Haile Selassie
Haile Selassie I (1892–1975) was the Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974. Rastas claim that he is the root of Jesus(Yahshua) Christ and therefore an incarnation of Jah(Jehovah) onto the Earth. They also claim that he will lead the righteous into creating a perfect world, called "Zion." Zion would be the ultimate paradise for Rastas. The future capital city of Zion is sometimes put forward as the New Jerusalem (Lalibela, Ethiopia), the very Habitation of the Godhead (Trinity) creator, Rastafari. Prophetic verses of the Hebrew Bible such as Zephaniah 3:10 have been interpreted as subtly hinting that the messianic king will be in Ethiopia, and the people will come from the rest of the world "beyond" its rivers.
Rastafari is not a highly organized religion; it is a movement and an ideology. Many Rastas say that it is not a "religion" at all, but a "Way of Life".[3] Most Rastas do not claim any sect or denomination, and thus encourage one another to find faith and inspiration within themselves, although some do identify strongly with one of the "mansions of Rastafari" — the three most prominent of these being the Nyahbinghi, the Bobo Ashanti and the Twelve Tribes of Israel. I Belong to the mansion of Twelve Tribes of Israel so I will be focusing more on it, sorry.
Nyahbinghi Order
The Nyahbinghi Order (also known as Haile Selassie I Theocratical Order of the Nyahbinghi Reign) is named for Queen Nyahbinghi of Uganda, who fought against colonialists in the 19th century. The Nyahbinghi Order holds steadfast to ancient biblical values. They consume nothing that harms their body[clarification needed] because the body is the temple and the temple the church. The Nyahbinghi Order is a non-violent order that calls upon God's power to execute judgement upon all black and white "downpressors" (oppressors). This is the oldest of the orders[citation needed] and it focuses mainly on Haile Selassie, Ethiopia, and the eventual return to Africa. It is overseen by an Assembly of Elders.
Bobo Ashanti
Bobo Ashanti was founded by Prince Emanuel Charles Edwards in Jamaica in the 1950s. "Bobo" means black and "Shanti" refers to the Ashanti tribe in Ghana, from which this sect believes Jamaican slaves are descended. Members of Bobo Shanti are also known as Bobo Dreads.
In belief, Bobo Dreads are distinguished by their worship of Prince Emmanuel (in addition to Haile Selassie) as a reincarnation of Christ and embodiment of Jah; their emphasis on the return to Africa ("repatriation"); and their demands for monetary reimbursement for slavery.
Members of the Bobo Ashanti order wear long robes and tightly wrapped turbans around their dreads. They adhere closely to the Jewish Law, including the observance of the Sabbath from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday and hygiene laws for menstruating women. They live separately from Jamaican society and other Rastafarians, growing their own produce and selling straw hats and brooms. They often carry brooms with them to symbolize their cleanliness.
Twelve Tribes of Israel
The Twelve Tribes of Israel sect was founded in 1968 by Dr. Vernon "Prophet Gad" Carrington. It is the most liberal of the Rastafarian orders and members are free to worship in a church of their choosing. Each member of this sect belongs to one of the 12 Tribes (or Houses), which is determined by birth month and is represented by a color. The Standard Israelite calendar begins in April. Bob Marley was from the tribe of Joseph, and Haile Selassie from the tribe of Judah.
Rastafari are monotheists, worshipping a singular God whom they call Jah. Rastas see Jah as being in the form of the Holy Trinity, that is, God being the God the Father, God the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Rastas say that Jah, in the form of the Holy Spirit (incarnate), lives within the human, and for this reason they often refer to themselves as "I and I". Furthermore, "I and I" is used instead of "We", and is used in this way to emphasise the equality between all people, in the recognition that the Holy Spirit within us all makes us essentially one and the same.
Some Rastas accept the Christian doctrine that God incarnated onto the Earth in the form of Jesus Christ, to give his teachings to humanity. However, they often feel his teachings were corrupted by Babylon. Many Rastas[who?], in accordance with their assertion that "word, sound is power", also object specifically to the English pronunciation of his name (/dʒi:zəs/) as impure, preferring instead to use the forms in Hebrew (Yeshu) or Amharic ('Iyesus).
