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Faith: Abakuá Society Cuba – Volume 1 – Finals/ 25/08/11 09:43 Page 287 FAITH: ABAKUÁ SOCIETY within the government and religious denominations to Fernández Robaina, Tomás. Hablen paleros y santeros. 2nd work toward overcoming confl icts between them. Fol- ed. Havana: Editorial Ciencias Sociales, 2008. lowing a course that was increasingly open—and not Moore, Robin D. “Music and Revolution.” In Ay, Dios free from dissension—between the 1990s and 2010, ampárame: Sacred Music and Revolution. Berkeley: rapprochement set the standard for a new stage. Th e University of California Press, 2006. new accommodating approach was characterized by Primer Congreso del Partido Comunista de Cuba. Tesis greater religious freedom, which translated into a cli- y Resoluciones. Havana: Dep. de orientación revolu- mate of cordial respect and a greater awareness of the cionaria del Comité central del Partido Comunista de Cuba D.O.R., 1976. essence that underpins Afro-Cuban religious practices, accompanied by a reduction of prejudice. Greater Hagedorn, Katherine J. Divine Utterances: Th e Performance of Afro-Cuban Santería, especially chapters 6–7. religious tolerance led to a certain permissiveness in Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001. practice, some of it for monetary gain, some of it out of ignorance of traditions. Th e government promoted Heran, Adrian H. Cuba: Religion, Social Capital and Development. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, religious tourism, something that became more preva- 2008. lent from the beginnings of the nineties, and greater Kirk, John M. Between God and the Party: Religion and commercialization of the religion became more wide- Politics in Revolutionary Cuba. Gainesville: University spread, with outrageous fees being charged for initia- Press of Florida, 1989. tions or for the purchase of religious artifacts. Several milestones attested to this new stage of religious tolerance: One of these was the visit of Alaye- Faith: Abakuá Society ■ See also luwa Oba Okunade Sijuwade (Olobuse II) (b. 1930), Día de Reyes en la the Ooni (emperor) of Ifé (the capital city of the Ivor Miller Habana (Víctor Patricio Yoruba people), in 1987. A major religious fi gure from de Landaluze) Nigeria, Olobuse II was treated almost like a head of An initiation club for men in Havana and Matanzas, Food: Ritual Foods and state when he visited Cuba. Other important achieve- Afro-Cuban Religious ments were: the legalization in 1991 of the Sociedad derived from the Ékpè leopard society of West Africa. Traditions Cultural Yoruba de Cuba (Cuban Yoruba Cultural Society) and its recognition as a religious institu- Abakuá, known by its members as Ekório Enyéne Language: Abakuá in Abakuá (a group founded by a sacred mother that is Cuba and its Infl uence tion since 2007; Communist Party bylaws in 1991 on Spanish Usage accepting the enrollment of religious believers into called Abakuá), is a Cuban mutual aid society for men, that organization; and the success of the fi rst edition whose ceremonial activities occur exclusively in the Music: Afro-Cuban port cities of Cárdenas, Havana, and Matanzas. Popu- Religious Infl uence on of Natalia Bolivar’s book, Los Orishas en Cuba (Th e Cuban Popular Music Orishas in Cuba, 1993), referring to the deities and larly referred to as African Masonry, Abakuá is struc- spirits of the Yoruba belief system and its off shoots in tured through lodges, the fi rst of which was created Race: Slavery in Cuba the New World. Th e publication ofFidel y la religión in 1836 by its African-born founders who migrated La sentencia (Belkis (Fidel and Religion, 1985), by Frei Betto, also helped: from the Cross River region of southeastern Nigeria Ayón) With more than one million copies sold, it added new and southwestern Cameroon. In the 2010s, there were spark to the debate about religious beliefs. Th e pope’s more than 150 functioning lodges with more than visit in 1998 contributed to the opening up of a space 20,000 members. Although it is a secretive initiation for all believers, although the pontiff refused to meet society, Abakuá has been referred to unoffi cially as a with practitioners of Santería and its high priests. national symbol of Cuba, due to the participation of its members in the development of Cuban music, arts, Th e full inclusion of Afro-Cuban practitioners and identity. into Cuban society ultimately validated their religious, cultural, and social importance as key participants in In the Calabar region, the Ékpè leopard society the creation of the revolutionary republic Martí envi- was the regulatory institution, in which councils of sioned, “con todos y para el bien de todos” (by all, and free-born titled members established the common laws for the good of all). Th is inclusion of believers aff ected of their communities and regulated trade throughout the ruling ideology and its leadership as well, liberat- the region. Abakuá practice, which includes a ritual ing them from the ghosts of prejudice. An old Yoruban