Introduction to Cosmo-Semantics
This story was told by BALBO TONYE, a bard also known as KOP LIKAN'.
UM
The following folk story
tells of the discovery of Um, the Bassa deity whose teachings Bassa
people call MAUM--COSMOSEMANTICS
for the modern Bassa/African
mind.
A man called Makumbuk ma Nkan was sick. He had Njambe
(leprosis lepromatosis). Leprosis gnawed his toes and fingers, his
lips and nose. He did no longer know how to say, "salt". He
would say "Nhan". Leprosis gnawed his entire body. He
looked like a salamander. He lost weight. He was a bag of bones. One
day, when cocks beat their wings on their tails, right before dawn,
Makumbuk called his wife: "Kisasa, come here." Kisasa came
at once. "I'm dying," he told her. "It's time for me
to set my house straight. My strength is gone and my vitality is
running away, so find yourself a lover. One thing, though, he must be
of my kin."
The day grew.
The old man called
Makumbuk ma Nkan had a younger brother called Nyenge Nkan. Kisasa
came up with the latter. "This is my lover," she told her
husband. Makumbuk nodded assent.
Kisasa left the two
men.
"Nyenge, call my wife," Makumbuk ordered after
a few minutes. Nyenge called Kisasa who came and sat down. Makumbuk
called his brother Nyenge by his name: "I now want to give you
my rules and regulations," he continued. "This is my home.
Never should I spend a night here without a fire burning. If ever I
spend a night up here without fire, your relationship with my wife
will be over. This is my initiatic pot. It should never go all night
without some meat inside. Once this pot goes all night without meat,
your affair with Kisasa will have to come to an end. This is my jar.
Always should there be palm wine in it. If ever this jar of mine goes
all night without wine, your relation with Kisasa will
stop."
Makumbuk gave his rules to Nyenge, then called his
wife. "Kisasa!"
"Yes," answered the
woman.
"These are my rules: my house does not like trash.
The day this house goes dirty all night, your relation with Nyenge
will stop. This is my calabash. There should always be water in it.
The day this calabash goes all night without water, your relation
with Nyenge will be over. Do you hear me?"
Kisasa
answered "Yes."
Nyenge Nkan and Kisasa i Makumbuk ma
Nkan stayed together nine years.
Nyenge Nkan was a great
hunter who gave all the animals he killed during that period to
Kisasa who ate them, but never, as the custom is, did Kisasa went
fishing for him. Makumbuk witnessed this, and this angered him. So
one morning, at dawn, he called his wife. "Kisasa, come
here."
Kisasa came running.
"Since you
started dating Nyenge," he said, "the man gives you all the
animals he hunts but never have I seen you go fishing for him.
Traditionally, a man hunts for his woman, the woman go fishing for
her man. What is this? Who do you think you are?"
When
the sun was high in the sky, Kisasa grabbed her fishing sieve, a
machete and a hoe, and went to the river nearby. She walked in the
river which reached her ankles at first. The woman advanced slowly
into the river. Water reached her knees. She stepped forth. When the
water reached her neck, she stopped. Trunks were floating around her.
She dragged them and cut the current up and downstream. Then she
started drying the space by throwing the water outside with the
fishing sieve. Each time she threw the water outside, she said:
"Bikete: Momi ni Momi; Bitan: Biwoga ni Biwoga!" which
means "What's inside is dead and what's outside is
alive!"
After a while, she heard: "Ummh...ummh..."
She stood up, removed sweat from her forehead and looked around. She
saw nothing. She bent over and went on throwing water outside. She
could not believe her eyes. Fish were everywhere around. Crabs were
swimming in squads. Shrimps, plentiful, were moving in lines,
circling around her. She smiled and ran outside the water to get her
fishing basket that laid on the bank. When she came back, surprise:
Fish, crabs, prawns were nowhere to be seen. She spotted a hole by
the bank and a flat stone in the middle of the river. All of the
sudden, water started flowing out from the hole. Kisasa did not think
twice. "The fish that were present here a minute ago, biting me
all over my body, has moved into this hole," she said to
herself. She grabbed a machete and began digging into the hole. At
one point, while taking out the earth, her hands bumped into
something sticky. She held itfirmly and, going backward, dragged it
out and dropped it on the river bank. This creature had red teeth and
bow legs. Kisasa looked at the creature and did not recognize it. She
went back to the hole and started digging again. When she put her
hands in the hole to take out the earth, she again bumped into
something viscous. She held it firmly, dragged it out and dropped it
on the bank. This creature also had red teeth and bow legs. She
looked at both creatures and did not recognize them. Suddenly,
blisters covered her entire body. She held the machete and began
scratching and scraping herself with it. A minute later, she heard:
"Ummh... ummh...". Scared, she took off, leaving everything
behind her, and ran to her husband. What did she tell her
husband?
"Since I went fishing this morning to the river
called Lingen li Lep," she started breathlessly, "I've
stepped into all the waterholes of that river. The one that swallowed
me whole is the one I chose. A whirlpool settled upon my head. I cut
the current up and downstream, and began to pull the water out. Fish
were everywhere, along with shrimps and crabs. I went up the bank to
take my fishing basket but when I came back, the fish have all
disappeared. I spotted a hole by the bank and a flat rock in the
middle of the river. Water started coming out of the hole. I thought
that the fish and schrimps and crabs that were around a moment ago
all hid in the hole. That's why I grabbed the cutlass and started
digging into the hole. When I put in my hands to take the dirt out, I
bumped into a viscous creature. I grabbed it and dragged it out. It
has red teeth and bow legs. I have never seen this creature before. I
went back to the river hole. I put in my hands again, and again I
bumped into another viscous creature. I dragged it out also. It also
had red teeth and bow legs. As I was going back to the hole, I heard
'Ummh... ummh...'. I did not wait a second more. I took off and ran
to you. O my husband, look at my body. Blisters have covered it all.
Please light a fire for me. I'm so feverish..."
Makumbuk
nodded and began calling Nyenge. Nyenge came running. "Grab a
gong and a torch," Makumbuk ordered him, "and let's go to
Lingen li Lep."
A minute later, both headed to the river.
When they arrived, they walked into the water, measuring the river
holes. The creatures Kisasa had dragged on the bank had returned into
the hole. "This is the hole Kisasa dug," Makumbuk told his
kin. "Get some wood and dry grass. Make a fire right at the
entrance, and blow."
