African Yoruba Orisa worship is said to be a widely practiced African religion. The Yoruba religion is prominent in regions such as Brazil, Costa Rica, Columbia, Trinidad, Haiti, Trinidad, and Cuba. This religious practice has a few differences from Christianity. One of the most obvious differences would be that Christianity is a monotheistic religion, and the Yoruba religion is assumed to be polytheistic.
When the Africans were brought to the New World during the Maafa, many of them practiced this Yoruba orisa worship. It was assumed by the slave masters that their form of worship was a form of witchcraft. Therefore, the slave masters and owners began to punish the slaves for this type of behavior brutally stripped of their natural culture. The slaves were then brutally beaten and ultimately forced to convert to
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Orunmila is also the orisa of wisdom. He oversees the cures for illnesses and deformities and has the knowledge of the human form.
Obatala, symbolized by a white cloth, is the god of purity, morality and the overseer of mankind. Obatala was originally given the dignified task of creating the Earth, but is said that on his way to Earth, he strayed into a party and became drunk and failed his task of creating the Earth. Obatala’s brother Oduduwa, jumped at the opportunity to succeed at his brother’s drunken and failed attempt. Oduduwa stole the tools given to his brother and created the Earth. Their father, Olorun, was so pleased with his creation, that he deemed Oduduwa as the god of the Earth, and ordered Obatala to begin creating man kind.
Sango, the warrior god is the god of thunder, lightning and fire. Sango is associated with the ram and the colors red and white. He is symbolized by a double-headed axe which represents his timely and balanced justice. Sango is also said to have been a magician, but those powers were stolen from him by his third
The Yoruba religion was brought to the Hispanic Caribbean approximately four hundred years ago by African slaves during the period of conquest and colonization of the new world. The religion remained traditionally strong among the African community until the Spanish conquerors began to prohibit its practice. When the Spaniards reached the New lands they brought with them the religion of the reigning King. That is Queen Isabella's religion; Catholosism. The conquerors forced the slaves to accept the Catholic faith as their new religion. The African, stripped already of their dignity refuse to give up their religious beliefs, this belief being all they brought with them. Knowing of the negative ramnifications, punishment and sometimes even death if caught "devil worshipping" it meant that in order to continue to worship theri Gods the angry Africans had to find a way to practice thier religion. They astutely hide theri religion behind Catholic religious practices and saints.
During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the majority of slave brought to the new world were young men who were mostly not especially religious. Very few Africans had previously obtained Christian beliefs prior to being shipped from Africa to the New World. The majority of slaves were, in fact, followers of...
The slaves went along with the demands of the slave owner’s ideals of paternalism and in return were able to manipulate the system to create their own culture within the plantation, therefore using accommodation as a tool of resistance and revolting. Many slave owners often saw religion as a form of “social control” and feared those without religion. While the masters believed they were in control, the slaves used Christianity as a sense of hope, community and equality. The slaves combined Christianity and African traditions, and emphasized the ideal of “the irrepressible affirmation of life” meaning they never let the world around them affect their joy in life. This helped many slaves get through life, create their own identity, and deal with the life they were given. The slaves molded their beliefs, therefore creating a religion of resistance and defiance. The strong unity of religion brought the slave community closer, therefore aiding them in the creation of culture, family life and traditions on the
Each colony passed in fear of rebellion laws regulating slave’s behaviors. These laws were called slave codes. Each colony had opposing beliefs about the rights of slaves. Legally slaves could not own land of their own. They could not assemble together with out a white person present. If a slave lived off a plantation, they had a spherical curfew to follow. If a slave committed a crime against a white person, the slave was condemned. Slaves could not testify against a white person in a court of law. Slave codes had devastating effects on African American society. Slaves could not be taught to read or write. White Christians taught the slaves to read the Bible. Although the same Christian did not honor marriages between slaves in the laws. By not horning marriages made it easier to vindicate the breakup of families when it came to selling one of their family members. As time went on the African Americans grew in numbers in the new world, so did the white captors. With every new rebellion, came more strict slave codes, they had very few privileges, this would distress most people (US History,
From the Yoruba cosmological myths, in the beginning of time, Olodumare (God) sent seventeen divinities to earth. Sixteen of the primordial divinities were male while one of them being a female named Osun. The male being the majority in number excluded Osun from making decisions and in turn, Osun retaliated by gathering all women around the universe to disrupt the activities of the sixteen male divinities. The women succeeded in their quest prompting the male to seek divine intervention from Oldumare who advised them on making peace with Osun.
The punishments provided for offenders against the law were very severe. Even against whites, the punishments were tough and embarrassing. Whenever an Englishman slept with a slave, the accused had to confess in front of the entire church that next sunday. The church would be disgusted at this idea because not only was the other partner a slave, but the relationship was also before marriage. Actions such as this would change the way people looked at the accused Englishman. Additionally, Africans had
From the 1800’s until the 1900’s colonialism was a major force in the world and every country has been affected by it in some way. Colonialism, the belief that a technologically advanced nation has the right to exploit the land, people, and resources of a less developed people (MHD), is the main reason behind the syncretistic or blended (MHD) religions of Africa. Originally, Africa had an animistic religious system, where everything was caused or linked to spirits, but during colonialism this changed. The colonial era brought Christianity to Africa and before long the standing religion syncretized, or blended (MHD), with Christian beliefs.
