Biography of a Lwa

COPYRIGHT 1996 - Mambo Racine Sans Bout
No reproduction without consent of author


Luc Gedeon's most serviceable lwa, the one he calls for practically every consultation, is an affable, communicative, piquant lwa named Arapice La Croix. Like Ti-Charles La Croix, he is a Gede (pronounced GAY-day) lwa. In the Vodou system of classification, this makes him a lwa Kreyol, one who originated in Haiti; as opposed to a lwa Gine, one who came from Africa. The Gede lwa are the spirits of the deceased ancestors, and are feasted every year on the first day of November.

Since Arapice La Croix was once a man, his metamorphosis from human to lwa provides a fascinating insight into the heart of the Vodou faith. On the second day of November in the year nineteen hundred, a poor Haitian named Antoine Jean-Pierre was born in the slum district of Croix Belair, which despite its poverty is rich in tradition. Belair was originally a sugar cane plantation; one of the first plantations in the Port-au-Prince area and therefore one of the first African settlements.

Later it became a refuge for urban mawonaj, for runaway slaves who remained in the city instead of fleeing to the mountains. They lived by working trades they had learned during their enslavement, or were hidden and supported by other Africans. The priests and priestesses among them worshiped and practiced in secret, for the penalty if they were caught was often death by burning. They built secret shrines in tiny rooms, and kept their belief hidden from the French enslavers but alive in their hearts and minds. Despite the anti-African decrees of the French rulers, as time went by, the sacred names and ceremonies of many tribes became known to each other, until a religious leader was expected to have a full command of most if not all. At the same time, the religious and folkloric beliefs of the petits blancs, the poor whites, entered the spiritual worldview of Africans in Haiti. After the Haitian revolution, the nascent Vodou faith flowered and took its form.

This tendency for resistance and subversion persisted until the American military occupation of Haiti which began in 1915 and ended in 1934. Urban guerrillas of the day led the American Marines many a merry chase through the twisted corridors and alleys of the neighborhood, in one case even firing on and crippling an American military vehicle.

Vodou flourished in Belair as the traditions of many African nations were carefully preserved. Even today, the Houngans and Mambos of Belair exhibit a mastery of ritual detail and a perfection of execution unrivaled in Haiti.

In these surroundings Antoine Jean-Pierre grew up. He had an unremarkable childhood and little formal education. As an adult, he too had courage and disliked injustice. Ironically, this proved to be the downfall of his human existence. One day, in a fit of outrage at the arrogant behavior of some local gwo neg, some big shot, he slapped his tormentor across the face. Predictably, the powerful gwo neg arranged his murder, which of course went unavenged. No one was ever brought to trial for his death, in fact it was never even reported to the police for fear that their corrupt members might be making payoff money from the same gwo neg who killed him. Antoine Jean-Pierre was buried by his family at the age of twenty-five.

Antoine became another of the tens of thousands to die unjustly since the first enslaved African was dragged onto the beaches of Haiti, but that was not the end of his story. After he spent the prescribed one year and one day beneath the abysmal waters the separate the souls of the dead from the world of the living, Maman Brigitte, the mistress of the cemetery and mother of all the Gede lwa, and her husband Baron La Croix reclaimed Antoine Jean-Pierre and renamed him Arapice La Croix. He passed again into the world of humans, invisible but intimately concerned with their affairs.

It is a basic tenet of the Vodou faith that the living and the dead work together to help each other. The first task that Arapice La Croix accepted was to protect a Haitian man who served as a soldier under the American flag during the Vietnam war. Arapice carried him safely through battles, ambushes and booby-traps, until at last the Haitian soldier was honorably discharged and went to enjoy the rewards of his service in the city of Paris, France. He foolishly neglected to thank Arapice or to make any ceremony for him. He offered Arapice no recompense whatsoever. Grieved and infuriated by such a lack of respect and gratitude, Arapice himself gripped the man's heart with a spectral hand during his sleep, killing him. Then he returned to Haiti.

Three months after Arapice's return, another poor man sought his help. The man had three sons, and Arapice did his best to lift them from the misery he had known during his mortal existence. He helped the man to get money to educate his sons abroad. One went to Paris, one to Mexico, and the last to Canada. Under Arapice's protection, the man's fortunes continued to turn for the better, until he was the owner of three trucks, all working to bring in yet more income. With the comfort of prosperity came indifference to the lwa who had helped him so faithfully. This man too neglected to make food offerings, sacrifices, or ceremonies for Arapice. Embittered and heartbroken, Arapice La Croix killed the father and all three sons, then ran away to the mountains of Grand Goave, on the coastline south of Port-au-Prince.

Frightened after what he had done and wretched in his incarnation as a lwa, Arapice went up in a tree and remained there for a very long time. One day, he saw another lwa at work, healing a sick person. This was the lwa Kanga, the lwa demembre or member's lwa, of Houngan Luc Gedeon's society. Arapice helped Kanga to heal people, and Luc soon realized that another lwa was present and assisting at his cures.

When Luc walked into the forest one morning, carrying the clay pot, the govi, from which he would summon the voice of Kanga to instruct him, Arapice heard Luc recite the priye Gine, the prayer of Africa. Luc recited well, and Arapice realized that Luc was a man who could truly serve Guinea. Arapice begged Kanga for permission to enter the govi with him, but Kanga told him instead to follow Luc back to his peristyle. For one year Arapice waited patiently outside.

After the year had passed, Kanga made a ceremony for Arapice to enter the peristyle and serve the members of the society. In possession of Houngan Luc, Kanga ordered a huge bonfire to be built. The he withdrew from Luc's head, and Arapice mounted him for the first time.

Arapice saw his opportunity to demonstrate his power. In possession of Houngan Luc, he promptly sat down in the midst of the fire. Not a hair of Luc's head or a thread of his garments were singed. Members of Luc's society wept, first with fear for Luc's safety and then with awe at Arapice's undeniable power.

Having attained the vindication of his martyred life, Arapice quietly entered his baji, the special chamber consecrated to him in Luc's peristyle. There he remains, faithfully serving the needs of the society and of those who come seeking help; respected, served, feasted and loved by the servants of Guinea in Grand Goave.

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