kenneth harrow
professor emeritus
dept of english
michigan state university
517 803-8839
harrow@msu.edu
Sent: Saturday, January 22, 2022 8:32 AM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You": Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of Wukari
Prof. of History/African Studies, CCSU
africahistory.net; vimeo.com/ gloriaemeagwali
Recipient of the 2014 Distinguished Research
Excellence Award, Univ. of Texas at Austin;
2019 Distinguished Africanist Award
New York African Studies Association
Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2022 8:20 PM
To: USAAfricaDialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You": Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of Wukari
Please be cautious: **External Email**
--Great, this clarification is needed and must be restated.
An owner of a university believes in ritual murder, and he killed for ritual murder, relating the theory to practice!
When Nigerian professors who are Christians teach African religions, they teach them as "meal tickets". Is this a problem? There are those who teach Africa as a meal ticket. Is this not a problem?
When Christian professors teach Christianity, they teach them both as a meal ticket and their own core values, believing that Jesus can cleanse sins. Is this a problem?
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Moses Ebe Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com>
Date: Thursday, January 20, 2022 at 1:11 PM
To: USAAfricaDialogue <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You": Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of WukariOga Falola,
No contradiction in my positions to reconcile. I have never said that academics cannot study myth, spirituality, beliefs, religion, and metaphysical claims of power, instrumentality, and amelioration. Scholars have done that for many centuries, applying different critical and research methods to the realm of belief, myth, and supernatural beliefs. They have explained the logics, rationales, and functions of beliefs in socioeconomic, political, and quotidian affairs within Western and non-Western contexts. But these scholars undertake this task with a scholarly detachment and the analytical distance expected of a scholar.
Nwolise's academic "crime," which riled me and others, is that, not only did he not observe any scholarly or analytical detachment from the supernatural claims he was promoting (in fact he was emphatically asserting and describing them as established, verifiable, and cocksure phenomena), he proclaimed with certitude and with no caveats, qualifiers, or tentativeness that spiritual forces and the powers they are alleged to possess by practitioners of various religions, are real.
The unscholarly language of certitude and absolutism he deployed to make these unscholarly claims was jarring to say the least. It's obvious that the man believes, as an article of faith, what he proclaims in the texts/lecture we discussed, but he wasn't making these proclamations on the pulpit, in a religious pamphlet, or in a faith-based conversation. These ideas were contained in a professorial inaugural lecture, academic books, and papers. That was the problem. He was fraudulently and cavalierly passing off his faith and beliefs as scholarly verities and axioms in an academic medium.
My second critique of Nwolise was that, having committed the first egregious scholarly violation of conflating his belief with his scholarship, he proceeded to recommend and to convince the highest military authorities in Nigeria to adopt a military strategy of invoking spiritual powers and forces to help them win the fight against Boko Haram and other terrorist insurgents. That is madness, of course. National defense is a serious business requiring investments in equipment, training, personnel, and strategy. To trivialize it and replace its core military elements with some notions of spiritual warfare is silly and dangerous. Pray, how to you summon or conscript spiritual entities to fight against well-armed terrorists and insurgents?
What people do in their belief systems, religions, and rites in subnational or even national contexts is their business, and we must respectfully engage these beliefs whether as scholars or regular observers. Those cultures and beliefs and their associated myths, rites, and practices pose no harm to anyone or the nation and in fact can serve as ways of forging national cohesion and self-affirming cultural pride. Those of us who are curious scholars can study the beliefs and rites and their underlying logics and ethos to the extent possible with our methodologies and modes of inquiry. But how do you go from that to elevating such beliefs and cultures to the heart of public policy and national defense policy formulation? That was the second and, for me, fatal error of Nwolise.
On Thu, Jan 20, 2022 at 9:32 AM Harrow, Kenneth <harrow@msu.edu> wrote:
hi moses
the line between outsiders and insiders, in instituting change, must really change over time.
and not aways be determined by obvious things, like force, or forced conversions. i imagine economic factors are often key, like when cameroonians from northern cameroon identified themselves as hausa, so as to get a job. the pressures related to how one is inside or outside depend on where you are working, as geschiere wrote in describing people who left the village for the city, in s east cameroon.
we change when we get educated in one city vs another.
and so on.
i see change from within as often being a dialectical and very painful process. i am thinking about the jewish community in the u.s. torn over the question of israel's position vis a vis palestine. no unity there at all. the same for our rituals, like being kosher. normally a minor question now heightened by ultra-orthodox who have spoiled so many of our values, especially toward women....
change comes from violence, according to hegel...
ken
kenneth harrow
professor emeritus
dept of english
michigan state university
From: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM <chidi.opara@gmail.com>
Sent: Thursday, January 20, 2022 9:07 AM
To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You": Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of Wukari
"Finally, cultures of course change and shift with time, and I am certain that Jukun religion and royal funerary rites are dynamic and have evolved over time, but the pace of change and evolution should not be dictated by judgmental outsiders but by the organic momentum of internal consensus and societal evolution"-Moses Ochonu.
