Waaqeffannaa Oromo Religion and the Unavoidable Death of Fake 'Ethiopia'
A few days ago, I re-published (in: 'The Inexorable Radiation of Waaqeffannaa, the Oromo Religion' -
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/60798
) an excellent paper written by one of Oromia's foremost intellectuals, Mr. Getachew Chamadaa Nadhabaasaa, a theological analysis of Waaqeffannaa, the historical Oromo religion (under the title Waaqeffannaa - Testimony of an Indigenous Religion of the African Past and Present).
As I intended to extensively comment on that text that serves as a founding text for a new phase of Waaqeffannaa, as written religion, I encrusted numbers in the text. A first part of the commentary was published already in the article entitled 'Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Religions and Waaqeffannaa Oromo Religion'
(
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/61419
). I will continue in the present article. My present comments relate to the numerated points in Mr. Nadhabaasaa's text (as above).
Commentary
16. The point reveals the originality of the Oromo culture; of course, personal names in the past were socially, religiously, culturally and ideologically meaningful. Only in our modern times, personal names have almost everywhere lost their meaning. Personal names could eventually be real sentences, and this helped describe an ideological, spiritual and social dimension that the newly born person would serve and fulfill. In some cases, meaningful names survived until our times but the meaning has been totally lost; in fact, who remembers today that Elijah means "My God is Jahveh"?
The loss is even greater when it comes to the home and school (temple in the Antiquity) education that would contribute to the making of the person according to his / her name's meaning.
17. This is another point of originality. In the Antiquity, there were particular cases in which the Name of God had to be invoked. These cases were well specified and absolutely respected. Today, among religious people who practice their religion, there is an excessive use of invocations, whereas amidst non religious people there is no use at all. Even in cases of spasmodic action like sneezing, invocations were to be made; for the particular case of sneezing, in Ancient Greece, people used to say 'Zeus, save", which shows that every action, every event was viewed differently, and within a markedly dissimilar context.
18. This belief has great similarities with Ancient Egyptian concepts. The human being had to live – principally – in peace. The concept has been preserved as an empty word down to our times but it is widely misunderstood. With this term, we do not mean quite and serene relations among states, as the peace and the war between two states is a very limited and secondary issue. Peace mainly means personal serenity and quietude, spiritual balance, piety and reliance on the Providence.
What was critical for an Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Ethiopian individual was never to be invaded by anger, rage or wrath, which were all typical characteristics of the Evil (Seth). Absence of evil means automatically peacefulness. If an Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Ethiopian individual was to be asked what the essence of war is, he would automatically answer "rage"; Seth was invaded by rage when he decided to kill his brother Osiris according to the narratives of the Heliopolitan theology. Osiris' name itself (Wser in Ancient Egyptian) meant the 'Well Being'.
The top daily concern for an Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Ethiopian individual was to keep him/herself in personal serenity.
19. Using the name of God in Ancient Egypt and Kush (Ethiopia) would imply spiritual purity, innocence, and virtue, which means absolute absence of personal material interest or bias. The real name of God, and as such we mean the Only and Supreme Ra, was known to very few high priests, as it should not be used in vain. An invocation expressed by an impure person was rather perceived as an evil attempt of desecration; its consequences would be disastrous for the evildoer.
20. The concept is identical among Modern Oromos and Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians. One person's evildoing was believed as able to cause serious trouble to the entire society and country.
Oromo, Kushitic Ethiopian, and Ancient Egyptian Ontology
21. Selfishness, deception, treachery, mendacity and any opposition to the Values of Osiris (the 'Well Being') were considered by the Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians as violations of the Supreme Law of Ra which was conceived as inherent to the nature, and therefore to every being.
22. This consists in another point of similarity between Modern Oromos and Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians, as integration into the system was an individual's stance toward life and not a state's concern for legislation and law enforcement. Furthermore, conformity to facts of truth was considered indispensable for integrity, progress, and prosperity.