Nyenge did as ordered. He blew,
blew, and blew. That's when he heard a voice calling him: "O
Nyenge!" He kept himself from answering. "O Nyenge!"
The man stayed quiet again.
"Blow!" urged Makumbuk.
"What's calling you from inside the hole will show its face
today."
Nyenge blew and blew. Then he heard a third call.
"O Nyenge!"
"Answer," Makumbuk told
him.
Nyenge answered and was asked the following: "Who
ever found a raffia outfit, picked it up, made a fire and starting
blowing?"
Nyenge scattered the embers and immediately
Dingonda di Um (the twin daughters of Um) jumped outside, turned
their backs to each other, and began dancing.
"Poke up
the fire!" ordered Makumbuk.
Nyenge put the embers
together and started blowing. He blew and blew and heard a call: "O
Nyenge!" He stayed quiet and heard another call. "O
Nyenge!" He stayed quiet again.
"Blow,"stammered
Makumbuk, very excited. "We'll see what is calling you from the
hole today."
Nyenge blew and blew again. When he heard a
third call, Makumbuk said: "Answer!"
Nyenge answered
the call and was asked: "Who ever found an outfit, had picked it
up and stirred up a fire?" Nyenge scattered his fire and heard:
"Ummh... ummh...". Immediately after, Ngena Um jumped under
the sun. Makumbuk placed him next to Dingonda di Ma'Um and walked
back to Nyenge. "Poke your fire!" he ordered again. "Um
is still in the hole!"
Nyenge put the embers together and
started blowing again. He blew and blew. Then he heard another call.
"O Nyenge!" He ignored the call. He heard another call. "O
Nyenge!" which he ignored again. "Blow, O Nyenge, blow,"
Makumbuk told him. "We'll see what is calling you in this water
hole today." Nyenge blew and blew. When he heard the third call,
Makumbuk told him: "Answer!" Nyenge answered. A voice asked
him: "Who ever found an outfit, picked it up, made a fire and
started blowing? Scatter your charcoal, O Nyenge."
Nyenge
scattered his embers and heard "waaarrr umh..."
Immediately, Mbam Um jumped in the light. Makumbuk smiled. "There
are no Um left in the hole," he said to his brother. "Let's
go home. You'll stay behind, carrying Um while I walk ahead, hitting
the gong, and making it known to women and children to run for cover,
for Um is on his way."
Nyenge Nkan carried Um and stayed
behind. Makumbuk ma Nkan walked ahead with the gong. "Hide,
women, and take your children with you. Um is coming. Um is on his
way."
This is how Um entered the village and came to live
with human beings.
THE
SANCTUARY OF UM
In Bassaland, Um
lives (or is supposed to live) in every village. Ask the elders where
Um is. In every village, the Um-Um (initiates of Um) keep the
knowledge of Um alive. Ask the elders where the sanctuary of Um is in
your village. Help rebuild it. It's not only appropriate that this
generation, and those to come, learn to know Um, it is their duty to
develop the knowledge transmitted to human beings by Um.
Remember,
we do not have many reasons to help humanity fight the Polluter, but
we shall do battle against him ANYWAY, so that human beings may live
and live well.
EXERCISES
Exercise 1: Why does Makumbuk
react at once? Could it be that he knew beforehand that Um was in the
river? He asked his brother Nyenge to grab a gong. Did he know
beforehand that he would be beating the gong and asking women to
hide?
Exercise 2: One minute, Kisasa sees fish, crabs and
prawns; the next minute, she sees nothing. Illusion? Self-delusion?
What do you think?
INTRODUCTION
TO COSMOSEMANTICS
Do
not approach the above tale with naivete. Believe that Makumbuk knew
not only that Um was in the river hole, but also that Um wanted to
come out of the river hole and go live with human beings. Um is a
dangerous creature. To touch him without preparation may result in
your own malaise, your body turning into something that resembles the
body of a salamander. Be careful. Learn to know Um and you will hold
Um's power in your hand and have a clear understanding of (what is)
power (for Africans).
Cosmo-Semantics introduces to a
knowledge and an understanding of power, true power, the African way
of understanding, mastering and using power. What is power? When in
traditional Africa we say power, what are we talking about? In the
above story, one minute, Kisasa sees lots of fish, crabs and praws,
the next, she sees nothing. What sort of power makes that
possible?
Before we begin, I'd like to anchor our discussion
more and help you, reader, better grab what we'll be talking about by
giving you five other anecdotes.
EXAMPLE 1: In the region of
Bikok, in Bassaland, during Kamerun's independence war, a platoon
headed by a French captain (let's call him "Armand")
surprised a man called "Bikoy" on a palm tree and summoned
him to climb down the tree and be arrested. Bikoy paid the captain no
mind and continued his work. He wanted to cut down a palmnut bunch
and bring palm nuts to his wife.
"If you don't come down,
we'll shoot!" the captain warned Bikoy. But Bikoy continued
calmly to do his work. Tired of waiting, the captain ordered his
soldiers to shoot. But instead of a man, what the captain and the
soldiers saw fall was a bunch of palmnuts. The captain looked at this
mystery, shooked his head, and left.
Five years later, after
the war had ended and the process of national reconciliation begun,
the government promised armistice to the maquisards who would
surrender their weapons. The day Bikoy came to the precinct to
surrender his rifle, he bumped into Armand. "Where did you go
that day when we shot you up a palm tree?" Armand asked Bikoy.
"You can tell me. Nothing will happen to you now."
"After
you shot me, did you see anything fall?" Bikoy asked Armand
back.
"Yes, a palmnut bunch."
"If you
had picked up the palmnut bunch, you'd have arrested me," Bikoy
said and left.
EXAMPLE 2: In the region of Ndom, during the
same period, a warrior called Balep was incircled by a platoon led by
Commander Marguin. The order was to arrest Balep alive for the
much-needed information the colonialist wanted to get from him. Balep
tried to escape but when he realized that he could not, trapped as he
was like a hunted hare, he did two things: 1) he invoked Gwek, his
ancestor princeps, and 2) he screamed.
What happened next
terrified everyone present. A lighting flashed in the perfectly sunny
sky and was followed by a tremendous thunder blast. When the soldiers
opened their eyes, Balep was nowhere to be seen.
Balep was
subsequently arrested and spent years in prison. "They surprised
me. I was not prepared when they came," he told me. One day,
Marguin asked him what happened to him after the thunder blast. "I
moved into a riverhole," Balep replied.
