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Nigeria Indigenous Beliefs
Alongside most Nigerian religious adherence were
systems of
belief with ancient roots in the area. These beliefs
combined
family ghosts with relations to the primordial spirits of
a
particular site. In effect the rights of a group defined
by
common genealogical descent were linked to a particular
place and
the settlements within it. The primary function of such
beliefs
was to provide supernatural sanctions and legitimacy to
the
relationship between, and the regulations governing,
claims on
resources, especially agricultural land and house sites.
Access
rights to resources, political offices, economic
activities, or
social relations were defined and legitimized by these
same
religious beliefs.
The theology expressing and protecting these
relationships
centered, first, on the souls of the recently dead, ghosts
who
continued their interest in the living as they had when
they were
alive. That is to say, authoritative elders demanded
conformity
to rules governing access to, and inheritance of, rights
to
resources. Indigenous theology also comprised all of the
duties
of the living to one another and to their customs,
including
their obligations to the dead ancestors whose spirits
demanded
adherence to the moral rules governing all human actions.
The
second pantheon were the supernatural residents of the
land.
These spirits of place (trees, rock outcroppings, a river,
snakes, or other animals and objects) were discovered and
placated by the original founders, who had migrated to the
new
site from a previous one. Spirits of the land might vary
with
each place or be so closely identified with a group's
welfare
that they were carried to a new place as part of the
continuity
of a group to its former home. In the new place, these
spiritual
migrants joined the local spirit population. Such deities
developed from an original covenant created by the
founders of a
settlement between themselves and the local spirits. This
covenant legitimized their arrival. In return for regular
rites
and prayers to these spirits, the founders could claim
perpetual
access to local resources. In doing so, they became the
lineage
in charge of the hereditary local priesthood and village
headship
and were recognized as "owners of the place" by later
human
arrivals. Both sets of spirits, those of family and those
of
place, demanded loyalty to communal virtues and to the
authority
of the elders in defending ancient beliefs and practices.
In addition to ensuring access to, and the continual
fertility of, both land and people, the spiritual entities
protected their adherents from misfortune, adjudicated
disputes
through trials by ordeal or through messages divined by
special
seers, and punished personal or communal immorality
through
personal and group failures, sickness, drought, fires, and
other
catastrophes. Special practitioners were in control of
supernatural forces to heal illnesses, counter malevolent
intentions by others and/or the ghostly entities, and
diagnose
witchcraft--the effects of malefactors whose personal
spirits
might cause harm, sometimes without the actual knowledge
of the
evildoer. Protection against misfortune was strengthened
by
charms, amulets, and medicinal products sold by the
practitioners. In everyday life, misfortune, sickness,
political
rivalries, inheritance disputes, and even marital choices
or the
clearing of a new field could be incorporated and
explained
within this religious framework. Given these beliefs,
causal
relations were stipulated and explained through the
actions of
supernatural entities, whose relations to the living
involved
interventions that enforced morality and traditional
values.
As with many peoples around the world, especially in
Africa,
the adult men were organized into secret societies that
imitated
the activity of the spirits in maintaining the moral
order. In
the 1980s in Igboland and in similar societies in
neighboring
areas, social control and conformity to moral order was
still
enforced by secret societies. In the 1970s, this pattern
was
observed spreading into small, originally autonomous
communities
of the southern middle belt at the northern rim of
Igboland.
Generally, adult men received some training and were then
initiated into membership. In 1990 memberships were more
selective, and in some places such organizations had died
out.
Specifically, these societies enforced community morality
through
rituals and masked dances. During these performances,
secret
society members imitated the spirits. They preached and
expressed
displeasure with and gave warnings about individual and
communal
morality, attributing accusations and threats to spirits
of place
and family who were displeased with their human charges.
Sorcery and even witchcraft beliefs persisted and were
discussed as forms of medicine, or as coming from "bad
people"
whose spirits or souls were diagnosed as the cause of
misfortune.
There also were special ways in which the outcomes of
stressful
future activity, long trips, lingering illnesses, family
and
other problems could be examined. Soothsayers provided
both
therapy and divinatory foreknowledge in stressful
situations.
In the city-states of Yorubaland and its neighbors, a
more
complex religion evolved that expressed the subjugation of
village life within larger polities. These city-states
produced a
theology that linked local beliefs to a central citadel
government and its sovereignty over a hinterland of
villages
through the monarch. The king (oba) and his
ancestors were
responsible for the welfare of the entire state, in return
for
confirmation of the legitimacy of the oba's rule
over his
subjects
(see Early States Before 1500
, ch. 1). In Oyo,
for
example, there were a number of national cults, each with
its own
priests who performed rituals under the authority of the
king
(alafin) in the public interest. Shango, god of
thunder,
symbolized the power of the king and of central
government;
Ogboni represented the fertility of the land and the
monarch's
role in ensuring the well-being of the kingdom.
In 1990 these indigenous beliefs were more or less
openly
practiced and adhered to among many Christians and Muslims
in
various parts of the country. Thus, in a number of the
northern
Muslim emirates, the emir led prayers for the welfare of
the
state at the graves of royal ancestors. In many Muslim and
Christian households and villages, a number of the older
religious practices and beliefs also survived. On the
other hand,
research indicated that many, especially younger people,
believed
the older traditions to be apostasy so that it was common,
particularly in rural areas, to see mixtures of local
beliefs
with either Christianity or Islam. And in some instances,
although the overall trend was away from indigenous
religions and
toward monotheism, older people suffered such mental and
physical
anguish over denouncing inherited beliefs that they
abandoned the
newer one.
Data as of June 1991
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