The Supernatural and Igbo Cosmology in Chigozie Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities
Ekikereobong Usoro, University of Ibadan, Nigeria
Abstract
The corpus of African literature has witnessed the attempts by writers to project the motif of the supernatural and its connection with mankind, and the results of these attempts are mostly dependent on the relics of culture conjured in the memory of the writer. In this regard, this paper investigates the various manifestations of the supernatural in Chigozie Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities within the Igbo cosmology. The paper engages such elements of the supernatural as reincarnation, dual identity, evil spirits, and ancestors, and also highlights how words are aesthetically used in the novel to further amplify the discourse on the supernatural among the Igbos. It reveals that even if man were to live in constant denial of the supernatural, the inseparable connection between him and what he does not remains unscathed. The paper concludes that Obioma successfully weaves the fabric of the supernatural through his representation of the inseparable bond between man, his chi, and the creator.
Keywords: supernatural, Igbo cosmology, reincarnation
Introduction
Literary writings across different times and climes may share certain ideologies courtesy of intertextuality, and persisting socio-religious and political issues, they however bear certain overt or covert peculiarities that embody the beliefs of the writer and the society from which he emerges. Although the concept of myth, for instance, taps into the universal consciousness of humanity, it is sundered by the dearth of different mythologies that stretch across the globe. The disparate ideas about the universe and the supernatural are transposed into literature, such that the understanding and representation of the universe in Greek literature that is rooted in its traditional cosmology is different from Egyptian, Roman, Yoruba, and Igbo literatures, among others. In the words of Onyibor (36), “the concept of the world whether sensible or supra-sensible held by a people in a given culture has a vital influence on their attitude to and evaluation of life and death”. This vital influence is not only evinced in how people evaluate life and death but also in how they represent the supernatural in literary texts.
Within the African worldview, the supernatural is one predominant aspect that has gained prominence and importance from antiquity and has thus propelled the proliferation of discourse on the extramundane by many writers. According to Ojiakor:
From the pre-colonial Africa to the contemporary, an African has always recognised and has also tried to strike a balance between what he knows and what he does not know; that is, things natural and things mysterious. The African man, even before the advent of external influence, had begun to order his world so that he would find harmony in it (197).
Ojiakor’s position signals the fact that ideas about the supernatural precedes imperial rule in Africa — what accompanied the Western missionaries at the dawn of colonisation was not the conception of the supernatural but a different way of conceiving it. The attempt by the precolonial man to understand what lay beyond the physical was not for the sheer creation of a synergy between knowns and unknowns but to also establish “a spiritual hierarchy which reveals a cunny understanding of natural phenomena and a clever talent for manipulating them toward good for himself and evil for his enemies” (Awoonor 11). Awoonor goes on to say that:
By the light of his own logic, the African assigns to the creator God a certain degree of distance and inapproachability, not because he considers him unconcerned, but rather because he thinks of him in his primal ancestral role as the supreme paterfamilias who must not be bothered with petty details of the universe. He, himself, appoints lieutenants and assistants who become overseers and guardians of various natural phenomena and faculties. These minor deities are the recipients of sacrifices and messages for the creator God. (18).
The belief in the concurrent existence of the natural and supernatural worlds by Africans as indicated in Awoonor’s contention is further disparaged by such questions as who the guardians of the natural world are, where they reside, their order of command and mode of operation. However, this paper interrogates these questions from an Igbo cosmological perspective using Chigozie Obioma’s An Orchestra of Minorities, where the supernatural beliefs of south-eastern Nigerians aid the critique of the aforementioned novel.
The Supernatural and Igbo Cosmology in An Orchestra of Minorities
Within the context of Igbo cosmology, Achebe avers that “In a general way, we may visualize a person’s chi as his other identity in spiritland — his spirit being complementing his terrestrial human being; for nothing can stand alone, there must always be another thing standing beside it” (quoted in Obioma, 8). This is corroborated by Dibia Njokwuji of Nkpa who says that:
Even though humans exist on the earth in material form, they harbor a chi and an onyeuwa because of the universal law which demands that where one thing stands, another must stand beside it, and thus compels the duality of all things. It is also the basic principle on which the Igbo concept of reincarnation stands (quoted in Obioma 8).
