1.1 Controversial definitions of African traditional religion(s)

2In his contribution in the Encyclopaedia Aethiopica, Dirk Bustorf rightly argues that “traditional religions” in Ethiopia are today commonly defined as “local” or “ethnic” beliefs, both anterior to and separate from Christianity or Islam, through the following series of distinct features.

3Nevertheless, Bustorf underlines that these distinctions present important shortcomings, embedded in the evolutionist prejudices regarding the implicit superiority of Christian and Muslim “monotheistic civilisations,” over the regional “traditional religions” that were historically considered “primitive tribal superstitions.”

4Moreover, the classical distinctions between the so-called “universal” and “traditional” religions based on writing/oral transmission and the celebration of natural spirits/holy figures do not fairly reflect the socio-historical practices of both Christianity and Islam. Indeed, the books of the Christian and Islamic revelations were both written and disseminated a long time after the deaths of Jesus and Mohammed (Qur’ān means “recitation” in Arabic, as reciting and memorising it has remained the basis of the Muslim religion, since the 7th century oral revelation by the Archangel Jibril/Gabriel); in addition, the famous Ethiopian Christian Orthodox saint Gäbrä Mänfas Qǝddus and the Qur’anic holy figure of al-Khidr (“The Green Man”) are both presented as major saints and servants of God, with holy attributes rooted in the animal and natural world.

5Last but not least, it might be scientifically doubtful to speculate about the strict anteriority and separation of ‘traditional religions’ from Christianity and Islam, due to the very ancient history of Christianity and Islam in Ethiopia—respectively from the 4th and 7th centuries. In other words, the commonly assumed non- and pre-Christian/Muslim linear history of these blurry “African traditional religions” might rather depict the plural and still understudied national trajectories of Christian and Muslim reformations, accompanying the controversial political history of medieval and contemporary Ethiopia.

1.2 “Traditional” religions in Ethiopian and Western Christian historiography

6The classical Ethiopian and European Christian historiography generally associate the regional ‘autochthonous religions’ with the diverse Gamo, Hadiya, etc. and mostly Oromo populations living in the southern margins of the northern Habaša Christian kingdoms.

7From the Orthodox monk abba Bahrey’s writings of the 16th century, to those of the French Catholic and German or Swedish Protestant missionaries and the Ethiopian (and notably Oromo) elites they trained during the 19th–20th centuries, these historical sources present three different—and sometimes radically opposed—descriptions of these ambivalent “primitive religions” of “foreign invaders” or “indigenous biblical descendants.”

8In 2014, Osmond demonstrated that these three classical Christian interpretations reveal the religious and political reformist dynamics that (re-)shape the divergent definitions of (Oromo) “traditional religions” throughout the medieval political history of Christian Habaša kingdoms and the contemporary emergence of the modern Ethiopian state—from the medieval “barbarian peril” or “national emancipation” incarnated by the 16th century (Oromo) “foreign invasions” or “autochthonous uprisings,” to the contemporary “national liberation movements” challenging the imperial regime, or the current institutional recognition of “ethno-linguistic nationalities” and “indigenous cultural (religious) heritages.”

9Apart from their close connections with the history of Ethiopian national politics, these main Christian historical narratives on (Oromo) “traditional religions” have provided limited knowledge of the involvement of women, often fenced into quite stereotyped representations of “witches” (involved in Zar spirit possession cults) or “malefic queens” (like the mythical ambivalent figure of Yodit, leading the sacking of the Axumite Kingdom at the end of the first Christian millennium).

1.3 “Traditional religions” in regional Muslim historiography

10Beyond these contemporary Christian interpretations, the Muslim medieval historiography depicts an ambiguous and floating portrait of the (Oromo) “traditional” religions, across the blurry and rearticulated margins of the non-Arab “indigenous” Islamic Community in the Horn of Africa.

11Thomas Zitelmann points out the probable proximity of central terms found in the Oromo religious tradition—like ayyaanna (spirit, divine presence/character) or seera (law)—with classical Sufi philosophies and Ibn al-‘Arabiy’s theory of knowledge (pointed out by Mohammed Hassen in 2015). His socio-historical linguistic approach suggests a rereading of the Oromo religion in terms of social statuses and official religious representations.

12The work of Zitelmann tends to confirm the hypothesis formulated before him by several scholars (like Cerulli, Haberland, Braükamper or Mohammed Hassen) that the Oromo “traditional religion” has never been strictly outside Islam, but rather historically rooted in ancient regional Sufi Islamic legacies and “might have at one time been derived from an Islamic heterodoxy” (Zitelmann 2005, 94) through the Sunni orthodox reformations and changing alliances of agro-pastoral federations and trade centres, throughout the socioeconomic, political and religious history of the Horn of Africa—from imam Aḥmäd’s jihad, to the contemporary Salafi or Wahhabi puritan movements, as demonstrated by Osmond in 2014.