language, body-mask traditions, collective organiza- proverb, illustrating the importance of the inclusion of tion, percussive music, cuisine, cosmology, and gender religious and cultural diversity, says it best: the water relations, is best understood in relation to its African makes the stream, and the streams make the river. sources. Although it was created in the context of a slave society, Abakuá is not a slave culture, as is often assumed. Instead, following the Ékpè model, it was BIBLIOGRAPHY created by free-born Africans as a vehicle for jurispru- Betto, Frei. Fidel y la religión. Santo Domingo: Editora dence and artistry. Alfa y Omega, 1985. In colonial Cuba, the Spanish government Bolívar Arostequi, Natalia. Los Orishas en Cuba. Miami: divided migrating Africans ethnically by encouraging Libros Sin Fronteras Inventory, 1993. those in urban areas to form cabildos (nation-groups). CUBA 287 Cuba – Volume 1 – Finals/ 25/08/11 09:43 Page 288 FAITH: ABAKUÁ SOCIETY Th ese cabildos became important centers for the According to Ékpè and Abakuá mythology, conservation of African languages and cultural practices. Ékpè was discovered or created in a fi shing commu- Carabalí peoples formed several cabildos by the 1750s, nity in the estuaries of what is in modern times the and titled members of the leopard societies were among Bakassi Peninsula, along the Cameroun-Nigeria bor- them. Th e African-born Ékpè members were hesitant der. Called Usagaré in Cuba and Ùsàghàdè (spelled on to initiate their Cuban-born sons, which explains why maps as Usak-Edet or Isangele) in Africa, this place is Abakuá was not established until the 1830s in Regla, a spoken of with reverence on both sides of the Atlantic. small town across the harbor from Havana. Th e altar spaces in Abakuá lodges display objects Abakuá tradition has three lineages, the Efí, Efó, that evoke Cross River cultural history. Th ey often con- and Orú. Each is derived from an ethnic identity in the tain a seven-keyed lamellophone (mbira in Southern Cross River region, known today as Èfìk, Èfúùt, and Africa) to represent the original music of Ùsàghàdè; in Úrúán. Th e term Abakuá memorialized the Àbàkpà the Calabar region lamellophones were once common people of Calabar, who call themselves the Quas. Th e instruments. Abakuá altars also display the signature fi rst lodge was known as Efí Butón, after the Òbútòng of their lodge, a magical sign—based upon the Nsìbìdì community in Calabar. writing of the Cross River Ékpè practice—that is fully known only by the lodge leaders. Other common EARLY LODGE NAMES DOCUMENT objects are the percussion instruments of Abakuá CARABALÍ MIGRATION music, the nkomo drums (ekomo in Efi k), ekón metal gong (nkong in Efi k), and the two seed-fi lled rattles As Carabalí organized themselves in western Cuba, (nsak in Efi k), the forms of which are nearly identical they started using African names for areas of their to Cross River Ékpè instruments. Showing the Catho- environment. Th ey renamed HavanaNúnkue , inter- lic infl uence in Cuba, each lodge has a representative preted into Èfìk as nung nkwe (I have also not seen), Catholic saint upon its altar. Because Cross River Ékpè meaning that Havana was a new place to them. Th ey practice is directly linked to that of the water spirit called Regla ítiá ororó kánde, interpreted into Èfìk as itiat òyóyò Nkàndà (the foundation of great Nkàndà); societies of each community (called Ndèm among the Nkàndà was a key Ékpè grade that was evoked during Efi ks), the female saints are understood as cognates for the foundational Abakuá ceremonies. the link between male Ékpè and female water powers. Abakuá lodges were created in western Cuba ABAKUÁ BECOMES A UNIVERSAL because many Cross River peoples lived there, but INSTITUTION also because Calabar and Cuba shared a similar ecol- ogy. Both have estuary zones of mangrove swamps, Each generation of Abakuá leaders directed their lodge manatees, crocodiles or alligators, and other fauna activities based upon their understanding of the teach- that have deep symbolism for Ékpè. Components ings of the African founders, as well as upon the needs missing in Cuba (e.g., leopards) were represented of the day. Whereas the African founders took decades symbolically. to create a lodge for their own off spring, the Cuban Creoles decided that, in the face of the tremendous Th roughout the nineteenth century, Cuban repression of African-derived institutions, they would lodge names represented communities in the Cala- best defend Abakuá by opening up their ranks to any bar region, becoming indexes for source communi- qualifi ed male, regardless of his ancestry. Th e fi rst lodge ties. For example, the Efí Abarakó Eta lodge founded of white males was created in 1863 by members of some in Regla in 1863 was likely named after the Calabar of Cuba’s elite families who, it was thought, could infl u- community called Mbàràkòm, a ward of Creek Town ence the dominant class perspective on this criminalized foundational to modern Èfìk Ékpè history.
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