Nobel laureate Professor Wole Soyinka has emphasized that the Isese tradition remains impervious to diminishment and is here to endure. He underscored that Isese has an enduring presence throughout human history and will continue to do so indefinitely.
These statements were made by Professor Soyinka during a public discussion held on Friday at the Kongi’s Harvest Art Gallery on Freedom Way, Lagos State. The occasion coincided with the celebration of Isese Day, observed in various South-Western states.
It’s worth noting that Isese Day had become a subject of controversy, particularly in Ilorin, Kwara State. In this regard, an Osun priestess named Yeye Ajesikemi Olatunji faced verbal opposition when she planned to commemorate the day on August 20. The Emir of Ilorin, Mallam Abdulazeez Arowona, and other Muslim adherents discouraged the observance of the day.
Mallam Abdulazeez Arowona, the Emir’s spokesperson, conveyed in a statement that the Ilorin Emirate had never historically endorsed what he termed as “idolatry activities.”
It’s also worth recalling that Adegbola Abdulazeez, a prominent Isese devotee and activist from Ilorin known as Talolorun (Who is God), who had been a leading advocate for the recognition of Isese in the state, was apprehended and detained on allegations of defamation.
He had since been charged to court for “insulting the Emir of Ilorin among other offences.”
But, speaking during his presentation, the Professor of English Literature, spoke against Talolorun’s detention, adding that nobody deserved to be detained and put in a dungeon for issues bordering around belief.
“It transcends religion since it calls to what is innate to all sentient beings, those strange advocates of freedom who, paradoxically, nonetheless persist in fashioning chains for themselves and for their fellow beings.
“Isese liberates. It is an expression of the collective human spirit, its enveloping, compassionate accommodation of human experience, yet one that strives towards the seemingly inaccessible, intuitively felt as an elevating dimension of one’s material estate.
“Isese is a path, not a destination, a seizure yet a pursuit of what we experience as the inner quest for ultimate illumination. Isese does not conclude, and neither does it exclude. It does not diminish, rather, it enlarges. It teaches the community to embrace, explore, and adjust.
“Isese promotes, as foundational consciousness, gratitude for, and sanctity of human life. It repudiates the supremacist claim of any structure of spirituality over another. Content with the pursuit of inner serenity, which is the climax of, and extraction from celebration, Isese does not seek to exercise power. All true religions know that celebration is a prelude to community equilibrium,” he said.
Soyinka also warned Muslim adherents whom he (Soyinka) said had gone on a smear campaign to desist from such crusade.
He stressed that there was never a time when he said he displayed hate for any religion, adding that he stands only for equity, fairness, and justice.