Bob Marley and his reggae music is nothing less than mainstream. His face and message has been immortalized on T-shirts, posters and the like. I own a couple of Bob Marley T-shirts and I didn’t have to go far to find them—just a quick trip to my local Hot Topic or even Target.
We associate Bob Marley with peaceful rebellion and… well, marijuana use. However, for Bob Marley, marijuana was less than a leisure activity—it was a part of his religion. It is used for religious meditation, to heighten the sense of community with each other and God. Among Rastafarians it is commonly referred to as “wisdom weed,” “holy herb” or one of several slang words. Their dialect, known as “lyaric” is a rejection of English, which they consider to be a colonial language. The Rastafari movement, whose followers are best known for their thick, long natty dreadlocks and signature color combination of green, gold, red and black.
We usually think of these as “Jamaican colors”. Although this movement is rooted in Jamaica, these are the colors of the Ethiopian flag as it was during the 1930 reign of King Halle Selassie I, believed to be a reincarnation of God, or “Jah”. Rastafarians commonly refer to Jah as “I and I” to signify the unity and equality of man and the Holy Spirit. Their main source of scripture is the Bible, interpreted in an Afro-Centric way. They believe that their God will save their people from slavery and exile and return them to the holy land Zion, Africa, and more specifically, Ethiopia.
Several proponents of this movement, including Marcus Garvey and Bob Marley have been highly political figures. They revere Jesus Christ, but believe that Europeans of Babylon corrupted his teachings. Thus, they reject abortion and contraception seeing it as a way for Europeans to control the black population.
As part of their religious beliefs, they follow a strict “I-tal” diet, meaning natural and clean, which restricts them from consuming pork, alcohol, milk and coffee, which are impure. In accordance with the Bible, they do not cut their hair and instead allow it to grow long and coil it into dreadlocks.
This is a hairstyle that might look familiar—blonde renditions of it were seen on the 2012 runways of MaxMara and more recently, Chanel. In the last couple of years we’ve seen Chanel Iman sport green, gold and red tie die in a Rastafarian inspired Blumarine collection and Rasta hats on models at Gwen Stefani’s Fall 2011 L.A.M.B. collection and on superstars like Rihanna. She was seen wearing one and carrying a purse with a jeweled marijuana leaf on it.
Although the mainstream public can sometimes misconceive the intentions of the Rastafari movement, it is music moguls like Bob Marley, his sons and even Rihanna, to some extent, who have molded this young, international movement.
No comments:
Post a Comment