Candomblé () is an African diasporic religion that developed in Brazil during the 19th century. It arose through a process of syncretism between several of the traditional religions of West and Central Africa, especially those of the Yoruba, Bantu, and Gbe, coupled with influences from Roman Catholicism. There is no central authority in control of Candomblé, which is organized around autonomous terreiros (houses).
Candomblé venerates spirits, known varyingly as orixás, inkice, or vodun, which are deemed subservient to a transcendent creator god, Olodumaré. Deriving their names and attributes from traditional West African deities, the orixás are linked with Roman Catholic saints. Each individual is believed to have a tutelary orixá who has been connected to them since before birth and who informs their personality. An initiatory tradition, Candomblé's members usually meet in terreiros run by a mãe de santo (priestess) or pai de santo (priest). A central ritual involves practitioners drumming, singing, and dancing to encourage an orixá to possess one of their members, with whom congregants can then interact. The orixás are given offerings such as fruit and sacrificed animals, while their will is deciphered through divination. Offerings may also be given to lesser spirits, including caboclos and the spirits of the dead, the egun. Healing rituals and the preparation of amulets and herbal remedies also play a prominent role.
Candomblé developed among Afro-Brazilian communities amid the Atlantic slave trade of the 16th to 19th centuries. It arose through the blending of the traditional religions brought to Brazil by enslaved West and Central Africans, the majority of them Yoruba, Fon, and Bantu, with the Roman Catholicism of the Portuguese colonialists who then controlled the area. It primarily coalesced in the Bahia region during the 19th century. Following Brazil's independence from Portugal, the constitution of 1891 enshrined freedom of religion in the country, although Candomblé remained marginalized by the Roman Catholic establishment, which typically associated it with criminality. In the 20th century, growing emigration from Bahia spread Candomblé both throughout Brazil and abroad, while also influencing the development of another religion, Umbanda, in the 1920s. Since the late 20th century, some practitioners have emphasized a re-Africanization process to remove Roman Catholic influences and create forms of Candomblé closer to traditional West African religion.
The religion is divided into denominations, known as nations, based on which traditional African belief system has been its primary influence. The most prominent nations are the Ketu, Jeje, and Angola. Candomblé is centred in Brazil although smaller communities exist elsewhere, especially in other parts of South America. Both in Brazil and abroad Candomblé has spread beyond its Afro-Brazilian origins and is practiced by individuals of various ethnicities.
Definition and terminology
Candomblé is a "neo-African" or African American religion, and more specifically an Afro-Brazilian religion. It arose in 19th-century Brazil, where the imported traditional African religions of enslaved West Africans had to adapt to a slave colony in which Roman Catholicism was the official religion. It is thus one of several religions that emerged in the Americas through the interaction of West African and Roman Catholic traditions, and for this reason is considered a "sister religion" of Cuban Santería and Haitian Vodou.
Candomblé's followers are called povo de santo (people of saint), or Candomblecistas. The term Candomblé itself probably derives from a Bantu word for dances, kandombele, which also developed into the term for a dance style in Argentina and Uruguay, Candombe. Another word sometimes applied to Candomblé is macumba; this generic term can be applied to Afro-Brazilian religions as a whole but is especially associated with sorcery or black magic, and thus some Candomblécistas distance themselves from it.
Candomblé is not institutionalised, with no central authority to determine doctrine and orthodoxy, and no central sacred text. It is heterogenous, displaying regional variation in its beliefs and practices. Each lineage or community of practitioners is autonomous, approaching the religion in ways informed by their tradition and the choices of their leader.
Most Candomblecistas also practice Roman Catholicism—some priests and priestesses of Candomblé refuse to initiate anyone who is not a baptised Roman Catholic—while other practitioners have also pursued Evangelical Protestantism, New Age practices, or Buddhism. Sometimes these non-Candomblist elements have been directly integrated into Candomblé itself; there are reports of a Brazilian practitioner including a statue of the Mahayana Buddhist deity Hotei on their altar, and of a Belgian Candomblé group that incorporated characters from Welsh and Slavic mythologies in their practice. Candomblé has sometimes also been influenced by Spiritism, a French variant of Spiritualism, although many Spiritists distinguish their religion from Afro-Brazilian traditions.
Afro-Brazilian religions often mix with each other rather than existing in pure forms, with many scholars viewing them on a continuum rather than as wholly discrete entities. Candomblé shares the names of its deities, the orixás, with Umbanda, a religion formed in Rio de Janeiro in the 1920s. Umbandista groups exist on a spectrum from those emphasising connections to Spiritism to those stressing links with Afro-Brazilian religions like Candomblé; the anthropologist Diana Brown noted that the boundary separating Umbanda from Candomblé was largely "a matter of individual opinion". Omolocô was founded in Rio de Janeiro as an intermediate religion between Candomblé and Umbanda, with traditions merging these two systems sometimes labelled "Umbandomblé" by outsiders. There are also other Afro-Brazilian religions rooted largely in specific regions, including Babassuê in Pará, Batuque in Rio Grande do Sul, and Tambor de Mina in Maranhão and Pará.