From the above, it is deduced that every human has a dual identity: the human body which is seen and a chi which remains unseen to the human eye. In the novel, the significance of the chi cannot be overemphasised. In fact, it is the chi of the protagonist, Chinonso, who narrates the whole story.
The novel opens with the chi's address to Chukwu (God): “OBASIDINELU, I stand before you here in the magnificent court of Bechukwu, in Eluigwe, the land of eternal, luminous light, where the perpetual song of the flute serenades the air” (13). The supreme deity is associated with creation and is revered with many names which the chi recounts: “You are the creator of the universe, patron of the four days – Eke, Orie, Afor, and Nkwo that make up the Igbo week – To you the old fathers ascribed names and honorifics too numerous to count: Chukwu, Egbunu, Oseburuwa, Ezeuwa, Ebubedike, Gaganaogwu, Agujiegbe, Obasidinelu, Agbatta-Alumalu, Ijango- ijango, Okaaome, Akwaakwuru, and many more” (14). Where God resides — Eluigwe, the land of eternal luminous light — is made known at the beginning of the novel. Obioma, in his An Orchestra of Minorities, avers that a chi is constrained when in its host body. In there, it becomes “nearly impossible to see or hear what is present or spoken in the supernatural realm. But when one exits one's host, one becomes privy to things beyond the realm of man” (29). Like in classical Greek tragedies where the fate of man is predetermined by the gods, Obioma, through the protagonist's chi, affirms that “the ill luck that has befallen a man has long been waiting for him in the middle of some road, on a highway, or on some field of battle, biding its time” (30). It is noticed that chis communicate with each other as first observed when Chinonso, the protagonist, meets Ndali, his wife, a second time.
After their conversation which borders around the genuineness of the intentions of their hosts, Chinonso's chi says he shall return with the message to comfort his host. Furthermore, Obioma affirms the existence of a domain which exists between the living and dead known as Alandiichie. The existence of this domain is further confirmed by the moonlight song often sung by old mothers and their daughters in Igbo communities:
Alandiichie
A place where the dead are alive
A place where there are no tears
A place where there is no hunger
A place I will go in the end (271).
Here, great heroes and heroines long dead are present, some of which include the great Onye-nka, sculptor of the face of ancestral spirits (271) and “Oyadinma Oyiridiya, the great dancer, who was synonymous with the saying At the pleasure of gazing at her waist, we slaughter a goat” (272). In this realm, a chi who goes to testify on behalf of its host is asked certain questions to ensure it is not an evil spirit pretending to be a chi.
The belief in reincarnation is a significant part of the Igbo cosmology. For Nwala (47), death is “a transformation from this life to the yonder world with the possibility of reincarnation”. He adds that “for an old man, there is a great need for proper burial to ensure that he lives well and happily in the spirit world, that he reincarnates into another life without any problems” (47). Obioma explains several phenomena and why they happen, with one of such addressing why a child frowns at a man it has never seen before:
Do you ever wonder why a newborn child sees a particular individual for the first time and from that moment develops hatred for that person without cause?... It is often because the child may have identified that individual as an enemy in some past existence, and it an enemy in some past existence, and it might be that the child has returned to the world in their sixth, seventh, or even eighth cycle of reincarnation to settle an ancient score (8)!
According to the novel, “sometimes, too, a thing or an event can reincarnate during a lifetime. This is why you find a man who once owned something but loses it may find himself in possession of something similar years later” (8).
