To maintain spiritual wellness, it is sometimes
recommended to wash the kra and provide food
offerings to the particular Winti that corresponds
to a particular person’s kra and djodjo. The corre-
sponding Winti depends partially on the day of
the week one was born. Just as in the Akan tradi-
tion, the weekday of one’s birth determines the
name of one’s kra, and there are a total of seven
names for both sexes. They also correspond to
personality types. In Suriname, these names are
usually only used during the purification rituals of
the kra, during which the male and female version
of the name is called.
Three Categories of Ancestor SpiritsThe spirit or soul of a deceased person is divided
into three categories. As noted previously, the
first is the jorka, which is the name reserved for
persons who have passed recently or in the not so
distant past. This corresponds to the category of
the living dead who are so termed because their
process of dying is not complete for up to five
generations.
The next category is called kabra, which is the
general name that refers to the spirit of ancestors
who have been deceased for at least seven gener-
ations. The kabra is also an ancestral spirit that
has been reborn at least once in one of his or
her descendants. This quality in the kabra is
an example of the Winti belief in the principle of
reincarnation.
The last and most senior category of spirit of a
deceased person is called profen, which are the
ancestral spirits of our forefathers and -mothers
that passed in Africa. It is believed that their spir-
its accompanied their descendants to the diaspora.
The profen, besides being a spirit of a person who
was never christened when he or she was alive, is
also the spirit of the patrilineal sanguine clan
called bere or lo. The profen are the spiritual
founders of the patrilineal clan. Each member of
the clan shares the same spiritual founder, and
therefore they share major communal rituals.
Other aspects of a person’s spiritual makeup
are dependent on a variety of other influences;
examples of these are as follows:
- The spiritual forces (Winti) that a person is
exposed to or presented with during his or her life.
2. The Winti that are tied to a family via the famil-
ial (maternal and paternal) ancestral line of spir-
its (the jorka, kabra, and profen).
3. The Winti that regulate all other life forms (e.g.,
plants, animals, life under water, and life in the air).
4. The Winti that do not expose themselves to
anyone, but still ensure that life remains intact.
Winti teachings say that people must direct
themselves to their spiritual possibilities. Spiritual
life must be ordered by the operation of spiritual
links and divine laws, and furthermore, spiritual
stability and harmony are dependent on this. The
absence or violation of one of these spiritual links
can mean disharmony. With faith in Winti, one
can nourish oneself spiritually.The Winti Pantheon
The Winti religion recognizes four pantheons,
each with its own particular theological society of
gods and spirits, divided into male, female, and
child gods, of which most have retained their
African names and characteristics. The four pan-
theons of air, Earth, water, and forest consist of
the following gods:1.TheTapu-WintiorTapuKromantigodsofthe
air, universes, and cosmos. Wooding states that
these Tapu-Winti are popular gods in the Para region
of Suriname because these gods are known to have
come directly from Africa along with the ancestors.
The belief is that these gods selected the people from
Para and protected them. They are all high gods that
are particularly concerned with the spiritual cleanli-
ness of the people. The colors with which they are
associated are white, blue, and black. The word
Kromantiin Winti indicates sacred black African
nobility. It is also a sacred spiritual language only
spoken by Winti spiritual leaders.
Among the pantheon of the Tapu-Winti, there
are seven gods. The first is Opete. This god domi-
nates the pantheon of the air or cosmos gods and is
associated with thunder. He is endowed with
knowledge and wisdom. He maintains the contact
between the pantheon and God the Creator and
also with Africa from whence he originates. The
wordopetemeans vulture in Fante-Akan, and its
meaning remains the same in this area, although itWinti 721