The Oromo Concept of Reality or Dhugaa-Ganama

By Yoseph Mulugeta Baba (Ph.D.)*

Part II

(In my previous article, I elucidated the way in which the Oromo system of knowledge essentially takes its starting point from the concept of jireenya—existence—with reference to jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama—ontological characteristic of human being; for the understandingand interpretation of the world, of oneself, and other people. In doing so, I clearly indicated how Oromo’s concept of Reality can best be subsumed under three broad concepts: (a) Uumaa (Cosmology); (b) Waaqa (Undifferentiated-Being); and (c) Saffu (Human Ontology). The present article is a continuation of previous one.)

The Oromo mode of thought “denies” any distinction between thought and things. As a consequence, Waaqa is conceived of as being both transcendent and immanent. This is due to the Oromo concept of Uumaa —creation. Uumaa is a world-of-process. This act of creation —Uumaa— signifies Waaqa’s presence as a natural part of the entire created natural world in the form ofAyyaanaa, which in turn is responsible for the emergence of new creatures —uumama—at different epochs of human history. Ayyaanaa is thus something of Waaqa. In other words, Waaqa is at the same time one and many. In Oromo philosophical thought, therefore, a distinction between the universe of thought and the universe of nature is untenable.

In the absence of such distinctions, however, how to define human nature remains problematic. Such a philosophical question sets the scene for the concept of Saffu. This concept has its origin in the description of human “existence” as being related to one or another kind of human “activity”. As I argued in my pervious article, unlike other things, human “existence” is intrinsically linked to jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama — ontological characteristic of human being. This “activity” can best be a result of having a knowledge of things in accordance with the place assigned to each of them by Waaqa. The Oromo notion of jireenya includes the idea that everything relates to nature outside of itself. As it would be absurd to have this notion about human reason, however, the concept of jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama was developed which enables one to interpret and balance the “paradox” posed by Uumaaversus Ayyaanaa.

Therefore, the concept of Saffu—human ontology—is not only about the Oromo’s moral philosophy, as some scholars have tended to argue. But, it is also an epistemological notion founded on the idea of the jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama— ontological characteristic of human being. The jiruu-fi-jireenya-namaessentially relates to the physical world as well as human society. The concept of Saffu—human ontology—is thus nothing other than a proper understanding and interpretation of one’s state of “existence” as s/he radically relates to both aspects of nature—physical world and human society. It is a critical reflection upon a relationship that ought to exist between each human being and Uumaaas well as Ayyaanaa, on the one hand, and between an individual and human society, on the other. (Raayyaa Horoo, 2008, p. 13)

The above epistemological assertion has two philosophical foundations: (a) seera Waaqa—the laws of Undifferentiated-Being and (b) seera Nama —the laws of human being. The former is not a complete form of knowledge. As I have already argued, the origin of Undifferentiated-Being is wholly “unknown” to the human mind. Yet, coming to some sort of such knowledge is not impossible. This is due to the Oromo’s notion of Ayyaanaa. Ayyaanaa can be “thought of as fractions of Divinity [Undifferentiated-Being]: fractions which arise from the continuous Creation [Uumaa] by which God expresses himself and imposes structure on the world.” (Gudrun Dahl, 1996, p. 170)  Hence,knowledge gained concerning the laws of “nature”, for instance, is attributed to Ayyaanaa. These laws are conceived of as fixed and eternal. They are thus immutable.

  Seera Nama — the laws of human being—, on the other hand, are subject to change in the context of  jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama—human “existence”. Although the seera Waaqa —the laws ofUndifferentiated-Being—underlie every jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama—at different epochs of human history, yet; the understanding and interpretation of the seera Nama—the laws of human being—may differ considerably between individuals. In the Oromo concept of Reality, however, this difference need not be seen as a “contradiction”; unless such an interpretation goes against the concept of Saffu—human ontology. That is to say, the denial of Saffu is the failure of the individual to keep a balancebetween seera Waaqa—Ayyaanaa—and seera Nama—Uumaa. This “activity”, as indicated already, is generally called the jiruu-fi-jireenya-nama. The clear assumption is that, although one has a considerable difficulty (in) overcoming this “contradiction”, there is always room for theinterpretation and understanding of the case in question to keep a balance between all things: Saffu, which finally leads, to pluralistic interpretations of the universe, despite the fact that there is just oneuniverse.