Using the existence of evil spirits that roam the earth, Obioma also explains why some people run mad. These spirits are commonly found where many people gather, especially in markets. Chinonso’s chi says: “The market was also the one human gathering that attracted the most vagrant spirits — akaliogolis, amosu, tricksters, and various vagabond discarnate beings” (16). Narrating one of its encounters with evil spirits, the chi says that it (akaliogoli) once possessed the dead body of a dog, managing, by “some alchemical means, to stir this carrion to life and make it amble a few steps before leaving the dog to lie dead again in the grass. It was a fearful sight” (16). He goes on to say that some of these spirits even sometimes try to overpower a present chi, or ones who have gone out to consult on behalf of their hosts, and “This is why we have the mentally ill, the epileptic, men with abominable passions, murderers of their own parents and others” (16)! The belief in gut feelings is subverted in the Igbo cosmology. Highlighting the significance of the chi, the author pinpoints that chis do not interfere in every affair of their hosts — they allow man to execute his will. Instead of interfering directly in man's affairs, chis “simply put the thought in his mind” (19). This is called “gut feeling” or “intuition” outside the Igbo worldview. Man always thinks that the voice of his chi is something that originates from him because he “has no way to distinguish between what has been put into his thoughts by a spirit — even if it is his own chi — from what has been suggested to him by the voice of his head (28).
Obioma also explains how people are born with gifts which they call talent. Before childbirth, it is believed that the spirit of a child chooses one gift in the great garden of Chiokike. It is in this garden that the onyeuwas (avatars/incarnate spirits) often go to find a gift that had returned there from people who had died unfortunately through accidents and prematurely through miscarriages. The protagonist's chi says:
Before he was born, while he was yet in Beigwe in the form of his onyeuwa and we were traveling together to begin the fusion of flesh and spirit to form his human component (an account which I will render in detail in the course of my testimony), we made the customary journey to the great garden of Chiokike (122).
It is in this great garden that the onyeuwa of Chinonso finds a bone. He and his chi are told that the finding of the bone meant that Chinonso would always get whatever he wanted out of life if he persevered.
The Igbo society thrives on the artistic use of words which also convey their beliefs of the natural and supernatural worlds. Achebe affirms this when he says that among the Igbo, “the art of conversation is regarded very highly, and proverbs are the palmoil with which words are eaten” (3). Nwoga’s definition of a proverb as “a terse statement which figuratively gives expression to the point of traditional wisdom relevant to a given situation” (16) infers that these proverbs are not said for their sake but are agents of wisdom and truth. Some of the proverbs deployed by Obioma in his novel are followed by their meanings. The protagonist’s chi says, for instance: “[…] I am here because the old fathers say that we bring only the blade sharp enough to cut the firewood to the forest. If a situation deserves exigent measures, then one must give it that” (14). While addressing the council of Bechukwu, Chinonso’s chi says that “to get to the top of a hill, one must begin from its foot. I have come to understand that the life of a man is a race from one end to the other. That which came before is a corollary to that which follows it” (22). The above is an equivalent of the English saying, “one step at a time”. Another proverb says: “IJANGO-IJANGO, the great fathers often say that a child does not die because his mother’s breast is empty of milk” (44). This means that man is conditioned to always fight for survival even no matter how gory his reality is, for when one door closes, it is believed that another one opens. To underscore man’s endurance in a cruel world, a proverb says that “no matter the weight of grief, nothing can compel the eyes to shed tears of blood. No matter how long a person weeps, only tears continue to fall. A man may remain in the state of grief for a long time, but he will eventually grow out of it. In time, a man’s mind will acquire strong limbs, strike down the wall, and be redeemed” (33).
With emphasis on how people achieve what they desire, in line with the occasion at which it is said, a proverb in the novel goes thus: “The wise fathers in their cautionary wisdom say that whichever position the dancer takes, the flute will accompany him there” (75), for the chi’s host that evening had received what he wanted — that Ndali come to him — “But he had achieved it by protest and dictated the tune of the flutist” (75). Another proverb says: “The ndiichie say that if a wall does not bear a hole in it, lizards cannot enter a house. Even if a man is troubled, if he does not become broken, he can sustain himself” (83). Within this context, a man must guard against breaking down, for then will the weariness of life set in. Commenting on the unpredictability and ephemerality of life, a proverb says “That the life of a man is anchored on a swivel. It can spin this way or that way, and a person’s life can change in significant ways in an instant” (104). This proverb foregrounds the tragedy in the novel before its manifestation. Another proverb says: “[…] that a mouse cannot run into an empty mousetrap in broad daylight unless it has been drawn to the trap by something it could not refuse” (107). This proverb simply says that an unusual thing does not just happen ex nihilo, but that there is a cause for it.
