{"id":62,"date":"2023-02-22T15:47:29","date_gmt":"2023-02-22T15:47:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology\/?post_type=chapter&p=62"},"modified":"2023-05-10T19:46:46","modified_gmt":"2023-05-10T19:46:46","slug":"2-5-the-beginning-of-ife","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/chapter\/2-5-the-beginning-of-ife\/","title":{"raw":"2.5 The Beginning of Ife, from the Yoruba Traditions of Africa","rendered":"2.5 The Beginning of Ife, from the Yoruba Traditions of Africa"},"content":{"raw":"

The Beginning of Ife, from the Yoruba Traditions of Africa<\/h1>\r\nTo cite this source in a sentence, please use the title at the end of the sentence in parentheses as demonstrated here (The Beginning of Ife).<\/em>\r\n\r\n[caption id=\"attachment_163\" align=\"aligncenter\" width=\"500\"]\"Brass Altar Ring, Yoruba peoples, Ife group, Public Domain via The Metropolitan Museum of Art<\/a>[\/caption]\r\n

Cast of Characters: <\/em><\/h2>\r\nAr\u00e1mf\u00e9 [also called Olorun]: God of Thunder and Father of the Gods.\r\n\r\nThe Great Orisha [also called Obatala]: Creator of men. Son of Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9.\r\n\r\nOd\u00fawa or Odud\u00fawa: King of men. Son of Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9.\r\n\r\nOlokun: Goddess of the Sea.\r\n\r\nOrni Od\u00fam\u2019la: The ancestor of the Ornis of Ife.\r\n\r\nOibo means White Man.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nA white man visits Ife, the sacred city of the Y\u00f3rubas and asks to hear the history of the place.\r\n\r\nThe Orni, the religious head of Y\u00f3rubaland, begins, and directs the Babalawo Araba, the chief-priest of Ifa, to continue.\r\n\r\n \r\n
    \r\n \t
  1. \r\n

