Abstract

FUENTE RUIZ, Rodolfo Alejandro de la. The formation of the kusiyai: first doctors in Baja California. Rev. Fac. Med. (Méx.) [online]. 2019, vol.62, n.3, pp.50-54.  Epub Oct 16, 2020. ISSN 2448-4865.  https://doi.org/10.22201/fm.24484865e.2019.62.3.09.

The Kumiai Indians, a branch of the Yumano speakers, used to live in a vast region of the territories that today form the Northwest of Mexico and the South of the United States of America. They were semi-nomadic groups that descended from the North of the continent and established a migratory cycle with large camps in the North of Baja California, in the Sierra Juarez and the Pacific coast. These social groups, like other similar organizations, needed that their members were healed in body and soul. This required the integral formation of a "Kusiyai" (witch-doctor) with the sufficient capacity to diagnose, guess and heal the different evils of the body and the spirit. The formation of this witch-doctor began in his adolescence in a mystical and magical selection ceremony. Once proven that he had the required virtues, his training continued under the protection of an old teacher who taught him the Mother Nature’s knowledge and guided him in his Astral journey to receive the teachings of the spirits that inhabit the beyond.

Keywords : Witch doctor; kusiyai; teaching; training; medical student.

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