Talk:Iyanifa

The Babalawo and Iyanifa articles are word by word the same. One of them should be a redirect. Alensha 21:54, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

That may be so, but there is considerable disagreement about the role or even existance of the Iyanifa role in Yoruba religious culture. AS The word Iyanifa is an offense for this religion, women are forbiden to see Odu. Babalawo Baba Eyiogbe ll.

Dispute
I am putting a Dispute tag on this article. This article is disputed by two contributors: one here on the talk page (see above), and by another who wrote talk-page-like (non- NPOV) comments in the article text itself. The second contributor has no user page and no talk page. I am cut/pasting his/her comments here to this section of the talk page and creating a talk page for that contributor... note that I'm doing this in good faith; tho it's a little ticklish to move something from the article to Talk. Here are the other contributor's comments:

 This article is incorrect. Women who are initiated to Ifa are "Awo Ifa". The term "Iyanifa" is not a term used loosely in Yorubaland.

This article or essay should not be "merged" with "Babalawo" because when you speak of women initiated to Ifa and "babalawo" one is comparing apples and oranges!

Women initiated to Ifa are humble in nature and in most cases one does not even know they belong to the cult of Ifa. In Africa, the Source, it is inappropriate for anyone to use the title "Iyanifa" unless that woman, normally a woman who has been studying Ifa all her life, has been "entitled" as such. Even then, there is no demand that she be called that.

There has been much discussion, most of it incorrect and encouraged in order to make money, that women initiated to Ifa can perform the same functions as Babalawos. This is not correct and is a wholly african american concept and invention.

Please contact me if this is not the correct way to go about this process. --Ling.Nut 13:22, 18 September 2006 (UTC)