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Urhobo Historical Society |
Urhobo Community as Unity of Two Worlds
By Ochuko Tonukari
The idea of community and humane living are highly cherished
values of Urhobo traditional life. This statement remains true in
spite of the apparent disarray in the experience of modern politics
and brutal internecine strife in certain parts of Urhoboland. For
traditional Urhobo, the community is basically sacred, rather than
secular, and surrounded by several religious forms and symbols. A
visitor to Urhoboland is soon struck by the frequent use of the first
person plural Avware, Orhavware (we, ours) in everyday speech.
In modern Urhobo towns, primary community loyalties of one's extended
family and village continue to exert their hold over people who live
away from the communities of their home-towns. People generally return
to their villages from their residence in the cities from time to time
to join members of their village community to celebrate important
traditional rituals and cultural events like initiation, title-taking
or festival. From their residence in urban cities, they send
substantial financial contributions to their rural home communities to
support various development projects like provision of electricity and
pipe-borne water, building of educational institutions and scholarship
awards, funds to send young men and women on further studies in
foreign countries or in one's own country.
Primary communities based on clan equally abound in many modern
Urhobo towns. Analysts point out that these are often, for people who
are detached from the communities of their home-towns, "surrogate for
the extended family or the community of village neighbors.�
Elder Ovedje�s observation underscores the
important belief and sense of the community among traditional Urhobos.
In traditional Urhoboland, the individual does not and cannot exist
alone except co-corporately. He owes his existence to other people,
including those of past generations and his contemporaries. Whatever
happens to the individual is believed to happen to the whole group,
and whatever happens to the whole group happens to the individual. The
individual can only say: "I am because we are, and since we are,
therefore I am.� This is a cardinal point in the understanding of the
Urhobo view of man.
This treatise discusses the religious dimension of community in the
traditional Urhobo background. Several myths relate the founding of
community as well as shed light on certain symbol objects and forms
that feature prominently in the ritual network of Urhobo people. I
will try to show how such relevant ritual forms and symbols are
employed by the Urhobos to enhance the ideal of community. I shall
also be interested in finding out how certain punitive sacred
sanctions like ostracisation, help to curb deviance, and indirectly
advance the cause of harmonious communal life. I propose to conclude
the paper by examining the phenomenon and impact of radical social
change on the role of traditional Urhobo Religion in promoting the
community ideal in contemporary Urhobo society.
Traditional Urhobo people share the basic instinct of gregariousness
with the rest of human-kind. Families and members of kin-groups, from
minimal to maximal lineages, generally live together and form a
community. The Urhobo share life intensely in common. There are
communal farmland, streams, barns, and markets. There are also
communal shrines, squares, masquerades, ritual objects and festivals
for recreational activity, social, economic and religious purposes.
Members of the same kindred or clan could distinguish themselves by
their proficiency in a particular trade, skill or profession. Some
traditional Urhobo communities may be experts in rain-making, weaving,
wood carving, practice of traditional medicine, hunting or
fishing. These and similar features characterize the communal
life of traditional Urhobo society. Closeness to nature, the
experience of life in terribly hazardous environment, and the crucial
need for security and better performance in means of livelihood are
some relevant factors that combine to deepen the natural impulse for
gregariousness and sense of community among Urhobo people.
For traditional Urhobo, community is much more than simply a social
grouping of people bound together by reasons of natural origin and/or
deep common interests and values. It is both a society as well as a
unity of the visible and invisible worlds; the world of the physically
living on the one hand, and the world of the ancestors, divinities and
souls of children yet to be born to individual kin-groups. In a wider
sense, Urhobo traditional community comprehends the totality of the
world of its experience including the physical environment, as well as
all spirit beings acknowledged by a given group.
The network of relationships among human beings are remarkably
extended and deep. In fact, the words 'family', 'brother', or
'sister', etc. define far more for Urhobo people than what they mean
today for the average European or North American. The family for the
traditional Urhobo usually includes one's direct parents, grand and
great grand parents, brothers, sisters, uncles, and aunts, cousins,
nieces and nephews. And normally, a child would refer to any of his
uncles or aunts as his father or mother, his nephews and nieces as
his/her brothers and sisters. People generally do not ask a child
his/her personal name. Rather, a child is identified as a child of
so-and-so parents. The extended family system is the model. The
molecular family pattern is alien and believed to be inimical to the
traditional value of community. Actually, it is only in recent times
that the latter system began to surface mainly in urban towns as a
result of external influences. The extended family structure is held
up to people as model, one in which parents, grand-parents, uncles,
aunts, nephews and nieces live together and are cared for by their
children, grand-children and other relatives in mutual love and
respect.
