Ashe, Asé or Axé: Ifá and Yoruba Religion in the West “Other than the continent of Africa itself, Bahia, Brazil has the most Black/African population in the world.” “An Orisha (also spelled Orisa or Orixa) is a spirit or deity that reflects one of the manifestations of God in the Yoruba spiritual or religious system. This religion has found its way throughout the world and is now expressed in practices as varied as Santería, Candomblé, Trinidad Orisha, Anago and Oyotunji, as well as in some aspects of Umbanda, Winti, Obeah, Vodun and a host of others. These varieties, or spiritual lineages as they are called, are practiced throughout areas of Nigeria, Republic of Benin, Togo, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Panama, Puerto Rico, Haiti, Guyana, Jamaica, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, the United States, Uruguay and Argentina among others. As interest in African indigenous religions (spiritual systems) grows, Orisha communities and lineages can be found in parts of Europe and Asia as well. While estimates may vary, some scholars believe that there could be more than 100 million adherents of this spiritual tradition worldwide.” The paper/essay below, explores how an indigenous African religion survived slaveocracy to the African-Diaspora in Brazil, to eventually reinvent itself in an Afro-Brazilian cultural and religious context. The source is provided at the end. Have a good read. Bon appétit The image represents traditional Candomble and Capoeira attire and dress, and also food such as acaraje, which is a traditional dish offered to the Orishas. Photo Credit: Jaimee Swift, Historic District of Pelorinho, Salvador, Brazil, July 2012 “I was sent by my superiors, I did not send myself. The asé with which I speak belongs to those who sent me.” - Dr. Wande Abimbola, Ifá Chant I. Introduction The African Personality is comprised of a unique set of measures that edify the African memory (past, present and future); African consciousness and African customs and tendencies. According to Professor M.W. Makgoba, those who encompass the characteristics of the African Personality, “are linked by shared values which [are] fundamental features of African identity and culture.” (Lassiter, 2000) Within those shared values include elements such as hospitality; collectivism or community; justice; family; education and most importantly, in regards to this paper, religiosity. Embedded within the African Personality and its shared values is a cultural and even revolutionary charisma —inherent in both Pan-Africanism and the African Diaspora —which historically “rejects the personality of the oppressor” in order to maintain African longevity within the European hegemonic structure. (Walters, 62) Makgoba also further describes that it is within these shared values and characteristics which “underpin the variations of African culture and identity everywhere.” (Lassiter, 2000) Geographically scattered, ancestrally and culturally unaware and African unconscious some of those of the African Diaspora may be, a pertinent force of the African Personality—African Religiosity—continues to subsist; despite the spiritually caustic and disruptive methods of both European and even Arab colonialists, who throughout history, have thwarted the African vitality to maintain their own. Though the prejudicial, racial and discriminatory ideology of European exceptionalism in regards to African Spirituality persists even today (while many including the African/African-American and European alike still hold a certain worldview of African religions as “savage”, “wicked” and/or “demonic”), African mysticism has evolved into various denominations; adapting to a new order of cultural, social and political characteristics just as its fragmented disciples were forced to do during the Diaspora. With this fragmentation, African Spirituality within the Diaspora thrived in spite of the dominance of the Christian structure, through various means including syncretism; integration or insertion of indigenous African culture into imperialistic paradigms and a sense of solidarity among enslaved and free African peoples to preserve their religious heritage. II. Abstract Thus, this paper will focus on an indigenous West African religion known as Ifá. The objectives of this paper are to connect the overarching West African religious prototype to Pan-African Religiosity in Bahia, Brazil known as Candomblé. This paper will also explore how the religious solidarity of Ifá was able to permeate and distinguish itself as re-manifested divination practice in Bahia—despite the schism from Mother Africa due to the Transatlantic Slave Trade. By focusing on Ifá’s origins, rituals and customs and how the religion