Officially (as of 1685 by royal police decree), the slave population was to be baptized and Catholic, but in practice little "official" religious instruction was afforded them. By and large, they continued to carry on their traditional beliefs, sychretizing the rites of various regions, while only gradually becoming Christianized, Voudon receiving a veneer of Catholic liturgy. At the end of the eighteenth century, the slave-plantation system in Saint Dominque fell apart as the white population protested the growing class of free Creoles and lawfully freed slaves and their descendants having gained political rights in 1789. The island remained in revolt until the French were defeated (despite the intercession of Napoleonic troops), and two generals, Dessalines and Christophe, came to govern a free Haiti. Haiti was only one half of the island, however; the Spanish-speaking inhabitants regained control of the island's eastern half in 1844 and formed there the Dominican Republic, which remains today.
The etymology of the word Voudon (with its alternate spellings voodoo, voudoun, and vodun) is from the Fon (Dahomey) language "vòdû," which means "god," "spirit," or "sacred object," much the same as the word "fetish." Voudon's major descriptive terms are still Dahomean in origin, such as: "azein," holy emblems; "hunto," drum; "asson," sacred rattle; "govi," cooling pitcher; "hunsi," the servants of the divinity; "hungan," the priest; and "mambo," the priestess, while the names of the gods and main types of rites are from throughout the whole of the Gulf of Benin region.
In Voudon, the gods or spirits are known as the "loa." They are ancestral and archetypal embodiments of the forces of nature and the human psyche. They can be contacted in an immediate and intimate fashion and are absolutely considered to be a living, integral part of a devotee's life and culture. The underlying principal of ritual action in general is the "contact of divine power, making for it a channel in your human terms," as Malita Denning and Osborne Philips write in Voudoun Fire, the Living Reality of a Mystical Religion, and in Voudon this is accomplished most directly through the practice of allowing the possession of a devotee by a loa, accompanied by the feasting or "feeding" of the loas.
The number and character of the loa are too numerous to recount here, yet it can broadly be said that they make up groups of "greater" and "lesser" loa and include "families" of loa of related functions. An example would be the family of Guede Loa, the loa of life and death, guardian of the cemeteries and the sexuality of persistent life-renewal. Guede-Nimbo himself is a moon god, keeper of thunderstorms, agricultural timing and the underground, Hecate-like and Osiris-like. The family present themselves often as comic, trickster or lewd figures, but this may be because for the Guede, all our machinations and emotions surrounding sex and death are amusing. As ethnologist Maya Dern relates: "Life for Guede is a destiny...[where] eroticism is beyond good and evil; like life, like death, it is inevitable; beyond elation or despair or love." Guede is "amused by the eternal persistence of the erotic and amused by man's eternal persistence that it is something else."
It is difficult to outline a typical Voudon ceremony as each rite varies from purpose to purpose and according to the loa included, the origin of the rite (Rada, Congo, Ibo or Petro), the traditions of the particular "hounfour" (temple site) and circumstances within the realm of the loa that are revealed during the course of possessions and that are outside the general control of the participants. The houngan (priest) and mambo, however, are responsible for the safety of their congregation and the actions of a ceremony; therefore, they have the skill and power to compel a chaotic or disruptive loa to leave. The loa themselves present a benevolent relationship to those they choose to possess, whether their character is one of the more mild, paternal Rada Loa or of the more aggressive and defensive Petro Loa.
Any ceremony functions primarily to serve the loa and only secondarily for the people, but it can be said that there exists a reciprocal relationship within the ceremony between the loa and the congregation. Direct possession of a person by a loa is the single greatest avenue of contact between the worshiper and the divine, and the "feeding" of the loa through offerings and sacrifice is the single most important and common obligation of the worshiper to the loa. Thus, the congregation requires direct contact with the loa as much as the loa require attending by the congregation in order for each to be satisfied, strong, and to survive.
In brief, as described by Denning and Philips in Voudon Fire, a basic ceremony might unfold as follows: around the "poteau-miton," or center-post, within the ceremonial grounds or peristyle are drawn the graphic representations of the loa, called "vèvè." Libations are poured to the loa three times at the center-post with water from a "cooling pitcher" that has been oriented to the cardinal points. This water is also libated before the entrance to the peristyle, along a line from entrance to center-post and before each of the drums. The universal forces, the ritual ground and the participants are then integrated with the ceremony by a set of ritual salutations: two "hounsis" (initiated devotees) bearing ritual flags and the "La Place" (one who marshals and directs the movement of the ceremony) bearing his saber enact a danced salutation to the cardinal points, the center-post, the drums and the officiants and members in hierarchical order; then the houngan greets visiting houngans and mambos with a salutation using his symbol of office and power, the "asson," or sacred gourd rattle.