The invisible members of the extended family, especially ancestors
and spiritual beings, are powerful and by far superior to human
beings. Their reality and presence in the community are duly
acknowledged and honoured among various people in Urhobo traditional
society. Neglect could spell disaster for human beings and the
community. The invisible beings are represented by different kinds of
symbols like carved objects, shrines and sacred altars. They may also
be recalled in personal names given to children, especially in cases
where particular ancestors or spirit beings are held to have
reincarnated in individual children. The presence of the ancestors is
particularly felt in traditional Urhobo community. They are believed
to be benevolent and powerful representatives of the community in the
subterranean world of 'erivwin' (underworld). Their symbols and
shrines are common features among most traditional Urhobo people. For
example, women within the child-bearing age are bound to observe
several prohibitions. Such women run a serious risk of becoming
childless if they flout such taboos, since it could result in scaring
away of souls of unborn babies that are believed to hover around
homesteads and families wanting to incarnate in wombs of potential
mothers.
Most traditional African groups, including the traditional Yoruba of
Nigeria and the Dogon of Mali, have intriguing sacred stories or myths
that tell how the world, human beings and important institutions came
into being. Such sacred stories generally also underscore the
involvement of ancestors and mythical beings in the life and affairs
of the community of the physically living. They also try to explain
the significance of different rituals for human beings and their
important life-interests.
Members of traditional Urhobo society, like their counterparts in
other parts of
The idea and structure of human society for traditional Urhobo are
essentially part of a world-view that is fundamentally wholistic,
sacred and highly integrated. Human community, therefore, has its full
meaning and significance within the transcendental centre of ultimate
meaning. Hence, the belief in ancestors and the supernatural order, in
addition to its inherent religious import, provides traditional Urhobo
society a useful over-arching system that helps people to organize
reality and impose divine authority and sanction to their life.
It is an essential article of belief in Urhobo traditional Religion that a fundamental delicate balance and equilibrium exist in the universe, between the visible world and the invisible one. The Creator, Oghene, created everything that exists and set everything in its place. Traditional Urhobo basically view the universe as comprising basically two realms; the visible and the invisible realms. They grasp the cosmos as a three-tiered structure, consisting of the heaven above, the physical world and the world beneath. Each of these is inhabited by different categories of beings. The Creator and a host of spirit beings, including arch- divinities, inhabit the heaven above; other divinities, ancestors, and myriads of unnamed spirits dwell in the world beneath; while human beings occupy the physical earth. Human beings may be less powerful, but their world is the centre and the focus of attention. It belongs to human beings as sensible beings to maintain the delicate balance in the universe. This is what assures the happiness and prosperity of individuals and the community.
Harmonious living is clearly a pivotal value. Urhobo traditional
religion, which I would prefer to refer to as the womb of the people's
culture, plays a key role in the realization of this all-important
value among traditional Urhobo people. Religion is central in the
promotion and realization of harmonious inter-relationship among
individuals and the community. In the traditional Urhobo background,
religion is a most important aspect of life. It pervades and permeates
all aspects of life and infuses the social, economic, and political
dimensions with meaning and significance. But there are some more
striking avenues through which the traditional religion helps the
community to realize the community ideal of harmonious living. They
include transmission of certain key religious ideas and beliefs,
initiation practices, ritual activities, sacred symbol forms and vital
public institutions. I shall discuss these, one after the
other.
i. Belief in Ancestors:
The belief in ancestors is an important element of Urhobo traditional
religion. This belief occupies an important place in the understanding
of the role of traditional religion in inculcating the ideal of
harmonious living among Urhobo people. One needs however, to know the
content of the belief to be better able to appreciate how it helps the
people to realize the community ideal of harmonious living.
The ancestors, or the living-dead, as John Mbiti refers to them, are
believed to be disembodied spirits of people who lived upright lives
here on earth, died 'good' and natural death, that is at ripe old age,
and received the acknowledged funeral rites. They could be men or
women. But more often than not, male ancestors are prominent since
patrilineage is the dominant system of family and social integration
in traditional Urhobo society. With the completion of prescribed
funeral rites, a deceased person is believed to transform into an
ancestor. The funeral rites in this case, serve as some kind of 'rites
de passage'. The disembodied spirit joins the esteemed ranks of fully
achieved ancestors in the spirit world.