Nações
Candomblé divides into traditions known as nações (nations). The three most prominent are Nagô or Ketu (Queto), Jeje (Gege) or Mina-Jeje, and Angola or Congo-Angola; others include the Ijexá (Ijesha), Egba, Efan (Ekiti) and Caboclo. Each derives influence from a different African language group; Ketu uses Yoruba, Jeje adopts Ewe, and the Angola draws from the Bantu language group. Informed by these ethno-linguistic origins, each Candomblé nation has its own lexicon, chants, deities, sacred objects, and traditional knowledge. Although originating among ethnic differences, this has largely eroded over time, with members drawn to a nation for reasons other than ethnic heritage.
An initiate can transfer from one nation to another, a process referred to as trocar as águas ("to change the waters"). Attitudes between nations can be negative; those groups which emphasise claims to "African purity" have often denigrated other nations they deem more syncretic, with the Angola nation sometimes regarded as the most syncretic. The Nagô nation is the largest, reflecting how Yoruba traditional religion became the dominant West African influence within Afro-Brazilian religions in the 19th century, and even among nations other than the Nagô, Yoruba-derived terminology predominates widely.
Beliefs
Olorun and the orixás
Candomblé teaches the existence of a supreme divinity called Olorun or Olodumare. This entity is regarded as the creator of everything but is thought distant and unapproachable, and thus not specifically worshipped in Candomblé.
The orixás
Candomblé revolves around spirits termed orixás (orishas) or santos ("saints"). In the Angola tradition they are sometimes termed inkice, and in the Jeje tradition vodun. The males are termed aborôs, the females iabás. Believed to mediate between humanity and Olorun, the orixás have been varyingly conceived as ancestral figures, or embodiments of forces of nature. Their names may differ according to nation; in Nagô they commonly possess Yoruba names, but in the Jeje nation they are instead given Fon names.
The orixás are deemed morally ambiguous, each with their own virtues and flaws, and are sometimes in conflict with each other. Each orixá is associated with specific colours, foods, animals, and minerals, favoring certain offerings. Each orixá is associated with a particular day of the week; the priesthood also states that each year is governed by a specific orixá who will influence the events taking place within it. Their personalities are informed by a key conceptual opposition in Candomblé, that of the cool versus the hot.
Oxalá is the chief orixá, depicted as a frail old man who walks with a pachorô sceptre as a walking stick. Practitioners commonly believe that Olorun tasked him with creating humanity. In some accounts, all of the junior orixás are the children of Oxalá and one of his two wives, Nanã and Iemanjá. This trio are associated with water; Oxalá with fresh water, Nanã with the rain, and Iemanjá with the ocean. Other accounts present this cosmogony differently, for instance by claiming that Oxalá fathered all other orixás alone, having created the world from a mingau pudding. An alternative claim among practitioners is that Nanã is the grandmother of Oxalá and the mother of Iemanjá, the latter becoming both mother and wife to Oxalá.
Xangô is the orixá associated with thunder and lightning; one of his wives is Obá, a warrior who has only one ear. Ogum is the orixá of battle and of iron, often depicted with a machete; his companion is Oxóssi, the male orixá of the hunt and forest. Obaluaiê or Omolu is the orixá associated with infectious disease and its cure, while Osanyin is associated with leaves, herbs, and herbal knowledge. Oya is the orixá of wind and storms. Oxumaré is regarded as both male and female and is portrayed as a serpent or a rainbow. Oxum is the orixá of love, beauty, wealth and luxury, and is associated with fresh water, fish, mermaids, and butterflies. She is married to Ifa, regarded as the orixá of divination.
Tempo is the orixá of time; originating in the Angola nation, he is associated with trees. Due to the link with trees, he is sometimes equated with the Nagô orixá Loko. The orixá Exú is regarded as a capricious trickster; as the guardian of entrances, he facilitates contact between humanity and the other orixá, thus usually being honoured and fed first in any ritual. His ritual paraphernalia is often kept separate from that of other orixás, while the entrances to most terreiros will have a clay head, decorated with cowries or nails, that represents Exú and is given offerings.
The orixás are regarded as having different aspects, known as marcas ("types" or "qualities"), each of which may have an individual name. Child forms of the orixás are termed erês. They are deemed the most uncontrollable spirits of all, associated with obscenities and pranks. The child forms of orixás have specific names; the erê of Oxalá is for instance called Ebozingo ("Little Ebô") and Pombinho ("Little Dove"). The material image of an orixá is called an igbá.
Saints
Each orixá equates with a Roman Catholic saint. For instance, Omolu, an orixa of sickness, is often equated with Saint Lazarus the leper. Oxalá has been conflated with Our Lord of Bonfim, Oxum with Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, and Ogum with St Anthony of Padua. Due to his association with time, Tempo is sometimes equated with the Christian idea of the Holy Spirit. In Candomblé altars, the orixás are often represented with images and statues of Roman Catholic saints.