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An Epistemic Critique of Ifa as a Revelatory Source of

Knowledge

Yunusa Kehinde Salami

The paper examines the position of repute that Orunmila and Ifa occupy in

Yoruba cosmology on the question of ultimate meaning and knowledge of

the world and of the human beings, with the specific purpose of ascertaining

the adequacy or otherwise of ifa as a revelatory source of knowledge. The

paper observes that in spite of the metaphysical and epistemological appeal

of ifa as a revelatory source of knowledge, it does not provide an inter-

subjectively verifiable sort of knowledge that meets the scientific needs of

the modern African society. The paper concludes that the possibility of

developing the ifa divinatory process of knowledge production, though far-fetched, should not be foreclosed.

Introduction

Yoruba cosmology gives a position of repute to Orunmila and

Ifa on the question of ultimate meaning and knowledge of the world

and of the individual human beings. This paper intends to examine the

epistemic role assigned Ifa divination in Yoruba epistemic system in

order to ascertain the level of certainty and fallibility of Ifa as a source

of revelatory knowledge.

Ifa as a Religion and a Source of Revelatory Knowledge.

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Ifa has been variously regarded as a religion and a repository

of knowledge. In Yoruba culture both at home in Nigeria and in

Diaspora, Ifa, as represented by Orunmila, has been treated as a

religion with its great number of worshippers and followership. Those

involved in Ifa religious worship lay a lot of emphases on the prowess

of Orunmila as one of the deities of Olodumare, the supreme deity in

Yoruba Cosmology and Spiritualism. Ifa involves a form of worship

by the devotees. This worship includes a compendium of

performances and praise singing by the babalawo.

Wande Abimbola sees Ifa as a special divinity among the

Yoruba. For him, the Yoruba believe that it was Olodumare who sent

Ifa forth from the heavens and who charged him to use his wisdom to

repair the world. The wisdom, knowledge, and luminosity with which

Olodumare endowed Ifa account for Ifas pre-eminence among

divinities in Yoruba land.1

On the other hand, another Ifa scholar,

William Bascom, sees Ifa as a system of divination based on sixteen

basic and 256 derivative figures (odu) obtained either by the

manipulation of sixteen palm nuts (ikin) or by the toss of a chain

(opele) of eight half seed shells.2

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Given Kola Abimbolas submission, it is possible to conceive

Ifa in different mutually inclusive ways. For Kola Abimbola:

Ifa (also known as Orunmila or Orunla) is the name of the god

of knowledge and wisdom; Ifa is used to refer to the divination

process related to the god of knowledge and wisdom; there is abody of knowledge also called Ifa (Ifa Literary Corpus). This

body of knowledge is the Sacred Text of Yoruba Religion andall its denominations in Africa and the DiasporaThere are

some special Ifa poems that function as incantations or

powerful words. When uttered, believers think that the wordscan reveal truth in the sense that whatever they state willhappen. These Ifa incantations are used mainly for medicinal

purposes3

In the same respect, Wande Abimbola is of the view that; the Yoruba

people themselves regard Ifa as the great authority on their

mythology, history and philosophy4

From the reading thus far, Ifa can be identified as one of the

most important of the gods who was

sent by Olodumare, the supreme God, from on high, chargedwith the responsibility of using his God-given incomparablewisdom and capacity for omniscience to order the world

aright, and to ensure that both it and its inhabitants do not spinout of their proper orbit. Hence, Ifas nickname, A-kere-finu-

sogbon, which is an allusion to the fact that Ifa is reputed tobe among the youngest gods, yet Ifa is endowed with

unsurpassable knowledge.5

This is gradually shifting us towards the revelatory capacity of

Ifa as a means of divination. An ascription of the power of a

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godgodliness to Ifa and treating it as a divinity gives some credence to