It was a "judgemental outsider" for example, that stopped the culture of killing of twins in Igboland. Now, we have twins, who would have been killed (as prescribed by the culture then), contributing their quotas in all spheres to the advancement of the Igbo society in particular and to the larger society.
-Chidi Anthony Opara (CAO)
On Thursday, January 20, 2022, Moses Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com> wrote:Toyin, you have answered your own questions with your own conjectures. I insist that the mystery and the myth are essential elements of tradition— any tradition. This is not unique to the Jukun or Africans. As I stated in my reflection, most of these esoteric practices are not esoteric at all and were created at particular moments for practical and strategic social, economic, and political purposes. When I have the time, I'll recount the Benin story told to us in Ilorin by the great Professor Osofisan.
What you call illusions and the maintenance of it are sometimes what holds a community together, the glue of solidarity, cohesion, and monarchical stability.
Myth-making itself is a rational, logical process, not an idle, archaic relic of superstition. Most modern institutions and nations are sustained by myths that are not tethered to objective, verifiable, or self-evident realities. Yet these myths are so powerful that people are willing to and do die for them, signing up to sacrifice their lives to defend them. There are many examples.
The other thing is that self-sacrifice—-varying notions of it ranging from martyrdom to blood atonement to the extreme of human sacrifice —are integral to many religions. And of course as you know, assisted honorable suicide is now legal in most Western countries.
By all means study Jukun royal funerary rites and religion with academic lens, but don't expect to unravel or satisfactorily explain it to those outside the overarching religious orbit, to non-initiates. I don't think that's possible, as unknowability is a central aspect of the practice, crucial to its sociopolitical function. But even if you could explain or unravel everything about it or fill gaps with informed, intelligent conjectures, would it not be arrogant to do so as an outside interlocutor whose enterprise does not have the cooperative input of the Jukun people?
Critique certain elements of the rites, but my point is that it is disrespectful and even unethical to derisively condemn or dismiss some of the practices as barbaric and repugnant as some have done and for Christians to apply their scriptural and exegetical standards to practices of an African Traditional Religion (ATR).
Finally, cultures of course change and shift with time, and I am certain that Jukun religion and royal funerary rites are dynamic and have evolved over time, but the pace of change and evolution should not be dictated by judgmental outsiders but by the organic momentum of internal consensus and societal evolution.
Sent from my iPhone
On Jan 19, 2022, at 11:53 PM, Oluwatoyin Adepoju <ovdepoju@gmail.com> wrote:
Agree with Chidi.
Having read the BBC interview with the escort and looked again at his picture, he does not look or sound like a person who ever battled wild animals or evil spirits, talk less having just survived such an ordeal a few days ago.
I expect the Wukari have long abandoned the dagerous aspect of the rites, if they ever existed, but sustained the illusion.
I also suspect the whole account has always been an elaborate illusion.
There has never been any handing over of the king's body to spirits of the forest, I expect.
I expect the king was buried in the forest and the escort either sacrificed or sent into.exile.
Thanks
Toyin
On Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 06:32 Chidi Anthony Opara, FIIM <chidi.opara@gmail.com> wrote:
In modern societies, are people free to want to die? What would be the cost of such deaths to the society if allowed?
Must we relive these traditions? Are these practices still relevant today? Shouldn't we put records of these practices in museums, where interested persons can go and view them?
By the way, isn't it better to make that young man a medical doctor, lawyer, engineer, etc, than one who escorts a dead king to the ancestors (and may never come back).
A Poet wrote "I took my revolver and killed the gods". Revolver here representing modernity and the gods of course representating tradition.