    THE BEGINNING.<\/h2>\r\n<\/li>\r\n<\/ol>\r\nThe Orni of Ife speaks:\r\n\r\nOibo, you have asked to hear our lore,\r\n\r\nThe legends of the World\u2019s young hours\u2014and where\r\n\r\nCould truth in greater surety have its home\r\n\r\nThan in the precincts of the shrines of Those\r\n\r\nWho made the World, and in the mouths of priests\r\n\r\nTo whom their doings have been handed down\r\n\r\nFrom sire to son?\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nBefore this World was made\r\n\r\nThere reigned Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 in the realm of Heaven\r\n\r\nAmidst his sons. Old were the hills around him;\r\n\r\nThe Sun had shone upon his vines and cornfields\r\n\r\nSince time past reckoning. Old was Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9,\r\n\r\nThe father of the Gods: his youth had been\r\n\r\nThe youth of Heaven... Once when the King reclined\r\n\r\nUpon the dais, and his sons lay prostrate\r\n\r\nIn veneration at his feet, he spoke\r\n\r\nOf the great things he purposed:\r\n\r\n\u201cMy sons, you know\r\n\r\nOnly fair things which I made for you, before\r\n\r\nI called your spirits from the Dusk: for always\r\n\r\nYour eyes have watched the shadows and the wind\r\n\r\nOn waving corn, and I have given you\r\n\r\nThe dances and the chorus of the night\u2014\r\n\r\nAn age of mirth and sunrise (the wine of Heaven)\r\n\r\nIs your existence. You have not even heard\r\n\r\nOf the grey hour when my young eyes first opened\r\n\r\nTo gaze upon a herbless Mass, unshaped\r\n\r\nAnd unadorned. But I knew well the heart\r\n\r\nOf Him-Who-Speaks-Not, the far-felt Purpose that gave\r\n\r\nMe birth; I labored and the grim years passed:\r\n\r\nStreams flowed along their sunny beds; I set\r\n\r\nThe stars above me, and the hills about;\r\n\r\nI fostered budding trees, and taught the birds\r\n\r\nTheir song\u2014the unshapely I had formed to beauty,\r\n\r\nAnd as the ages came I loved to make\r\n\r\nThe beautiful more fair... All went not well:\r\n\r\nA noble animal my mind conceived\r\n\r\nEmerged in loathsome form to prey upon\r\n\r\nMy gentle creatures; a river, born to bask\r\n\r\nIn sunlit channels and mirror the steep hills,\r\n\r\nTore down its banks and ravaged field and plain;\r\n\r\nWhile cataract and jagged precipice.\r\n\r\nNow grand with years, remind me of dread days\r\n\r\nWhen Heaven tottered, and wide rifts separated my young\r\n\r\nFair hills, and all seemed lost. Yet\u2014I prevailed.\r\n\r\nThink, now, if the accomplished whole be Heaven,\r\n\r\nHow wonderful the anxious years of slow\r\n\r\nAnd hazardous achievement\u2014a destiny\r\n\r\nFor Gods. But yours it has not been to lead\r\n\r\nCreation by the cliff\u2019s-edge way from Mass\r\n\r\nTo Paradise.\u2019\u2019 He paused on the remembrance.\r\n\r\nAnd Great Orisha Obatala cried: Can we do nothing?\r\n\r\nWhat use is godhead without deeds to do?\r\n\r\nWhere yearns a helpless region for a hand\r\n\r\nTo guide it?\u201d And Old Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 answered him:\r\n\r\n\u201cMy son, your day approaches. Far-off, the haze\r\n\r\nRests always on the outer waste which skirts\r\n\r\nOur realm; beyond, a nerveless Mass lies cold\r\n\r\nBeneath floods which some malign unreason heaves.\r\n\r\nOduwa, first-born of my sons, to you I give\r\n\r\nThe five-clawed Bird, the sand of power. Go now.\r\n\r\nCall a despairing land to smiling life\r\n\r\nAbove the jealous sea, and found sure homesteads\r\n\r\nFor a new race whose destiny is not\r\n\r\nThe eternal life of Gods. You are their judge;\r\n\r\nYours is the kingship, and to you all Gods\r\n\r\nAnd men are subject. Wisest of my sons,\r\n\r\nObatala, yours is the grateful task to loose\r\n\r\nVague spirits waiting for the Dawn\u2014to make\r\n\r\nThe race that shall be; and to you I give\r\n\r\nThis bag of Wisdom\u2019s guarded lore and arts\r\n\r\nFor Man\u2019s well-being and advancement. And you,\r\n\r\nMy younger sons, the chorus and the dance,\r\n\r\nThe voice of worship and the crafts are yours\r\n\r\nTo teach\u2014that the new thankful race may know\r\n\r\nThe gladness of Heaven and the joys of labor.\u201d\r\n\r\nThen Oduwa said: \u201cHappy our life has been,\r\n\r\nAnd I would gladly roam these hills forever.\r\n\r\nYour son and servant. But to your command\r\n\r\nI yield; and in my kingship pride oversteps\r\n\r\nSorrow and heaviness. Yet, Lord Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9,\r\n\r\nI am your first-born: wherefore do you give\r\n\r\nThe arts and wisdom to Orisha Obatala? I,\r\n\r\nThe King, will be obeyed; the hearts of men\r\n\r\nWill turn in wonder to the God who spells\r\n\r\nStrange benefits.\u201d But Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 said, \u201cEnough;\r\n\r\nTo each is fitting task is given. Farewell.\u201d\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nHere the Beginning was: from Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9\u2019s vales\r\n\r\nThrough the desert regions the exiled Gods approached\r\n\r\nThe edge of Heaven, and into blackness plunged\u2014\r\n\r\nA sunless void over godless water Ipng\u2014\r\n\r\nTo seize an empire from the Dark, and win\r\n\r\nAmidst ungoverned waves a sovereignty.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nBut by the roadside while Obatala slept\r\n\r\nOduwa came by stealth and bore away\r\n\r\nThe bag Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 gave. Thus was the will\r\n\r\nOf God undone: for thus with the charmed sand\r\n\r\nCast wide on the unmastered sea, his sons\r\n\r\nCalled forth a World of envy and of war.\r\n\r\n \r\n\r\nOf Man\u2019s Creation, and of the restraint\r\n\r\nOlokun placed upon the chafing sea.\r\n\r\nOf the unconscious years which passed in darkness\r\n\r\nTill dazzling sunshine touched the unused eyes\r\n\r\nOf men, of War and magic\u2014my priest shall tell you,\r\n\r\nAnd all the Great Ones did before the day\r\n\r\nThey vanished to return to the calm hills\r\n\r\nOf Old Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9\u2019s realm... They went away;\r\n\r\nBut still with us their altars and their priests\r\n\r\nRemain, and from their shrines the hidden Gods\r\n\r\nPeer forth with joy to watch the dance they taught,\r\n\r\nAnd hear each night their chorus with the drum:\r\n\r\nFor changeless here the early World endures\r\n\r\nIn this first stronghold of humanity,\r\n\r\nAnd, constant as the waves\r\n\r\nOf Queen Olokun on the shore, the song.\r\n\r\nThe dance of those old Gods abide, the gladness.\r\n\r\nThe life\u2026 I, too, am born of the Beginning:\r\n\r\nFor, when from the sight of men the Great Gods passed,\r\n\r\nThey left on Earth Orni Odum\u2019la charged\r\n\r\nTo be a father to a mourning people.\r\n\r\nTo tend the shrines and utter solemn words\r\n\r\nInspired by Those invisible.\r\n\r\nThus has it ever been; and now\r\n\r\nWith me that Being is\u2014about, within\u2014\r\n\r\nAnd on our sacred days these lips pronounce\r\n\r\nThe words of Odud\u00fawa and Orisha Obatala.\r\n\r\n
    \r\n\r\nTo cite this reading, use the following format:\r\n\r\nWyndham, John. Yoruba Creation Myth. Myths of Ife.<\/em> E. Macdonald, 1921. Maricopa Community Colleges,     open.maricopa.edu\/worldmythologyvolume1godsandcreation\/chapter\/from-myths-of-ife-yoruba-creation-myth\/<\/a>.","rendered":"

