398 Maat
generosity. Through the consumption of meat and
the drinking of milk, God and human beings become
one again. Thus, meat eating and milk drinking,
through their re-creation of this primordial unity, are
religious experiences of the highest order and, quite
predictably, occur at the most important times in
Maasai life, such as birth, initiation and circumci-
sion, marriage, and death, and on all critical occa-
sions like rites of passage from one age set to the
next. Animals are ritually killed, and the meat is
blessed by the elders and shared and eaten publicly.
In addition to Ngai, who gave all the cattle in the
world to the Maasai, the latter also believe in protec-
tive spirits. Each person receives one such spirit at the
time his or her birth ceremony. The spirit’s role is to
protect a person during his or her lifetime from all evil
and danger. When a person dies, two scenarios are
possible depending on his or her behavior while alive.
If the person was a good and constructive member of
his or her community, his or her soul will be taken by
the protective spirit to a beautiful place, filled with cat-
tle and grass. If the person was bad, his or her soul will
be taken to a desert place with no water and no cattle.
The central figure in Maasai religion, as far as
human beings are concerned, is theLaibon(plural:
Laiboni). Laiboni intercede between God and the
living. They are diviners. They organize and
preside over ceremonies involving sacrifices and
offerings. They heal both physical and spiritual ill-
nesses. They cure physical ailments with herbs
because their herbal knowledge is vast and widely
respected. They tackle spiritual illnesses with spiri-
tual means. Some scholars have suggested that they
can be sorted into three categories: those Laiboni
dealing only with illness and private domestic
issues; those Laiboni preoccupied with war, ade-
quate rainfall, and so on; and, finally, those
Laiboni concerned with issues of importance to the
community at large. One becomes a Laibon
through inheritance within one’s lineage.
Ama MazamaSeealsoNgai
Further Readings
Bentsen, C. (1989).Maasai Days. New York: Doubleday.
Hauge, H.-E. (1979).Maasai Religion and Folklore.
Nairobi, Kenya: City Print Works.
Kipury, N. (1983).Oral Literature of the Maasai.
Nairobi, Kenya: East African Educational Publishers.
Scheub, H. (2000).A Dictionary of African Mythology,
the Mythmaker as Storyteller. Oxford, UK: Oxford
University Press.
Spencer, P. (2003).Maasai(African People):Rites and
Ceremonies. London: Routledge.
Spencer, P. (2003).The Maasai of Matapato:A Study of
Rituals of Rebellion. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press.MAAT
Maat represents the personification of a cluster of
concepts that introduce the world to abstract
ideas of philosophy, such as order, truth, balance,
harmony, justice, reciprocity, and propriety.
Represented in ancient Egyptian literature as a
goddess, Maat is unlike the familiar goddesses of
Hathor, Nebhet, and Auset, in that she was more
a concept than a goddess to be worshipped. It was
believed by the ancient Egyptians that Maat
existed as long as Ra existed and that when the
universe was created it was only Maat with Ra.
Without Maat, chaos would reign, evil would
conquer, and injustice would be the state of the
world; thus, it was necessary that Maat exist from
the beginning of the universe and come into being
as the food of Ra.
Because Maat was harmony and order, she was
what was correct, and she represented the way
things had to be done. Once humans understood
the fundamental aspects of relationships, they also
understood the essentiality of Maat because the
only method for preventing chaos was to do Maat.
The early Africans accepted the fact that the
universe was balanced, ordered, and right. How-
ever, this correctness could be maintained only by
vigilance or else the rationality that existed would
disappear. The aim, therefore, of all societies was
the maintenance of Maat. When Maat was not
maintained, then the universe became unpre-
dictable, chaotic, and irrational. In the realm of
morality, discipline, order, reciprocity, and propri-
ety were to be honored and encouraged, but isfet,
evil, and disorder were to be discouraged and con-
fronted to bring Maat back to her rightful place at
the center of human society.