How the Maraca Was Born

How The Maraca Was Born

From the Odu Odí Obara (7-6)

The peony seed cannot decide if it is red or if it is black.

Odí Pataki 3

Olófin created the rosary bead plant; Eshu blessed it, and Obatalá decreed it was one of the greatest plants in the religion. Soon it was decreed by the orishas that any plant missing in their sacred omiero could be replaced with its leaves, and all the orishas planted it in their gardens. Shangó had one such bush growing outside his bedroom window. Obatalá gave him the seeds and he planted them carefully where they would receive ample amounts of sunshine and rain. It grew quickly, and thousands of seeds grew in its branches.

The day came that one of the seeds looked at all the seeds to his left and saw only red, and then he turned his eyes to the right and saw only black. “We are the strangest bush in all the land,” said the seed, “for all of you on my left are red and all of you on my right are black.” He tried to see his own color, but no matter how he tried to twist or turn he could not see himself. “What color am I?” he wondered aloud. “Am I red or am I black?”

One of the seeds to his left answered him first, “You are black. I can see you from where I sit and you are most definitely black, just like all the seeds to your right.”

“Thank you, red seed,” said the peony, and he shifted himself to lay closer to his black brethren on his right.

“You are not one of us!” said the seed to his right. “For I can see your color clearly from where I hang, and you are most definitely red. You belong on the other side with all the red seeds.”

“He is black!” roared the other seed. “He belongs with you!”

“You don’t belong with us either,” screamed another seed further right. “For I see you clearly, and you are red as is the first seed. Move over to your side!”

Soon all the seeds were fighting about who was red and who was black. None of them thought, not for a minute, that maybe they were half each color. Outside Shangó’s bedroom window the seeds argued through the night. Shangó could neither rest nor sleep and when he could stand the argument no longer he ran outside with a large gourd and yelled, “Enough! You are all the same color—half red and half black!” He grabbed the seeds by the handful and put them inside the gourd; he bound it tight. “Now you are neither red nor black; you live in darkness and without light there can be no color. Be quiet!”

The seeds, however, continued to quarrel, but inside the gourd their cacophony became harmony. Shangó shook the gourd and listened to the sound the seeds made; it pleased him. In that moment, the maraca was born. Shangó stashed the maraca inside his house far away from his bedroom and slept peacefully all that night. The next day, he shared the instrument with all the orishas, and soon most of them preferred the sound of the maraca above all others.

Still, the peony seeds never decided if they were red or if they were black, and they remained the same throughout all their days.