Meaning of the word mojo
Maybe age has taught us to listen better and speak wisely. Seems like when we were young our elders were just speaking Mumbo Jumbo anyway. He supposes that Mumbo Jumbo at one time meant divine ancestor wisdom. My favorite literary reference to Mumbo Jumbo is in Ishmael Reed’s fictional book of the same name. These sound similar to the Egungun masquerades that occur even still today. “ An supplement to the Encyclopaedia Britannica in 1803 describes a strange custom in which a masked dancer would come in the darkness and a ritual would occur. It is described here as a “Mundingo (Mandingo) idol. The first print appearance of the words Mumbo Jumbo was in Travels in Africa written in 1738. Well, actually Barnum was told the elephant was named Jumbo, which was probably a bastardization of the Swahili word Jambo, which means Hello, and was very likely one of the few words the foreigners has retained from their journey to obtain the animal. But you may be thinking wait doesn’t Jumbo means big like the elephant. Mojo ka hindi mein matalab, arth aur prayog. translation in hindi for Mojo with similar and opposite words. The most widely accepted history of the phrase Mumbo Jumbo is that it refers to a masked ritual where people would be publicly punished for their indiscretions. Mojo definition, pronuniation, antonyms, synonyms and example sentences in Hindi. There is definitely bad juju and good juju and this has found it’s way into urban legend in the form of monkey paws and rabbit’s feet respectively. Over time this word has evolved to mean the energy, or what Voodoo practitioners would call the Ashe of a place. There is an amazing piece by Bill Casselman about the Oxford English Dictionary falsely attributing juju and gris gris to the french language despite their obvious African roots. Some also attribute it’s use to the Hausa people. This obvious root of the word Juju comes from the custom of throwing herbal spells and fetishes at people as a method of spiritual delivery. The world of Voodoo has a lot of mysterious words and many have found their way into our waking speech today. My best friend said to me once over the phone(after she had apparently fallen asleep) “ There is tuna between us.” That has to be my favorite mysterious sleep talk. Even when we sleep there are words in our dreams, sometimes we even speak them. But then the thought came, like a revelation “There are always words.” When you dance there are words in your head, maybe words in the music, words people are speaking around you, always words. I love to dance and move so much that everyone thought I would have those qualities ruling my spirituality. Even my path of Eleggua in Santeria (Lukumi) is all about words, which came as a surprise to both me and my godmother, when we saw the divination results. Well, maybe not literally, but words are a key to our past, a doorway to understanding and meaning that we use everyday. I sleep with a dictionary next to my bed. Tarkawa Bay- Snake Charmer by Sudhanshu Pran Kaul licensed under CC by 2.0