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Don Patricio’s Dream
their own right. From this perspective, then, it is ironic that shamans
are very jealous of their knowledge and busily guarding from one an-
other secrets that, to a significant extent, they all in effect share. In-
deed, the shared nature of their beliefs and practices is what allows
us to speak of “Mazatec shamanism” as such, and could be taken as
evidence for arguing that the use of this shamanic knowledge apper-
tains collectively and exclusively to all Mazatecs, as something that
ought to be guarded against appropriation by outsiders.
Normally, Mazatecs are not troubled by the implications of this in-
herent contradiction between their individualist model of the produc-
tion or acquisition of shamanic knowledge and their insistence upon
uniform standards in the evaluation of its performance. Perhaps the
occasion for thinking about this issue did not arrive until I did. The
conflict of values latent in this context came to a head as I found my-
self caught between two shamans with opposing views on the dispo-
sition of sacred knowledge. One is Don Nicolás, an elder shaman,
renowned for his great powers and a long career of community ser-
vice, whom I had approached with a proposal of collaboration that
he firmly refused. The other is Don Patricio, a younger shaman who
had already cautiously begun to discuss his knowledge and experi-
ence with me.
One day when I was away, Don Nicolás sought out and publicly be-
rated Don Patricio for working with me. This constituted an unusual
event, given that Mazatecs, unless they are extremely drunk, normally
avoid public displays of anger. According to those who later told me
of the incident, the older man had vehemently accused Don Patricio
of “shameless” involvement in something that was, he charged, “en-
tirely a business.” Don Nicolas furthermore declared his not wanting
to have anything to do with it himself. He voiced as well his opposi-
tion to any other shaman’s speaking with me about such “delicate”
matters—employing the usual euphemism for what we would call
“sacred” concerns. From what I could gather, he was asserting that
such ritual and cosmological knowledge rightfully belongs to Maza-
tecs alone, principally their shamans.
The gist of Don Nicolás’s harangue was that Don Patricio had al-
lied himself with me “just for the money.” This is an accusation of sin-
ister resonance for a shaman, given the central place in the Mazatec
