It is saying the obvious that Prof. Wole Soyinka, a great many fondly call WS, is a delight to read about or listen to any day. We are ever eager to hear from a man of letters, also known for adherence to justice with absolute disregard for personal consequences. Early this month, Soyinka spoke again about religion. Not surprising, so many were all ears and quite a number asked me if I watched his interview or the video. After listening to him, my mind raced to what was called a conversation he had in 2012 with Ulli Beier, himself a well-regarded artiste. Soyinka spoke again in 2018. In all the conversations it was plain he professes the values traditional religion has to offer, and he prefers it to the major ones, Christianity and Islam. He said he found the traditional religion liberating and accommodating which he believes is traceable to the liberal nature of his people, the Yoruba. He told Ulli Beier:
“The Igbale was nothing sinister to me: It signified to me a mystery, a place of transformation. You went into Igbale to put on your masquerade. Then when the Egungun came out, it seemed that all they did was blessing the community and beg a little bit for alms here and there…Occasionally, there were disciplinary outings: they terrorized everybody and we ran away from them but then, some distance away you stopped and regathered…maybe my dramatic bent saw this right from the beginning as part of the drama of life.
“I never went through a phase, when I believed that traditional religion or ceremonies were evil. I believed that there were witches—I was convinced of that –but at the same time there were good apparitions. And of course I found the songs and the drumming very exciting”.
According to him, he never took to Christianity at any stage. “Not even as a child. I remember distinctly my first essay prize at secondary school—that was in my first year. My essay was titled: ‘Ideals of an Atheist’. Yes, I went through all these phases. I just felt I couldn’t believe in the Christian god and for me that meant I was an atheist”. He was 11 years old at the time. But then, he enjoyed being a chorister. I went regularly to rehearsals. I enjoyed the festive occasion, the harvest, etc…At Christmas and New Year I enjoyed putting on the robes of a chorister…” But then he could not move away from the fascination for the Egungun masquerades. In his words, “And my Sunday was made even more interesting we”—he and his friend, Edun living at Ibarapa—“met the Egungun masquerades on the way “to church” which was quite often. But what put him off was intolerance as well as this “whole spate of prophesying, this competitive mortification of people is nothing but an attempt to bring powerful and wealthy people under the control of the priest. Even ordinary individuals are not exempted”.
“Traditional religion is not only accommodating, it is liberating, and this seems logical, because whenever a new phenomenon impinged on the consciousness of the Yoruba—whether a historical event, a technological or scientific encounter—they do not bring down the barriers—close to the doors. They say: ‘Let us look at this phenomenon and see what we have that corresponds to it in our tradition that is a kind of analogue to this experience. And sure enough, they go to Ifa and they examine the corpus of proverbs and sayings: and they look even into their, let’s say agricultural practice or the observation of their calendar. Somewhere within that religion they will find some kind of approximate interpretation of that event. They do not consider it a hostile experience. That’s why the corpus of Ifa is constantly reinforced and augmented, even from the history of other religions with which Ifa comes into contact. You have Ifa verses which deal with Islam; you have Ifa verses which deal with Christianity. Yoruba religion attunes itself and accommodates the unknown very readily…”
All said, Soyinka recognizes forces beyond man, which in any case formed the basis for traditional religion. Or, in other words, one may want to ask: what is the origin of traditional religion?
In the course of our development mankind increasingly became aware of the existence of some other entities, unseen though they were to a great many. In all cultures and to all races, their existence became manifest, as their helpers, as their friends, and as their teachers. They are forces that are active in Nature and are called Nature beings and also widely referred to as elemental beings. As I did state in these pages five years ago, and I have had a few times subsequently to hint at their work, as teachers they taught the early men many things. We never read in any literature, for example, that our forebears went to any laboratory to perform experiments to determine whether okro or lettuce was not edible and safe, nor did we read that they were armed with tubes and scalpels and headed for the forest to test the suitability of a variety of herbs to heal their ailing bodies. Their friends and helpers were their untiring teachers and guides whose activities they found were amazing and that they carried out these with incredible precision. The early people, in their simplicity and closeness to Nature, beheld water sprites, also called nixies or mermaids in exquisite beauty. They saw gnomes of various sizes and were amazed to see those they called giants, tending hills and building mountains, and elves male and female, each species facing its allotted tasks in loyal commitment. The small gnomes bring about the sands of the beach, all, big or small, working correspondingly to their sizes. Seeing gnomes of unbelievable sizes with their heads touching the clouds, and in incredible beauty, the people of old thought they had seen their gods who were preoccupied with giving them cover and protecting them.
