“[Obeah] Ọbịa by Igbo Spelling”
Against the backdrop of the demonization of Africana Religious Traditions (ARTs), peoples of African descent, in shame and ignorance, and seduced by the benefits of a ruthless capitalist Christianity, fail to affirm the value of their ancestral spirituality. In Jamaica and other parts of the Anglop...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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UJ Press
2024-07-01
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| Series: | African Journal of Gender and Religion (AJGR) |
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| Online Access: | https://journals.uj.ac.za/index.php/ajgr/article/view/3325 |
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| Summary: | Against the backdrop of the demonization of Africana Religious Traditions (ARTs), peoples of African descent, in shame and ignorance, and seduced by the benefits of a ruthless capitalist Christianity, fail to affirm the value of their ancestral spirituality. In Jamaica and other parts of the Anglophone Caribbean, the word “Obeah”, a label for African spirituality, remains misunderstood, demonized, and criminalized as Christians consistently thwart any effort to value it. Dibịa-Professor Umeh’s spiritual oeuvre provides necessary redress to the epistemicide that fuels the continued criminalization of “Obeah”. This article presents John Umeh’s After God is Dibịa: Igbo Cosmology, Divination & Sacred Science in Nigeria, Vols. 1 and 2 as performative texts that affirm traditional African Priesthood as honorable, valuable, and necessary, while negating the myth of a superior white male god and consequent female inferiority. I explore these acts of writing the Igbo Dibịahood as sacred performances of testimony, communion and redemption. The emphasis on Dibịa ethics, I posit as offering a critique of Christian priestcraft. African defined Ọbịa rejects eurocentric impositions on the term by affirming it as a healing vocation and inclusive priesthood defined by wisdom and knowledge. Through attention to the feminine space of revival, Ọbịa balmyard, I explore similarities with continental antecedents and present female Dibịahood as a radical faith tradition that insists on the power of Nne Agwu, Mother Holy Spirit. The respell of Ọbịa through eight emanations is shown as a potent antidote against epistemicide. By affirming the sacredness of matriarchal power, the dignity of traditional Dibịahood and the ethical force of traditional knowledge, Umeh exemplifies a priest class worthy of the name.
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| ISSN: | 2707-2991 |