Contemporary Pedagogy of Applied Yorùbá Sacred Text

Abstract

The major religions of the world have written scriptures which serve as spiritual guides for their adherents. In these contemporary times, Prothero in his seminal book God is Not One narrowed down major religions to these: Islam, Christianity, Confucianism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Yorùbá Religion, Judaism, Daoism, and Atheism.1 The Yorùbá religion that is referenced here is specifically Ifá and Òrìṣà worship, to which most Yorùbá globally subscribe, and such sub-scription is mostly oral. It is that oral transmission of knowledge and wisdom that forms the basis of our interrogation and attention in recognizing writers and scholars in contemporary times, who have been providing coherent documentation and pedagogy of the oral forms of Ifá and Òrìṣà worship as sacred texts. Such efforts are now contextualized and referenced as the Odù Ifá Literary Corpus. However, “Indigenous African spiritual beliefs are not bound by a written text, like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam” (Olupona 2015: 5). In Yorùbá Religion (Yorel),2 the Ọdù Ifá3 Corpus has served as the guiding light of the Yorelians since time immemorial (Abimbola 1997: 86). It offers guidance on themes that relate to life lessons, such as character, pride and humility, human relations, sex and sexuality, culinary arts, and financial management, to mention just a few. Even the human skeleton is derived from the Ifá Corpus (Àjàyí and Sanni 2006). The Yorùbá do not take spiritual guidance lightly, as they constantly make a recourse to Odù Ifá for investigation and direction, particularly on vital issues in life.