-Chidi Anthony Opara (CAO)
On Thursday, January 20, 2022, Moses Ebe Ochonu <meochonu@gmail.com> wrote:TEN FURTHER THOUGHTS ON THE AKU UKA'S TRANSITION
1. Unknown to many people, especially judgmental and self-righteous Pentecostal Christians who condemned the beautiful Pankya transition rites from their conceited Christian perspective, the late Aku Uka, Dr. Shekarau Angyu Masa Ibi II was a devout Christian of the Reformed Church of Nigeria. Not only that, he was a trained theologian. A friend of mine recounted in our online forum how the departed Aku Uka used to have theological debates and discussion with my friend's father, a prominent Bible scholar and missionary.
But the Aku Uka was also a man who was not ashamed of his culture or the traditional religion and rituals of his people. He skillfully navigated the obligations of both his Christian faith and those of his ancient Kwararafa/Jukun people and kingdom. He was an excellent model for how to be a Christian without succumbing to the colonial mentality of disavowing and rejecting your cultural heritage, history, and traditions. Many of us can learn from his example.
By the way, the anti-culture Christian brigade have their work cut out for them because there is a growing cohort of traditional rulers who are devout and in some cases Pentecostal Christians. The newly elected Och'Idoma is a Deeper Life Pastor, as is the Tor Tiv. The young Olu of Warri is a vocal Christian. I understand that the Chief of Kagoro who recently passed away was also a pastor. There are many others.
2. One of the sons of the transitioned Aku Uka is a pastor and proudly participated in the funerary rites. He was being a proud Jukun prince, which in no way diminishes his Christian bona fides.
3. The horse riding escort (Atobe) belongs to a special family of royal courtiers and servants whose job it is to groom male members for the role of escort so that when the time comes one or more of them would eagerly volunteer to accompany the Aku Uka on his journey into the forest to be "delivered to his ancestors."
4. Being the horse riding escort is a coveted position of masculine honor and prestige, something that members of the designated family crave because whether the person makes it back or not, the family and the person are forever credited with doing the bidding of the ancestors and thus bringing blessings and fortunes to the community.
5. That brings me back to the horse rider. It is considered a mark of great individual martial accomplishment and distinction to accompany the Aku Uka on the three day journey and make it back alive because it indicates that 1) the person is a great warrior who might have encountered wild animals and evil spirits and vanquished them; 2) he is a man with a clean conscience and pure love for his community, otherwise the gods would have killed him in order to save the community from the repercussion of his evil deeds or intentions; 3) the gods are happy with him and the community because if/when he returns from the forest, he brings blessings, powers, and positive messages from the gods.
6. Yes, there is a foreboding possibility of the horse rider not returning, hence the prepayment of a ritualistic token compensation to his family. He goes to the mission fully cognizant of this possibility but yet proudly embraces it as a free-willing adult. How, by the way, is this different from the honorable and heroic kamikaze Japanese pilots of World War II, or from the practice of young men and women signing up voluntarily for war in defense of their country's or king's honor knowing fully well that the odds of returning alive is against them?
7. As with every tradition, the mystery is an essential element of it, so trying to rationally explain or understand every aspect of it using the empirical logic of verifiability is misguided. The story in this case is that the gods and ancestral spirits take the life of the horse rider as a sacrifice if they wish. Often, in these types of traditions, such stories serve to further mystify and to thus entrench the tradition once the practice has become accepted. Without such mystifying stories, future generations might do away with the tradition or invent a new one, so there is a perfectly rational political and social explanation for the story. It is a powerful technique to preserve the practice beyond the time of the people who invented it.
As Zainab Ali explained yesterday, the real explanation may not even be mysterious at all and may have to do with the simple fact that in the old days a man who rode a horse deep into the forest by himself unarmed was unlikely to return because of wild animals, thirst, hunger, physical injury, and climatic vagaries. The community knew this but that explanation would render the enterprise mundane and rob it of its spiritual power. Therefore, in many such instances, even in the Western and Eastern monarchical and sociopolitical traditions, the people construct elaborate myths about gods, spirits, and forces in the forest or in the sky or in the water that kill and spare as they wish.
Often such stories kill the proverbial two birds with one stone because, sticking with this example, apart from sacrelizing the possible disappearance of the horse rider, further adding to the mysterious allure of the event, the story mystifies the monarchy, helping to consolidate it, forging obedience to it, and discouraging rebellion by putting sacred fear in the hearts of subjects. I have a similar story from Benin Kingdom down south that I will share soon.
