Watched the Rose hall episode with interest as I am an author and Babalawo (with Wanaldo) of Orisha worship and IFA (roughly on par with a Catholic Arch Bishop).Orisha worship & IFA you may know is the mother religion of Voodoo (Voodum), Santeria, Palo, Macumba etc. I trained in Cuba.
The Babalawo is the high priest and specializes in divination throughout our religion, we are trained specifically for this. Herein lies mistake number one: Your Voodoo priestess is not on the same level as a Babalawo, so if indeed this "priest" named King was or is a real Babalawo and not a prop, he should have been directing the ceremonies, not her. Rank is important in Orisha worship and this trickles down to its various forms. Mistake number two was trying to expunge the "witch" rather than respectfully ask her for her help. Here, they tried to confront her and throw her out of her property! "Priest"King called his ancestors to protect him and then had what we call a "Tambor" where an Orisha would take control or "mount" him.....(Babalawo's can not be mounted). While many of these are shams, let's assume it was real (extremely doubtful).. of course then he could not be a high priest.....anyway.even if he was mounted he is not in control ...the Orisha is. What they had here, was a combo of them trying to use: The Dead, The Ancestors and The Orishas....None of which we control. The Dead protect us, The Ancestors guide us and The Orishas are how we obtain Ashe (Nature's energy) All but 3 of the 201 immortal Orishas represent Nature and have a natural element that the respective Orisha.can manipulate and guard (not to be confused with each Orisha BEING the element as they are not).
Any Babalawo or serious student of our faith knows that 1) The light is stronger than the darkness and defeats it with the right tools. 2) That when working with spirits it is important to find out what the spirit wants,and how to appease them and give them peace.This is done through divination. The Babalawo is the expert in divination not the Santero/ Santera/ or priest or priestess. He is a priest of Orunmila, the Orisha of divination (one of the three Orishas that do not have a Natural element (the two others are Eshu and Eleggua). The Babalwo has unique equipment to divine with that lesser rank is are prohibited from. In fact of the 256 Odu or signs possible, lesser ranks are prohibited from "reading" certain Odu. Once the Odu is discovered it then becomes a matter of how knowledgeable the Babalawo is. Think of him as the consular who reads the diagnosis and prescribes the medicine.
Let us hope that in the future they will do a better job of obtaining qualified experts. Indeed there are many scams with our religion and with all religions, yet we get enough bad press as it is. Movies like The Believers are loosely based on our religion and show the smoke and mirrors because the film has made a poor choice of "expert" consultants. In that case Ms. Gonzalas - Whippler. She is a successful author but gives second hand accounts as she has little more than a toe in our religion. Orisha worship has followers of around 150 million, only fools take it lightly.
Very Truly Yours, Charles Spencer King (Awo Ogbe Sa)and Author of Nature's Ancient Religion
The Babalawo is the high priest and specializes in divination throughout our religion, we are trained specifically for this. Herein lies mistake number one: Your Voodoo priestess is not on the same level as a Babalawo, so if indeed this "priest" named King was or is a real Babalawo and not a prop, he should have been directing the ceremonies, not her. Rank is important in Orisha worship and this trickles down to its various forms. Mistake number two was trying to expunge the "witch" rather than respectfully ask her for her help. Here, they tried to confront her and throw her out of her property! "Priest"King called his ancestors to protect him and then had what we call a "Tambor" where an Orisha would take control or "mount" him.....(Babalawo's can not be mounted). While many of these are shams, let's assume it was real (extremely doubtful).. of course then he could not be a high priest.....anyway.even if he was mounted he is not in control ...the Orisha is. What they had here, was a combo of them trying to use: The Dead, The Ancestors and The Orishas....None of which we control. The Dead protect us, The Ancestors guide us and The Orishas are how we obtain Ashe (Nature's energy) All but 3 of the 201 immortal Orishas represent Nature and have a natural element that the respective Orisha.can manipulate and guard (not to be confused with each Orisha BEING the element as they are not).
Any Babalawo or serious student of our faith knows that 1) The light is stronger than the darkness and defeats it with the right tools. 2) That when working with spirits it is important to find out what the spirit wants,and how to appease them and give them peace.This is done through divination. The Babalawo is the expert in divination not the Santero/ Santera/ or priest or priestess. He is a priest of Orunmila, the Orisha of divination (one of the three Orishas that do not have a Natural element (the two others are Eshu and Eleggua). The Babalwo has unique equipment to divine with that lesser rank is are prohibited from. In fact of the 256 Odu or signs possible, lesser ranks are prohibited from "reading" certain Odu. Once the Odu is discovered it then becomes a matter of how knowledgeable the Babalawo is. Think of him as the consular who reads the diagnosis and prescribes the medicine.
Let us hope that in the future they will do a better job of obtaining qualified experts. Indeed there are many scams with our religion and with all religions, yet we get enough bad press as it is. Movies like The Believers are loosely based on our religion and show the smoke and mirrors because the film has made a poor choice of "expert" consultants. In that case Ms. Gonzalas - Whippler. She is a successful author but gives second hand accounts as she has little more than a toe in our religion. Orisha worship has followers of around 150 million, only fools take it lightly.
Very Truly Yours, Charles Spencer King (Awo Ogbe Sa)and Author of Nature's Ancient Religion