EXAMPLE 3: We
suspect that Thomas Mongo was made (first Bassa and first Kamerunian)
bishop of the Diocese of Douala for two reasons: 1) to get Um Nyobe
to surrender to the French colonial authority and 2) to help the
French pierce the secret of Ngock Lituba, the sacred Alesed Rock,
symbol of the Mbog Bassa, and most important sanctuary of the Bassa
people. Many times, he asked the elders' permission to enter the Rock
with one or another French person, which they always refused, warning
Mgr. Mongo that Judas may have received thirty coins for Jesus but
neither Um Nyobe nor the Alesed Rock would be betrayed. Period. And
that if they, the elders, had to choose, it's him, Mongo, that would
be discarded.
One day, despite all the warnings, Mongo took
Bonneau, the bishop he was to replace as pastor of the diocese, to
the Alesed Rock. As the tale has it,
"Bonneau entered the
Rock on two feet,
And came out on a stretcher.
He entered the
Rock healthy,
And came out dying, one side of his body totally
numb,
Moaning: 'Les Bassa, les Bassa, instruisez-les!" (the
Bassa, the Bassa, educate them!?
Bonneau died two days later.
And Mongo never knew one more healthy day for the rest of his
life.
EXAMPLE 4: In the region of Eseka, a group of French
soldiers entered the forest one day and wandered for a long time
looking for the rebels. When the sun began to set, they met an old
woman who stopped them, claimed that she was lost and that she was
looking for a way out of the bush. But the regiment commander found
it best to ask the woman to join them, for it was late, and that he
himself will take her to safety the next day. He and his men were
planning to spend the night in the forest. When he asked her name,
she said: "Wenugwe."
They all ate, then built a camp
for the night. A few hours later, they were all asleep. But that
night appeared endless. We all have a sense of night and day, a sort
of built-in clock which tells us that it's supposed to be morning.
First these French armymen who had been in Kamerun for years began
wondering how long nights lasted in Equatorial Africa. They looked at
their wrist watches often. It was still night at four o'clock the
next day.
They soon realized that something was wrong and that
they were powerless in bringing back the day. So they called Wenugwe
who had kept her composure all that time. "What's going on
here?" the commander asked her.
"You are the one
holding up the night," she replied.
"How is
that?"
"I am your bride and we have yet to
consommate our wedding."
The story has it that the
commander began to cry, like a child, right there in front of his
men. This fellow who prided himself for never having touched a native
after twenty years of service in Africa, knew that his moment had
arrived. What happened next between the commander and Wenugwe, the
tale does not say. What it does relate to us is that the commander
let go of the night and the country called Kamerun the very next
day.
These stories have many elements in common. The first
thing they have in common is that it's the same story. Whether
it's
Um, Bikoy, Balep or Wenugwe, they all seem to have the power to
enchant and create illusion.
The second thing they have in
common is that all these stories are accounts of situations of
exception such as liberation struggles (even Um wants to free
himself
and get out of the riverhole), wars (freedom fighters against
colonialists), heroisms, survival, and application of initiatic
secrets. WHEN CORNERED, AFRICANS LOOK TO TRADITIONAL POWERS TO SAVE
THEMSELVES. That's the African way.
My father who was in the
medical profession, used to tell me that what people do when they are
sick to get well (more rest, better diet, eating more fruit and
drinking more milk), they should do when healthy (not to fall sick).
If we apply the same wisdom, WHAT WE, AFRICANS, DO WHEN CORNERED (IN
TIME OF WAR OR ELSE), WE SHOULD DO IN TIME OF PEACE SO THAT WAR DOES
NOT COME. We have got to know our power--Um power is simply one of
the many ingredients of AFRICAN POWER], master it, and use it to
develop ourselves, TO FEED OUR CHILDREN, to protect ourselves and the
integrity of our lands.
We must go in depth to investigate the
secret and power of Um. How does Um use his power? What are the
earlier circumstances which made Kisasa see fish and crabs and prawns
one minute and not see them next? How do human beings apply the same
secret and power to get themselves out of tricky situations?
I
could share the steps that it takes to create Um's illusion (a
formidable sense of impermanence) in people, the same way women
exchange kitchen recipes. But it would be just that: a recipe, a
trick. There is much more to this secret and power to reduce it to a
trick. The Mbon Um (neophyte of Um) must understand what is at play,
the meaning of this secret, knowledge and power, then learn how to
apply it, become a Um-Um. They first learn that the cosmos is an
artifact, a tool put at our disposal for us to use, then they learn
how it functions, and finally how to use it. That's what we are going
to do.
The anthropology of liberation we will be doing in this
chapter explores and investigates power. Is there such a thing as
African power? or power-the-African-way? What is power for the
African people? What is our understanding of power? Can we use
African power to develop our countries? to compete in world markets?
What will that require?
COSMO-SEMANTICS:
DEFINITION
Cosmo-semantics is the power arm of Engaged
Anthropology.
Cosmo-semantics means "meaning of meaning
of the cosmos". Cosmo-semantics captures the very meaning of the
cosmos (or what African tradition says the very meaning of the
cosmos
is), its organization and the operations of the metaphysical laws
which govern the universe, and its order.
Cosmo-semantics
teaches how to use the cosmos as a tool, how to drain power from it
and use it for our own protection and growth. Cosmo-semantics tries
to take what is most useful in African understanding of power out of
its traditional path and empirism and turn it into a power the modern
can use.
THE LAWS OF
NATURE
Seneca the Elder once
wrote: "Quaedam iura non scripta sed omnibus scriptis certiora
sunt" (Some laws are not written but they are better established
than all written ones). What was he talking about? Which laws was he
referring to?
Um teaches that nine natural laws govern our
planet, each one of the nine planets of the solar system, the solar
system itself, every planet of the cosmos, whether life is there or
not, and the cosmos itself. These nine laws are the metaphysical
tools which make up HINEA. In the Bassa cosmology, the nine laws
which rule the universe are: 1) LIJO
(complementary contradictions),
2) NYINGHA (motion), 3) NJOM (causality), 4) MAHOL (evolution), 5)
PUN, or MAPUN, or MAPUNA (compensations), 6) OT (natural
attractions), 7) NON, MANON, or TOLAMANON (cycles), 8) NYONGEN
(hierarchy) and 9) NGWEY
(symbolic correspondences).
