Shango is an Orisha in Yoruba religion. Genealogically speaking, Shango is a royal ancestor of the Yoruba as he was the third Alaafin of the Oyo Kingdom prior to his posthumous deification. Shango has numerous manifestations, including Airá, Agodo, Afonja, Lubé, and Obomin. He is known for his powerful double axe (Oṣè). He is considered to be one of the most powerful rulers that Yorubaland has ever produced.
Oshun is the Yoruba orisha associated with love, sexuality, fertility, femininity, water, destiny, divination, purity, and beauty, and the Osun River, and of wealth and prosperity in Voodoo. She is considered the most popular and venerated of the 401 orishas.
Olokun is an orisha spirit in Yoruba religion. Olokun is believed to be the parent of Aje, the orisha of great wealth and of the bottom of the ocean. Olokun is revered as the ruler of all bodies of water and for the authority over other water deities. Olokun is highly praised for their ability to give great wealth, health, and prosperity to their followers. Communities in both West Africa and the African diaspora view Olokun variously as female, male, or androgynous.
Obatala is an orisha in the Yoruba religion that is believed to have been given the task to create the Earth but failed the task by being drunk on palm wine and was outperformed by his little brother Oduduwa. He was instead given the job of creating human beings. This was authorized by his father, Olodumare which gave Obatala the name sculptor of mankind.
"Now Olodumare [the supreme being] once called on Obatala and told him that he would love him to assist in creating human beings that would live in the world he was about to create. This is because as he (Olodumare) said further he would not like the world he was planning to create to exist without human beings."
Èṣù is a pivotal Òrìṣà/Irúnmọlẹ̀ in the Yoruba spirituality or Yoruba religion known as ìṣẹ̀ṣe. Èṣù is a prominent primordial Divinity who descended from Ìkọ̀lé Ọ̀run, and the Chief Enforcer of natural and divine laws - he is the Deity in charge of law enforcement and orderliness. As the religion has spread around the world, the name of this Orisha has varied in different locations, but the beliefs remain similar.
Orishas are divine spirits that play a key role in the Yoruba religion of West Africa and several religions of the African diaspora that derive from it, such as Haitian Vaudou, Cuban, Dominican and Puerto Rican Santería and Brazilian Candomblé. The preferred spelling varies depending on the language in question: òrìṣà is the spelling in the Yoruba language, orixá in Portuguese, and orisha, oricha, orichá or orixá in Spanish-speaking countries.
Ifá is a divination system originating from Yorubaland in West Africa. It originates within the traditional religion of the Yoruba people although is also practised by followers of West African Vodun and in African diasporic religions like Cuban Santería.
The Yoruba religion, West African Orisa (Òrìṣà), or Isese (Ìṣẹ̀ṣe), comprises the traditional religious and spiritual concepts and practice of the Yoruba people. Its homeland is in present-day Southwestern Nigeria, which comprises the majority of Oyo, Ogun, Osun, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara and Lagos states, as well as parts of Kogi state and the adjoining parts of Benin and Togo, commonly known as Yorubaland.
Efuntola Oseijeman Adelabu Adefunmi was the first documented African-American initiated into the priesthood of the Yoruba religion, who would then go on to become the first African-American to be crowned Oba (King) of the Yoruba of North America in Ile Ife, Nigeria.
The Oṣun River, Yoruba: Odò Ọ̀ṣun, is a river of Yorubaland that rises in Ekiti State and flows westwards into Osun State before turning southwestwards at its confluence with the Erinle River near the town of Ede and then heading south at the Asejire reservoir flowing though the rest of the state and Ogun State in Southwestern Nigeria before eventually discharging into the Lekki Lagoon and the Atlantic at the Gulf of Guinea.
Babalú-Aye, Oluaye, Ṣọpọna, Ayé in Trinidad Orisha, or Obaluaiye, is one of the orishas or manifestations of the supreme creator god Olodumare in the Yoruba religion of West Africa. Babalú-Aye is the spirit of the Earth and strongly associated with infectious disease, and healing.
Aganju is an Orisha. He is syncretized with Saint Christopher in the Cuban religion known as Santería.
In the Yoruba tradition, Erinlẹ was a great hunter who became an orisha.
The Yoruba calendar (Kọ́jọ́dá) is a calendar used by the Yoruba people of southwestern and north central Nigeria and southern Benin. The calendar has a year beginning on the last moon of May or first moon of June of the Gregorian calendar. The new year coincides with the Ifá festival.
Distinctive cultural norms prevail in Yorubaland and among the Yoruba people.
Trinidad Orisha, also known as Orisha religion and Shango, is a syncretic religion in Trinidad and Tobago and the Caribbean, originally from West Africa. Trinidad Orisha incorporates elements of Spiritual Baptism, and the closeness between Orisha and Spiritual Baptism has led to use of the term "Shango Baptist" to refer to members of either or both religions. Anthropologist James Houk described Trinidad Orisha as an "Afro-American religious complex", incorporating elements mainly of traditional African religion and Yoruba and incorporates some elements of Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, Buddhism, Judaism, Baháʼí, and Amerindian mythologies.
Oko, also known as Ocô in Brazil, was an Orisha. In Nigeria and the Benin Republic, he was a strong hunter and farming deity, as well as a fighter against sorcery. He was associated with the annual new harvest of the white African yam. Among the deities, he was considered a close friend of Oosa, Ogiyan and Shango, as well as a one-time husband of Oya and Yemoja. Bees are said to be the messengers of Oko.
Iyalawo is a term in the Lucumi religion that literally means Mother of Mysteries or Mother of Wisdom. Some adherents use the term "Mamalawo," which is a partially African diaspora version of the Lucumi term, Iyaláwo and Yeyelawo are two more versions of mother of mysteries. Ìyánífá is a Yoruba word that can be translated as Mother (Ìyá) has or of (ní) Ifá or Mother in Ifá & is the Yoruba title for Mother of mysteries & the female equivalent of a Babalawo.
Yemọja is the major water spirit from the Yoruba religion. She is the mother of all Orishas. She is also the mother of humanity. She is an orisha, in this case patron spirit of rivers, particularly the Ogun River in Nigeria, and oceans in Cuban and Brazilian orisa religions. She is often syncretized with either Our Lady of Regla in the Afro-Cuban diaspora or various other Virgin Mary figures of the Catholic Church, a practice that emerged during the era of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. Yemọja is said to be motherly and strongly protective, and to care deeply for all her children, comforting them and cleansing them of sorrow. She is said to be able to cure infertility in women, and cowrie shells represent her wealth. She does not easily lose her temper, but when angered she can be quite destructive and violent, as the flood waters of turbulent rivers. Some of the priests of Yemọja believe that she used her fresh water to help Ọbàtálá in the molding of human beings out of clay.
Sango Festival is an annual festival held among the Yoruba people in honour of Sango, a thunder and fire deity who was a warrior and the third king of the Oyo Empire after succeeding Ajaka his elder brother. Renamed in 2013 to World Sango Festival by the government of Oyo State, the festival is usually held in August at the palace of the Alaafin of Oyo and also observed in over forty countries around the world.