Zion Versus Babylon
Rastas assert that Zion (i.e., Africa, especially Ethiopia) is a land that Jah promised to them. To achieve this, they reject modern western society, calling it "Babylon", which they see as entirely corrupt.[5][7][11] "Babylon" is considered to have been in rebellion against "Earth's Rightful Ruler" (Jah) ever since the days of the Biblical king Nimrod.
Some Rastas claim themselves to represent the real Children of Israel or children of god, (this may stem from the belief by some scholars that Ethiopia was populated at some stage by one of the "lost" tribes of Israel; modern credence is given to this view with the acknowledgement of the Beta Israel by the Israeli government). Another historical viewpoint which seeks to validate this link between Ethiopia, Israel and the Rastafari belief system can be found under the Lion of Judah and their goal is to repatriate to Africa, or to Zion.[clarification needed] (Rasta reggae is peppered with references to Zion; among the best-known examples are the Bob Marley songs '"Zion Train" and "Iron Lion Zion".)
Ceremonies
There are two types of Rasta religious ceremonies: Reasoning and Groundation.
- Reasoning
A "reasoning" is a simple event where the Rastas gather, smoke cannabis ("ganja"), and discuss ethical, social, and religious issues. The person honored by being allowed to light the herb says a short prayer beforehand, and the ganja is passed in a clockwise fashion except in time of war when it is passed counterclockwise.
- Groundation
A "groundation" (or "grounation") or "binghi" is a holy day;[13] the name "binghi" is derived from "Nyabinghi", believed to be an ancient, and now extinct, order of militant blacks in eastern Africa that vowed to end oppression. Binghis are marked by much dancing, singing, feasting, and the smoking of ganja, and can last for several days.
In public gatherings, Rastafari often say the following standard prayer, with several variants, comparable to the Lord's Prayer:
- "Princes and princesses shall come forth out of Egypt, Ethiopia now stretch forth her hands before JAH. O Thou God of Ethiopia, Thou God of Thy Divine Majesty, Thy Spirit come into our hearts, to dwell in the paths of righteousness. Lead and help InI to forgive, that InI may be forgiven. Teach InI Love and loyalty on earth as it is in Zion, Endow us with Thy wisemind, knowledge and Overstanding to do thy will, thy blessings to us, that the hungry might be fed, the sick nourished, the aged protected, the naked clothed and the infants cared for. Deliver InI from the hands of our enemy, that InI may prove fruitful in these Last Days, when our enemy have passed and decayed in the depths of the sea, in the depths of the earth, or in the belly of a beast. O give us a place in Thy Kingdom forever and ever, so we hail our God JAH Selassie I, Jehovah God, Rastafari, Almighty God, Rastafari, great and powerful God JAH, Rastafari. Who sitteth and reigneth in the heart of man and woman, hear us and bless us and sanctify us, and cause Thy loving Face to shine upon us thy children, that we may be saved, SELAH."
When lighting a chalice, the following, shorter invocation is often used: "Glory be to the Father and to the Maker of Iration, as it were in the Iginning, is now an shall be foriva, world without end, SELAH."
Some important dates when grounations may take place are:
- January 7 – Oriental Orthodox Christmas
- February 6 – The birthday of Bob Marley
- May 11 – The day that Bob Marley died
- April 21 – The anniversary of Haile Selassie's visit to Jamaica. Also known as Grounation Day.
