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== Headline text ==
{{alternateuses}}
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The term '''Voodoo''' ('''Vodou''' in ]; also '''Vodou''', '''Voudou''', or other phonetically equivalent spellings in ]; '''Vudu''' in the Dominican Republic) is by some individuals applied to the branches of a ]n ancestor-based ]-] religious tradition. However, the different spellings of this term can be explained as follows:


'''DEFINITION OF VODOUN'''
Voodoo is used to describe the Cajun traditon of New Orleans,
Vodou is used to describe the Haitian Vodou Tradition, while
Vudon and ] are used to describe the entities honoured in the Brazilian Jeje nation of ] as well as Dahomean Vodou.


The '''Vodoun''' ("Vudu" "Voodoo" "Vodou" "Vodun" "Vaudou" "Vaudaux") religion at its cosmological core, is an African ancestral religion, practiced today largely in West Africa, and all througout the Diaspora. Its fundamental tenants are the honoring of specialized deities typically born to Africans and honored along with their ancient, and recent ancestors, through specific ritual, prayer, evocation, and celebration. On a basic level, these deities are often described and symbolized as "forces of nature," and are honored with specific rites unique to their element. It is this level of Vodoun that is understood and practiced in popular culture. However, the Vodoun religion is far more cosmologically complex, and theologically grounded in the early development of African and global religious civilization than what is displayed in popular culture.
Its roots are varied and include the Fon, Ewe, and Yoruba peoples of West Africa, from western ] to eastern ]. In ], Vodun is the national religion, followed by around 60% of the population, or some 4½ million people. The word ''vodún'' is the ] word for '']''. Voodoo elsewhere is highly influenced by Central African traditions. The ] rite, also known in the north of Haiti as Lemba (originally a cult practiced among the ]) is as widespread as the West African elements, but has largely been overlooked by North Americans.


== Headline text ==
Until recently, many assumed that the admixture of such traditions with Catholicism occurred in the New World. There is significant evidence that the model for such ] can be found in the religious practices of the ].


'''ANCIENT ROOTS OF VODOUN RELIGION'''
The Fon tradition in ] is known as ''La Regla Arara''.


The Vodoun religion is estimated to have existed for more than 10,000+ years, having its ancient roots in ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, East Africa, India, Asia Minor (ancient Turkey), ancient Crete, Thessalonia, and in ancient Afro-matrilineal Ionia (later known as "Greece" where the African, Queen mothers established their powerful temples and theocratic empires.
==African origins==
At their height, these African, matriarchal empires reigned for more than 4,000 years—centuries before their conquer by the Dorian Greek invaders. Until the present, western revisionists credits the ancient social and religious history of these African matriarchs to the Dorian Greeks, and have hidden their cultural theology under "Greek Mythology." The consequence of this action had forever obscured the historical fact that the Vodoun religion was one of the major African, ancestral religions practiced all throughout the ancient world. Over the centuries, as the African matriarchs were conquered and their temples seized or destroyed, they migrated westwardly, ultimately settling into the West African region; the religion having adapted to the cutural and language nuances with each new settlement and wave of immigrants.
Vodun is a ] form of ] that developed among various ] ethnic groups predating ] times. The cultural area of the Fon, Gun, Mina and Ewe peoples share common ] conceptions around a dual ] divine principle: ], the ]-Creator, and the God-Actor(s) or Vodun(s), daughters and sons of the Creator's twin children ] (goddess of the moon) and ] (sun god). The God-Creator is the ] principle, who does not trifle with the mundane, and the Vodun(s) are the God-Actor(s) who actually govern on earthly issues.
Currently, Benin (ancient Dahomey), the Domincian Republic, Cuba, Brazil, and Haiti are credited with being the "home" of the Vodoun religion by western scholars. However, the actual number of its practitioners and adherents throughout the world are far more numerous.


The ] of Voduns is quite large and complex. There are seven direct sons of Mawu, interethnic and related to natural phenomena or historical or mythical individuals, dozens of ethnic Voduns, defenders of a certain clan or tribe, as well as the modern Voduns, mostly coming from Ghana.


== Headline text ==
West African or Beninese Vodun is similar to Haitian Vodou in its emphasis on the ancestors, however each family of spirits has its own specialized clergy that is often hereditary. In Africa, spirits include ], who are goddesses of waters; ], who is virile and young in contrast to the old man form he takes in Haiti; ], ruling iron and smithcraft; ], who rules diseases; and many other spirits distinct in their own way to West Africa.


'''POPULAR MYTH OF VODOUN'S ORIGINS'''
Totalitarian regimes in ] tried to suppress Vodun as well as other forms of religion, but today they are flourishing again and Vodun is practised by over 30 million people in the area.


