The knowledge of Ifa has been preserved within Yoruba communities and transmitted among Ifa priests. The ese reflect Yoruba history, language, beliefs, cosmovision and contemporary social issues.
The ese, considered the most important part of Ifa divination, are chanted by the priests in poetic language. Each of the 256 odu has its specific divination signature, which is determined by the babalawo using sacred palm-nuts and a divination chain. The Ifa literary corpus, called odu, consists of 256 parts subdivided into verses called ese, whose exact number is unknown as they are constantly increasing (there are around 800 ese per odu).
The Ifa divination system is applied whenever an important individual or collective decision has to be made. In contrast to other forms of divination in the region that employ spirit mediumship, Ifa divination does not rely on a person having oracular powers but rather on a system of signs that are interpreted by a diviner, the Ifa priest or babalawo, literally “the priest’s father”. The word Ifa refers to the mystical figure Ifa or Orunmila, regarded by the Yoruba as the deity of wisdom and intellectual development. In addition, the talk will show that-contrary to many popular claims-several women have become Ifa diviners in West Africa, but that the important ways that gender is understood in a variety of different contexts, its ramifications for initiation rituals, and the rapidly growing number of female initiates in diaspora, will likely change the dynamics of the tradition going forward.The Ifa divination system, which makes use of an extensive corpus of texts and mathematical formulas, is practiced among Yoruba communities and by the African diaspora in the Americas and the Caribbean.
Thus, it seeks to explain why male Ifa priests from West Africa have been eager and willing to initiate women. It also places the male-oriented nature of Ifa within the larger context of Yoruba gender norms, contrasting Yoruba notions of gender with modern values of gender equality. Much of the debate hinges around ritual practice associated with the mysterious ori'a Odu, and consequently the paper addresses the relevant mythology and rituals associated with her in an Ifa context. This talk traces the origins of women who have sought the highest levels of Ifa initiation-primarily in Cuba and the US-engages the various arguments, concerns, and appeals to authority of the numerous players. A lecture by Ayodeji Ogunnaike, Bowdoin College: As the tradition of Ifa divination has gained increasing popularity and membership around the world, the previously male-dominated composition of its priesthood has become challenged.
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