Varieties of African American Religious Experience

Toward a Comparative Black Theology - 20th Anniversary Edition

Anthony B. Pinn

• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781506403359
• eBook ISBN: 9781506403366
• Edition: 20
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Comparative Religion

Twenty years ago, Anthony Pinn's engrossing survey highlighted the rich diversity of black religious life in America, revealing expressions of an ever-changing black religious quest in four non-Christian religious movements. Based on extensive research, travel, and interviews--and embellished with photos, bibliographies, and case studies--Pinn's work provides a fascinating look especially at Voodoo, Santeria, the Nation of Islam, and black humanism in the United States, and uses the diversity of religious belief to begin formulation of a comparative black theology--the first of its kind.

Focusing less on institutional and doctrinal history and more on the varied popular religious practices and sites, this volume highlights, for example, the significant influence of Caribbean religions in the United States, practices of divination and healing, the surge of black Muslims, the emergence of black humanism, and the religious influence and ethical practices of black women. The unique contribution of this volume, however, isn't the description of these traditions but instead it is the new method of theological work it begins to outline.

This twentieth-anniversary edition is an expanded version, including a new preface and a new concluding chapter. An important contribution to classroom studies!

I

Case Studies: Traditions and Their Existential Link

1

Serving the Loa

Vodou, Voodoo, and the Voodoo Spiritual Temple

Dahomey and Voudun

The small and independent groups that lived in what is now Benin were replaced by a complex system headed by a king. It is said that the royal line, the first ancestor of the royal dynasty, originated in Adja-Tado (1300). The royal family moved from Adja-Tado before the beginning of the seventeenth century. In the genealogical story, the daughter of Adja-Tado’s king was impregnated by a leopard. The child was named Agasu and is remembered as the ancestor of all the Fon of Dahomey. The children of Agasu ultimately attempted to rule Adja-Tado but were forced to flee, and through their travel, the holy city of Allada was founded.^[1] From this line emerges the leaders of Dahomey.

The relocation to Allada resulted in prosperity and tranquility until a feud between the kings sons resulted in a triadic split within the community: one group went north (founding Dahomey’s capital city of Abomey), anoth­er south (taking control of Ajase-Ipo or Porto Novo), and the third remained in Allada. In roughly 1625, Dako became the king of the Agasuvi and undertook expansionist goals within the region. This activity successfully continued under several additional kings, who were even successful against the powerful Yorùbá kingdom and interior groups.^[2] One of the greatest of these leaders was Wegbadja, who is said to have given Dahomey its name. In fact, a famous story tells how he demanded land on which to build a palace from a chief called Dan. His demands were considered excessive, and Dan asked him, “Do you want to build in my belly?” Wegbadja killed Dan for his resistance and built the palace on his grave. The palace was called Danhome (“in the belly of Dan”), whence the familiar version, Dahomey.^[3]

Dahomey was never a centralized kingdom but was composed of a loosely connected, yet highly organized, grouping of people using agriculture and the market for its major forms of economic support. Socially, it is com­posed for the most part of three structures: the family, the extended family, and the geographically decentralized sib groups or groupings of families.

The cultural exchange that comes along with contact through trade and war shapes the religious development of Dahomey. Its complex pantheon, ritual structure, and theological system are marked by contact with Yorùbá, Mahi, and Ketu. Robert Farris Thompson observes:

The deities of the Yorùbá had already made their presence felt in Dahomey over hundreds of years. Yorùbá de­ities were served under different manifestations in Allada before 1659. Fusion and refusion of Yorùbá spirits, first in Dahomey and then all over again in Haiti, go a long way toward explaining the phenomenon of multiple avatars of the same Dahomean-Yorùbá god. It also helps explain the persistence of the concept of the orisha in the black New World.^[4]

Dahomean religion is composed of a high God, lesser deities who are concerned with the daily dealings of life, spirits, ancestors, humans, other animals, and objects (see Figure 1). All of these elements are connected through an energy that gives shape to daily life. Maintaining balance of this energy involves the complex structures, in­formation and rituals that comprise the religious tradition and entail the way of service to the gods (vodun).^[5] The following story of creation puts this into perspective:

The world was created by one god, who is at the same time both male and female . . . named Nana-Buluku. In time, Nana-Buluku gave birth to twins, who were named Mawu and Lisa, and to whom eventually dominion over the realm thus created was added. To Mawu, the woman, was given command of the night; to Lisa, the man, command of the day; Mawu, therefore is the moon and inhabits the west, while Lisa, who is the sun, inhabits the east.^[6]

