Would that more people know about this.  I've been planning on writing about this for next month.

And the curse on Haiti itself.


        Dutty Boukman

Dutty Boukman (Also known as "Boukman Dutty") (died 7 November 1791) was an African man, enslaved in Jamaica and later in Haiti. He is considered both a maroon leader and Vodou hougan (priest) and was an early leader of the Haitian Revolution.^[3]
According to some contemporary accounts Boukman alongside Cécile Fatiman, a Vodou mambo, presided over the religious ceremony at Bois Caïman, in August 1791, that served as a catalyst of the 1791 slave revolt which marks the beginning of the Haitian Revolution.
Boukman was a key leader of the slave revolt in the Le Cap‑Français region in the north of the colony. He was killed by the French planters and colonial troops in 7 November 1791.
Background

Dutty Boukman was a self-educated slave born on the island of Jamaica. After he attempted to teach other slaves how to read, he was sold to a French plantation owner and placed as a commandeur (slave driver) and, later, a coach driver. His French name came from his English nickname, "Book Man," which some scholars, despite accounts suggesting that he was a Vodou houngan, have interpreted as meaning that he was a Muslim, since in many Muslim regions the term "man of the book" is a synonym for an adherent of the Islamic faith. One scholar suggests that it is likely that Boukman "was a Jamaican Muslim who had a Quran, and that he got his nickname from this."^[6] Other scholars suggest that Boukman may have practiced a syncretic blend of traditional African religion and a form of Christianity.^[7] Boukman was killed by the French in November 1791, just a few months after the beginning of the uprising.^[8] The French then publicly displayed Boukman's head in an attempt to dispel the aura of invincibility that Boukman had cultivated.The fact that French authorities had to do this shows just how much of an impact Boukman made on the views of Haitian people during this time.

Ceremony at the Bois Caïman
According to some contemporaneous accounts, on or about 14 August 1791 Boukman presided over a ceremony at the Bois Caïman in the role of houngan (priest) together with priestess Cécile Fatiman. Boukman prophesied that the slaves Jean François, Biassou, and Jeannot would be leaders of a resistance movement and revolt that would free the slaves of Saint-Domingue. An animal was sacrificed, an oath was taken, and Boukman and the priestess exhorted the listeners to take revenge against their French oppressors and cast aside the image of the God of the oppressors." ^[9]
According to Gothenburg University researcher Markel Thylefors, "The event of the Bois Caïman ceremony forms an important part of Haitian national identity as it relates to the very genesis of Haiti."^[10] This ceremony came to be characterized by various Christian sources as a "pact with the devil" that began the Haitian Revolution.^[11]
According to the Encyclopedia of African Religion, "Blood from the animal was given in a drink to the attendees to seal their fates in loyalty to the cause of liberation of Saint-Domingue."^[12] A week later, 1800 plantations had been destroyed and 1000 slaveholders killed.^[13][14] Boukman was not the first to attempt a slave uprising in Saint-Domingue, as he was preceded by others, such as Padrejean in 1676, and François Mackandal in 1757. However, his large size, warrior-like appearance, and fearsome temper made him an effective leader and helped spark the Haitian Revolution.
Legacy and Reference in Popular Culture[edit]

Sources

What a great find Croix de Fer!

Laramie, your previous research and writings on the "Curse of Ham" play right into this topic. The Hirsch Files


        Noah curses Ham

Just to keep the "race thing" straight and in a Catholic context, I want to dig back into files and study the finer points.

I tend to write about America's race problem this time of year.  I've written two articles about what the Left thinks (and may be right about) when it comes to Martin Luther King Jr.  A Haiti article--particularly in the wake of #Sh**holegate--is definitely in the works.  Black History month is coming up, after all.  

I also wanted to write about Zimbabwe and South Africa.  

“The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to speak openly and candidly on the subject of race, and to apply the Constitution with eyes open to the unfortunate effects of centuries of racial discrimination.”
-Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor in 2014

I couldn't agree with her more.

A Catholic Haitian told me Haiti's constitutional religion was Catholicism, until the Vatican II sect told all such countries to remove Catholicism as the State religion, like they did to Italy, Colombia and others. 

That's more than I can say for all the other countries like Cuba and the USA.

Haiti's problems are more complex than that.

Haiti suffers from a Voodoo curse and most Haitians will acknowledge it.

