The first thing one must do on any treatise of this subject, is to clarify the many misinterpretations of the so-called "Animist" religions, which are commonly defined as "1. The attribution of a living soul to plants, inanimate objects, and natural phenomena." and/or "The belief in a supernatural power that organizes and animates the material universe". (Dictionary.com) I say "so-called", because this is one of many terms that non-African scholars have chosen to describe the more "primitive" (sic), or traditional belief systems, which clearly does not take into account the full linguistic and traditional mores of the people, and typically impose an ethnocentric view on foreign traditional cultures. And I believe I can say this is done to many traditional cultures around the world, as many of my Hindu, Buddhist, and other traditional religious scholarly colleagues from all over the world have expressed the same dismay in the use of such European derived terminology. So unfortunately, unless we are all going to completely immerse ourselves and learn the Yoruba language and culture, we are forced to speak the language of the Europeans, which I again qualify, does not adequately convey the full meanings of some of our traditional Yoruba concepts. But then that is why you are here at the Yoruba Spiritual Institute, to broaden your mind and learn the Yoruba way.
The Yoruba traditionally have always believed in a higher supreme being or God, specifically called Olodumare or Olorun, the latter, which is a shortening of the former, loosely translates as the "owner of heaven". The concept is simple. The Yoruba believe in God. The same God that the Muslims call Allah, and the Jews call Yahweh (YHWH), or the Christians call God, etc. This is the same God that theYorubas believe in and praise. This is important to understand, because our esteemed non-African scholars have often characterized the Yoruba's concept of God as being a "sky God", which in their opinions simply and literally is a God that controls the sky, versus the so-called other Yoruba Gods that control various other parts of nature. We will get to this in a bit, but this is completely mistaken. Again for the Yoruba, God is God. A side note, which will be surely addressed later, one reason why many European religions (Christianity and Islam in particular) have thrived in Africa, but especially in Yorubaland is because despite of our traditional belief system, we have always shared in the concept of God. The same God as the Europeans. So it was never deemed to be a contradictory concept to worship God in any host of ways, especially as Yoruba society embraced more European mores and customs. Again, this will be addressed more thoroughly in future discussions.
So now that we understand that the Yorubas believe in God or Olorun, let us now address the concepts of our (Humans) role on Earth. There are several excellent (and many more non-excellent) books that cover the entire Yoruba creationist theories and mythologies, and I implore you all to read them as they are truly amazing in their complexity and similarity to the great Greek and Roman cultures. Unfortunately the Yoruba never received the same Hollywood coverage and adoration, nor was it a requisite in any school I attended, like the many Greek and Roman subjects (not to mention Latin) that were made compulsorily available to students (at least in the USA). So wether or not you believe in the concept of the Yoruba being the first human beings and/or the birthplace of civilization being in Ile-Ife, Nigeria, is completely and utterly irrelevant to the core concepts of Yoruba traditional belief. That is my opinion as a modern western educated Yoruba scholar, and I will address it more in detail later. But bestow in me the benefit of the doubt, that the bottom line of our belief system does not depend on wether we were necessarily the first people or where the "holy city" is located, but on our core values and practice philosophies and techniques. Let the pure historians debate themselves to death on those minute concepts, and let us focus on Yoruba traditions as they truly impact our day to day lives.
The Yoruba have been painfully aware of certain other concepts in addition to their belief in Olorun. They respect their elders, and the elders of their elders. And furthermore, we don't believe death stops the propitiation and adoration of our elders. I never met my Grandfather, but rest assured I pay homage to him for putting my father, and uncles and aunts on this earth, and bestowing in them the upbringing and opportunities to achieve the greatness they all did. So clearly I must continue that philosophy with his Grandfather, and then his grandfather, etc, etc, etc. So we pay homage to our living and non-living elders, almost equally. Note: I say grandfather, but understand it to also mean grandmother equally. However, there is a certain male-dominance in the family structure amongst the Yoruba, which will I'm sure be addressed later. But rest assured all my concerned modern sistren, there is no culture that adores and respects the woman as an equal if not leader, than the Yoruba. Of course, I’m just being Yoruba-centric, but the roles of women in Yoruba society have and always will be crucial and equal to any man’s.
