The pastor and the babalawo: the interaction of religions in nineteenth-century Yorubaland

Abstract

1. The Priority of the EncounterThe system of divination called Ifa is among the most elaborate of African systems of divination and occupies a unique position in what is often called ‘Yoruba traditional religion’. That it is inappropriate simply to regard it as part of Yoruba traditional religion indicates the nature of our problem. For its saliency in Yoruba religion, as that has been conceived by commentators both Yoruba and non-Yoruba since the early nineteenth century, has precisely been because of its capacity to ‘ride’ social change, to detach itself from much of what Muslims and Christians call paganism, and to impose itself on the respectful attention of the modern educated.