Accordingly, the Oromo have adopted and developed a philosophic method of enquiry to identify and determine the tenable form of interpretation whenever various competing interpretations arise. This mode of investigation is called an ilaa-fi-ilaamee-philosophic-mode-of-thought. With such foundations in mind, let us, in the following subsection explore the justification of this form of enquiry. In order to do so, I would single out Gumii Gaayo as  justification of the case in point.

(to be continued)

References

1. Baxter, P. T. W., Hultin, J., and Triulzi, A. eds. Being and Becoming Oromo: Historical and   Anthropological Enquires. Asmara: The Red Sea Press, Inc., 1996.
2. Dirribi D. B. Oromo Wisdom In Black Civilization. Finfinnee: Finfinne Printing and Publishing S. C., 2011.
3. Geleta K. Hirkoo: English-Afan Oromo-Amharic Dictionary. Aster Nega Publishing Enterprise, 2008.
4. Knutson, K. E. Authority and Change: A Study of the Kallu Institution Among the Macha Galla of Ethiopia. Gӧteborg: Etnografiska Museet, 1967.
5. Lambert, B. Oromo Religion: Myths and Rites of the Western Oromo of Ethiopia:  An Attempt to Understand. Berlin, 1990.
6. Leus, Ton. Aadaa Boraanaa: A Dictionary of Borana Culture. Addis Ababa: Shama Books, 2006.
7. Loo, J. V. D. The Religious Practices of the Guji Oromo. Addis Ababa, 1991.
8. Raayyaa Horoo, Waaqeffannaa. Finfinnee, 2008.
9. Sumner, Claude, Oromo Wisdom Literature. Vol.1 Addis Ababa: Gudina Tumsa Foundation, 1995.

Note: The responsibility for the article is entirely mine.

Galatoomaa!

*Yoseph Mulugeta Baba received his B.A; M.A; and Ph.D degrees in Philosophy from the CUEA. His research areas include Metaphilosophy, Oromo Philosophy, Continental Philosophy, Post-colonial African Political Philosophy, Postmodernism, and Ethiopian historiography. Currently, he is completing his forthcoming book (CUEA PRESS)—on The Ilaa-fi-Ilaamee Philosophical Method of Enquiry. He can be reached at kankokunmalimaali@gmail.com.

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Previous article The Oromo Concept of Reality or Dhugaa-Ganama, Part I

=>ayyaantuu

Conspiracy of Pseudo-Ethiopianist ‘elites’ to carryover fictitious Ethiopia to the future

By Nigussie B Gemechu

History tells us that some nations including Ethiopia are built by creating unnatural sense of belongingness through dismissal and denial of the uniqueness existing among various populations. The core purpose of building a monolithic brand serves the interest of the builder, class of the builder (even if not claimed) and servant of the builder (to some extent). This brand is not only used as a formula to manipulate the status quo but teaches the almightiness and godly power of the nation builder ((refers to the yesterday’s and today’s forged nation architect/engineer Pseudo-Ethiopianists) in public and religious institutions. The nation builder establishes ways of sustaining this power by creatingunquestioning & unreasoning mentality in the subjects (the people). The nation (aka Ethiopia) builder creates a society that perceives or believes that: ‘its’ nation does not fail; a nation builder assumes power from God; a nation builder is always right and does not make mistakes; a nation builder protects the rights of everyone; a nation builder is fair; a nation builder knows everything; a nation builder lives forever; and so on (list of good and positive – entitling perfectionism)