    The Beginning of Ife, from the Yoruba Traditions of Africa<\/h1>\n

    To cite this source in a sentence, please use the title at the end of the sentence in parentheses as demonstrated here (The Beginning of Ife).<\/em><\/p>\n

    \"Brass
    Altar Ring, Yoruba peoples, Ife group, Public Domain via The Metropolitan Museum of Art<\/a><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

    Cast of Characters: <\/em><\/h2>\n

    Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 [also called Olorun]: God of Thunder and Father of the Gods.<\/p>\n

    The Great Orisha [also called Obatala]: Creator of men. Son of Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9.<\/p>\n

    Od\u00fawa or Odud\u00fawa: King of men. Son of Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9.<\/p>\n

    Olokun: Goddess of the Sea.<\/p>\n

    Orni Od\u00fam\u2019la: The ancestor of the Ornis of Ife.<\/p>\n

    Oibo means White Man.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    A white man visits Ife, the sacred city of the Y\u00f3rubas and asks to hear the history of the place.<\/p>\n

    The Orni, the religious head of Y\u00f3rubaland, begins, and directs the Babalawo Araba, the chief-priest of Ifa, to continue.<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

      \n
    1. \n

      THE BEGINNING.<\/h2>\n<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      The Orni of Ife speaks:<\/p>\n

      Oibo, you have asked to hear our lore,<\/p>\n

      The legends of the World\u2019s young hours\u2014and where<\/p>\n

      Could truth in greater surety have its home<\/p>\n

      Than in the precincts of the shrines of Those<\/p>\n

      Who made the World, and in the mouths of priests<\/p>\n

      To whom their doings have been handed down<\/p>\n

      From sire to son?<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Before this World was made<\/p>\n

      There reigned Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 in the realm of Heaven<\/p>\n

