ABSTRACT
Orisha can best be understood as a complex and hierarchical set of relationships between Olodumare, the orisha, human beings, other living things such as animals and plants, and nonliving, natural objects such as rocks and water. All are embedded in spiritual “webs of relationships” in which each exists in direct and intimate relation to the others.3 Orisha is what I
consider a living religion, as it is an everyday, interactive set of beliefs, obligations, sacrifices, prayers, and deeds in the name of Olodumare, the Yoruba creator god, and the deities that serve as messengers to and for Olodumare.4 No sacrifices are ever made to Olodumare (the embodiment of ashe, the creative force that occupies all things and makes all things happen), and priests and practitioners supplicate via the deities that serve as representative liaisons. The lines that are usually drawn between the sacred and secular realms of existence and understanding, are blurred, as the sacred exists in the secular: for example, the orisha reside in pots in people’s homes or temples in the forms of specific aesthetically styled stones. To many, this would seem baffling. In fact, in Carl Hunt’s book on the Yoruba movement in America, one of his respondents stated, “I remember when the initiation rituals were over and we were preparing to leave the Temple and return to America, our Godfather told us to open our pots and see what we had, and there was nothing in them but stones. And I thought, ‘Oh my God! You mean I spent $2000 for some stones to take home to my wife’; and there was embarrassment and shock at the same time.”5 But to the initiated, the fact that the sacred energy of the orisha is found in the stones is not baffling: when the orisha came to earth to make it habitable for human beings, they left their respective essences, their ashe, in various objects and places on earth such as stones, trees, water, soil, and animals. These objects and substances are understood to vibrate with the original energies of the orisha themselves and are thus given in initiations and used in other ritual moments and procedures. But the orisha are more than messengers for Olodumare. They are extensions of Olodumare that are often associated with aspects of nature and culture, and they all have their own distinct personalities, likes, and taboos. For example, Eshu is understood to be the ambiguously characterized guardian of the crossroads, an eternal trickster yet a stringent judge of act and character. Yemonja, on the other hand, is understood to be the kind and cool maternal deity of the ocean, nursing, and midwives, while Ogun embodies male virility, weaponry, and warfare.6 Thus, devotees can appeal to a particular orisha for guidance and assistance with certain personal life and health problems.