The elemental beings were in all parts of the world; they were therefore called benevolent helpers. They taught them not only seasons, what to plant and when, but also how to fabricate tools. As the inner eyes of the people of olden times got increasingly open, and connected to the finer environment, the external perception temporarily shut down, they were able to behold the lords of the elemental beings themselves who they regarded as embodiments, indeed, personification of virtues. They were able to discern the specific briefs of each or group of them. Such was it that an acute sense of justice was ascribed to Zeus; vigilance to Athena; sincerity to Apollo; to Aphrodite, grace; Mercury, humility and consciousness; to Mars and Ares, courage, and Artemis, purity. As the familiarization with these gods and goddesses was firmly established among the Greeks, Germans, and the Romans of the olden times, so was it assiduously cultivated and the knowledge passed on by the clairvoyants among them, unassailably upheld among Africans, Indians, and the Chinese.
In his work, “The Nature of the Gods”, Cicero says, “For the belief in the gods has not been established by authority, custom or law, but rests on the unanimous and abiding consensus of mankind; their existence is, therefore, a necessary inference, since we possess an instinctive or rather an innate concept of them; but a belief which all men by nature share must necessarily be true; therefore, it must be admitted that the gods exist”.
With the knowledge passed on by clairvoyants among all people and unassailably upheld, the time then came for them to climb the next rung of the ladder of life and widen their recognitions. Our world is a school, as I have stated here many times, to learn to recognize the Will of the Creator and obey and swing in It. The schools everyone went to are patterned after the school of life—moving from Infant One; to Primary One, Primary Two; then Standard One to Standard Six as in the colonial days; but today, it is just Primary One to Primary Six; then off to secondary school and tertiary institutions. The zenith is the university.
Those who have come to the recognition that there are certain forces in life moved closer to the Nature Beings not just for help and guidance but also saw them as entities to worship and so the concept of gods and goddesses arose. Much as the Nature Beings sought to reject being worshipped, pointing to them that God, the Almighty in Heaven alone was to be worshipped the guidance on the deaf ears of many until this day. Those who heeded their guidance moved on to the next class, to the next rung of the ladder. Unfortunately, the missionaries and clerics, lacking in clarity, came and dismissed their recognition and cooperation with the Nature Beings as well as their appreciation for their help as primitive. In the process the Creator’s ordained systematic and orderly development of mankind for a great many was disrupted. The overzealous missionaries not having sufficient knowledge about the next rung task they took upon themselves, were unable to separate the wheat from the chaff and they threw away the baby with the birth water. They would seem to have led to many people, among them the highly educated, resisting what the missionaries brought and spread, dismissing Christianity as foreign, imposed, and as attempts at dislodging the gods of their forebears and the corresponding way of worship. So, there is an awakening to hold on to the worship of gods and goddesses recognized in large communities of Brazilians of Yoruba extraction, for example.
If our world is a school, shouldn’t it go without saying that one cannot get oneself stuck in primary one all one’s school life in the name of patriotism and resistance to foreign and imposed foreign religious influence? Where there are students, teachers will always appear, appointed by the authority. In the course of further development of mankind and with the foundation solidly laid through the recognition of Nature Beings as the first set of their teachers, Prophets, and higher Teachers were sent from very high Realms by the Almighty Creator. They were to lead people to the next class, the next rung of the ladder to the Heights, His Luminous Kingdom, to move away from the gods and the goddesses. These Teachers were sent to different parts of the world, to different peoples who had developed to a certain degree of spiritual maturity, receptivity, and an absorptive capacity for what was being mediated to them. It would be considered anomalous to send a professor to teach in a secondary school how much less in a primary school! The pupils would be incapable of grasping the instruction and whatever else he may have to impart to them.
