IFA (edited slightly, for the uninitiated)
The subject of our ethnographic study was the divination system known as IFA. IFA is the name of an oracular entity, as well as the name used to refer to a deity that created the universe and gave humans the knowledge to achieve dominion over the Earth. According to my informant, the IFA was developed by the Abyssinian Highlanders of the East African Rift Plateau where the Blue Nile finds its source... known today as Ethiopia, and referred to in various historical sources as Somaliland, Axum, Aker, Kush or Punt. This tradition traces modern human civilization back to approximately 11,600 years ago (referencing Manetho, an Egyptian historian circa fifth century BCE), when the Ice Age civilization was disrupted by the beginning of the Holocene Age of warm climate and glacial retreat. This cradle of civilization is said to have been formed from the most highly organized remnant of the Ice Age, and they are credited with the development of agriculture, mining, written language, and military forces. Diodorus of Sicily (circa first century BCE) believed that the Egyptians were merely missionaries from the culture of Ethiopia, who were sent out to colonize the Earth, cultivating ethical and aesthetically pleasing use of science and technology.
From its source in Ethiopia (where the Judaic Ark of the Covenant is said to now reside, according to the Kebra Nagast), the wisdom of IFA spread across Africa and Asia. The original eight-bit form of IFA is still practiced today in and is found today in Benin/Dahomey among the Fon (who call it FA); in Nigeria among the Yoruba and Benin Edo (who call it IFA); in Togo among the Ewe (who call it AFA); in North Africa among the Arabs (who call it Ilm al Raml 'Science of Sand' or Khatt al Raml 'Lines in Sand'); in Madagascar among the Malagasy (who call it Sikidy); and among the people of the African Diaspora located throughout the USA, West Indies, and South America, where the process is the found in the traditions variously referred to as Cadomble, Macumba, Santeria, and Vodou (also spelled: Voodoo, Houdou etc.). A six-bit binary subset of the IFA is known throughout Asia as the I Ching, which most estimates probably indicate arrival in China at about 5,300 to 6,000 years ago, and which is related to the form of Geomancy known as Feng Shui. An eight-bit binary system is also found 900 years ago in Europe, referred to as Geomancy. Early in the eighteenth century, Gottfried Willhelm Liebnitz, german mathematician and philosopher thought he had independently developed a binary number system; but a Jesuit missionary in China named Joachim Bouvet sent him a copy of the I Ching, by which he was further inspired -- and for which he was also also satirized by Voltaire, who cast him as Dr. Pangloss in Candide.
Shortly after the First World War, Carl Jung developed a system of personality types with three binary categories (thus, making a six-bit system) based on the I Ching. Between the First and Second World Wars, Jung's system was improved upon by Katherine Briggs and her daughter Isabel Briggs Myers, who added a fourth binary category (thus, making an eight-bit system identical to the IFA), but they called it the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). They had hoped that the MBTI would improve mutual understanding between people and possibly even prevent war. The MBTI has continued to be used in the corporate world to determine appropriate jobs for people, according to their personality types.
In its ancient forms, the IFA divination rituals have been performed using a wide variety of different items, such as nuts, shells, beans, calabash, metal (brass, copper, aluminum, silver, lead, iron, etc.), wood, ivory, pangolin or crocodile scales, fish or turtle bones or shells, etc. But the method used by our consultant, is a conservative synthesis of the many ancient traditions, as interpreted from a radically analytical modern perspective.
