Diloggun Tales of the Natural World

Since ancient times the Yoruba of West Africa created sacred stories--patakis--to make sense of the world around them. Upon arrival in the New World, the Yoruba religion began to incorporate elements from Catholic and Native traditions, evolving into Santeria, and new patakis were born, adding to the many chapters already found in the odu of the diloggun--the sacred oral teachings and divination system of the Yoruba, or Lucumi, faith. Comparable to the myths of ancient Greece and Rome and rich with jewels of wisdom like the I Ching, these Santeria stories are as vast as the Hindu Vedas and as culturally significant as the parables in the Torah, Talmud, and Christian Bible.DILOGGUN TALES OF THE NATURAL WORLD presents more than 40 patakis that shed light upon the worldview of Santeria. Each story in this collection, reassembled from the oral tradition of the African diaspora, is centred on a spiritual principle in nature: the waxing and waning of the moon, solar and lunar eclipses, the phenomenon of shooting stars, the separation of sky and earth, and the origins of the animals and birds who play key roles in Santeria symbology. Revealing the metaphysics, theology, and philosophy of the Yoruba people, this volume shows these stories to be as powerful and relevant today as they were to the ancient Yoruba who once safeguarded them. Includes more than 40 myths, stories, and histories from the Lucumi tradition Reassembles the oral fragments from the African diaspora into coherent stories Demonstrates that the African peoples, specifically the Yoruba, had deep philosophies and metaphysics involving nature and the natural world