- July 23 – The birthday of Emperor Haile Selassie
- August 17 – The birthday of Marcus Garvey
- September 11 – Ethiopian New Year
- November 2 – The coronation of Haile Selassie
For Rastas, smoking cannabis, usually known as "herb", "weed", "sinsemilla" (spanish for "without seeds") or "ganja" (from the Sanskrit word, "Ganjika", created by the Hindus of India), is a spiritual act, often accompanied by Bible study; they consider it a sacrament that cleans the body and mind, heals the soul, exalts the consciousness, facilitates peacefulness, brings pleasure, and brings them closer to Jah. The burning of the herb is often said to be essential "for it will sting in the hearts of those that promote and perform evil and wrongs." By the 8th century, cannabis had been introduced by Arab traders to Central and Southern Africa, where it is known as "dagga"[14] and many Rastas say it is a part of their African culture that they are reclaiming.[15] It is sometimes also referred to as "the healing of the nation", a phraseology adapted from Revelation 22:2.[16]
The migration of many thousands of Hindus from India to the Caribbean in the 20th century may have brought this culture to Jamaica. Many academics point to Indo-Caribbean origins for the ganjah sacrament resulting from the importation of Indian migrant workers in a post-abolition Jamaican landscape. "Large scale use of ganjah in Jamaica... dated from the importation of indentured Indians..."(Campbell 110). Dreadlocked mystics, often ascetic, known as sadhus, have smoked cannabis in India for centuries.[17]
According to many Rastas, the illegality of cannabis in many nations is evidence that persecution of Rastafari is a reality. They are not surprised that it is illegal, seeing it as a powerful substance that opens people's minds to the truth — something the Babylon system, they reason, clearly does not want.[18] They contrast it to alcohol and other drugs, which they feel destroy the mind.[19]
They hold that the smoking of cannabis enjoys Biblical sanction, and is an aid to meditation and religious observance. Among Biblical verses Rastas quote as justifying the use of cannabis:
- Genesis 1:11 "And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so."
- Genesis 1:29 "And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb-bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat."
- Genesis 3:18 "... thou shalt eat the herb of the field."
- Proverbs 15:17 "Better is a dinner of herbs where love is, than a stalled ox and hatred therewith."[2]
- Psalms 104:14 "He causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herb for the service of man."
- Revalation 22:2 " the river of life proceeded to flow from the throne of God, and on either side of the bank there was the tree of life, and the leaf from that tree is for the healing of the nations"
Ital or I-tal is food often celebrated by those in the Rastafari movement. The word derives from the English word "vital", with the initial syllable replaced by i.[1] This is done to many words in the Rastafari vocabulary to signify the unity of the speaker with all of nature. Rastafarians derive their beliefs and morality from intense personal meditations and prayer, and therefore there is no single dogma of Rastafarian belief. Due to this emphasis on individual personal meditation in Rastafari, the expression of Ital eating varies widely from Rasta to Rasta, and there are few universal "rules" of Ital living.
The primary goal of adhering to an Ital diet is to increase Livity, or the life energy that Rastas generally believe lives within all of us, as conferred from the Almighty. A common tenet of Rastafarian beliefs is the sharing of a central Livity among living things, and what is put into one's body should enhance Livity rather than reduce it. Though there are different interpretations of ital regarding specific foods, the general principle is that food should be natural, or pure, and from the earth; Rastas therefore often avoid food which is chemically modified or contains artificial additives (e.g., color, flavorings, and preservatives). Some also avoid added salt in foods, especially salt with the artificial addition of iodine, while pure sea or kosher salt is eaten by some. In strict interpretations, foods that have been produced using chemicals such as pesticides and fertilizer are not considered ital.
Early adherents adopted their dietary laws based on their interpretation of several books of the Bible, like the Genesis ("Then God said, "I give you every Seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food."[2]), the Leviticus and Deuteronomy. In common with religions such as Judaism, Islam, and Ethiopian Christianity, most Rastas avoid the eating of pork. Some Rastas also avoid eating shellfish because, in common with pigs, they are considered to be scavengers. Most Rastas avoid the consumption of red meat, some do not eat fish over 12 inches in length, and some are strict vegetarians or vegans.[3]
The most strict interpretations also avoid food that has been preserved by canning or drying and even prohibit the use of metal cooking utensils. In this case, only clay and wood cooking pots, crockery, and cutlery are used. Few adherents of ital follow the strictest interpretation; some Rastas do not adhere to them at all.
Due to its roots in Jamaica and the deleterious effects alcohol has had on Jamaican society, many Rastafarians do not approve of alcohol consumption. However, many Rastas, especially those in the United States and Europe, do drink alcohol on occasion as long as it does not reach a level that clouds the mind or reduces their livity. Many Rastas disapprove of cigarettes due to the serious health concerns associated with their use, and a few Rastas avoid coffee and other caffeinated beverages, though this is less common. Most Rastas, however, do favor the use of cannabis because they believe it causes a strong prayerful state. Some Rastas do not believe in modern medicine, but many urbanized Rastas allow such practice.