Now, or after the vèvè are drawn, a candle is oriented and lit upon the vèvè and the prayers to the loa begin. The first stage of prayer is performed in French using Catholic liturgy; then, using a stylized set of words known as "langage" (words possibly derived from the native Arawak Indians, as suggested by Maya Dern), litanies are spoken to invoke the loas in hierarchical order. The prayers are concluded with a drumming "batterie." The "action" of a ceremony follows over the next hours or even days for whatever reason the rite was intended, whether it be for "mange-loa" (the feeding of the loa), a healing ceremony, an initiation, a ceremony for the passage of the dead, a general festival or one for a specific loa. In whatever case, drumming, songs and invocations, dance and the inevitable circumstance of the manifestation of the loa will ensue.
"Spirits revealing themselves in people to whom they lend their own customary features and mannerisms, have no need of statues or images in order to be conceived as anthropomorphous," quotes Alfred Metraux in his book Voodoo in Haiti. As in the neighboring Afro-Caribbean religion Santería, the images and names of Catholic saints have been superficially superimposed upon the identification of the loa - but all with little effect upon the psychic or physical manifestations and representations of the loa to their faithful. In Voudon, the image of the loa is most often represented by the vèvè (also called vèver), as well in a lesser sense by objects attributed to particular loa: bead necklaces called hunsi, the saber of Ogu, the crutch of Legba, the wrought-iron snakes of Damballah, the boat of Ague and so on, as well as lodestones known as "thunderstones."
A vèvè is a design that represents the physical presence or doorway or a loa. They are drawn out around the center-post or poteau-miton on the ritual ground by the houngan or mambo using fine cornmeal, flour, coffee, brick dust or ashes before any ritual. Combined with salutations and offerings, the drawing of a vèvè compels the loa to attend and is in a sense the altar on which all ritual actions revolve. Vèvè are stylistically European (French) in design, but their meanings again are Dahomean in origin and reveal the characteristics of their individual loas.
All rites begin with drawing the vèvè of the crossroads at the poteau-miton. This is the vèvè of Legba, the loa of the crossroads, who grants contact between the invisible immortal realms of the loa-spirit and the visible-mortal realms. No ritual can proceed without Legba. After this point, the vèvè of other loas are usually drawn out symmetrically from the crossroads and oriented to the four compass directions. Each vèvè is saluted by libations of water and consecrated to its individual loa by offerings and sacrifice, chants, song and invocation. Emblems of the drums are included in the drawing, as each drum has specific "voice" and place within the ritual. A vèvè can also be drawn upon individual objects to mark them as a particular loa's and strengthen the link between the divinity and the object.
In Voudon, the loa are also known as "the Divine Horseman" because of their special relationship to their worshippers; a person who becomes possessed is said to be "mounted by the loa" and is in a sense the "horse" during the while. As Maya Dern stated, in Voudon "possession is the physic phenomena occurring when a divinity becomes manifest." Upon initial contact, the physical body of the person and the will of the loa may experience conflict; this is characterized by often violent lurching and dancing. However, once the spirit of the loa becomes installed, this ceases, the person's body calms and the full personality of the loa shines. This possession has nothing in type to do with the nature of "demonic" possession. When the loa become manifest, all actions, utterances and attributes of the "horse" are actually those of the loa, the will of the "rider"; in this way, the god gives instruction and exercises his or her authority. The loa is the virtuoso, not the person, who experiences profound amnesia about the event.
As a person can be the "child" of any particular loa, so too can a loa enter males or females regardless of the sex that the loa is considered to be. Once the loa has been installed into a person during a rite, they are led out of the dance to be "dressed" in their favorite clothes or attributes. Multiple possessions by the same loa are a common occurrence; once the loa is finished with one person and the possession ceases or is passed on through a twirling "handshake," the clothing and attributes are removed and passed on to the next person inhabited by the loa.
There is one instance in which someone who is being mounted by the loa can remember the experience: in dream. In dream, the person can also experience direct contact without possession, in either case gaining powerful information such as healing advice, warning and admonitions, details of new rites or premonitions. The loa often take the form of the dreamer's relatives but retaining the loa's own peculiar attributes. Usually such dream contact occurs to priests or priestesses, or to someone who is particularly predisposed to his or her loa or the psychic realms. One is well advised to pay particular attention to any contact with the loa in dreams. Another instance of witnessing the manifestation of the loa without possession is through their revelation or epiphany - often at a crossroads or a river. Appearing most often is the loa Azaka or Zaka, the peasant god who ascertains who is hard-working and of a charitable heart.
