This post essentially is about why that is: both the mentioning and the negativity of that mentioning.
ORIGINS
Historical sources on the origin of Obeah (also spelled: Obia(h)) within Jamaica are overall not entirely consistent or uniform, probably due to partly lacking reliable sources. Quite much is known, however. Against all odds, one can say, because in Jamaica’s colonial past, there is an evident bias from the White British ruling class perspective, and from the slave masters. The separate world of enslaved Africans of course preferred an own discourse, but was still influenced and framed by the oppressive colonial context, related to degrees of also mental slavery.
The origins are already controversial in the academic field. An Akan origin (from present-day Ghana, in West Africa) seems most probable, also related to the fact that a large percentage of enslaved Africans in Jamaica were brought from that region (estimated at a bit over 50%). Others, though, found sources – including linguistic ones - suggesting rather a Igbo origin (now SE Nigeria) of Obeah, as Igbo were also among the enslaved in Jamaica (a bit more concentrated in the West of the island), or a Calabar region (Efik) origin, from what is now the coastal border area between Nigeria and Cameroon.
IMAGE
Whatever its precise African origins, it developed in Jamaica in a direction that one can term negatively as a “caricature” or more neutrally (if cynically) as a “survival mechanism”. Most sources seem to confirm that Obeah actually before used to have a cosmology with deities, ancestors, and spirits that could be invoked according to certain norms and rules, part of a certain world view. This got reduced, one can say, to a more practical “spirit invocation” or “casting spells” to protect oneself, or poison or harm enemies. This vindictive, selfish image of Obeah, it more or less maintained among the Jamaican populace, up to today.
This image of Obeah was, by the way, not only maintained by self-interested White planters, fearing overt but also sneaky rebellion by their slaves, associating this subtle rebellion (including e.g. poisoning, or “bad spells”) also with particularly women. The famous female Maroon leader fighting British colonial rulers and masters, Queen Nanny, was also labeled a Obeah practitioner, using it in this case against colonial oppressors.
Not just Whites, but also other Afro-Caribbean faiths and spiritual systems/religion that developed, however, condemned the “trickery” and “withchcraft” of Obeah as “evil” or “devilish” , such as Myal adherents.
MYAL AND NATIVE BAPTISTS
Myal, also of African origin (assumed of Congo origin, with Akan elements), developed among Africans in Jamaica, and maintained clear African spiritual retentions (possession, “spirit” invoking), but made a connection to European Christianity, getting mixed with it, especially with nondominant Protestant churches that became popular in Jamaica, notably in what became known as Native Baptists. This Africanizing through Myal (including in interpretations of the holy ghost/spirit and water baptism as “rebirth” in the African tradition ) was frowned upon by White Baptist missionaries, but could not be stopped, giving rise to Native Baptists as Protestant variant among Afro-Jamaicans..
Yet, within this Afro-Christian Native Baptism (also known as Myalism), there grew also a distancing from other African practices, deemed backward or vile, notably Obeah, from which Myal/Native Baptist adherents distanced themselves, confirming thus its image of an evilous, selfish withchcraft.
Obeah was not presented as edifying or uplifting, only as doing harm within the community, though it was also known to have “healing” and “medicine” purpose that could be beneficial.
It seems that this negative characterization of Obeah among Jamaican Native Baptists (and similar Afro-Protestant beliefs), continued in the later Rastafari movement, indeed also Christian influenced, even if Afrocentric. In fact, some scholars point at influences from Native Baptism on aspects of the Rastafari movement, that arose in the 1930s in Jamaica, but of course not in a vacuum. Some early converts to Rastafari came from families where Spiritual Baptism was practiced.
WIDER CARIBBEAN
The same term Obeah with the same meaning (magic/sorcery/spells for personal, selfish goals) is also known elsewhere in what is known as the British Caribbean, such as in Trinidad, to which certain Calypso songs and lyrics attest, such as by Mighty Sparrow, Chalkdust, and Terri Lyons.
There are – taken broader – also interesting parallels elsewhere in the African Diaspora, such as on the neighbouring islands of Cuba and Haiti.
Santería is well-known as the Cuban variant of Vodou (very simply put), in this case mostly based on Yoruba (SW Nigeria, Benin) beliefs and spiritual ideas, translated in a Spanish colonial (Catholic) context. Like Vodou in Haiti, Santería is not just a “withchcraft” or magic practice, but includes a complex and ordered, spiritual cosmology with specific deities, spirits, world views, and rituals, involving rules and conditions. This sets it apart from how Obeah is now known: a magic practice or “withchcraft”.
Another, more Congo/Bantu-influenced Afro-Cuban faith in Cuba is known as Palo Mayombe (with variants in the Dominican Republic), which is known for spells (a bit like Obeah is known), but both positive and negative, and also praised for folk medicine and natural healing. Image-wise Palo Mayombe is thus somewhere between developed, sophisticated Santería and selfish practical magic as Obeah is known elsewhere in the Caribbean.
In Haiti, Vodou is likewise a complex, ordered world view and cosmology, with elaborate rituals, thus in contrast to its stereotypical, simplified “Hollywood” image of “casting spells” on enemies, through e.g. pins in dolls/puppets. This superficial, withchcraft image in fact resembles how Obeah is known in Jamaica.
There are differences between Afro-Haitian Vodou and Afro-Cuban Santería, of course, at first in relation to origins in Africa: Vodou has a strong Benin (Fon-Ewe) imprint, whereas Santería a strong Yoruba (SW Nigeria) one (geographically East of Fon-Ewe people).