Ifa as a source of divination for the knowledge beyond immediate

cognition. Makinde, in agreement with Wande Abimbola and some

others, identifies Ifa with Orunmila, the owner or possessor of

wisdom and knowledge.6

Makinde goes further to assert that

Orunmila, through Ifa, brought to the world such knowledge that

consists of such branches as science of nature (physics), animals

(biology), plants(botany), medicinal plants(herbalism), oral

incantations(ofo), and all the sciences associated with healing

diseases(medicine)7

Attempts are severally made to ascribe to Ifa the status of the

unsurpassable repository of knowledge and wisdom.8

Ifa is seen to be

omniscient. It is regarded as a deity, which transcends the limits of

human cognitive capacities, has the capacity to know from several

perspectives at the same time, and is not bound by the time-space

constraints of human knowing.9

A critical look at the kinds of

epistemological assistance that people seek from Ifa reveals that they

are such that require knowing about a future that is beyond the

ambience of the present scope of our senses. They include such

request about what the future holds for individuals or groups. For

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instance, when a new child is born, there is the need to know what

path the child will pass through in life. This in some places may be

called the akosejaye (the planned passage) or the ayanmo, ipin, or

akunleyan(the destiny), that the child brought to the worlds of the

living.

In this respect, when a child is born, the elders around,

especially those with filial relationship, would wish to know the dos

and donts for the newborn child. This, as one can rightly perceive,

may be to prevent the child from groping unnecessarily in the world

before finding the right step to take. This will put the human person

on the right path concerning what to do and what not to do with

respect to the trade to learn, which space to occupy within a

particular point in time, which wife or husband to marry and from

where to marry. In another very similar sense, when all precautions

are taken and life is still not going things still are not going well,

individuals or groups of people may wish to seek the assistance of Ifa

in knowing what the causes are. Ifa may also be contacted for

explanation in cases when what is considered a favourable way of

existence is up turned. The nexus between the kind of knowledge

sought from Ifa and the ones through other mystical explanation for

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human beings and human existence is that they are usually such that

are beyond the reach of the ordinary human capacities. Those

mundane things of every day experiences are usually not thought to

form part of the knowledge that deserves being taken to Ifa for

divination or consultation. It is just those kinds of knowledge that

human beings consider themselves incapable of penetrating. As

observed earlier, this is relevant mostly because of the belief that the

destiny of individuals or groups consists of many things about the

success and failure, joy and sadness, health and ill health that such

individuals may go through in life.

As this discussion suggests, Ifa seems to be more of a process

of pursuit of knowledge about destiny, i.e. about the course of life. It

is a quest for greater and greater individual and social self-

understanding, especially in order to determine the right course of

action for life...10

This is necessary to enable a human being

realise the fullness and reality of self. The question of human destiny

is one of the prominent areas in which Ifas epistemic prowess is

mostly accorded recognition in Yoruba thought.

Yoruba Account of Predestination

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In the Yoruba conception of human person11

, a human person

is made ofara, emi and ori. Ara is body, emi is soul while ori is the

inner head. Ori(the inner head) is regarded as the bearer of destiny.

This account of human person emphasizes the importance ofori and

by implication, makes destiny or predestination a necessary

component of a human person. With this introduction of ori, the

third component, there is a challenge to the Cartesian dualist account

of human person. This gives a tripartite conception of human person

as against the dualist account of Descartes.

The Yoruba generally refer to ori as the unconscious self, as

inner head, as ones guardian spirit, and as the bearer of destiny.

According to Gbadegesin, it is the ori that selects the destiny of

the person before Olodumare (the Supreme deity) who normally

endorses such a choice12

. Another account of Yoruba concept ofori

is given by Idowu, who claims that Yoruba regard ori as the

personality Spirit. For Idowu, ori is the very essence of

personalityit is this orithat rules, controls, and guides the life and

activities of the person13

. Going by Idowu and other available

materials on ori and destiny, a persons destiny can be known as ipin-

ori or shortened to be iponri. This can be translated as the oris

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portion or lot. Ipin means portion, and ori means the inner head. So,

iponri means oris portion or lot.

The question, however, is about the status of ori vis--vis

other causal agents. Can we regard ori as the antecedent cause of all

other possible causes? In other words, do we see other causes as mere

causal manifestations of one underlying cause - ori? If the answer is

yes, then we can correctly argue that there is a connection between the

concept ofori and destiny. This takes us to the other related notions

of ipin (that which is allocated to someone), ayanmo (that which is

affixed to someone), and akunleyan (that which is chosen kneeling).

