Perhaps no other magical system in the world has such a dark trail behind it as the Haitian voodoo cult.
Famous dolls, obsession with spirits and, of course, zombies - this is what the voodoo cult looks like in the eyes of the average European.
We decided to plunge into the mysterious world of this Haitian syncretic religion to find out if all the rumors and stories about it are true.
Origins
European colonialists brought the first slaves from Africa to Haiti back in 1503. This date can be taken as a starting point in the formation of voodoo as a full-fledged religion. Torn away from their native land and deprived of their freedom, Africans had to play according to imposed rules: Catholicism was implanted among the slaves literally with fire and steel.
It's time to break down here, but black slaves found a clever way to preserve their animistic beliefs by dressing them in Christian clothes.
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Transformation
Despite the fact that the slaves were massively baptized, moving into the bosom of the Catholic Church, behind this noble facade the old gods and foundations continued to hide, being, perhaps, the only outlet for the exhausted slaves. Time passed. Catholicism and African belief in the old gods were fused into an entirely new religion.
Over the centuries, the mixture of pagan cult, the Christian concept of a single father-god and various scraps of African and European cultures has turned into one of the most unusual religious phenomena - the cult of voodoo.
What we believe
Without further ado, the Haitians divided their pantheon into two unequal parts: the supreme deity (Bondieu) and all the rest (loa).
The very form of verbalization of the sacred name of the supreme god is noteworthy: Bondieu is just an intricate transformation of the French bon Dieu - "good god". Bondyo does not in any way affect the life of his people - he created the world and retired.
The situation is more complicated with loa (from the French loi - law). These African deities and spirits, who donned the masks of Christian saints, are incredibly powerful. The whole concept of the ritual magic of the voodoo cult is based on interaction with the loa. The spirits are innumerable, and each has its own name and purpose. Loa live in their special world - Le Guinea.
Magicians
Contact between the loa and the flock is carried out by the priests, divided into specialties. The Hungans and Mambo are in charge of predictions, while the bokors are responsible for black magic. Both those and others in their practice use many ritual objects, the most famous of which is the volt doll.
A voodoo doll
The doll is designed to symbolize a certain person, and with the help of a special ritual, the volt becomes inextricably linked with the bokor's target. For the ritual to be successful, the doll, among other things, must contain the victim's blood or hair.
Zombie transformation
The term "zombie" was brought to Haiti by African slaves at the beginning of the 18th century. The homeland of the word is the semi-mystical kingdom of the black continent of Dahomey. In fact, the word "zombie", as the researchers found, is a distorted form of "nzambi", which is translated from the African Bantu means "soul of the dead."
With the help of a special mixture containing tetrodotoxin, the bokor put the person into a state of deep coma and calmly waited until the unfortunate's family buried the body.
The day after the burial, the sorcerer came to the cemetery and dug up a freshly baked slave: oxygen starvation, multiplied by the toxic effect of the potion, led to brain damage of the victim - the areas responsible for memory and speech simply died off, and a creature that could only follow commands rose from the grave sorcerer.
Benin
Although many people throughout West Africa still practice voodoo in secrecy, it is the country's official religion in Benin.
In January, the small town of Ouidah draws crowds - rich and poor, priests and dignitaries, tourists and locals - to commemorate the 60 million people who lost their homeland and their freedom during the African slave trade.