Charles Finch, M.D.
Former Director of International Health
Morehouse School of Medicine
Author of “The African Background of Medical Science”
I am writing this letter to strongly endorse the proposed Yoruba Sages documentary project proposed by Mr. James Weeks. I am a physician by training but have worked for many years in West Africa with traditional healers and knowledge-keepers, serving as the principle investigator of a Knowledge, Attitudes, and Practices Survey among the traditional healers, priests, and diviners of the Serer people of west-central Senegal along with their village-based clientele, 1991-1992. This project was funded by the USAID mission in Senegal, working in collaboration with Tulane School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine and the Malango Traditional Healers Association which, at the time, boasted 383 registered members (now 550). In addition, I led three study tours to Senegal to participate in the annual COUMBA LAMBA ceremony among the Lebu people of the country’s coastal region and was the co-organizer of COUMBA LAMBA USA (1996), the first and only authentic African healing ceremony ever held in North America (St. Helena Island, South Carolina). I have also visited Togo and Benin, interfacing with the healers, diviners, and shamanic practitioners of the Vodun (Ewe/Fon) and Orisha (Yoruba) traditions.
African traditional medicine and spiritual practice has been called ‘a science out of the shadows’ by Dr. Erick Gbodossou, a physician and Vodun initiate from Benin. Their roots in the Western Hemisphere are coeval with the presence of Africans in the New World, beginning nearly 500 years ago. Already solidly established in Brazil, Trinidad, Haiti, and Cuba, more and more persons in North America are exploring these age-old West African and Congolese traditions and practices.
With the increasing acceptance among Westerners – including clinical scientists – of ‘alternative’ or ‘integrative’ medicine, these practices and traditions, along with those from other parts of the world, are percolating into the emerging healing systems of the modern world. Moreover, these ‘alternative’ ethnic-based systems are thousands of years older than modern medicine and in fact gave rise to it, once medical history is properly understood.
A film documentary detailing the ideas, philosophies, and healing approaches of a group of Yoruba sages – with a special focus on Ifa – is timely and germane to the challenges facing the 21st century. Ifa is one of the most inspired and profound world-systems extant. Exploring the Yoruba system of knowledge through film is not merely a pleasant intellectual exercise but essential to uncovering the precious legacy it contains to assist in facilitating the continuing evolution of humanity because it is likely to be viewed by a much wider audience than would be available through the print media. Mr. Weeks’ commitment to such an enterprise should be supported to the fullest possible extent.