Haiti is universally credited by western scholars of developing and introducing the “Voodoo” religion into America. Haiti is also credited as the location where "Voodoo" reached its highest philosophical and cultural development. These historic claims though popular, are categorically untrue. Haiti is not where the Vodoun religion was born, nor is it where it reached its highest pinnacle of philosophical, ritual and theological development, nor did they introduce the religion into America. The Vodoun religion was being practiced in America long before Haiti'an influence. There were already powerful Vodoun priests and priestesses present in Louisiana and throughout the United States, many never having even met a Haitian. Lack of the fundamental understanding by western, cultural experts of what it means to be “Voddoo” as it is known and understood in West African cosmology, is largely responsible for the perpetuation of this myth.
==New World traditions==
===Haitian Vodou===
Called '''Sèvis Gine''' or "African Service" in ], a ] form of Vodou, Haitian Vodou also has strong elements from the ] of Central Africa and the ] and ] of ], though many different people or "nations" of Africa have representation in the liturgy of the Sèvis Gine. Among these other nations are the ] and ] ], venerated as the indigenous population (and hence, a form of ancestors) of the island now known as ]. A large and significant portion of Haitian Vodou most often overlooked by scholars, especially English speaking ones until recently is the Kongo component. The entire Northern area of Haiti is especially influenced by Kongo practice. In the North, it is more often called Kongo Rite or Lemba, from the Lemba cult of the Loango area and Mayombe. In the south, Kongo influence is called Petro. Many loas or lwas (also a Kikongo term) are of Kongo origin such as Basimbi, Lemba, etc.


]
] forms of Vodou exist in Haiti, the Dominican Republic, parts of Cuba, the United States, and other places that Haitian immigrants dispersed to over the years. It is similar to other African-diasporic religions such as Lukumi or Regla de Ocha (also known as ]) in Cuba, ] and ] in Brazil, all religions that evolved among descendants of transplanted Africans in the Americas.


----
====History====
The majority of the Africans who were brought as ] to Haiti were from the Guinea Coast of West Africa, and their descendants are the primary practitioners of Vodou (those Africans brought to the southern US were primarily from the Kongo kingdom). The survival of the belief system in the ] is remarkable, although the traditions have changed with time. One of the largest differences however between African and Haitian Vodou is that the transplanted Africans of Haiti were obliged to disguise their ] (sometimes spelled ]) or spirits as ] ]s, a process called ].


'''Right Image''': ''Cudjo Lewis, ‘Cujo’, meaning “born on Wednesday” who was Ewe, was amongst the
Most experts speculate that this was done in an attempt to hide their "]" religion from their masters who had forbidden them to practice it. To say that Haitian Vodou is simply a mix of West African religions with a veneer of Roman Catholicism would not be entirely correct. This would be ignoring numerous influences from the native ] Indians, as well as the evolutionary process that Vodou has undergone shaped by the volatile ferment of Haitian history.
last shipload of Africans from Dahomey whose ship the “Clothilde,” landed directly in
Mobile, Alabama in 1859. After the Civil War, Cudjo and his shipmates founded Plateau, Alabama. The Vodoun religion of Africans enslaved in America came directly in their blood from these and other “serpent worshiping” sibs/clans. '''Source''': ''National Geographic, Escape From Slavery: Underground Railroad, Vol. 166, No.1., July 1984''.'' '''Excerpted from book''':
----


Vodou as it is known in Haiti and the Haitian ] is the result of the pressures of many different cultures and ethnicities of people being uprooted from Africa and imported to Hispaniola during the African slave trade. Under slavery, African culture and religion was suppressed, lineages were fragmented, and people pooled their religious knowledge and out of this fragmentation became culturally unified. In addition to combining the spirits of many different African and Indian nations, Vodou has incorporated pieces of Roman Catholic liturgy to replace lost prayers or elements. Images of Catholic saints are used to represent various spirits or "mistè" ("mysteries", actually the preferred term in Haiti), and many saints themselves are honored in Vodou in their own right. This syncretism allows Vodou to encompass the African, the ], and the European ancestors in a whole and complete way. It is truly a '']'' religion.


== Headline text ==
The most historically important Vodou ceremony in Haitian history was the Bwa Kayiman or ] ceremony of ] ] that began the ], in which the spirit ] possessed a priestess and received a ] as an offering, and all those present pledged themselves to the fight for freedom. This ceremony ultimately resulted in the liberation of the Haitian people from ] ] rule in 1804, and the establishment of the first black people's ] in the history of the world and the second independent nation in the Americas.


'''ENSLAVED AFRICANS BROUGHT THE VODOUN RELIGION TO AMERICA'''
Haitian Vodou grew in the ] to a significant degree beginning in the late 1960s and early 1970s with the waves of Haitian immigrants fleeing the ] regime, taking root in Miami, New York City, Chicago, and other major cities.


