Ngai Nanyokie asked Ngai Narok to stop sending
rain, which she or he did. Later, when asked to
release rain again by Ngai Narok, Ngai Nanyokie
refused. What followed was a dispute between the
two, and the noise that they made while arguing
was heard in the form of loud thunder. Hence,
powerful, invisible forces of the natural world,
such as rain, thunder, and lightning, represent
both blessings and punishments from Ngai. When
drought strikes, the Maasai appeal to their
supreme God by having children sing a religious
song while standing in a circle and holding a
bunch of grass in their hands after the sun has
retired for the day.
Ama MazamaSeealsoGod; Maasai
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. (1988).The Maasai of Matapato:A Study of
Rituals of Rebellion. Bloomington: Indiana University
Press.
Spencer, P. (2003).Maasai(African People)/Rites and
Ceremonies. London: Routledge.
NGANGA
In Africa, religion is not merely about the world
to come. It is not about self-denial for the glori-
fication of deities. Rather, religion is viewed as a
system of the ultimate meaning of human existence.
It provides a comprehensive healing of mind and
body and enhances spiritual and physical well-
being. At the core of this religious worldview
stands the nganga, or healer, who acts as a power-
ful mediator between the visible world and the
realm of spirits and ancestors.
The nganga is an indispensable agent in the
African tradition of healing and peacemaking.
The wordngangais used in the Kiluba language
of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and in
many other Bantu languages, from central Africa
to Zimbabwe and South Africa. It refers to the
healing function of religion. Although referred to
by some scholars with less offensive lexicons as
“medicine-man” or “shaman,” the nganga has
been widely disparaged in Western scholarship, in
which he is often referred to as a witchdoctor.
In Africa, however, the nganga is a savior of lives
who plays an honorable role in the religious and
social order of Africa. As a healer of body and
spirit, the nganga works in close relation with the
spirits and is often a priest who bridges the world
of the living and that of the ancestors. In other
words, the nganga is a complex and polyvalent
agent. He is at once an herbalist and a priest, a
diviner and a prophet. He may be regarded accord-
ing to other taxonomies as a clairvoyant, a shaman,
a psychic, or a medium. His medicine is closely
intertwined with prayers, incantations, songs,
dance, offerings, and sacrifices to the deities. While
performing his divination, the nganga often enters
a trance to better communicate with the spirits.
In African cosmology, it is believed that the world
of the ancestors abounds in peace, joy, harmony,
wealth, health, and happiness, whereas the current
world of the living is beset by evildoers, danger, ill-
ness, and death. Therefore, genuine healing cannot
be achieved without the intervention of the world of
the ancestors. Moreover, physical and mental illness
is viewed primarily as a form of disorder or imbal-
ance resulting from disunity between mind and body,
the individual and society, or humans and spirits. A
proper diagnosis of the root causes of disease
requires an investigation of social relations and spir-
itual transgressions. These negative forces of disor-
der are often referred to as witchcraft (buloji,
kindoki, orbutshi). Hence, the nganga employs divina-
tion and spirit possession to determine the cause of
the disorder and plays the role of an “anti-sorcerer”
(the one who neutralizes the power of witches). His
healing process restores the psychic, social, and cos-
mic balance of the individual, as well as that of his
community, and involves the observance of funda-
mental ethical rules to avoid sinking in chaos that
brings about sickness.448 Nganga