Cults and religious establishments

Cults

Indeed, it is very difficult to think of two traditions that could be more radically different than those as embodied by the movement of the Nation of Islam in America and the tradition of Vodou as it is practiced in Haiti and as variants of it are practiced in other areas as well. Indeed, the origins could not be more different than they are, for one thing, as Vodou stems out of a long and distinguished tradition of beliefs held by the Yoruba peoples of Africa and that was changed and syncretized during the period of enslavement. The Nation of Islam, on the other hand, was created by a single man, Elijah Muhammad and is a religion that, though it attaches itself to a greater historical tradition, which is that of Islam, is, in fact, quite ate variance with the larger religion, but at least elements of being part of different and older religious tradition. Although both do have elements of ritualized dress and behaviors, however, it also appears that the National of Islam's dress is quite different, and certainly, the rituals practiced by the two religions could not possibly more different than they, in fact, are.

There are some similarities between the two, of course. In particular both were to some rather extensive degree shaped and affected by the denigrated status afforded to African peoples who were displaced and made to suffer sub-standard living conditions by conquering European powers. This, of course, is most obvious in the Vodou tradition, which developed its powerful and intriguing tradition of syncretism. Syncretism is a word that means the combining of two seemingly incompatible religious traditions. In the case of Vodou, African peoples enslaved by European colonizers in Haiti were not allowed to practice their true religion, thus they combined it in a syncretic fashion with the Gods of the Yoruba people in a way such that the two religions have commingled to form Vodou, which has been, itself, now a religion for literally hundreds of years. The Nation of Islam, too, was a religion founded on the idea that the emancipation of balck people was an important issue. In the case of the Nation of Islam, however, the belief held is that white people are literally devils created as the result of a science experiment gone awry. Thus, while Vodou was shaped in a more covert way by white oppression, the Nation of Islam was an openly hostile and separatist force that flew in the face of white oppression.

Aside from this similarity, however, there are really very, very few other elements in which the two religions could even be considered slightly similar. Vodou, for example, is a religion that revolves largely around performance and spirit possession. In a typical Vodou ceremony, a band begins playing and the service starts and then during the service, one or two people enter into trance-like states in which they are powerfully overcome by the spirit of a god, called the loa, and this person then takes on the characteristics of the loa. Often the loa will be summoned by a specific beat or rhythm in the song that is considered unique to him or her. Moreover, there is usually some sort of animal sacrifice at a typical Vodoun ceremony and the slaughtered is then cooked and offered for consumption by all of those in attendance.

Indeed, for these reasons the bands that perform at these ceremonies, typically known as Rara bands, have an exceptional and unbelievably important cultural influence as well as a religious one. Since it is through them that contact with the gods, or the loa, is typically maintained and established, they hold an extremely preeminent and important position in Haitian society.

The Nation of Islam, on the other hand, is an extremely different type of religion. At its core it claims to be Islamic and, in certain respects, this is true. All three of the it leaders, for example including Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X, and Louis Farrakhan, have gone on what is known as the haj, or the traditional pilgrimage to Mecca. Moreover, the basic tenets of the Nation of Islam seem quite similar to those of traditional Islam in that they refer to god as Allah and observe important fasts also. There are also several serious differences, however: