Over the last months I have noticed an
increase in resentments concerning the use of saints in sorcerous contexts and
in particular within cults and faiths of African pedigree. A few people have
written asking how Christian Saints and African faiths are at all compatible
and some have written to tell that this Christian oppression of African faiths
must cease as yet others of a more Satanic inclination have expressed a furious
resentment with mentioning orixa and in particular Christian saints as being
remotely related to Quimbanda in any form or way. It is my understanding that
it is a field that invites confusion, so I hope this blog posting can make
these matters more tangible and clear.
As detailed in Palo Mayombe in relation to
Kimpa Vita (1684 -1706) and the rise of Antonianism in the African territory
that was referred to as ‘Congo’, but designated at large Bantu and Ewe speaking
people spread out south and north in Western Africa. The ‘Congos’ arrived to Brazil
from Cabinda and counted people from Angola, Congo and other countries sharing
linguistic and religious similarities.
We find in relation to Kimpa Vita and her
movement words like makungu and nkisi applied
on saints and symbols of the Christian faith in the early days of the Christian
mission. The word makungu were used
to describe saints like St. Anthony, St. Benedict and Our Lady of the Rosary
that were experienced to have a particular affinity with the African people.
The word makungu means ‘elevated
ancestor’. This means that the African view upon saints were motivated by the
concept held about what enables a person upon death to become an ancestor that
could take an active role in people’s lives. The word nkisi could also be used, which loosely means ‘a thing of power’,
and was considered a vital and vibrant extension of Nzambi/God. This word would
also be used to describe a saint like St. Anthony who was also given an African
name ‘as nkisi’, in his case Cuye
Lumbemba, with its variations, is known in Palo Brillumba to be the nkisi moving this saint.
Another phenomenon worthy of mentioning is
the battle in Lepanto at the Ionian Sea in 1571 where the Portuguese occupants
saw a victory over the Moorish people which they attributed to the protection
of Our Lady of the Rosary which was at the time known as Our Lady of Victory.
Her feast day is 7th of October and the fest day is attributed to
the date of victory in this battle at Lepanto. She became a popular saint and
her cult was early on installed in the district known as ‘Congo’. However, it
seemed that this saint favoured the Africans more than the missionaries and
occupants and so she became rapidly a saint seen as protecting the Africans.
Countless stories in the 17th Century speak of her showing herself
in epiphanies exclusively for Africans and in this way her cult spread out as
an exclusively ‘Congolese’ cult. It was something about her legends and myths,
to gain victory when confronted with impossible opposition that nurtured a kinship,
and her benevolence towards the Africans that turned her into an ‘elevated
ancestor’.
Her cult arrived to Brazil in 1713 with
the Congolese slaves that were sent to Ouro Preto, Minas Gerais. We find her
here together with St. Benedict and St. Anthony as patrons for exclusively
African fraternities completely dislocated from the Church save for its
clerical blessing to exist. The records from the archbishopric of Ouro Preto
1745 states that the existence of these fraternities are maintained as a ways
of keeping peace in the district, while the practice of the cult with dance,
drums, gunpowder and possessions were seen as barbaric and savage, a heresy
better left alone. This fraternity became even more important in 1747 when Ganga Zumba Galanga, a ‘Congolose’ king
was installed as such in Ouro Preto under the name of King Chico. He gained
rapidly his freedom and was given a portion of the mines to work for himself,
making him a very wealthy king.
What effectively happened in this
situation was a spiritual coup on a saint that seemed to provide success for
the Africans and making her theirs. The good fortune befalling King Chico would
attest to her favours being more attainable for the Africans than the people of
the Church. The coronation of King Chico was a turning point in many regards,
but in particular how it enabled the Africans that unwillingly came to Brazil
to accept this New Land as their land, because victory was affirmed to be a
possibility with King Chico’s success and coronation.
What should be taken notice of here is
that this particular saint came from Cabinda/Angola to Brazil with the slaves
and not through the people of the Church. As any careful study of the attempts
of turning the Bantu speaking people into true Christians testify to, they
might have accepted aristocratic titles, baptism and the powers of saints – but
usually on their own premises that shaped and forged the understanding of
saints in a distinct African world view. In other words, the understanding they
held of Christian dogma was a constant heresy that was over the time just
allowed to exist.
We should in this context be be mindful of
the idea vested in the term nkisi, ‘a
thing of power’. Anything of power was conceived of as a ray and reflex of
Nzambi – and if a thing of power was available for use it was also up for being
taken and cultivated if it responded to ones petitions and summoning. If the
saint was white or black didn’t mattered, what mattered was if it worked. This
fact is demonstrated in Kimbisa and how Christian saints are adopted into a field
of syncretism resting on African – and in particular ‘Congolese’ tenants – so in
the end it is not Christianity abducting African faith, but quite the opposite.
We find a similar syncretism in Quimbanda
from the 1920’s and onward where practitioners of what was known as ‘low
spiritism’, Candomblé de Caboclo and macumba in general attempted to sort out
the spiritual legacy in Brazil in terms of lineages. Around 1930 we find St.