      Amidst his sons. Old were the hills around him;<\/p>\n

      The Sun had shone upon his vines and cornfields<\/p>\n

      Since time past reckoning. Old was Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9,<\/p>\n

      The father of the Gods: his youth had been<\/p>\n

      The youth of Heaven… Once when the King reclined<\/p>\n

      Upon the dais, and his sons lay prostrate<\/p>\n

      In veneration at his feet, he spoke<\/p>\n

      Of the great things he purposed:<\/p>\n

      \u201cMy sons, you know<\/p>\n

      Only fair things which I made for you, before<\/p>\n

      I called your spirits from the Dusk: for always<\/p>\n

      Your eyes have watched the shadows and the wind<\/p>\n

      On waving corn, and I have given you<\/p>\n

      The dances and the chorus of the night\u2014<\/p>\n

      An age of mirth and sunrise (the wine of Heaven)<\/p>\n

      Is your existence. You have not even heard<\/p>\n

      Of the grey hour when my young eyes first opened<\/p>\n

      To gaze upon a herbless Mass, unshaped<\/p>\n

      And unadorned. But I knew well the heart<\/p>\n

      Of Him-Who-Speaks-Not, the far-felt Purpose that gave<\/p>\n

      Me birth; I labored and the grim years passed:<\/p>\n

      Streams flowed along their sunny beds; I set<\/p>\n

      The stars above me, and the hills about;<\/p>\n

      I fostered budding trees, and taught the birds<\/p>\n

      Their song\u2014the unshapely I had formed to beauty,<\/p>\n

      And as the ages came I loved to make<\/p>\n

      The beautiful more fair… All went not well:<\/p>\n

      A noble animal my mind conceived<\/p>\n

      Emerged in loathsome form to prey upon<\/p>\n

      My gentle creatures; a river, born to bask<\/p>\n

      In sunlit channels and mirror the steep hills,<\/p>\n

      Tore down its banks and ravaged field and plain;<\/p>\n

      While cataract and jagged precipice.<\/p>\n

      Now grand with years, remind me of dread days<\/p>\n

      When Heaven tottered, and wide rifts separated my young<\/p>\n

      Fair hills, and all seemed lost. Yet\u2014I prevailed.<\/p>\n

      Think, now, if the accomplished whole be Heaven,<\/p>\n

      How wonderful the anxious years of slow<\/p>\n

      And hazardous achievement\u2014a destiny<\/p>\n

      For Gods. But yours it has not been to lead<\/p>\n

      Creation by the cliff\u2019s-edge way from Mass<\/p>\n

      To Paradise.\u2019\u2019 He paused on the remembrance.<\/p>\n

      And Great Orisha Obatala cried: Can we do nothing?<\/p>\n

      What use is godhead without deeds to do?<\/p>\n

      Where yearns a helpless region for a hand<\/p>\n

      To guide it?\u201d And Old Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 answered him:<\/p>\n

      \u201cMy son, your day approaches. Far-off, the haze<\/p>\n

      Rests always on the outer waste which skirts<\/p>\n

      Our realm; beyond, a nerveless Mass lies cold<\/p>\n

      Beneath floods which some malign unreason heaves.<\/p>\n

      Oduwa, first-born of my sons, to you I give<\/p>\n

      The five-clawed Bird, the sand of power. Go now.<\/p>\n

      Call a despairing land to smiling life<\/p>\n

      Above the jealous sea, and found sure homesteads<\/p>\n

      For a new race whose destiny is not<\/p>\n

      The eternal life of Gods. You are their judge;<\/p>\n

      Yours is the kingship, and to you all Gods<\/p>\n

      And men are subject. Wisest of my sons,<\/p>\n

      Obatala, yours is the grateful task to loose<\/p>\n

      Vague spirits waiting for the Dawn\u2014to make<\/p>\n

      The race that shall be; and to you I give<\/p>\n

      This bag of Wisdom\u2019s guarded lore and arts<\/p>\n

      For Man\u2019s well-being and advancement. And you,<\/p>\n

      My younger sons, the chorus and the dance,<\/p>\n

      The voice of worship and the crafts are yours<\/p>\n

      To teach\u2014that the new thankful race may know<\/p>\n

      The gladness of Heaven and the joys of labor.\u201d<\/p>\n

      Then Oduwa said: \u201cHappy our life has been,<\/p>\n

      And I would gladly roam these hills forever.<\/p>\n

      Your son and servant. But to your command<\/p>\n

      I yield; and in my kingship pride oversteps<\/p>\n

      Sorrow and heaviness. Yet, Lord Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9,<\/p>\n