2.1 Women as “invisible” historical agents of Oromo national reformation

13By ensuring state/religion separation, religious freedom and the official recognition of the diverse national cultural heritages, the current Ethiopian federal regime has encouraged the revival of “indigenous” religious traditions. For almost two decades, the institutional “renaissance” of the Oromo Waaqeeffaata religion has been largely centred on the annual Irreecca (or Irrecha) celebration held around the Horra Lake in Däbrä Zäyt/Bishooftuu. However, as in the classical Christian and Muslim historiography, the studies of this major Oromo religious celebration remain largely centred on men’s activities and often provide limited and very general information on women’s representation.

14To overcome these long-lasting evolutionist or culturalist male-centred prejudices and critically question the controversial historical interactions with Christianity and Islam, the reexamination of women’s participation in Oromo religious tradition(s) should privilege:

• More dynamic methodological approaches
• More detailed and fieldwork-based investigations
• More transversal research objects, like the involvement of women in marriages (or matrimonial alliances), national welfare and the trans-confessional celebrations of regional saints.

2.2 Women’s ritual involvement in social unity and welfare

15Until recently, the active role and reponsibility of women in regional religious practices has been closely related to maintaining the peaceful unity and mutual prosperity of the Oromo agro-pastoral federations.

16Far from the long-lasting clichés about women’s reproductive functions or Afro-traditionalist mother-goddess representations, the Siiqe/Sinqe, Ateete, Daalalle or Mahram terms rather designate various and often combined ranges of ritual objects, ceremonies, conflict resolution/reconciliation institutions and other social forms or practices of religious and political mobilisations for women’s rights recognition.

17The Siiqe/Sinqe, Ateete, Daalalle or Mahram corpuses, actors and practices are embedded into a series of rules regulating legal marriage contracts or officially recognised matrimonial alliances, founding, reforming or ensuring the continuity of Oromo federations—by complementing men’s responsibility in the historical implementation of changing socioeconomic partnerships and political pacts or constitutions.

2.3 Women’s representation in the celebration of trans-local/national saints

18In the same perspective, the still commonly assumed docility, passive obedience or even marginality of women in the political and religious spheres of African ‘traditional’ societies is also largely invalidated by the existence of several religious groups, which provide a formal representation of women in order to challenge and moderate the abuses of social male domination—from husband/wife family household, to Gadaa or Qaalluu political/religious institutions and public celebrations.

19In the present Western Šäwa Zone, the Mo’aata communities designate the religious groups venerating the female saint Demamiti, in the rural vicinity of the towns of Ambo and Tullu Bolo. These communities mainly gather the marginal individuals—like widows, unmarried girls, sick persons or homosexuals—of the local Kutay coalition. This political coalition involves different Oromo kinships and territorial federations of farmers, cattle herders and Gadaa assemblies, under the final authority of the Qaalluu leaders. In this political order, Demamiti is formally recognised as one of the several religious figures, subordinated to the Qaalluu. Thus, in spite of their marginal or deviant label, the Mo’aata communities enjoy an official existence. They are even closely involved in the celebration of the peaceful relations among the plural actors of the Kutay coalition, and between their non-Oromo partners of the southern Säbat Bet Gurage federations, beyond the Awaš River.

Figure 7. Laurent Lafuma, A Mo’aata woman and Oromo riders in Qaalluu’s shrine

Figure 8. Laurent Lafuma, Shaalo Magarsa, the female-male leader of the Mo’aata

20Like the Oromo Mo’aata, the Gurage Me’wet communities found from Šäwa to the Kistane’s territories venerate Demwe’wit, the patron saint of unmarried female teenagers and marginalised handicraft workers, gays or asocial persons in general. These Mo’aata/Me’wet communities also participate in the yearly ceremonies held in the main religious shrines of the Kutay coalitions in Western Šäwa, and those of the Gurage Säbat Bet in the present Southern Nations, Nationalities, and Peoples’ Regional (SNNPR) State, as demonstrated by Osmond in 2016.

21Shaalo Magarsa, the present leader of the Mo’aata communities in the rural vicinity of Ambo town, formulates these trans-local legacies through collective prayers, proclaiming the authority of Demamiti from the sources of the Awaš, to the southern Gurage Zone.

22Though scholars often classify the Oromo and Gurage Mo’aata/Me’wet communities in the controversial category of “traditional religions,” these networks of local saints still claim their historical proximity with the major Muslim Sufi orders of southeastern Ethiopia, like the shrines of Ayyoo Mommina in Arsi or Sheikh Hussein in Bale.

23According to Osmond, in Western Šäwa, Shaalo Magarsa and the main Mo’aata dignitaries often associate Demamiti with the term arshi, borrowed from the Arabic ʾarsh, designating the “Celestial Throne of Allah” in the Quran. Among the regional hierarchy of the female Muslim saints distributed along the Awaš river’s southern banks, Demamiti arshi is often presented as the spiritual daughter or heir of Ayyoo Mommina, herself positioned under the authority of “Mother Fatuma,” the daughter of Prophet Mohammed and the wife of Ali.