The strong belief in ancestors is not restricted to Urhobo people
alone. For instance, among the Akan of Ghana, as part of the
coronation ceremony of a new king, the candidate carves a traditional
stool for himself which he uses as personal stool while he is alive.
When he dies, he is placed on the stool and bathed before his burial.
The stool is then blackened and kept at the shrine of his ancestral
spirit. Each lineage has a chapel of blackened stools which is the
shrine of its ancestors. The Zulu, Sotho, Tswana, Thonga, and Shona
among other South African peoples have their respective ancestral
symbols and shrines. The Igbo of South-east Nigeria have their
Okpensi and Ofo as well as sacred altars for the
ancestors.
Traditional Urhobos hold the ancestors as the closest link the
physically living have with the spirit world. "The living-dead are
bilingual; they speak the language of men, with whom they lived until
'recently', and they speak the language of the spirits and of God
...They are the 'spirits' with which Urhobo people are most concerned:
it is through the living-dead that the spirit world becomes personal
to men. They are still part of their human families, and people have
personal memories of them. Urhobo strongly believe that the ancestors
are essentially benevolent spirits. They return to their human
families from time to time and share meals with them, however,
symbolically. They know and have interest in what is going on in their
families.
For Urhobo people, there are the belief and ideas about
ancestors being able to form an essential part of the effort to
inculcate, mobilize and promote the community ideal of harmonious
living in the society. As benevolent spiritual guardians of their
respective families and communities, ancestors are believed to
reincarnate in new-born babies in the community. A child is named
after the ancestor that is believed to have reincarnated in the life
of that child. Special attention and favours are bestowed to such a
child as a mark of respect to the ancestor. Family elders make regular
offerings of gifts, food and drinks to the ancestors. The Urhobo male
elder does not normally eat or drink without first offering some
portion on the ground, or at the shrine or symbol of the ancestors.
Again, this situation is not limited to the Urhobo people alone. The
Mende of Sierra Leone avails of the staple food item of rice, and
water for their offering to ancestral spirits. Among the Akan, the
lineage head offers food and drinks to the ancestors at appropriate
times. The Adae rites which take place every twenty-one days
and the annual Odwera festival are high points of the Akan
worship of ancestral spirits. Furthermore, ancestors are generally
held to be the custodians of the land on which their children live.
They are guardians of family affairs, customs, traditions and ethical
norms. Offence in these matters is ultimately an offence against the
forefathers who in that capacity act as invisible police of the
families and communities (E.Ikenga-Metuh 1987; 149). Ancestors are
thought to mete quick and severe punishment on people who disregard
the hallowed traditions of the community, or infringe taboos and norms
of acceptable behaviour in society. Urhobo people, therefore, try to
strictly observe such taboos and norms, thereby ensuring peace and
harmony in their relationship with one another, with ancestors and
other supernatural beings.
From early childhood through adolescence to full adulthood, the traditional Urhobo citizen is formed to hold tenaciously to the belief in the ancestors, to reverence them as powerful and benevolent members of the community, although not in a physical but rather mystical sense. Ancestors are held up as models to be copied in the effort to strictly adhere, preserve and transmit the traditions and norms of the community. The average Urhobo man is psychologically fully equipped and motivated to promote the delicate balance and equilibrium that is believed to exist in the universe through ensuring harmony in his relationship with the invisible world and among members of his immediate surrounding.
ii. Libation
:A libation quite simply is a form of prayer used in traditional
Urhobo life. Unlike Western prayers, where the eyes are closed,
libations are done with eyes open to see what gods or ancestors have
brought. Performed at significant events, such as the birth of a
child, a harvest or a wedding, libation comes from the same cultural
wellspring that gave Christians Communion. As a sacred communal
ritual, it helps to bind families and communities with everything that
lives and everything that ever lived. It is also an act of remembrance
to keep families linked to their familial legacy and to prevent them
from becoming isolated and adrift in society.