The wearing of dreadlocks is very closely associated with the movement, though not universal among, or exclusive to, its adherents. Rastas maintain that locks are supported by Leviticus 21:5 ("They shall not make baldness upon their head, neither shall they shave off the corner of their beard, nor make any cuttings in the flesh.") and the Nazirite vow in Numbers 6:5 ("All the days of the vow of his separation there shall no razor come upon his head: until the days be fulfilled, in the which he separateth himself unto the Lord, he shall be holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow.").
It has often been suggested (e.g., Campbell 1985) that the first Rasta locks were copied from Kenya in 1953, when images of the independence struggle of the feared mau mau insurgents, who grew their "dreaded locks" while hiding in the mountains, appeared in newsreels and other publications that reached Jamaica. However, a more recent study by Barry Chevannes[26] has traced the first Hairlocked Rastas to a subgroup first appearing in 1949, known as Youth Black Faith.
There have been ascetic groups within a variety of world faiths that have at times worn similarly-matted hair. In addition to the Nazirites of Judaism and the sadhus of Hinduism, it is worn among some sects of Sufi Islam, notably the Baye Fall sect of Mourides,[27] and by some Ethiopian Orthodox monks in Christianity,[28] among others. Some of the very earliest Christians may also have worn this hairstyle; particularly noteworthy are descriptions of James the Just, "brother of Jesus" and first Bishop of Jerusalem, whom Hegesippus (according to Eusebius and Jerome) described as a Nazirite who never once cut his hair. The length of a Rasta's locks is a measure of wisdom, maturity, and knowledge in that it can indicate not only the Rasta's age, but also his/her time as a Rasta.
Also, according to the Bible, Samson was a Nazarite who had "seven locks". Rastas argue that these "seven locks" could only have been dreadlocks,[29] as it is unlikely to refer to seven strands of hair.
Locks have also come to symbolize the Lion of Judah (its mane) and rebellion against Babylon. In the United States, several public schools and workplaces have lost lawsuits as the result of banning locks. Safeway is an early example, and the victory of eight children in a suit against their Lafayette, Louisiana school was a landmark decision in favor of Rastafari rights. More recently, a group of Rastafarians settled a federal lawsuit with the Grand Central Partnership in New York City, allowing them to wear their locks in neat ponytails, rather than be forced to "painfully tuck in their long hair" in their uniform caps.[30]
Rastafari associate dreadlocks with a spiritual journey that one takes in the process of locking their hair (growing hairlocks). It is taught that patience is the key to growing locks, a journey of the mind, soul and spirituality. Its spiritual pattern is aligned with the Rastafari movement. The way to form natural dreadlocks is to allow hair to grow in its natural pattern, without cutting, combing or brushing, but simply to wash it with pure water.
For the Rastas the razor, the scissors and the comb are the three Babylonian or Roman inventions.[31] So close is the association between dreadlocks and Rastafari, that the two are sometimes used synonymously. In reggae music, a follower of Rastafari may be referred to simply as a "hairlocks", "dreadlocks" or "natty (natural) dread", whilst those non-believers who cut their hair are referred to as baldheads.
As important and connected with the movement as the wearing of locks is, though, it is not deemed necessary for, or equivalent to, true faith. Popular slogans, often incorporated within Reggae lyrics, include: "Not every dread is a Rasta and not every Rasta is a dread..."; "It's not the dread upon your head, but the love inna your heart, that mek ya Rastaman" (Sugar Minott); and as Morgan Heritage sings: "You don't haffi dread to be Rasta...," and "Children of Selassie I, don't lose your faith; whether you do or don't have your locks 'pon your head..."
Many non-Rastafari of black African descent wear locks as an expression of pride in their ethnic identity, or simply as a hairstyle, and take a less purist approach to developing and grooming them, adding various substances such as beeswax in an attempt to assist the locking process. The wearing of dreads also has spread among people of other ethnicities, including those whose hair is not naturally suited to the style, and who sometimes go to great lengths to form them. Locks worn for stylish reasons are sometimes referred to as "bathroom locks," to distinguish them from the kind that are purely natural. Rasta purists also sometimes refer to such dreadlocked individuals as "wolves," as in "a wolf in sheep's clothing," especially when they are seen as trouble-makers who might potentially discredit or infiltrate Rastafari.[32]
Rastafarian Colors:Red,Gold, and Green.
