Starting in the 16th century, large numbers of Yoruba natives were transported as slaves to the Caribbean and the Americas. They combined beliefs and practices from their Ifa religion with elements of Roman Catholicism to produce the syncretistic religions of Candomblé, Palo Mayombe, Santeria, Vodun, etc. These are now flourishing in the Caribbean, South America and North America, notably in Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, Grenada, the Guyanas, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts, St. Vincent, Tobago, and Trinidad.http://www.religioustolerance.org/ifa.htm
In their mind everything African is chained to slavery,never mind there were always African populations in the Caribbean and S.America dating from ancient times.
Ifa,and its derivatives are actually extremely complicated with extensive pantheons and detailed requirements of its devotees and practitioners. However they all share certain main themes
- Prominence of female priests
- Ritual music and dance
- exorcism
- Human and Animal sacrifice
- execration ritual
- Belief in spirits
- Ancestor Veneration
"You could see the mouth and eyes of the snake. It looked like a real python," said Sheila Coulson of the University of Oslo. "The play of sunlight over the indentations gave them the appearance of snake skin. At night, the firelight gave one the feeling that the snake was actually moving."
From the wall of Apep.
Cotzolcoatl,the feathered serpent of the Aztecs is a direct product of the ancient African religious concept of the snake and ideas of death and rebirth.
Snakes,particularly pythons are still an important part of modern voodoo.
Beninese voodoo priestesses.
A typical S.Indian carving of the snake gods.
Krishna dancing on the kaliya serpent.
The god Shiva,king of all nagas.
3000 year old Afro Minoan carving of the female snake motiff.Yes,Africans were also there!
This religion morphed into the Nile Valley faiths and even Hinduism. Even a casual glance will show the same elements apart from female priestesses which died out as the Turkic Caucasoids introduced patriarchy in their society as they spread out from the Central Asian homeland.
Hinduism is the worlds oldest religion
ReplyDeleteBut do you know the identity of the first Hindus?
Delete"The uploader ,himself a Tamil proves numerous similarities between bantu speaking Cameroonians and Tamil."
http://karanjazplace.blogspot.co.ke/2012/09/the-secret-histories-of-black-people_10.html
Ifa and the dahomey region wich is voodoo is not the same. Also in ifa no human sacrifices were ever conducted. Also in ifa no female priest is allowed. Santeria has nothing to do with voodoo as they were opposing rival powers and diferent city states empires. Voodoo has diferent Gods and believes. Ifa is from the Yoruba empire of ilè ife and expanded to Oyo empire. Never were the Benin wich is dahomey part of the Yoruba empire they only paid tribute in a certain time in history. Voodoo does practice human sacrifice and female priestes. Ifa does not. Thing in common they have is ancestral veneration. And enchantment by Orishas (gods) to the person possession. and very few individuals experience it.santeria was mixed with catholicism but it was just camouflaged. Nowhere were they ever Christians or a pagan sect of Christianity. They are pure African ifa. Unlike Haitian voodoo with includes rituals of native Americans combined with other regions mainly the one from dahomey (Benin). Ifa is diferent from voodoo. In fact they were enemy.
ReplyDeleteThanks for that clarification,Johnny! Btw,early Catholicism was brought to Europe by the first blacks who were in situ til at least the 1700s. It had much in common with Ifa. Here's a pic of the pope and the black Madonna. http://d39ya49a1fwv14.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads
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