BY REV. FR. GERALD NWAFOR
Some people were moving around the traditional markets in Igboland disturbing the Christian preachers but ignoring the loud microphones of the Mosque, in the name of traditional believers. I remember one of my teachers who said that if education is costly, you can try ignorance.
I studied religions of the world disinterestedly not being attached to any of them. One of the astonishing conclusions was the copying and borrowing that happens in the religious tradition. Let me remind the people who think that they have the monopoly on violence that no religion thrives with violence.
You can ask the Crusaders, the Arab conquerors, and the Reconquista around 718. Violence has not benefited any religion, be it borrowed or traditional. Let us go back to the gist of the matter. Before the advent of Christianity, in what is called the Igboland today the Igbo people travelled a lot around the world. In some of these travels, they would go with their chi (gods) and their religion which would be embedded in rituals and rites.
The Igbo people believe that some Chis are more powerful than others which is why the people of Onitsha can go to Arochukwu to consult the deity of the Aroh people. In some extreme cases, the people or Aroh would give the visitors the power to erect another Aroh in their city or town and the Chief priest of Arochukwu would go to the said village to erect the shrine. These shrines, when fully erected, commanded their power and authority completely with or without reference to the original deity.
There are popular deities around Igboland that have landmark reputations because of what was attributed to them. The first was Kissa, Ntoko, Ulasi, Aroh, and many more. A look at how this shrine has helped the community would help the people who go around now trying to force people to worship them.Our parents and forefathers worshipped the Gods they created, and some worshipped the gods they borrowed from other people, in search of a superior or stronger one.
Whenever they see a chi that will bring them closer to the ‘Chi-Ukwu’ they will jump to it. The idea that the forefathers would not jump into Christianity is something new in our people. Today I watched people going to the shrines and the idols in the quest for wealth.
Our forefathers who instituted most of the shrines in our traditions do not sell their farmland to go and worship the new gods they brought in from Ulasi or Kissa, nor do they stop going to the farm because they have gotten a new religion from Arochukwu.
They never short-changed hard work with religion, and they never preached to anyone that they have a new deity that brings wealth and health. Rather, the goal of their religion and worship has been for the welfare and protection of the society and family.
When the young people who do not know what religion stands for in the primary tradition of our people begin to compare successes and achievements in the light of religion, I think it is a step in the wrong direction.
There are equal billionaires in the Muslim world as you can see in the Christian world, vis a vis the Hindi and the atheist. It is hard work and discipline that creates wealth not the chi you are worshipping.
Why should our forefathers give us the saying that when you see something more precious than farmland, you need to sell all your farm products to buy it (Afu ife ka ubi ele oba)? When they saw Christianity in the early 1800s and started sending their kids to schools and churches, they knew what the future would be, and they did not want to miss out.
Remember what the proverb stated, “You sell the farm produce not the farm itself.”The new generation wanted to sell the farmland and the farm produce in the name of clinging back to tradition.
I hope they will see the light and begin to fight for what would benefit them not what is of no value. How many mobile phones, cars, planes, and electronics do we produce in religious houses? Good schools have given us many engineers, doctors, and scientists to better our human society.
The church in Christendom discovered this trajectory a long time ago and started building schools to help develop our minds to create more engineers and doctors. I have not seen a local shrine that teaches people how to make a living. I had an uncle who cured people of scorpion stings and snake bites.
I went to him directly to teach me what he uses to cure snake bites and scorpion stings, but he blatantly refused, telling me point blank that it was a gift for him alone from his chi.
What kind of Chi does not allow a good gift to be circulated in the community to cure one another? The people attacking the preacher in the market were wearing clothing materials made in China (People who had no chi at all). They wanted to use microphones created by another society.
I call on them to go back to their chi and planned traditional religion and ask them how they can help humanity. I can assure them if they can invent one pin and circulate it in our society today, they would not need to force anyone to join them because their good work would speak for them. I hope they will see the light that religion is not their problem but hard work and discipline.
I would urge them to go back to their group and continue the fight by telling other young people that religion is not the problem, because the farmland is still fertile for cultivation and harvest, not idolatry and paganism which they are promoting.
