Émété Edowàé

Emete edowàé:

Some of us, father’s today may pass on only to return to experience the plight that we have subjected our current generation to suffer.

The saying in English that “the boy is the father of the man” is no idle is not just for fun. It strongly confirms the validity of reincarnation, the age-long belief of “inota-uwa” or of an individual experiencing more than one earth-life.

It is also reverberated in the popular Oknunano reference to ‘akpa uwa ghu esaa’ meaning that an individual may be permitted to reincarnate up to seven times.

We are also very familiar with the custom of our people to seek out ‘onye nnoru ya uwa’ from the different available mediums in those days, from where also most us may have drawn our native names because you are expected to bear the same names with your ‘ogbo’ or ‘onye uwa ghu’.

Our forbearers were spiritually conscious of nature and the activities of the elemental beings around them hence they were able to depict the natural law of sowing and reaping “Emete edo wàé”.

The law of sowing and reaping, which simply put states that “whatever a man sows that must he reap” captures completely this Okunano expression “emete-edo wàé” in its entirety. In other words, “Eme te” the things you do, your actions, “Edo wàé” are kept for you, or awaits you.

Our fore-bearers believed in leaving behind good legacies in their days, Infact , in the whole of igboland, it is constantly affirmed that the anti-social practices that men perpetrates exists after their demise.

This was captured in some popular igbo adages like: “Nke onye metalu onwere isi ya buru” “ome njo eri” “isi kote aebu ogabkasia aru” and in Okunano dialect “Emete edo wae” here simply collaborates with and re establishes the potency of the natural law of sowing and reaping.

Looking around you now, you can’t help but marvel at what we, most people of the present generation are capable of doing or the great evil seeds we sow on regular bases.

You may want to note here that it is the great evil seeds sown in the time past, which its returning effects has come and is tearing most of us apart and reaping everything to pieces.
In the olden days, our people were more mindful of their integrity and good names than material wealth and avarice. But today, what do we have?

A direct contrast to those days that we all sometimes reminisce about, how things were all seemingly perfect for even in those days, there were also great evil-doers who in accordance with the law of sowing and reaping must redeem their evil deeds either reincarnated for another earth life here or over there in the great beyond.

For indeed, there is life after death whether we believe it or not, this has been established in the customs, culture and traditions of the Okunano people.   

That we have deviated today from the set rules of life that guarded our forbearers in the past is as a result of “emete edo wàé”

That we continually devise to poison or kill one another over trivial issues like land boundaries (aera-oke ani) or even portions of land which is not ours is as a result of “ihe anyi  doweru onwe anyi” in previous earth lives.

Now, imagine what the present generation is sowing and keeping for themselves assuming they are permitted another earth life.

It is not by accident that people are born into great wealth and seemingly perfect opportunities for leadership and authority while others lavish in abject poverty, penury and pains.

Such is the perfection of the Almighty God, for if you have in one earth-life ruled and revelled in great wealth and power.

You have no right to complain or hate another who is very rich today, but would have suffered abject poverty and rejection from you when you had the same privilege in your former earth life.

Emete edo wàé here reemphasizes the constant mobility of our lives, the impeccable and indisputable justice of the creator and the great sacrifice and efforts made by our forbearers to transmit this great rule of life to their descendants, you and I.
©Chiegeonu Aga 2019