Like the wine in Christian Communion, liquids are often used in
libation; some will include water, as a symbol of the continuity of
life, and some may use palm wine or oil, a household staple in
Urhoboland. Others may use coconut milk, a liquid that many consider a
symbol of the mysteries in life. Other communities may use beer, gin,
schnapps, or other alcoholic beverages as a symbol of the ancestral
spirits.
There is a hierarchy to pouring libations that is strictly followed in Urhobo communities. The libation closely follows the family lineage and in many cases, it is a recitation of a couple�s links to each family member, living, dead and unborn. Libations can be simple expressions of good wishes, or complicated choreopoems with refrains of call and response. In Urhobo society, every adult is expected to be able to call up the appropriate words at appropriate moments. It may be performed by the eldest family member or by a respected family member or friend. Instruments such as bells, drums, or horns may accompany the officiant. Repetition helps to reinforce sentiments and the mood. This wish is typical: "May the spirits on high, as well as the spirits below, fill you with grace."
A libation can be one of the most dramatic parts of a marriage
celebration. It may be done at the ceremony and again at the
reception. It is meaningful and colorful, and offers a moment to pause
and reflect on the importance of family. It is an important act of
remembrance that helps young people to reclaim their family heritage.
Because it is prayer, it can evoke powerful emotions and feelings of
good wishes. It also offers a way to highlight both families� ties to
one another. The libation can be a way of elevating the event and
involving guests and family members in a personal way. And for anyone
who has lost a parent or other family member, it can be a moment of
emotional reconciliation and celebration.
A libation, like a prayer, starts with an invocation to invite
everyone to participate. It is followed by an introduction where
ancestors, elders and family members may be named. The supplication
asks God for good wishes. The conclusion ends the libation by thanking
everyone for participating. It also sends the spirits home.
This libation details the importance of immortality. We call upon our own name seven times so one day we may be immortalized in the memory of our children as our ancestors are now. We invite God to look down upon his children as they gather for a day of honor, rejoicing, and remembrance. We ask for your blessing of power and unity. We honor our ancestors and ask that those who have a foot in both worlds carry our blessing to God so that he may hear our entreaties. We lift our voices to all whose bravery, blessings, perseverance, and deeds served to uplift and strengthen these families. We lift our voices to unite these two families. We lift our voices to banish ill will. We lift our voices to bring peace. And when the celebration draws to a close, we wish everyone to leave more blessed than when they came.
iii. Initiation Rituals:
Rites marking the transition of individuals and groups from one
significant stage of life to another abound in traditional Urhobo
societies. Similar rites are also found in several parts of the world
outside
Prior to the introduction of Western-type schools, initiation rituals
provided a most effective avenue for socialization and transmission of
key beliefs, ideas and values of the community to successive
generations. Against the background of the oral culture of traditional
Urhobo society, people relied on such oral media as speech-forms,
dramatic performances, and ritual symbolic forms to communicate their
important ideas, beliefs and values to members of the community. The
awe and mystery that often characterised the initiation ceremonies
prove particularly favourable for the successful communication of the
accumulated wisdom of the people, including the ideal of harmonious
co-existence in the community.
Masquerades and several ancestral symbols feature prominently in
traditional Urhobo initiations. Such is the case also for example,
with initiation into the Poro for young men and even
Sande for young girls in
iv. Dominant Ritual Symbols: Traditional Urhobo also preserve
and express the ideal of harmonious community-living through their
dominant ritual symbols. In an effort to ensure that this, and other
important values relating to their survival, are well preserved and
successfully transmitted to successive generations, in the absence of
developed culture of literacy, traditional Urhobo avail of different
kinds of oral means and media to encode and communicate their
important cultural values over and over again. Repetition is, no
doubt, a typical feature of oral cultures around the world.
Traditional Urhobo rely on speech-forms such as myths, proverbs, wise
sayings and songs, as well as art-forms like sculpture, dance, ritual
objects, etc to preserve and impress their key beliefs, ideas and
values in the minds of successive generations of society. Dominant
ritual objects are particularly relevant because of their tremendous
potential as effective means of communication in the oral cultural
background and their prominence in the socio-cultural and religious
dynamics of life of traditional Urhobo people. They encapsulate and
express for traditional Urhobos vital information relating to their
different areas of awareness; the intuitive, physical, aesthetic,
social and normative.
v. Important Traditional Institutions: Traditional Urhobo people also possess important sacred institutions with significant religious dimension that equally further the community ideal. They include sacred kingship institution, public shrines and sacred groves, divination and masquerades. Each one of them generally implies important religious beliefs, supernatural power and authority, and serves as a vital channel for inculcating and promoting the ideal of harmonious living in society by the people. For traditional groups that have sacred kings, such kings are not simply political heads, they are more importantly sacred personages. They posess spiritual and mystical powers which enable them to confer benefits on their people. In most cases, they are regarded as descendants or incarnations of divine beings, a mythical ancestor, or divinity.
