by Ya Sezi Bo Oungan

July 22nd is the feast day of St. Mary Magdalene, who is the saint mask for Maman Brijite, and Metress Dayila found in the Rada, not the one of the same name found in Petwo. We can tell she is a saint mask for a Guede because of the skull in the image, and we can tell she is Rada, for the sake of her fair complexion. The masks for the Lwa are complex puzzles and involve looking at the image not for the who is in it, but for the what it is comprised of , not looking at the individual depicted as the way the Lwa appears, but as a code that if you can imagine living in a time when there are no televisions, no internet, that you could look upon some art work and see the depth of what is there, even if you don’t understand what your looking at or why its even there. I’m sure this was the case with many saint images used to disguise the Lwa. decoding this image further for you all is as follows: the book indicates that they know magic, and secret information, the cross -though that may be common in many saint images, here it is standing alone and not connected to the saint by touch so we can tell that they are not subject to the rules of mortality, or morality. because her hair is loose, we know she is a witch or possesses her own power in the world.

Bon Fete Sen Marie Magdalene