The nation builder creates ‘national identity’ for the people of ‘its’ nation regardless of the uniqueness and diverse segments of the population in terms of language, culture and values. The nation builder writes and re-writes history and dictionary of ‘its’ own while writing and re-writing a separate history and dictionary of ‘others’ in the same ‘nation’. The story lines of the writings go along with praising the ‘highness’ of the nation builder versus demoting the segments categorically known as ‘uncivilized’ and backward ‘others’. Questioning the godly nation builder is considered disloyalty and would result in condemnation and dehumanization. The people live on the ‘Good Will’ of the nation builder. That’s how the nation named Ethiopia is built by the minority ‘unifying’ nation builders. This pattern has continued to 21st century Ethiopia. Not just that, a self-proclaimed habesha ‘elites’ work day and night to build similar ‘homogenous nation’ implemented by their forefathers.

The reality is these people (Pseudo-Ethiopianists) can never exist in a democratic society. That’s the main reason they only give lip service to building a democratic nation. That’s is the main reason they buried Gada System in their homestead when the other part of the world institutes this huge asset indigenous to the Oromo people. It’s laughable to look at these illusionist comparing the nation their fathers and grandfathers built with the United States of America. How elite should an ‘elite’ be to understand the conceptual and contextual ground on which the United States of America was constituted? They think the word ‘uniting’ is enough to line them up with the USA as a democratic nation. I wouldn’t be saying anything today if the bad- intentioned nation builders of yesterday and today have adopted a well-tested wisdom and values of the Cushitic people in creating a democratic and humanly society. Despite the systematic nation builder’s silencer, incredibly brave and forward-looking people were born to challenge their conspiracies at different times in the past 130 years of the ‘nation’. And now, we need a nation builder that recognizes and believes in the diversity of

Conspiracy-1: Pseudo-Ethiopianists don’t want to recognize the giant Cushitic majority (Oromo & Southern People), a society whose principles of life are love, mutual respect, fairness, truth, caring and valuing every person equally as human. They do their best to reduce any sort of majority quest for a sensible, all-inclusive, participatory and real nation building.

Conspiracy-2: Pseudo-Ethiopianist have their own doctrine and believe their God has created them ‘Special’ to lead ‘others’, not to be led; to be light for ‘others’ living in darkness; to educate ‘others’.

Conspiracy-3: Pseudo-Ethiopianists believe they are superior, more intelligent, gifted, and naturally privileged to build a nation and in fact listens to and works with no one but themselves and people in their circle. They present themselves as the only architect to build a nation and re-writes books and history like their forefathers to justify their perfectionism.

Conspiracy-4: Pseudo-Ethiopianists portray any other concerned individuals or groups who want to build a real nation as enemy of the a ‘nation’, perceive them as a threat and do their best to eliminate them.

Conspiracy-5: Pseudo-Ethiopianists, while priding themselves as true ‘believers’ and ‘chosen people of God’, use condemnation and dehumanization, mainly manifested in the form of insult as a big tool to demoralize and silence those genuinely questioning and challenging them.

Conspiracy-6: Pseudo-Ethiopianists want to build a nation on the ideology of protecting individual rights by assuming and ensuring homogeneity – a hypothesis that couldn’t be proved by any means when there are practical very distinctive nations equally demanding group rights. This has been implemented and experimented against the will of the people for over a century but failed again and again but the conspirators want to keep it alive.

Conspiracy-7: Pseudo-Ethiopianists believe assimilation and humiliation worked in the past for the nation builders and it should work now rather than having a commonsense and reasonable reconciliation.