Public shrines and masquerades are some other important sacred
institutions which contribute significantly in promoting the sense of
community. Shrines are often located in large public squares. They
serve multi purposes for traditional Urhobos. The shrines are
specifically for religious worship. The adjoining open space is for
meetings, economic transaction, for staging of festivals and other
public performances. Symbolically, shrines and adjoining public
squares signify for traditional Urhobo the mystical meeting-point or
communion of the invisible world of spiritual beings and the visible
world of human members of the community. People usually take turns in
keeping them clean. Such places are surrounded by all kinds of
prohibitions and taboos. As sacred place, they inspire awe and elicit
reverence because of what they stand for.
Masquerades are highly symbolic public institution and performance
among traditional Urhobo people. There are mainly two types; a class
belonging to youths and adolescent children that serve largely for
purposes of entertainment, and the serious masks belonging to
different senior age grades. Urhobo masquerades are generally public
performance troupes that evoke a wide variety of significant ideas and
values concerning the social, occupational, political and religious
aspects of life of the people.
Masquerades are rich in their meaning-content. Udi refers to them as
"the Dead among the Living", while Okereka suggests the title of "Gods
As Police Men". Masquerades, no doubt relate to several important
areas of life of the people of Urhobo. Masks usually identify and
represent the respective social units; villages or age sets in the
community. They were associated closely with the occupational pursuits
of the people, as well as their socio-political structure. Primarily,
masquerades are thought of by Urhobo as powerful sacred symbols. They
represent lineage ancestors and serve as the visible expression of the
spiritual force and authority believed to validate the basic beliefs
and values of society. They also serve to reinforce social modes of
conduct and symbolize the spiritual authority that eradicates social
evils. As a sacred symbol with a rich religious significance, they
contribute considerably to bind people together, to sustain and foster
the people's sense of interdependence.
IV. Other Ways Of Enhancing The Community Ideal
: The afore-mentioned media do not exhaust the many and varied oral
means through which traditional Urhobo people try to communicate and
enhance the important value of harmonious community-living. As already
stated, repetition is a characteristic feature of oral cultures,
including those of other traditional
i. Direct Speech-forms; Recorded oral materials, including prayers, personal and titular
names of traditional Urhobo culture contain a lot of references to the
theme of social harmony. Naming ceremonies are important events among
traditional Urhobo people. In many places in Urhoboland, it is the
prerogative of lineage elders to give personal names to the children
born to the different families in the kindred. The elders usually try
to convey significant life-experiences of parents, or community as
well as their important aspirations in the names they give to babies
during the naming ceremony. Similarly at initiation into important
title positions, candidates take title and praise names which refer to
important values in the community, or attributes for which the
candidate has become distinguished in society.
Apparently the names may seem not to have much to do with religion.
But, they certainly do. The context in which the names are given is
clearly religious. Naming ceremony and initiation always take place
within the context of ritual performances. The giving of a name is
usually the climax and conclusion of the ritual event. Religious
beliefs and ideas are implied in peoples' names among traditional
Urhobo people. Most traditional Urhobo names are meaningful and
symbolic. Many of them imply values that relate to and enhance
community consciousness in traditional Urhobo society.
Traditional prayers equally play an important role in the promotion
of the sense of community. Most traditional prayers are intensely
communitarian in content and orientation. Whether offered by the
individual elder in front of his family shrine, or by a priest or
other ritual experts in public shrines, Urhobo prayers contain a lot
of references to the community. The elder in most traditional Urhobo
communities begins the day by offering prayers and supplications for
himself, members of the kindred and the entire community. He would
pray to the ancestors, divinities and other spiritual beings for his
health, that of his family, for progress of members of the lineage,
both the young and the old, for peace and harmony, for protection from
the attack of evil forces, sorcerers and witches, and finally for the
elimination of his enemies and evil doers in the community.