In West African cosmology, the vodou are divine, specialized deities, whom, along with special ancestral and totemic spirits are cosmogenetically and biologically linked to each African at birth. As such, no individual or group can "introduce" these deities into ones biogenetic sphere. Further, the Africans who were imported and sold into the American slave-holding states, were transported directly from West Africa. The vodou deities and the exoteric “culture of the deities” (religions) also came directly from West Africa into America.
====Beliefs====
The two largest and primary groups of Africans who were transported directly from West Africa into the United States, upon whom the Vodoun religion would soon overlay, were from the Congo and southwestern, Nigeria. The largest West African groups imported into America who actually brought the Vodoun religion with them were mainly from the Ewe, Guin and the Nago groups.
Haitian Vodouisants believe, in accordance with widespread African tradition, that there is one ] who is the creator of all, referred to as "Bondyè" (from the French "Bon Dieu" or "Good God"). Bondyè is distinguished from the God of "the whites" in a dramatic speech by the ] ] at Bwa Kayiman, but is often considered the same God of other religions, such as ] and ]. Bondyè is distant from his/her/its creation though, and so it is the spirits or the "mysteries", "saints", or "]s" that the Vodouisant turns to for help, as well as to the ]. The Vodouisant worships God, and serves the spirits, who are treated with honor and respect as elder members of a household might be. There are said to be twenty-one nations or "nanchons" of spirits, also sometimes called "lwa-yo". Some of the more important nations of lwa are the Rada (corresponding to the Gbe-speaking ethnic groups in the modern-day Republic of Benin, Nigeria, and Togo); the Nago (synonymous with the Yoruba-speaking ethnicities in Nigeria, the Republic of Benin, and Togo); and the numerous West-Central African ethnicities united under the ethnonym ]. The spirits also come in "families" that all share a surname, like ], or ], or ] or ]. For instance, "Ezili" is a family, ] and ] are two individual spirits in that family. The Ogou family are soldiers, the Ezili govern the feminine spheres of life, the Azaka govern agriculture, the Ghede govern the sphere of death and fertility. In Dominican Vodou, there is also an Agua Dulce or "Sweet Waters" family, which encompasses all ] spirits. There are literally hundreds of lwa. Well known individual lwa include ] Wedo, Papa ] Atibon, and ] Tawoyo.
The “Nago groups” were the Vodoun-Yoruba worshipers who comprised the inter-ethnic (Ewe-Fon, Edo, Igbo, Ijaw, and other) sub-mixtures, which were long ago established in Badagry, southern Benin and southern Togo, as a result of their long history from ancient Ketu, to their continual political and economic struggles through warfare after the establishment of the Dahomean and the Oyo empires.


In between both of these nations quest for regional hegemony, there were sparse periods of inter-ethnic marriages, mass migrations, mutual commerce and inter-cultural sharing. '''It was these primary West African groups who initially laid the cultural, linguistic and the religious substratum for the African spiritual traditions that existed in America. '''
In Haitian Vodou, spirits are divided according to their nature in roughly two categories, whether they are hot or cool. Cool spirits fall under the Rada category, and hot spirits fall under the Petwo category. Rada spirits are familial and congenial, while Petwo spirits are more combative and restless. Both can be dangerous if angry or upset, and despite claims to the contrary, neither is "good" or "evil" in relation to the other.


Everyone is said to have spirits, and each person is considered to have a special relationship with one particular spirit who is said to "own their head", however each person may have many lwa, and the one that owns their head, or the "met tet", may or may not be the most active spirit in a person's life in Haitian belief.


In serving the spirits, the Vodouisant seeks to achieve harmony with their own individual nature and the world around them, manifested as personal power and resourcefulness in dealing with life. Part of this harmony is membership in and maintaining relationships within the context of family and community. A Vodou house or society is organized on the metaphor of an extended family, and initiates are the "children" of their initiators, with the sense of hierarchy and mutual obligation that implies.


== Headline text ==
Most Vodouisants are not ], referred to as being "bosal"; it is not a requirement to be an initiate in order to serve one's spirits. There are clergy in Haitian Vodou whose responsibility it is to preserve the rituals and songs and maintain the relationship between the spirits and the community as a whole (though some of this is the responsibility of the whole community as well). They are entrusted with leading the service of all of the spirits of their lineage. ]s are referred to as "Houngans" and priestesses as "Manbos". Below the houngans and manbos are the hounsis, who are initiates who act as assistants during ceremonies and who are dedicated to their own personal mysteries. One does not serve just any lwa but only the ones they "have" according to one's destiny or nature. Which spirits a person "has" may be revealed at a ceremony, in a reading, or in dreams. However all Vodouisants also serve the spirits of their own blood ancestors, and this important aspect of Vodou practice is often glossed over or minimized in importance by commentators who do not understand the significance of it. The ancestor cult is in fact the basis of Vodou religion, and many lwa like ] (formerly a king of Dahomey) for example are in fact ancestors who are said to have been raised up to divinity.


