Eyiogbe

In Heaven the deities were created without a head, because the head itself —Orí— was a separate deity. Orunmila wanted to have a complete body, so he went to the diviner Amure, who told him to pray for a head and to offer four kolá nuts, a clay pot, a sponge and soap. He warned him to keep the nuts unbroken, because an unexpected visitor would come to break them.

Eshú announced all over Heaven that Orunmila had four beautiful kolá nuts and was looking for someone to break them. One after another, all the deities —led by Oggún, and even Orishanlá— tried, but Orunmila told them they were not the right ones. At last Orí, the only one missing, who had not even been able to pay for her own sacrifice, came rolling up to his house. Orunmila went out to meet her, carried her in, washed her with the sponge and the soap and took her to his sacred place. Orí prayed for him, so that everything he did would come to pass; she prayed for herself, to have a permanent home and many followers; and she broke the nuts with a bang that was heard all over Heaven.

Then the hands, the feet, the body and the other limbs, which until then had lived apart, came together and decided to live with the head, and they crowned her king of the body. Because of what Orunmila did in that good fortune, the head touches the ground as a sign of respect to him to this day. And because he made the sacrifice that made the head king, Eyiogbe is the deity that owns Orí.

Orishanlá wanted a child on Earth, but his wife Afin did not want one so much. In Heaven, a spirit called Omonighorogbo asked Olodumare to be born as the child of both of them, to show the world what kindness is. Afin became pregnant and, as the months went by, her temper got harder.

A boy was born. That same day there was no food in the house and Orishanlá was late coming back from the field. Afin, furious, decided to kill her husband: knowing that palm wine was forbidden to him, she poured it into his drinking water and went out. When Orishanlá went to drink, the one-day-old child spoke: «Father, do not drink that water; my mother poured palm wine into it». Surprised, he listened, but in return he put salt —which was forbidden to her— into his wife's food. When Afin came back and sat down to eat, the child spoke again: «Mother, do not eat; my father put salt in it».

She screamed for help and the deities were called together. Oggún led the trial, because the usual judge, Orishanlá, was the accused. When everyone thought the woman was out of her mind —how could a newborn speak?—, the child cleared up the riddle by saying «Eji Mo Gbe»: he had come to Earth to save the lives of both his parents. Seven days later they named him Eyiogbe, «double salvation». That is why, when Eyiogbe comes out in the initiation, the materials for the sacrifice go double, and salt and palm wine are added to them in memory of that day.

At fifteen, Eyiogbe went with his mother to the great market of Oja-Ajigbomekon, where the beings of Heaven and of Earth traded. On the way he crossed paths with a woman and, without letting her speak, told her she had been carrying a pregnancy for three years that would not develop; he told her to make a sacrifice and, once she did it, he assured her that her problem was over.

Further on he met a crippled man called Aro, who denied having any problem at all. Eyiogbe pointed his divining staff at his legs and the man stood up and walked for the first time. Then he found a blind man, who also denied his trouble; he pointed his staff at his eyes and the man got his sight back.

He healed them both without asking for any payment, telling them to follow Orunmila and never to hide their suffering, because whoever hides his troubles carries them to the grave and will never know when Olodumare answers his prayers.