Music has long played an integral role in Rastafari, and the connection between the movement and various kinds of music has become well known, due to the international fame of reggae musicians such as Bob Marley and Peter Tosh.
Niyabinghi chants are played at worship ceremonies called grounations,[13] that include drumming, chanting and dancing, along with prayer and ritual smoking of cannabis. The name Nyabinghi comes from an East African movement from the 1850s to the 1950s that was led by people who militarily opposed European imperialism. This form of nyabinghi was centered around Muhumusa, a healing woman from Uganda who organized resistance against German colonialists. In Jamaica, the concepts of Nyabinghi were appropriated for similar anti-colonial efforts, and it is often danced to invoke the power of Jah against an oppressor.
The drum is a symbol of the Africanness of Rastafari, and some mansions (Rastafari sects) assert that Jah's spirit of divine energy is present in the drum. African music survived slavery because many slaveowners encouraged it as a method of keeping morale high. Afro-Caribbean music arose with the influx of influences from the native peoples of Jamaica, as well as the European slaveowners.
Another style of Rastafari music is called burru drumming, first played in the Parish of Clarendon, Jamaica, and then in West Kingston. Burru was later introduced to the burgeoning Rasta community in Kingston by a Jamaican musician named Count Ossie. He mentored many influential Jamaican ska, rock steady, and reggae musicians. Through his tutelage, they began combining New Orleans R&B, folk mento, jonkanoo, kumina, and revival zion into a unique sound. The burru style, which centers on three drums — the bass, the alto fundeh, and the repeater — would later be copied by hip hop DJs.[35]
Maroons, or communities of escaped slaves, kept purer African musical traditions alive in the interior of Jamaica, and were also contributing founders of Rastafari.[citation needed]
Reggae
Reggae was born amidst poor blacks in Trenchtown, the main ghetto of Kingston, Jamaica, who listened to radio stations from the United States. Jamaican musicians, many of them Rastas, soon blended traditional Jamaican folk music and drumming with American R&B, and jazz into ska, that later developed into reggae under the influence of soul.
Reggae began to enter international consciousness in the early 1970s, and Rastafari mushroomed in popularity internationally, largely due to the fame of Bob Marley, who actively and devoutly preached Rastafari, incorporating Nyabinghi and Rastafarian chanting into his music, lyrics and album covers. Songs like "Rastaman Chant" led to the movement and reggae music being seen as closely intertwined in the consciousness of audiences across the world (especially among oppressed and poor groups of African Americans and Native Americans, First Nations Canadians, Australian Aborigines and New Zealand Māori, and throughout most of Africa[citation needed]). Other famous reggae musicians with strong Rastafarian elements in their music include Peter Tosh, Freddie McGregor, Toots & the Maytals, Burning Spear, Black Uhuru, Prince Lincoln Thompson, Bunny Wailer, Prince Far I, Israel Vibration, The Congos, Mikey Dread, Don Carlos, The Viceroys, The Itals, Cornell Campbell, The Meditations, Wailing Souls, Norris Reid, Michael Phrophet, The Heptones, Dennis Brown, Twinkle Brothers, and hundreds more.
- Reggae music expressing Rasta doctrine
The first reggae single that sang about Rastafari and reached Number 1 in the Jamaican charts was Bongo Man by Little Roy in 1969.[36] Early Rasta reggae musicians (besides Marley) whose music expresses Rastafari doctrine well are Peter Tosh, Bunny Wailer (in Blackheart Man), Prince Far I, Linval Thompson, Ijahman Levi (especially the first 4 albums), Misty-in-Roots (Live), The Congos (Heart of the Congos), The Rastafarians, The Abyssinians, Culture, Big Youth, and Ras Michael And The Sons Of Negus. The Jamaican jazz percussionist Count Ossie, who had played on a number of ska and reggae recordings, recorded albums with themes relating to Rasta history, doctrine, and culture.
Rastafari doctrine as developed in the '80s was further expressed musically by a number of other prominent artists, such as Burning Spear, Steel Pulse, Third World, The Gladiators, Black Uhuru, Aswad, and Israel Vibration. Rastafari ideas have spread beyond the Jamaican community to other countries including Russia, where artists such as Jah Division write songs about Jah, and South Africa where Lucky Dube first learned reggae music from Peter Tosh recordings. Afro-American hardcore punk band Bad Brains are notable followers of the Rastafari movement and have written songs ("I Against I", etc.) that promote the doctrine.
