Okana Meyi

Okana Meyi realized that his colleagues had already left for the earth, and resolved to ask Olodumare for authorization to leave heaven. He went to an awó, Asokon Deji, who recommended that he make an offering before presenting himself to receive the instruments of command from Olodumare. The elements were a dove, a male goat, a female goat, a hen, a fish and a hutia. Okana Meyi offered them and went to the Divine Palace to state what he wished for his life on earth.

He planned to come down accompanied by the calabash, the melon and the clay jar, but the awó told him to descend without any of that and by a different road. During the descent he came to some cultivated land. At one edge there was a trap holding an antelope that was beginning to rot. Okana Meyi freed it, cut it into pieces and headed toward the farm to light a fire and preserve the meat.

He was curing the meat when the owner of the farm appeared and demanded an explanation. Okana Meyi explained that he had acted out of generosity, so that the animal would not rot completely. The owner, understanding the kindness of the gesture, thanked him and gave him a leg of the antelope. Since then that is the piece the priest of Ifá keeps for himself every time he sacrifices an animal. That is why Okana Meyi is described as the Ifá who was given freedom to prosper, and his children are advised to devote themselves to working the land, since it went well for him in that.

Once born into the world and grown, he was a farmer, although the first times were of bad fortune. He grew mostly yam and corn, and animals often ate what he planted. He consulted about the situation and was told to make a tunic with pockets everywhere, filled with kola nuts and bitter kola, to pass a chicken over his body and to grip a staff. He also had to gather earth and materials taken from the top of two neighboring hills and from the two ends of the roof of his house. With all of it he would invoke Eshu so that he would drive off the meddling animals from the farm. Okana Meyi carried out the work. Eshu, now satisfied, placed traps that no one could see around the land, and the animals fell in one after another. Free of them, he began to prosper, and he also gathered a lot of money by selling the meat of what Eshu trapped.

With that money he married. Years passed without his wife having children. One night she dreamed that Okana Meyi was dancing all through the town followed by a great crowd, and she went to consult about what it meant. The priest told her to prepare sticks with sharpened points and to gather a bunch of pimiento peppers, and to offer them to Eshu, begging him to turn her bad luck into good. She did it at once and everything in her life improved, but she did not become pregnant.

Okana Meyi did not know that his wife was a harmful and merciless witch. Later, while he slept, Okana Meyi's guardian angel revealed the truth to him: it was the angel himself who prevented her from having children. He summed it up with a poem: the snake is born with its bag of venom, just as the witch feeds on the sorcery from the insides of her mother. In the end the woman left, and soon afterward Okana Meyi's parents also died.

Having lost his wife and his parents, he wanted to move away for a while. He visited Kponrikpon Abidi Tirigi, a priest of Ifá, who told him by divination to make an offering so as not to get lost in the forest. He had to offer a pig to his own Ifá and a male goat to Eshu, prepare 16 packets of cold corn bread and bean paste for the trip, and set out with two dogs.

He fulfilled the offering, left his lifelong home in Ilaye Ule and headed for Ilaye Oko, to withdraw there for a time. He did not know that this road had become a nightmare: whoever traveled it disappeared without ever arriving, and no one knew the cause.

Halfway there the dogs felt hungry and he shared out part of the cold bread and the bean paste. While they ate, a boa constrictor of mysterious origin appeared, threw itself on the dogs and devoured them. Then the snake became slow and weak, and Okana Meyi killed it with a sturdy stake. He left it there and continued to Ilaye Oko. When he told people his experience, they understood that this boa was the one making travelers disappear between the two towns.

Many went with him to the place to destroy the snake. From it he took only a small stone found in the stomach, the iyin osumale, and the oil, and left the meat to the inhabitants. That extraordinary event gave him fame and well being as a priest of Ifá. In addition, the town offered him several women as wives.

Aragba and Iroko never understood each other: they were natural enemies, like dog and cat. Iroko was so powerful that everyone feared him; the Elders of the Night gathered in his house, so it did not cross anyone's mind to attack him. The odu Okana Meyi told both of them to offer Eshu an axe, a machete, a goat and a rooster. Aragba complied. Iroko refused, because he believed himself invulnerable.

Eshu was pleased with what Aragba offered him and then pointed out to the men how sturdy Iroko was and what good timber he would make. He wanted to destroy the legend of invulnerability that surrounded that tree, so he offered to guide them to it and put an axe in the men's hands. At first nobody dared to begin, but with the courage Eshu gave them they threw themselves at the tree with fury. Iroko fell with a crash whose echo ran through the whole forest.

Aragba heard the collapse. On learning that the men with their axe had felled the great Iroko, he understood that he had been right to obey the diviner and dedicated songs of praise to him. That is why, when someone receives this sign, he is warned that he faces an imposing enemy who is trying to bring him down; with the ebbó to Eshu, the one who falls is the enemy.

When all the trees were getting ready to come into the world, they visited Okana Meyi to learn how to carry out their mission well. He was also preparing to go down, so he left the consultation in the hands of one of his subordinates, Efun fun Zele, the strong wind. Efun fun Zele prescribed three offerings. To Eshu, a goat, and to feed their heads, kola nuts, a dove and a rooster. To Ogún, roasted yam, a tortoise, a rooster and a small barrel of wine. To Shangó, bitter kola, wine and a rooster. All the trees refused except Agbon, the royal palm, called Urua among the Bini. Then they all set out for the world.

Many years passed, and when the trees had prospered and made the earth beautiful, the divinities sent Shangó to see what was happening there. Efun fun Zele, who had done the consultation for the trees, was ordered to go with him. On arriving they saw that many trees were infected by the wickedness of the world, and they destroyed them one by one with thunder and the force of the wind.

When they reached where the royal palm stood, it began to sing praises for the diviner who had consulted for it in heaven; in this way it recalled the ebbó it had made and thanked him for its success on earth. That is why it was the only tree whose life was spared, and why to this day the royal palm is the only tree safe from thunder and strong winds.