African Voodoo can be defined as the African Religion that originated in the West African Kingdom of Dahomey which is in modern day Nigeria and Benin.
In its African form, Voodoo was called Voudon and it comes from the Fon word for “God” or “Spirit” known as “Iwa”.
African Voudon was also a Monotheistic religion, which recognized one Supreme Being expressed in the Natural Metaphysical and Physical Forces of Life which the Africans represented symbolically as Deities or Angels.
The Moral teachings and life lessons of African Voodoo were preserved and transmitted in an Oral Tradition which also included Divination.
It is interesting to observe that the African Vodoun Theology mirrors very closely that of the other Ancient Nile Valley Religions of Africa like the Metu Neter Oracle from Ancient Egypt’s Story of Creation and Nigeria’s Yoruba Ifa Oracle.
Both these African Religions were Monotheistic believing in One Supreme Being expressed as the Neteru Deities like Ausar (Osiris) in the Metu Neter Oracle and the Orisha Deities like Ogun in the Ifa Oracle.
Just like the Deities of the Metu Neter and Ifa Oracles, the African Voodoo Deties or Angels also represent the Primordial aspects of Nature like Earth, Fire, Water and Air in a manner similar to the Ancient Egyptian Deities Shu, Geb, Nut and Tefnut who are the first 4 Children from the The Supreme Being that also represent the 4 Elements of Nature that are the determinants of the Reality we experience in our Universe.
In addition, African Voodoo applied the same underlying principle in conceiving of the African Voodoo Deities not as actual Physical Gods, but as mere expressions of the Cosmic forces of Nature in the Moral and Physical planes of the Universe in the same way as the Deities of the Ifa Oracle and Ancient Kemet’s Metu Netu Oracle in the Ancient Egyptian Tree Of Life represent the Metaphysical Aspects of Nature such as Thought, Creation, Karma, Justice, Will, and Fertility.
However, as an Oral Tradition, it can be said that African Voodoo probably originates and mirrors more closely Nigeria’s Ifa Oracle which remains an Oral Yoruba Tradition that also includes Divination to this day especially because most of the people that were enslaved were taken from West Africa after the 15th Century in the period when the indigenous African Religions practiced at the time were The Ifa Oracle and Voudon in its original African form.
The basic principles for the indigenous African Religions of Ifa and Voudon practiced during the time Africans were enslaved to the Americas were probably derived from the more Ancient Metu Neter Oracle which continued to survive in different forms in the indigenous African Religions of Ifa and Voudon that were practiced by Africans before they were enslaved by the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.
This may explain why Voodoo in the Americas and the Religions of Ifa and African Voodoo it was based on used some of the same Iconography such as Snake symbols which were originally conceived and used in Ancient Kemet.
Conclusion
African Voodoo gave African Slaves a continuous sense of Identity and connection with their African Homeland.
As a result, the success of the Haitian Revolution has been attributed to the influence of African Voodoo as a Unifying Principle that strengthened the Haitian resistance in a manner that other subsequent Slave Revolts like the Nat Turner Slave Revolt could not achieve because other Slave Revolts in North America were based entirely on the foreign religion of Christianity which was not strong enough to unify revolting Slaves in the United States.
While African Voodoo can be defined as the African Religion that originated in the West African Kingdom of Dahomey in modern day Nigeria and Benin, its important to remember that African Voodoo is itself based on the Kemetic Spirituality from Ancient Egypt’s Metu Neter Oracle.