was able to preserve itself in the Afro-Brazilian, specifically, Pan-Africanist context, this paper will explore what Dr. Wande Abimbola, the Awise Ni Agbaye[1]describes how the head Asé[2] —or Axé in Brazilian Portuguese — was “brought by those who were enslaved and taken to Brazil.” (Abimbola & Miller, 30) III. Portuguese Slaveocracy and the African Diaspora in Bahia Nestled on the northeastern coast of Brazil, the city of Salvador, the capital of Bahia, can be described as the Mecca of Candomblé. (Walker, 103) While Bahia comprises the second largest African-Black populous in the World, falling short to only the African continent itself, Ifá arrived to the shores of Bahia and integrated itself into Afro-Brazilian society notably due to the late arrival of slaves of Central African origin into the mid-nineteenth century. (Walker, 109) From 1530, when the first Portuguese colonialists arrived in Bahia to 1888, “sixty-six years after Brazilian independence from Portugal and one year prior to the country becoming a republic” (Dziendyo, 1), the importation and exploitation of Africans thrived—leaving the Portuguese with the legacy of producing the largest slave economy in the World. During the Transatlantic Slave Trade, it was estimated that about “3, 647, 000 men, women and children were imported to Brazil; of about which 1, 200, 200 went to Bahia alone.” (Dziendyo, 1) Within that estimated 1.2 million African slaves, the majority were taken from the West Coast of Africa, deriving from multiple ethnic and cultural groups—specifically, of the Bantu, which included Angolans, Congolese and Mozambiques and the Yoruba, which encompassed the Nagos, Males, Jejes, Minas, Mandingas and Hausas. (Falola, 58) But it was the Yoruba people “from present-day Nigeria and Benin…whose religious culture has remained most intact and influential in both Brazil and elsewhere in the Americas.” (Walker, 104) It is within the Yoruba culture or what Abimbola describes as “Yorubaland”, in which the divination system of Ifá originates and the African Diasporic/Afro-Brazilian religious sect of Candomblé is derived. (Falola & Childs, 2005) IV. Ifá Tradition, Customs and Beliefs as Prototype for Candomblé In the Yoruba context, Ifá is regarded as an integral and essential a part of Yoruba history, mythology, religion and folk medicine. (Abimbola & Miller, 1997) Intrinsic to Ifá are the divinities known as Orishas, which are manifestations of the high god, Olodumdare or Olòrún. Having their own unique characteristics, distinct chants, colors (which are known as ileke), numbers, foods and even literature, the Orisha have full autonomy and authority over the forces of nature as well as the power of working for or against humanity. The Orisha pantheon is seemingly limitless, as hundreds of entities comprise the pagoda, but some entities more specific and most notable in Ifá who have survived in the pan-Africanist context are: Èṣù (god of chaos and trickery); Orunmila (god of wisdom, knowledge and divination); Osun (the goddess of love, beauty and intimacy); Obatalá (creator of god of human bodies as well as owner of ori or heads) footnote; Ogun (god of hunting, iron and war); Sango (god of thunder, fire and lightening); Oya (goddess of wind and magic); Yemoja (goddess of the ocean and motherhood), and Osan-in (god of herbs, leaves and medicine). (Abimbola & Miller, 1997) Orishas Orishas. Photo Credit: Jaimee Swift, Salvador, Brazil, 2012 Omnipresent in that each Orisha is incarnate and ubiquitous in nature (for example, Oya, is represented by the river Niger or Yemoja, by the river Oogun in Nigeria) the Orisha is supreme in power but not a perfect entity in terms of character. Unlike the Christian God, who is without flaw or sin, the Orisha are humane in their characteristics; as many drink, party, marry and even divorce. Thus, the call of the Orisha is not so much guiding their devotees to infallibility but instead to balance—as the Orisha act as intermediary forces of leveling the bad in human behavior as well as the good. Just like many other religions, Ifá has its own unique story of creation—where Obatala molded human beings with clay supplied by Ogun, the Orisha of iron. The high god, Olodumdare, provided the vital breath force and heart known as Emi [3]and Ajala, another potter of heaven, provided the inner or spiritual head. (Abimbola & Miller, 14) In terms of the creation of the universe, the “Yoruba believe that Ile-Ife, their ancestral home and city, is also the cradle of humanity.” (Abimbola & Miller, 14) Prior to the creation of Ile-Ife, the earth was submerged with water and the Orisha descended from Oke ara[4] to create dry land from water. With only a parcel of dust combined with a chicken