Transcription
I blew her up. Yeah, but she said bye-bye.
All right, boy. So, how are you?
I'm good. How about yourself?
Doing good.
That's good. All right. test test. Yep. Hitting pretty good this way. All right. Okay. Need to share this. All right.
So, I think there's one more person coming in from the outside. All right.
It's all right. Yeah, I don't see like right now. Okay. Ocean, can you still hear me? Okay. Hey, Caro. Uncle, can you hear me? All right. I don't know if y'all type. I can see the notes.
Yes. A car.
Oh, hold up. All right. Well, while we uh get set up, I don't have the the the chat up right now, so if you have to speak, you'll just have to unmute and say something. Um uh do y'all have any questions so far?
No. No.
Okay. So, everybody's good. Now, this is the last one. This is the last ritual that we're doing. We only have two more weeks, I think, before we start the um the demonstrations. And so, you have to pass your evaluations in order to be let into the next class. We only got two more two more classes next week and the Sunday after that. Next week we're going to do I think next week will be EA and then the week after that will be but this is the last demonstration before we do everybody else do that demonstration and take the test. Once you take the test, once you get the demonstration, then you will be allowed into the OB divination class, which we are going to look at the OB in more depth and how to read and what's the word I'm looking for interpret OB. So, that is the uh the um plan. All right. What you got?
Okay. So as we talked about um ah invatala last week, what do you all remember as far as the reasons why we would go to
clarity. clarity, health, protection, love,
creativity, conflict,
conflict, creativity, creativity,
yes, fertility. Uh, now when you go to about conflict, what specifically are you looking for on the other end of that conflict?
Yes. So Abata um many times is known as the one who brought the uh the conflict with the ebo to a peaceful end. So essentially when you go into about conflict, you really are wanting to uh be friends. You want things to kind of like calm and cool and kind of smooth over friendship. Okay. Okay. Good. Can you click the next one?
I think so. On another page. Where's where is the download mouse?
Yeah. All right. So, yes, all these are good reasons to go. creativity, leadership, patience, diplomacy, childbearing, and healing are all good reasons. So, we need to before you do your ritual, you need to prepare your stuff. So, you would bring in all of your things. Make sure that you have water. Make sure that you have your offerings together uh so that you'll be ready to go when it's time to go. Now quick discussion about the offerings. I do not remember all the offerings gave you. So what do you remember are the offerings? Obviously the ones that you have but
yes snail um uh I say o cotton
what else E. Yeah.
So, coconut.
See, that one bring traditionally coconut is not often for that's something that they do in the diaspora. So, well, we are the diaspora, but it's something that is done in the diaspora, but it's not traditionally something that is given to a mata. I'll I won't be like, you know, somebody bring coconut like hell no get out of here. You know, I won't do that. But most of the time I just kind of remind them like, hey, you know, coconut's not really, you know, bata offering that we do, you know, but since people also come from different lineages, I don't really stop there. Um, so the thing about the coconut is that the coconut is an offering for uh spirits that we call the ewing. And the eween are spirits that hang out around the shrines. So I still take them and just give it to them because known as oluing olu is means like the the owner of ewing or like the the ruler of the e-wing. So batala is like the arisha who's at the head of the ewing. kind of like you could think about Ishu being at the head of the AO boom or Ashon being at you know one of the leaders of Yami or one of the leaders of Eggbe or Batala is like the leader of the E-wing and there's a story where Batalah gave coconut to the E-wing. So that's another reason why I just take it. I don't really most of the time try to correct people when they bring coconut to a matala even though so coconut is more so an offering for ori and egg. So we do give coconut to egg and we give coconut to ori but typically not to but it's not prohibited. Um, okay. The other offerings that you can get to a batala are a goosey. It's a food offering. It's really easy to make. You just warm up some water, put some It's grounded melon seed. You put grounded melon seed inside of a bowl and pour some hot water like you like, you know, you got a kettle, you know, like tea, and just pour that in there and just mix it around. That's about it. You just do it that way. Um, some people also do that and put it on the stove and add shea butter. So, you do that, too. Um, and if you really want to get fancy, you just take some snails, put that in there, too. So, you do snails and a goosey with shea butter. So, that is a super simple food offering to do. Almost as easy as the only thing about eon, you got to know how to pound it. And, you know, that's just the trick is the pounding to release the starches so that it sticks together. should not be soupy. Shouldn't be like, you know, so it should be pretty and it should be like you can hold it together. Yeah. So, the trick with is to pound it against the side of the pot like repeatedly over and over and over again until it starts to kind of take on that fufu type of type of feel. Um, but that's it. Hot water and the powder. Um, and there's one more dish that people make with corn, sugar, and coconut that they get from that's a little bit more involved. Um, what else? Uh, so we said ebing. Yeah. So that would be like the a larger list of things for watah. Um, yeah. So we got our offerings together. What should you do before we before we begin?
