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“In Saint-Domingue [Haiti] the Arada slaves from the Bight of Benin, who were the majority during the first decades of the eighteenth century, brought the traditions of the Fon and Yoruba peoples, which were joined by those brought by the Kongo slaves who eventually became the island’s majority. In a world organized to the production of plantation commodities, where slaves were meant to be laborers and nothing more, religious ceremonies provided ritual solace, dance and music, but most importantly a community that extended beyond the plantation.
They also provided an occasion for certain individuals to provide advice and guidance. Out of the highly industrialized and regimented plantations, then, emerged a powerful set of religious practices that celebrated and reflected the human struggles of those who participated in them. Religion was, in some sense, a space of freedom in the midst of a world of bondage,and helped lay the foundation for the revolt that ultimately brought complete freedom to the slaves.”
“Administrators and slave owners had long recognized the subversive potential of the religious ceremonies of slaves. They criminalized and sought to suppress them, though they were never entirely successful. Moreau described in detail a “danse vaudoux” that involved the worship of a snake that had “the knowledge of the past, the science of the present, and the prescience of the future.”… “Nothing is more dangerous than this cult of Vaudoux,” asserted Moreau. He lamented the power of the religious leaders and the dependence of worshipers on them. Such relations of power, presumably, were acceptable only between master and slave.”
– Avengers Of The New World, Laurent Dubois [Parenthesis Added]
