African cosmology of the Bântu-Kôngo: tying the spiritual knot: principles of life & living

Twenty-one years ago this study was printed to serve as a stepping ground to my class discussions at Yale University. Since its publication, many outside of the classroom wanted to have a copy of African Book Without Title, but it was not available. Friends asked to review the materials and expand the book for a new edition. This was not possible because each time I tried to do so I continued to push the work off to the next day. Meanwhile demands and requests for the book accumulated. Finally, I decided to review the materials of the study for a second edition, which we are happy to present to you now under a new title African Cosmology of the Bantu—Kongo: Principles of Life and Living. Is there any difference in form and content between this edition and the first? My answer to that question will be yes, indeed. Its content was revised and expanded where it was possible. This expansion includes a brief description of the Bantu-Kéngo concept of mapping the universe [kayéngele/luyalungunu] and a new chapter on the “Vee”, one of the most secret aspects of the Bantu teaching among the Koéngo people. "Life is fundamentally a process of perpetual and mutual communication; and to communicate is to emit and to receive waves and radiations (minika ye minienie). This process of, receiving and releasing or passing them on (tambula ye tambikisa) is the key to human beings game of survival. A person is perpetually bathed by radiations' weight, (zitu kia minienie). The weight (zitu/demo) of radiations may have a negative as well as positive impact on any tiny being, for example a person who represents the most vibrating: "kolo" (knot) of relationships." "The following expressions are very common among the Bantu, in general, and among the Kongo in particular, which prove to us the antiquity of these concepts in the African continent; Our businesses are waved/shaken; our health is waved/shaken; what we possess is waved/shaken; the communities are waved/shaken: Where are these (negative) waves coming from (Salu bieto bieti nikunwa; mavimpi nikunwa; biltuvwidi nikunwa; makanda nikunwa: Kwe kutukanga minika miami)?" "For the Bantu, a person lives and moves within an ocean of waves/radiations. One is sensitive or immune to them. To be sensitive to waves is to be able to react negatively or positively to those waves/forces. But to be immune to surrounding waves/forces, is to be less reactive to them or not at all. These differences account for varying degrees in the process of knowing/learning among individuals. Book jacket."--Jacket "Life is fundamentally a process of perpetual and mutual communication; and to communicate is to emit and to receive waves and radiations (minika ye minienie). This process of, receiving and releasing or passing them on (tambula ye tambikisa) is the key to human beings game of survival. A person is perpetually bathed by radiations' weight, (zitu kia minienie). The weight (zitu/demo) of radiations may have a negative as well as positive impact on any tiny being, for example a person who represents the most vibrating: "kolo" (knot) of relationships." "The following expressions are very common among the Bantu, in general, and among the Kongo in particular, which prove to us the antiquity of these concepts in the African continent; Our businesses are waved/shaken; our health is waved/shaken; what we possess is waved/shaken; the communities are waved/shaken: Where are these (negative) waves coming from (Salu bieto bieti nikunwa; mavimpi nikunwa; biltuvwidi nikunwa; makanda nikunwa: Kwe kutukanga minika miami)?" "For the Bantu, a person lives and moves within an ocean of waves/radiations. One is sensitive or immune to them. To be sensitive to waves is to be able to react negatively or positively to those waves/forces. But to be immune to surrounding waves/forces, is to be less reactive to them or not at all. These differences account for varying degrees in the process of knowing/learning among individuals" --BOOK Cover. Fu-Kiau Bunseki, Ph.D. is one of the great scholars of the African religion, and the leading authority on the Bantu-Kongo civilization. He is also a genuine practitioner of the Kongo spiritual tradition. He is intiated in the three "secret societies" Lemba, Khimba and Kimpasi. Lemba is the foundation for several African based religious practices including Palo Mayombe (Cuba), Vodou Petro (Haiti) and Candomble Angola (Brasil). African cosmology of the Bantu-Kongo explores the Bantu-Kongo religious and philosophical teachings, as well as concepts of law and crime. It connects the reader with one of the most ancient and powerful spiritual traditions-explore "seven-direction walk" our origin and links to society, nature and the universe. African Cosmology of the Bantu—Kongo Contents Introduction to the First Edition A Few Words to the Second Edition 1. Kongo Cosmology in Graphics Mapping the Univere 2. African Concept of Law and Crime 3. Historical Background of the Kéngo Cultural Zone Social Organization The Ancestral Land Crime Debate Process Proverbs Used Within the Community About the Community Hearing is Seeing, and Seeing is Reacting/Feeling 4. The “V”: Basis of All Realities Annex Bibliography The following graphics about Kongo concepts of their world are excerpts based on my book N'kôngo ye nza yakun'zungidila/Le Mukôngo et le Monde qui L'Entourait (ONRD, Kin 1969) and on my unpublished manuscripts KM Nènga; Vérité Sur les Grandes Initiations en Afrique Centrale (1973, pp. 300), and Makuku Matatu: Les Fondements Culturels Kongo (1978, pp. 450).