and chameleon, dry land began to appear as the chicken scratched and spread solid earth in various directions. (Abimbola & Miller, 14) According to Abimbola, Ifá, also known as the Orisha Orunmila, who provided all animals and vegetation with their own unique name and identity, witnessed the creation of both humanity and the universe. (Abimbola & Miller, 15) Hence in Ifá, there is a mighty emphasis on nature and humankind; as one of its key elements is to promote oneness with the individual and the rest of creation—whether the rest of creation is in human form or not. (Abimbola & Miller, 33) Within the Yoruba heavens known as orun, there is a dichotomous element that separates the right or the left or the good entity from the bad. Abimbola describes these halves as the Orishas, the benevolent powers on the right; while the malevolent powers, the Ajogun, are on the left. The Ajogun are represented by eight warlords which include Iku (death); Arun (disease); Ofo (loss); Egba (paralysis); Oran (big trouble); Epe (curse); Ewan (imprisonment) and the last one, Ese, which comprises “all other afflictions not mentioned (Abimbola & Miller, 3) Since the 200 + 1 malevolent powers of Ajogun are in constant conflict with the 400 + 1 benevolent powers of the Orisha as well as with humankind[5], it is within the sacrifices of animals, gifts and food from devotees that Esu[6] can share the offerings with the right and the left; thus offering a temporary alleviation or peace to the chaos. (Abimbola & Miller, 5) Diviners or high priests of the Ifá tradition are known as babalawo, who are highly respected and revered as the spiritual and advisory pillars of the Yoruba community. The process of becoming a babalawo and learning Ifá divination is rigorous and timely; as pupils at a young age, watch their master divine for others while learning various aspects of the faith such as ibo[7]; medicine and manipulating the diving chain known as opele. Once pupils master these concepts, they must riran or repeat to memory the Odu, a chapter of ifa literature. (Abimbola & Miller, 38) With 256 chapters of Odu and over 1,000 verses, mastering the Odu can take up to ten to fifteen years as babalawo are expected to assert full knowledge and intellect about their religious craft. V. Ifá Re-manifested in Pan-Africanism as Afro-Brazilian Religion, Candomblé Many of the foundational principles of Ifá still apply but within a pan-Africanist paradigm of new cultural, social and linguistic variation as Candomblé, according to Shelia S. Walker, “is the religion that provides the spiritual foundation and superstructure of Bahian life.” (Walker, 103) Among the regions of which were impregnated by the Diaspora, Bahia is considered as the guardian of African traditions due to its “immense legacy of Africanisms.” (Pinho, 33; 43) Dubbed as the African Rome, Candomblé in Salvador is seen and valued as an intrinsic force of cultural and societal values as the African spirit permeates an officially Catholic city of more than two million people. (IGBE, 2010) Whether it be in the fifteen-hundred plus Candomblé temples or terreriros; the presence of the maes e pais de santo (priestess and priests of Candomblé) or in the acaraje, “a black –eyed pea fritter cooked in red palm oil”, a delicacy of some Orishas served by Afro-Brazilian women known as Bahianas (Walker, 104), Ifá has reconstructed itself in an Afro-Brazilian cultural and societal context. Bahiana Bahiana. Photo Credit: Jaimee Swift, Pelorinho, Salvador, Brazil, July 2012 Prior to the religious freedom and respectability that the faith has accrued today, Candomblé was viewed as an inferior and barbaric religion congruent with the “economically deprived and socially oppressed descendants of the African slaves who created it.” (Walker, 106) Under the Portuguese colonial regime during the nineteenth century—as typical of European imperialism—enslaved Africans were forced to a policy of assimilation or rather cooptation; as the Portuguese vehemently denied the right for Africans to exercise their religious system but enforced their own. Even after Brazilian independence in 1888 to the end of World War II, Brazilian authorities persecuted leaders and practitioners of Candomblé and the religion fell victim to police harassment. (Walker, 106; 112) Though the Portuguese imposed their Catholicism, Ifá thrived as its indigenous core values syncretized with the inflicted Christian ones due to the heavy populous of Yoruba slaves in Brazil. Within this new religious dynamic, the African Personality in Brazil was cultivated as the Orishas of Ifá —unbeknown to the Portuguese—were canonized and edified by way of the pantheon of the Catholic saints. Now, according to Walker, “the