As I am wont to say, quoting my boss of blessed memory, Allah-De…Two weeks ago, I drew attention to the spiritual values Professor Wole Soyinka professes which manifest in his familiarization with the traditional form of worship. I am particularly elated that he holds on to something. We celebrated his 90 years of eventful and beneficial living in July. I am not a seer, and I am not pretending to seeing anything. The point I am seeking to make is that the clock is ticking for all of us. The bell tolls for you, it tolls for me! We must therefore permit ourselves some reflection on where our paths lead us after this earthly life. It can’t but be elating that Soyinka (WS) holds firmly to certain spiritual values. For non-believers who do not bear the firm conviction of a continuing life after death, they are shocked when they get to the Beyond. Life can be dreary, indeed, dreadfully tormenting when they penetrate far into the new world. The faculties for recognition are paralyzed by the non-believer’s own chosen that there is no God, or that once a person dies all is ended for him, that it is all over and no one should ruffle his calm by talking about life after death: There is no such thing!
First, there is what Dr. Richard Steinpach calls ‘’an experience of terrifying loneliness’’ when a person feels himself to be alive in the intermediate region and yet expelled from all living. After the brain currents cease working, and the departing soul is pronounced to have died by the doctor, the experience first begins with a feeling of being pulled out and in a lift moving between two floors. The next floor is a world of faster vibration. Those interviewed by Dr. Raymond Moody of Life after Life fame said on being pulled out of the lift they heard a noise, and described it as “the booming of a bell, a rushing, a roaring, a bang. Thereafter they found themselves in the brightness of a new world.”
It is a world of faster vibrations. One of those interviewed by Dr. Moody said: “As soon as one has detached oneself from the earthly body, everything seems to speed up.” But when they have penetrated far there is sorting through the automatic outworking of the Law of Spiritual Gravitation, the Law of Homogeneity and the Law of Sowing and Reaping, all working separately and yet together. The weight is determined by the dross gathered around the soul from sinfulness, thoughts and conduct in violation of the Laws of Nature otherwise called the Divine Laws, because it is the Creator that put them in His Creation.
They are the mechanisms He uses to govern His Creation, contrary to widely-held views that He enters everyone’s soul and orders the person around! Each one has his free will, freedom of decision. But for every exercise of that freedom there is responsibility, for it is the Creator’s Power that is being used through radiations. In other words, we account for the use of His Power. Therefore, a person with a heavy deposit of wrongdoing around his soul sinks down according to his weight on the scale of spiritual gravitation– to different levels of Darkness with correspondent degree of hellishness—which could be to the very bottom. For a good man as defined by the Divine Law, he is light and without any gainsaying floats, soars, ascending and is headed for the Light Region, carried by how far his lightness can get him. Far is the way, and great the exertion, we are told in higher knowledge available and spreading on the surface of the earth, today.
For the unbeliever, it is darkness around him by his own election because he cannot sense and feel all the merciful helps that line his route. He is closed to them. He is blind and deaf. He, therefore, gropes in the darkness, knocking his head against rocks, and sharp objects in barren lands. They crawl in tattered dresses in dark alleys. This can go for centuries. Help will come to him only when he breaks from within him to recognise a higher Being owns the land, and He governs it. The unbeliever, confused, battered and sober, he then begins to supplicate to the Throne of Grace. Upon recognizing his smallness, hopelessness bred by conceit, carried away by his own invincibility, influence and power while on earth, help is then sent to him. A helper is standing by him. He regains his sight and hearing gradually.
Those who are awake in the Beyond say: “…they experienced that in the world beyond, only a completely different kind of knowledge counts. It was as they described it, a deeper knowledge, a knowledge as it were ‘with the soul,’ which is connected with the origins and interweaving of that which ‘holds the world together at its core.’ To acquire this kind of knowledge, as they were told by helpful beings in the beyond, is the most important thing, even here on earth.” Dr. Steinpach then says, “And this should not only make us think, it should arouse us. For it certainly shows how wrong our education is, how much precious time in our life we spend on learning things which after all are quite unimportant .”
So, as I was saying last week, every now and then there is talk about foreign religions. The two religions to which our mind races at the mention of foreign religions are Christianity and the Islamic faith. We read and hear of years of resistance and wars in different lands and in different communities, in centuries past. The natives everywhere see the advent of the religions as an intrusion into their own ways of life; it was an attempt at supplanting their own religions and ways of worship for those of the Whiteman. The people of old not exposed to Western education resisted them. The modern man, well educated has reservations. Those who embrace the new religions cannot understand why their towns’ men cannot see what they are seeing. They become overzealous and believe that force was the answer. Come with me to Umuaro in Chinua Achebe’s Arrow of God.