Pray to the offerings.
Pray to the offerings. Yes. Take your offerings. Pray.
You just need one, right?
Just need one for this one, right?
Mhm. Oh, that might
might be that might be dry. Too dry. Okay. So we pray to our offerings. So now we begin our ritual. So I'm going to do it for like when we're here. So you don't have to take it down because we're not opening up the pot. So you can leave it there. Um, so what we would do, we take on the appropriate posture which is to be kneeling on our knees. And we have our water. No, it's fine. Let me
In fact, let me take your orons. I will put them right about there so I know who they're going to. Okay. So, we have our water. We have our offerings. We have our colon nuts. Here you can um when you first start you pray dip it in the water. Usually we sprinkle it on the arisha and touch to your head and touch to your chest.
Hold up. We ready? So we begin with libation. Last I didn't say or amu. All right. Then you go into hamage. You say whoever yourisha is and then you begin to go down our lineage.
Oh sh
Well, that's it.
Yeah. Huh?
I can remember.
You can remember it. Yeah.
You want to say it?
Yeah.
Oh, wow. Good job. Then we begin with our oriki foratala. So with the batala, you can have any of these. Like this bell works fine. This one's not so great. But well, no, it's okay. That works, too. This is the traditional vata bell that you get when you get initiated or this is the one. So this is the one that is like it looks more like this most of the time. Um, so you can grab but any of these bells work. Basically, it's a it's a silver or Peter bell. Remember that Obatala's metal is actually put. Um, they say OJ OJ sometimes is translated as lead. So, but it's called OJ. Oh yeah. Boom. So you can just That's perfectly fine. There is There There are some more, but that that one's perfectly fine. It is me James writes I come to you on behalf of Angie via our pope. Baba I come to you on behalf of Fantasia Davis. Yes,
Fantasia Davis. Bye-bye. We come to you on this day with offerings. Offerings of colonut. offerings of of right now we pray that I pray on their behalf of God that you will bring all the blessings from each and every offering that they have every prayer that they have uttered by on on their offerings today. Please may you ensure that they have long life. May you ensure they have good spouses and good relationships. May you ensure that they have beautiful, healthy children. Babe, may you ensure that they have money, resources, riches, prosperity to take care of their families, to keep their full to uh be able to not be stressed out about anything that is happening around them. Baba, right now, for stability over their lives, may they have the stability to have a good life. May they have the stability to not allow stress. Please, may they continue to have victory over their enemies and their obstacles.