Other differences relate to the colonial and political context. State communism in Cuba since the early 1960s was officially atheist, but also actively discouraged “religion” in public life, albeit not successfully. Privately it went on, and only later the State became more lenient openly, especially when Cuba needed tourism since the 1990s crisis period.
In Haiti, some dictatorships had semi-totalitarian traits too (under Duvalier for instance), but Vodou remained the main popular religion, partly mixed with popular Catholicism.
PROTESTANTISM OR RASTAFARI?
Jamaica, rather, kept up a Protestant Christian image, to which later half-heartedly - and after repression periods - Rastafari was added. Remnants of traditional African religions (Kumina, Burru, Myal, Obeah) were marginalized, and partly vilified. Kumina, however, maintained a more extensive cosmology (like Santería), only with more Congo roots.
Even among Afrocentric Jamaicans, such as those in the Rastafari movement, some expressions as Obeah were criticized, while Kumina was more or less respected as interesting connection to the African roots.
While some spiritual and musical aspects from Kumina even influenced Rastafari – “heart beat” drum rhythms, for instance - , on the other hand the “spirit possession”, “ancestor worship” or “trance” aspects from its rituals were eschewed for being “backwardish” or even “devilish”, and at most “translated “ to metaphors.
One explanation for this, besides a Biblical/Christian influence, is the focus on “naturality” and “reality” in the Rastafari worldview. Also, the emphasis on life, and eschewing everything “dead” (including dead bodies or spirits), which in turn can be a Biblical (Levitical/Nazarite) influence.
This type of (social) consciousness and natural livity does not seem to combine well with the “supernatural” or “magic” one can perceive in some traditional African faiths: such as when spirits (e.g. ancestral ones) take possession of a body when someone is in trance. It also seems at odds with the “sorcery” or “witchcraft” of casting spells for which Obeah and Obeah men are known.
What remains a bit unclear, however, is whether this negative image of Obeah is fully an independent, “own” Afrocentric, Rastafari conclusion, or in fact an indirect result of Western Christian colonialism. White Protestantism fought against such African “magic” ideas from the beginning, and likewise Catholicism (although “looser” Catholics tended to use it to their advance, at times too). In other words: it might be a Biblical and Protestant influence in which Rastafari was by necessity based, as Rastafari poet/thinker Mutabaruka pointed out: Rastafari arose in that (post)colonial Biblical/Protestant context: whether it wanted or not.
In Africa itself, “witchcraft” or “bad”, vindictive magic or spells are sometimes lambasted too, but there the same question applies as in Jamaica: really indigenous or due to Western Christian (colonial) influences?
In the article ‘The first chant: Leonard Howell’s ’The promised key’, with commentary by William David Spencer’, in the volume ‘Chanting Down Babylon: the Rastafari reader (1998, edited by: Nathaniel Samuel Murrell, William David Spencer, and Adrian Anthony McFarlan), this view on Obeah within Rastafari is discussed.
The article is also about early (some say the first) Rasta, Leonard Howell. Howell considered some aspects from African traditional religions useful, also for “healing” purposes, such as from Myal, but was more critical about Obeah sorcery, for having wrong intentions and negative (divisive) effects, even if more or less recognized among Rastas as also part of the African heritage, albeit a troubled (and probably corrupted) part of it.
Later Rastas still associate Obeah with wicked intentions and iniquity, and therefore lambast it. Similar – indeed – to how criminals and conmen are criticized, for dividing and disturbing the community.
This view of Obeah can be seen as a Christian influence, but not entirely. In light of the whole Rastafari worldview and values of positive living, Black/African pride, equality, and naturality – and its community sense – magic spells with bad intentions disturb this community and go against such values, causing divisions and conflicts within the community.
In the article about Leonard Howell mentioned – with quotes by reggae artists like Ziggy Marley or Black Uhuru -, but also in many Reggae lyrics, this is indeed the image of Obeah, even beyond Biblical influences: iniquity, wicked intentions.
CONCLUSION
The negative image of Obeah in Jamaica, including among Rastafari, cannot be so easily explained, and has in fact multiple dimensions and origins. An external Protestant/Western influence is there, but relegating it to this is too simplistic.
The latter becomes especially evident, when one realizes that the Rastafari movement was meant to restore African pride and to build community, i.e. unity. Obeah sorcery, magic, or other “trickery” (such as represented by the trickster spider Anansy sories from the Akan heritage) are too “sneaky” and therefore too dependent on the “powers that be”. For the same reason, Rastas prefer the “lion” as proud symbol, rather than the “trickster” spider symbol, even if from the African heritage. A better, more solid sense of purpose, one might say.
The trickster spider Anancy (from Akan culture) outsmarted on occasion powerful authorities in the stories (associated later with White masters), and likewise Obeah spells were used against White colonial authorities/masters too during slave rebellions. Not consequently though, and just as often the trickery or spells were used against one’s own people, fellow-slaves, fellow-sufferers, etcetera, only out of competition and for personal gain.
It is this divisive inconsistence and competition within the community that Rastafari, after all, also sought to overcome.
Traditional African religions of course have their own cultural complexity and beauty - and social/community functions! - too, as their relative intact remnants in the West also show (Santería, Vodou, Kumina, Candomblé, a.o.), including rich musical and percussive legacies, and keeping alive African, ancestral legacies. They, however, became corrupted too, in a cynical (slavery/colonial/exploitative) context of survival. Rastafari, rather, sought a more positive, assertive and unifying answer to this cynical colonial past, building on, yet going beyond - one might say: "repairing" - these African legacies.
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