'''HAITI AND OTHER CULTURE LATER INFLUENCES'''
====Liturgy and practice====
After a day or two of preparation setting up altars, ritually preparing and cooking fowl and other foods, etc., a Haitian Vodou service begins with a series of Catholic prayers and songs in French, then a litany in Kreyòl and African "langaj" that goes through all the European and African saints and lwa honored by the house, and then a series of verses for all the main spirits of the house. This is called the "Priyè Gine" or the African Prayer. After more introductory songs, beginning with saluting the spirit of the drums named Hounto, the songs for all the individual spirits are sung, starting with the Legba family through all the Rada spirits, then there is a break and the Petwo part of the service begins, which ends with the songs for the Gede family. As the songs are sung spirits will come to visit those present by taking possession of individuals and speaking and acting through them. Each spirit is saluted and greeted by the initiates present and will give readings, advice and cures to those who approach them for help. Many hours later in the wee hours of the morning, the last song is sung, guests leave, and all the exhausted hounsis and houngans and manbos can go to sleep.


On the individual's household level, a Vodouisant or "sèvitè"/"serviteur" may have one or more tables set out for their ancestors and the spirit or spirits that they serve with pictures or statues of the spirits, perfumes, foods, and other things favored by their spirits. The most basic set up is just a white candle and a clear glass of water and perhaps flowers. On a particular spirit's day, one lights a candle and says an ] and ], salutes Papa Legba and asks him to open the gate, and then one salutes and speaks to the particular spirit like an elder family member. Ancestors are approached directly, without the mediating of Papa Legba, since they are said to be "in the blood".


As the exoteric “culture of the deities,” (religious practices) of these initial enslaved African groups were systematically suppressed, each new wave of West Africans imported would simply overlay or "refresh" the older traditions with the new, until they too were forcibly suppressed. However, what is critical to understand is that although the “culture of the deities,” (religious practices) were outwardly suppressed, the deities themselves continued to be born with the African people, and the Vodou traditions though modified, continued in individual African-American families, and ceremonies were held in secret meeting places or masked in early Christian religious worship. '''Haitian cultural and religious influence was the last to refresh what was clearly the exoteric (outer) cultural expression of the deities.''' However, even their influence did not began to take root until the early 1800s, shortly after Haiti won their independence, and many disgruntled, white French slaver-
====Values and ethics====
holders fled to the U.S. and to Cuba, bringing many of the enslaved Africans with them. The Haitian groups who refreshed and overlaid the diminishing Vodou exoteric culture in America, specifically in Louisiana were largely from the Fon, a subgroup of the Ewe, and the final group to be imported. Which is why their Haitian blends remained the most recent and the most enduring.
The cultural values that Vodou embraces center around ideas of honor and respect — to God, to the spirits, to the family and society, and to oneself. There is also a notion of relative propriety — and what is appropriate to someone with ] Wedo as their head may be different from someone with ] as their head. For example, one spirit is very cool and the other is very hot. Coolness overall is valued, and so is the ability and inclination to protect oneself and one's own if necessary. Love and support within the family of the Vodou society seems to be the most important consideration. Generosity in giving to the community and to the poor is also an important value. One's blessings come through the community and there is the idea that one should be willing to give back to it in turn. Since Vodou has such a community orientation, it is sometimes seen as an extention of the beliefs in the old Soviet Union, and, since the dissolution of the USSR, has drawn many Russian initiates. There are no "solitaries" in Vodou, only people separated geographically from their elders and house. A person without a relationship of some kind with elders will not be practicing Vodou as it is understood in Haiti and among Haitians.


The point that is being made, is that '''the Vodoun religion was introduced into America by the Africans who were directly imported into the slave-holding states from West Africa.''' Over the centuries, as a system of African religious and cultural suppression was effected in America, the Haitian blended influence being the last, became the most enduring. In time, it too would be ultimately reduced to the present day ethno-botanical and magical folk practices known as “Hudu” (“hoodoo”). It is this Afro-folk tradition that Hollywood and Christian evangelists enjoy labeling as the “Voodoo religion” proper. Finally, making the distinction between the cosmogenetic and biological link that Africans and the Diaspora possess with the vodou spirits and the “popular culture" of worship of the deities, is critical to understanding the consistency and the permanency, and the indestructibility of the bio- and cosmogenetic component the Afro-Diaspora have with their ancient ancestors and gods.
In the view of some the Haitian Vodou religion is an ecstatic rather than a fertility based tradition and because of this ''some'' do not have prohibitions against ] men and ] women. Although it is rare, there are hounfos or temples in Haiti whose clergy are entirely gay males or lesbians, etc.{{fact}}


