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Susanne Wenger,also known as Adunni Olorisa,is one the world's greatest religious thinkers.Her achievement emerges from her reinterpretation of the Orisa tradition,first developed by the Yoruba of West Africa and  the Americas, and  which has become a global religion.Her unique perspective was developed in over fifty years of living in Yorubaland,most of them in Osogbo. She is best known for her sculpture and architecture,constructed  and sited by herself and members of her school in the Osun forest in Osogbo.Her writing and the magnificent scope of her ideas are  not well known.Her writing is marked by the combination of a baroque elegance with  precision of thought.The human predilection for the sublime,for that which is beyond the struggle to make do with the limitations of the material and psychological conditions of the journey from womb to grave, has rarely had a better expositor. From within the African rain forest,through meditations in nature and a lifetime of ritual,Wenger sees the ultimate in nature and portrays the capacity of the human self and art to embody the divine.

Here I am,one with the water;I think and feel like the river,my blood flows like the river,to the rhythm of its waves,otherwise the trees and the animals wouldn't be such allies.

I am here in the trees,in the river,in my creative phase not only when I am here physically,but forever,even when I happen to be travelling-hidden beyond time and suffering,in the Spiritual Entities which,beceause they are Real in many ways,present ever new features.I feel sheltered with them -in them- beceause I am so very fond of trees and running water - and all the gods of the world are trees and animals long,long before they entrust their sancrosanct magnificence to a human figure.

Susanne Wenger from Adunni: A Portrait of Susanne Wenger by Rolf Brockmann and Gerd Hotter.Machart:Hamburg,1994.Back cover.

Each week, I will make my contribution by analyzing a  line or a term from one of Wenger's books or essays.

To join this group,go to addunniwenger


Thanks

Toyin Adepoju