Besides our elders, the traditional Yoruba also respect the land they live on and live off of, as well as respect all of God’s creatures great and small, which each have a role on earth. A concept I'm sure you’ve noticed is shared by many of the other traditional cultures of the world, and especially here in the Americas (before the Europeans took their land, but I digress). However that is where the similarities end, because although the Yoruba traditionally respect all elements of nature, they do not necessarily worship these elements of nature. So for example, the Yoruba do not worship trees or animals, however we may recognize the spiritual power bestowed to these elements, and either use them for ourselves or when propitiating our God and/or elders.
The most controversial part of this discussion is centered around the concept of the Orisa (pronounced Oh-ree-shah). And I admit it is my own personal dilemma as an academician and scholar, because to discuss a Yoruba concept in a non-Yoruba language to a non-Yoruba, leads me to the same errors committed by many of the academic scholars that I take great offense to for their ethnocentric and myopic views of the Yoruba. The words that are used to describe some Yoruba concepts unfortunately lead to more trouble than was probably intended, and tend to be more difficult to later correct. Many have tried to define or equate the Orisa has "mini-Gods", "spirits", or even "saints". Even those of us in the academic world thought we could fool you all with a more intellectually robust sounding term, such as "deity", but even that can not adequately define what the Orisa are. So let us stop trying to understand things through our limited experience and understanding of language, and just understand things as they are. Hence, from this day forth, I'm going to stop saying "the Orisa are like this or like that", and just say the Orisa are the Orisa. After all, do I have to define what a spirit or a God is for you to understand what I am talking about? Just because I am using a foreign term does not necessarily mean it is a foreign concept. So Orisa are Orisa. Not spirits or Gods or deities or saints or any other term that you may have heard before and understand. They are what they are, and that is the Orisa were placed on earth by God (again not “our” God, but the one and only God) to assist humans in their day to day tasks. The Orisa are members of the Irunmole which are the full collective of entities (there I go again...) that were created by Olorun to serve him in heaven. Some of the Irunmole came to Earth, and hence are called Orisa. So all Orisa are Irunmole, but not all Irunmole are Orisa. You may notice that some other scholars have a slightly different view of this, but I believe this is the most consistent view held in Yorubaland. So it is said, the earliest humans (The Yoruba, according to some theorists) briefly lived amongst the Orisa. A concept that is irrelevant to me as, again it is debatable, and does not change the main points of the worship system. Nonetheless, the Orisa serve as personal guides to all Yoruba and especially to their devotees, and most importantly act as intermediaries to God. So I’m sure you’re asking, why does God need an intermediary? Can’t he be worshipped and propitiated directly? My answer is, of course he doesn’t need them, and he most definitely can be adored and paid homage to directly. However, the Orisa serve a more personal and direct role in our day to day life, which according to Yoruba belief is a bit trivial and mundane for an Almighty God (Olorun) who must oversee the collective welfare of over a trillion creatures both great and small in the entire universe. Again, it is not that we believe he is overwhelmed, far from it. Omnipotent, omnipresent, and all that, are all concepts in the Yoruba language for God. However, something unique to the traditional Yoruba, and this might lend some credence to their supposedly being the first human beings, but the traditional Yoruba had no fear of dealing with the Orisa either in person or in practice. The Yoruba even related to many of the particular characteristics of each Orisa, and their worship was felt to even follow familial lines. For example, I come from a long lineage of Ogun worshipers on my fathers side, and if traditional Orisa worship had not been interrupted by the Islamic Influx and the conversion to Islam by my Grandfather, I would be a devotee to primarily Ogun. But as fate would have it, my mother’s side had a strong connection to Sango and Osun, and ironically I was born Dada in Nigeria, initiated into Sango in Nigeria and then later went to Cuba and was told I should initiate into Aganju. (All Orisas that you either know about or will soon learn about, but they are all part of the “Sango” family.) So my point is that the Orisa were treated like and revered like members of our own family, and their worship sometimes had similar elements to the way we propitiate our ancestors. Quick point- You will hear and read about shrines. This is just a location where certain activities are conducted, and like a church, are not the religious elements themselves. So just