In the
five examples given above, what is at play is simply the heroes
manipulating these nine metaphysical laws. If you master
cosmosemantics, you can do the same thing. The interactions of
alchemical laws and the manipulations of the cosmic forces and their
reactions in the body cells are one essential part of
cosmosemantics.
EXPLANATION OF THE METAPHYSICAL LAWS
1)
COMPLEMENTARY CONTRADICTIONS: Contradiction is the capacity to state
the contrary of what is, here and now; and a complement is a quantity
needed to make a thing complete. Complementary contradictions will
therefore be those contradictions (like light and darkness, hot and
cold, man and woman) which, when they come together, are able to
create or/and sustain life. Remember that for a fight to take place,
both parties must be willing to fight. Each time you indulge yourself
in a fight, you enact the law of complementary contradictions.
2)
MOTION: Anything that changes a place is set in motion. Leaves moved
by the wind, a dog running... yourself walking apply the law of
motion.
There are nine known motions: 1) Vertical motion with
acceleration equals gravity equals 9.8 meter per square second
downward, 2) Horizontal motion with acceleration equals zero when
velocity is constant, 3) Rotational motion, 4) Parabolic motion, 5)
Oscillatory
motion, 6) Vibratory motion, 7) Torsion motion, 8)
Sinusoidal motion, and 9) Wave motion.
3) CAUSALITY or
CAUSATION: Relationship between the agent of bringing something about
and the effects caused by this agent. For example, if the land is
wet, it is because it has rained.
4) EVOLUTION: Series of
movements (process of change) in a particular direction. When you
hear that man evolved from ONE monkey, a process of change had
occurred.
5) COMPENSATIONS: Reparative equivalence between
effects and causes. For instance, the tremendous strength of a
crippled person's arms compensate for the loss of his legs.
6)
NATURAL ATTRACTIONS: The natural power to draw toward oneself by
emotional and/or aesthetic appeal. It's no secret that women attract
men, which says that women have a natural power to draw men toward
them by aesthetic appeal.
7) CYCLES: Period of time occupied
by a series of events that repeat themselves regularly and in the
same order, a recurring round of events, the seasons for example.
8)
HIERARCHY: Things arranged in ranks, or graded series. Teachers like
to apply this law in classrooms when they give grades and rank their
students.
Hierarchy is the central law because it's the
chemistry law. The periodic chart of the elements is a ranked
series.
9) SYMBOLIC CORRESPONDANCES: Agreement between these
first eight metaphysical laws at particular moments. When someone
beats gravity and say, walks on water, he is applying the law of
symbolic correspondences.
These laws work individually
(diachrone) and, at the same time, interact with one another
(synchrone). Picture the cosmos as a gigantic computer which collects
information from each law and as a result of these interactions,
re-injects all the information processed back into the system and the
cycle begins anew. The unity of the cosmos is a functional unity from
which every planet benefits. The cosmos benefits from the birth or
death of each star. The cosmos benefits from the birth or death of
every human being. The cosmos benefits from the birth and death of
every creature.
THE COSMO-SEMANTIC TABLE
Now draw a
double entry table with these laws in ordonnees and coordonnees). You
get a table with 81 boxes. Box 27 for example is (causality)(symbolic
correspondences), which can also be written (c)(sc). We have here the
first view of the interaction of the natural laws the way they come
together in nature, contradictions reacting to motion, hierarchy
interweaving with attractions. Because of the law of complementary
contradictions which brings things in two, the positive and the
negative, each box of the cosmo-semantic table must be studied
accordingly, having its positive as well as its negative aspect.
THE
COSMO-SEMANTIC TABLE AS AN INFORMATION STRUCTURE
The
cosmo-semantic table is the first peep into what, in the Bassa
nation, the elders call "Nguy Minton mibi yek", literally
"The power the demiurges left behind." Before anything,
this power is an information structure capable of considering
billions and billions of pieces of information at megabitic speed, a
rate a billion time faster than the fastest electronic network.
When
Um's brain taps into that structure, it can create fish, crabs, and
prawns, and make them disappear at will. When a human brain taps into
that structure, it can transforms man into a palmnut bunch, blasts
thunder in broad daylight, or uphold the night.
EXPLANATORY
COSMO-SEMANTICS
To better understand cosmo-semantics and
better make use of it later, we must of course conceive each law as
attaining an end in itself. Its very existence is the presentation
and representation of its many components unto itself, for the sake
of its own ends. But the whole system is a complex unity, which can
be analyzed as a process of agreeing with its own
components.
Satisfactory cosmo-semantics must explain the
interweaving of efficient and final causation.
One tendancy is
exemplified in the slow decay of physical nature; the other tendancy
is exemplified by the early renewal of nature in the spring (cycles)
and by the upward course of biological evolution.
THE COSMOSEMANTIC STUTTERINGS OF
WESTERN PHILOSOPHY
Every
culture, every human being has an understanding of the metaphysical
laws that rule our planet. Some thinkers have put them down on paper.
Let's see what European philosophers, especially since the time of
the presocratics, have said about these laws.
Western
philosophy came in contact with cosmosemantics. Thales is said to
have traveled to Khemit (ancient Egypt) and to have thence brought
back to Greece the science of geometry. He seems to have discovered
how to calculate the distance of a ship at sea from observations
taken at two points on land, and how to estimate the height of a
pyramid from the length of its shadow. According to Aristotle, he
thought that water is the original substance, out of which all is
formed, that the magnet has a soul because it moves the iron
(ATTRACTION); further, that all things are full of gods.
Anaximander
held that all things come from a single primal substance, infinite,
eternal, neutral in the cosmic strife, ageless, and "it
encompasses all the worlds." He made this remarkable statement:
"Into that from which things take their rise they pass away once
more, as is ordained, for they make reparation and satisfaction to
one another for their injustice according to the ordering time."
Doesn't that sound like he is talking about PROPORTIONAL
COMPENSATIONS, an idea of justice, both cosmic and human?
He
spoke of an eternal MOTION, in the course of which was brought about
the origin of the worlds. According to him, the worlds were not
created, as in the judeo-christian theology, but evolved
(EVOLUTION).
Mathematics, in the sense of demonstrative and
deductive argument, begins in Europe with Pythagoras. Pythagoras is
believed to have taught "first, that the soul is an immortal
thing, and that it is transformed into other kinds of living things
(EVOLUTION); further, that whatever comes into existence is born
again in the revolutions of a certain CYCLE, nothing being absolutely
new."
