The indigenous religious beliefs and practices of African people includes various traditional religions.
Due to the diversity of African cultures, generalizations of these religions are difficult, because they don't have similar characteristics.
Generally, they are oral rather than scriptural, include belief in a supreme being, belief in spirits and other divinities, veneration of ancestors, use of magic, and traditional medicine.
The role of humanity is generally seen as one of harmonizing nature with the supernatural.
Traditional African religions have been passed down from one generation to another orally and can be found through art, rituals and festivals, beliefs and customs, names of people and places, songs and dances, proverbs, and myths.
Masquerades are an important part of the ancient divination in Africa. Source: Twitter
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While adherence to traditional religion in Africa is hard to estimate, due to to the advent of Christianity and Islam, practitioners are estimated to number 100 million, or 10% of the population of the continent.
Practitioners of traditional religions in sub-Saharan Africa are distributed among 43 countries, and were estimated to number about 90 million,] with the largest religions in Africa being Christianity and Islam.
West African religious practices generally manifest themselves in communal ceremonies and/or divinatory rites in which members of the community, overcome by force are excited to the point of going into meditative trance in response to rhythmic or mantric drumming and/or singing.
Followers of traditional African religions pray to various secondary deities (Ogoun, Da, Agwu, Esu, Mbari, Thiorak, etc.) as well as to their ancestors. These divinities serve as intermediaries between humans and God.
Most indigenous African societies believe in a single creator God (Chukwu, Nyame, Olodumare, Ngai, Roog, etc.). Some recognize a dual or complementary twin divinity such as Mawu-Lisa.
For example, in one of the Yoruba creation myths, Olodumare, the 'Supreme', is said to have created Obatala, as Arch-divinity, who then created humans on earth. Olodumare then infused those human creations with life. Each divinity has their own priest or priestess.
There are more similarities than differences in all traditional African religions. Often, God is worshiped through consultation or communion with lesser deities and ancestral spirits.
The deities and spirits are honored through libation, sacrifice (of animals, vegetables, or precious metals). The will of God is sought by the believer also through consultation of oracular deities, or divination.
In many traditional African religions, there is a belief in a cyclical nature of reality. The living stand between their ancestors and the unborn. Traditional African religions embrace natural phenomena.
The environment and nature are infused in every aspect of traditional African religions and culture. This is largely because cosmology and beliefs are intricately intertwined with the natural phenomena and environment.
All aspects of weather, thunder, lightning, rain, day, moon, sun, stars, and so on may become amenable to control through the cosmology of African people. Natural phenomena are responsible for providing people with their daily needs.
One of the most traditional methods of telling fortunes in Africa is called casting (or throwing) the bones. Because Africa is a large continent with many tribes and cultures, there is not one single technique.
Not all of the so-called bones are actually bones, small objects may include cowrie shells, stones, strips of leather, or flat pieces of wood. Some castings are done using sacred divination plates made of wood or performed on the ground (often within a circle) and they fall into one of two categories:
Casting marked bones, flat pieces of wood, shells, or leather strips and numerically counting up how they fall – either according to their markings or whether they do or do not touch one another – with mathematically based readings delivered as memorized results based on the chosen criteria.
Casting a special set of symbolic bones or an array of selected symbolic articles, e.g. a bird's wing bone to symbolize travel, a round stone to symbolize a pregnant womb, and a bird's foot to symbolize feeling.
In African society, many people seek out diviners on a regular basis. There are generally no prohibitions against the practice. Those who tell fortunes for a living are also sought out for their wisdom as counselors and for their knowledge of herbal medicine.
Most indigenous African religions have a dualistic concept of the person. In the Igbo language, a person is said to be composed of a body and a soul. In the Yoruba language, however, there seems to be a tripartite concept: in addition to body and soul, there is said to exist a spirit or an ori, an independent entity which mediates or otherwise interacts between the body and the soul.
Some religious systems have a specific devil-like figure (e.g. Ekwensu) who is believed to be the opposite of God.
Virtue in traditional African religion is often connected with the communal aspect of life. Examples include social behaviors such as the respect for parents and elders, raising children appropriately, providing hospitality, and being honest, trustworthy and courageous.
In some traditional African religions, morality is associated with obedience or disobedience to God regarding the way a person or a community lives.
While there are man made holy places (e.g. altars, shrines, temples, tombs, etc.), very often sacred space is located in nature (e.g. trees, groves, rocks, hills, mountains, caves, etc.).
These are some of the important centers of religious life: Nri-Igbo, the Point of Sangomar, Ile-Ife, Oyo, Dahomey, Benin City, Ouidah, Nsukka, Akan, Kanem-Bornu, Mali, and Igbo-Ukwu.
Many indigenous religions, like most religions, have elaborate stories that explain how the world was created, how culture and civilization came about, or what happens when a person dies
Other mythologies are meant to explain or enforce social conventions on issues relating to age, gender, class, or religious rituals. Myths are popular methods of education; they communicate religious knowledge and morality while amusing or frightening those who hear or read them.
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Allah's name appears on Moringa tree on NAIJ.com TV
Source: Naija.ng
ROSY CREST
Tuesday, 28 November 2017