Irete-Ogbe - How Odu Became Orunmila's Wife Part 9

"Orunmila made the offering.  On the day Odu arrived at Orunmila's home she found the offering outside the door.  Odu asked who has made this offering to the Earth?  Esu said it was Orunmila who made the offering because he wants to marry you.  Odu took the offering and fed the bird Aragamaga."

Commentary:

Here we have the relationship between Odu, representing raw spiritual power, and Orunmila, representing social order and the development of good character, being facilitated by Esu.

The word good character in Yoruba is iwa pele from the elision I wa ope ile meaning I come to greet the Earth.  We greet the Earth because the Earth is our teacher the Earth teaches us how to live in harmony with self and world.  By seeing the offering Odu is expressing her understanding the Orunmila is a good man, who was attempting to do good things in the world.

In this section of the verse Odu takes the offering and feds Aragamaga.  This is the first reference in the verse between Odu and Iyaami Osoranga.  The bird Aragamaga I would translate to mean the body of female power.  This is a symbolic reference to the collective power of all women.  This power is accessed through Odu or the womb and links all women through Ori or consciousness.  The power of Iyaami is the ability of women to pray in the astral realm as a group.

Iyaami as an Egbe or religious society was set up to do three things.  There first responsibility is to protect the women of a given community.  In the olden days all women were automatically members of the Iyaami Egbe.  The elder women of the community were initiated into the secrets of the Egbe but all women were members.  If any woman was the victim of male violence the elder mother of the Iyaami Egbe would go to the Chief Ifa priest of the village and ask him to mediate.  If the mediation was unsuccessful the women would invoke the collective power of Aragamaga which is the power to prevent a man from going to sleep by inducing nightmares.  After two or three nights of no sleep the abusive man was often willing to consider changing their abusive character.

I believe that the men who misread this verse are often in denial about their own abusive issues.

The bird used to administer justice is described as a black bird.  In Iyaami Osoranga there is also a white bird whose job it is to make sure the power of the black bird is used fairly.  Just because a woman accuses a man of violence does not automatically make the allegations true.

The third bird in Iyaami Osoranga is a red bird who job it is to locate abundance.

When Odu or the portal of female power accepts the offering of Orunmila and feeds it to the black bird the gesture of accepting the offering is recognition of the fact that Orunmila was not a threat to the safety and well-being of women.

This primal relationship is symbolized in Ifa initiations when offerings are made to Iyaami and it is symbolized when portions of ebo (personal offerings) are giving to Iyaami.  This represents a primal covenant between divergent forces in nature and this covenant is reaffirmed during initiation and when making offerings prescribed by Ifa divination.

Ire,
Awo Falokun

Irete-Ogbe - How Odu Became Orunmila's wife Part 4 & 5

"Aragamago is the name Olodumare gave to the bird.  Aragamago is the name of the bird belonging to Odu."

Commentary:

Aragamago is a spirit bird associated with the mysteries of Iyaami Osoranga.  Odu is a force of nature and it is a pot associated with Ifa initiation.  In this verse we have the inference that the worship of Ifa is dependant on Odu and Odu is empowered by Aragamago and Aragamago is a symbolic reference to the mysteries of women's power preserved by the secret society called Iyaami Osoranga.  This then takes us back to the name of the diviner, which is the key to the meaning of the Odu, and the name of the diviner tells us this Odu is about learning how to work together.

This takes us back to the meaning of the word Osoranga from the elision oso ran ga meaning astral travel brings us female power.  The word Aragamago from the elision ara ga mi ago which I would translate to mean I greet the body of female power.  Aragamago is the think women search for when in their astral mode of consciousness.  That thing is the ability to create life.  As a hermetic principle the ability to create human life is the template for the ability to create anything in the universe.  It is the foundation of the ability of ritual to fix what is broken in the world.

Aragamago or the ability to create life first entered the Universe in the moment of Creation.   This ability is seated in the womb of a first generation star which is essentially a huge cauldron creating hydrogen atoms.  When this cauldron collapses in on itself it explodes creating a cloud of gas.  In Ifa scripture this cloud of gas is called Omi Orun or Heavenly Waters.

The Heavenly waters gather together in the Odu or womb of a second generation star which transforms hydrogen atoms into all the basic elements of Creation.  This is the first major work in the Alchemical process of transformation.

The Heavily waters of second generation stars creat planets, planets create all forms of life on earth.

It is the bird of Aragamago spreading her power of fertility throughout the universe.

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Irete-Ogbe - How Odu became Orunmila's wife Part 5


"Olodumare told Odu that anything she wished to accomplish would be done if you send the bird to do it.  Olodumare said, anyplace you want to send this bird, it will go there."

Commentary:

Here the verse is affirming the belief that effective prayer requires ase or spiritual power.  The verse is identifying astral travel as an effective source of spiritual power in the personal realm.  Astral travel is the ability to disassociate the ori or consciousness from the physical body allowing consciousness to view hidden dimensions of reality.

From a metaphysical point of view the concept here is based on the idea that humans are spiritual beings having a human experience.  As human beings our ori is connected to our Iponri and our Iponri is connected to Orun.  That means everyone knows everything.  The issue is where are we going to place our concentration.  This issue is why Ifa spiritual discipline is based on iwa pele.  The mechanism for placing our concentration in the moment in the correct time and place is totally dependent on suuru or inner peace.  Suuru is the ability to be in the world and to see the world through a lens that is not shaped by egotism, greed or the need to control others.

We embrace the ability to access higher levels of consciousness by embracing the idea that if your life gets better my life gets better.  Once we fear the other, once we compete with the other once we denigrate the other, once we judge the other, our ability to access that which is needed to fix that which is broken our ability to access higher levels of consciousness is closed.  In the Yoruba language the closing of this door is called ibi.

The best example of using the bird to find ire is through the ase of Osoosi.  The omo of Osoosi are given birds to track in the bush.  The bird is similar to the bird of Iyaami.  When a traditional Yoruba tracker is about to go into the forest the tracker sends their bird to view the landscape in concentric cycles.  Before a tracker even enters the forest they know the location of every animal, every bird, every source of water, every predator and virtual every living thing for miles in every direction.  This is a skill women are born with and men can develop.  It is a fundamental component of an Awo’s ability to transform ibi into ire.