Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
The word is before every other thing; in its fluid forms, it constitutes the material that fills the
oceans and sacred rivers and provides the soluble base for animal erythrocytes, including those of
humans. As fire, it erupts in volcanoes and gives teeth to lightning and thunder. The word in its
simplest conception is a force, effective and yet dormant until uttered. “Thought,” no matter how
ferocious, can never equal the force of the spoken word; the word is life. Once expressed, human
thought becomes a reality, effective and binding. According to Jahn, “If there is no word, all forces
would be frozen, there would be no procreation, no change, no life”
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(p. 855). A child that has not
been “named,” consecrated, and the incarnate spirit determined is considered a mere “thing,” like a
corpse without life; if it dies before its designation with the word, it is not even mourned.
The bible credits the creation of the world to the spoken word of God. He did not just will it; he
expressed it. The word was the life imparted on the earth. It is the force of the word that differenti-
ates us from animals, and it is the relativity in the force in each human's word that differentiates him
or her from other men or women. The word precedes all other things. The beginning of the gospel
according to St. John states:
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by it and without it was not any-
thing made that was made.
The word is spoken, yet it is not speech; there is nothing like an inconsequential word; there
is no “harmless” or noncommittal word; every word is binding on the person who uses it. It is this
power of the word that is invoked during incantations, not as monosyllabic pronouncement, but
often as repetitive order and usually combined with the power of the rhythm.
Rhythm is to the word what clothes are to a person. As fine clothes could make an otherwise
ordinary person look distinguished, with all the airs expected of these new looks, so will good
rhythm turn an otherwise weak invocation into a powerful force. This analogy is, however, a very
weak one; since rhythm is a necessary aspect in rendering words, it is only in theory that the two
components can be separated. Rhythm is indispensable to the word; these two components of incan-
tation are inseparably interwoven. It is the word that has the force, yet it is rhythm that activates the
word, potentiates it to its fullest magnitude; rhythm is the procreative component of incantation.
Perhaps the best articulation of the significance of rhythm in African culture is that given by
Senghor; in his article “L' esprit de la civilization ou les lois de la culture negro-africaine,” the ven-
erated African statesman and poet wrote:
Rhythm is the architecture of being, the inner dynamic that gives it form, the pure expression of the
life force. Rhythm is the vibratory shock, the force which, through our sense, grips us at the root of our
being. It is expressed through corporeal and sensual means; through lines, surfaces, colours, and vol-
umes in architecture, sculpture or painting; through accents in poetry and music, through movements
in the dance. But, doing this, rhythm turns all these concrete things towards the light of the spirit. In the
degree to which rhythm is sensuously embodied, it illuminates the spirit.
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He continued further in the same work to say that only rhythm gives the word its effective full-
ness; it is the word of God, that is, the rhythmic word, that created the world. For the rhythmic word
to become manifest, it may have to acquire form, in the nature of designation of things. It may find
expression in music or dance or in the permanency of carved objects. An incantation could give
form to a corporeal existence through the mimicking movement of the body. A hiss of the great
snake, for example, could be rendered more potent by twisting the body during dance to resemble
the curves of the serpent.
The word could take shape in images, which could be masks, iron, gold, tree, bone, stone, in fact
anything that serves as a vehicle for the intromission of the force of the rhythmic word. As has been
