Journey to the stars: as above, so below; as below, so above

I remember a programme on the Rhodesia Broadcasting Corporation (RBC), now the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation (ZBC), titled “Ukufunda Akupheli.” Learning does not end.

Several decades later, I realise how true that was. Indeed, we never stop learning. Every day of our lives, there is something that we learn, at least that is true about me.
The more I read about and reflect on the cosmic bodies, the more knowledge and information I get.

My search for astronomical knowledge is not restricted to Zimbabwe. Instead, I have ventured everywhere to cover as much of the African continent as possible. I have a passion for identifying the African essence that characterises us all as different ethnic groups. What do we share in common beyond residence on the African continent and our dark skins?

I am engrossed in my next book titled, “African Body Art: Aesthetics or Functionality,” where I am unpacking various body art forms found in several African communities. Where I thought I possessed quite a substantial corpus of knowledge on the arts, body art included, I discovered how ignorant I am.

For me that has been a wakeup call never to be complacent but to continue knowledge-gathering efforts, as indeed learning does not end. It is a humbling experience to discover that there is a lot more to learn than we already know.

I have always argued that there is no group in the world that should ever entertain the false, baseless and empty notion that it knows everything there is to know in this vast world. Even where knowledge of all the knowledge of world’s communities was put together, there would still be more that is unknown than what is already known.

The cosmos that is trillions upon trillions times bigger than our tiny blob called earth, is so vast that what we know is a miniscule of that which we can still learn. Humbling indeed!

I have been seeking to understand humans’ knowledge about the heavens and the earth. The knowledge that there is seems to place humans at the centre of everything. They push the horizons of knowledge for their own benefit.

Even the way God is perceived tallies with that picture, of one who should be in the service of humans.
I realise that humans believe they understand their world and habitat in relation to the cosmos. They understand the world in terms of the impact of the heavenly bodies on earth, the humans included.

They glean certain traits that they envy, admire and seek to acquire and perpetuate.
The heavenly bodies are circular in design and are in constant motion. Their movement is regular, seasonal, rhythmic, periodic and therefore predictable.

The heavens are eternal. The earliest humans to inhabit the earth saw the moon that we see today. The heavens are eternal.
Humans loathe dying, something that they cannot do anything about. Through sexuality, they have only managed to eternalise their communities, but not themselves as individuals. Individuals perish, humanity is forever, I once said.

The effect of these heavenly phenomena and characteristics has been, on the part of humans, the desire to replicate the heavens on earth, leading to the adoption of the well-known African adage, “As above, so below.” Humans’ envy and desire to live in perpetuity led to their seeking to replicate the heavens on earth. What was it that humans envied and sought to replicate for their own benefit?

They saw themselves at the centre of the earth. It is their preoccupation with dominion over all other life forms that underpins their working philosophy
Africans may be excused from these self-centering inclinations as they respect other forms of life and seek to conserve the environment together with its diversity of life forms, be they flora and fauna, water, the soil.

Spirituality buttressed their conservation thrust as they acknowledged that culture depended upon and was sustained by nature. In the absence of nature, their own lives and culture are unimaginable.
What we have been saying, essentially, is that humans, Africans in particular, view and understand their own lives and everything on earth as under the influence of the heaven and put into practice knowledge and information from the celestial bodies.

Their own destinies are indelibly etched on the cosmic bodies. They are mirrored on the heavens on which they are dependent, both directly and indirectly.
Imagine what would be the future of life forms on earth if the sun did not emit light that supports photosynthesis, the process responsible for food production.

Our thrust in today’s journey to the stars is more about perceptions of Africans concerning cosmic bodies. They seem not able to understand the cosmos without reference to their own lived experiences on earth.
The said lived experiences were themselves informed partly by an appreciation and interrogation of the cosmos.

Now it is knowledge gleaned from the nature, behaviour, in particular design, form, shape, and movement, characteristics and other perceived traits of the heavenly bodies at the disposal of African groups. Gazing the heavens, Africans project their experiences and acquired knowledge on earth to help them understand the heavens.

It seems to me the heavens are the tools that are made use of to understand the heavens. I have been writing about the moon for several weeks now. I see double usage of the same medium, the heavens, to help humans, Africans especially, to understand the same heavens. Mind boggling perhaps? Who said African thought and philosophy are easy to grasp anyway?

Just how much culture would we have in the absence of reference to the heavens? Art is expressive culture. Outside of the heavens what would be there for the arts to express, to represent and to symbolise? When the arts begin to be appreciated beyond themselves, we shall begin to see the connectedness among Africans, their arts, their culture and the heavens. In all of them, the rallying and reference points are the heavens.

Let us now engage some travelling gear and simplify matters. For several weeks now, we have been writing about the moon. This has been possible for certain reasons. The moon is visible and is the biggest and the closest cosmic body to us.
The moon thus took the credit and the blame sometimes, for the challenges, hopes and joys that Africans meet in their daily lives.

Now getting more and more mundane. Let us look at the Zulu people and the moon. Here we shall see how the Zulu understood the moon in reference to their experiences on earth.
The Zulu saw the moon as having horns, two horns, in fact. This should not come as a surprise since the Zulu people were pastoralists. Large herds of cattle were what every man aspired to having.

Their cattle had horns and the disposition of the horns led to the naming of cattle. They thus perceived a crescent moon as having two horns, just like their preferred cattle had them.
In terms of what we have been saying, Zulu analysis, interpretation and understanding of the moon stemmed from the knowledge that they possessed on earth.

The sharp ends of a crescent moon, would not, in their view, have been anything else other than two horns symbolic of cattle horns. Perception and interpretation of a cosmic body is that a component creates a worldview, thought and cosmology for the Africans. The cultural adage now changes from, “As above, so below,” to “As below, so above.”

It is a two-way projection ‘from above to below’ and’ from below to above.’ This is the double use of the heavens in the understanding of natural and cultural phenomena that Africans make use of.
The same Zulu people will grant that the moon is genderless. Once again, the Zulu are applying their knowledge, experiences and beliefs on earth to explain what happens when one dies.

We get to understand them as a people who perceive a human as constituted by a tangible or material body and intangible spirit.
This is the Duality of Being. Once again, the Zulu are thrusting and projecting their knowledge and experiences on earth onto a cosmic body and see it through their earthly mental eyes.

Indeed, the Zulu perceived themselves as the children of the stars —abantwana bezinkanyezi zezulu.
What is critical for us is that the Zulu, indeed in line with other African people, projected their knowledge and experiences on earth onto cosmic bodies in order to make sense of them.
This is what I have been learning as I traversed the stimulating and rewarding journey to the corpus of African knowledge and cultural practices relating to body art in Africa.