Cyprian being in control of the African line of Umbanda. In this line we find
Pai Cabinda, Pai Congo, Zun-guiné and many others that were known as pretos
velhos, or ‘old blacks’ were testifying to the African heritage. Certainly a
Christian bias was present at this time when white intellectuals gravitated
towards Umbanda from Kardec’s spiritism that was widespread in urban centres,
in particular Salvador and Rio do Janeiro, and attempts of elevating this ‘low
spiritism’ found in the African line were set in motion. This syncretism helped
in fleshing out the particular stream of macumba cultivated in Rio de Janeiro
and Minas Gerais into becoming known as Quimbanda. Now Macumba/Quimbanda was
not a uniform cult. It varied from place to place and house to house in
relation to what was proven effective and thus in these earlier manifestations,
brought from the cabulas (the refuges of runaway slaves and also more or less
free African communities) we found symphonies of what was just called ‘macumba’
in the sense of something sorcerous, something belonging to the many reflexes
of ‘low spiritism’.
In the late 1940s Aluizo Fontenelle wrote a
book called ‘Exu’ where he as a white intellectual presented a syncretism of
the spirits of Quimbanda with the daimonic spirits of Grimorium Verum. His work
was an adaption of the knowledge circulating in particular houses of macumba in
Rio do Janeiro that was practicing ‘low spiritism’, which was another name
applied on what we know as Quimbanda today – but at the time also included
Umbanda, which was partly established on the practice known as Candomblé de
Caboclo as well as macumba.
Fontenelle, an ardent student of the works
of Eliphas Levi, worked out a ponto for Exu Rei that represented a fusion of
Lucifer and Ogum, the orixa of iron and blacksmithery, while he assigned the
role of Maioral to St. Michael the Archangel.
As his book makes clear this role is not
given because Fontenelle is interested in converting the sorcerous African line,
it is a connection made because of St. Michael’s capacity of controlling these unruly
forces worked in Quimbanda. St. Michael with all demons under his cape is de
facto the King demon himself and was understood to represent a principle of order
and respect in a cult of hierarchy. In other words his work was about establishing
a spiritual order rooted in principles from Christian theology he felt made
justice to the streams of macumba, Quimbanda, Umbanda and spiritism he was involved
with. It was his way of making sense of things, not a Christian mission on his
part.
It is understandable that the presence of
a saint or two in cults sorcerous in nature puzzle people, but we need to understand
that for the Angolan priest in the 16th Century that sensed power in
a saint, it is in the same ways today for a practitioner who works with both
hands and understand the concept of dual observance. At the end of the day, it
is this we are speaking of, how you can see in a saint, a contradiction that
with a particular approach can be turned into a force of personal use. For
instance St. Cyprian holds all this ambiguity of being a sorcerer that
converted to Christianity because he realized some power there, but he didn't
abandoned what he was doing prior to his conversion, rather he added one more storehouse
of power to his arsenal of magic. It was not about giving up what he had, it
was about accepting one more stream of power.
If we make an attempt of undressing saints
and angels, demons and spirits from the cultural and religious fabric we tend
to veil them in we can enable a direct and true communion where we see them for
what they are and not blinded by the religious fabric they are wrapped up in or
the doctrine of faith we have wrapped ourselves up into.
In particular when it comes to saints we
should be mindful that every saint was once a human being that upon death was
elevated, just like people living remarkable lives in conformity with their Fate
were seen as individuals that might be elevated upon death in many African
faiths.
For sure for many saints and the Christian
faith itself carries the air of oppression in the memory of its blood soaked
missions, but when our passions clouds our clarity of mind we impose veils of
resentment and the cloth of judgment upon spirits and saints that are not necessarily
true.
I believe everything should be question
and that we should be slow in making conclusions. We never know what the next
day brings and we never know if the demonized person or spirit is our confidant
if we don’t give them a chance because of our prejudgments and internalized
dogma. Incidents like Our Lady of the Rosary that was adopted by Bantu/kimbundu
speaking Africans and brought to Brazil by them should at least give us a
reason to pause and reflect and question if the world is as black and white as
some tend to think or if matters are more fluid and dynamic than this.
For sure this brings no comfort for the
soul of he or she who have figured it all out until the last brick in the dogma,
but we need to realize that history is nothing but a series of facts that we attempt
to make sense of with our prejudgments and personal bias that shoots in all
possible direction in the process. I mean when you are convinced beyond doubt
that a given thing is exactly as it is, well, doubt should be invited in again
and again...
... and as for the spirits themselves and
how we cultivate them, well, the proof rest in actually doing the work and
being attentive to what is going on in the invisible realms and be honest in
our assessment of what works and what don’t work. Just because you see enmity between two
friends it is not necessarily so. Perspectives can fool us as much as they
enlighten us. Because this pragmatic frame of mind is not only the attitude of
a sorcerer; it is also very much ‘Congolese’...