During the course of the rite, it is the voice of the drums, with song and dance, that carries everyone along, makes the congregation a whole, one heartbeat with the drum, one dance with the god. One of the most beautiful and fascinating examples of this is revealed in the 1947-1951 film documentary by Maya Dern called The Divine Horseman, which show the grace and heart of a dance dedicated to Erzili, the goddess of love.
Dern describes attributes of Erzili, who is often represented as a mermaid figure, Aphrodite-like: "Voudon has given woman in the form of Erzili, exclusive title to that which distinguishes humans from all other forms... the capacity to conceive beyond reality, to desire beyond adequacy, to create beyond need." Through Erzili, Voudon "salutes woman as divinity of the dream, goddess of love, muse of beauty." She is identified with the Virgin Mary and Aphrodite; she is mistress, creatrix, bringer of peace and creator of fresh cool breezes. Throughout Dern's description, we watch the film as the dancer's movements become synchronized with each other and the drum and the song; as one dancer reveals the presence of the goddess through her spectacularly beautiful movements, smile and flashing eyes; as the congregation of dancers become more and more languid and fluid in their movements; and all seem to express a timeless, peaceful and joyful existence within the dance.
As each loa has a different archetypal nature, so too does the character of the dance of each loa differ. Damballah the snake is revealed with intense, writhing motion of the entire body, where the person is consumed with the rippling action of the primordial snake. Damballah is also lightning; he whistles instead of speaks, is in charge of granting treasure; he is the world snake, surrounding the universe like the "wurm ouroborous"; he is the source of primordial wisdom and the assurance of a positive future.
Azaka, the peasant god in charge of agricultural labor and crops, is dressed as he dances in a big hat, sackcloth and a bag slung across his shoulder. Ogu was an iron-working loa in Dahomey; now a warrior loa, he dresses in red and old military clothing and carries a saber. He loves fireworks and gunfire, rum and cigars.
Feeding the loa, or mange-loa, is a matter of reciprocal generosity from the devotee to the boundless spiritual forces of the loa. Feeding, or sacrifice, is considered to permit the loa to gain life-force through nourishment at the physical level. The spirit or loa is acknowledged not to actually "eat" the material sacrifice, but instead to absorb the release of life power of blood sacrifice, the energy that is released as a candle burns or the life nourishment of grains, fruit and vegetables placed upon a vèvè.
The kind and amount of sacrificial food required depends upon the type of ceremony performed and the individual preferences of the loa. Each loa is associated with a distinct array of correspondences of numbers, colors and kinds of sacrifice. In practice, the sacrificial animal or bird is oriented to the cardinal points and becomes identified with and consecrated to the god as it eats food (grain) at these points, at which point it may be sacrificed. The actual consecrated meat of the sacrifice is usually cooked and divided among the participants unless the animal has been used to absorb impurities in a cleansing or healing rite, in which case the loa will inform the houngan or mambo how it wishes the remains to be taken care of, usually by burial at the edge of a wood. The attitude surrounding sacrifice is not morbid; the intent is not upon the death of the animal but on the transference of the life force to the loa, leading to the restoration of the energy of the god.
In conclusion, Voudon is a living religious system of remarkable complexity, some of the major aspects of which I have only managed to touch upon here. Voudon is practiced most commonly in the country of Haiti and in the United States around New Orleans, New York and in Florida. It is also found throughout the rest of the Caribbean and West Indies islands, elsewhere in North and South America and in Africa and Britain. It is my intent and wish that the reader retain an open mind and continue to learn about a subject that carries with it a deep history, power and beauty.
Sources: The film The Divine Horsemen; the Living Gods of Haiti (1947-1951) by Maya Dern, and the publications Voodoo in Haiti, by Alfred Metraux (Schocken: 1959); Voudoun Fire, the Living Reality of a Mystical Religion, by Malita Denning and Osborne Philips (Llewellyn: 1979); African History by Curtin, Feierman, Thompson, and Vansina (Little, Brown and Co.: 1978); African Mythology by Geoffrey Parrinder (Hamlyn: 1967); with additional material by Migene Gonzalez-Wippler in The Santeria Experience (Llewellyn: 1992 ed.).
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