as churches have a certain religious value and we ascribe a lot of emotional and spiritual ties to them, we hardly are worshipping churches or synagogues or mosques or any other temples, right??? So let us not ascribe any more significance to the place or the vessels that we all use, and let us focus on the spiritual energies that we are propitiating. Hence, this statement applies to the pots, and the stones, or the other physical elements that are used, not unlike the christian cross or the catholic rosary or the muslim Tasbih beads, or any of the other religious instruments most religions use as part of their worship. These are all instruments used to worship, and are not in of themselves God(s). To steal part of a phrase from my muslim brothers and sisters, which I believe most every other religion also believes in- Ashadu Alla ilaha illala- I believe in only one almighty God. If you would entertain me one brief detour into my past religious lives. In Arabic/Islamic studies I remember the Imam hammering home the point that unlike those “barbaric idol worshiping heathens”, Allah (God) is the creator, and everything else was created. He seemed to always direct his comments to me for some reason, maybe I was just being self conscious, or maybe it was because my Uncle told the Imam on the first day of class to straighten out his American nephew who has been corrupted by those Christian Infidels (Yes sir, I was baptized, went to a Christian school, and every week attended sunday school). Another detour, but I must say, God bless my parents, especially my mother for being so religiously open minded to give me the foundation for my religious experience and teachings. Anyway, so I left Arabic/Islamic studies with a renewed sense of what God was, and hence what the Orisa were. The Orisa may possess the power to create some things, and make changes happen, however they can never ever be called the creator of all. And as I learned in my Yoruba Studies classes and later in Ifa, even when all the Orisa rallied together and thought they could all gang up on God, because they became arrogant at their idolization by humans, and hence felt they were more important than God. They were all quickly reminded of the finite nature of their powers, and without God, they were powerless. (Otura ‘Sa). So to recap, the Orisa were created by God to assist humans and to serve as the intermediaries to God under Yoruba traditional practices, and many of us are devotees to one (and sometimes more) Orisa.
The last part of this discussion is the concept of Ifa. Ifa literally means “the voice of God”, which can be further understood as the teachings and advice that God gives to us human beings. Ifa is not an Orisa. Ifa is a concept. A study of life, so to speak. It is the entire history as well as the future of the human existence. The Orisa who is responsible for witnessing the creation of the human experience is Orunmila. You can think of him as the “great note taker” and/or the objective observer. He merely took notes of everything God created. How created. Why created. Why certain features were placed on some, yet not on others, etc, etc, etc. As a result, when one seeks information in life, one seeks Ifa. It may have different names in different languages, but the concept remains the same. It is the repository of all information, our great Oracle.
Clearly to devote one’s self to this discipline one must be a responsible, learned and disciplined person, and this is the concept we here at the Yoruba Spiritual Institute 100% subscribe to. The priests of Ifa who follow the teachings and philosophies of Orunmila are called Babalawos- “Fathers of the secrets”, and we would love to help both the initiated or uninitiated help get a better understanding of what Ifa truly is.
Ase o.
The Yoruba traditionally have always believed in a higher supreme being or God, specifically called Olodumare or Olorun, the latter, which is a shortening of the former, loosely translates as the "owner of heaven". The concept is simple. The Yoruba believe in God. The same God that the Muslims call Allah, and the Jews call Yahweh (YHWH), or the Christians call God, etc. This is the same God that theYorubas believe in and praise. This is important to understand, because our esteemed non-African scholars have often characterized the Yoruba's concept of God as being a "sky God", which in their opinions simply and literally is a God that controls the sky, versus the so-called other Yoruba Gods that control various other parts of nature. We will get to this in a bit, but this is completely mistaken. Again for the Yoruba, God is God. A side note, which will be surely addressed later, one reason why many European religions (Christianity and Islam in particular) have thrived in Africa, but especially in Yorubaland is because despite of our traditional belief system, we have always shared in the concept of God. The same God as the Europeans. So it was never deemed to be a contradictory concept to worship God in any host of ways, especially as Yoruba society embraced more European mores and customs. Again, this will be addressed more thoroughly in future discussions.
