akha/Zaqnyiq thinking. Many of the "Invisible forces" and especially the "owners" (about which later) are conceived as Ying/Yang type, male/female oppositions needing each other.
Interesting is - however - that female is dominant, which seems in contrast with the actual (outside) situation of the "machismo" (seemingly dominant role of the man to the outside) in Akha/Zaqnyiq culture.
Some Hani-scholars have argued that Yi/Hani cultures in a far past were originally matrilinear, that is: following the line of the women/mothers. This seems to happen in "warrior" cultures because of the frequent absence and higher mortality of the men (As has been also the case of Thai-culture). It is true that the Yi or Lolo, from which the Akha/Zaqnyiq also originated, were originally warrior cultures. It is my hypothesis that when the influence of the colonial Chinese system increased in Yunnan and Czechuan, genealogies had to be rewritten in a patrilinear fashion in order to fit the Chinese system, starting from "Heaven"(m; m-ma; m-gh;ang) (Cfr. Wiens etc.). There are quite some arguments for this thesis. One is the place of the Akha apoe-paw law/ancestor basket at the women site and in general the so-called "bilateral" tendencies, such as the important role of - and even fear of the "agh"oe" or mothers" family"s males. Many other arguments can be found, such as in the "aw sang", "owners" or principles.
One example frequently occurring in archaic texts is the opposition between M"yeh (female) and M"sa (male), which can be translated as "Heaven/sky water/rain" and "Heaven/sky heath"; they are opposed by Mir-yeh and Mir-dza, being "earth-water" and "earth-heath" or fire. In the middle, between Heaven and Earth are "U-yeh" and "U-tsa" being "middle-water" or rain and "middle-heath", warmth and sunshine. These are a perfect Taoist type set of oppositions, as well horizontally and vertically. The opposite female principle (of water/rain) and male principle (of heath) also need each other. This is poetically expressed in the following sentence: "If M"sa (male) does not draw the clouds (from water-damp coming up), M"yeh (female) cannot produce the rain". In this setting the female "water-principle" is superior, however. If M"yeh does not produce rain and water, nothing can grow. But, if M"sa (male) does not produce heath, M"yeh (female) cannot produce the life-giving water. But life does not come from water only; it also comes from and needs warmth and heath.
Now, there is some confusion in contemporary Akha world, around these words, especially M"yeh, Miq yehr and Miq-yehr. In fact mostly the names Aphoe-Miq-yehr and Aphoe M"sa (to a lesser extent) still are used as somewhat personalized forces.
Aphoe means ancestor or very important person. Traditional Akha in Thailand, Laos and China insist that Aphoe Miq-yeh is a woman, identical to the M"yeh of the archaic pirma/reciter texts.
Also the "Miq-yeh" who advises the Nyir paq or shaman high up into the "invisible world", is clearly female.
This is also the case in most of the fables/stories about Apoe-miq-yehr.
At the occasion of rice planting and cleaning of the water-sources of Apoe miq-yeh (Apoe-miqyeh öeu lawgaw shaw-eu) in May, in which the first rice to plant is washed) the following fable as it was told to me: A dove (called rice-thief in Akha), steals rice which (a female) Aphoe-Miq-yeh wants to give for planting to the ya-yeh-ama, the older lady with the white skirt. The dove is than hunted by a female hunter being the daughter of a female Aphoe-miq-yeh. The dead dove falls in a stream and is later retrieved by the dog of the dzoema, who still is able to save the rice, wash it and plant it. It seems to be a justification for the fact that the first rice is planted by the dzoema, village-leader and who also is a man.
"Ulo" Akha in Thailand and Burma (so called after cone-shaped headdresses of the women) have the following problem: Miq, for them is clearly the prefix to a women"s name. But Aphoe, meaning "over - grand-father" and male "ancestors" of the genealogy before them. The women are called "Aphi". Most Burmese, Laotian and Chinese Akha don"t have this problem, however. In their dialects Aphoe is used for male and female ancestors. The word "Aphi" is restricted to the grandmothers only.
Another complication seems to be, that Aphoe-Miqyeh is not conceived as an ancestor at all by the Akha, although some Akha not knowing the archaic texts well, have tried to link her somewhere.
For those, knowing the archaic texts, like "oe-za-eu, " it is clear however that the word "aphoe" in the past was used in several honorific ways for important persons, men or women, or even groups, also including non-Akha. (See: labui-aphoe; aboe-aphoe-; etc. in oe-za-eu).
That Aq poeq miq yehr indeed has to be seen as a very important and high female originator of water and rain became also clear when we visited the swallow grotto"s in the Honghe district, during the first International Hani/Akha Cultural Conference. The several kilometers large grotto is crossed by a river, and where hundreds if not thousands of "apoe-miyeh-eu aji" or swallows are staying during the hot period before swarming out in the rainy season.
At the entrance of this grotto a statue can be seen of Aphoe-miyeh, as a queen or "rain/water-goddess". It"s the Tao-ist "Rain-Principle" but made into a "Rain/Water-Goddess, " by the Chinese in later times Akha/Zaqnyiq, however, don't see her as a "Goddess" and she is not adored as such in any ceremony. This is in fact similar to the Chao Ti Mae Nam or the Mother of Water Principle honoured by the Thai peoples. They certainly don"t see her as a male "Creator" or "God, " as she was unfortunately made by the Western Missions. Most traditional Akha would quite vehemently deny the existence of a monotheistic male "Creator" in Akha tradition. Nor does this concept exist in other Asian, Latin American or African religious traditions. A modern Chiang Mai based Christian group and related to the Catholic Missions, at least made Aphoe-Mi-yeh into the Virgin Mother, keeping her femininity alive.
As told before, "Akha-zangr" is no religion and does not have "Gods" or "prayers, " nor real "sacrifices" to higher beings. Traditional Akhas of the older generation would say: "We don't worship in Akha customary law, as it is not a religion".
© Leo Alting von Geusau, based on Geusau (1999)