'''RELIGIOUS PERSECUTON AND SUPPRESSION OF VODOUN IN AMERICA'''
====Orthodoxy and diversity====
There is a diversity of practice in Vodou across the country of Haiti and the Haitian diaspora. For instance in the north of Haiti the sèvis tèt ("head washing") or kanzwe may be the only initiation, as it is in the Dominican Republic and Cuba, whereas in Port-au-Prince and the south they practice the kanzo rites with three grades of initiation – kanzo senp, si pwen, and asogwe – and the latter is the most familiar mode of practice outside of Haiti. Some lineages combine both, as Manbo Katherine Dunham reports from her personal experience in her book ''the Possessed Island''.


There are volumes of material available on the history of slavery and its subsequent aftermath on the African family. However, little if any information is available on the religious persecution and suppression that took place on the plantation and in America culture after Reconstruction. The practice of the Vodoun and other African religions were strictly forbidden. On many southern plantations, it was even against the law for any enslaved African to pray to God. The slave owners greatly feared the spiritual powers that many enslaved African priests possessed. Those who were caught praying to God were often brutally penalized, as the following excerpt taken from Peter Randolph's 1893 narrative "Slave Cabin to the Pulpit" recounts:
While the overall tendency in Vodou is very conservative in accord with its African roots, there is no singular, definitive form, only what is right in a particular house or lineage. Small details of service and the spirits served will vary from house to house, and information in books or on the internet therefore may seem contradictory. There is no central authority or "]" in Haitian Vodou since "every manbo and houngan is the head of their own house", as a popular saying in Haiti goes. Another consideration in terms of Haitian diversity are the many sects besides the Sèvi Gine in Haiti such as the Makaya, Rara, and other secret societies, each of which has its own distinct pantheon of spirits.


In some places, if the slaves are caught praying to God, they are whipped more than if they had committed a great crime. The shareholders will allow the slaves to dance, but do not want them to pray to God. Sometimes, when a slave, on being whipped, calls upon God, he is forbidden to do so, under threat of having his throat cut, or brains blown out. Oh, reader! this seems very hard- - that slaves cannot call on their Maker, when the case most needs it. Sometimes the poor slave takes courage to ask his master to let him pray, and is driven away, with the answer, that if discovered praying, his back will pay the bill.
====Survival in the Southern US====
A common saying is that Haiti is 80% Roman Catholic, 20% Protestant and 100% Vodou.
Thus the Catholic contribution to Haitian Voodoo is quite noticeable. However, in the United States the story is different, despite claims to the contrary.


An aggressive campaign was implemented to do away with African traditional religious practices once and for all. Heavy fines were often levied. Brutal forms of torture, severe beatings and even death was imposed on anyone caught practicing any from of the religion. Stringent laws were passed to prevent the Africans from speaking any African languages, building shrines, making ritual drums, or any musical instruments. Family members and neighbors were encouraged to "report" one another if caught practicing any form of the religion.
Confusion about Voodoo in the USA arises because there exists throughout the United States a widespread system of African American ] magic belief and practice known as ]. The similarity of the words hoodoo and Voodoo notwithstanding, hoodoo is neither an organized religion like Voodoo, nor does it incorporate elements of traditional Fon and Ewe practices or beliefs. This is because hoodoo derives primarily from ] and ]n magical practices of Central Africa and retains elements of the traditions and practices that arose among ] language speakers.


These medieval, and laws were so successful, that in less than one generation, the many priests and priestesses who were not murdered, were forced to practice underground hearing Vodoun the undeserved reputation of being “dark and mysterious.”. Intentionally, mocked as "Voodoo", no clear distinctions were made between the ancestral religious traditions and its beneficent practices, and the "darker" maleficent traditions such as "sorcery, conjuration, and witchcraft." Tantamount to the spiritual-genocidal equivalency of blending Satanism with Christianity proper.
Most hoodooists are members of African American ] churches, such as the various ], ] (AME), ], and ] denominations, but when hoodoo is compared to African religions in the diaspora, the closest parallel found is not Voodoo, but ]n ], a survival of Congo religious beliefs melded with some Catholic forms of worship.


Because the African diaspora welded no significant economic, or political clout, and most of what remained of its priesthood duly maligned and discredited, it became nearly impossible to present the true spiritual reality of what Vodoun actually is, and its profound importance to the spiritual sustenance of the African diaspora.
Survivals of Haitian-influenced Voodoo religion in the southern US are claimed by some to be found within the African-American ] of ], a city with a large Catholic population. This is a fallacious assumption.


