The Uses of Plants in Healing in an Afro-Cuban Religion, Santeria

Abstract

Although plants have long been known to play an important medical and ritual role in the religious traditions of Africa, little attention has been devoted to examining the use of plants in the context of the various Afro-American religions. As one scholar has written: Medicinal species, to a large extent, have been overlooked even though in some cases these plants represent some of the social and cultural traditions of the people who use them (McClure, 1982). This is particularly evident in the case of Afro-Cuban Santeria,1 for despite the important role plants play in this religion, studies of their use in Santeria have been few. The African origins of Santeria stem largely from the Yorubas of southwestern Nigeria but also include contributions from other neighboring West African peoples sharing similar or related beliefs and practices. In Cuba the Yorubas' orisha worship practices fused with Spanish folk Catholic traditions of hagiolotry and gave rise to an early form of Santeria. The influence of the 19th century European Spiritist movement headed by Allan Kardec completed the ingredients making up present-day Santeria. In Cuba the numerous Yoruba subgroups became known by the ethnic group name Lucumi, which originally had only applied to Yorubas from the kingdom of Oyo. Lucumi is also the name for the dialect of Yoruba serving as Santeria's liturgical tongue (Bascom, 1950; Olmsted, 1953). Ethnicity remained significant in the forma-