I am working on ‘I Ching Part II’ and hope to have it posted in another week or two, but in the interim, I wanted to post this lesson as a sort of holiday-month gift, because I’ve got another freebee-deck attached to this lesson.
SOME BACKGROUND FIRST
Adinkra refers to a type of cloth used as funeral garments among the Akan people in the nations of Ghana and Cote D’Ivoire along the west coast of Africa. The word ‘adinkra’ translates as ‘a message one gives to another when departing.’ Adinkra symbols are either hand-painted or hand-embroidered on cloth in a specific manner to convey a parting message to the deceased. Examples of this appear below:
The Adinkra symbols constitute a living, visual language, with multiple layers of meaning, and which is continually expanding and evolving. They are a handy shortcut, because each symbol can convey a whole paragraph of meaning without saying a word. When I first became aware of and exposed to the Adinkra symbols, being the diviner I am, I immediately started wondering to myself if maybe these symbols could be used to convey helpful information to the living.
Before I go any further, I must issue a disclaimer: I have no sub-Saharan African in my background. Not unless you want to include the first homo sapiens ever a couple-million years ago. So I plead guilty to cultural appropriation here. Furthermore, I don’t know of anyone who’s authorized the Adinkra’s use as a divination tool/system. Nobody okayed me to do this, so alarm, horror or outrage that I would use the Adinkra this way is a completely-understandable reaction. Send all comments, conundrums and brick-bats to my e-mail address as stated.