The connection between person and chi is established at the time of conception. The Igbo, who believe in reincarnation, say that the chi in one life is different from that in the next. This might result in a person being rich in one lifetime and poor in another. Further describing the chi, Meek (1970, p. 55) says, “A man’s abilities, faults, and good or bad fortune are ascribed to his chi, and this explains, to some extent, the fatalistic attitude of the Ibo. If a man’s conduct gets him into trouble he excuses himself by saying (and believing) that his chi and not himself is responsible.” Animals also have their chi. When an Igbo hunter finds his arrow misses its animal target, he attributes this to the protective action of the animal’s chi. Meek (1970, p. 55) adds: “An animal may become the chi of a man, and people who behave in a brutal manner are believed to have the chi of an animal. It is said that the children of hunters are liable to have the chi of animals slain by their fathers. In this way animals revenge themselves on men.”
The chi is, however, different from the real self. According to Ogbuene (1999, p. 112), the unchanging spirit self is called mmuo—the spirit that activates all living things. For the Igbo, says Ogbuene (1999, p. 112), “Reality is the hierarchy of Mmuos—spirits, which all originate from Chukwu, the ultimate Mmuo-Spirit.” Departed ancestors are called alammuo—spirits alive in the spirit world, but dead in this world (Ogbuene 1999, p. 112). But such spirits can return to this world. Ogbuene (1999, p. 116) says: “Parents and relatives who knew a spirit in a former existence will recognize that spirit in a new incarnation and can recall the events of that spirit’s life. We believe that many children are born resembling their past spirits closely.”
The body that the soul inhabits is called aru (Ogbuene 1999, p. 164). There is also another element connected with a living thing—obi, which Ogbuene (1999, p. 164) characterizes as breath, and which Meek (1930, p. 56) characterizes as a person’s “vital essence.” Ogbuene (1999, p. 164) also recognized an element called eke, which he calls “the ancestral guardian.” mmuo, chi, aru, obi, and eke might be compared respectively to the Vedic concepts of atma (individual spirit soul), mana (subtle material body), deha (gross physical body), prana (vital air), and paramatma (the accompanying Supersoul).
The Igbo feel a close connection with their departed ancestors. The living behave as if the dead were still with them. Victor Chikenzie Uchendu (1965, p. 102) writes about the spirits of the dead: “They are reprimanded for failing in their duty to their children, by closing their eyes to the depredations of evil spirits which cause death in the family, cause crop failure, and make trade unprofitable.” In simple household rituals, they are offered ordinary foods. According to Igbo beliefs, their ancestors sometimes reincarnate again in their same families. Uchendu (1965, p. 102) notes, “Belief in reincarnation [rebirth in human form] gives the Igbo hope of realizing their frustrated status goals in the next cycle of life. Transmigration [reincarnation into nonhuman species], on the other hand, is regarded as the greatest possible punishment for the incestuous, the murderer, the witch, and the sorcerer. ‘lsdigh uwa na mmadu’ ‘May you not reincarnate in the human form’—is a great curse for the Igbo.” This corresponds with Vedic concepts of reincarnation, in which those souls who have accumulated bad karma reincarnate in lower forms, such as those of animals.
Among the Igbo, certain animals are sacred or taboo for certain kin groups. For example, at Lokpanta the leopard is sacred to the Um-Ago kinship group. Um-Ago means “the children of leopards.” The Um-Ago do not kill leopards or eat their flesh, believing that if anyone did so, that person would die untimely. Members of the Um-Ago are said to possess the ability to become leopards and act against enemies by killing their livestock (Meek 1970, p. 252).
The Igbo also have a belief in shape-changing children. If a child cannot walk or crawl by the age of three, the Igbo conclude that it is a creature that has come from a river or stream. Among one group of Igbo, the child is taken to a nearby river, along with an offering of a plate of mashed yams, whereupon, it is said, the child turns into a python and glides into the water. In another Igbo group, a ceremony for such a child takes place in the house. Sometimes the child turns into a snake, and in that case it is killed. Sometimes the child turns into a monkey. Northcote W. Thomas wrote in his anthropological report on the Igbo (1914, p. 29): “A changeling is known as nwa di mwo, and I have been seriously assured by more than one person that they have actually seen the transformation.”
The gods of the Igbo are described as follows by Charles Kingsley Meek (1970, p. 20): “Firstly, there is a pantheon of high gods, headed by Chuku or Chineke the Supreme Spirit, Anyanu (the Sun), Igwe (the Sky), Amadi-Oha (Lightning), and Ala (the Earth deity). Then there are innumerable minor deities: water and agricultural godlings; spirits which are the personification of fortune, destiny, wealth, strength, divination, and evil; spirits which are the counterparts of living human beings; and finally the ancestors, who control the fortunes of their living descendants. The Supreme Being, or it might be more correct to say the Supreme Spirit or World-Oversoul, is known as Chuku, a word which is a contraction of Chi=Spirit and uku=great. . . . In his creative aspect he is known as Chineke, or Chukwoke, or Chi-Okike.”
Ogbuene (1999, pp. 113–114), like Meek, makes a distinction between Chukwu or Chuku (“God, the big Spirit . . . the first ancestor . . . the self existent Being and wellspring of all that exists”) and Chineke (“God the creator”). In the Vedic cosmology there is a similar distinction between Krishna, the Supreme Personality of Godhead, known as the source of everything, and the creator god Brahma, who, using the ingredients supplied by Krishna, manifests the earth and other celestial bodies in the universe. Okpewho (1998, p. 90) believes that the traditional God concept of today’s Igbo has been to some extent influenced by Christian missionaries, but even Okpewho accepts there is some kind of “supreme divinity” and gives traditional accounts of humans meeting with a personal God (1998, pp. 73–74). As Okpewho puts it (1998, p. 74): “It is significant . . . that the Ijo [Igbo] imagination can conceive of an encounter with the supreme divinity.” Ogbuene (1999, p. 108) states that “Chukwu . . . is a God who acts and speaks, from whom help and assistance is sought in sacrifices.” At the same time he is indescribable, and is therefore sometimes called Ama-ama-Amasi Amasi, “One who is known but can never be fully known.” Ogbuene (1999, p. 108) says, “This is different from saying that Chukwu could be anything at all, or nothing. It is rather saying there is a reality which cannot be described; but towards which His actions point.”