The Spiritual Churches of New Orleans are a Christian sect founded by ]-born Mother ] in the early 20th century. These churches incorporate Catholic iconography, ecstatic worship derived from African American Protestant Pentecostal sources, and a large dose of ], but a closer examination shows that the hallmark of the New Orleans Spiritual Churches is the honoring of the Native American spirit named ], who lived in Illinois and Wisconsin (Anderson's home state), not in Africa, or Haiti. Furthermore, the names of some individual churches in the denomination -- such as Divine Israel -- bring to mind typical Black Baptist church names more than Catholic ones.


== Headline text ==
In sum, Voodoo derives from West African religious traditions and was retained in modified form by slaves in the Caribbean who were held captive by Catholics, but in the USA, most of the slaves came from central Africa and were held captive by Protestant Christians, and their magical and spiritual tradition, called hoodoo, is far closer to the Congo-derived Cuban religion called Palo than it is to Voodoo.


'''VODOUN IN POPULAR CULTURE'''
====Myths and misconceptions====
Public relations-wise, Vodou has come to be associated in the popular mind with such phenomena as "]s" and "voodoo dolls". While there is ethnobotanical evidence relating to "zombie" creation, it is a minor phenomenon within rural Haitian culture and not a part of the Vodou religion as such. Such things fall under the auspices of the ] or sorcerer rather than the priest of the Lwa Gine.


Today, with African Traditional and Diaspora religions making a powerful re-emergence especially in America, they have become the tradition of choice among New Agers, Wiccans, and others who are searching for spiritual sustenance and divine meaning in their lives. Additionally, many in the Diaspora are being born with their deities, and are being called to serve as did their enslaved and ancient ancestors. As a result, many are challenging the often racists stereotypes, and mis-information portraying Vodoun as "cultic," "satanic" "magical" and "superstitious." Many too in the Diaspora are demanding that the image of Vodoun reflect
The practice of sticking pins in "voodoo dolls" has history in healing teachings as identifying pressure points. How it became known as a method of cursing an individual by some followers of what has come to be called "New Orleans Voodoo", which is a local variant of ] is a mystery. Some speculate that it was one of many ways of self defense by instilling fear in slave owners. This practice is not unique to New Orleans "voodoo" however and has as much basis in European-based magical devices such as the "]" and the ] or bocio of West and Central Africa. In fact it has more basis in European traditions, as the nkisi or bocio figures used in Africa are in fact power objects, what in Haiti would be referred to as ''pwen'', rather than magical surrogates for an intended target of sorcery whether for boon or for bane. Such "voodoo" dolls are not a feature of Haitian religion, although dolls intended for tourists may be found in the Iron Market in Port au Prince. The practice became closely associated with the Vodou religions in the public mind through the vehicle of ]s. In fact, voodoo always gets a bad rap in movies with possibly the only exception being the film '']'' where voodoo is shown as a force for good.
its historical and present reality, as being an ancient tradition of ancestral and deity veneration and worship, that is deserving of the same recognition and respect as all religions.

There is a practice in Haiti of nailing crude poppets with a discarded shoe on trees near the cemetery to act as messengers to the otherworld, which is very different in function from how poppets are portrayed as being used by "voodoo worshippers" in popular media and imagination, ie. for purposes of sympathetic magic towards another person. Another use of dolls in authentic Vodou practice is the incorporation of plastic doll babies in altars and objects used to represent or honor the spirits, or in ''pwen'', which recalls the aforementioned use of bocio and nkisi figures in Africa. One Haitian artist particularly known for his unusual sacred constructions using doll parts is Pierrot Barra of Port au Prince.

==Trivia==
In November ], ] ] ] ] charged his opponent with using voodoo against him in an election. He lost.

==Demographics==
About 60% of the population of Benin, about 4½ million people, practice Vodun. (This does not count other animistic religions in Benin.) In addition, many of the 15% of the population that call themselves Christian practice a syncretism of Christianity and Vodun not dissimilar from Haitian Vodou. In ] about half the population practices indigenous religions, of which Vodun is by far the largest, with approximately 2½ million followers; there may be perhaps another million among the Ewe of ] (13% Ewe and 38% indigenous beliefs overall out of a population of 20 million.)

Haitian Vodou is practiced alongside Christianity by about half the population, or some 4 million people, and this has been carried abroad with Haitian emigration.


