UMBANDA

The umbanda is a wrong concept. Generally speaking, this ritual embraces elements of the Catholic liturgy along with others characteristic of the American continent. Among these concepts, the umbanda strictly speaking has to be distinguished from the "kimbanda" and the purest africanism and cabinda, nago and other syncretism, that are presently referred to as nation or batuque.

Umbanda is the rythmic spiritist worship and the chanted spiritist ritual, with prediction purposes.

It is a new Brazilian worship, whose consolidation took place from 1907 onwards, which resulted from the syncretism of some beliefs and African magickal rites with some other of indigenist roots that aggregated to them. Some Catholic forms of worship, icons and symbols, some spiritist ideas, which assert reincarnation and the laws of "karma", product of the Oriental philosophy.

Its main characteristic is prediction and the practice of white magick, aimed at healing, both spiritually and physically. Its priests are called "páis", and they can baptize, marry, consecrate, that is to say, they have the faculty of practicing liturgy based on their religion, and always wear in white.

The term Umbanda comes from the Quimbundo language, of Angolan origin, the Congo, currently Kenya and Guinea, within the Bantu idiomatic area. Umbanda is the art of praying by magical means, whereas kimbanda is the witch doctor and magick master.

The term Kumbanda comes from the verb to cure, to prescribe, and the word quimbanda derives from it as the concrete form and the Umbanda as the abstract form. According to the African beliefs, the spirit invoked by the witch doctor rises and evolves, from below to the summit of its power and fulfillment thanks to the influence of the invocation worship.

It is possible in Africa to follow the route of penetration and spreadness of the bantu language and worships from the Sudan to Angola. The origin of the Umbanda terms and concepts can be followed back to Old Egypt, from the deads book and the idea of a unitarian deity -yet plural at the same time. The idea of the immortality of the soul as factor of the universal balance is worthy mentioned. The name Olorum derives from Horus -Sun god-, and hence, Osiris and Oxala.

Angolan animist religion believes in spirits that preside over the development of life and death, and in other more general spirits of one clan or family. There are three categories of transmigrating souls: the "Muculo", which is the soul of a newly dead person interfering in other people's lives to reveal secrets, the "Quilulo", which is a lost soul, and the "Zumbi" , which is the spirit of someone who died a long time ago.

The Umbanda as a religious activity is the necessary bridge for communication of the spirits.

The Orixás are divine spirits who are related to the saints of Catholicismo, and can invoke to great moral and natural forces. They act as forces balancing universe, and head phalanxes of other spirits not so perfect, who are in turn in charge of communicating with humans in the course of the worship sessions. In the Umbanda, orixás do not embody in mediums. Orixá means leading spirit or spiritual head.

The Orixás pantheon integrates the entities that follow, which are intermediate between Olorum and men:

In all works relating to Evil, Exú is invoked. The concept of this deity is difficult per se, being the equivalent to the Devil in Christianism. In African worships, such as Candomblé, Exú is considered as a disobedient orixá, liable to disturb ceremonies. For this reason, it must moved away, not only during the works, but also from the locations of the saints' rooms, that is, out of the ritual grounds.

In these worships of African origin, it needs to be present to provide security to the works.

Exú is an Orixá's envoy, but it does not have a will of its own. It is a power that needs to be moved, as without it the works cannot start. It is the one in charge of breaking grounds, cleaning the environment and provide confidence in the tasks. It is guard that needs to be pleased and thanked. There are certain structures in Umbanda that refer us to the kingdom of Exú, and to certain lines of Quimbanda. Depending on their past in other lives, the soul evolution draws up present attitudes. The agent's intention combines with it in the works to extents that range from black magick to good-oriented magicks.

This means -and so it refers us to- vibratory fields more or less weightys, and on these grounds, an almost material power is required for works in the powerful areas where the evil powes reside. That is why guards need to have some kind of vibratory affinity with them.

Various entities act under the name of Exú. Every man and place has an Exú of his own, which must be call to act in that field of weighty vibrations, as everything exists and acts according to the affinities of every means and in agreement with the minds of those taking part, for good or for evil sake. It is the representation of complex stairs or evolution levels, or signs with a given intention that shows a series of behavioural sequences.

Exú means eveil deity in Nigerian, and it is mischievous and noisy. The Exú is different from quiúmbas, gombeteiros and other disturbing and obsessed spirits, which can mystify in the works. Exú pagao is marginal to spirituality, and, in Quimbanda, it works in the evil magick and for evil's sake. Exú Batizado or Já, is the human soul sensitized to Good in its way to evolution. There are four different general senses to consider Exú: as an Orixá, disobedient or fallen angel, as a soul bound to the material nature, as a malefic spirit standing still at evolution, or as a spirit in a very basic stage of the said evolution.