Making reference to a proverb that has been nullified due to the rapid evolution that has engulfed humanity, the protagonist’s chi says:
No matter how much a man leaps, he cannot fly. They should consider why the fathers said this before shaking their heads and thinking of the wise fathers as ignorant. Why? Because a man is not a bird. But the children see something like the plane and they are shocked at how this wisdom has been upended by the White Man’s sorcery. Humans fly every day in various shapes (160).
This points to the fact that even within the Igbo cosmology, some of the beliefs may appear plausible and true, but are false in reality due to certain factors like innovation and evolution. Another proverb says that ‘a toad whose mouth is full of water cannot swallow even an ant’ (173). This is applied to how a man’s mind works, for “when it is occupied by something that threatens its peace, [it] becomes consumed by it” (173). To affirm the authenticity of what people call “suspicion”, Chinonso’s chi says: “OSIMIRIATAATA, indeed, as the fathers of old said, a fish that has gone bad would be known from the smell of its head. I had begun to suspect by this time that what had befallen my host was what he and I most feared” (194).
The short-sightedness of man as compared to gods and dibias who are bestowed with the gift of seeing/telling the future is emphasised in a proverb which says that “[…] a mouse cannot knowingly enter into a trap set for it” (204). This is because “no one sees fire and throws himself in it. But such a man may walk into a pit of fire if he did not see that it is there. Why? Because a human being is limited in sight” (204). In an attempt to portray the complexity of life, a proverb says: “EBUBEDIKE, the old fathers in their cautionary wisdom say that the same place one visits and returns to is often the place where one goes and becomes trapped” (268). Chinonso’s chi explains that its host had found succor in the white woman, but this same place where he had “found succor is where he now lay, wounded and bleeding, blinded by his own blood” (268). To underscore the importance of a necessary and important reaction for every action, a proverb says “that a man whose house is on fire does not go about chasing rats” (270). That is, man must always focus on important issues rather than go after overtly inconsequential things.
In Igbo cosmology, the supernatural is an almost indispensable factor that cannot be evaded because it is interwoven in the belief system of people. As Obiechina contends: “Whether in folklore or mythology, in their symbolism and figures of languages, in their religious and magical beliefs, they [Africans] have a total view of the universe soon as a continuum and a perpetual flow of being and experience comprehending the visible and invisible universe, the world of nature and supernatural, and the living and the dead” (131). In this light, this paper concludes that Obioma successfully weaves his novel in a way that connects the supreme deity with his subordinates and all other supernatural entities like the ancestors, maintaining this connection through his representation of the inseparable bond between man, his chi and the creator within the context of Igbo society.
Works Cited
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Nwoga, Donatus. “The Igbo Poet and Satire.” In: Uche Egbulem (ed.), Oral Poetry in Nigeria. Lagos: Federal Ministry of Culture, 1981.
Obiechina, Emmanueal. Culture, Tradition and Society in the West African Novel, London Cambridge University Press, 1975.
Obioma, Chigozie. An Orchestra of Minorities. London: Little, Brown and Company, 2019.
Ojiakor, Chinyere. “Supernaturalism in African Literature: A Study of Laye’s The African Child And Amadi’s The Concubine.” International Journal of Social Sciences and Humanities Reviews, Vol.8, No 1, 2018. 197 – 208.
Onyibor, Marcel. “Death in Igbo Cosmology: A Hermeneutical Investigation.” Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State. Unpublished PhD Thesis, 2012.