23. In Ancient Egypt and Kush (Ethiopia) persecution due to differences of skin colour, language, origin or other was viewed in the same way as among today's Oromos followers of Waaqeffannaa. Of course, there was opposition, rivalry and at times enmity, but any evildoing was viewed as rather detrimental for the evildoer, not the potential victim of the action. It all hinged on the belief that life is a vast spiritual phenomenon that is not terminated by the death, and it was common conviction that no wrongdoing and no evildoing - with the consequences it would entail - merited the deriving, eternal punishment in the Life after death. Hospitality was an institution. Foreign visitors in Egypt were protected in enclosures and guided throughout the country; only in later periods, the interminglement among Egyptians and foreigners advanced and free movement was allowed to all foreigners.
24. This is another archetypical concept that we encounter among Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians. Tone and activity of an individual correspond to aspects of the Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Ethiopian ontological terms Ka and Ba.
The "ka" was perceived as the real hypostasis of a human being, a real force of life and sustenance that was the main constituent element of a human being. The "ka" was represented in Egyptian hieroglyphics by a pair of arms pointing upwards. This was the symbol of eternity, and in fact the 'ka' never perished. Each individual's "ka" was to be incepted at the moment of person's birth, and it was thought to subsequently serve as his / her "double".
Of course, according to various mythological narratives, various attributes and stories have illustrated the "ka" in a way fitting this or that Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic theological school, but all this should not be taken into consideration in the comparison between the Oromo Tone concept and the Ancient Egyptian and Kushitic Ethiopian theory of "Ka".
The ka was believed to live within the body of the individual and this is the reason the Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians conceptualized ka's need of the material body after death. They then mummified their dead. If the body decomposed after death, its spiritual double would die too, and the defunct person would lose his / her chance for eternal life at an individual level. In a way, "ka" was the paragon of the individuality. A euphemism for death in Ancient Egypt was "going to one's ka". Sin was called "an abomination of the ka".
In the Ancient Egyptian Art, the "ka" was portrayed in different ways, namely as a person identical to the person whose "ka" it was, as a shadowy figure, and as a person with two upraised arms on his head.
The "Ba" was the individual's distinctive manifestation; it encompassed all expressions and activities, as well as all the non physical attributes which make each human unique. The "ba" was associated with the stork, as the Ancient Egyptian name of that bird was precisely the same, and thus the "ba" is often seen depicted as a bird with a human head and arms.
25. The social connectivity was far higher in ancient societies; the model Oromo society preserves this trait as well.
26. I would rather prefer the term 'secluded' or 'isolated' instead of just 'closed'. This chaotic difference between the Oromo Kushitic Ethiopians and the Semitic Amhara Abyssinians demonstrates clearly why the colonial empire of Abyssinia, fallaciously re-named 'Ethiopia', cannot and will not survive. The national, cultural and religious differences between the two nations are unbridgeable; nothing can help in this regard the Neo-Nazi Amhara Abyssinian target of forging one country (fake 'Ethiopia') out of many nations whereby the two largest entities are so diametrically opposed to one another. No tyranny, no treachery, no trickery, nothing can make of these two nations one; the structural differences of the two societies herald the unavoidable death of Fake 'Ethiopia'.
The English term Monophysitic corresponds to the Amharic / Tigrinya term Tewahedo.
Waaqeffannaa Oromo and Ancient Egyptian Rejection of Christianity
27. A vast subject to study, analyze and propagate is a genuine Waaqeffannaa Oromo overview of the Christian theological system(s). The limited scale the author expanded on the subject within the limits of his article makes me encounter a replica of the Ancient Egyptian rejection of Christianity. We have a vast documentation on the argumentation of various ancient cultural, religious, and philosophical backgrounds against the early Christians. We know how the Ancient Greeks, Romans, Egyptians, Aramaeans, Phoenicians, and Persians reacted against, how they perceived, and how they refuted Christianity. Among all, the most successful have been the Persians, who remained permanently out of the Christian world, as those who accepted Oriental theological systems of Christianity within the Iranian imperial Sassanid borders were all Aramaeans, not Persians. In fact, the Persians stopped the diffusion of Christianity to the East, something they proved unable to do in the case of Islam.
The Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians who rejected Christianity did it in a very different way than that of the Ancient Romans and Greeks, who found Christianity as purely infantile as philosophical system, although there had earlier been some respect for the great approach and work of Philo of Alexandria.