Exú's spiritual figure, as a willful embodiment of evil, depends on the concept of evil that one has as an active power in reality or as the mere lack of good; lack or sin in the sense of fault. The sin is a fault in will, moved by oral ideals towards the good and kept in the matter and its laws by the nature itself. From this perspective, Exú could be considered as the power of nature that binds one person to the earthly world, preventing him from moving, if not of evil, at least of men's Nemesis in their earthly trial.

FROM AFRICA

The main Africanist guidelines, in syncretism with one other and presented under the common term of nation are as follows: Cabinda, Nacó, Tambór, Yeye y Yeya, among others. These lines, as showed by our folklore, existed in ancient Buenos Aires as generations attached to various central churches of the city. Covered by the Catholic worship and the plateresque religious images of the time, masked a hidden reference to the African rituals in the utmost secrecy. They practiced black magick for works of protection from their masters' abuses and from the arrogance of the Colonial church. Some references can still be found in the Tambor quarter, of black population, and the gaucho mandinga gauchesco as embodiment of the Devil. In Brazil too, African arrived as slaves were forced to accept the Catholic religion, and those who dare to rebel against the power of the Church received a severe treatment.

Thus, the religious essences of those black people, heirs of ancient traditions were subjugated by Catholicism, which put an emphasis on its interest on the external worship of images. Indian and black slaves venerated their old gods transformed in those white statues. Fugitive slaves took refuge in the rainforest with native tribes and white pariahs. In those redoubts or quilombos, all the beliefs of the oppressed people got mixed, giving rise to forms the more and more refined, the so-called Umbanda nowadays.

The Nation worship is universal and naturalist. The ancient tradition remains valid and preserves its purity among primitive people, who remained loyal to the most universal and ancient practices. These traditions revere certain symbolic elements as well as the powers of nature. this knowledge allow people to deploy them usefully, provided that the cosmic equilibrium is not jeopardized.

It can be stated that the traditions of the black peoples from Africa are still alive, in the famous library of Alexandria. It can also be stated that the current crisis in culture and civilization is helping people to come back to their origins and recover ancient traditions.

For Quimbanda, the Exú are but men who died in impurity, spirits of dead people chained to the evil, who, having been humans can better penetrate human wishes. Neither Exú nor Pomga-giras are demons. Rather, they are entities working from death in favour of the earthy things of the alives. They make or help to make what people ask or invoke. The break grounds, open doors, clear the vegetation, in order to help human beings get their resolutions or interests.

In the Quimbanda ritual, drums and maracas are played and Exú is invoked. The invocation consists in the symbollism of chanted and written parts, when spirits arrive to the body of the people in the session, who wear black and red clothes to favour the vibration required for the ritual. It is not necessary that the head of the session be a babalorixa, that is, a saint pái having his orixás set up in his religion house.

The orixá or African saints set up on stones and the Exú sets on a clay plate. The elements are strengthen by means of sacrifices. The head of the Exú ritual can be an Umbanda chief, and at the same time, a Babalaorixa.

The power of Exú is contained in its settlement, favoured by the sacrifice ritual. The Orixás set up the same, but with particular accents that served the priest to help others through them. Every human being is bouned to an orixá of his/her own, which will always influence his/her life. The sense of the earthly life, the overcoming of the individual's spiritual defficiencies. Orixás are vocations of the universal spirit, read by men in nature, as particular and saints-like venerated, which incorporate to the individual and condition his/her life. Orixás are also in evolution and needs the matter to attain their own perfection. The spiritual nature of men brings an atavism of saintliness to them, which has to be first cleaned and then grown to be able to accomplish the superior destiny of human spiritual evolution.

The moral keys of that improvement are charity, love and integration with Nature. God aims to the reorganization of the forces of nature existing in men into a hierarchy. Each individual is bound to an Orixá who influences his/her life. Each entity manages an element of nature as an independent power balanced with the other natural powers with those spiritual entities that report about their actions.

We all have a head saint and a body mother, although it may happen that there be a head mother and a body father. One person's Karma can have a male or female spirit and the matter will act within that spirit and influenced by it. Each person's Orixá will always mark his/her general life. The identity of each individual's spirits can be found by the game of the buzios. This way, a character table can be carried out. According to the orixá, these characters integrate the individual's personality.

The head saint is pure spirit and, hence is eternal. The body saint depends on the karma. That is, the condition of the soul with regard to the divine justice as an earthly trial for his/her development towards the balance. The body saint helps the soul to reincarnate. The spirit is one, but individual incarnation is characterized by trends or vocations that relates to the natural elements. The body saint lives as long as the person lives his/her individual life, and can be helped in serious difficulties by other orixá, attached to that body as a passage saint under unusual circumstances. the symbollism of the written or recorded points relates to each person's guardian angel and its guide. We can be adopted by a guide, who can incorporate to the same person of the same entity. Oxalás are similar to men concerning the particular factors of the universal balance. They have individuality, but bear spiritual moments materialize in natural forces and are have a direct and indirect influence upon the spirit bearers.