SYMBOLS AND THEIR SYMBOLIC MEANINGS AMONG THE IGBO'S IN TRADITIONAL RELIGION

Abstract

It is a known fact that every culture has the responsibility of describing reality, its origin and models of structural development as well as the hidden knowledge and truth about being. This responsibility is evidently illustrated, addressed or depicted in Igbo paradigm in form of symbols. Devoid of these symbols, signs and images, the traditional life experiences of the Igbo's will completely be void, abstract and meaningless because some of these symbols represented in tangible visible forms were believed to be real and living. The proper underpinning of these traditional symbols, signs and images of the indigenous people of Igbo's will go a long way in the full integration of the Igbo people's life and their immediate cultural ecology with messages they disseminate. It must be noted also that despite the significance of this integration, it must be informed that such symbols, signs and images are evidently limited in their transmission of reality. This paper investigates how symbols basically play significant roles in mediating and facilitating religious communication in Igbo Traditional Religion, giving rise to thought, interpretation, and symbolic meanings. In Igbo cosmology, symbols encapsulate so many things which are very distinctive thereby representing so many things and ideologies.