Heraclites regarded fire as the fundamental
substance. Everything, like flame in a fire, is born by the death of
something else. "Mortals are immortals, and immortals are
mortals, the one's living the other's death and dying the other's
life," he wrote. There is UNITY in the world, but it is a unity
formed by the combination of opposites (COMPLEMENTARY
CONTRADICTIONS). All things come out of the one, and the one out of
all things. But the many have less reality than the one, which is God
(COMPLEMENTARY CONTRADICTIONS BETWEEN THE ONE AND THE MANY). He
talked of the world as the mingling of opposites. "Men do not
know how what is at variance agrees with itself. It is an attunement
of opposite tensions, like that of the bow and the lyre." His
belief in strife is connected with this theory, for in strife
opposites combined to produce a MOTION which is a harmony. There is
UNITY in the world, but it is a unity resulting from DIVERSITY.
He
said: "Couples are things whole and things not whole.
What is
drawn together and what is drawn asunder;
The harmonious and the
discordant.
The one is made of all things,
And all things issue
from the one."
Sometimes he spoke as if the unity were
more fundamental than the diversity:
"Good and ill are
one.
To God all things are fair and good and right,
but men
hold some things wrong and some right.
The way up and the way down
is one and the same.
God is day and night, winter and summer, war
and peace,
surfeit and hunger; but He takes various shapes,
just
as fire, when it is mingled with spices,
is named according to the
savour of each.
Nevertheless, there would be no unity
if there
were no opposites to combine:
It is the opposite which is good for
us."
This exploration of Khemitic wisdom (where Umics
really began) contains the germ of Hegel's philosophy which proceeds
by a synthesis of opposites.
For Parmenides, the only true
being is "THE ONE", the plenum, which is infinite and
indivisible. It is not, as in Heraclitus, a union of opposites, since
there are no opposites: "cold" means only "not hot"
and "dark" means only "no light" or "not
bright".
Empedocles is the one who established earth,
air, fire and water as the four elements for Western doctrine. Each
of these was everlasting, but they could be mixed in different
proportions, and thus produce the changing complex substances that we
find in the world (CHEMISTRY, HIERARCHY). They were combined by Love
and separated by Strife. There were periods when Love was in the
ascendant and others when Strife was the stronger. This introduced
the CYCLE: when the elements have been thoroughly mixed by Love,
Strife gradually sorts them out again; when Strife has separated,
Love gradually reunites them. Thus every compound substance is
temporary; only the elements, together with Love and Strife, are
everlasting. - There is a similarity to Heraclitus, but a softening,
since it is not Strife alone, but Strife and Love together, that
produce change. The doctrine of Empedocles, outside science, consists
in the theory of the four elements and in the use of the two
principles of Love and Strife to explain change.
Anaxagoras
held that everything is infinitely divisible, and that even the
smallest portion of matter contains some of each element. He taught
that mind is the source of all MOTION. It causes a rotation (MOTION,
CYCLE) which is gradually spreading throughout the world.
The
founders of atomism were Leucippus and Democritus. The latter, a much
more definite figure, spent a considerable time in Egypt in search of
knowledge. Leucippus, if not Democritus, was led to atomism in the
attempt to mediate between MONISM and PLURALISM, as represented by
Parmenides and Empedocles respectively. They believed that everything
is composed of atoms which are physically, not geometrically,
indivisible; that between the atoms, there is empty space, that atoms
are indestructible, that they always have been, and always will be,
in MOTION.
The atomists, unlike Socrates, Plato and Aristotle,
sought to explain the world without introducing the notion of purpose
(or final cause). The "final cause" of an occurence is an
event in the future for the sake of which the occurence takes place.
Why does the baker make bread? Because people will be hungry. Things
are explained by the purpose they serve. When we ask "why?"
concerning an event, we may mean either of two things: "What
purpose did this event serve?" or "What earlier
circumstances caused this event?" The answer to the former
question is a teleological explanation (explanation by the final
cause) and the answer to the latter question is a mechanistic
explanation. Experience has shown that the mechanistic question leads
to scientific knowledge, while the teleological question does not.
The atomists asked mechanistic questions and gave mechanistic
answers.
If you have been reading this discourse closely, you
may have noticed that each of these presocratic characters bumped
into one metaphysical law or another, and sought to explain the world
by it. It has always been so in Western philosophy. Hegel
believed
that complementary contradictions, dialectics, could alone explain
everything and lead man to the knowing. Darwin came and made much
noise with evolution. All he did was to masterfully prove that
evolution exists and is a true law of nature. For those who already
knew, Darwin was a complete waste of time.
The existence or
not of God is important in Western philosophy. It's vital in the
world of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle. With the advent and growth of
Christianity, God became central. Until Nietzsche killed Him. And
Karl Marx buried Him. Western philosophy these past 50 years is a
discussion with Nietzsche. Western politics these past century is a
debate with Karl Marx.
Personally I see in both the discussion
with Nietzsche and the debate with Karl Marx the angst of a people
begging for God to provide guidance by performing a miracle. They
like the idea of God's death (or God's murder) and His replacement by
Man but when they, and we all, see Man's (polluting) work in only two
centuries of industrial revolution, they, and we all, shiver.
THE
MIND ACCORDING TO UM
The universe, our galaxy, the solar
system, our planet Earth, every creature, including MAN, each has an
intelligence, an entity were decision making, perception, awareness,
and sense of self reside. The MIND is the interconnection of the
minds of the universe, our galaxy, our solar system, our planet
Earth, and every individual's own mind. Needless to say that the
phenomenon of mind and consciousness is complex. It cannot be a
physical object and may not have a particular location. Science has
proven that the destruction of one or other part of the brain may
severely impair the working of the mind, but not destroy it. Even for
modern science, the mind appears as an interplay of things
(perception, intelligence, stored and unstored knowledge) much as the
rainbow is the interplay of light and raindrops. In-put from the
senses play a part, so do body chemicals whose ebb and flow we
experience as language, emotions, and so on, the way we translate 1)
the main interplay and the subsequent underlays of interplays, 2)
concepts into symbolic forms, and 3) the way we acquire, store new
data and are able to retrieve them later on.
Any mind acts
that way, whether it is the mind of the universe or the mind of a
rat. The difference is simply of degree and capacity of data storage.