The transliterated text of a prayer from the late Elder Ekeke of
Isiokolo recounted by Popor, his son, makes a good illustration:
O my ancestors,
A wild dog can never lie near a wolf's den;
You have now finished eating. I offer you an imported drink;
It is gin. Please receive it for all members of the lineage,
Here is the drink we have brewed ourselves; It is corn beer. Receive
this one also.
May you be as a powerful medicine to protect the entire lineage. May
we all be in good health always, All our children too.
All our customs which are going to the Europeans,
May they understand them well.
They should take good care of the black people....
Look! Prayers offered for one's in-laws should not become
ineffective.
No ! Never!
Here is gin; Here also is water.
Help us to succeed when we use your nets;
Your coconut plantation too must be fruitful,
To provide a means of livelihood for us;
May trouble be far from us. May poverty be far from us;
May sickness be far from us; May death be far from us.
Give us plenty of wealth; Give us plenty of children;
Just as we have also given you,
May you too give us even more abundantly.
As typical oral (rather than formalized) texts, Urhobo traditional
prayers are very contextual. They fiercely reflect the concrete needs,
aspirations, values and relevant life-situation of people making the
intercession. The above prayer of the late elder Ekeke is a good
example of Urhobo people�s keen interest and concern for both the
needs of individual and the general well-being of the entire
community. The individual's need for protection, good health and
material wealth has its full meaning within the context of the need of
the entire community for overall well-being. Hence, the above elder
does not focus simply on the individual as such. He asks for the
health of the entire lineage (which in this case includes the kindred
of his relations through marriage, his in-laws), for the well-being of
the black people, for prosperity in the means of livelihood (coconut
plantation, success in fishing) and for a large community with an
abundance of children.
ii. Normative Standards of Behaviour:
The area of morality is yet another relevant avenue through which
traditional Urhobo try to socialise people and reinforce in them the
important idea and value of harmonious community-living. Every social
group evolves its distinct ethical code. Every society has its norms
of acceptable behaviour, taboos and prohibitions. Many traditional
Urhobo people have in addition, motivational features and incentives
through which compliance to the norms of approved behaviour and social
ideals are encouraged. There are equally rituals of purification, as
well as punitive measures that try to deter and curb the tendency to
deviate.
Religion may be distinct and separate from morality, as many scholars
have rightly argued. For traditional Urhobo, however, the line
dividing the two is very thin indeed. Urhobo traditional religion
plays a crucial role in the ethical dynamics of the different levels.
In the traditional Urhobo background, 'gods serve as police men'.
Urhobo traditional world-views invariably outline a vision of reality
that is, at once ethical in content and orientation. Human beings and
their world are the focal centre of a highly integrated universe.
Hence, traditional Urhobo world-views have been described by some
people, as heavily anthropocentric. Human conduct is seen as a key in
upholding the delicate balance believed to exist between the visible
world and the invisible one.
There are norms and taboos that try to address the need of the
individual human person for security of life and property. For
example, most traditional Urhobo communities have stiff penalties for
willful murder of a person, not an enemy at war, including bringing
about the death of a foetus. Any one guilty of murder, would be
required to repair the crime usually by providing another human being
to the family of the person killed, a person relatively close in age
to the deceased. The offender would then be bound to take his/her own
life through public hanging. There are also severe penalties for
willfully damaging people's crops, economic trees, and animals.
The vast majority of norms, taboos and prohibitions are directed
towards protecting the community and promoting peace and harmony.
Communal farmland, economic interests like the market-place, stream,
or shrine are generally surrounded with taboos, including who may or
may not enter, and when and under what circumstances people are
permitted or not to enter such places. Stealing is abhorred. It is in
fact, an abomination to steal things relating to people's vital
life-interests and occupation, like cassava crop or stealing fish held
in a trap laid by someone in a stream or river. There are also special
restrictions and norms regulating the behaviour of people towards
public functionaries like lineage heads, the king or queen,
traditional priests, diviners and medicine-practitioners. Such persons
are generally regarded as specially sacred, and representative of the
community. Their residence is equally sacred.
Traditional Urhobo people believe that spiritual beings, especially
ancestral spirits, guarantee and legitimate the ethical code. Urhobo
traditional elders visibly demonstrate this by striking their powerful
lineage ritual symbol on the ground to mark the promulgation of a law
or a taboo. And they invoke severe divine sanction on any one who
would try to oppose or disobey a promulgated law or norm of morality.
