A Nigerian Theologian at Work

Extract

My justification for writing about an unpublished thesis is simply that people ought to know about the work of the Reverend Dr L. A. Adeolu Adegbola, and that publishing being what it is, the thesis is most unlikely to be published as a whole. Hence, an article like this could help in the circulation of ideas.

Dr Adeolu Adegbola is a Methodist pastor from the great Yor-uba people of western Nigeria. After considerable pastoral experience, he completed his thesis, “Ifa and Christianity among the Yoruba”, at Bristol in 1976, and is, at present, Director of the Institute of Church and Society at Ibadan, western Nigeria, which aims both at keeping Christians thinking, and thoughtful people, who either never were Christians or who have drifted away from the churches, aware that there is at least the possibility of a Christian response to the pressing cultural and social questions of contemporary Nigeria. In this article, I shall outline and comment on his thesis, and indicate some of the new ground it seems to open up. One further word of explanation, as to what “ifa” is. Ifa is the Yoruba system of divination. Unlike many other African systems of divination, there is in Ifa no element of spirit possession, nor does the client have to tell the diviner what his problem is. The diviner (in Yoruba babalawo, father of secrets) may throw down a rope or chain, on which are eight similar objects, capable of giving a heads-and tails arrangement, or he may hold sixteen palm-nuts in his left hand. He then tries to take them with his right hand, noting how many remain in his right hand, but has to do this eight times, whereas one throw of the divining chain will give him a sufficient number of signs to select the appropriate figure, or odu, which is then marked on the divining board.