8. Some people say riding a horse with a corpse is barbaric. This is a decontextualized and judgmental perspective. Did the people who invented the tradition consider it barbaric? There are many funerary traditions in the world and in different religions. Some people cremate their dead proudly in blazing pyres. Others may find it unacceptable and barbaric even though research has shown that it is the healthiest way of disposing of the dead. There is an ethnic group in the Indonesian archipelago that keeps the bodies of their dead with them in the community, dressing them up on occasion for many years. Another group puts the bodies in nearby caves unburied so that family members can visit and see their dead loved ones. Again, some people may consider this barbaric but it's perfectly normal and respectable to the people who practice it. To each their own.
9. I for one have learned a lot about this beautiful, ancient, proudly preserved religion/culture of the Jukun, of which the royal funerary right of Pankya is only one aspect. I am now thirsty for more, the curious historian that I am.
10. Most of us criticize what we don't understand instead of trying to know more about it with an open mind. With that in mind, let me recommend a live Facebook lecture and discussion on Pankya, the Jukun transitional rite of Aku Uka, which is taking place this Saturday (see details in my comment below). I plan to attend to learn more. Join the discussion if you can and come with an open mind and with your serious (not derisive and disrespectful) questions. I am sure the expert presenters and authorities will answer your questions and clarify your confusion regarding this wonderful culture/religion.
On Wed, Jan 19, 2022 at 5:51 PM Cornelius Hamelberg <corneliushamelberg@gmail.com> wrote:
Profound, profound.
You bring a tear to smile and I can't hide it.
As far as the title of this thread is concerned, I imagine that there are those who have not taken these words of gentle Jesus to heart ,
" But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which spitefully use you, and persecute you.."
I suppose that when such people are at the brink of The Hereafter "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You" , would be putting it lightly, preferably, more honestly it should be
" When you die, May all your enemies accompany you"
That the prohibition against child sacrifice is made so clear suggests that it was a practice that was prevalent in the neighbourhood, some of the surrounding cultures and possibly still continues in some of the darkest places in the wilderness.
Unbelieving Thomas wants to see real proof and not speculation before he's convinced.
Mr. Ginsberg was unsparing with his condemnations with much howling about Moloch
in Howl part 2:
II
What sphinx of cement and aluminum bashed open their skulls and ate up their brains and imagination?
Moloch! Solitude! Filth! Ugliness! Ashcans and unobtainable dollars! Children screaming under the stairways! Boys sobbing in armies! Old men weeping in the parks!
Moloch! Moloch! Nightmare of Moloch! Moloch the loveless! Mental Moloch! Moloch the heavy judger of men!
Moloch the incomprehensible prison! Moloch the crossbone soulless jailhouse and Congress of sorrows! Moloch whose buildings are judgment! Moloch the vast stone of war! Moloch the stunned governments!
Moloch whose mind is pure machinery! Moloch whose blood is running money! Moloch whose fingers are ten armies! Moloch whose breast is a cannibal dynamo! Moloch whose ear is a smoking tomb!
Moloch whose eyes are a thousand blind windows! Moloch whose skyscrapers stand in the long streets like endless Jehovahs! Moloch whose factories dream and croak in the fog! Moloch whose smoke-stacks and antennae crown the cities!
Moloch whose love is endless oil and stone! Moloch whose soul is electricity and banks! Moloch whose poverty is the specter of genius! Moloch whose fate is a cloud of sexless hydrogen! Moloch whose name is the Mind!
Moloch in whom I sit lonely! Moloch in whom I dream Angels! Crazy in Moloch! Cocksucker in Moloch! Lacklove and manless in Moloch!
Moloch who entered my soul early! Moloch in whom I am a consciousness without a body! Moloch who frightened me out of my natural ecstasy! Moloch whom I abandon! Wake up in Moloch! Light streaming out of the sky!
Moloch! Moloch! Robot apartments! invisible suburbs! skeleton treasuries! blind capitals! demonic industries! spectral nations! invincible madhouses! granite cocks! monstrous bombs!
They broke their backs lifting Moloch to Heaven! Pavements, trees, radios, tons! lifting the city to Heaven which exists and is everywhere about us!
Visions! omens! hallucinations! miracles! ecstasies! gone down the American river!
Dreams! adorations! illuminations! religions! the whole boatload of sensitive bullshit!
Breakthroughs! over the river! flips and crucifixions! gone down the flood! Highs! Epiphanies! Despairs! Ten years' animal screams and suicides! Minds! New loves! Mad generation! down on the rocks of Time!