All these concepts convey the idea of destiny, which, if critically

examined, could be seen to convey some important differences in the

meanings of destiny in Yoruba. For Idowu, we have a trimophous

conception of destiny.14

Going by these related terms, a little clarification may be

warranted. For instance, ayanmo and ipin imply something imposed

on human persons, without any enquiry on whether they wanted it or

not.Ayanmo and ipin are predominantly suggestive of the influence of

an external factor against which we are powerless. Consequently, one

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may argue that what becomes ones destiny is not within ones ability

to choose. Given this account, the action one finds oneself performing

here on earth, is independent of ones choice or wishes in this world.

The account renders human beings as mere toys in the hands of the

gods. On the other hand, akunleyan is suggestive of ones conscious

choicewithout any external compulsion. In spite of these differences

in Yoruba conceptions of predestination, a person comes into the

world with his destiny already packaged and whatever a person does

achieve, or whatever happens to him, is a precise working out of his

destiny.15

The upshot of this is that in Yoruba universe, each human

being is predestined to lead a kind of life and not others. That is, each

human being while in isalu orun (heavenly abode), chose or found

affixed on him or her, a particular kind of destiny which he or she is

expected to actualise, unravel, or manifest in this isalu aye(earthly

world). On this account, destiny represents the kind of choice or

affixation in isalu orun, which will invariably determine the earthly

success or failure. It is believed that the choice or affixation of a good

ori ensures that the individual concerned would lead a successful and

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prosperous life on earth, while the choice or affixation of a bad ori

condemns the individual concerned to a life of failure.

Ifa and the Knowledge of Human Destiny

Going by the discussion thus far about the epistemic status

of Ifa in relation to the question of ultimate reality of persons and

communities, the point is highly emphasised with respect to the

question of destiny. There is the assumption that while the lifeless

bodies (ara) were picking their ori, the marker of destiny, in isalu

orun, from Ajalas house, Orunmila was there watching the kind of

ori that individuals were picking. On the point of this, he is regarded,

in Yoruba cosmology, as the eleri ipin, the one who was present when

individuals were picking their ori or destiny in isalu orun, heaven, and

so he is regarded as the one who can enter the witness box between

the ori, destiny, and the actual possessors of destiny.

The concept ofOri and destiny is well discussed in some

chapters and verses ofIfa. The most aptly relevant verses can be

found in Ogunda Meji and Ogbegunda or Ogbeyonu16

. Relevant

verses ofIfagive the idea that^ individual went as a whole person

with a whole body and soul to pick ori. The verses tell of three

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friends, Oriseeku(the son of Ogun), Orileemere(the son ofIja) and

Afuwape(the son ofOrunmila) who were going from heaven to earth

to settle down. The account involved sacrifices by Afuwape (the son

ofOrunmila) before going to pick his ori. As this account goes, this

sacrifice aided Afuwapes choice of a good and durable Ori which

withstood the hazards of the journey to earth and upon which

Afuwape became a successful man on earth.

The initial problem is that it is already contained in the

Yoruba account of predestination that the chooser of destiny in isalu

orun (heaven) would have passed through or would have crossed the

river of forgetfulness while coming to ode- isalaye (the human world)

and so cannot remember or have a reflective memory of having ever

picked an Ori.

The question from this is how to link a destiny to a man who

never remembered anything or have been made to forget everything

in connection with the destiny or the fact of picking it. If the destiny

and its choice are to be of principal relevance to the life of a person,

that person must be able to link himself or his life to the destiny and

its choice.

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It is generally assumed that the problem generated by the river

of forgetfulness can be adequately taken care of by the Yoruba

account according to which Ifa was present at the time when

individuals were picking their individual Ori. Based on the supposed

presence ofIfa oracle, it is believed that Ifa divination can help to

reveal the sort ofOri which was chosen and, perhaps, what sacrifice

or propitiation can be done to change a bad Ori to a good one. f.

The position assumes the authenticity ofIfa as a plausible

means to the knowledge of the transcendent. If this is granted, then,

we shall also grant the possibility of linking a person to his destiny

through the revelatory knowledge ofIfa oracle. Given this account, it

is assumed that anyone who wishes to have his destiny revealed to

him would simply seek the assistance ofIfa oracle and its priest. This

informs the practice in which the Yoruba consult Ifa at the birth of a

new child to know the akosejaye; what the future has in stock for the

child.

