Oops, we're also a religious system

[lb_lee]

Mori: Well, it took me a while, but I finished Maya Deren's Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. It didn't take me this long because I was bored by it; on the contrary, I took like twenty pages of notes, way more than the other stuff I've been reading lately. I still don't have the guts to take on Jung's The Red Book yet (the last time I tried to read Jung, it was a SLOG), so on to Leslie Desmangles's Faces of the Gods: Vodou and Roman Catholicism in Haiti! And Desmangles, quoting Deren, sums up a big part of why it took us so long to figure out we're also a religious-based system:

The concept of belief in Haiti does not have the same connotation that it does in English (Deren, 1972). The English word belief suggests an intellectual activity by which one may or may not choose to identify with a system of thought. Vodouisants never think of believing in something in the sense of identifying with a system of thought--or, by extension, with a community that affirms such a system [...].

Asked if they believe in the Vodou deities, notes Maya Deren, Vodouisants never reply that they believe in the gods; rather, they answer, 'I serve the lwas,' or 'I obey the Mysteries of the world' (1972, 73-74).The significance of their statements lies in their outlook on the nature of belief in general, for they do not think of religion in abstract terms, but in practical ones. [...] Vodouisants cannot afford the self-surrender of mysticism, nor can they permit themselves the luxury of an idealism that seeks to mask the miseries and frustrations of their existence. Their needs are too immediate for that. Their religion must satisfy actual needs rather than merely invite them to high-flown intellectual exercises of theology. Deren observes that they have neither the time, the energy, or the means for inconsequential activity. She notes that in Haiti, religion 'must do more than give moral sustenance; it must do more than rationalize [the Vodouisant's] instinct for survival when survival is no longer a reasonable activity. It must do more than provide a reason for living; it must provide the means of living. It must serve the organism as well as the psyche. It must serve as a practical methodology, not an individual hope. In consequences, the Haitian thinks of his religion in working terms.'

(Desmangles, pg. 4-5)

We were forever getting hung up on the hook of, "you don't BELIEVE this nonsense, do you?" and thus wasting time trying to figure out our beliefs when they were irrelevant. We were putting the cart before the horse. It is not our intellectual systems of thought that create our religious experiences; it is through living, working through, and understanding the experiences that we build appropriate actions surrounding them. The actions come first; the abstractions, the boxes humans make to put stuff in, come later.

So much for origins! Every time we ask, the answer is "yes and." "Yes, you're a soulbonder, AND you've got the DID/DDNOS/OSDD depending who's looking at you, AND you're gonna have to deal with that religion shit, which will conveniently fail to mesh with others' so you'll just have to make it up as you go along... good luck, kid!"

Comments

[feotakahari]

I don’t get the distinction between intellectual exercise and usefulness. My impression is that for a lot of people, the intellectual exercise IS what’s useful.

[lb_lee]

Mori: In our case, it's the difference between intellectual pondering and "I need to not die now. How do I not die?" Intellectual exercise can be useful, but our needs were/are more immediate and physical. It's like pondering food when you're starving--you can't THINK your way out of starvation.

[talewisefellowship]

a friend of mine did a presentation on fairy belief in ireland just this week and said something that makes me think of this. Apparently when asked if they believe in fairies, irish people often answer that they don't, but then they say that their mother or neighbor or someone had an encounter with the fairies and that this is an honest person who would never tell a lie.

I'm not sure that it's the same thing but it makes me think of that.

EDIT: Also because fairies inhabit ancient monuments such as fort remains, if there's a plan to destroy a monument for construction then the entire community rallies to stop it because it would upset the fairies and bad things would happen, and at least in the case that my friend described are successful. So even though irish people tend to be ambivalent about whether or not they believe in the fairies, either way there's a deeply felt emotional sense that they share the world with them.

--Janusz

[lb_lee]

Mori: I've read that too! Heh, wonder if your classmate read the same book...

When asked "do you believe in...?" It's almost always a trick question to make you display whether you're one of the "good ones" or not, I figure. It's also maddening: if Being is RIGHT THERE and can fuck you up because it's RIGHT THERE and a part of daily life, belief is irrelevant!

Me, nothing I have heard of fairies makes me want to cross one. I would avoid bulldozing their stupid mound just to keep them AWAY.