characteristics of the Euro-Brazilians’ saints and their material representations in pictures and statues allowed Africans to establish parallels between some of the saints and the Orishas—both responsible for particular areas of life acting as intermediaries between humans and the supreme being for specific concerns.” (Walker, 111) In the Afro-Brazilian context, Olodumare, the high god, was now associated with the Christian God; while Obatala (Oxala in Brazil) was represented by Jesus Christ because of this “structural role as a preeminent male figure.” (Walker, 111) Yemoja, now Yemanja, was deified as Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, the mother of Jesus and Osun (now Oshun) and Oya were also syncretized as other demonstrations of the Virgin Mary. (Walker, 111) Many other Orisha worship deteriorated because of the onslaught of slavery, Christianity and European education, which completely sought to eradicate African Spirituality. But specific Orisha deities survived the assault of imperialism such as the Orisha Sango (Shango in Brazil) whose devotees comprise the Ilê Axé Opó Afonjá or the “Pillar of Asé of Afonja”, the largest Sango temple in Brazil. (Abimbola & Miller, 30) Orisha Worship Orisha Worship. Photo Credit: Jaimee Swift, Bahia, Brazil Although syncretism was an essential form of preservation to sustain African Religiosity inBahia, an important element to note is that Ifá, as an African tradition, was exercised in Catholicism as a mechanism to culturally and religiously survive and used not so much to adopt the Christian faith but to adapt. The Christian saints were merely symbolic vessels for the Orishas that were appropriated to comply to the religious imperialism of the Portuguese. Many believers of Candomblé, though possessing a duality of faith in both Catholicism and Candomblé practice the faiths respectively, essentially what is practiced in Bahia is Ifá itself; as the practices of Christianity were not so much as influential to Ifá as Ifá was to Brazilian Catholicism. Within in this syncretism, “Africans could adapt so well to outwardly observing the feast day of the saints as they were acquire to do so because they could perceive the spiritual beings they were honoring not as European saints, symbols of the people who were oppressing them, but as representations of the Orisha whom the saints most closely resembled.” (Walker, 111) Orisha worship maintained under the guise of cooptation but the notions of humankind as intrinsic to nature, sacrifice and the Orisha worship itself are evident of the Yoruba, specifically African religious elements that impacted the Bahian religious tradition. Now, with the freedom exercise to exert their religion and African customs, Candomblé leaders and practitioners today “are ready to put to an end the idea and manifestations of the equivalences between Orishas and saints.” (Walker, 113) Despite the fact that many devotees are now equipped to end the hybridized notion of Orisha and sainthood, there is a duality that remains among the new generation of Afro-Brazilians who practice Candomblé, who recognize their faith as an indigenous African entity but still use overt Brazilian Catholic symbols in Orisha worship. (Walker, 122) Though images of the European saints still stand in Candomblé houses, portraying Orishas who cannot “visually be portrayed” (Walker, 112) and many Candomblé priests and priestesses have been baptized Catholics, Walker describes these “two spiritual realities” in Bahia as non-contradictory and even complementary as ultimately it represents and eternalizes African Orisha worship. (Walker, 112) The Ifá tradition in Brazil not only infiltrated itself by way of syncretism but also through means of commercial trade. Several freed black Bahians participated in trade with Africa and many of the products that were imported from the Gulf of Benin were materials used in Candomblé such as red feathers, dyes and fabric. (Pinho, 48) Within these materials included secret religious directives and information which connected Brazil and Africa despite the transatlantic divide. Not only were intercontinental messages sent between Bahia and Mother Africa, may devotees of the Ifá tradition in Africa traveled to Bahia to reclaim the religious practices that vanished from the continent yet were protected and conserved in Candomblé temples. (Pinho, 48) Not only were African peoples traveling to Bahia to reclaim a sense of their African-ness, African-Americans also made their way to Bahia for the same understanding. In attempt to seek African Purity and reclaim their traces of the African Personality, since the 1970’s, Black American tourism to Bahia has gained popularity for these very reasons; as Bahia is