Demystifying The Character Of Esu — Guardian Life — The Guardian Nigeria News – Nigeria and World News

Of all the major misconceptions of traditional Yoruba mythology, the modern representation of the god, Esu, stands out as more ludicrous. The contemporary understanding of Esu makes him nothing more than the devil or Satan who is famous in the Christian faith. However, the term Esu has not fallen out of contemporary usage. This is a name that has existed through Yoruba mythology and, the character shows a different personality.

In Yoruba mythology, the Supreme Lord is called Olodumare, who created every living thing including humans, the natural environment, the sky, and animals. Olodumare also created other deities called Orishas who were less powerful than himself by narrowing down their functions to one or two main tasks. For example, Ogun is made the god of iron and metalwork, which makes him associated with war and justice. Another example is Osun, who is considered a river goddess, with metaphorical functions including purity, fertility and love.
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Like Ogun and Osun, Esu is another deity with a unique primary function—acting as an intermediary usually between humans and another god or deities. His function as an intermediary included taking the sacrifices prepared by humans for other gods. For example, people, who are looking for justice for the wrong done to them usually prepare a ritual sacrifice with the completion that Esu will take the sacrifice to heaven where the supreme God resides. As a result of the function as an intermediary, most Yoruba see Esu as one of the most sensitive tasks.

In addition to his function as a mediator, Esu also represents the avenger whose functions include, distributing punishment according to the supreme command of God to the guilty people. Esu’s primary function of receiving and delivering messages from humans to other gods often tempts him to err during missions. In fact, Yoruba cosmology says that Esu once lived in heaven with other gods. However, as a result of Esu’s trickster nature in misconstructing the message he sent, he was forbidden to enter the gate of heaven by Olodumare. After that, Esu was made to live only on earth and continue the main function of sending sacrifices from humans to other gods.

The Yoruba cosmological image of Esu is very different from the contemporary era which makes the character of Esu an evil being, while focusing more on deception than his primary function. Contemporary Esu seems to be synonymous with the Christian term Satan, a fallen angel who only seeks to destroy and deceive mankind into sin. However, Esu’s character is very different from Iblis. On the one hand, traditional Yoruba representations of Esu see him as a human messenger to other gods. The two descriptions of Esu have similar and different characteristics. Contemporary and traditional depictions of Esu regard him as a deity restricted to living on earth. However, Esu’s previous and subsequent functions are very different in traditional Yoruba cosmological depictions when compared to contemporary depictions of Satan.

As a result of the adoption of Westernization, most of the values, customs and beliefs of traditional African narratives have been lost or blurred for modern African children. Today, people are more aware of the war between good and evil represented by God and Satan. This contemporary belief has obscured the true narrative of Yoruba cosmology. A good example of a traditional Yoruba narrative distorted by Westernization is Esu, the messenger god.