In order to use the divination system of the IFA, at the most basic level, one must generate two results from the sixteen possible Tetragrams (or Quadruples of sets containing either 1 or 2 elements: 2^4 = 16). Because there are sixteen possible Tetragrams for each of these two results, this brings the total number of possible pairs to 256. However, there is an additional complication -- the Tetragrams are generated by one or another various random processes [the descriptions of which had to be removed from this report, owing to their sensitive nature as trade secrets, available only to initiates]
These results have been correlated with the genetic codons (T, A, C, and G) of the DNA's double-helix, which is in turn related to the Golden Mean [ A:B = B:(A+B) ]. This Golden Mean is a ratio which can be found in Mandalas, and in Fractals, which the Ancient Hindus, Egyptians and Greeks worshiped in their aesthetics, and which has been celebrated by scientists and philosophers throughout the millenia from the Orphics, through Pythagoras, to Kepler, Descartes, Bernoulli, and even now, among modern Physicists, and Chaos Mathematicians.
[further divinatory methods have been excised from this report, owing to their sensitive nature as trade secrets, available only to initiates]
The values (either 0 or 1) are recorded from the bottom, to the top of the Tetragrams. And finally, the Tetragram on the left is considered the Elder Tetragram, and the Tetragram on the right is considered the Younger Tetragram. Each of these pairs is referred to as an Odu, or sacred story.
Each Odu is interpreted as follows:
The Elder Tetragram is considered to be the static essence, or past/present state of the situation.
The Younger Tetragram is considered to be the dynamic potential, or present/future of the situation.
The individual Tetragrams each have particular archetypal characteristics which are abstract to a degree, and are interpreted differently, according to the nature of the query. [attributions and interpretations for the Tetragrams would have been summarized in an appendix to this report, except that they had to be removed, because of their sensitive nature as trade secrets, available only to initiates] The Tetragrams are known by known by the first name that follows each individual Tetragram.
My query concerned the nature of my academic studies and their relationship to my chosen career path, about which I have been having some anxiety... I was granted the following reading during the interview:
11
10
10
00
Elder Tetragram / static essence / past-present state of the situation:
1
1
1
0
Okanran
Enthusiast
Follow Intuitive Plans
Strategy for All Seasons
Force of Growth
Younger Tetragram / dynamic potential / present-future of the situation:
1
0
0
0
Osa
Performer
Fear is the Mind Killer
Namaste
Individual Totem
In our oracle's words, “This means that you have too thick a skin, and you must sacrifice in order to avoid misfortune and ensure tranquility. It tells of a story in which the antelope did not sacrifice, because he thought he could depend on his horns to defend himself from insult, so his enemies sent trouble to him from far away -- they shot at him from a distance, where he could not defend himself with his horns. There is another tale, this one of the snail, who was building his house away from those who insulted him. As it is said, discretion is the better part of valour -- so, he had walked away from conflict with others, even though it was inconvenient for him. Instead of being stubborn and competing with irrational people, he made the sacrifice to leave his home; and he found a new cooperative community where he was always well fed and never unhappy.”
In the ancient times, I would have been required to sacrifice twenty-two hundred cowries (money), a bow and quiver of arrows, and a rooster, or eighteen hundred cowries and a tortoise. But, in this modern world, devotional ritual and meditations can take the place of sacrificial rites. So, afterwards, we danced and drummed until everyone was exhausted, and then we grounded and centered with a banishing ceremony. Then, I meditated upon the divination.
The result was interpreted to mean that I have been trying to devise the perfect plan for my future; although I am afraid that no matter what I do, that I will still have some weakness that can be exploited -- change is the only constant, and no strategy can completely prepare one for every possible danger. It was suggested that if I would just face my fears, I would see that they are reasonable. And more importantly, that some battles are not worth fighting -- particularly those with unreasonable people in my own family.
So, it was implied that I should leave some room for growth and change, and put the rest of my concerns in divine hands, for there will always be forces beyond my control. And it was said that the best thing I could possibly do to safeguard myself, is to make time for myself to meditate and build discipline in my own connection with the voice of my conscience, for if I put my trust in my own inner guide, then I will reach the pinnacle of my ability to perform in whatever duties for which I am destined. And if I trust in my intuition, then I will be ready for any surprises that come my way.
[bibliography and appendices removed because of their sensitive nature as trade secrets, available only to initiates]