==See also== ==See also==
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== External links == == External links ==
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{{Afro-American Religions}} {{Afro-American Religions}}


Revision as of 14:18, 6 June 2006

Headline text

DEFINITION OF VODOUN

The Vodoun ("Vudu" "Voodoo" "Vodou" "Vodun" "Vaudou" "Vaudaux") religion at its cosmological core, is an African ancestral religion, practiced today largely in West Africa, and all througout the Diaspora. Its fundamental tenants are the honoring of specialized deities typically born to Africans and honored along with their ancient, and recent ancestors, through specific ritual, prayer, evocation, and celebration. On a basic level, these deities are often described and symbolized as "forces of nature," and are honored with specific rites unique to their element. It is this level of Vodoun that is understood and practiced in popular culture. However, the Vodoun religion is far more cosmologically complex, and theologically grounded in the early development of African and global religious civilization than what is displayed in popular culture.

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ANCIENT ROOTS OF VODOUN RELIGION

The Vodoun religion is estimated to have existed for more than 10,000+ years, having its ancient roots in ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, East Africa, India, Asia Minor (ancient Turkey), ancient Crete, Thessalonia, and in ancient Afro-matrilineal Ionia (later known as "Greece" where the African, Queen mothers established their powerful temples and theocratic empires. At their height, these African, matriarchal empires reigned for more than 4,000 years—centuries before their conquer by the Dorian Greek invaders. Until the present, western revisionists credits the ancient social and religious history of these African matriarchs to the Dorian Greeks, and have hidden their cultural theology under "Greek Mythology." The consequence of this action had forever obscured the historical fact that the Vodoun religion was one of the major African, ancestral religions practiced all throughout the ancient world. Over the centuries, as the African matriarchs were conquered and their temples seized or destroyed, they migrated westwardly, ultimately settling into the West African region; the religion having adapted to the cutural and language nuances with each new settlement and wave of immigrants. Currently, Benin (ancient Dahomey), the Domincian Republic, Cuba, Brazil, and Haiti are credited with being the "home" of the Vodoun religion by western scholars. However, the actual number of its practitioners and adherents throughout the world are far more numerous.


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POPULAR MYTH OF VODOUN'S ORIGINS

Haiti is universally credited by western scholars of developing and introducing the “Voodoo” religion into America. Haiti is also credited as the location where "Voodoo" reached its highest philosophical and cultural development. These historic claims though popular, are categorically untrue. Haiti is not where the Vodoun religion was born, nor is it where it reached its highest pinnacle of philosophical, ritual and theological development, nor did they introduce the religion into America. The Vodoun religion was being practiced in America long before Haiti'an influence. There were already powerful Vodoun priests and priestesses present in Louisiana and throughout the United States, many never having even met a Haitian. Lack of the fundamental understanding by western, cultural experts of what it means to be “Voddoo” as it is known and understood in West African cosmology, is largely responsible for the perpetuation of this myth.

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Ewe Enslaved in America

Right Image: Cudjo Lewis, ‘Cujo’, meaning “born on Wednesday” who was Ewe, was amongst the last shipload of Africans from Dahomey whose ship the “Clothilde,” landed directly in Mobile, Alabama in 1859. After the Civil War, Cudjo and his shipmates founded Plateau, Alabama. The Vodoun religion of Africans enslaved in America came directly in their blood from these and other “serpent worshiping” sibs/clans. Source: National Geographic, Escape From Slavery: Underground Railroad, Vol. 166, No.1., July 1984. Excerpted from book: Mami Wata: Africa's Ancient God/dess Unveiled-Reclaiming the Ancient Vodoun Heritage of the Diaspora.


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ENSLAVED AFRICANS BROUGHT THE VODOUN RELIGION TO AMERICA

In West African cosmology, the vodou are divine, specialized deities, whom, along with special ancestral and totemic spirits are cosmogenetically and biologically linked to each African at birth. As such, no individual or group can "introduce" these deities into ones biogenetic sphere. Further, the Africans who were imported and sold into the American slave-holding states, were transported directly from West Africa. The vodou deities and the exoteric “culture of the deities” (religions) also came directly from West Africa into America. The two largest and primary groups of Africans who were transported directly from West Africa into the United States, upon whom the Vodoun religion would soon overlay, were from the Congo and southwestern, Nigeria. The largest West African groups imported into America who actually brought the Vodoun religion with them were mainly from the Ewe, Guin and the Nago groups. The “Nago groups” were the Vodoun-Yoruba worshipers who comprised the inter-ethnic (Ewe-Fon, Edo, Igbo, Ijaw, and other) sub-mixtures, which were long ago established in Badagry, southern Benin and southern Togo, as a result of their long history from ancient Ketu, to their continual political and economic struggles through warfare after the establishment of the Dahomean and the Oyo empires.

In between both of these nations quest for regional hegemony, there were sparse periods of inter-ethnic marriages, mass migrations, mutual commerce and inter-cultural sharing. It was these primary West African groups who initially laid the cultural, linguistic and the religious substratum for the African spiritual traditions that existed in America.