Please negate all death, negate all sickness, negate all loss, negate all fight, negate all curse, negate all enemies, negate all calamity out of them.
uh just as uh so means we have. If you say that means I have a ori means we have uh and then you say the name of the thing that you're offering. So money ori we have liquor just as when liquor never spoils may the blessings never spo there is a verse that we say when we give liquor essentially what that verse is saying is that Aranisan uh drank liquor and became wealthy so it's talking about the luxurious nature of having liquor because we don't need It's something that is done when people have festivals or people have parties. When people have gatherings, they bring liquor so that other people may have fun. They bring liquor so that other people may enjoy themselves. So it's a luxury item. So when we give liquor, we are freely giving of the luxury of our lives. So we want to attract luxury back to our lives. So baba right now we offer a tei a te on behalf of your children baba to where uh they may have lux luxury in their lives. They may have uh uh positivity in their lives. Just as a lick never spoils may their blessings never spoil.
Usually you can take a drink of it too but right for right now we're just going to put it there. Um, present it to has liquor and place your liquor whatever you have right there. Seems good. Can y'all see what I'm doing? Or is it like am I blocking the way it just looks? You don't really see nothing. What What is it? I was trying to scoot out the way so you can kind of see. Hello.
I was on mute. I can see. Byebye.
Okay, good.
This is effic. Okay. I was like, this consistency is different. Trying to trick me. That's a ramkin.
Oops, my bad. Bye-bye. Your children have brought to you today cotton. Bye-bye. They have brought shea butter. They brought brought please may you bless them with all the blessings that are attached to uh these offerings of just as she butter brings protection. She better covers uh whoever it is on. Please may you cover their life. Just as o you are the first to weave the cotton from he and stretch it from heaven to earth. Right now I pray that you may weave your cotton to cover your children like fabric. Baba that they will be protected from all danger. Right now we pray just as it brings coolness. Please may they have coolness in mind. May they have coolness in their stress. May no stress or no nothing uh overwhelm them in their lives or may they have peace. Just as uh fills the belly by it brings comfort. May their lives be comfortable. May their houses be comfortable. May their houses be their castles by where they may be able to find peace in their lives. May they find refuge from the from the uh the dangers, from the stress, from the whatever is going on outside of their home. Please may their homes be comfortable. May their homes uh not be hot. May their stomach always be full. Aba. May they always have nourishment for themselves, nourishment for their children, nourishment for their spouses and their families. I please may you bring blessings, abundant blessings about innumerable blessings about over their lives.
A
sher You can come and get this too. Like um um you don't have to leave me here like you're ramic. that is with these offerings of our is with these prayers that we humbly ask that you will accept everything that has been given today God that you will answer quickly that you will uh answer these prayers fast that you will bring back uh blessings that you will uh uh bless them with all the things that they ask for in their lives all the things that they desire that you may bless them with all the things that they need inside of their lives in order to reach their destinies in order to uh order to have good successful
lives. Uh offer Please keep a residence in their house. No be able to take residence in their life. Well, beyond Hey, so he just went through all of this the prayer section that we've been doing while and all that and then the uh closing part right now. So you should have this prayer somewhere else in your notes. So you say you could stop there. You don't have to say the last part that I said but you can. That is what that is. So obini negates death negates death negates sickness. Ob negates loss. So that just talking about that OB light negates enemies or the negative negativities from enemies. So we take out the the eye the little C thing. Let me show you that. Take the finger. Plug it out. Dig it out to move. Okay. So, we take that out. Toss it to the side. You guys have seen this before. Yeah.
Okay. There are some versions of this where you may put this inside of the offering like basically give it also as a part of the offering too. Um, it comes with this little chant. I think I gave that one to y'all. The edo ob. And you said the name of the uh the arisha. So my edi is the liver of the cola is yours. Please give or like you're saying to give me please or give me. So uh give me the live life to eat. J is eat. And then you add it inside your offering. Hold on. Sprinkle three times. With three loes, you can take them all in one hand or you can take two in the right. shield or shield back from NG via Super kay.
Yeah. So that normally at this stage I would have told you to stop at a second. Okay. But because uh the next thing that we'll do in the OB classes to see what to do after so as a preview of that class the first one gets thrown and this is two down one up. Yeah. Okay. So that is what is that called?
Okra okra. Ok. What does okon mean?
