Quimbanda: Afrobrazilian "witchcraft" or Macumba
Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2016 9:28 pm
Motumbá Àse
Today, as I promised, I'll be posting about Quimbanda. I'll try to be the most concrete and point at it's very roots, what is part of the tradition and what was added just and tainted by "white hands", something that tends to happen when occult dubblers or pseudo occultist get to glimpse a tradition that is "foreign" for them. They take it, make it theirs and deviate it.
From "what place" am I speaking? I'm initiated in Candomblé Naçao Ketu (Ketu-the Yoruba of actual Benin- Nation), medium of Umbanda and Quimbanda. I'm a step away from my "chefatura" (Chief degree-priest) in both Umbanda and Quimbanda, I have years of practice and sharing with elders of the different afrobrazilian traditions. What I know it's not just fruit of a trip to Brazil and share a couple of weeks with the natives. It's fruit of practice, of being medium of these "entidades" (entities-spirits) and of antropological studies guided by the elders of these cults.
To find the roots of Quimbanda we need to understand about sincretism, that didn't happened the same way in all the places, we need to think about the Bantu people (Angola and Congo), we need to think about indigenous beliefs and european "magico-spirituality" or "witch-folklore".
The first bunch of slaves to come Brazil were the Bantu people. They lived in "Senzalas" (places like stables or such where the black slaves were put). They already had a very sincretic belief system, because in the congo they already had a king that "added" some christian beliefs and adopted some imaginery. They already done that before with the arabs, etc. The bantu, specially the congo where very sincretic, and I feel they still are, their desendants. The Bantu have influenced various diasporas, for example Haitian Vodou, and all "vodous", Palo in all it's manifestations, the Obeah, some candomblés and even Santeria/Osha.
In senzalas there whee also some indigenous slaves, so basically they saw that between these two cultures shared a lot of similar thinking, specially the cult to the ancestors. Then, the black slaves continued their rituals but they thought they needed to pay respects to the ancestors of this new land, this land that was their new home, though they were their new ancestors. There they added worship to "Caboclos", indigenous ancestral spirits.
From that moment a new cult was born. "Cabula" which is the cult of the Nkisi, the African and Indigenous Ancestors, the practice of witchcraft, of healing and all african "supernatural" arts. After Cabula commenced it's changes, the "ritual" modified it self, the "nago" thinking begin to gain strength, the Bantu Nkisi where named after the Yoruban Orisa, and the cult transformed itself into the famous brazilian "Macumba".
The word Macumba has various meanings. Macumba was a name of an african tree/bush; was the name of a musical instrument made of the wood of that african tree/bush; was the name of the "drummings" for ritual and the "macumbeiros" were the drummers; was also the name of the cult developed in the Quilombos (agroupation of slaves that fled from the senzalas and lived in the jungle or the hills) and the macumbeiros where the practitioners of this cult. Today is used as a pejorative word from non "africanist" people or from "ultra whitened" umbandists whose say tha they're not macumbeiros, renegating from their cults roots.
In the "Belle Epoque" of Brazil, there was a growing amount of Scientific Spiritism (Allan Kardec's Spiritism) and the "people of society" was very interested in it. Then, a lot of middle class white people stated to atend the macumba's rituals and started to gain pristly degrees, and slowly starting to "whiten" the cult. White people, or the light skined people of Brazil, where not used to the tribal rituals of the black, the sacrifices and the blood, and started, maybe unconsciously, maybe not, to whiten it. It became more and more similar to the White's spiritism.
There was a split. You had the "whitened" macumba, that was known by Umbanda or Mbanda, and the more african macumba, that kept its black roots. Mbanda means in kimbundo "Magic" or "art of healing", "healing ritual". Also the Chief of the Terreiro (temple) was called Pai (Father) or Tata (father in bantu) and Embanda wa scalled the one in charge of the Ngira or Gira (seance or session).
You have the opinion of that both Umbanda and Quimbanda were contemporary, and the vision that Quimbanda came FROM Umbanda in an atempt of reviving the more african ways of the afrobrazilian people. In either way, the cult of spirits, Caboclos, Preto Velhos and Exus, existed way before the "official" dates of birth of Umbanda (of Zelio F. de Moraes) and of Quimbanda (in the 70's).
