Dalian Adofo and Verona Spence-Adofo, the creators of the brilliant, groundbreaking
educational African Spirituality resource, Ancestral Voices,
captured the key aspects of African Spirituality. They have
synthesised the work of many great African writers and spiritualists into a
digestible form.
They dedicated seven years to conducting literature and action
research on the topic and expanded its scope beyond what previous scholars or
writers have accomplished. Since many had previously only focused on individual
systems, it was seen as being specific to those systems.
The only work that closely resembled theirs was by Christian priest John Mbiti
(1969), but even that work concentrated on continental Africa and was filled
with his religious bias.
Travelling to many different countries and speaking to various practitioners in their
diverse expressions, both on the continent and in the Diaspora - ancient and
modern- allowed them to map and identify commonalities that clearly show we are
dealing with just modified forms of the same ideology.
Their work shows that Africans developed many tools to understand the life force or
spirit that all existence—past, present, and future—is part of. The tools
depended on their time period, location, and languages spoken, which is why
they have many names, such as Vodoun, Dagara, Kemetic Mystery System,
Obeah, Ifa, Candomblé, Dogon. None were more correct than others; they
were simply methods the All gifted to humans to understand reality.
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