In spite of this reassuring support from the revelatory prowess

ofIfa oracle, its capacity to give an adequate knowledge of what the

future holds for individuals and groups can be challenged. For

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instance, the question of inter-subjective verifiability can be raised. A

critic may object that the modus operandi of Ifa as a source of

knowledge is not open toempirical verification. It does not allow

crosschecking of facts. In fact, two Ifa priests may differ or disagree

on whatIfa says about the destiny of a particular individual. The critic

may claim further that there is little likelihood, if any, forIfa to

provide the supposed missing link in the memory-phases of a person

P1 at t1 who picked an ori, and by extension, destiny, and, the person

P2 at t2 who unravels the destiny as encapsulated by the ori.

This critique ofIfa may be too hasty. The critic may not have

sufficiently explored the potentialities or efficacy ofIfa as a means of

knowing. The method of Ifa divination should be sufficiently

explored. The possible variations that may occur about what Ifa

reveals may be due to the variations in the levels of proficiency of

different Ifa priests and not necessarily a product of the limitation of

ifa oracle. Again, this introduces the problem of epistemic relativism.

Relativism will amount to the position that what is true or amounts to

knowledge for me is true or amount to knowledge for me and what is

so for you or any other person is also knowledge or true as such. In

this case, knowledge becomes a mere conjecture.

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If relativism is true, then, conflicting theories or modes of

thought can be held together. This, according to the critics, is self-

refuting, and so, relativism is self-stultifying. This possibility for

different verdicts from different Ifa priests on the same puzzle makes

Ifa divination not to offer an acceptable warrant for any judgment

and so, acceptance of one verdict from one Ifa priest rather than

another is arbitrary. On this ground, appeals to evidence as a way of

settling disputes will not work because any evidence can be

interpreted in ways which are so different as to be incommensurable.

This can be likened to Quines thesis of indeterminacy of translation

according to which the same data may yield different interpretations

given different manuals of translation.17

This lack of intersubjective verifiability may also lead to the

problem of authoritarianism. The fact that the result of Ifa divination,

through different Ifa priests, concerning what the future holds in stock

for an individual or groups of individuals cannot be interpersonally

tested raises the question of subjectivity. I

In spite of some of these possible objections against the

revelatory source of knowledge through Ifa divination, Philip Peek

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claims that divination sessions are not instances of arb itrary,

idiosyncratic behaviour by diviners.18

Rather than being arbitrary or

subjective, Eze sees Ifa divination as a system or rather a way

of interpretation and understanding inscribed in the religious-

hermeneutic tradition of the Yoruba as well as many other African

peoples.19

Eze conceives Ifa as a practice of deep understanding,

which is of philosophic nature because it is a reflective process of

seeking knowledge about human life and action- by way of

established discernment and epistemological processes.

However, no matter what we may say, knowledge derived from

Ifa divination remains a kind of knowledge which more often derives

its source from other persons. We can always raise the problem of the

moral character (iwa) of the mediator between Ifa and the inquirer. In

other words, their honesty, their reliability as sources of information

becomes a fundamental criterion to evaluating the reliability of

second-hand information obtained from them.20

This raises our

attention to the possibility of mischief, fraud, and sheer incompetence

on the part of Ifa priests. After all, there have been cases when clients

were asked to carry out some sacrifices to actualise some desired

effects in their lives and nothing actually is effected in turn. In

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addition to these, there may be the epistemological problem of how

chance and probability, on the one hand, and any supposed extra-

empirical cognitive mechanisms, on the other, play out in the

manipulation of the divination instruments.21

Nevertheless, these objections may not necessarily prove the

inefficacy of Ifa as a source of reliable knowledge. It may simply

mean that further critical studies of Ifa as a source of knowledge

should be made to discover reasons for the present fallibility state in

Ifa divination to pave way for better and more epistemological

understanding and manipulation of Ifa divination to achieve more

reliable epistemic results.

Conclusion

In this paper, an attempt has been made to examine the position

of Ifa in Yoruba religious and epistemological worldview. The paper

examines the status of ifa as a deity, which attracts a lot of

followership and worship among the Yoruba of Nigeria and the

diaspora. As a deity, ifa is seen, among the Yoruba, as the

commissioner, from Olodumare, in charge of knowledge and wisdom.

