PRAYER AND MAGIC: A POTENT PARADOXICAL RITUAL IN AFRICAN TRADITIONAL RELIGION

Abstract

Prayer and magic are two interrelated phenomena that sometimes are misinterpreted. Prayer could be offered to the deity (vertical prayer) or human (horizontal). Whichever one, prayer is a practice of religious communication style to appease a super force (corporeal or incorporeal) and as such, it’s potent when well ritualized. The concept of magic has been a misconceptualized phenomenon that many untutored minds have conceived over the years. Magic could be good or bad, (white and black magic), just the same way prayer could be for good or bad. Prayer and magic are important elements in African traditional religion and they are very potent before the ritualization. The ritualization process could be familiar or unfamiliar to a non-adherent of the religious tradition. Based on this, the researcher ventured into a circumscribed scholarship to bring to the fore “Prayer and magic: a potent paradoxical ritual in African traditional religion.” The paper is designed qualitatively in a historical and descriptive grand style. Findings are the structural breakdown such as the classical anchors that instilled the magic consciousness in both terms (prayer and magic) as the basis for the thematic debate. The finding factually opined that the potency of prayer and magic in African society curt across divination, incantation, alchemy, astrology, sorcery, necromancy, spirit mediation, and others.