Ile Ife

Something very unique occurred over the course of a thousand years (500 BC to 500 AD). We can even call it a manifestation connected to the African continent. It was a change in the macrocosmic axis when ancient African kingdoms (including great Ancient Egypt) were replaced by a new center of effort. This center, regardless of subsequent changes in the space, continues to perform its special function to this day.

There was a materialization of energy known as Oduduwa, which represented Olorun, one of the highest integrals of the sky. The place where that energy was manifested was defined as the new axis of Earth; it was called Ile Ife — the holy city and the center of Yoruba culture. That place also shaped a new human mentality. I would go so far as to call it the highest mentality that exists on Earth.

One of the keys to understanding this phenomenon is related to the fact that in this very place it became possible to materialize energy that could be used for outstanding creations. This was reflected in the development of a new mindset — both in Africa and worldwide — which in turn was expressed in a surprising variety of items made of bronze, brass, copper, wood, ceramics, and ivory, comparable to the best works of metallurgy in Europe. At the same time, they represent different types of resonance — something akin to the concept of musical instruments.

What’s especially important to us is that this art was a manifestation of the need to produce objects for certain rituals and energy-related purposes. In reality, it was a form of interacting with macrocosmic processes and a form of power generation.

This started the maturation process for Yoruba culture, which retained its connection to the power represented by the Olorun field, or by the concept of Axé in its popular form. Therefore, Ile-Ife became not only the spiritual center of the Yoruba but the center of the entire African mentality — the superior form of consciousness that humanity has today. It was this center of power that later attracted slave traders, who ended up contributing to the spread of this power around the world. That means they did not enslave Africa: instead, the consciousness of Africans enslaved them and later the entire so-called civilized world that had forgotten how to think — and, most importantly — how to experience subtle processes in a world currently governed by reactions and irritations.

It’s also interesting that Yoruba culture has a mystical origin, which is difficult to define today with our rational consciousness. And it seems that a certain awareness of space produced a synthesis of everything that Africa had back in this time. By turning our attention to Ile-Ife, we are essentially studying the essence of the entire African culture.

Ile-Ife is also the key to the consciousness of Olodumare (the Creator Orisha) expressed in the highest form of African mentality, the Niger–Congo branch, which formed its entire structure based on two key factors: the principle of divine cosmogony and the understanding of the nature of blood as the flow of ancestral and family energy (Ebí) that leads to a common Oduduwa ancestor. Therefore, the entire principle of life was connected to a particular egregore with a special quality: the art of communicating with ancestors by blood and totem — that is, with all African cultures significant to Ile-Ife.

Yoruba men used special looms to make small strips of fabric that were then connected to large pieces of fabric made by women on large looms, thus forming a tapestry of the Ile-Ife kingdom. This was the establishment of the religious and artistic capital of the Yoruba territory and the place from which spiritual consecration emanated. That’s how the Ife civilization formed in the very heart of Africa.

Ile-Ife also has a special language that was created to establish a connection between the two realities that make up the Yoruba world: the invisible reality and the visible reality. Therefore, this center is an oracle that has been developing gradually since ancient times in the cultural context of the Yoruba, the Nupe, the Edo, and the Ibariba. But it was Yoruba culture that systematized the knowledge covering all aspects of life. For the followers of Orunmila (the preacher and the witness to the creation of the world), everything was determined by the practice of Ifá, where nothing was done without consulting the oracle. Ifá approves dates for engagements, marriages, and the conception of children, makes decisions about the life of the society, and negotiates with the space.

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