The elders met, disturbed that the Yam Festival was going to be postponed, a period each person was to give one yam to their deity, Ulu. The influence of Christianity would also get them to abandon the worship of Python. John Jaja Goodcountry, Catechist of St. Mark’s CMS Church, Umuaro, would countenance no such thing as worship of what were regarded as sacred animals. His uncompromising position was opposed by the most important Christian in Umuaro, Moses Unachukwu, who feared the possibility of incidents of martyrdom in the area. It already happened in Delta Pastorate which claimed the life of Joshua Hart. There was a petition to the Bishop of the Niger. There were skirmishes following which the Lieutenant Governor wrote a strong letter to the Bishop, a White priest, to call his overzealous boys to order. The Bishop himself in turn wrote a firm letter to Goodcountry, the Catechist, and assured the community that the Catechist would not interfere with the Python, but prayerfully hoped that the day would not be long when the priest and all his people would turn away from the worship of snakes and idols to the true religion.
As it was with the people of Umuaro, so was it in several parts of the world, whether in India or China. There have been writings in which the authors wonder how even the highly educated people could embrace foreign religions, forsaking their own. They must be victims of brainwashing, they assert. There is reference to the Chinese that they have held on to Confucianism, based on the teachings of Con-Fu-Tse who came after Lao-Tse, the Teacher sent by God in 600 B.C., the same time Zoroaster was born (600 B.C.) as well in Persia today known as Iran, and Buddha in India, 550 B.C., Jeremiah (630 B.C.), Isaiah 720 B.C.; Ezra in 458 B.C; Joshua, 1200 B.C. and Prophet Mohammed 571 A.D– Teachers all and Prophets sent by God the Most High. In the writings, the authors also believe that Hinduism is the main religion of Indians. They ask why will Africans not hold on to theirs, especially as the study of Ifa corpus is intensifying among well educated young men, and going places in some parts of America and as so very well publicised, among Brazilians of Yoruba extraction? After all, the penultimate Ooni of Ife was wont to say to the world that Creation began at Ile-Ife, adding proudly that Remo in Ijebu was from his domain, Ile-Ife as well as the Itsekiri of Warri Kingdom! What is called Olojo Festival is staged yearly at Ile-Ife to commemorate the story of creation. There is Osun Osogbo Festival which is not unrelated to the Ife beliefs. There is Isese Festival spread across Yoruba towns and villages.
The question to ask is: Are there, in the real sense, foreign religions? What is religion? Chambers 21st Century Dictionary defines it as “a belief in, or the worship of a god, or gods; a particular system of belief or worship, such as Christianity and Judaism…” It is from the Latin word religio. For the purpose of this discussion, the definition that is germane is “a particular system of belief or worship, such as Christianity or Judaism…” to the extent that a particular system of belief and worship is not indigenous to a people, it can be said to be foreign. However, it cannot be said that this gives the total picture. How did belief and worship begin?
Spiritual longing is inherent in all human beings in consequence of who they are and where they came from. As I have stated on a number of occasions in these pages, every human being carries within him a spiritual core. He is spirit from the Spiritual Realm more commonly referred to as Paradise where as a result of the luminousity of the vicinity of the Almighty Creator, vicinity which in terms of distance and vastness from the Throne Of Grace, is inconceivable and incomprehensible to us human beings. There we lived in an unconscious state which made it impossible for us to partake of the splendour and joyful activities there. The urge arose in us to be permitted conscious existence. This urge welled up as a petition to the Creator. The quiet supplication was granted and all human spirits were led through different intervening planes to a cooler region of this earth, which is gross matter, carrying earthly cloak called the physical body. The substances of the intervening planes are wrapped as finer bodies around the spirit which makes us souls and earth dweller on earth each with a physical body. This is why it is possible to continue living outside of this earth at death when the physical body is discarded.
The purpose of man’s sojourn on earth is to mature, familiarize himself with the Will of God and internalize it so he can obey It and swing in It effortlessly. Our world is, therefore, a school. As influences of the material world assail us we begin to come into an awakening through experiences. Man gets to be aware of forces around him, known as animistic beings. These were the first teachers of mankind. As loyal servants of the Creator, they were the preparer and builder of the Household of God which is at the same time His Mantle. They taught the ancestors of man what plant to eat as food, and what plant to use to heal their ailing bodies. They showed them the plant that was poisonous and should be avoided. They taught them the season to plant and the time of harvesting. Using radiations they bring plants into life and tend them. Carbohydrates are formed when the energy of sunlight is used to drive the reactions between carbon dioxide of the air around us and water. It is their working that gives us oxygen; and through photosynthesis, they convert radiant energy in plants and carbon dioxide to give us oxygen without which man and all animate animals cannot live.
As I explained already recently, carbohydrates are put in plant storage organs of root crops such as yam, cassava and potatoes as well as in grains such as maize, rice and wheat. When we eat them the chemical energy in them, is in a form we need for breathing, thinking, motion, speaking and writing. It should go without saying therefore that without the unceasing activities of the elemental beings life on earth for any living being, man or animal, reptiles, birds and what have you, would have impossible.
Are we not seized with awe beholding the meadows of the field and enthralled by the gushing brook of the village, the refreshing air out of the cities, or the water falls of Ikogosi in Ekiti, the Himalaya Mountain or Mount Everest and the hills of Jos, Bauchi or Mambilla. It only stands to reason that the elemental beings have forms and consciousness, indeed human forms. Nixies commonly called Water Sprites or Mammy Water popularized by Victor Uwaifor through his music has pinions, they are exquisite in beauty and children who see them call them angels. They are the governing and regulating forces, generating and preserving forms. In the words of Christopher Vassey, a Swiss naturopath who has done extensive studies on them, “they govern the chemical processes of inanimate matter and biological processes of animate entities. And control them.”