The majority of the Yoruba people live on the west coast of Africa in Nigeria, but can also be found in many other places, as they are one of the largest cultural classifications in Africa. There are approximately 40 million Yoruba world-wide. As a matter of fact, most of the slaves brought to America were Yoruban, and descendants of their tribes can be found everywhere, including Europe, Brazil, Cuba, and the Caribbean. The Yoruba have been constructing and thriving in sophisticated urban kingdoms for more than 1,500 years, and have produced extraordinary art work since the 5th century BC.
Based on Santería, people are born under a guardian Orisha, or saint, that must be worshipped throughout life. Each Orisha is an aspect of one supreme god. The seven main Orishas are known as the Seven African Powers. Eleggua is the gatekeeper between life and the afterlife in heaven and is the connection between the Orishas, humans, and god. He is very powerful because without him, there would be no communication between humanity and the saints. The Catholic Saint that is associated with Eleggua is Saint Anthony, and the colors associated with him are red and black.
To further understand the role of the owners’ inference and belief in civilising the slaves, this section will explore the role of religion in developing the slave community. The religion of Christianity was regarded by the whites as the religion of the civilised. For this reason, slaves had to be indoctrinated into Christianity. This conversion began in the second half of the eighteenth century and was a prominent element of the lives of Antebellum slaves. Yet, this created a problem for slaveholders. The problem was that the religion which they were trying to promote, stressed on equality of all, and to treat others how you would like to be treated. Therefore, a solution was that the slaves heard selective teachings of Christianity, the theology of which focused on obedience in life, and salvation in the afterlife. Obedience to masters while on Earth will result in the rewards in heavens. Christianity is an umbrella religion, with many variants under
distinctions between African and European culture, their religion shared some characteristics. The Africans believed in a supreme being or a creator, but they had never given this being the name of God or Jesus Christ. They also had lesser gods, but they took on various different names. Blassinggame simply states it as being “In America, Jehovah replaced
Beginning in 1770, slaves in the southern states began to convert to evangelism religions such as Methodist and Baptist Faiths. Ways of worship such as clapping, dancing and singing were encouraged by evangicals, which was similar to African worship patterns. The idea that Christians were equal in the sight of God was a message that provided hope to slaves. In 1800, emphasis was placed on Protestant evangelicalism, individual freedom and direct communication with God. In 1810, slave trade in the U.S. came to an end. During this time period, whites would insist on slave attendance at the white controlled church where ministers promoted obedience to ones master. Blacks saw white actions as a mockery of the "true" Christian message of equality
African-Americans utilized American Christianity as an embodiment of hope and comfort during a time of oppression. While they endured backbreaking labor and physical abuse from their overseers, they likely sought a spiritual experience characterized by movement and loud vocals such as when they were “seized by the spirit” for a positive physical ritual in their life. Additionally, God to them was an entity outside of the plantation that was rooting for them because he believed in universal human equality and the evils of slavery and abuse. For slaves, especially in the South, this encouragement was likely hard to come by. If this was the case, slaves believed that judgment would set things right and that hopefully they would not live their whole lives enslaved. However, the teachings that slaves were given during white sermons were fragmented and they knew it. Specifically, African-Americans acknowledged the emphasis on servitude expressed in white interpretations but the lack of passages related to their masters’ wrongdoings.
Christianity is the largest religion in sub-Saharan Africa, it was first introduced to north Africa, it slowly started spreading west to Ethiopia. But even with Christianity slowly spreading throughout Africa, it wasn’t prominent until slavery, where Christianity was being forced upon the enslaved Africans by the Europeans. There’s different variations to the Christianity religion, everybody practices and worship in their own way; but some things they do have in common is that Christians do have places of worship no matter what type of Christian you are, there is always a church for the people to worship and praise god. Even though most people interpret the bible differently, all Christians still use the bible as their layout of worship. The last religion I wanted to highlight was the Islam religion; there’s about 234 million Africans that follow the Islam religion. Most of the Africans who practiced the Islam faith was centered in north Africa, but even with all these religions being based in Africa; Muslims had a different way of worshipping their god. Muslims called their God (Allah), which was founded by the prophet Muhammed in the seventh century. Christianity and Judaism influenced the Islam religion, it
As the English began to colonize the Igbo society, there were few natives who opposed it, they others just felt that the English would come and go, but they were wrong. Soon, the English began to introduce "white man's religion." This new religion was completely the opposite from what the natives were accustomed to. Christianity was rather intriguing to many of the natives and many of them turned away from their families and everything they were to become a member of this new religion. Before this, they natives had been very superstious, but as they new religion flooded over the peoples, their superstiousocity began to lessen and their belief in the many gods they had previously believed in.