People, no doubt, acknowledge the social basis of ethical norms. Fines
may be imposed or material reparation demanded. But they seriously
reinforce the norms with the supernatural authority and sanction of
invisible beings. As such, agents of divinities, including traditional
priests, and more frequently special masks representing individual
deities or ancestral spirits, participate actively in the execution of
communal law and morality in many traditional Urhobo communities; they
impose sanctions and take active part in the recovery of fines imposed
on defaulters. Serious criminals are not simply regarded as
anti-social persons; they are sorcerers, witches and wizards. People
protect themselves against their nefarious activities through
different kinds of ritual practices including offering ritual
sacrifice, making and wearing of charms and amulets.
For most Urhobo people, ostracizing an individual or group that has
fragrantly disobeyed the community is thought to be the most severe
punishment that could be meted out to any body. It feels like death
for any one so punished since such a person is regarded as an outcast.
He (or she) would not be allowed to share in the life of the
community. There would be no visits to the family, no exchange of
greetings, no one would sell or buy from members of the affected
family. So severe is the punishment of ostracisation, that every
member of the community highly dreads it, and would do every thing
possible to avoid it. It does, on the other hand, show the kind of
tremendous power of the community in traditional Urhobo background.
In cases of abomination, grave offence or defilement against the
community like murder, incest, etc., the moral pollution has to be
cleansed or expiated by special ritual experts in order to appease
spiritual beings and ancestors who are believed to have been also
offended. Until the expiation is done, the entire community (and not
only the individuals directly involved), stood a real and imminent
danger of suffering a disaster. The serious moral breach has
destabilized the fundamental peace, balance and harmony that should
prevail between the visible world of humans and invisible world of
spiritual beings and forces. The affected community could, therefore,
expect severe punishment from the supernatural custodians and
guarantors of morality. Urhobo traditional religion clearly plays a
distinctive role as the ultimate source of supernatural power and
authority that sanction and reinforce public morality. It is pressed
into full service to maintain social order, peace and harmony.
Traditional Urhobo society believes that success in life; including
the gift of off-spring, wealth and prosperity, are all blessings from
the gods and ancestors. They accrue to people who work hard, and who
strictly adhere to the customs, and traditional norms of morality of
the community, people who strictly uphold the community ideal of
harmonious living. Only such people could entertain a real hope of
achieving the highly esteemed status of ancestorhood in the hereafter.
V. Conclusion; The Factor Of Radical Change In Urhobo Society:
Prior to the advent and spread of external forces of change
engendered by colonialism, commerce and Christian missionary
campaigns, most Urhobo people lived in stable, largely small-scale and
homogeneous communities. The traditional religion was 'a typical
religion of structure'. It was the sole world-view with which Urhobo
people explained, predicted and controlled space-time events. It
underpinned every facet of life of the people. It was particularly
significant in inculcating and promoting the sense of community-living
and certain key values associated with that. Urhobo traditional
religion suffused and gave meaning to life, pervaded and permeated all
its aspects.
What one of the pioneer colonial officials, who lived and worked in
the Niger Delta from 1895 to 1905 witnessed, is typical of the
situation that prevailed throughout Urhoboland:
"...They are, in the strict and natural sense of the word, a truly
and a deeply religious people, of whom it can be said, as it has been
said of the Hindus, that "they eat religiously, drink religiously,
bathe religiously, dress religiously, and sin religiously".In a few
words, the religion of these natives, as I have endeavoured to point
out, is their existence, and their existence is their religion". (A.G.
Leonard 1968; 409)
The situation has changed radically nowadays. The experience of
colonialism and Christian missionary activity have given rise to a
radically different socio-political and religious background in
Urhoboland. Colonialism created a new social and political order. It
created modern beliefs and value systems by pulling together
traditional groups with diverse language and cultural identities. A
lot of things hitherto unknown came into existence as a result of the
colonial enterprise. Most communities are no longer homogeneous. They
are heterogeneous and plural in virtually every aspect of their life.
A wedge has been driven between the sacred and the so-called secular
aspects of life.