Real holy laughter in the river! They saw it all! the wild eyes! the holy yells! They bade farewell! They jumped off the roof! to solitude! waving! carrying flowers! Down to the river! into the street!
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 23:32:57 UTC+1 Kenneth Harrow wrote:
cornelius, why do you call azazel the scapegoat? i thought the goat was sent to him in the wilderness.
on another note, i am skeptical of accounts of child sacrifice, most anywhere. i'd want to see real proof and not speculation before i'd be convinced.
ken
kenneth harrow
professor emeritus
dept of english
michigan state university
From: usaafric...@googlegroups.com <usaafric...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Cornelius Hamelberg <cornelius...@gmail.com>
Sent: Wednesday, January 19, 2022 5:02 PM
To: USA Africa Dialogue Series <usaafric...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Re: "When You Die, Someone Should Die With You": Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of Wukari
Very interesting. For the super-sleuth, the plot thickens; in a non-religious context it would be a or the case of the missing king.
" Because he does not die, there are no undertaker's, coffin or grave, that will make him mortal. He rides majestically on his royal horse to meet his forebears. The young man with him serves as his sheath bearer. But also serve as the proverbial scapegoat, on behalf of the community." ( Pankya and its May Mysteries )
Nor does he, like Jesus, in full view of his disciples ascend bodily to our Father heaven, disappearing beyond the clouds, Gate Gate Para Gate Para Sam Gate Bodhi Swaha.
What does the conclusion of the Heart Sutra have to do with the bodily ascension of Jesus to Haven? It's the kind of question that the uninitiated may well ask, and the kind of question that e.e. answers with the first line of his love poem that begins at this beginning:
somewhere i have never travelled, gladly beyond
" The proverbial scapegoat " is reminiscent of poor old Azazel
no crucifixion
no resurrection
no ascension
the goat merely disappears
into the wilderness
carrying his burden:
all our sins
Azazel the scapegoat
far removed from the lofty dream:
O lamb of God who take away the sins of this world !
I cry
tears hide.
At this stage, you have the right to be intensely worried and even the right to remain silent about the trial of Nnamdi Kanu which started yesterday and narry a word about this very significant event, in this USA- Africa series.
Or is it the silence before the tsunami?
Hopefully, Brother Nnamdi is not another Azazel or the case of another failed Messiah who says "Seek ye first the political kingdom, and all will be added"
"But He, Himself was broken
Long before the sky would open
Forsaken, almost human
He sank beneath your wisdom like a stone"
Cf Your Master
On Wednesday, 19 January 2022 at 05:53:26 UTC+1 chidi...@gmail.com wrote:
"That it is traditional does not make it right"-Barack Obama.
-CAO.
On Tuesday, January 18, 2022, Cornelius Hamelberg <cornelius...@gmail.com> wrote:First things first ( Africa First!)
Question 1, and in the name of Shalom, I don't want to quarrel with anyone, but just as Adepopju enquired of Professor Gloria in Excelsis Emeagwali : "could i know what motivated your interest in this at this time? " , the this being her posting "Atrocities/war crimes condoned in the Bible", so too I ask Adepoju the same question, in light of his recent altercation with Professor Moses Ochonu: Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju, please, could we know what motivated your interest in posting the transcript of a discussion involving Professor Ochonu, at this time?
And no mention of the ancient Egyptian burial rites ensuring immortality after death? For example there are certain funeral rites for Mende Chiefs in Sierra Leone, that are sensitive and no business of those not directly concerned...
After reading through the transcript of the discussion, I should only like to make the following observations
1. We are to surmise the Almighty is totally against human sacrifice , as evidenced by the Akedah , a ram being substituted for Isaac, at the very last moment.
The idea that God's absolute justice required that His only begotten Son should be sacrificed on the cross in order to save sinful humanity, is still being debated by both Jew and gentile, in websites such as Jews for Judaism and Tovia Singer and mythvision
There's also a necessary distinction to be made between suicide on the one hand – which is forbidden - and martyrdom , such as Kiddush Hashem . But how to characterise what happened at Masada?
It's a very moving picture of the chivalric horse rider who accompanies his liege into the dark forest at the end of the latter's life pilgrimage – hopefully, Tunde Kelani will make a blockbuster movie out of it. In my not so informed imagination, I imagine a parallel with the last scene of King Arthur's farewell as captured by the last verse of Alfred Lord Tennyson's Morte D'Arthur...
