by
Obododimma Oha
In the catechism class in those days, we learnt that mmụọ (spirit)
was "ihe a naghị ahụ anya, maọbụ nụ olu ya maọbụ metụ ya aka" (what
we cannot see, neither can we hear its voice nor touch it). You know how the
religious discourse of that nature goes. You have no hand in the idea; it is
only "repeat after me." You have no choice in the matter but to just
repeat after the instructor. The instructor's saying is your saying; the
instructor's thought is your thought. The instructor even has no thought
independent of what the book says. So, it is our saying. Well, operating from
this ultra-conservative world of established, nailed-down truths, children are
sometimes recruited to perform some acts, to complete a ritual, which is in
consonance with the fortune or misfortune of being born into a belief system.
You have no say in that, too. You just grow up
being a believer, continuing the belief of your parents, even their
madness! If they say, "Kill somebody," you do it faithfully without asking questions. In
fact, you can even over-do it, to show that you are a super-believer!
In those days when the tree tops were a highway for squirrels and roads
passed respectfully under the breadfruit tree, those of us who were children
were privileged to eat meat and fish on behalf of the spirits. I know that in
our local area, there was this idea (sometimes voiced out by some people), that
"ụmụaka bu mmụọ" (children are spirits). Whether this idea emboldened
us or it was sheer greed, our eating on behalf of spirits was something unique.
I am going to recall how it played out in one interesting instance in which a
late paternal uncle, a worshiper of traditional Igbo religion, asked us to go
and drop food in "ihu mmụọ" (the presence of the spirits, indeed
their altar).
The food to be served the spirits (which nobody should touch anyway) was
mouth-watering and special. It had the best part of the meat and the special
portion of the fish from the soup pot. Eyes were on them, anyway, as the
children fought to be the ones chosen to go and serve the food. I think the
food was deliberately made unique; things served the invisible by the fan (not
the fanatic) should be extra-attractive. Also, children were chosen with an
assumption that they were innocent, naive, and more straightforward. It was
assumed that the innocence would please the spirits and persuade them to accept
the food offering. Adults were considered too morally stinking and stupidly
wise and would even annoy the spirits with their presence. Look at them with
their flags with so much stain! So much stench. So, only children, who were
also spirits and an offering, should bring the food and the spirits would
accept to eat!
Well, the spirits liked us, especially when we fell on the food, eating on
their behalf. That was when Uncle was not looking and we had gone far from the
house towards "ihu mmụọ." Since he trusted us with the food, being a believer, it should be
between spirits and spirits. And the spirits watched spirits eat on their
behalf in their presence.
We ate fast so that any delay would not make Uncle suspicious. What he wanted
to see was the empty plate, anyway, and
had no business asking how the spirits ate his food. The important thing was
that the spirits accepted it and ate it. And didn't spirits eat it?
Recently, this situation was even vocalized by Osụọfịa in one of the Ikuku
films he acted. Osụọfịa is the acolyte of Ikuku and charged with the task of
looking after Ikuku's property -- mainly sheep and goats offered by people as
sacrifice. Well, Osuofia did not ask for sheep or goat colony, neither did he
make a law to impose RUGA. Instead, he proclaimed that a devotee of the rich
Ikuku should equally be rich and driving an SUV! His table, too, should speak
of wealth: "O bụ anyị ga na-atara Ikuku anụ" (We are the ones that
should be eating meat for Ikuku). Osụọfịa, I am with you completely. Does
Ikuku, as a spirit, have a mouth? A mouth is a human form, not a form for
spirits. Those that have human forms are in a position to use those forms as
humans. Food or meat is not for entities without human form, and can only through
mediation be consumed by human-spirits.
So, as children growing up in the African countryside in the religion of
our ancestors, we had enormous power as spirits. We ate on half of spirits.
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