In the 21st century, Rastafari sentiments are spread through roots reggae and dancehall, subgroups of reggae music, with many of their most important proponents promoting the Rastafari religion, such as Capleton, Sizzla, Anthony B, Barrington Levy, Turbulence, Jah Mason, Pressure, Midnite, Natural Black, Daweh Congo, Luciano, Cocoa Tea, Richie Spice or H.I.M. Sound System. Several of these acts have gained mainstream success and frequently appear on the popular music charts. Most recently artists such as Damian Marley (son of Bob Marley) have blended hip-hop with reggae to re-energize classic Rastafari issues such as social injustice, revolution and the honour and responsibility of parenthood using contemporary musical style.
Berlin-based dub techno label "Basic Channel" has subsidiary labels called "Rhythm & Sound" and "Burial Mix" whose lyrics strongly focus on many aspects of Rastafari culture and ideology, including the acceptance of Haile Selassie I. Notable tracks include "Jah Rule", "Mash Down Babylon", "We Be Troddin'", and "See Mi Yah".
Jamaican reggae artist Jah Cure also praises Jah and the Rastafari movement in many of his songs, as do two Sinéad O'Connor rastafari/roots reggae CDs – "Throw Down Your Arms" and "Theology".
Marcus Garvey
Rastas see Marcus Mosiah Garvey as a prophet, with his philosophy fundamentally shaping the movement, and with many of the early Rastas having started out as Garveyites. He is often seen as a second John the Baptist. One of the most famous prophecies attributed to him involving the coronation of Haile Selassie I was the 1927 pronouncement "Look to Africa, for there a king shall be crowned," although an associate of Garvey's, James Morris Webb, had made very similar public statements as early as 1921.[37][38] Marcus Garvey promoted Black Nationalism, black separatism, and Pan-Africanism: the belief that all black people of the world should join in brotherhood and work to decolonise the continent of Africa — then still controlled by the white colonialist powers.
He promoted his cause of black pride throughout the 1920s and 1930s, and was particularly successful and influential among lower-class blacks in Jamaica and in rural communities. Although his ideas have been hugely influential in the development of Rastafari culture, Garvey never identified himself with the movement, and even wrote an article critical of Haile Selassie for leaving Ethiopia at the time of the Fascist occupation.[39] In addition, his Universal Negro Improvement Association disagreed with Leonard Howell over Howell's teaching that Haile Selassie was the Messiah.[39] Rastafari nonetheless may be seen as an extension of Garveyism. In early Rasta folklore, it is the Black Star Liner (actually a shipping company bought by Garvey to encourage repatriation to Liberia) that takes them home to Africa.Early written foundations
Although not strictly speaking a "Rastafari" document, the Holy Piby, written by Robert Athlyi Rogers from Anguilla in the 1920s, is acclaimed by many Rastafarians as a formative and primary source. Robert Athlyi Rogers founded an Afrocentric religion known as "Athlicanism" in the US and West Indies in the 1920s. Rogers' religious movement, the Afro-Athlican Constructive Church, saw Ethiopians (in the Biblical sense of all Black Africans) as the chosen people of God, and proclaimed Marcus Garvey, the prominent Black Nationalist, an apostle. The church preached self-reliance and self-determination for Africans.
The Royal Parchment Scroll of Black Supremacy, written during the 1920s by a preacher called Fitz Balintine Pettersburg, is a surrealistic stream-of-consciousness polemic against the white colonial power structure that is also considered formative, a palimpsest of Afrocentric thought.
The first document to appear that can be labelled as truly Rastafari was Leonard P. Howell's The Promise Key, written using the pen name G.G. [for Gangun-Guru] Maragh, in the early 1930s. In it, he claims to have witnessed the Coronation of the Emperor and Empress on 2 November 1930 in Addis Ababa, and proclaims the doctrine that H.I.M. Ras Tafari is the true Head of Creation and that the King of England is an imposter. This tract was written while Howell was jailed on charges of sedition.