I imagine the mysterious & anonymous masked rider accompanying the dearly departed King into the dark forest , and who knows, unrecognised and unrecognizable reappearing to continue life as before, in the kingdom or elsewhere
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 17:55:40 UTC+1 Cornelius Hamelberg wrote:
Correction : Should read ; " Now, isn't it a paradox that the Hindus infiltrated Cremation into the Church of England in Great Britain, as far back as 1918?
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 17:48:20 UTC+1 Cornelius Hamelberg wrote:
This theme is just too exciting . No holds barred, I'm looking forward to how the discussion will evolve.
"I believe many people criticize what they don't understand" , opines Brother Professor ( Full Professor) Moses Ochonu. Exactly what I was thinking last night without any reference backing from Kant or any of the greater sceptics - another instance of argumentum ad verecundiam – as in " I am the way, the truth and the light – no man cometh unto the Father except by through me!" (Jesus ) or , " God must be a boogie man " because wizard Charlie Mingus the super good jazz bassman said so, and as for me, I'm in full agreement with Stevie Wonder here singing, " When you believe in things you don't understand , then you suffer : Superstition ain't the way"
Therefore, the saying is "Two Jews, three opinions" attesting to the glory of the Talmud and the Talmudic sages, I daresay ten opinionated, specially educated Nigerians speaking international English and not the exactitudes of Kantian German as the chosen vehicle for their arguments, as in this transcript, and we get a large number, verily, a multitude of attitudes - and thank God that the Hindu practice of Sati has fallen into desuetude , not due to the outright forbidding/ regulated out of existence by what Adepoju would like us to believe are civilising British Colonialists, but due to post-enlightenment and what 21st century futurists looking back deem to be modernity even then, though for very different reasons the Sotah ritual as prescribed in ancient Judaism – for a wife accused of infidelity, has also fallen into desuetude, since – so the rabbis say, the nation had gradually seeped into stages of unholiness thereby rendering the Sotah ritual ineffective.
With trepidation a modernist/ postmodernist and the village schoolteacher Lakunle, himself not that civilised - if we are to go by Kenneth Harrow's harrowing questions raised here, please, only use the word "barbaric" to describe the Sotah in the Torah, at the risk of sounding disdainful and anti-Semitic.
Now, isn't it a paradox that the Hindus infiltrated Creation into the Church of England in Great Britain, as far back as 1918?
Lissen up : " I warned the people of Jamaica and they did not listen".. Buju Banton speaking once more in Deep English ( bad words edited out as much as possible.
On Tuesday, 18 January 2022 at 11:29:13 UTC+1 toyin....@gmail.com wrote:
"When You Die, Someone Should Die With You"
Perspectives on Accompanied Death by Moses Ochonu and Friends on Facebook in
Relation to the January 2022 Burial of the Aku Uka of Wukari
Compiled by Oluwatoyin Vincent Adepoju with an Introduction,
Background Images and Accompanying Facebook Comments by Various Readers
Accompanied death, the process of a person dying along with a person
already dead, recurs in various civilizations. It emerges in the now
defunct Indian tradition of Sati
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sati_(practice)>, discontinued by the
colonising British, in which a wife burnt herself alive in the process of
her husband's cremation. It has also been visible in a number of various
African civilisations. Wole Soyinka builds his play *Death and the King's
Horseman* around that custom as it was demonstrated in 1946 in the Yoruba
city of Oyo. The sections of the play centred on the attempted ritual
suicide of the king's horseman who is to follow his lord to the beyond are
among his greatest work. It has been described in African cultures, as also
actualised in the forceful seizure of people to be killed in accompaniment
of a dead ruler, though whether it still continues in some or all of those
cultures, I have not been able to ascertain.
In the case of the Aki Uka of Wukari, in Nigeria, his corpse is seated on a
horse, leaning on the horse rider, who rides with the body into a forest
believed, by one perspective, to a forest wherein is the abode of spirits
where the deceased ruler will achieve his final transition. The spirits,
this view states, may or may not decide to take the horse rider along with
the deceased ruler, whose body is also believed to experience a fate
unknown to any but the spirits and the departed ruler's final companion.
Picture of an earlier example of the final ride of the body of the deceased
Aki Uka of Wukari, with his living companion
Image source: Apajukun Facebook page
<https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters/photos/a.261613190932055/1282480332178664/?__tn__=%2CO*F>
[image:
272080198_1282480328845331_5569717339850277576_n.jpg]
In the post and discussion below, Moses Ochonu and his Facebook friends
discuss the subject in relation to the recent burial, in January 2022, of
the Aku Uka of Wukari.