[talewisefellowship]

it's possible, I can ask next time I see her.

And yeah its true that thats not a question you could answer yes to without losing face, and its true, belief is irrelevant. Honestly I've felt like the debates that christians and atheists of christian origin get into as to whether or not god exists is missing the point. the point isn't whether or not god exists the point is whether or not god(s) have any sort of presence in the world you inhabit, which is a very different question with different answers for different people. And my answer to that question is that the world is full of gods. I think there are thousands all over the world, but I'm only drawn to a very small number of them. I don't know all or even most of these gods, I just know that the world is teeming with them.

As for the ancient monuments, fairies or not, I wouldn't want to destroy them anyway just because they're ancient and have history. Which is another way of saying I have a basic reverence for past people or ancestors as they're more commonly called (they dont have to be my ancestors necessarily), which is itself an ancient way of thinking. Incidentally, it turns out that in irish folk belief, some fairies are ancestors so that comes full circle and makes sense as to why they'd hang out around fort ruins and such.

--Janusz

[talewisefellowship]

Update: I asked my friend and apparently the anecdote came from her own personal experience talking to people in Ireland, and then she later read that this was a common response.

I found the papers she cited for her presentation, here they are:

A New Solution of the Fairy Problem
Author(s): David MacRitchie
Source: The Celtic Review, Vol. 6, No. 22 (Oct., 1909), pp. 160-176
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/30070215

Ringforts or Fairy Homes: Oral Understandings and the Practice of Archaeology in
Nineteenth- and Early Twentieth-Century Ireland
Author(s): Máirín Ní Cheallaigh
Source: International Journal of Historical Archaeology , June 2012, Vol. 16, No. 2,
Archaeology, Memory, and Oral Tradition (June 2012), pp. 367-384
Published by: Springer
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23258947

Unfortunately I've not had time to read these even though I'd really love to. If you're interested but need help accessing the articles, the Hub of Science is available on the internet.

--Janusz

[lb_lee]

Ooh sweet, thank you! Yeah, we heard it from a book of fairy oral traditions, definitely not either of those.

[talewisefellowship]

Yeah it seems like a common enough occurrence in Ireland that it's probably been mentioned in multiple sources.

--Janusz

[starfallhaven]

Reminds me of a common sentiment I see in a lot of pagan communities. "The gods can fuck your shit up or knock on your door whether you believe in them or not". I don't know if even believe in the gods I worship, so much as I know what Helps, ritual-wise, and that there's something funky that happens when I do certain shit or pray to certain gods. Maybe it's all bullshit! Who knows! If so it's effective bullshit!

[lb_lee]

Mori: yeah, a chaos magician we read said that you don't need to believe in something for it to ask you for a light. Its existence may not be dis/provable yet, but neither is MY existence! I ain't hanging around twiddling my thumbs while science figures it out.

[monsterqueers]

"It is not our intellectual systems of thought that create our religious experiences; it is through living, working through, and understanding the experiences that we build appropriate actions surrounding them. The actions come first; the abstractions, the boxes humans make to put stuff in, come later."

That is exactly it!!

Its also how we conceptualize our own spirituality. We less 'believe' and more 'experience' and just have to live with that.

[lb_lee]

Mori: Sometimes Mama Reality spanks you and you just have to figure shit out afterward.

Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

>>Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. It didn't take me this long because I was bored by it; on the contrary, I took like twenty pages of notes, way more than the other stuff I've been reading lately.<<

It's heavy reading. I recommend Jambalaya by Luisah Teish for the family-feel of Voudoun.

>>Vodouisants cannot afford the self-surrender of mysticism, nor can they permit themselves the luxury of an idealism that seeks to mask the miseries and frustrations of their existence. Their needs are too immediate for that. Their religion must satisfy actual needs rather than merely invite them to high-flown intellectual exercises of theology. <<

Well yeah. It's what was left after the Middle Passage stripped off everything that didn't work. This is "how to survive when the world is stacked against you" shit. It keeps people alive.

Also, there have been some hilarious incidents -- I saw one on a documentary once -- of archaeologists excavating former plantations. They keep finding these jars of junk buried under the master's old bedroom. White people be like, "What is this?"

Every black person instantly took a big step back. They already knew a hex when they saw it.