So now that we understand that the Yorubas believe in God or Olorun, let us now address the concepts of our (Humans) role on Earth. There are several excellent (and many more non-excellent) books that cover the entire Yoruba creationist theories and mythologies, and I implore you all to read them as they are truly amazing in their complexity and similarity to the great Greek and Roman cultures. Unfortunately the Yoruba never received the same Hollywood coverage and adoration, nor was it a requisite in any school I attended, like the many Greek and Roman subjects (not to mention Latin) that were made compulsorily available to students (at least in the USA). So wether or not you believe in the concept of the Yoruba being the first human beings and/or the birthplace of civilization being in Ile-Ife, Nigeria, is completely and utterly irrelevant to the core concepts of Yoruba traditional belief. That is my opinion as a modern western educated Yoruba scholar, and I will address it more in detail later. But bestow in me the benefit of the doubt, that the bottom line of our belief system does not depend on wether we were necessarily the first people or where the "holy city" is located, but on our core values and practice philosophies and techniques. Let the pure historians debate themselves to death on those minute concepts, and let us focus on Yoruba traditions as they truly impact our day to day lives.
The Yoruba have been painfully aware of certain other concepts in addition to their belief in Olorun. They respect their elders, and the elders of their elders. And furthermore, we don't believe death stops the propitiation and adoration of our elders. I never met my Grandfather, but rest assured I pay homage to him for putting my father, and uncles and aunts on this earth, and bestowing in them the upbringing and opportunities to achieve the greatness they all did. So clearly I must continue that philosophy with his Grandfather, and then his grandfather, etc, etc, etc. So we pay homage to our living and non-living elders, almost equally. Note: I say grandfather, but understand it to also mean grandmother equally. However, there is a certain male-dominance in the family structure amongst the Yoruba, which will I'm sure be addressed later. But rest assured all my concerned modern sistren, there is no culture that adores and respects the woman as an equal if not leader, than the Yoruba. Of course, I’m just being Yoruba-centric, but the roles of women in Yoruba society have and always will be crucial and equal to any man’s.
Besides our elders, the traditional Yoruba also respect the land they live on and live off of, as well as respect all of God’s creatures great and small, which each have a role on earth. A concept I'm sure you’ve noticed is shared by many of the other traditional cultures of the world, and especially here in the Americas (before the Europeans took their land, but I digress). However that is where the similarities end, because although the Yoruba traditionally respect all elements of nature, they do not necessarily worship these elements of nature. So for example, the Yoruba do not worship trees or animals, however we may recognize the spiritual power bestowed to these elements, and either use them for ourselves or when propitiating our God and/or elders.
The most controversial part of this discussion is centered around the concept of the Orisa (pronounced Oh-ree-shah). And I admit it is my own personal dilemma as an academician and scholar, because to discuss a Yoruba concept in a non-Yoruba language to a non-Yoruba, leads me to the same errors committed by many of the academic scholars that I take great offense to for their ethnocentric and myopic views of the Yoruba. The words that are used to describe some Yoruba concepts unfortunately lead to more trouble than was probably intended, and tend to be more difficult to later correct. Many have tried to define or equate the Orisa has "mini-Gods", "spirits", or even "saints". Even those of us in the academic world thought we could fool you all with a more intellectually robust sounding term, such as "deity", but even that can not adequately define what the Orisa are. So let us stop trying to understand things through our limited experience and understanding of language, and just understand things as they are. Hence, from this day forth, I'm going to stop saying "the Orisa are like this or like that", and just say the Orisa are the Orisa. After all, do I have to define what a spirit or a God is for you to understand what I am talking about? Just because I am using a foreign term does not necessarily mean it is a foreign concept. So Orisa are Orisa. Not spirits or Gods or deities or saints or any other term that you may have heard before and understand. They are what they are, and that is the Orisa were placed on earth by God (again not “our” God, but the one and only God) to assist humans in their day to day tasks. The Orisa are members of the Irunmole which are the full collective of entities (there I go again...) that were created by Olorun to serve him in heaven. Some of the Irunmole came to Earth, and hence are called Orisa. So all Orisa are Irunmole, but not all Irunmole are Orisa. You may notice that some other scholars have a slightly different view of this, but I believe this is the most consistent view held in Yorubaland. So it is said, the earliest humans (The Yoruba, according to some theorists) briefly lived amongst the Orisa. A concept that is irrelevant to me as, again it is debatable, and does not change the main points of the worship system. Nonetheless, the Orisa serve as personal guides to all Yoruba and especially to their devotees, and most importantly act as intermediaries to God. So I’m sure you’re asking, why does God need an