Conspiracy-8: Pseudo-Ethiopianists still believe they are nation builders – an imaginary nation, a falsehood nation, exclusionist nation, foundationless nation, a nation of assimilation, a nation of denial, a nation of few/minority, a nation not based on love, mutual respect, mutual understanding, truth, commonsense and participation, a nation of inequality, a nation of poor mentality, a nation of unfairness, a nation of destruction,

Pseudo-Ethiopianists invest quite a significant amount of resources to make sure their conspiracies look real and good. They sing about them; they loudly & proudly talk about them; they preach about them; they teach about them; they write and re-write about them; they idolize about them; they do daily propagandas about them; they enforce them; they count on the unquestioning and unreasoning followers (remember: they worked hard on creating this mentality); and so on…………………..

I’m sure you have come across most of the conspiracies and the conspirators. They live with us and they pretend to care for us. They tell us they are working day & night to ‘free’ us. They still think and believe they are the right and only people to build a ‘perfect’ nation. They go after and attack potential real nation-makers. They gently approach us as long as we are subject to their conspiracies with unquestioning and unreasoning mind. Otherwise, it’s very easy for them to easily categorize us to a ‘threat’ to their fake nation building.

Here is the simple truth: no one was born Oromo, Amhara, Tigre, Sidama, Hadiya, etc by his/her choice. However, once that happens, we have to accept everyone as is. The identity of a person comes with a language, culture, and values associated with his/her being Oromo, Amhara, Tigre, Sidama, Hadiya, etc. These identity features (language, culture, and values) give an individual or a group a unique psychology up on which a character of a person is developed. It is not just easy like dressing someone’s cloth, eating someone’s food, or singing someone’s song. It’s much more than that. Denying someone or a group these basic natural ingredients is like abusing his/her humanity. This is one reason why group right is as equally important as individual right. A society plays an enormous role in shaping the character of the member of that group.

Therefore, IT’S TIME to stop the Pseudo-Ethiopianists and permanently thrash their fictitious identity and nation. Let’s build a real nation for all, by all. Yes, that’s what we want – a real nation! I think any ordinary person, other than the manipulative Pseudo-Ethiopianist conspirators, understands what a real nation means. It’s time to filter them out and isolate them; it’s time to call them nation-abolishers instead of nation builders; it’s time to teach their unquestioning & unreasoning blind-followers to question and follow commonsense to the least; it’s time to carefully identify and bring good and genuine people together to build a common nation. Regardless of the extensive class imposition in many ways, the Oromo people lived with everyone giving their utmost love and respect. I would like to call up on the good and genuine people of other ethnic groups to denounce these conspirators, appreciate the fact and work for a bigger vision where everybody sees and enjoys a shared interest. Otherwise, the Oromo nation is a much bigger & better nation than Ethiopia falling in the hands of nation-abolishers.

=>ayyaantuu

Ethiopia celebrates "Erecha" the beginning of Spring

Oromia: “Say No” to Oppose Tigreans’ Master Plan – Which Is the “Master Killer” for Oromo Farmers

Hundreds of Oromo (and friends of the Oromo) Facebook and Twitter users have changed their ‘profile pictures’ to the “Say No” graphic asnews broke out earlier on September 30, 2015, that the Tigrean-led Ethiopian government was advancing to finalize the “Addis Ababa Master Plan” through its agent OPDO. The “Addis Ababa Master Plan” aims to evict millions of Oromo farmers from the Oromia Federal State’s localities around Finfinne (Addis Ababa) in order to take the land for Tigrean investors, Tigrean real-estate developers and Tigrean commercial farmers while Oromo farmers will become day-laborers (unskilled workers), guards, housemaids, etc. (i.e. low-wage earners) on the Tigrean investment hub (called “Industrial Zone”) in Central Oromiyaa. In addition to Central Oromiyaa, these Tigrean “Industrial Zones” are to be built all over Oromiyaa near major cities/towns, such as the Dire-Dawa Industrial Zone near Dire-Dawa, the Jimma Industrial Zone near Jimma city, and so on – more details can be read here.

https://www.oromiamedia.org/2015/10/omn-oduu-fulbaana-30-2015/