Moses Ochonu presents this view on what happens in the climatic final
scenes of the ride to the beyond:
''there was no "intentional killing of another human being." The king's
escort goes ALONE into the bush with the king on a horse and, depending on
what the gods decide, would commit ritual sacrificial suicide. In many
cases, the gods spare the escorts. In the current case, the young man was
not only spared but has since returned home to his family.''
Zainab Ali, responding to Ochonu's post on the subject, presents another
perspective on the fate of the ruler's companion:
''historically the forest where the final burial is conducted is dangerous,
wild animals evil spirits, and whatnot. So considering the escort is just
one man, the possibility of something happening to him over there is known
and accepted by him ab initio.
It is that danger that raise the conversation around the uncertainty of his
return, it is never about him being sacrificed.'
Ochonu, a historial, tries to contextualise Ali's contribution:
''Zainab Ali
<https://www.facebook.com/ZaynerbAli?__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
thank
you again!!This is very enlightening. You are educating many misinformed
people. I believe many people criticize what they don't understand, and
that there had to be a rational, perfectly logical reason for for the
escort perhaps not returning. Often, with this type of things, the
ritual/sacrificial/suicidal explanation is constructed strategically after
the tradition has already taken root, as a way of consolidating monarchical
power by further mystifying its occupant and putting sacred fear in the
hearts of subjects. I have a similar story from Benin Kingdom.''
A principal disagreement between Ochonu and some of his intercutors is
represented by the following exchange:
Chris Ugwualor
<https://www.facebook.com/chris.ugwualor?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwNzk5OTQ1NjQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
While we all appreciate the excesses of the Pentecostals in painting
anything non-western as barbaric, I must admit that human sacrifice,
whether voluntarily or otherwise is very barbaric.
3
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- · 15h
<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu/posts/10160107982926484?comment_id=10160107999456484&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
Hide 19 Replies
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<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwODAwNjg0MTQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
Author
Moses Ochonu
<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwODAwNjg0MTQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
It was not barbaric to the people who invented it and at the time that
it was instituted. You can call for its review in view of current moral
standards without calling it barbaric. The folks who came up with it would
have disapproved of many rituals and practices we consider mainstream and
modern, but I doubt they would have been so judgmental as to call those
practices barbaric. It's this type of decontextualized condemnation and
judgmental critique that is problematic.
5
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<https://www.facebook.com/chris.ugwualor?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwODAxOTg4MTQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
Chris Ugwualor
<https://www.facebook.com/chris.ugwualor?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwODAxOTg4MTQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
Moses Ochonu
<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu?__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>,
I completely disagree. Any cultural practice that leads to the intentional
killing of another human being under any guise is barbaric.
In my culture, they used to bury titled men with some of their slaves.
Also twins were seen as abomination and were killed. Both practices were
barbaric too and had long been stopped.
There are some evidence that Western Europe practised human sacrifice.
That's also barbaric.
All other aspects of Jukun cultural practices may be excellent but that
of human sacrifice is a no no no.
2
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- Moses Ochonu
<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu?comment_id=Y29tbWVudDoxMDE2MDEwNzk4MjkyNjQ4NF8xMDE2MDEwODAzMjg0NjQ4NA%3D%3D&__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
Chris Ugwualor
<https://www.facebook.com/chris.ugwualor?__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
but
there was no "intentional killing of another human being." The king's
escort goes ALONE into the bush with the king on a horse and, depending on
what the gods decide, would commit ritual sacrificial suicide. In many
cases, the gods spare the escorts. In the current case, the young man was
not only spared but has since returned home to his family.
1
- Moses Ochonu
<https://www.facebook.com/moses.ochonu?__cft__[0]=AZU9nHblt41rhIfNfXL4rRf8_gP_aP1bf4WU010z4iMB2rWmhGVDo1nx8UIZhFsT8VLXPXw_bD6uMo1s1WRYE1BOzYGiloAC6-DSEwa297SRQV06QtDXFrFxn_k63mhgCv8&__tn__=R]-R>
"
- From what I've read, the man alone will ride on the horse with the
corpse of the King to the final resting place deep in the wilderness, where
he is expected to "deliver the king" to the gods and then commit ritual,
sacrificial suicide.
