Joseph Onasakenrat (September 4, 1845 – February 8, 1881), also known as Sosé Onasakenrat, was a

Mohawk Mohawk may refer to: Related to Native Americans *Mohawk people, an indigenous people of North America (Canada and New York) *Mohawk language, the language spoken by the Mohawk people *Mohawk hairstyle, from a hairstyle once thought to have been t ...

chief of

Kanesatake Kanesatake (''Kanehsatà:ke'' in Mohawk) is a Mohawk (''Kanien'kéha:ka'' in Mohawk) settlement on the shore of the Lake of Two Mountains in southwestern Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Ottawa and Saint Lawrence rivers and about west of ...

, one of the Seven Nations of Canada in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Onasakenrat (meaning ''Swan'' or ''White Feather'') was born to a Mohawk family near

Oka, Quebec Oka is a small village on the northern bank of the Ottawa River (''Rivière des Outaouais'' in French), northwest of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Located in the Laurentian Mountains, Laurentians valley on Lake of Two Mountains, where the Ottawa has ...

. He was baptized Catholic and named Joseph, and was fluent in Mohawk and French. In 1860, he entered the

Petit Séminaire de Montréal Petite or petite may refer to: *Petit (crater), a small, bowl-shaped lunar crater on Mare Spumans *Petit (EP), ''Petit'' (EP), a 1995 EP by Japanese singer-songwriter Ua *Petit (typography), another name for brevier-size type *Petit four *Petit G ...

where he studied for the priesthood for about three years. He returned to Oka and was appointed as secretary of the

Sulpician The Society of Priests of Saint-Sulpice (french: Compagnie des Prêtres de Saint-Sulpice), abbreviated PSS also known as the Sulpicians is a society of apostolic life of Pontifical Right for men, named after the Church of Saint-Sulpice, Paris, ...

mission. On July 25, 1868, Onasakenrat was elected chief of the Mohawk community. Almost immediately, he travelled to

Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

to meet with the Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Onasakenrat petitioned the government to return land to the Mohawks which was, at the time, held by the Sulpicians. The Mohawk had learned that the Sulpicians had changed the terms of an earlier land grant deed and, rather than holding the land in trust for the Mohawk, had taken control of it. They were already selling it off to settlers. Onasakenrat accused the seminary of exploiting the natives and of intentionally keeping them impoverished. The bishop threatened to

excommunicate Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to end or at least regulate the communion of a member of a congregation with other members of the religious institution who are in normal communion with each other. The purpose ...

anyone involved in the petition, prompting Onasakenrat, along with most of the Mohawk community, to leave the Catholic Church that winter and convert to

Methodism Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a group of historically related denominations of Protestant Christianity whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's br ...

. On February 18, 1869, the chief confronted the Sulpicians again, challenging their authority over the land by cutting down a large

elm Elms are deciduous and semi-deciduous trees comprising the flowering plant genus ''Ulmus'' in the plant family Ulmaceae. They are distributed over most of the Northern Hemisphere, inhabiting the temperate and tropical-montane regions of North ...

tree without permission. One week later, backed by an armed band of forty men, Onasakenrat demanded that the Sulpicians leave Oka within eight days. The priests refused to leave, and instead obtained a warrant for his arrest. Montréal police arrived and arrested the group, although they were released a few days later. In 1877, Onasakenrat was charged after the Catholic Church in Oka was destroyed by fire in the early morning of June 14. At the time, the Mohawk were engaged in a dispute with white Canadian settlers over logging rights on their reserve. A group of Protestant Mohawks were accused of starting the fire. The group was tried quickly, and found not guilty by a jury. A devoutly religious man, Onasakenrat became an ordained Methodist minister in 1880, and worked to translate religious works into the Mohawk language. He translated the

Gospels Gospel originally meant the Christian message ("the gospel"), but in the 2nd century it came to be used also for the books in which the message was set out. In this sense a gospel can be defined as a loose-knit, episodic narrative of the words an ...

(1880) and several hymns. At the time of his sudden death at Oka in 7 Feb. 1881 at age 35, he was working on a translation of the remainder of the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts of a ...

, having completed up to the

Epistle to the Hebrews The Epistle to the Hebrews ( grc, Πρὸς Ἑβραίους, Pros Hebraious, to the Hebrews) is one of the books of the New Testament. The text does not mention the name of its author, but was traditionally attributed to Paul the Apostle. Mos ...

Notes

References

* * * *{{Cite Appletons', wstitle=Ouasakeurat, year=1900 Translators of the Bible into indigenous languages of the Americas Mohawks of Kanesatake