At the beginning of the Dreamtime, the earth was flat and dry and empty. There were no trees, no rivers, no animals and no grass. It was a dry and flat land.
One day, Goorialla, the rainbow serpent woke from his sleep and set off to find his tribe. He crossed Australia from east to west and north to south, stopping to listen for his people. He crossed every part of the dry, flat Australia but found nothing. After searching for a long time, he grew tired and lay down to sleep.
The land he lay down to sleep on was not the same land he had set out to search for his people on, though. As he had looked for his people, his big, long body had cut great gouges into the land.
Goorialla lay in the sand all alone until he decided to create more life in the world. He called “Frogs, come out!” and frogs rose out of the ground with their bellies full of the water they stored. He tickled the frogs until the water burst from their mouth and filled the gouges in the land. These gouges made the rivers and streams we see today.
As the water flowed over the land, grass and trees began to grow and fill the land with colour.
Now that there was grass to eat and water to drink, Goorialla woke the animals. The kookaburra laughed, the goanna walked, and the wombat climbed out of her burrow, all for the first time.
Some animals lived in the sea, swimming back and forward. Some animals lived in the sky, flying with their friends to distant places. Some animals lived on the land, digging and playing in the sand. They were happy and gathered food and water to bring back to their own tribes.
The Rainbow Serpent made rules that all animals had to obey. He said “All animals that obey the rules will be rewarded by becoming humans. The animals that disobey the rules will be punished.”
Some animals followed the rules and were rewarded by being turned into humans. Other animals disobeyed the rules and were turned into the stone that makes the mountains.
One day, it started to rain. And it rained like it had never rained before. Rain fell for days and days and the world was becoming flooded with water. Two young men, Bil-bil, or the Rainbow Lorikeet brothers had no shelter and they came to the Rainbow Serpent. They asked for help sheltering from the rain.
The rainbow serpent was hungry and tricked the young men “I have no shelter, but you can hide in my mouth. You’ll be safe from the rain in there.” The young men climbed into Goorialla’s mouth and he closed it shut, swallowing both men.
He soon realised that people would notice the young men missing and come looking for them. He knew they would find their track leading right into his mouth. He didn’t want to be caught and so decided to hide in the only place he knew he would be safe: the sky.
He hid in the sky away from the people chasing him and he saw their sadness at losing these two young men. He decided to try and make them happy again so turned his body into a big arc of beautiful colours.
Now, every time, just after it rains, you can see the Rainbow Serpent sharing his beautiful colours with the people on the ground as his way of saying sorry for taking those Rainbow Lorikeet brothers.
no worries
Good dream story
I so agree with you it was so spiritual
cheers
I love dream time stories they are so calming
I heard that the term “dreamtime” is culturally inappropriate and that Dreaming stories is more politically correct, is this true?
yes you are right I don’t know why these people call it Dreamtime I’m starting to wonder if they are even aboriginal
Fair go old chap , look around the world and you will find more brown/black skinned people then pale!
Thats my budda
Every year the AFL (Australian Football League, the national league for Australian Rules Football) have an Indigenous round of football to celebrate the achievements and influence Indigenous players have had on our game. The main game of this round is between Richmond and Essendon, the clubs famous for recruiting and playing many Aboriginal players decades ago, opening the door for many to follow in their footsteps. This main game is held at the MCG in front of an average of 80,000 plus spectators. It is called “DREAMTIME AT THE ‘G'” – many Aboriginals are on the planning committee – I’d suggest your information for it to be called DREAMING and not DREAMTIME is incorrect.
Did I ask?
exactly
they called it dreamtime because thats what the Indigenous australians
called it.
idk
Ev,that rumour is false. I’m from an aboriginal background, and I’ve done research about it. It is fake
fake, just like you.
when?
Surely this can’t be true…
of course this is not true its a story duhh
actually, RAINY, you are wrong sis
rainy; it is how they believe it came to be
No it isn’t at all Iv seen him
Hey no need to disrespect the oldest living culture in the world. No need at all.
Yes, I totally agree. Please give some respect to others’ culture.
This is cool.
This story is slightly cool.
My name is Phoenix reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee
I never remembered putting a giant rainbow lizard in Australia.
I don’t remember that either dad
I dont remember that either nephew
Go to bed child
Ah yes you are correct
My interpretation:
It is a beautifully written story about shortly after the interglacial period around 20000 years ago… The serpent is a body of water… The sleeping bit is about it turning to ice (hence the gouging out the gorges). Then it woke up and melted and was dangerous and killed the brothers. Afterwards it returned the the sky (think evaporation) and it made a rainbow…
It is full of symbolism and metaphor… It is beautiful.
