Yoruba World View
Since I got good feedback on my little post asking if people wanted to learn more about witchy/spiritual things from other cultures, I thought Iâd start off sharing information on the people of Yoruba and their view of the cosmos!
All information that I will be stating can be sourced from A History of Art in Africa (2nd Edition) by Monica Visona. All of what I post is what Iâve learned from my Art History Professor at school.
I will post as a red more since this will be a bit lengthy <3
The Yoruba people are an ethnic group of southwestern and north-central Nigeria, as well as southern and central Benin. This diagram above demonstrates their view of the cosmos. As you can see, there is a a spiritual world and material world; it is a circle intersected by a line. The material world that we live in is called the AyĂ© and the spiritual world where the spirits, ancestors, and gods live is called the Ărun. As you can see, the lines indicate that both the world of the living and the spiritual world still interact/influence each other.Â
The Gods
As mentioned prior, the minor Gods are in the spirit world. The Yoruba terminology for the minor Gods is Ărisa, pronounced as âOrishaâ. They are in charge of various particular things. People worship and pray to these gods and goddesses for specific things. Some are similar to the Greek and Roman pantheons!
Some Ărisa are:
Obatala (creativity)
Odudua (earth)
Olokun (ocean)
Oshun (river and love)
Shango (lightning)
Ogun (iron and war)
Osanyin (healing and herbal medicine)
Orunmila/Ifa (divination)
Esu/Elegba (messenger and trickster deity)
Do you see a similarity between the Ărisa and the Greek/Roman Pantheon?
There are over 200 Ărisa in just Yorubaland alone! Some Ărisa lived on Earth as human beings but instead of dying, they became deities. For example, Shango was a powerful king but then became the God of Lightning when he passed.
The Ancestors
I will touch a little bit on the ancestors in Yoruba belief but will definitely go in depth more about them on a separate post because they are VERY important in the Yoruba belief system and deserve a whole lengthy post about them! The ancestors in Yoruba culture are called Egun which translates to bone. We walk along the Earth above the bones of the ancestors that came before us.
Even when family members die, they are still considered part of the family in Yoruba culture and are highly worshipped to aid in everyday life, travel, having children and more! Even to the Oba, the king, ancestors are VERY important in making chiefly decisions and judgements on punishments, his leadership and other things pertaining to the kingdom. There is a whole process, which I will go in depth on in a future post, on how the Yoruba people bury their dead in order for them to become an ancestor.Â
Ancestors are seen to be quite powerful and full of knowledge because they once lived on this earth as human beings.
As I stated before, I will definitely go in depth more on the ancestors in Yoruba culture! I hope Iâve helped you understand a bit more on the Yoruba People!
PLEASE LET ME KNOW IF SOMETHING IS INACCURATE SO I CAN MAKE PROPER CHANGES TO EDUCATE PEOPLE <3
Did you know?
Did you know that because of the Transatlantic Slave Trade, the Yoruba people were brought to countries such as Cuba, Dominican Republic, Saint Lucia, Jamaica, Brazil, Grenada, Trinidad and Tobago, among others?
Maybe itâs redundant, but they were brought to the U.S. too. Like most of us are descendent of the slaves from said trade. I know it shouldnât bother me that we arenât in that list, but it always feels like u.s. blacks are always left out of the list. Like you arenât really African unless youâre carribean, south American or central American. Itâs getting real old, seeing as the only thing of our ancestry we were able to keep was jumping the broom. Idk it just seems to happen alot and itâs annoying.
But great post!
