The bear enters the earth, a cave, or the hollow beneath some boulders, or among the roots of a massive tree. The bear goes to sleep in the earth, dies to the world while the forest is in the grip of winter, and reappears with the budding of new life in the spring. So the bear is not merely eternal in the sky, he enacts the mystery of resurrection, an animal enacting the universal re-birth of spring. And not content with being resurrected, the bear, if a female, comes forth to new life with new life, cubs born and nurtured in that earth womb, so we speak of women bearing children. For all these and many other reasons, the man-like, powerful, animal force that we call Bear has literally personified the Wild for as long as humans have had the intelligence to recognize and think on their kinship to us.
Bears are hunters and gatherers, like humans.
They are resurrected, like gods. In fact, resurrection is the focus of the bear sacrifice cult as practiced by the Ainu, the aboriginal people of Japan, and probably by their paleolithic predecessors. Just as the moon is sacred because it is light, and is resurrected each month, bears are sacred because they are dark and wild, live in the woods, and are resurrected each year. I scouted around and soon found what looked sort of like bear tracks. I decided to follow them.