In the animal brain (including man), storage takes place as a pattern
of connections among neurons, the nerve cell which serves as the
brain's basic building blocks. The first element is the EYE through
which information enters the brain, arriving in the form of electric
impulses streaming from the retina up the optic nerve and into the
cerebral cortex, the gray matter which houses the brain's higher
functions. The impulses die away within milli-seconds. It is their
passage which reinforces the particular set of connections between
this particular set of neutrons, giving them the ability to recreate
the image. The more often a pattern (short-term memory) is
reinforced, the more likely the pattern becomes a pathway (long-term
memory).
Um also stresses that human beings use only about 9%
of their brain capacity because of a poor wiring. A boy who grows up
among the Um-Um cannot help it but develop extraordinary
capabilities. The Um-Um do the re-wiring for him.
Another
thing to know is that the brain (whether it is the brain of the
universe or the brain of a dog) craves new information, for, as said
above, the mind is an information system. When the mind does not have
new information, it creates it. The "it" here is something
we won't often like and will call "evil". But the
knowledgeable knows that without evil, nothing new appears in the
world, the village, or in our individual lives.
Also, every
brain has a convergence zone, and the mind has many convergence zones
(cosmosemantic space/time), and billion of secondary ones spread
throughout the universe. They coordinate the minutest information the
universe's brain needs to be fully functional. Every brain, at its
level, merge disparate pieces of information into a whole in order to
create its consciousness, its sense of self, of being in the right
here, right now. All these convergence zones are inter-related,
providing access to new information and dispaching relevant data to
each other.
This sense of self is one thing each brain
reconstructs endlessly, moment after moment, on the basis of its own
physical reality, that is, what it was or what it knows of its past,
its present reality, and what it wants its future to be.
Emotion,
not simply love, is, according to Um, a key element of learning and
decision making, and is central to the process of rational thought.
Severe stress is the only thing that can change the way a brain
functions.
COSMO-SEMANTIC
COMPUTING or HOW THE
COSMO-SEMANTIC MIND
WORKS
Suppose you have nine computers at your disposal. The
first one computes DIACHRONICALLY everything that relates to the law
of Contradictions, the second one does the same with everything that
relates to Motion, the third one with Causation, the fourth one with
Evolution, the fifth with Compensations, the sixth with Natural
Attractions, the seventh with Cycles, the eighth with Hierarchy, and
the ninth computer stores only information about Symbolic
Correspondances. Then you have another computer at the center of this
system which computes SYNCHRONICALLY all information emanating from
each of the above-mentioned computers. This is how the universe
works; this is how the solar system works, this is how our planet
Earth works. This is also how our brain works, whether we are
conscious of it or not. Being conscious of this, and being conscious
that we are conscious of this, is the first step to cosmosemantics.
Focus on this, meditate upon it, and you benefit from the structural
energy of everything that is, from medicinal plants (trees, roots,
plants,flowers, roots, barks) to the energy of shapes (pyramids,
triangles, squares, and obelisks).
When one law meets another,
for instance when Evolution (E) meets Hierarchy (H), what happens
next is fourthfold, in virtue of the law of contradictions, which can
be contradictory as well as complementary:
(+E)(+H) here both are
positive, thus complementary;
(-E)(+H) the first one is negative
(contradictory) and the second one positive, i.e
complementary;
(+E)(-H) the first is positive (complementary) and
the second one negative, contradictory.
(-E)(-H) here both are
negative, thus contradictory.
This second exercise (just
having the mental image of the positive and negative aspects of
things acting individually, with one another, and synchronically)
helps you gain the energy of the non-polarized force such as the
energystate which is created between birth, life-state, and
death.
The actions and interactions of the eight first laws
create the ninth, the law of symbolic correspondences (SC).(SC)
crossing paths with (SC) and you have a system where sounds, tastes,
colors really respond to one another.
Connect all these
"computers" together and you have a N'UMI. In doing so, you
turn them into a system which, when you change the smallest element
in one computer, you change the whole system altogather. Their
connection point IS the cosmosemantic space/time. Again this is how
Nature works. This is how the African mind works. The minds of most
members of all societies close to Nature work the same. When a mind
takes distance from Nature, like the Western mind did, it's a matter
of time before it starts to pollute or, as African elders
would put
it, "commit incest with the Mother."
THE GREATEST
POLLUTION
The Western mind stops at dialectics, the first
computer. The Western mind seems incapable of going beyond the law of
contradictions. As a result, the dialectic tradition is greatest in
the West (Westerners seem to see the world as ONLY dialectical), not
as an entity set in motion, effect and causes responding to one
another, evolving, where events repeat themselves in cycles, elements
being naturally ranked, and where all these laws often agree to
disagree with the natural order, thus creating a space where all laws
are suspended. Those who cater to it, Hegel and his cohorts, the
Hegelians, even Karl Marx and his followers, the Marxists, have
become great among human beings. This is also the reason why the
Western mind does not seem to really have a problem with pollution.
When I say this word, "pollution", I do not simply mean oil
or fumes or other chemical dumps in the ocean and the atmosphere. I
also mean slavery, colonization, The
Jewish Holocaust, apartheid,
neocolonization, racism. Go see what alcohol
(the white man's water
of fire) has done to the Native Americans. The Western mind created
all those ignominies which corrupt the mind and instill doubt and
uncertainty in us about our own humanity. They lead us to ask
ourselves: When we say "human beings", are we all talking
about the same thing? If the a human mind conceived and carried out
such activities as Slavery (the African holocaust) and the Final
Solution (the Jewish holocaust), am I too a human being?
THE
COSMOSEMANTIC WEB
At this level, the cosmosemantic student is
able to master the inherent laws of plants, rocks and crystals,
metals and manets. He knows why colors, sounds, taste and smells
respond to one another.
Nature is a cosmosemantic system. So
is the African mind. A cosmosemantic web. So also is the Indian and
Asian(?) mind, as evidenced in the story of Indra's Net. Indra was a
mythical king whose people made him a net which, wherever the strands
crossed, had a jewel reflecting every other jewel in the net. This is
cosmosemantics at its best.
THE
COSMOSEMANTIC SPACE/TIME
The
cosmosemantic space/time is the riverhole, where the laws of nature
do not exist. It's what the medecine man creates materially when he
builds a sanctuary or an altar. In other words, an altar is the
cosmosemantic space/time materialized. There, the metaphysical laws
that rule our planet are suspended. They work no more. There, Nature
puts itself in the juridic position of an obedient one. It's as
though Nature says to Man: "Command, I'll obey."
