Kalunga line

The Kalunga line is a watery boundary between the land of the living and the spiritual realm of the ancestors. An element of traditional Bakongo spirituality, the word Kalunga is Kikongo for "threshold between worlds". It is the point where the two realms, Ku Nseke and Ku Mpemba. It represents liminality, or a place literally “neither here nor there."[1]

The Kongo Cosmogram

Creation

The Bakongo believe that in the beginning there was only a circular void, called mbûngi, with no life.[2] Nzambi Mpungu the Creator God summoned a spark of fire, or Kalûnga, that grew until it filled the mbûngi. When it grew too large, Kalûnga became a great force of energy and unleashed heated elements across space, forming the universe with the sun, stars, planets, etc.[2] Because of this, Kalûnga is seen as the origin of life and a force of motion. The Bakongo believe that life requires constant change and perpetual motion. Nzambi Mpunga is also referred to as Kalûnga, the God of change.[2] Similarities between the Bakongo belief of Kalûnga and the Big Bang Theory have been studied.[3]

The creation of a Bakongo person, or muntu, is also believed to follow the four moments of the sun, which play a significant role in their development.[2] Musoni is the time when a muntu is conceived both in the spiritual realm and in the womb of a Bakongo woman. Kala is the time when a muntu is born into the physical world. This time is also seen as the rise of the sun. Tukula is the time of maturity, where a muntu learns to master all aspects of life from spirituality to purpose to personality. The last period of time is luvemba, when a muntu physically dies and enters the spiritual world, or Nu Mpémba, with the ancestors, or bakulu.[2][4] Because Bakongo people have a "dual soul-mind," or mwèla-ngindu, they are able to exist and live in both realms during the different moments of their lives. Even while in Nu Mpémba, a muntu still has a full life with as they prepare for Kala time once again. [2]The right side of the body is also believed to be male, while the left side is believed to be female, creating an additional layer to the dual identity of a muntu.[3]

Kongo cosmogram

The nature of Kalûnga is also spiritual. As Kalûnga filled mbûngi, it created an invisible line that divided the circle in half.[2] The top half represents the physical world, or Ku Nseke, while the bottom half represents the spiritual world of the ancestors, known as Ku Mpèmba. The Kalûnga line separates these two worlds, and all living things exists on one side or another.[2] After creation, the line and the mbûngi circle became a river, carrying people between the worlds at birth and death. Then the process repeats and a person is reborn. Together, Kalûnga and the mbûngi circle form the Kongo cosmogram, also called the Yowa or Dikenga Cross.[2] A simbi (pl. bisimbi) is a water spirit that is believed to inhabit bodies of water and rocks, having the ability to guide bakulu, or the ancestors, along the Kalûnga line to the spiritual world after death. They are also present during the baptisms of African American Christians, according to Hoodoo tradition.[5][6]

The four moments of the sun are also represented on the Kongo cross.[2][3] Musoni is the time when a muntu is conceived both in the spiritual realm and in the womb of a Bakongo woman. Kala is the time when a muntu is born into the physical world. This time is also seen as the rise of the sun. Tukula is the time of maturity, where a muntu learns to master all aspects of life from spirituality to purpose to personality. The last period of time is luvemba, when a muntu physically dies and enters the spiritual world, or Nu Mpémba, with the ancestors, or bakulu.[2] These four moments are believed to correlate to the four times of day (midnight, or n'dingu-a-nsi; sunrise, or ndiminia; noon, or mbata; and sunset, or ndmina), as well as the four seasons (spring, summer, fall and winter).[3]

Slavery in the Americas

Due to the deep, spiritual connection that Bakongo people had to water, the Kalunga line is often associated with bodies of water. After many were kidnapped and forcibly taken to the Americas, the line and the sacred circle became synonymous with the Atlantic Ocean.[7] The Bakongo people believed the soul after death traveled the path of the sun as it set in the west. The enslaved believed they were being taken to the land of the dead, never to return.[2] Thus, the Kalunga line became known as a line under the Atlantic Ocean where the living became the dead and the only way back to life was to recross the line. Some religions today still make reference to the Kalunga Line believing that the soul of an African American travels back to Africa upon death and re-enters the world of the spiritually living although the body has passed on.[2]

References
  1. Gaskins, Nettrice R. (2016-01-02). "The African Cosmogram Matrix in Contemporary Art and Culture". Black Theology. 14 (1): 28–42. doi:10.1080/14769948.2015.1131502. ISSN 1476-9948.
  2. Asante, Molefi Kete; Mazama, Ama (2009). Encyclopedia of African Religion. SAGE Publications. pp. 120–124, 165–166, 361. ISBN 978-1412936361.
  3. Luyaluka, Kiatezua Lubanzadio (2017). "The Spiral as the Basic Semiotic of the Kongo Religion, the Bukongo". Journal of Black Studies. 48 (1): 91–112. ISSN 0021-9347.
  4. Van Wing, J. (1941). "Bakongo Magic". The Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland. 71 (1/2): 85–97. doi:10.2307/2844403. ISSN 0307-3114.
  5. Anderson, Jeffrey E. (2008). Hoodoo, Voodoo, and Conjure: A Handbook. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press. p. 114. ISBN 9780313342226.
  6. Manigault-Bryant, LeRhonda S. (2014). Talking to the Dead: Religion, Music, and Lived Memory among Gullah/Geechee Women. Durham: Duke University Press. ISBN 9780822376705.
  7. W. Jeffrey Bolster (1997). Black jacks: African American seamen in the age of sail. Harvard University Press. p. 63. ISBN 0-674-07627-3. Retrieved 2009-06-26.
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