Ekwensu

In the town of Anaku, in Anambra State, the shrine of Ekwensu stands in the middle of things. It is in Isiokwe Umuezeagu village, with family compounds close around it. Other gods are kept out in thick forest, a long walk from anybody’s door. This one has neighbours. Children wander into the yard in the heat of the afternoon, and there is a rule about that. Nobody may strike a child on the shrine’s ground.

Outside Anaku, and outside a handful of towns like it, most Igbo people would find this hard to believe. Open an Igbo Bible and Ekwensu is the name printed where an English one says the Devil. The hymns use it. The prayers use it. For more than a hundred years, in church and out of it, Ekwensu has been the tempter, the enemy of God, the thing behind every wicked thought. The older record says something else.

The older Ekwensu is a war spirit. He was the power a community reached for when it was attacked. Researchers who have gone back over the material describe a force that was seldom called on, and then only when lives, land and the town’s own freedom were in real danger. He was for defence against an enemy who had no right to be there. Victory was his gift. The diviners who cast the Afa seeds kept a praise name for him, the eagle that pecked the serpent to death, and they counted him among the kindly powers of the moon, a child of the light.

No tale about him survives. There is no story of his birth, no parents, no wife, no quarrel with another god, no famous battle with his name on it. What survives is practice. That is not nothing. A god with shrines, feast days and a hill named after him has left a firmer mark than many who only have a story.

The shrines are the heart of it. In 1987 one writer on Igbo religion stated that Ekwensu was too dangerous and too hateful for anyone to build him a shrine, and that none existed. In 2005 the Nsukka scholar Damian Opata answered with a list. He found shrines called Onu-Ekwensu at Umundu and at Iheaka, and others at Nkalagu, Nimbo, Uvuru, Abi and Ugbene, all in what is now Enugu State. He also wrote down what went on in them. At Umundu, a man about to take the title of Ozioko went through the last rite at the Ekwensu shrine. At Iheaka, people came to the shrine with ordinary requests and asked for favour. At Nimbo, before the missionaries arrived, the bodies of people who had lived well enough to become ancestors were laid out in the shrine while the mourners called out their good deeds, their honesty and their hard work. At Amalla, the yearly Akatakpa festival is held at his shrine, and people known for bad character are kept away from it.

There is more. West of the Niger, the historian Elizabeth Isichei recorded a yearly festival at Asaba, called Ine or Ika-Ekwensu, held to thank him for guarding the town against its enemies. Anaku still holds its own feast, Uta-Ekwensu. And his name is on the land. There is a hill of Ekwensu at Ukpor, a piece of ground at Achi, and forests at Uga and Ufuma. People do not name their own hill after the enemy of God.

So how did a town’s defender become the Devil? The missionaries who put Christian teaching into Igbo needed a word for Satan, and Igbo religion did not have one. It had no single spirit who stood against the creator. Harm came from people, or from a god who had been wronged. The translators took the fiercest name they could find, the one tied to blood and fighting, and used that. Opata reads it as a deliberate move against the old religion. Whatever the intent, it worked. Looser modern tellings also make Ekwensu a trickster and a patron of bargaining and markets. That side of him is much less well recorded than the war spirit.

At Anaku today the old character is plain enough. He is the town’s protector against invaders. He is said to stand with the weak and to hate injustice. Witches, and people who use charms to hurt others, are said to be afraid to come near his shrine. Old men sit in its shade. The yard is swept. It is an odd place to go looking for Satan.

His strength is narrow and exact. He wins wars that have to be fought, and he keeps the wicked away from his door. His limits are as clear. He was never called for small things. He had no say over rain or harvest or birth. And he could not defend his own name. One word in a translation was enough to empty most of his shrines, which no invading army had ever done.

Frequently Asked Questions

Who is Ekwensu in Igbo religion?

Ekwensu is an Igbo spirit of war and victory. Communities called on Ekwensu when they were attacked and had to defend themselves. He had shrines and yearly festivals, and he was seen as close to the supreme being Chukwu and not opposed to him.

Is Ekwensu the Devil?

In Igbo Christian usage, yes: Ekwensu is the word for the Devil in the Igbo Bible, hymns and prayers. In the older Igbo religion, no. Ekwensu was a war spirit who protected towns, and Igbo belief had no single spirit who stood against the creator.

Why did missionaries use the name Ekwensu for Satan?

Missionaries translating Christian teaching into Igbo needed a word for Satan, and Igbo religion had no matching figure. They chose Ekwensu, whose name was tied to war and bloodshed. The scholar Damian Opata argues that the choice was a deliberate move against the old religion.

Are there shrines to Ekwensu?

Yes. Damian Opata listed Ekwensu shrines at Umundu, Iheaka, Nkalagu, Nimbo, Uvuru, Abi and Ugbene in Enugu State in 2005. The town of Anaku in Anambra State still keeps an Ekwensu shrine in the middle of the community and holds a yearly festival called Uta-Ekwensu.

What festivals honour Ekwensu?

Anaku holds the yearly Uta-Ekwensu festival. Asaba, west of the Niger, held a yearly festival called Ine or Ika-Ekwensu to thank Ekwensu for guarding the town against its enemies. At Amalla the yearly Akatakpa festival takes place at the Ekwensu shrine.

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Ala (Igbo), Amadioha, Anyanwu, Agwu, Ahia Njoku, Eshu, Ogun, Satan, Shaitan, Ares, Mars