ANOTHER
ASPECT OF THE UNIVERSE'S WORK
I like the following examples
because they happened in the Western world, not in Africa.
Cosmosemantic phenomena happen everywhere:
Three extraordinary
things happened on Holy Thursday of 1996 while we were in the street
retreat led by Roshi Glassman, a Zen Buddhist monk who organizes
street retreats all over the world, including Nazi concentration
camps in Poland and Germany, to raise consciousness about suffering,
homelessness, AIDS, and violence. His ambition is to get participants
to ask themselves: "What is my personal role in these ills? And
what is my own next step toward healing these wounds of
society?"
That morning,, Daigu wanted to read the paper
and set off to buy one--Daigu is the Zen Buddhist name of Michael
O'Keefe, a Hollywood actor who is a fixation in the tv series:
Roseanne.
"That's exactly the mindset I'm trying to
change," Glassman said, trying to stop him, and added: "You
want something, you buy it. Isn't there any other
alternative?"
Daigu did not want to hear that. "I
need to read the news," he said.
Fifteen minutes later, a
guy came to us with a stack of newspapers under his arm. He wished to
sell them for a quarter each but nobody wanted them, so he trotted
away. He came back five minutes later and just dropped them on the
bench, saying: "What the heck! You can have them all."
Around
noon, as we were ready to go to the soup kitchen, Sarah who had been
sitting with us, said that she had cooked for us. We forgot about the
soup kitchen and ate her food instead right there in the park. A few
minutes later, I heard Rabbi Don Singer say that he was dying for a
cup of coffee and wanted to buy one across the street. Todd and Ahmed
Munir followed him. "Isn't there any other alternative?"
Roshi Glassman asked again. But nobody replied. Singer, Todd, and
Munir had not crossed the street before a nun appeared, inviting us
and the homeless people of Tompkins Park (New York City) to lunch at
a nearby church. "There's coffee and afterwards you'll get your
feet washed, just like Christ did after the Last Supper, and a new
pair of socks," I heard her say. We followed her. The caffe con
leche was delicious, made exactly as in Cuba or Puerto Rico. Walking
back to Tompkins Park, I heard another participant to the retreat,
Arnie, say: "I have never eaten this much and this good in my
own home," then he asked me: "Is it always like this on the
streets?"
"This is holy week and the middle class is
atoning," I said. "Just imagine when there's no penitence
in the air."
These anecdotes in themselves offer nothing
remarkable (to a non-initiate). But these are the sort of things an
elder asks 13-year-old boys to pay attention to when he takes them to
a three-month-bush retreat before they are allowed to enter adult
society.
There are three reactions possible when you call the
universe to the rescue. In the above anecdotes, the newspaper guy's
wish to sell his newspapers is a call to the universe. So is Daigu's
desire to read the news. The nun's plan to get people to come to her
church and share a meal with her society is a call to the universe,
so is Don Singer's desire for a cup of coffee. See how they meet and
how the concerned miss out.
Any want, desire, or even prayer
is a call to the universe. We send messages in all directions and
believe it or not, they are heard by a lot of creatures, people
included. Some run away from us, some stay put, some move toward us
to offer assistance and comfort. Isn't there any other alternative?
There always is. Every call to the universe brings millions of
alternatives. The Western mind is simply too one-tracked, and as
Herbert Marcuse wrote, "too unidimensional", to see
them.
Pay attention to the cosmosemantic space/time. There
things happen ahead of their normal or natural schedule.
PLAYING
GOD
What happens when want, desire, and even prayer have not
worked and man steps up to actually manipulates the metaphysical laws
that rule our planet to get them to be effective for his sake? IS MAN
PLAYING GOD OR IS MAN GOD? Is Um God? Are the Um-Um gods? If man
simply plays God (when for instance a Western biochemist tries
genetic engineering out), then questionning the limits of Reason,
Freedom and Necessity is relevant. But if man is God, then he IS
Freedom itself, that is, freedom, and liberty, and free will, and
free arbiter. What a scary thought!
THE
COSMO-SEMANTIC GOD
Of course the notion of God is
important in cosmosemantics. Who is God for cosmosemanticians? How to
best approach Him, talk to Him, receive blessings from Him?
Before
we begin, let me ask you this: Would you one day want to be
transported instantly to work without having to take your car, or the
bus, or commute by train? How about being transported in an instant
to another destination in another continent, say from Africa to
America and back without ever facing the challenge of delayed jets,
packed planes, lost luggage? Have you realized that that's what we
have been talking about here? Have you realized that that's what
cosmosemantics may one day offer?
I am sure that you all have
experienced weird things like you think of someone and a minute
later, he calls or appears or you receive a letter from him. MINEM MI
N'LENLA, the elders would say, as if hearts afire paid visits to one
another. You are sure you have placed your purse on a table. You look
and look and do not see it, and when you are no longer looking for
it, here it is right there on the table. Now think hard and ask
yourself a teleological question to get a teleological answer: "Why
did I think of my brother a couple of minutes before he called me?"
Then ask yourself a mechanical question in order to get a mechanical
answer: "What earlier circumstances made me think of my
brother?" or better yet "What earlier circumstances made my
brother call me?"
In the beginning of our discussion on
cosmosemantics, I gave you a few examples about three people who used
special powers to fight the invader in Africa. Let's ask a mechanical
question about one of them, say, Bikoy. What earlier circumstances
caused him to transmute into a palmnut bunch? You may think about all
the possible and probable initiatic manipulations he went through to
master his powers but let me suggest this answer: the most important
earlier circumstances that caused him to transmute into a palmnut
bunch was 1) the KNOWLEDGE that his people, the Bassa, had a weapon
that could topple the colonizer and get him to leave the country, and
2) the WILL to use that weapon. That WEAPON, which is simply a
KNOWLEDGE, is cosmosemantics.
IDENTITY
TRANSFER AND
TELEPORTATION
Have you realized that this transmutation of
Bikoy into a palmnut bunch is what modern physicists refer to as
IDENTITY TRANSFER? And have you realized that in one of the other
examples, Balep (the man who manipulates lightning and thunder to
escape the soldiers who had incircled him) used the equivalent of
what quantum physicists call TELEPORTATION: disappearing here and
appearing somewhere else? Destroying matter in one place and
reproducing it instantly somewhere else, on the other side of the
room, the other side of the forest or the other side of the
galaxy?
