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PART TWO
THE SEARCH FOR KNOWLEDGE |
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The right conduct of affairs will need, first of all, the use of divination. . . .
Marcel Griaule and Germaine Dieterlen, "The Dogon of the French Sudan" |
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An understanding pervades African societies that the true reasons for all events can be known, but sufficient knowledge is seldom available through mundane means of inquiry; therefore, divination is employed to ensure that all relevant information is brought forward before action is undertaken. Because of its primacy, divination is counted among the most ancient traditions of African cultures, as it is of other cultures. |
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Virtually every civilization has linked divination's advent to the introduction of other necessary technologies and arts (see Caquot and Leibovici 1968 and Loewe and Blacker 1981). In Madagascar, Andriamamelo, the mythical founder of the Merina royal dynasty, discovered metal working and "is also represented as a master of astrology, an advanced technique of civilization, which he is said to have discovered" (Bloch 1986:106). The ancient Greeks recorded that Prometheus gave them much technical knowledge, including the arts of divination. Other Greek traditions about divination concern the blinding of Tiresias as punishment by the gods, who then granted him extraordinary vision through divination. These accounts contain remarkable similarities to the associations with divination encountered in African cultures, such as liminality and androgyny, which are discussed later in this volume by Peek. |
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Despite divination's centrality, accounts of its origins are not easily found. The detailed Yoruba historical traditions about Ifa are an exception (see Bascom 1969; Abimbola 1976; McClelland 1982). Usually there are only marginal comments, such as Lienhardt's reference (1970) to the time before the Dinka had diviners as intermediaries between worlds. For the Atuot of the Sudan (see Burton's essay below) and the Lobi of Burkina Faso (see Meyer's essay), an original world of harmony was disrupted by improper human behavior, for which God punished the people by giving them ignorance, illness, and death. While God "blinded" |
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