It also shows a story passed down over thousands of generations from a group of humans that survived the last ice age….
Mikayla,
If I was your teacher I would have to give you full marks for analysing this Dreaming Story.
Congratulations
I learnt that Aboriginals spirituality believed in a variety of deep meaningful, interesting stories including the story of “The rainbow serpent”. The rainbow serpent had important meaning because it discusses how Goorialla spread its powers and passion of creating an amazing life on the land with beautiful scenery and colours, full of living animals and humans. An aspect of Religion addressed in this story included the ethics that were created for the animals in order to indicate who was a good animal and will have the privilege to turn human. Another aspect that stood out to me was spiritual experience of Goorialla the rainbow serpent to have the power to create an entire life on land. This story made me feel interested in the miracles that Aboriginals believe in and the ending. I think the moral of this story is to demonstrate how the feeling of guilt was formed from a wrong choice and how to make it right.
I agree with Mikayla
Thank goodness someone replied with critical thinking and elegant writing skills. Metaphors and symbolism endure millennia.
i just thought it was a snake with some colours on it aye
idk
This story was very inspirational 🙂
My Friend Called me out as racist for searching aboriginal stories
10/10
hi, i really like this story because it is lovely and inspiring.
This story fascinated my little toes
i learnt that the aboriginals spirituality is full of story that help us through life of what to do and what not to do.
this story addresses the creation of earth and how it was formed and also addressees good and evil and how to whats right and wrong, this story made me feel intrigued to know more about the stories and rituals they go through.
i believe the message of this story is about the creation of life and how we have come about and also explains good and evil in us and whats happens once we do something bad or good.
rip
I learnt that Aboriginal religions consist of meaningful and metaphorical stories. An example of one of these stories is “The rainbow serpent”, which conveyed a significant message because it demonstrates how the serpent, Goorialla used its power to create a land of colour and happiness for all creatures. An aspect of Religion within this story is ethics, which was used to distinguish which animals were deemed ‘good’, and therefore would have the privilege of becoming human. Another aspect identified in the story was the spiritual experience of Goorialla the rainbow serpent. He was able to use his power to create life on land in a spiritual way. This story sparked my interested in the stories of creation that Aboriginals believe in. The moral of this story is to use something that goes wrong as an opportunity to make things better.
How is the rainbow snake living because if there are no trees, that means there is no oxygen! If there is also no river that means there is no natural water which means how does the rainbow serpent live! Also if the rainbow serpent made frogs, that must mean the rainbow serpent must be God, so does that mean God is Gay!!
But hey, thats just a theory! A gay theory!!
oi have som respect bloody mongrel
Tell em’ that there dreaming
Love It
It’s a story,they don’t need to breath
So Wonderful.
But how do they breath?
WOW! I thought that this was just about a Rainbow Serpent who went along the land and made the rivers. I didn’t know that they made the animals and plants too! Also I didn’t know the part where it swallowed the people (I thought that was a different story) and returned to the sky and made a rainbow! Very helpful!!
thats nice
They took my Devil Face! And replace it with these pesky wings! These buggers regrow no matter how many times I cut them off!
love that 🙂
it will come back over time and your brothers having a baby
why are my snakes now rainbow?
Don’t know?
Great Dreamtime story, my fav!!!
This is funny
Show some bloody respect me myself I’m an aboriginal dont judge wat u don’t know.
This is trash not I love this so much
This post fascinated my cheesy fingers
This is made up
Not a joke
Rip those dudes haha lol
Excuse me to all those disrespectful people out there, me myself I’m an aboriginal person show some respect to our culture. We did no harm to white people so leave the blacks alone.
yep i strongly agree just because all of you “non-aboriginals” dont believe in the creations of our culture it does not give you people the rights to disrespect our ways of life. Theres probably are reason why we have been around on this world and continent longer than any of you people. Because we respect the land that takes care of us and obey our sacred laws. you people dont see any of us disrecpecting God or any other cultures around the world. plus non of you people dont know anything about being aboriginal or to carry on stories and knowledges from our grandparents to recure to our grandchildren and we have been doing this for millenniums, so next time think about what you say because it will be held against you and your childish thoughts.
BYE FELISHA’S
Please do behave in this comments section. This is a beautiful and culturally rich story, and in sharing it with my grade 4 students as part of a unit on language features in literature, half of them only wanted to focus on some of your arguments.
The other half submitted Mikayla’s glacier interpretation.
Good story
this is a true dreamtime stories made up from the elderly aboriginals in the past
Nice Story
Aboriginal’s helped create Australia so leave them alone.
ev its not political its cultural