Because hey, if a man likes to beat and rape you, he deserves insomnia, nightmares, and whatever else someone decided to put in a hex jar.


>>The actions come first; the abstractions, the boxes humans make to put stuff in, come later.<<

Couple key things make African religions different than European ones:

1) They're family. It's as messy and loyal as any family. It's not like this system where the god is something totally different and above it all.

2) It's a big messy family because that's how it grows. You get good enough at something in this life, you get invited to do it in the next, and that's why there are dozens of loas in each group. The Ghedes are all folks who all worked with sex, death, and healing. And so on for the others.

Re: Yes ...

[talewisefellowship]

Out of curiosity are you talking about minkisi bundles? my favorite archaeology professor who is now retired specialises in that stuff. He talked a lot about how enslaved people kept practicing their african spiritual traditions hidden in plain sight. A minkisi bundle contained 'flash' which was white or shiny material (glass, crystal, white ceramics, etc) that represented water and called the spirit, a piece of iron or steel, and something belonging to the target person to instruct the spirit what to do. They could be used to curse people or to protect them depending on the intent of the person who put them there.

Naming my professor comes at the risk of doxing the university I go to, but this article is about what I'm talking about:

Matthews, Christopher N. (2011) "The Archaeology of Race and African American Resistance," African Diaspora Archaeology
Newsletter: Vol. 4 : Iss. 1 , Article 16.
Available at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/adan/vol4/iss1/16

-- Janusz

Re: Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

Similar concept but different vessel, variously called hex jars, curse jars, or witch jars. A glass jar or sometimes a ceramic jug, filled with sharp things (broken glass, bent nails, etc.), herbs or charms, and then a noxious liquid such as urine, vinegar, or blood. Very effective for causing insomnia, nightmares, impotence, and other mayhem in a bedroom (usually buried under the floorboards). They can also be buried under the front step or porch to curse the house in general with bad luck.

I mean really, if I was going to dig up a plantation, I'd want a houngan there for safety. You know, like a bomb squad.

Re: Yes ...

[talewisefellowship]

it does sound similar but different, very interesting stuff

my prof always asked permission from the ancestors and poured a libation for them before doing excavations, which i think is a really good thing to do. more archaeologists should do that imo

--janusz

Re: Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> it does sound similar but different, very interesting stuff <<

There are a lot of variations on how to make a little bundle of magic, overlapping among different traditions. Voudoun is one that uses a lot of curses for survival, and they're often combinations of nasty things in a container.

>>my prof always asked permission from the ancestors and poured a libation for them before doing excavations, which i think is a really good thing to do. more archaeologists should do that imo<<

Very sensible.

Re: Yes ...

[lb_lee]

I hadn't heard of Jambalaya! Thanks for letting me know about it; I'll add it to the list. I'm especially interested in traditions of spirit possession for learning more about plurality and other forms of body/mindsharing!

Re: Yes ...

[ysabetwordsmith]

There is some of that in Jambalaya.

The African Diaspora traditions are challenging to study from outside. Less has been written about them than most religions, because folks don't care to talk with outsiders much and prefer oral tradition internally. But there is some good stuff, and with some of it online now that makes it a little easier to find.

One thing that will probably fascinate you: some of the lwa or orishas are downright notorious for mounting nosy white people who show up to study or gawk and don't really believe. Like mount the camera man, run him up a tree, then dismount and leave him there. Sometimes it makes a lot of extra work for the houngans, trying to talk the lwa out of the more far-out pranks. Ghede and Legba have both been mentioned doing this. Sometimes they do weird shit to members too, but people know how to handle that better. Some other lwa are much fussier and will only mount their own devotees.

Another interesting feature: Most of the lwa / orishas are actually systems with dozens of individuals packed together, each with their own subspecialty and quirks within the general sphere of influence. Worship while alive aligns a person with a particular "head" whose work they do. Those with exceptional achievements may become known for returning after death to continue that work by helping their descendants or other worshippers. I've seen guides that listed dozens of versions of a lwa, but I would bet it's more like hundreds at the very least. Many are local and just don't get written down. In fact in those traditions, every Voudoun or whatever cemetery has its own Ghede and Brigitte (or other titles meaning similar things) from the first man and first woman buried there.