Here's a primer for the  historical battle between Voodoo and Catholicism there:


Bob Corbett
March 1988

(Important Note)
First and foremost Voodoo is a religion. It is the dominant religion of Haiti. Many of the practices and descriptions of Voodoo belief may sound to us like rank superstition, but then, imagine the beliefs of Christianity to people who know nothing about it. Tell them about the trinity or the resurrection, or the presence of Jesus in the eucharist. Any of these practices which very intelligent Christians believe in the fullest would seem no less superstitious to someone unfamiliar with Christianity.

Thus I urge you to recognize that Voodoo is Haiti's religion, it is taken very seriously not merely by unlettered peasants, but many intelligent and learned members of the Haitian society believe as sincerely in Voodoo as do German theology professors in their Christianity. In no way do I expect you to believe in Voodoo; no more than I would expect you to convert to Islam if I taught a course on that religion. But, please do recognize that it is every bit as real a religion as the major religions of the world.

• The most basic concepts of Voodoo.
  
  • There is one God, Bondye. This God is very similar to the God of Islam, Judaism and Christianity. There is only one God.
  • There are three important categories of other spiritual beings:
    
    • lwa. These are the various spirits of family members; the spirits of the major forces of the universe--good, evil, reproduction, health, all aspects of daily life.
      
      • lwa interact with the people of earth.
      • They "mount" people now and again during religious ceremonies and they give messages, and even cause various good and bad things to happen to people.
    • The twins. A curious and rather mysterious set of forces of contradictories: good and evil, happy and sad etc. If honored now and again in religious services they will tend to help you have the better side of life.
    • The dead. Mainly the souls of one's own family members who have died but have not yet been "reclaimed" by the family. Ignored family dead are dangerous. Honored and cared for family dead are helpful.
  • The central and key aspect of Voodoo is healing people from illness. Such healing activities probably constitute 60% of all Voodoo activity. Healers heal with herbs, faith healing (with the help of lwa and other spirits) and, today, even with western medicine!
  • The priesthood of Voodoo contains both men (houngan) and women (mambo).                                                   Their functions are:
• perform religious ceremonies to call or pacify the spirits.
• to hold initiations for new priests(tesses) (kanzo service and taking the ason).
• Telling the future and reading dreams.
• casting spells and creating protections.
• creating potions for various purposes. (From love spells to death spells.)
• For any of these they may receive fees. But, they may not too. This differs from one houngan and mambo to another. (Note his is similar to fees paid to rabbis, mullahs, priests and ministers.                                                                    
• Another central feature of Voodoo is the "service," the religious rites of the religion.
  
  • These are usually held outside, under a rough roof and around the "poto mitan," the center pole. A houngan or mambo almost always directs these.
  • Drums are used extensively to provide music and dancing is absolutely essential to the whole service.
  • Services are fully participatory. Not only the houngan and mambo participate but nearly everyone present.
    
    • A master of ceremonies (La Place) is often present.
    • A hounganikon directs the music and motion.
    • Hounsi (women only) are serving ladies, usually dressed in white.
    • Those in attendance are nearly all participants and most can be "mounted" by lwa.
  • In most services the lwa "mount" people. That is, they come and take over a person's body for a time. When the lwa come the person is gone. (It's not clear where the person goes.) The body is the body of the person, but it is really the lwa. If a male lwa mounts a female person, he is referred to as "he," not she, during the mounting.
  • Nearly every Voodoo service has animal sacrifice. By killing the animal one releases life. The lwa are exhausted by the taxing task of running the universe. Thus they can receive this life sacrificed to them and are re-juvenated. They are usually quite happy about this.
  • There are two primary sorts of Voodoo.
    
    • Rada. This is a family spirit Voodoo and the Voodoo of the relatively peaceful and happy lwa.
    • Petro. (In some areas called Congo.) This is a black magic Voodoo and the Voodoo of angry, mean and nasty lwa. Dangerous things happen in Petro including death curses, the making of zombi and wild sɛҳuąƖ orgies SPECIAL NOTE By virtually all scholarly estimates one can find, Rada accounts for about 95% of Voodoo, if not more. Thus the spectacular tales of black magic, while very real, are extremely limited. Petro is not the typical Voodoo, but it does exist.
  • The analysis of humans. Humans have two spirits and a body.ti-bon-ange (little good angel). This is similar to the conscience in the Western understanding of people
• Key terms in Voodoo
  