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HAITI AND OTHER CULTURE LATER INFLUENCES


As the exoteric “culture of the deities,” (religious practices) of these initial enslaved African groups were systematically suppressed, each new wave of West Africans imported would simply overlay or "refresh" the older traditions with the new, until they too were forcibly suppressed. However, what is critical to understand is that although the “culture of the deities,” (religious practices) were outwardly suppressed, the deities themselves continued to be born with the African people, and the Vodou traditions though modified, continued in individual African-American families, and ceremonies were held in secret meeting places or masked in early Christian religious worship. Haitian cultural and religious influence was the last to refresh what was clearly the exoteric (outer) cultural expression of the deities. However, even their influence did not began to take root until the early 1800s, shortly after Haiti won their independence, and many disgruntled, white French slaver- holders fled to the U.S. and to Cuba, bringing many of the enslaved Africans with them. The Haitian groups who refreshed and overlaid the diminishing Vodou exoteric culture in America, specifically in Louisiana were largely from the Fon, a subgroup of the Ewe, and the final group to be imported. Which is why their Haitian blends remained the most recent and the most enduring.

The point that is being made, is that the Vodoun religion was introduced into America by the Africans who were directly imported into the slave-holding states from West Africa. Over the centuries, as a system of African religious and cultural suppression was effected in America, the Haitian blended influence being the last, became the most enduring. In time, it too would be ultimately reduced to the present day ethno-botanical and magical folk practices known as “Hudu” (“hoodoo”). It is this Afro-folk tradition that Hollywood and Christian evangelists enjoy labeling as the “Voodoo religion” proper. Finally, making the distinction between the cosmogenetic and biological link that Africans and the Diaspora possess with the vodou spirits and the “popular culture" of worship of the deities, is critical to understanding the consistency and the permanency, and the indestructibility of the bio- and cosmogenetic component the Afro-Diaspora have with their ancient ancestors and gods.

RELIGIOUS PERSECUTON AND SUPPRESSION OF VODOUN IN AMERICA

There are volumes of material available on the history of slavery and its subsequent aftermath on the African family. However, little if any information is available on the religious persecution and suppression that took place on the plantation and in America culture after Reconstruction. The practice of the Vodoun and other African religions were strictly forbidden. On many southern plantations, it was even against the law for any enslaved African to pray to God. The slave owners greatly feared the spiritual powers that many enslaved African priests possessed. Those who were caught praying to God were often brutally penalized, as the following excerpt taken from Peter Randolph's 1893 narrative "Slave Cabin to the Pulpit" recounts:

In some places, if the slaves are caught praying to God, they are whipped more than if they had committed a great crime. The shareholders will allow the slaves to dance, but do not want them to pray to God. Sometimes, when a slave, on being whipped, calls upon God, he is forbidden to do so, under threat of having his throat cut, or brains blown out. Oh, reader! this seems very hard- - that slaves cannot call on their Maker, when the case most needs it. Sometimes the poor slave takes courage to ask his master to let him pray, and is driven away, with the answer, that if discovered praying, his back will pay the bill.

An aggressive campaign was implemented to do away with African traditional religious practices once and for all. Heavy fines were often levied. Brutal forms of torture, severe beatings and even death was imposed on anyone caught practicing any from of the religion. Stringent laws were passed to prevent the Africans from speaking any African languages, building shrines, making ritual drums, or any musical instruments. Family members and neighbors were encouraged to "report" one another if caught practicing any form of the religion.

These medieval, and laws were so successful, that in less than one generation, the many priests and priestesses who were not murdered, were forced to practice underground hearing Vodoun the undeserved reputation of being “dark and mysterious.”. Intentionally, mocked as "Voodoo", no clear distinctions were made between the ancestral religious traditions and its beneficent practices, and the "darker" maleficent traditions such as "sorcery, conjuration, and witchcraft." Tantamount to the spiritual-genocidal equivalency of blending Satanism with Christianity proper.

Because the African diaspora welded no significant economic, or political clout, and most of what remained of its priesthood duly maligned and discredited, it became nearly impossible to present the true spiritual reality of what Vodoun actually is, and its profound importance to the spiritual sustenance of the African diaspora.


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VODOUN IN POPULAR CULTURE

Today, with African Traditional and Diaspora religions making a powerful re-emergence especially in America, they have become the tradition of choice among New Agers, Wiccans, and others who are searching for spiritual sustenance and divine meaning in their lives. Additionally, many in the Diaspora are being born with their deities, and are being called to serve as did their enslaved and ancient ancestors. As a result, many are challenging the often racists stereotypes, and mis-information portraying Vodoun as "cultic," "satanic" "magical" and "superstitious." Many too in the Diaspora are demanding that the image of Vodoun reflect its historical and present reality, as being an ancient tradition of ancestral and deity veneration and worship, that is deserving of the same recognition and respect as all religions.

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