In reality, many of the "sacrificial" companions return home, spared by
the gods. Only a few do not. The idea is that if the gods wish, they could
take the life of the king's living companion during or at the end of the
three day journey deep in the bush."
I first provide the context of their discussion through images and
accompanying commentary from sources familiar with the culture of the
Wukari, from Apajukun <https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters>, a
Facebook page dedicated to this culture.
*Context of Discusion : The Burial of the Aku Uka of Warri in Pictures and
Commentary*
* Picture of What May be the Throne of the
Aku Uka *
[image:
246141275_1281940138899350_5966122671623590548_n.jpg]
* Announcement of Live Streaming of Funeral Rites*
[image:
271754981_1279899905770040_7258294245114307553_n.jpg]
Apajukun
<https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters/?__cft__[0]=AZV__A0zuSp-j3CYANoINheHanOjo0y3M850vE3tzJY0snDQUCvdRZbIyrhKZXQyTLbNeZgfc4F6hlrXVksvCHdwbpk2ACNPhEJIQpRT2_Gmw1b3fxv087cZo5FyLy5hnOtAadozzybZ5MW9gT36PIKQ&__tn__=-UC%2CP-R>
January 12, 2022
<https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters/posts/1279899942436703?__cft__[0]=AZV__A0zuSp-j3CYANoINheHanOjo0y3M850vE3tzJY0snDQUCvdRZbIyrhKZXQyTLbNeZgfc4F6hlrXVksvCHdwbpk2ACNPhEJIQpRT2_Gmw1b3fxv087cZo5FyLy5hnOtAadozzybZ5MW9gT36PIKQ&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-R>
PUBLIC NOTICE!!
This is to inform the general public that arrangement has been made for
live streaming of the final rite (Pankya) of His Majesty, Dr Shekarau Angyu
Masa-Ibi CON, The AKU UKA.
Those who may not be opportuned to attend can do so virtually on inferno TV
(Facebook and Youtube).
[image:
272014022_1283550552071642_3194283036749304598_n.jpg]
*A Poetic Celebration of the Aku Uka's Ride to the Beyond with His
Companion*
Apajukun
<https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters/?__cft__[0]=AZVn-SyZr8ad-3xkrHHj-kov0YXkw0nQkQfq2VZo4uTWDXzIAVpxEVfMXLKsSdiApB8qyd5XBCNEQGAsZA6BhgBkHKiOKk0nTsVdpqHi1DrU22Qb6LQo0PjWUb2-5vPA7BAhcsX2Pfnp3h5YT4dJafPL&__tn__=-UC%2CP-R>
Tuesday, January 18, 2022
<https://www.facebook.com/apajukunreporters/posts/1283550585404972?__cft__[0]=AZWZ6QZi-amySpUrW-E-_hfXepKbHQokBz_ate7SWCWANES4UsdMeXNDrQJAJ4fRix9yYaIp1-XRcSPKXQOgxdg70bWpj9WvpZNw7ZcsuQQ9wFtZZ2Xs5ZE8u7Td2vCLG3y1XbFJbehbVNWg-1F-iSNQ&__tn__=%2CO%2CP-R>
THE TRANSMOGRIFICATION & THE TRANSITION OF AKU UKA
He does not belong here alone, he belongs to the gods!
He descended from far beyond.
He was born mortal yet immortal.
His persona is twined betwixt two worlds.
He is an enigma beyond comprehension.
He is a satellite of the gods over the people.
He is a vicar of the gods.
He is the blend of the real & the surreal.
He knows no hate and hates not one.
On his hands is the power to make or stop the rain.
He possesses the power to silence the thunder and forbid the lightning
from striking.
Now, the appointed time beckons & his spirit must transit to NANDO, the
great beyond where he will commune with the gods in the land of the living
dead.
On his left hand, he holds the esoteric grains which he must release for
the survival of the people.
On his right hand, he holds all the natural elements which he must let go
of for his people as he journeys ahead.
But behold, a young hero on a stallion riding along gallantly with pride,
dignity & majesty to the great beyond with the ANDU.
The ground quakes & the multitudes of people shake & tremble at the sight
of the young hero who must not look back until he delivers the new citizen
to the land of the gods.
Prince Beavens Ajiduku (PhD)
A prince from the great Kwararafa Kingdom
[image: 272014022_1283550552071642_3194283036749304598_n.jpg]
*An Expository Explanation of the Aku Uka's Ride to the Beyond with His
Companion*
Ovie Okukulabe
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