considered a reference for African attitudes. (Pinho, 50; 51; 57) In the late to mid-70s, Candomblé further sparked a sense of collectivist resistance amongst descendants of African peoples to continue to assert and reaffirm their African religion via various Brazilian cultural and societal expressions including music and the ever-popular Carnaval. Founded in 1974 in Liberadade, a neighborhood in Salvador, a bloco afro or Black Carnaval group known as Ilê Aiyê, is a considered to be an integral aspect and pivotal organization representing Candomblé and the Brazilian Black community. Known as the “most African of the blocos afros in Bahia,” Ilê Aiyê has a history of inserting spiritual inspirations and elements of Ifá and Candomblé such as Orisha pageantry; African musical styles and even at a time in the 1970s “a black consciousness movement associated with specific Candomblé houses.” (Walker, 107) Referenced as “Candomblé in the streets”, afoxés; another style of Afro-themed carnival group based on the “Candomblé rhythm known as Ijesha, which is associated with the Orisha Oshun”, (Walker, 107) also promotes the Afro-Brazilian religion. Utilizing dances of the Orishas the afoxés were invented just after Brazil eradicated slavery in 1888. According to Walker, “the reemergence of afoxés is part of the contemporary process of the conscious cultural assertion of Africanity on [part] of many members of Bahia’s young Afro-Brazilian population.” (Walker, 108) VI. Conclusion Even in the midst of oppression, colonialization and struggle, Ifá, as form of African Religiosity, was able to survive within a Pan-Africanist paradigm in the African Diaspora, despite Portuguese slaveocracy and imperialistic methodologies to thwart the African Personality. Though Candomblé in Bahia represents a “scale of Africanisms” (Pinho, 33) —in both a cultural and religious reference as it is comprised of variations and deviations of expressions intrinsic to Africa—these “Africanisms” are African nonetheless; as they represent and perpetuate the intrinsic power and force that “drives African-origin people to continue identifying with the source of their cultural origin.” (Walters, 14) [1] “Spokesperson for Ifa in the World.” (Abimbola & Miller, 1997) [2] Asé (Yoruba form of the word) or Axé (Brazilian Portuguese linguistic variant) is known as an intrinsic spiritual power, the power to make things happen. (Abimbola & Miller, 5) [3] The Orisha Emi is known as the heart. She is regarded as the daughter of the high god, Olodumdare. The Yoruba believe that a person is not fully deceased until Olodumdare withdraws his daughter from his or her body. (Abimbola & Miller, 2) [4] According to Abimbola, Oke ara is “ mountain in the vicinity of Ile-Ife from whence the divinities descended after the creation of the Earth.” (Abimbola & Miller, 180) [5] “The idea of “plus one” denotes the principle of possible increase in the number of supernatural powers on both sides of the universe.” (Abimbola & Miller, 3) [6] The god of trickery and deceit, who also has characteristics of both Orisha and Ajogun. Esu accepts all sacrifices and shares with the benevolent and malevolent powers. (Abimbola & Miller, 5) [7] Ibo: “used by diviners to cast lots to find out whether the response to their question is a “yes” or a “no. It is made up of a cowrie shell and a bone and some other implements as well.” (Abimbola & Miller, 175) Bibliography: 1. Abimbola, W., & Miller, I. (1997). Ifa Will Mend Our Broken World . Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, United States of America: Aim Books . 2. Dzidzienyo, A. (1971). The Position of Blacks in Brazilian Society. Minority Rights Group; The University of California. 3. Falola, T., & Childs, M. D. (2005). The Yoruba Diaspora in the Atlantic World. Indiana University Press. 4. Lassiter, J. E. (2000). African Culture and Personality: Bad Social Science, Effective Social Activism, or a Call to Reinvent Ethnology. African Studies Quarterly , 3 (3). 5. Pinho, P. d. (2010). Mama Africa: Reinventing Blackness in Bahia. Durham and London, United States of America: Duke University Press. 6. Statistics, I. I. (2010). Bahia- Salvador. Retrieved from cidades.igbe.gov.br/xtras/perfil.php?lang=&codum=292740 7. Walker, S. S. (1990). Everyday and Esoteric Reality in the Afro-Brazilian Candomble . History of Religions , 30 (2), 103-128 . 8. Walters, R. W. (1993). Pan Africanism in the African Diaspora: An Analysis of Modern Afrocentric Political Movements. Detroit, Michigan, United States of America: Wayne State University . Source: districtoftheworld.wordpress/2014/01/24/ase-or-axe-ifa-and-the-role-of-religiosity-to-pan-africanism-in-brazil/
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