  • hounfo--the parish or region of a houngan or mambo's influence.
  • govi--a small earthen bottle into which the gros-bon-ange of dead ancestors can "rescued." After a person dies the gros-bon-ange goes to the underwater place. A year and a day after he or she goes their the relatives can recall the gros-bon-ange. Unfortunately this is a very expensive service, requiring a significant animal sacrifice, often an ox. Thus it is often considerable time before the service can be done. If too much time passes the ancestor may get a bit restless and cause trouble-- illness etc.
  • serviteurs--serious practitioners of Voodoo.
  • ason--the magic rattle of the houngan or mambo.
  • lave tet--(washing of the head) an initiation ceremony held for serviteurs after they have been mounted for the first time.
  • kanzo--the initiation ceremonies for those moving into a very serious level of Voodoo practice.
  • taking of the ason--the final initiation into being a houngan or mambo. NOTE: Both kanzo and the taking of the ason are very secret services. However, in Alfred Metraux's book (VOODOO IN HAITI), through observation and talking with people who were not too careful about the secrecy of kanzo, he has pieced together a detailed account of the ceremony.
  • verve--ceremonial drawings done in flour, of the various lwa.
  • peristyle--the Voodoo temple. A tiny tiny place.
  • poto mitan--the center pole in a Voodoo peristyle. It represents the center of the universe and all dancing revolves around the poto mitan.
  • Les Invisibles--all spirits.
  • Les Mysteries--
    
    • the lwa themselves.
    • sacred knowledge. Also called "konesans."
  • The crossroads. A central image in Voodoo. This is the place where the two worlds (earth and spirit world) meet. Virtually all Voodoo acts, even healing, begin with the acknowledgment of the crossroads.
• Some of the central lwa in the Voodoo pantheon.
  
  • Legba. An old man who is the gatekeeper between the two worlds, world of earth and the world of the Invisibles. He is the origin of life. The sun is one of his symbols, but he is also the source of regeneration and uses the symbol of the phallus.
  • Kalfu (crossroads) is the Petro counterpart to Legba. He is the spirit of the night, the origins of darkness. The moon is his symbol. He can be placated, but is a dangerous lwa.
  • Papa Ghede. lwa of death and resurrection. A total clown. Very erotic and comic. He is the lord of eroticism.
  • Dumballah. The father figure. He is the good snake. The source of peace and tranquillity. The egg is offered to him when he comes to mount a person. He is much loved and sought after. His wife Aida-wedo attends him.
  • Agwe. The sovereign of the seas. Especially honored, as one might well expect, by people who live near the sea.
  • Ogoun. The warrior. Today, too, the force of politics. Violent.
  • Erzulie. The earth mother. Spirit of the goddess of love. The muse of beauty. (Strongly identified with the Virgin Mary.) Her appearance (when she mounts someone) is one of cleansing, dressing, delicate foods daintily eaten. She can read the future in dreams. A much loved lwa.
• The FATALISM of Voodoo.
   Voodoo is much criticized by foreigners in Haiti. Sometimes it is simply because they profess a competing religion and don't want the people to stay with Voodoo. At other times they charge that it is devil worship. This claim is sheer nonsense when speaking of Rada Voodoo, the numerically primary form. It is less clear how to describe Petro. There are no "devils" in Voodoo, but Petro cultivates the evil or at least angry spirits.
  However, many of the non-religious aspects of Voodoo which people often criticize really seem to me to be more the result of Voodoo's overwhelming fatalism. The view is that to an astonishing degree the lwa determine out lives. The Haitian serviteur has little use for anything like the Western idea of free will and personal responsibility. Rather, whatever has happened it is the lwa who have caused it.
  If one would like to change anything in one's life, from a current illness to the fundaments of the social system, one must ask the lwa. One does not ACT on one's own. This would be counter-productive since it is the lwa who decide these things anyway.
  Further, the lwa are not very changeable. Things are the way they are because the lwa have decided it. This fatalism contributes significantly to the peasants' unwillingness to struggle for liberation.
  However, one can must the hard question: Is it Voodoo that has caused Haitian fatalism, or is it the history of the African/Haitian experience that has created Voodoo's fatalism?
• Voodoo's relationship to Christianity.
• The Catholic experience.
  
  • The Protestants.
    
    • Until the 1970s Haiti was nearly 100% Catholic.
    • In the 1970s evangelical Protestantism came to Haiti. After Reagan came to power evangelization mushroomed.
    • Evangelical Protestants are bitter enemies of Voodoo and denounce it all the time as devil worship. Many of these people claim that Haiti's misery is because she is being punished by God for the sins of her Voodoo serviteurs.
    • Protestantism has come to Haiti as a serious business. Evangelical Protestants groups own 7 of Haiti's 11 radio stations and have made significant gains in conversions.
    • Today most observers believe that at least 15% of the Christians in Haiti are Protestant evangelicals.

Source

Croix knocks another one out of the park. You do great work sir.