      I am your first-born: wherefore do you give<\/p>\n

      The arts and wisdom to Orisha Obatala? I,<\/p>\n

      The King, will be obeyed; the hearts of men<\/p>\n

      Will turn in wonder to the God who spells<\/p>\n

      Strange benefits.\u201d But Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 said, \u201cEnough;<\/p>\n

      To each is fitting task is given. Farewell.\u201d<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Here the Beginning was: from Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9\u2019s vales<\/p>\n

      Through the desert regions the exiled Gods approached<\/p>\n

      The edge of Heaven, and into blackness plunged\u2014<\/p>\n

      A sunless void over godless water Ipng\u2014<\/p>\n

      To seize an empire from the Dark, and win<\/p>\n

      Amidst ungoverned waves a sovereignty.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      But by the roadside while Obatala slept<\/p>\n

      Oduwa came by stealth and bore away<\/p>\n

      The bag Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9 gave. Thus was the will<\/p>\n

      Of God undone: for thus with the charmed sand<\/p>\n

      Cast wide on the unmastered sea, his sons<\/p>\n

      Called forth a World of envy and of war.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Of Man\u2019s Creation, and of the restraint<\/p>\n

      Olokun placed upon the chafing sea.<\/p>\n

      Of the unconscious years which passed in darkness<\/p>\n

      Till dazzling sunshine touched the unused eyes<\/p>\n

      Of men, of War and magic\u2014my priest shall tell you,<\/p>\n

      And all the Great Ones did before the day<\/p>\n

      They vanished to return to the calm hills<\/p>\n

      Of Old Ar\u00e1mf\u00e9\u2019s realm… They went away;<\/p>\n

      But still with us their altars and their priests<\/p>\n

      Remain, and from their shrines the hidden Gods<\/p>\n

      Peer forth with joy to watch the dance they taught,<\/p>\n

      And hear each night their chorus with the drum:<\/p>\n

      For changeless here the early World endures<\/p>\n

      In this first stronghold of humanity,<\/p>\n

      And, constant as the waves<\/p>\n

      Of Queen Olokun on the shore, the song.<\/p>\n

      The dance of those old Gods abide, the gladness.<\/p>\n

      The life\u2026 I, too, am born of the Beginning:<\/p>\n

      For, when from the sight of men the Great Gods passed,<\/p>\n

      They left on Earth Orni Odum\u2019la charged<\/p>\n

      To be a father to a mourning people.<\/p>\n

      To tend the shrines and utter solemn words<\/p>\n

      Inspired by Those invisible.<\/p>\n

      Thus has it ever been; and now<\/p>\n

      With me that Being is\u2014about, within\u2014<\/p>\n

      And on our sacred days these lips pronounce<\/p>\n

      The words of Odud\u00fawa and Orisha Obatala.<\/p>\n

      \n

      To cite this reading, use the following format:<\/p>\n

      Wyndham, John. Yoruba Creation Myth. Myths of Ife.<\/em> E. Macdonald, 1921. Maricopa Community Colleges, open.maricopa.edu\/worldmythologyvolume1godsandcreation\/chapter\/from-myths-of-ife-yoruba-creation-myth\/<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"menu_order":5,"template":"","meta":{"pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[48],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-62","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry","chapter-type-numberless"],"part":38,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/62","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/62\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":295,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/62\/revisions\/295"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/38"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/62\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=62"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=62"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pressbooks.ccconline.org\/worldmythology-cccs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=62"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}