There are blockages. So
means one also means heart. So yeah, it's talking about blockages, but it's also talking about blockages in in matters of the heart or in or it could be talking about blockages in general. Um, usually like courage, fear, things like that. So then we investigate because we have to see okay well what is ex what's exactly being said because it might not be courage, fear or blockages. So we say three times. Remember what that means?
Um I know it's hard to Yeah. So the other way to say that is to the ground. Right. to my heart. I touch my hands to the ground. I touch my hands to the heart. I touch my hands to the ground. Touch my hands to the heart. Hands to the ground. To chest really chest to my chest. And so, um, this is what we're doing this for. This is to connect ourselves to mother earth, to acknowledge mother earth, and to acknowledge that we need stability. We need we need like grounding to ground ourselves really
for to help us with our courage to help us in the realm of fear or to you know remove that basically for strength is essentially what you're doing this for. So it's a grounding thing and that's the first thing that we do because you know who doesn't need that when when don't we need that right and then we throw again. So it says okan again. So I in essence that's saying like I greet the one on the ground key is to greet like I greet the one on the ground. And so when we get yes after that which is what we got alafia. So now this changes the interpretation of our reading because at first it was like okay too like oh man you know oh boy here we go. So you know nah nah n now I'm wrong now I'm the one that's messed up you know so be good to like okay we got a question so we say greetings to the one on the ground and then we get a yes. So what this means is that yes there may some blockages in what was going on but trust trust bisha and blockages will be removed you know things will be removed you're going to have open roads it talks about it's all fiat so things are open it's all light we may move forward everything will be well um but there is the acknowledgment that oh we it took two oan for us to get here and we to greet the one on the ground. So what that also means is that we need to work with yourisha more. You need to go to more. You need to pray to more. And this could be something as simple as a daily like just prayer because remember you don't have to have a shrine to pray to any of the arisha. You can pray to any arisha at any time. What the shrines and stuff is for like more direct connection and also for giving things. giving offerings, placing, you know, that's really what they're for. Um, but you may pray to the orishad anywhere you have the oriki. You can just chant the oriatal. What's that? And then just be, you know, as many or as you can think of. It doesn't really matter. And then you begin to you can do that for any arisha. Doesn't really matter who it is. Any of them. You can do that. Pray to any of them at any time, anywhere. You only need shrines and stuff to give offerings. And you can do that in nature, too, you know. Uh some people be some nature warriors, you know, it's out there in the woods all the time. So that's how it is for some people. Some people have more so of a connection like inside of the natural setting because you know the arisha. So I am not a person me personally I am not a person be like oh the arisha live inside you. That's not me. I don't I don't have that interpretation. Um, one because it's never really described that way like anywhere. Uh, it is more so described that arisha are forces of nature or spirits that are in existence in the universe. And more often, Arisha are more so described as like almost like uh honored contemporaries of human beings or honored peers like not necessarily like like we just cool like peers like on the same level, but they are like just a little bit higher, you know? Um, but not like God, you know what I'm saying? is more so like these are people that you treat with much respect but at the same time you help them they help you type of thing. Uh, you know a lot of times it's explained that even orisha have orisha have ebet or just like you have or arisha has or just like you have ebet arisha have ebet. So it's not necessarily that the arisha live inside of you. It's more so that you all have access to the same essence type of thing. And so you go to the Arisha for help because they are they have different levels of accessibility. And you may have much of the same essence as that. So you might be a child of Abatala like hard hard to where you and you and some forms of Abatala really kind of like are really close and mesh very very well and to where you have access to the spiritual energy of Abatala more than somebody else would. But that is it doesn't necessarily mean lives in you. It's just more so that you all are connected in a in a spec in a specific way. Uh so some may interpret that as being like oh abatah lives within me but like that that you know I'm saying it in the way that ohah lives in me as somebody can pray to you know they can pray to me and it goes to when they give it to me no it doesn't I have to take it and give it to you know um, but you know I am not But I have a connection to talah and can pray to and you know all this stuff. Abata might listen to me more often because I'm always there always going to then you know some random person off the street but that's not even a guarantee either. You know might be just as cool with that person too. So you never really know. So anyway you develop your own relationships with your arisha um to get as close to as you can. Um, but typically I do not use the language that the arisha live inside of me just because of how it can be interpreted. Um, and there's no there is no evidence within any of the uh within any of the verses. And we get basically we base our understanding and interpretation of the arisha off of the odu odua or odu osa the oriki and many of the uh really the odu and the oriki and itan but odu and oriki are the main two that we really base everything off of. And so if it's not said in the ori, if it's not said in the odo, then it's, you know, we look at it as being like, you know, that might be the way that some people think about it, but that's not necessarily like the thing, you know, the orthodoxy if you, you know, want to look at it that way. Whatever. So um after that you can see if you want to share the the OB but here's a little old I would not uh recommend it. Uh but so we would take that and we'll place it with our offerings. Touch your head. Well, we already did that, but yes, you would still touch your head to the floor.
