Page 157 - A People Called Afrika

Afrika’s Indigenous Knowledge Systems

anything of our real belief. They think that we worship the
spirits of our ancestors; that we believe our spirits, when we
die, enter the bodies of animals. They, without proof or with-
out enquiry, condemn us, the Isanusi, as deluders of our more
ignorant brethren; or else they declare us to be wicked wizards
having dealings with evil spirits. To show how ignorant they
are, I shall tell you what we teach the Common Man (ordinary
Native). We teach that he has a body; that within that body is
a soul; and within the soul is a spark or portion of something
we call Itongo, which the Common Man interprets as the Uni-
versal Spirit of the Tribe. We teach that after death the soul
(Idhlozi) after hovering for a space near the body departs to
a place called Esilweni(Place of Beasts). This is a very differ-
ent thing, as you can see, from entering the body of a beast.

In Esilweni, the soul assumes a shape, part beast and part hu-
man. This is its true shape, for man’s nature is very like that
of the beast, save for that spark of something higher, of which
Common Man knows but little. For a period which is long or
short, according to the strength of the animal nature, the soul
remains in Esilweni, but at last it throws aside its beast-like
shape and moves onward to a place of rest. There it sleeps
till a time comes when it dreams that something to do or to
learn awaits it on earth, then it awakes and returns, through
the Place of Beasts, to earth and is born again as a child. Again
and again-does the soul travel through the body, through the
Place of Beasts, to its rest, dreams its dream and returns to
the body; till at last the Man becomes true Man, and his soul
when he dies goes straight to its rest, and thence, after a space,
having ceased to dream of earth, moves on and becomes one
with that from which it came—the Itongo. Then does the Man
know that instead of being but himself, apart, he is truly all

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