Ojuani Obara

In the land of Boso lived Awó Agbombo, with three sons who were Awoses and Osainistas like himself, all of them children of Ojuani Obara. Feeling death coming, he told them: «The ashé of this Odù is in the she-goat. When I die, do not divide: live more united than before, so what you hold and your ashé will be greater. And take care: there is one among you who is a bastard — but do not divide what I leave over that». He died, and against his wish, the sons quarreled, throwing the bastardy in each other's faces, until the eldest, Akueti, said: «We are Awoses and this is a disgrace to Ifá: let the Obá be the judge». They took up their Ifases and set out along the great paved road, apart and not speaking to each other.

An old man dressed in white, with a staff, asked each of them about his lost she-goat. The first said a one-eyed one had passed — the grass was cropped on one side only; the second, that she carried a wound in her back — there were drops of blood on the brushed grass; the third, that she went heavily loaded with a great basket — her prints were deep on both sides. «All three of you have given me her marks and none of you knows where she is: you have stolen her», said the old man, and they went before the Obá. Having heard their explanations, the Obá made osode, this Ifá came out, and he ruled that they had not stolen her: that the old man should look for her on the road and give the three of them, in equal shares, from the money in the basket. That night the Obá lodged them and sent a servant to spy on them with the food. «The rice is done, but it is dirty», said the first. «The meat smells of dog», said the second. «It can all be eaten, but the Obá is a bastard», said the third. The Obá questioned them: the servant had not washed her hands after being with her husband; the lamb had been born of a ewe killed by a dog; and his own mother, weeping, confessed that he was the son of a slave, from when they believed her husband dead in the war — fifty years keeping the secret. The next day the Obá told them: «Your father was a wise Awó: what he said about the she-goat and the ashé you have already seen with Oshalufón's she-goat; and do not quarrel — I am the bastard, and I rule this town. Live united, so you may be great, as your father wanted». Eboru, eboya, eboshishe.

Awó Ifa Ague lived in a small palm-bark house on the riverbank, with one calabash tree planted, which he worshipped: his Ifá lived in it. He lived poor and at a loss because the other Awoses would not think anything of him, and he bathed often with maravilla herb and peony, which cleared and cooled his mind. One day, at four in the morning, he read for himself and his own sign came out: a praying of the head, and blood of three doves for his dead, along with smoked hutia and fish, aguardiente, honey, candles and coconut. He carried it out at nightfall, and in a dream his dead told him to go to the land of Omologun, singing the súyere they taught him.

He set out carrying no food; hunger and weariness caught him, until at the foot of a ceiba he found an old man eating a rooster: it was Obatalá, who gave him food and water, cleansed him with a white cloth and told him: «My son, you are going to succeed. Further on you will meet a troublesome, mischievous fellow named Elegba: give him this chick and go along with him and eat». So he did: Elegba gave him some of what he was eating — hutia, smoked fish, palm oil and toasted corn — and went with him as far as the Omologun's house: «He will tell you what you have to do so that everyone respects you and you become as great as the other Awoses». The Omologun burst out laughing when he saw him, told him everything that was happening to him, and handed him a great secret to be done at the foot of the calabash tree, putting a fresh fish inside at the end. On his way back, he did it all: a branch of the calabash fell into the river with a gourd, the fish circled around it, and the Awó took a fish and put it inside. From then on the Awoses of the town began visiting him, and from every land the aleyos came to be read. One day the Omologun appeared to him: «I too am coming to live with you at the foot of the calabash tree, to help you go on prospering».

Oshún lived beside the river and kept hens, roosters and doves. There was an Awó named Oluwo Abere in such a bad way that he was living taken in by another family. One day he got up, made osode, saw this Odù and made ebbó: a she-goat, two yellow hens for Oshún — their bodies to the river with plenty of honey —, a young rooster for Eshu, and the she-goat let loose with whatever money he could tie to her: he put on $17.

The family who had taken him in heard what he was doing and began quarreling with him, to the point of throwing him out of the house. Awó Oluwo Abere gathered his Saints and left, already late in the day; as night fell, he sat down by the river and spent the night there. The next day Eshu passed by, remembered that this Awó had made ebbó, and went to tell Oshún, who said: «Stay here». Eshu helped him build, and Awó Oluwo Abere lived there very happily. The family who had thrown him out had to come looking for him, because Eshu had wrecked their whole house — and so that whole family came to an end.