Adherence To Tradition Not Adherence To Stagnation

“OK…I totally stumbled across this site haphazardly and I feel a little lost. What in the world are you talking about? I’m really curious about this now.

But as someone on the outside, knowing nothing about this sect of people or thoughts, I think it’s rather sad to be that caught up in anything outside of self. Any institution, any tradition, any unyielding static cultural remnant is, in my opinion, disastrous to our progression as human beings. I’m glad that you questioned the significance of your actions, though.

Would you mind writing me and filling me, though? I am always interested in anything spiritually enlightening! SophiaM@RealToolz4Pros.com” – Comment by Sophia

Thanks for the feedback Sophia,

People and people’s behavior run the gamut. While some people are rooted to the past, others are prone to look towards the future. While some people enjoy tradition and hierarchy and strict adherence to structure, others would prefer a more open and flexible environment. Ifa has a strong and long history of being a tradition strongly rooted to the past with strict adherence to spiritual law and hierarchy.

While some people are happy to follow spiritual traditions rooted in other cultures, others would like a spiritual connection to their African past. Unfortunately, there are few options for people to develop a spiritual link to their African past without the strict adherence to African tradition. And while that adherence to tradition served the African community well for thousands of years, in the age of capitalism and materialism, there is a stronger focus on developing wealth than there is on developing spirituality.

One can read about Ifa. There are plenty of books with people’s interpretation. But there are some concepts in Ifa that must be experienced. Even though the motivation of the teacher might be more geared towards earning a comfortable living, the student with a sincere desire to develop their spirituality will find their way. Spiritual entities like the ancestors and the Orisas and the Supreme Being Olodumare are more than ready to reach the student trying to reach them.

The spiritual entities do not have a list of regulations and rules and laws that each individual must adhere to in order to pass some test to earn spiritual enlightenment. A lot of people insist that the only way this can happen is if we spend our days in complete submission to tradition. People need to understand that spirituality runs the gamut just like anything else.

My time with my spiritual house was time well spent. These days I may not follow the traditional tenets that say people must shave their head to prove their devotion to spirituality, but in order to truly understand I sacrificed my hair to learn it. No one else needs to. If they want the significance or the symbolism of a head shaving to be associated with their initiation then more power to them. I just don’t think people should go around saying that adherence to tradition is absolutely necessary.  It is a choice.

Adherence to tradition is not necessarily a bad thing.  For example, I come from a family of ten children and we are spread across the country.  Like many families, my family has a tradition of attending family reunions.  Ever since I could remember when always made a pilgrimage to see our mom and dad’s old stomping grounds to celebrate Grandparent Peacemakers.  Because my immediate family is so focused on keeping our parent’s traditions going, we can’t seem to focus on getting our own immediate family reunion jumpstarted.  My brothers and sisters and I would have more flexibility in our plans to get together if some of us didn’t feel so obligated to continue our parent’s tradition.

But if we ever successfully make the transition to making our new tradition a priority, we run the risk of losing touch with our extended family through the disconnection from old traditions.

The bottom line tradition and innovation need to be balanced.  Unfortunately, many organized spiritualities, such as Ifa which is wrapped up solely around tradition as practiced by the large number of members, do not lend themselves to the side leaning towards originality.  The only thing traditional Ifa lends itself to is tradition.  In the end innovation loses and stagnation triumphs.

Peace