The Teachers of mankind were Hjalfdar who came in pre-historic times; Zoroaster, the Forerunner who was sent to Persia, today known as Iran; Lao-Tse the Forerunner sent to China; Buddha, the Forerunner sent to India; and Moses and the Prophets, principal among them Isaiah and Elijah; and Prophet Mohammed who was sent by God to Arabia. Africa can rightly claim to have Two Light Manifestations among its people some 3,000 years ago! All the Teachers and Prophets pointed to the Will of God in their words of Truth. They taught that the Will of the Most High was paramount; It is to be recognized in the Laws of God, which are also referred to as Divine Laws, Laws of Creation, or the Laws of Nature. These Laws are encapsulated as commandments. Zoroaster was told, for example, that he was to bring the Commandments of the Lord to the human beings who were ready to receive them so that they would have a firm guideline to which they could hold on their way. The world is more familiar with The Ten Commandments of God which Moses received on Mount Sinai. The Teachers of Mankind and the Prophets taught that it is by internalizing and unconditionally living according to these eternal and incorruptible Laws of the Almighty that humanity will know peace and development and we free ourselves of dross and entanglements. By so doing we would have learned how to live in Paradise where living in accordance to the Will of the Creator is given, and that only the Will of God governs the Realm. Lao-Tse said to his audience that “the spirit spark in each human being teaches what he must and what he must not do, in order to live according to the Will of the Supreme One. He who listens to his inner voice acts in harmony with the Laws of God.”
Since the Teachers and the Prophets brought the words of Truth, and truth is universal, it means that their Teachings are meant for people who have reached the degree of spiritual maturity to comprehend and absorb them even if they live in parts of the world distant from where the Forerunners lived and worked. They may be living in countries other than where the Teachings were mediated for several other reasons. It should then follow from the foregoing that no “religion” can be said to be foreign. The first people to recognize the existence of only One God, the Almighty, were the Jews. The revelation was received by Abraham about 1800 BC. This was consolidated with the receipt of the Ten Commandments by Moses who admonished mankind that worship should be directed exclusively to One God: “I am the Lord, thy God. Thou shall have no other gods before me.” Prophets arose to exhort and guide the Jews and encourage them so they would not waver in the recognition of only One God. Samuel said to Saul for example: “The Lord sent me to anoint you as king over His people, Israel. Now listen to words of the Lord.” With the recognition of One God, the Jews had taken a giant stride in the recognition of Truth and became the closest to the concept of Truth. In consequence, they provided the right soil for the anchorage of Light incarnation in their midst. So the Lord Jesus, the Light and Truth, was born among people prepared through their recognition for His Coming, bringing the Words of salvation to all mankind. Among the most prominent of the Prophets sent to the Jews were Isaiah, Elijah, Jeremiah, and Daniel. Following the Teachings of the great Prophet of God, Mohammed in Arabia, the worship of numerous gods gave way to the worship of Allah.
What I am getting at is that there are no foreign “religions”. The Teachers of mankind were sent by the same Creator after they were carefully prepared in higher Realms for their high tasks. The words of Truth they brought were put in the form suitable and correspondent to the degree of spiritual maturity of different people among whom they incarnated and people of the same degree of inner development elsewhere all over the world. Their words of Truth united were to lead mankind to the recognition and the single acknowledgment of Divine Truth and the eternal principles upholding and bearing witness to the Will of God.
However, no sooner the Teachers of Mankind departed from earthly life than men began to form religions around their teachings, some in the determination, and some ostensibly, to preserve the Teachings. With time men began to distort them, through misinterpretation and invention of creeds; then came dogmas, all of which obscure the pure Teachings of the truth-bringers. Also, struggles for position, power and influence soon ensued. Then also came, dissension and conflicts, and wars with men claiming superiority of one religion over the other! The ultimate Truth by the Lord Christ, the Son of God, from the highest Heights has fared no better with the teaching of men in several respects replacing His pure Words, yet in His Name. Indeed, largely and in several places, what obtains is the teaching of men in the Name Of Christ!
Yet, the prophesied trumpets go on blaring unaffected by the dissension among men, pointing to the main features of these times–wars, earthquakes, flooding, diseases; Isn’t the case that ripe and unripe fruits fall in a storm: sudden and unusual deaths of the young and the old? All foretold without many a man paying attention: Help in the knowledge and the Judgment!