For the Ancient Egyptians and Kushitic Ethiopians, Christianity meant the Epitome of Evil, violation of the natural order of the Universe, Utmost Hatred, Foremost Negativity, Evilness, and Persecution. Particularly evil for Ancient Egyptians was the Christian practice of anachoretism (monasticism), which was actually born in Egypt. In fact, monasticism has pre-Christian origins as social – sociopolitical practice in Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt, and as religious practice in post-Seleucid Judea.
More among the Ancient Egyptians than amidst the Kushitic Ethiopians, the rise of the Christianity constituted for more than a century a real Civil War. In Meroitic Ethiopia, Christianity had not advanced at all until the time king Ezana of Axumite Abyssinia attacked and destroyed Ethiopia ca. 360 – 370 CE. As Christianity at those days was still vehemently opposed in Egypt, where it was viewed as imposed by a foreign administration since the days of Emperor Constantine, and as the larger Christian communities were concentrated rather in Alexandria and the Delta, there was a constant fear that Meroitic Ethiopia, merging with non Christian Egyptians of Upper Egypt, would unite Egypt's largest part under an anti-Roman, anti-Christian banner, which would be detrimental to the Roman Empire at a moment the rise of the Sassanid Empire of Iran was threatening all Oriental provinces of the Roman Empire. Out of this background, one may eventually hypothesize an Egyptian Coptic suggestion to Ezana of Axumite Abyssinia (who had just been converted to Christianity) to attack Meroitic Ethiopia so that Meroe never has the possibility to foment an Anti-Christian unity of Ethiopia (in the area of today's Sudan) and Upper Egypt.
28. The indigenous values were never a subject of interest for the religious colonialists who are euphemistically named 'missionaries'. The use of term is appallingly perverse; rejected by the Oriental Christians, notably the Aramaeans, the missionaries of Western Christianity not only mercilessly destroyed ancient and highly sophisticated civilizations (Mayas, Aztecs, Incas, etc.) but also greatly damaged the Oriental Christianity, notably the Aramaeans and more particularly the Nestorians. Christian or not, the "indigenous values" have always been targeted by the religious colonialists.
29. It would be very useful to see Oromo bibliography on this subject in the future; as the topic has been developed mostly by either Marxist or Muslim authors thus far, it would be helpful to have an idea about the Oromo approach to this issue. It would also be helpful for the Waaqeffannaa Oromos to establish a list of criteria of Oromoness that are violated by Oromos adhering to Christianity and Islam, as this would create constructive polarizations about the Oromo adaptation of other religious systems.
30. The sentence, as it is articulated, would lead some people to imagine that the Oromos are atheists who reject the existence of the transcendental world. One should be more attentive in this case. The Ancient Egyptians and the Kushitic Ethiopians believed in the continuation of existence and life after death, and accepted the notion of Justice and Consequence, but did not share in anything the Christian vision of reward or punishment in the Other World which was conceptualized under terms of clear cut distinction between good and evil – which is also rejected by the Waaqeffannaa believers.
31. The Christian Hereafter is similar among all the denominations; it draws its origins from the Biblical Hebrew approach to the Nether World, but it is tremendously differentiated from that too. Monophysitic Abyssinians existed for many centuries without claiming the fair name of 'Ethiopia, which does not belong to them but the Ancient Kushites of Sudan and their offspring, the Oromos and the linguistically arabized Kushites of Sudan.
'Ethiopianism' is a racist and discriminatory political system and ideology that was not shared by the historical followers of Abyssinian Monophysitism. Ethiopianism is a monstrous and inhuman totalitarianism that justifies the use of the adjective Nazi and Neo-Nazi for the modern Abyssinians, who fallaciously re-baptized their country as 'Ethiopia'.
32. What is not clearly denoted here is the forefathers' sin, a concept that would sound as simply crazy in Ancient Egypt and Kush (Ethiopia) – as it does among Oromos today. Accepting that "the very nature of man is aggressive, vindictive, and deceptive" simply cancels the Creation and the notion of One and Just God.
We will continue and complete our Commentary in a forthcoming article!