Umbanda was founded (in "official" records, as a religion, because before that the word was used in many ways to point various cults and macumbas) in 1908 by th Caboclo das Sete Encruzilhadas ("indian of the Seven Crossroads") through his medium, Zelio de Moraes. Quimbanda, even if its "format" already was known, the name "Quimbanda" was just known as a cult in the 70's, after the cult of Exu and Pombagira was seprated from Umbanda Branca (White Umbanda or Umbanda of White Line, is practiced without blood). Quimbanda comes from the kimbundo word "Kimbanda" or "ki Mbanda" which was the name of the "Witch Doctor", the priest in charge to get in trance and being possesed by the ancestors, by the spirits of former witches and healers.
There is people that says that Umbanda and Quimbanda have nothing to do, that's plain wrong, they are part of the same cult. Two sides of the same coin. We still have Umbandas that work with exus and pombagiras, and we have Umbandas that are completely seperated from them.
Now, where does it come from the idea of "sincretism" between Goetic Demons and Quimbanda spirits? That was the work of several umandist writers who where all about the whitening of their practices. The compared them to demons, and actualy not even in an esoteric way, actually they did it in the very christian way, as evil doers. There is Exu Lucifer and Exu Belzebú (Beelzebub), but that is just sincretism and is in no way comparing Him with the actual Lucifer or Beelzebub.
Exus and Pombagiras are EGUN, are spirits of the dead, that echanted themselves or were "united" to a single symbol. They become part of a colective entity and lose their "indivialism". They are not just "dead people", they're part of a hierarchy of spirits that are part of a single ritual, independet of the line of macumba or Quimbanda practiced, and that is A Lei de Exu (The Law of Exu). There are things they do, there are things they don't. That's it.
Most of us, macumbeiros, do both. Many umbandists don't, but they're part of the "whitened" Macumba. Most of us macumbeiros or quimbandeiros (practicioners of Quimbanda) practice both Umbanda and Quimbanda because we understand that they are part of an equilibrium, the healing and wisdom of Umbanda/the strength and blood of Quimbanda.
Era meia noite quando minha banda chegou
Era meia noite quando minha banda chegou
Corre e gira, corre e gira
Vai chegar a madrugada
Salve Exu Salve Exu
Rei das Sete Encruzilhadas!
Saravá o Povo da Encruza! Salve Exu!
Idansinají
Today, as I promised, I'll be posting about Quimbanda. I'll try to be the most concrete and point at it's very roots, what is part of the tradition and what was added just and tainted by "white hands", something that tends to happen when occult dubblers or pseudo occultist get to glimpse a tradition that is "foreign" for them. They take it, make it theirs and deviate it.
From "what place" am I speaking? I'm initiated in Candomblé Naçao Ketu (Ketu-the Yoruba of actual Benin- Nation), medium of Umbanda and Quimbanda. I'm a step away from my "chefatura" (Chief degree-priest) in both Umbanda and Quimbanda, I have years of practice and sharing with elders of the different afrobrazilian traditions. What I know it's not just fruit of a trip to Brazil and share a couple of weeks with the natives. It's fruit of practice, of being medium of these "entidades" (entities-spirits) and of antropological studies guided by the elders of these cults.
To find the roots of Quimbanda we need to understand about sincretism, that didn't happened the same way in all the places, we need to think about the Bantu people (Angola and Congo), we need to think about indigenous beliefs and european "magico-spirituality" or "witch-folklore".
The first bunch of slaves to come Brazil were the Bantu people. They lived in "Senzalas" (places like stables or such where the black slaves were put). They already had a very sincretic belief system, because in the congo they already had a king that "added" some christian beliefs and adopted some imaginery. They already done that before with the arabs, etc. The bantu, specially the congo where very sincretic, and I feel they still are, their desendants. The Bantu have influenced various diasporas, for example Haitian Vodou, and all "vodous", Palo in all it's manifestations, the Obeah, some candomblés and even Santeria/Osha.
In senzalas there whee also some indigenous slaves, so basically they saw that between these two cultures shared a lot of similar thinking, specially the cult to the ancestors. Then, the black slaves continued their rituals but they thought they needed to pay respects to the ancestors of this new land, this land that was their new home, though they were their new ancestors. There they added worship to "Caboclos", indigenous ancestral spirits.