THERE IS NO QUANTUM WEIRDNESS OF NATURE
If you
think that a purse which disappears and reappears, thinking about
someone who calls you a couple of minutes later are random
occurrences, you are dead wrong. They are neither "eccentricities
of nature", "nature weirdness", nor the "quantum
weirdness of nature". They are what I call UMICS, works of a
cosmosemantic nature which follows a real pattern, a precise order
that the elders have been able to explain thousands of years ago, and
which they can even repeat at will. They explain that, in the case of
a person calling you a minute or two after you thought of him, at
that very moment, the laws of nature met at the space/time you were
at and created a cosmosemantic space/time. When that occurs, a vacuum
is created and whatever thought you had at that particular moment is
read by the universe as an order to obey without discussion.
This
is heavy stuff, I know. Um's power is too much power for one person
to have. I know that too. But a man's got to do what a man's got
to
do. Eccentricities of nature or the quantum weirdness of nature
is
the cosmosemantic nature of things. Quantum physics cannot explain
it; cosmosemantics can. Just read on. You are not wasting your time,
for if cosmosemantics can make teleportation a reality, airplanes,
buses, cars, motorcycles will be obsolete. And if motorized
transportation is obsolete, just think about the pollution we are
going to cut off.
Remember what dialectics had proven: Not
only does everything have a contrary, but everthing carries within
its own contradiction. In other words, if there is a metaphysical law
and a natural force called gravity (a force that pulls everything
inward, to the middle of our planet), there must be a law and force
that is the contrary of gravity, and there must be within gravity a
law and force that contradicts gravity, an antigravity force, an
energy in the vacuum of space and time that negates (attenuates?) the
effect of mass gravity.
There's no quantum weirdness of
nature. The universe has no eccentricities. Actually, what Western
scientists call quantum weirdness of nature is Nature at its best,
the finest tool Creation has put at our disposal to help us live and
live well.
THE CREATOR
AND HIS CREATION
Did I say
Creation? If there is Creation, then there must be a Creator. If
there is a Creator, then according to cosmosemantics, there must be
not only the contrary of the Creator but the negation of the Creator
within Himself, that is, pure energy in the vacuum of space and time
that negates the causes, actions, effects and influences of the
Creator. Put these three together and you begin to have an idea of
the cosmosemantic God. A God who did not create uncertainty or
indetermination, a God so powerful that He could afford to create His
own contrary and His own negation. Put these three realms together
again: 1) The Creator (Pure Energy in the vacuum of space and time
which creates, 2)The NoCreator (Pure Energy in the vacuum of space
and time which contradicts the Creator) and 3) The AntiCreator (Pure
Energy in the vacuum of space and time which negates all influences
of the Creator) and you have the best part of Nature's intelligence
and actions: the power to enchant. Cosmosemantic computing will
show
this sooner or later. Ngambi (the Oracle) even predicts that
cosmosemantics will revolutionize the way we human beings approach
knowledge more than anything we human beings have ever created.
In
a way, the cosmosemantic God is your everyday God, the One you pray
in the churches the polluter brought to Africa. In another way, He is
not. This is the God Nietzsche slaughtered because He is crippling
and this is the God whose worship Marx said was the opium of the
people, for this God is lethargic. I have to tell you, one gets the
most from cosmosemantics if he believes in a Supreme Intelligence, a
God who manipulates the metaphysical laws to enchant and create more
enchantment in the universe. As most African traditions stress, this
God used to live among human beings like a shop-owning Father among
His sons, but He moved away with His shop the day He granted us
Reason, Freedom, and Necessity. But He made sure we know the Way to
His compound and when we go to His shop to buy merchandise, He
accepts counterfeit coins from us.
This God is an aesthetic
God, this is the reason why before anything, you should thoroughly
investigate your people's idea of beauty. No one would be thirsty or
hungry if there were no such things as drinking water or food.
Likewise our desire for beauty and our sense of awe make sense if
there exists Beauty and an embodiment of Beauty.
Each one of
us is this Father's son or daughter. Each one of us is the
manifestation of pure humanity, which is a manifestation of pure
divinity, for anyone of us, human beings, has all authority to play
with the metaphysical laws that govern our planet and the whole
universe. When one of us decides to play this game, he is a Um-Um, a
cosmosemantician. And the Father delights himself when He sees us
trying to create enchantment and more enchantment. Tradition has it
that those are the only moments he smiles and amuses Himself.
IS
THE COSMOSEMANTIC GOD INTELLIGIBLE?
I am describing nothing
but the African idea of the Supreme Being, the Bassa Hilolombi, the
Bamileke Tshiepo, the Pahuings Zamba or Zambe, the Bakwedi Nyame, the
Father who distanced Himself from His children to allow them to take
His place. The cosmosemantic God is intelligible to Westerners as
well, as Pure Energy. Actually, and this is an irony, Westerners have
dismissed the Judeo-Christian God they brought to Africa a long time
ago. Figure that in an essay titled 'Comment" which appeared in
New Black Friars, 1984, page 3, J.O. Mills stresses that "while
every day in the West roughly 7,500 people stop being Christians,
every day in Africa, roughly double that number become
Christians."
The December 7, 1997 edition of the New York
Times Magazine published a survey, "Belief by the Numbers",
compiled by Russell Shorto, which places Nigeria first among the most
actively religious countries (89%) against Canada (38%), Spain (25%),
France, which used to call itself "La fille ainee de l'Eglise"
(21%) and Australia (16%). Which religion appears to be the
fastest-growing Eastern religion in the West? Buddhism.
If
religion is the opium of the people, surely our Nigerian brothers
must be sleeping a lot. And if religion is said to be the balm of the
oppressed, then our brothers, Nigerians, must be suffering a lot
under these successive military regimes. We must do something here to
help them stay awake and find freedom.
But what I am not sure
of is Westerners being capable to be (or become) cosmosemanticians.
Western science demands that everything be carefully measured. In
cosmosemantics, you measure nothing, for every space/time, every
single particle, and every single particle in the space/time
continuum in essence carries so much information that measurement is
simply impossible. Let's say for a moment, for the sake of this
discussion, that we begin to measure things, by the end we finish
measuring a simple particle in the space/time continuum, the
measurements we recorded first would have changed. Measuring is the
enemy of cosmosemantics.