And that's it.
Okay.
Any questions?
Um, I have a question.
What's up? Are we supposed to when we um have to um do the the um just had a brain freeze? Do we have to memorize the um oris for the orishas when we have our test like when we when we Okay. So we can
No, you don't have to. So what I want you to do the arisha that we will have. I want you to write down each of the rituals.
Okay?
And you can do a lot of copy paste, you know, because it's
most of the stuff is the same.
The only thing that's different is the ori. Everything else is the same. I literally can just copy paste just make a a file about you know or if you bring notes I would bring the notes for all the parts
and then just make a page of oriki. So make like um who else I say? And that's probably about it. That's probably the only ones we gonna do.
Okay.
Um Yeah. Yeah. So just have a page of oriki of like five or for each of them and then uh and then the rest of the pages are standard and just do it that way. That way you'll have it you'll be able to just flip flip flip flip just like that. You know one one one part for per page or whatever if it takes up half a page or whatever that you know may be. have that in your notebook and that way you'll be able to run through it regardless of which orisha you're working with and it'll just be simple.
Okay?
And that'll be the best way. And then I would plan to make that so that you can even use that after class is over.
That way you can very easily feed any arisha or any of these arisha that we've talked about.
Okay. The only ones that are different are you have to write kind of like a different thing is e or because I taught you the whole the whole template for that that Ori template is basically the two colon template. It's pretty much the same template for all the Eurasian.
So, I kind of already tal taught it to you as far how to do two colonets and then uh and uh me are different everybody.
We we'll talk about how to do EI when we cover that in the next couple weeks as well. Okay. Okay.
Any other questions?
No.
No. You ready?
Yeah.
Ready?
Did I?
Huh?
Didn't I?
That's good. All right. I want to see how many people sign up for this thing. This is always interesting to me to see how many people laugh throughout the whole thing. Mhm.
But man, I be trying to like, okay, I try not to like set it up with too many people, start with too many people because then when we get here and if a lot of them stay, they'll then be in trouble. Like last year it was like 20some people that was still like actively I was like, how the hell three or 24 people in four weeks? I'm like this about to run like six folks a weekend. Like I don't I don't know how. But this class, you fine. You guys, it's like four people that be showing up.
Oh man, I don't know what happened. We started off, I think, with like 35 the same like
it was a lot of people.
I only missed one class and that was last week because of the uh I was at Baba E Sean.
Oh, I was tired. I did that three days in a row.
I bet. Yeah. This year started off with a lot of people too and like oh my god this just y'all classmates have just fallen off
gone. I'm I'm I'm be like I'mma send out an email I better see all y'all [ __ ] next year. Okay,
it was only Fantasia, Brandon, Logan, uh Ria, uh Ocean Lee, uh Osh, uh Amul was here most of the time. Uh Rachel,
I can count them in less than two hands. I feel like it's only one or two more people that's been here like consistently.