From that moment a new cult was born. "Cabula" which is the cult of the Nkisi, the African and Indigenous Ancestors, the practice of witchcraft, of healing and all african "supernatural" arts. After Cabula commenced it's changes, the "ritual" modified it self, the "nago" thinking begin to gain strength, the Bantu Nkisi where named after the Yoruban Orisa, and the cult transformed itself into the famous brazilian "Macumba".
The word Macumba has various meanings. Macumba was a name of an african tree/bush; was the name of a musical instrument made of the wood of that african tree/bush; was the name of the "drummings" for ritual and the "macumbeiros" were the drummers; was also the name of the cult developed in the Quilombos (agroupation of slaves that fled from the senzalas and lived in the jungle or the hills) and the macumbeiros where the practitioners of this cult. Today is used as a pejorative word from non "africanist" people or from "ultra whitened" umbandists whose say tha they're not macumbeiros, renegating from their cults roots.
In the "Belle Epoque" of Brazil, there was a growing amount of Scientific Spiritism (Allan Kardec's Spiritism) and the "people of society" was very interested in it. Then, a lot of middle class white people stated to atend the macumba's rituals and started to gain pristly degrees, and slowly starting to "whiten" the cult. White people, or the light skined people of Brazil, where not used to the tribal rituals of the black, the sacrifices and the blood, and started, maybe unconsciously, maybe not, to whiten it. It became more and more similar to the White's spiritism.
There was a split. You had the "whitened" macumba, that was known by Umbanda or Mbanda, and the more african macumba, that kept its black roots. Mbanda means in kimbundo "Magic" or "art of healing", "healing ritual". Also the Chief of the Terreiro (temple) was called Pai (Father) or Tata (father in bantu) and Embanda wa scalled the one in charge of the Ngira or Gira (seance or session).
You have the opinion of that both Umbanda and Quimbanda were contemporary, and the vision that Quimbanda came FROM Umbanda in an atempt of reviving the more african ways of the afrobrazilian people. In either way, the cult of spirits, Caboclos, Preto Velhos and Exus, existed way before the "official" dates of birth of Umbanda (of Zelio F. de Moraes) and of Quimbanda (in the 70's).
Umbanda was founded (in "official" records, as a religion, because before that the word was used in many ways to point various cults and macumbas) in 1908 by th Caboclo das Sete Encruzilhadas ("indian of the Seven Crossroads") through his medium, Zelio de Moraes. Quimbanda, even if its "format" already was known, the name "Quimbanda" was just known as a cult in the 70's, after the cult of Exu and Pombagira was seprated from Umbanda Branca (White Umbanda or Umbanda of White Line, is practiced without blood). Quimbanda comes from the kimbundo word "Kimbanda" or "ki Mbanda" which was the name of the "Witch Doctor", the priest in charge to get in trance and being possesed by the ancestors, by the spirits of former witches and healers.
There is people that says that Umbanda and Quimbanda have nothing to do, that's plain wrong, they are part of the same cult. Two sides of the same coin. We still have Umbandas that work with exus and pombagiras, and we have Umbandas that are completely seperated from them.
Now, where does it come from the idea of "sincretism" between Goetic Demons and Quimbanda spirits? That was the work of several umandist writers who where all about the whitening of their practices. The compared them to demons, and actualy not even in an esoteric way, actually they did it in the very christian way, as evil doers. There is Exu Lucifer and Exu Belzebú (Beelzebub), but that is just sincretism and is in no way comparing Him with the actual Lucifer or Beelzebub.
Exus and Pombagiras are EGUN, are spirits of the dead, that echanted themselves or were "united" to a single symbol. They become part of a colective entity and lose their "indivialism". They are not just "dead people", they're part of a hierarchy of spirits that are part of a single ritual, independet of the line of macumba or Quimbanda practiced, and that is A Lei de Exu (The Law of Exu). There are things they do, there are things they don't. That's it.
Most of us, macumbeiros, do both. Many umbandists don't, but they're part of the "whitened" Macumba. Most of us macumbeiros or quimbandeiros (practicioners of Quimbanda) practice both Umbanda and Quimbanda because we understand that they are part of an equilibrium, the healing and wisdom of Umbanda/the strength and blood of Quimbanda.
Era meia noite quando minha banda chegou
Era meia noite quando minha banda chegou
Corre e gira, corre e gira
Vai chegar a madrugada
Salve Exu Salve Exu
Rei das Sete Encruzilhadas!
Saravá o Povo da Encruza! Salve Exu!
Idansinají