While it is true that traditional religion still has considerable
influence in the life and culture of many Urhobo people, it no longer
enjoys exclusive dominance and control over the life of the vast
majority of the population. Civil society now prevails. There are
civil governments, civil law, agencies of government responsible for
law and order, Western-type schools for formal education and
socialization. Above all, the belief in one and only God is now the
existing order in Urhobo nation, Christianity having emerged as the
dominant faith. The law of diminishing returns has since befallen
UrhoboTraditional Religion. Roles in society are now much more
specialized and differentiated unlike what is obtained in the
traditional background. Life is parcelled out into specific
departments and different needs are catered for by distinct units in
the civil society.
The prevailing radical social change has far-reaching implications
for the ideal of community-living in contemporary Urhobo society. On
the one hand, the world-view with which people explain and control
reality is no longer the traditional one which is religion-dominated.
Certain traditional Urhobo beliefs, customs and practices associated
with the idea and promotion of community-living have been outlawed.
They were considered either too cruel, or simply opposed to the aims
of colonial administration and/or Christian missionaries. For example,
polygamy, which has as its major objective to produce many children
and thereby increase the size of the community as much as possible, is
in serious decline in many parts of modern Urhoboland. This is as a
result of the combination of several factors, including Christian
missionary preaching against it, better health-care services, and
changing economic circumstances. The traditional belief in ancestors
and other spiritual patrons, as well as the vital role they were
believed to play in fostering community-living, have been seriously
relativised in most contemporary Urhobo communities. Masquerades are
not part of the apparatus of modern state administration. And schools
have largely displaced traditional initiations as the main channel for
formal education and socialization of youths.
Community-living on the other hand, remains a cherished value among
traditional Urhobo people. The dramatic changes in the socio-political
and religious aspects of life bring considerable pressure on the
people's sense of community. With the progressive relativisation of
the traditional religion, the traditional role of the latter in
inculcating and promoting harmony and peaceful co-existence become
more and more diminished. The profound sense of the sacred and feeling
of awe which the traditional religion brought to life in general and
different institutions in traditional communities have become greatly
circumscribed. The ability of Urhobo Traditional Religion to promote
the community ideal of peaceful and harmonious co-existence in
contemporary Urhobo communities is in a state of progressive decline.
The trend is much more noticeable in the urban areas like Warri,
Ughelli and Sapele than in rural towns and villages. The rate of
displacement of the traditional religion by the forces of radical
social change in Urhoboland is generally slower in rural areas than in
urban cities.
Urhobo communities are visibly in a state of transition, a stage of betwixt and between, with the attendant anxiety, tension and confusion being felt at virtually every facet of life of the people. The destabilization of Traditional Religion has clearly left wide gaps in the social structure, particularly in the bonds of interpersonal and inter-group relationships. Fortunately, the forces that precipitate and sustain radical change in the Urhobo nation, including Western culture and socio-political systems, now largely provide new framework and elements for community-living and harmony in most communities in Urhoboland.
Interviews
� Interview with elder Ejegedivo Udi, a local historian, aged 88 years at Isiokolo. 18th June, 2005.
� Interview with Elder Ekuke, aged 80 years at Isiokolo. 20 May, 2003.
� Interview with Pa Ovedje, a hunter, aged 80 years at Isiokolo. 12th January, 2006.
� Interview with Anthony Ujaw, a herbalist, aged 87 years at Erhon Abraka. 14th April, 2000.
Selected References
1.
N.S. Booth (ed.) African Religion, A Symposium (New York; NOK
Publishers, 1977)
2. C.I. Ejizu, OFO, Igbo Ritual Symbol (Enugu; Fourth Dimension
Publishers Ltd. 1986)
3. A. Ekwunife,
Consecration In Igbo Traditional Religion (Enugu; SNAAP Press,
1990)
4. E.Ikenga-Metuh, God And Man In African Religion (London;
Geoffrey Chapman, 1981)
5 ---- Comparative Studies Of African Traditional Religion
(Onitsha; Imico Publishers, 1987)
6. J.S. Mbiti, African Religion And Philosophy (London;
Heinemann, 1990 ed.)
7. C. Gaba,
Scriptures Of An African People; The Sacred Utterances Of The
Anlo
(New York; NOK Publishers, 1973)
8. A.G. Leonard, The Lower Niger And Its Tribes (London; 1905,
Frank Cass, 1968 edition)
9. B. Ray, African Religion, Symbol, Ritual And Community (New
Jersey; Prentice-Hall, 1976)
10. A. Shorter, African Christian Theology (London; Geoffrey
Chapman, 1975).