Vodou, << voh DOO, >> is a term used to describe a set of beliefs, traditions, and practices taken largely from traditional African religions and Roman Catholicism. Vodou comes from a word in the Fon language of west Africa meaning spirit. It is sometimes incorrectly spelled Voodoo. People practice various forms of Vodou in west Africa, the Caribbean, Brazil, and parts of the United States.
Followers of Vodou are called Vodouisants. They believe in a creator being and many spirits. Each person has a protector spirit, usually inherited from an ancestor. Protector spirits can reward individuals with luck or wealth. They can also punish people with misfortune or illness. Vodouisants believe that spirits commonly possess people and can speak, give advice, and tell stories about the past. Vodouisants also believe that after people die, they go to Nan Ginen, meaning in Africa. Nan Ginen sometimes is pictured as being under the sea.
In Haiti, Vodouisants organize themselves into temples. An oungan (priest) or manbo (priestess) heads each temple. The oungan or manbo leads prayer services for the congregation, called a society. Assistants known as laplas and ounsi help the leader in these ceremonies. Prayer services might celebrate one of the spirits, who are often the same as particular Catholic saints. Services also might initiate somebody into Vodou or marry someone to a spirit to bring that person extra luck.
Vodou began in Benin and nearby areas. In the 1700’s, French colonists brought Africans to Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) as slaves. The slaves shared their beliefs and practices with one another. They fought against French rule from 1791 to 1804, when Haiti became independent. Oral histories tell of spirits aiding the slave revolt.
French colonists and, later, ruling-class Haitians and the Catholic Church tried to keep people from practicing Vodou. They saw it as a threat, because it was the faith of the majority of the people who were poor. They feared these people would use Vodou to organize against them. False ideas circulated that Vodou was black magic and that its members stuck pins in dolls. In 2003, the Haitian government officially recognized Vodou as a religion.
