Juju

A Bekyar juju priest.

Juju is an ancient Mwangi faith based on the worship of spirit beings called wendo that inhabit a spirit world called the hana juju. It is a highly personal and evolving faith rooted in ritualistic traditions that resemble shamanism, druidism, and totemism, and is primarily practiced in the Mwangi Expanse, Vidrian, and the Shackles.

History

The origins of juju predate recorded history and are evident only in traces of its practices seen in ruins of the Mwangi Expanse. Some adherents suggest that the ancient decline of the Expanse's greatest empires was due to worshiping the wrong wendo.

Practitioners

Tribes of societies of the Mwangi Expanse and its nearby regions practice juju. Nighttime rituals draw entire communities together for rites held near bonfires with music, dance, chants, and offerings of fruits, grains, and goat milk.

Practices are led and passed down through oral traditions by an oracle known as a wendifa, a term that translates to "friend of the wendo". Such oracles are respected within their communities and empowered by their connection to the hana juju in various ways. Some use the power to protect themselves, speak with animals, better understand their surroundings, dominate others' minds or wills, view the auras of both living and undead beings, torment others' dreams, become incorporeal, summon a spirit of nature, or induce the possession of others by spirits. The most powerful wendifa master their connection to the spirit world, granting them a font of knowledge and dominance over beasts and monsters.

Each community typically has a single wendifa assisted by several others, though a wendifa keeps many of their personal practices secret.

Juju practices often involve physical items and symbols that represent aspects of power, such as fetishes and sigils, but each practitioner's and tribe's traditions differ and some omit them entirely. Such practices can include material objects or intrinsic material of a person, whether as the summoner or the target of a juju ritual. A hand-sized juju fetish can empower the ritual and is also uniquely crafted from natural materials, such as dirt, leather, spices, plants, bones, hair, or blood.

Practitioners summon and commune with wendo through rituals of sacrifice, music, and dance, and craft intricate pictograms known as metumbe from sacred chalks or powders to draw more powerful wendo. Sacrifices can range from food to blood, the nature of which relies more on the morality of the practitioner than the proclivities of the wendo. The practice can involve negotiating with the wendo as much as it does worshiping it.

Different wendo advise or empower wendifa on a variety of matters. Popular depictions of juju made by those outside of its adherents often associate the faith with undeath and the creation of juju zombies, but such practices are limited to specific tribes and practitioners.

Taboos

Wendo can become wrathful if their rituals are not executed with precision, but their worst taboo is allowing unbelievers—derisively referred to as ben kudu, or "lost ones"—to witness the ritual. As such, juju practitioners who travel keep their rituals secret from others.

Interlopers on a juju ritual are at a minimum ejected by force, while some tribes demand sacrifices of the intruders that might range from service to blood. A few evil tribes extract a permanent sacrifice, from a body part to the interloper's life.

Failed rituals can draw a wendo of opposite alignment from those who worship it. Known as a "contrary", this wendo might possess the wendifa or another participant and wreak havoc on the ritual.

Uda wendo

Mediums who allow wendo to possess their physical body are known as uda wendo. Like wendifa, an uda wendo cannot allow non-practitioners to witness this event or else risk being cursed; unlike other mediums, uda wendo do not engage in group seances. An uda wendo must struggle against being dominated by the wendo possessing them in order to harness its powers.

Pantheon

While not deities, the juju pantheon is vast and contains wendo of varying levels of power. Known wendo include:

Greater wendo spirits

• Mfuello, The Journeyer
• Sister Liiza, Sweet Sister

Lesser wendo spirits

• Donma Goko, The Cliffdweller, resident on the Shackles' island of Mgange Cove and reputed killer of Free Captain Xelemni Adulian from Taldas Isle

Other wendo spirits (rank unknown)

• Adamde Baaka, The Jungle Spirit
• Old Ba, Old Man, The Ancient, wendo of folklore and ancient wisdom
• Kindo Kane, The One Who Stands at the Gate
• Lo Lulu the Night Lord
• Omoro, The One Mighty and Strong
• The Serpent King, Wise Brother

On Golarion

Juju is practised primarily within Mwangi communities. Known adherents include the Bekyar, Bonuwat, and Zenj peoples; the inhabitants of the Shackles island of Mgange Cove; and the inhabitants of Umnyango in Vidrian, formerly known as Kalabuto in Sargava.

Juju and wendo worship were also practiced in Yamasa, which was introduced to the faith by trade with tribes in western Garund. Some Koboto tribes of the modern Sodden Lands continue this tradition.

References

For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.