Because the early men were close to Nature, and as their perceptive faculty began to unfold, they were capable of seeing them. They saw the giants among them with their heads touching the clouds. These were Gnomes that build mountains and hills. Despite their size, they are inconceivably beautiful. This made people of ancient days to easily conclude that they had seen the Creator and began to worship them. They sought their protection and found settlements on the slopes or the bases of their mountains. In his book, Ibadan, the City of Rust and Gold, John Pepper Clark speaks of Ibadan as a city founded on seven hills.
Similarly, their sharpened faculty and inner eyes were permitted to see Nixies, in local parlance, Mammy Water; they are in charge of rivers and oceans. They were worshipped as well, so were the Elves—male elves in charge of trees and female elves forming and tending flowers. In recognition and appreciation of their stupendous work, Harvest Festivals are instituted in different cultures. Hence Yam Festival in the East, South West, South South and North Central parts of Nigeria. In parts of South West, the Harvest Festival is known as Odun Orisa Oko or Odun Orisa Nla and the worship of the river goddess, the Water Sprite is Odun Yemoja. Because of their tender and benevolent nature associated with feminine entities, childless women besiege the river where Yemoja Festival is taking place to supplicate that they be blessed with children. There is the god of iron, (Ogun) which taught the people of old how to fabricate tools for farming or hunting; and the god of thunder (Sango). Salamanders create fire from the precipitation of the Power of the Holy Spirit flowing through Creation, the precipitation that is also tapped for electricity. The elemental beings know which rays to tap for water or for air or hurricanes and so on. Creation came out of the Power of the Holy Spirit, with the Almighty Father in Him and He in the Father while creating. In other words, it is the Holy Spirit that governs the whole of Creation while the Lord Jesus Christ govern the Divine Realm after re-uniting with the Father after His sojourn on earth. Sylphs are in charge of the air, winds, tornadoes, cyclones and hurricanes. Their sizes correspond with the nature of their activities. While giant gnomes form, tend or dissolve mountains, tiny gnomes form sands of the beach, with their remarkable stretch and enthralling endlessness.
From the foregoing, it can be seen that the knowledge of these beings exists among all peoples and in all cultures. Although the beings protest being worshipped because worship and thanksgiving belong to God Almighty alone, human beings beheld them in wonders and amazement and would not heed the admonition and warning. In some cases the beings had had to withdraw their activities from rivers and the rivers dried up. Gnomes cause landslide or mountain rocks to sever and roll down! Sylphs cause settlements to be uprooted and salamanders fire to gut forests forcing inhabitants to relocate as a result of extensive damage. Of course, their activities are motivated and driven by love the knowledge of which is lacking among human beings. Thunder storms, as I mentioned in passing two weeks ago, are meant to balance the extreme differences in electrical potential which has built up between the ground and higher atmospheric layers, an activity featuring electrical discharges which constitute lightning caused between clouds and the ground. The essence is to engender and maintain balance between polar and the tropical zones. This is why thunder and lightning are prevalent in September in our clime when the sun crosses the Equator headed for the Southern Hemisphere and March when it arrives back on the Equator crossing to the northern hemisphere.
The ancient Greeks with increased sharper perception even saw the lords of the gods and goddesses I named two weeks ago: Zeus as god of justice, Apollo god of sincerity, Athena, god of vigilance and Ares, god of courage. As the modern man began to downgrade and in fact shut down the cerebellum, the hind brain which is the spiritually receptive faculty of man, he began to close himself to the knowledge of elemental beings and dismissed them as primitive and paganic. Missionaries and clerics dismissed them as myths and unreal. They got different people in the course of evangelization to believe only theirs is the way and people must embrace Christianity. While recognition of the Lord Jesus Christ as the Truth and Life is the ultimate, the ordinance of the Creator, however, is that man is to be led step by step, moving from lower class in the school of life to the next higher class, that is, from one level of recognition to the other.
In their development, the Jews were the first to breast the tape, to come to the recognition of only One Supreme God through the revelation Abraham received about 1800 B.C. This was reinforced by and concretized with Moses receiving the Ten Commandments of God on Mount Sinai about 1250 B.C. Thus because they were the closest to truth it was to be expected that they would forge a link with the Highest Realm in accordance with the Law of Homogeneity as to permit the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ through them for the salvation of mankind. The Love of God Incarnate coming among them was, therefore, not a racial issue as has been misconstrued by different races. The Jews went into slavery, they went through wars, and several painful experiences so they could preserve their high recognition and refine them inwardly so they could continue to be worthy of receiving the Saviour of all mankind in their midst. Prophets arose from amongst them sent from On High to remind them of their sacred Mission and to warn having become the chosen race to prepare for the great Mission. From there the Gospel was to be spread abroad and throughout the world.