For the Dahomey, Nana-Buluku does not figure prominently in worship; rather, attention is given to Mawu-Lisa.^[7] This “deity may have been of Adja origin. . . . The cult was probably known in Dahomey before the reign of Tegbesou, for the name Lisa was used by the Capuchin monks to translate ‘Jesus’ in their version of the Doctrina Christiana prepared for their mission at Allada in 1658. Perhaps the safest conclusion is that the cult of Mawu-Lisa was not widespread in Dahomey proper until Tegbesou encouraged it for reasons of his own.”^[8]

There is debate concerning whether or not Mawu-Lisa receives direct attention from devotees or whether Mawu-Lisa is too distant to care for the daily affairs of humans. Regardless of one’s position, it is certain that Mawu-Lisa provides the energy that is the essence of life—the essential ontological energy for the human soul and all other forms of existence. Among them, Gû was given control over metal and war. Age was to rule the wil­derness and its animals. Djo was given control over the space between earth and sky—atmosphere and human destiny. Sakpata (Sagbata) was given control over the earth. (Dada Zodji and Nyohwe Ananu, children of Mawu and Lisa, descended to earth and produced children that control various aspects of life on earth. In this connec­tion, Sakpata is a term for a group of smallpox or earth deities.) Hebiosso owns the sky and punishes wrongdoing with thunder. Sogbo, who has power to create, remained with Mawu and Lisa in the sky and gave birth to several children, including Agbe and Naete. Agbe and Naete were given control over water—the oceans and the seas. Wete and Alawe, Aizu and Akazu are “storekeepers” for the original creators. Adjakpa is associated with water used by humans for nourishment and as a result has a valued place within the cosmos. Ayaba is also valued be­cause she is associated with fire.

Legba was made the mediator between the gods and humans. Each child of Mawu-Lisa was given a particular language which is indecipherable by the other vodun, or deities, “mysteries.” It is for this reason that Legba, who provides communication between the various realms, is so central to the workings of the world. Legba has no element of the cosmos with which he is associated, yet the workings of the world and the relationship between vodun and humans are impossible without him. Because of this, Legba must be approached prior to any of the other vodun if tasks are to be successfully fulfilled and rituals performed. Thus Legba has no place of his own, but his presence is required in all places. Because of Legba’s communicative importance, it is natural that he would have associations with Fa, the system of divination associated with Dahomean religion, which is at times referred to as the voice of Mawu.^[9] Legba, through this connection, is responsible for communicating human des­tinies. Although Legba is important, the principal figures among the children are Sakpata, Sogbo, and Agbe.^[10]

Da (force) marks an important aspect of the universe, the powerful nature of combinations. As Rob­ert Thompson remarks, “The good serpent of the sky, Da, is a metaphor for this primary sign of order. Like Mawu-Lisa, Da combines male and female aspects and is sometimes represented as twins. Many are his avatars, but principal among them is Da Ayido Hwedo, the rainbow-serpent. Coiling a resplendent bichromatic body about the earth, Da shaped its globelike form and sustained its balance and existence.”^[11] Da or Ayido Hwedo guarantees the movement of the celestial elements and is discernible to the human eye in the rainbow.

Theological anthropology is discernible through the outlining of the human soul (se), which is composed of numerous nonvisible elements: three souls (Selido, Semedo, and Semekokato), and the djoto or ancestral guide. It is believed that when a person passes away, Mawu uses the body to create another human, but the soul continues through a variety of possibilities and in a variety of locations. This, as Herskovits notes, highlights the concept of multiple souls. The djoto, often referred to as the ancestral guide, is the soul (or the eternal substance) inherited from one’s ancestors. Prior to being the djoto, or the individual’s given soul, it is the Semekokato, or the element that seeks out the body it will guard during life on earth. Once the Semekokato finds the clay out of which the body will be formed, the second soul or semedo inhabits the molded body and becomes the person’s individual or personal soul. The next soul, the Selido, is the portion of Mawu residing in each person. Conceived in anoth­er way: the Semekokato is the biological representation of the person; the selido is a person’s mind and instinct, which is responsible for reporting the person’s deeds to Mawu; and the semedo is the person’s personality.^[12]

Figure 1. Partial List of Dahomey Vodun^[13]
African Name	Function
Mawu	God Almighty
Lisa	Creativity God (usually understood as combined with Mawu)
Legba	Trickster and messenger between the gods and the gods and humans
Gû	Iron God and God of war
Age	God of the hunt and the bush
Sakpata	Ruler of the earth (who punishes with smallpox)
Hebiosso	God of the sky (who punishes with lightning)
Da (Ayido Hwedo)	Divine Serpent represented by the rainbow; assisted with crea...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Additional Praise for Varieties of African American Religious Experience
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Epigraphs
• Table Of Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Note on Orthography
• Introduction
• New Preface
• Case Studies: Traditions and Their Existential Link
• Toward a Comparative Theological Framework
• Bibliography
• Index