Ogbe Bara

In heaven, Shangó was going through great poverty. Ogbe Bara, who was also poor, divined for him and prepared Ifá for him. When the rite was over, he proposed that Shangó come along to his home. Shangó was ashamed of his appearance and declined, so Ogbe Bara went home alone.

From heaven, Shangó watched the world of men and found it dirty and full of evil. He promised to put an end to all the wrongdoers on Earth.

When he was getting ready to fight, a tornado lifted the roofs off many houses. With the first wind, Ogbe Bara was far away on a divination trip, and he had left his wife at home.

While trees and buildings were falling, Shangó noticed a roof collapsing, without suspecting that it belonged to Ogbe Bara. The woman began to sing and named the house of Ifá in her song. From that song, Shangó understood that this was the house of the one who had done him good. So he moved away from it and went back to heaven.

The first important divination of Ogbe Obara was for three brothers. For this reason, when this odu appears in divination, the person is asked whether he is one of three brothers or partners.

The father of the brothers fished in the lake: he drained the water and caught the fish. His sons went to see Orunmila to learn how to improve their father's business, and he advised them to give a goat to Eshu. As they left the house they began to doubt whether to do it, because their father was successful without making any sacrifice.

The boa also went to see Ogbe Obara. He told her to give a male goat to Eshu in order to survive the death that had taken her father, and to attend to her head. She only offered a coconut to her head and did not make the sacrifice to Eshu. The rabbit also went, and was told to serve Eshu with a goat and his head with a banana, to avoid trouble in his home. The Iroko tree and the guinea fowl did the same: they consulted, received the same advice and refused to make the sacrifice.

Meanwhile, the brothers went to their work. The eldest went in to drain the water and sank into the swamp. The second, when he tried to rescue him, had his hands separated from his body. And the third, when he tried to shout, had his jaw broken.

A squirrel saw what was happening and began to laugh and jump, but the branch it was on broke and fell on the boa, who was resting below. The squirrel's laughter and the blow of the branch reminded the boa of what had happened when her father and her brothers died. Frightened, she hurried to the rabbit's burrow and asked for shelter. At that moment the rabbit was raising seven newborns. It did not object to the boa staying, but by dawn she had eaten the seven young and was looking for the rabbit to eat it too.

To save its life, the rabbit went to the house of the Iroko tree. One of Iroko's branches hurt; although he wanted to make room for the rabbit, he warned it to be careful with that sore branch. In its panic, the rabbit forgot the warning and climbed onto it. At that moment the guinea fowl was hiding 201 eggs at the foot of Iroko, and the weight of the rabbit broke the branch, which fell on the eggs. Seeing the disaster, the guinea fowl decided to cause an uproar on Earth and in Heaven and began to shout. Her cry announces a sudden war in the forest. On hearing it, the animals ran about in disorder.

God heard the cries and sent a heavenly knight to see what was happening. He ordered the fighting to stop and asked the animals why there was so much confusion. They said they had been alarmed by the cry of the guinea fowl and by an order to mate. The guinea fowl, for her part, said that Iroko had broken her eggs.

Iroko told that the branch had been deformed for four years and that the rabbit had broken it by walking on it. The rabbit explained that the boa had abused its hospitality by eating its young. The boa apologized: the squirrel had frightened her, and that is why she sought refuge in the rabbit's house. She also recalled that the creator of everything that exists had authorized the squirrel to reveal her father's hiding place, because he had killed God's deer, and that the squirrel's laughter was what brought death to her relatives and ancestors.

The squirrel explained that it had laughed at what was happening to the three brothers in the lagoon. The knight called the brothers and all of them were freed from their afflictions at once. They said that their misfortunes came from not having made the sacrifice.

The knight, called Omo oni ghorogbo Oru, ordered them to follow the tradition of their father, who made a sacrifice every year before fishing, and told them to make it. He forbade the squirrel to laugh at the misfortune of others, so as not to attract the anger of the hunter. He blamed the boa for her lack of consideration toward the rabbit and told the rabbit to block the entrance of its home to avoid attacks. This is why, to this day, the rabbit blocks its burrow at several points. From then on the boa had to abstain from entering any cave, and to this day she enters none. The knight also forgave Iroko, but told the guinea fowl never again to lay her eggs in a tree and to hide them in a cave or in the desert sand.

A bandit named Akensheolu, boundlessly cruel, kept the town in terror. Brides could not reach their fiancés' houses, men did not dare go to their fields, women avoided the market, and children did not go down to the river. The elders decided to call Ogbe Bara to put an end to this.

In the consultation, Ogbe Bara was told that he would triumph over the bandit if he offered as ebbó a rooster, a goat, a machete, a rat, a fish, bread, mashed yam, and a tamale of tender corn. He carried out the offering and set out to find his enemy.

Soon he found himself at a crossroads of four paths without knowing which one led to Akensheolu's dwelling. So he threw himself on the ground, pretending to have fainted. A group of passersby stopped to look at him and wondered who this poor wretch could be, lying with his head pointing to the market and his feet toward the bandit's house. From this Ogbe Bara learned the direction.

He reached the house and called Akensheolu, with no weapons other than a bow and three arrows. The bandit came out shouting who dared to speak his name, since he was the one who dealt out death. He asked how he dared to challenge him, and Ogbe Bara told him he had come to kill him. Akensheolu burst out laughing and declared that only the footprints of that brave man would remain, since he would not return alive. Ogbe Bara replied that he would cut off his head and show it as proof.

The bandit took an arrow. Ogbe Bara recited a spell, and when Akensheolu shot, the wind pushed the arrow to the left and it was lost. In his turn, Ogbe Bara loosed his own, but the bandit answered with the same charm and made it go astray toward the sky, just as the arrow of the ekikan tree rises to the sky. The bandit shot again; Ogbe Bara ordered with his charm that the arrow fall to the ground, and it sank into the earth.

Ogbe Bara shot his second arrow, and again the bandit's charm turned it aside. Akensheolu shot the last one; Ogbe Bara made the hands holding the bow tremble, and the arrow was lost. When his last turn came, Ogbe Bara rested his arrow on the ground and said it should go where he sent it, for every messenger reaches the place to which he is sent. As soon as he took his hand away, and before the bandit could speak, the arrow struck him in the chest. Akensheolu fell in a pool of blood, his heart pierced.

Ogbe Bara cut off his head, kept it, and carried it with him.

Akensheolu's wife had witnessed the whole duel. She asked that the sun be eclipsed and everything go dark, so that her rival could not find the way back. Ogbe Bara, surrounded by darkness, asked that the light return, because the eyes of whoever shuts them open again after a while. The shadow faded and the road became clear. Once in the town, he told of his triumph. They lifted him up and carried him from his house to the king's palace, where a great reception awaited him.