African Traditional Religion : Egun

Blackbird

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Elders,

If I'm asking something that can not be discussed I understand, but I was told in Nigeria they crown Egun on the head. Is this so?

This is different from Palo, which I have an affiliation with. I was told about 10years ago that I have a path in Egungun so I'm just curious. I'm thinking of picking my weight up and pursuing this path in earnest. I know Eshu is also looking for me and I've made my promises to him in dreams.
 
Hey brother blackbird, judging from the knowledge you have dropped on us here at destee.com, I would have bet you were already an Egungun medium. Anyways, The first thing is, if you are feeling it, then you need to ask the oracle the question, "Does it bring me ire (good fortune) to receive Egun?"

There is alot of confusion regarding your question, for one, because in the Diaspora for some reason we have separated Orisa reverence from Egun reverence. Also, in the Diaspora usually when people are working with Egun they are actually only working with one ancestor, which in Yorubaland is called ara orun. The Ifa concept of Egun is that Egun is a collective spirit made up of the collective experiences of all those who have come before us in our family lineage.
The thing is, the idea of "crowning your head" is a western idea. so the answer to your question is no. However, one recieves Egun in the same way one recieves Orisa so the answer to your question is yes. Let me try to explain. First of all, to "crown" someone refers to the Yoruba word for crown, "ade" as seen in awo Sekhemu's avatar. Only Oba (kings) recieve ade. So then linguistically the idea of crowning regarding initiation in Egun, Orisa or Ifa is wrong. In the west the idea of crowning comes from the belief that initiation involves putting the ase in the person's head, which is totally wrong. EVERY INDIVIDUAL ORI CONTAINS EVERY ODU. ORISA, IFA AND EGUN ALL ARE BORN OF SPECIFIC ODU, SO EVERYONE IS BORN WITH ALL THAT EXISTS ALREADY IN THERE ORI. ALL INITIATION DOES IS UNLOCK LATENT POTENTIAL. Nobody puts nothing nowhere. Nobody is "crowned," nobody is "given" ase.
Now, if your question is does Egungun initiation unlock the potential for communication with the ancestors by unlocking latent potential, the answer to your question is yes.
 
More on Egun from Awo Falokun
(I have received his permission to post his writings)
I asked him about Egungun initiation and this is part of his reply:

the ori, as understood by ifa, is not simply the consciousness of the head it is the consciousness of the entire body and the consciousness of the various orisa enters the body from various chakra called iwaju in yoruba from the elision iwa oju meaning the face of my character or the strongest influence of my personality so iwaju:

obatala top of the head
osoosi forehead
esu back of the neck
yemoja throat
ogun heart
osun stomach
oya lower stomach
sango root

the latent potential in the brain for each of these orisa is accessed through different parts of the body. so, in the case of egun the portal that allows access to "tickle the ori" or unlock the portal of the brain used to communicate with the ancestors is the right big toe of women and the left big toe of men. so in the languge of the west, egungun is crowned via the big toe. why the big toe, you might ask. according to ifa scripture egun live in aye meaning they are a part of the earth we walk on in traditional yoruba culture ancestors are buried under the house when I visit Araba Adesanya I sleep on his mothers grave the big toe is our primary connection to the earth
this is not complicated. ancestors live in the earth. we connect to them with our feet, so if you go to a traditional yoruba burial an egungun medium will place their big toes on the big toe of the dead person and channel the spirit of the dead person when the egungun medium is in possession with the spirit of the dead person the dead person says their last goodbye to the community and then egbe oro says oriki that send the spirit of the dead person back home in yoruba the spirit is called emi meaning "i am."
in english we call communication with the dead at a funeral a resurrection
but according to western sources resurection only happened once in the history of life on earth the truth is it happens every day in traditional yoruba culture which is why christians are so frantic about converting traditional yoruba to christianity, because they need to hold on to the illusion that resurrection has only happened once.

ire
 

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