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This belief accords Ifa the status of special knowledge of the destiny

of individual human beings as well as that of the society. The paper

identifies some epistemological limitations to the power of Ifa to give

a kind of knowledge that may be infallible and indubitable. However,

the paper observes that further critical studies of Ifa, as a source of

knowledge, may pave way for better and more epistemological

understanding and manipulation of Ifa divination to achieve more

reliable epistemic results.

References

1. Wande Abimbola , Ijinle Ohun Enu Ifa, Apa Kinni 2nd ed.(Oyo: AIM Press, 1983) p6

2. William Bascom , Ifa Divination:Communication BetweenGods and Men in West Africa (Bloomington: Indiana

University Press, 1991)p3

3. Kola Abimbola , Yoruba Culture: A Philosophical Account(Birmingham: Iroko Academic Publishers,2005)p47

4. Wande Abimbola , Sixteen Great Poems of Ifa (Niamey:UNESCO, 1975)piii

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118

5. Olufemi Taiwo , Ifa: An Account of a Divination System andSome Concluding Epistemological Questions in Wiredu

Kwasi(ed) A Companion to African Philosophy(Oxford:

Blackwell, 2004)p305

6. Moses A. Makinde, African Philosophy: The Demise of aControversy(Ile-Ife: Obafemi Awolowo University Press,

2007)p69

7. Ibid p698. See Wande Abimbola , Ijinle Ohun Ifa, Wande Abimbola,

Sixteen Great Poems of Ifa, and Taiwo Olufemi, Ifa: An

Account of a Divination System and Some Concluding

Epistemological Questions

9. Olufemi Taiwo , p30510.Emmanuel C. Eze , The Problem of Knowledge in

Divination: The Example of Ifa in Eze E.C.,(ed) African

Philosophy:An Anthology(Oxford: Blackwell, 1988)p174

11.See Wande Abimbola, La notion de personne en AfriqueNoire Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, No.

544(1971): 73-89, Barry Hallen , Eniyan:A Critical Analysis

of the Yoruba Concepts of Person in C.S. Momoh (ed), The

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Substance of African Philosophy(Auchi: African Philosophy

Projects,1989)pp328-54, Yunusa K. Salami , Human

Personality and Immortality in Traditional Yoruba

Cosmology, Africana Marburgensia Vol.24 ,

No.1(1981)pp4-13, Yunusa K. Salami , Predestinacao e a

metafisica da identidade: um estudo de caso ioruba, in Afro-

Asia No. 35 (2007):263-280, among others.

12.Olusegun Gbadegesin , Destiny, Personality, and theUltimate Reality of Human existence: A Yoruba perspective,

Ultimate reality and Meaning, Vol.7, No.3 (1984):175

13.Bolaji Idowu , Olodumare: God in Yoruba Belief (London:Longman, 1962)pp170-180

14.See Bolaji Idowu , p194, and Salami Yunusa Kehinde,Predestination, Freedom, and Responsibility: A Case in

Yoruba Moral Philosophy, in Research in Yoruba Language

and Literatures, No.7 (1996)p6

15.See Olufemi Morakinyo , The Ayanmo Myth and MentalHealth Care in West Africa, in Journal of Culture and Ideas

No.1(1983):68-73, and Idowu Bolaji, p183

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16.Wande Abimbola , Ifa: An Exposition of Ifa literary Corpuspp116-149, andIdowu Bolaji pp179-200

17.William V.O. Quine , From a Logical Point of View(Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1964)

18.Philip M. Peek ., Divination: A Way of Knowing? inEmmanuel C. Eze , (ed)African Philosophy: An Anthology

(Massachusetts: Blackwell, 1998)p172

19.Emmanuel C. Eze , The Problem of Knowledge inDivination: The Example of Ifa in Emmanuel C. Eze

,(ed)African Philosophy: An Anthology,p173

20.Barry Hallen , Yoruba Moral Epistemology in KwasiWiredu(ed) A Companion To African Philosophy(Oxford:

Blackwell, 2004)p301

21.Olufemi Taiwo , Ifa: An Account of a Divination System andSome Concluding Epistemological Questions in Kwasi

Wiredu (ed)A Companion To African Philosophy, p311.