intermediary? Can’t he be worshipped and propitiated directly? My answer is, of course he doesn’t need them, and he most definitely can be adored and paid homage to directly. However, the Orisa serve a more personal and direct role in our day to day life, which according to Yoruba belief is a bit trivial and mundane for an Almighty God (Olorun) who must oversee the collective welfare of over a trillion creatures both great and small in the entire universe. Again, it is not that we believe he is overwhelmed, far from it. Omnipotent, omnipresent, and all that, are all concepts in the Yoruba language for God. However, something unique to the traditional Yoruba, and this might lend some credence to their supposedly being the first human beings, but the traditional Yoruba had no fear of dealing with the Orisa either in person or in practice. The Yoruba even related to many of the particular characteristics of each Orisa, and their worship was felt to even follow familial lines. For example, I come from a long lineage of Ogun worshipers on my fathers side, and if traditional Orisa worship had not been interrupted by the Islamic Influx and the conversion to Islam by my Grandfather, I would be a devotee to primarily Ogun. But as fate would have it, my mother’s side had a strong connection to Sango and Osun, and ironically I was born Dada in Nigeria, initiated into Sango in Nigeria and then later went to Cuba and was told I should initiate into Aganju. (All Orisas that you either know about or will soon learn about, but they are all part of the “Sango” family.) So my point is that the Orisa were treated like and revered like members of our own family, and their worship sometimes had similar elements to the way we propitiate our ancestors. Quick point- You will hear and read about shrines. This is just a location where certain activities are conducted, and like a church, are not the religious elements themselves. So just as churches have a certain religious value and we ascribe a lot of emotional and spiritual ties to them, we hardly are worshipping churches or synagogues or mosques or any other temples, right??? So let us not ascribe any more significance to the place or the vessels that we all use, and let us focus on the spiritual energies that we are propitiating. Hence, this statement applies to the pots, and the stones, or the other physical elements that are used, not unlike the christian cross or the catholic rosary or the muslim Tasbih beads, or any of the other religious instruments most religions use as part of their worship. These are all instruments used to worship, and are not in of themselves God(s). To steal part of a phrase from my muslim brothers and sisters, which I believe most every other religion also believes in- Ashadu Alla ilaha illala- I believe in only one almighty God. If you would entertain me one brief detour into my past religious lives. In Arabic/Islamic studies I remember the Imam hammering home the point that unlike those “barbaric idol worshiping heathens”, Allah (God) is the creator, and everything else was created. He seemed to always direct his comments to me for some reason, maybe I was just being self conscious, or maybe it was because my Uncle told the Imam on the first day of class to straighten out his American nephew who has been corrupted by those Christian Infidels (Yes sir, I was baptized, went to a Christian school, and every week attended sunday school). Another detour, but I must say, God bless my parents, especially my mother for being so religiously open minded to give me the foundation for my religious experience and teachings. Anyway, so I left Arabic/Islamic studies with a renewed sense of what God was, and hence what the Orisa were. The Orisa may possess the power to create some things, and make changes happen, however they can never ever be called the creator of all. And as I learned in my Yoruba Studies classes and later in Ifa, even when all the Orisa rallied together and thought they could all gang up on God, because they became arrogant at their idolization by humans, and hence felt they were more important than God. They were all quickly reminded of the finite nature of their powers, and without God, they were powerless. (Otura ‘Sa). So to recap, the Orisa were created by God to assist humans and to serve as the intermediaries to God under Yoruba traditional practices, and many of us are devotees to one (and sometimes more) Orisa.
The last part of this discussion is the concept of Ifa. Ifa literally means “the voice of God”, which can be further understood as the teachings and advice that God gives to us human beings. Ifa is not an Orisa. Ifa is a concept. A study of life, so to speak. It is the entire history as well as the future of the human existence. The Orisa who is responsible for witnessing the creation of the human experience is Orunmila. You can think of him as the “great note taker” and/or the objective observer. He merely took notes of everything God created. How created. Why created. Why certain features were placed on some, yet not on others, etc, etc, etc. As a result, when one seeks information in life, one seeks Ifa. It may have different names in different languages, but the concept remains the same. It is the repository of all information, our great Oracle.
Clearly to devote one’s self to this discipline one must be a responsible, learned and disciplined person, and this is the concept we here at the Yoruba Spiritual Institute 100% subscribe to. The priests of Ifa who follow the teachings and philosophies of Orunmila are called Babalawos- “Fathers of the secrets”, and we would love to help both the initiated or uninitiated help get a better understanding of what Ifa truly is.
Ase o.
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