Emergence
Emperor Haile Selassie I, whom some of the Rastafarians call Jah, was crowned "King of Kings, Elect of God, and Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah" in Addis Ababa on November 2, 1930. The event created great publicity throughout the world, including in Jamaica, and particularly through two consecutive Time magazine articles about the coronation (he was later named Time's Person of the Year for 1935, the first Black person to appear on the cover), as well as two consecutive National Geographic issues around the same time. Haile Selassie almost immediately gained a following as both God and King amongst poor Jamaicans, who came to be known as Rastafarians, and who looked to their Bibles, and saw what they believed to be the fulfilling of many prophecies from the book of Revelation. As Ethiopia was the only African country to be free from colonialism, and Haile Selassie was the only black leader accepted among the kings and queens of Europe, the early Rastas viewed him with great reverence.
Over the next two years, three Jamaicans who all happened to be overseas at the time of the coronation, each returned home and independently began, as street preachers, to proclaim the divinity of the newly crowned Emperor as the returned Christ,[40] arising from their interpretations of Biblical prophecy and based partly on Haile Selassie's status as the only African monarch of a fully independent state, with the titles King of Kings and Conquering Lion of Judah (Revelation 5:5).
First, on 8 December 1930, Archibald Dunkley, formerly a seaman, landed at Port Antonio and soon began his ministry; in 1933, he relocated to Kingston where the King of Kings Ethiopian Mission was founded. Joseph Hibbert returned from Costa Rica in 1931 and started spreading his own conviction of the Emperor's divinity in Benoah district, Saint Andrew Parish, through his own ministry, called Ethiopian Coptic Faith; he too moved to Kingston the next year, to find Leonard Howell already teaching many of these same doctrines, having returned to Jamaica around the same time. With the addition of Robert Hinds, himself a Garveyite and former Bedwardite, these four preachers soon began to attract a following among Jamaica's poorer classes, who were already beginning to look to Ethiopia for moral support.
Leonard Howell
Leonard Howell, who has been described as the "first Rasta",[41] became the first to be persecuted, charged with sedition for refusing loyalty to the King of England George V. The British government would not tolerate Jamaicans loyal to Haile Selassie in what was then a British colony. When he was released, he formed a commune which grew as large as 2,000 people[42] at a place called Pinnacle, at St. Catherine in Jamaica.
Visit of Selassie I to Jamaica
Haile Selassie I had already met with several Rasta elders in Addis Ababa in 1961, giving them gold medals, and had allowed West Indians of African descent to settle on his personal land in Shashamane in the 1950s. The first actual Rastafarian settler, Papa Noel Dyer, arrived in September 1965, having hitch-hiked all the way from England.
Haile Selassie visited Jamaica on April 21, 1966. Somewhere between one and two hundred thousand Rastafari from all over Jamaica descended on Kingston airport having heard that the man whom they considered to be God was coming to visit them. They waited at the airport smoking a great amount of cannabis and playing drums. When Haile Selassie arrived at the airport he delayed disembarking from the aeroplane for an hour until Mortimer Planno, a well-known Rasta, personally welcomed him. From then on, the visit was a success. Rita Marley, Bob Marley's wife, converted to the Rastafari faith after seeing Haile Selassie; she has stated that she saw stigmata appear on his person, and was instantly convinced of his divinity.
The great significance of this event in the development of the Rastafari movement should not be underestimated. Having been outcasts in society, they gained a temporary respectability for the first time. By making Rasta more acceptable, it opened the way for the commercialisation of reggae, leading in turn to the further global spread of Rastafari.
Because of Haile Selassie's visit, April 21 is celebrated as Grounation Day. It was during this visit that Selassie I famously told the Rastafari community leaders that they should not emigrate to Ethiopia until they had first liberated the people of Jamaica. This dictum came to be known as "liberation before repatriation."
Walter Rodney
In 1968, Walter Rodney, a Guyanese national, author, and professor at the University of the West Indies, published a pamphlet titled The Groundings with My Brothers which among other matters, including a summary of African history, discussed his experiences with the Rastafarians. It became a benchmark in the Caribbean Black Power movement. Combined with Rastafarian teachings, both philosophies spread rapidly to various Caribbean nations, including Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Dominica, and Grenada.
1 The Concise Columbia Encyclopedia is licensed from Columbia University Press. Copyright © 1995 by Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.
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