Did you say Logan? Uhhuh. Logan, I said Logan. Yeah, Simone. Simone has been she started showing up in person, but she was she was watching stuff on I know Simone was paying attention too. Yeah, it's been like about 10 people. It's been they fell off real hard. It's about over 50% that fell off. So yeah, I'm sure gonna be like, "Yep, I'm only expecting." So we might because most of the time we get about two we get about two um two people demonstrating per week. So we probably can knock it out in like two because this I'm I'm assuming it's probably going to end up being about eight people that really do. It's probably out of that 10, it's probably still going to be only about eight. So it's gonna be a real small OB divination class. I ain't got no problem with it. It's fine. But yeah, buddy Michelle g send an email out. So here and Arisha this same level it's gonna be called 2011 they feel like they went up they ain't going up man it's all good though um so you'll be able to know like you know if you did well too or how well you kind of comprehended with the exam as well um you know and then after we take this if you want to. You can start the next class. Uh if you want to it's completely up to you. The next one is right now it's called Arisha 2011. It will be called Arisha 301 when we get started. I will the site is set up. Um, so when you sign up for the next class, you're going to sign up in the new site for the next class. So it' be callisha 301 there. Um, and that class will be a mixture of courses and practical stuff. So, you'll have to like you'll take some classes, but then you'll have to do some stuff, then take some class, then do more stuff, and then take some classes, then do some stuff. So, it's more so it's more so a hands-on class. You have to like do things, memorize things, like actually show your comprehension through practical application.
Yeah. So, I mean, it's the same rituals we've done.
It's just
you have to do that.
Yeah.
And so, uh, and then there will also be memorization. So be memorizing odu and memorizing like you know chants and aiki and you have to like memorize it to get the next one.
So it's that too. It's it's a lot more intense.
Uh it's really more so a priest preparation like this I would say is more practitioner preparation. That one is more so priest preparation uh to be ready to like really kind of like step into what an initiated person how initiated persons would uh would have to carry themselves and what they need to know that kind of thing. So that was more so for initiate to prepare to be initiated. This one's more for practice like to be a practitioner. Sorry to be a practitioner. Uh noninitiated practitioner. What's a practitioner?
Huh?
Oh yeah. To be on [ __ ] Uh and um and yeah cuz I mean really a lot of people a lot of people don't even get this level of knowledge like this within itself is kind of a lot for some people. Um and most people don't even learn this far. So then that level is even further than
Huh.
They should I thought she was she
Oh no it's okay. Uh yeah, she should get up. We're back. So, everybody's good. No questions. Ready to go. We got two classes. We'll talk about E5 next week and then talk about and Obaluay after that. and we'll be on our way. Um, y'all can take the quiz. Let's get this thing cracking.
All right. Now,
be divination class.
So, that OB class like in between the this one and the next one or
Yeah, it'd be in between this one and the next it'd be like a month.
Okay.
About just about four classes we do concentrate on. We do three classes of OB and then one extra class after that. Uh so two classes to teach the OB thing, the third class to like practice it and go over it, and then a fourth class to So what's going to happen though, that first two classes will be like a weekend. It's going to be Saturday and Sunday.
And then the next class will be the week afterwards where we like practice it. And then the fourth class will be the one right before a festival. in the video. So, it's four classes. Okay.
All right. Thank you so much. Appreciate you. We'll see you all next week. Uh so, next week or also I'm going to go back to like asking like if you want to do it in person or if you need to do it because the next two weeks are both lectures. Okay. It was just these last two weeks we just needed to be or the previous week I needed to be here and then this week we're doing this. Greetings, Baba.
Hello. What's that?
Good to be good to be back.
Yes. Welcome.
I've been gone six week I've been gone six weeks. I'm
Yeah.
I've been so behind, but good to be back.
Yes. Well, good to welcome back.
All right.
Have a good day. You too.