July 3, 2011
‘Bible dropped from heaven on rain-soaked yams… Bible not wet’
The Bible on yams in Araya.
Is it a myth?
Where is the Bible?
Did the British missionary steal it?
Did he keep it in his home church before he died?
Can it be retrieved from Britain?
By Sam Eyoboka, who was at the Bible Site in Araya
ON January 1, 1914, the British government, in a deft political manoeuvre, proclaimed the amalgamation of the then Northern and Southern Protectorates and changed the political destiny of the geographical entity known today as Nigeria.
Eight months after that event, in the summer of the same year, another milestone event took place in the fresh water rain agrarian forest within the flood plains of the River Niger, some six kilometres north west of the confluence of the Ase and Niger rivers, that would alter the spiritual landscape of the country forever.
An unlettered aging woman, Mrs. Ofuonwaikie Esievo, with fellow farmers, was in a hurry to ferry her farm yield, mainly yams, across the Aya lake just before the pending floods when, like the biblical story of the Virgin conception, she became the bearer of a tale that would remain indelible in the history of the country.
The woman, who has since died unsung, had the onerous responsibility of carrying a Holy Bible that was said to have fallen from the fading sky blue heaven. That was in August of 1914 and the place was Araya in Isoko South Local Government Area of Delta State. That, in a nutshell, is the bizzare story of the Fallen Bible which has put the sleepy hometown of the former managing director of the Guinness Nigeria Plc, Dr. Abel Ubeku, in the world map.
Questions! Questions!! Questions!!! Fallen Bible? A swampy rain forest dominated by water spirits? Across the Christian world, it is not uncommon to see historical monuments depicting the entry of the missionaries into such places.
Apart from several camps known as Ori Okes (Mountaintops) reserved for spiritual retreats and solemn prayers in different parts of the western parts of the country which were mostly used by early Christian leaders like Apostle Babalola, it is difficult to point to any monument marking the spread of the Christian faith in other parts. Aya was reputed to be dominated by visible water spirits such that Okolobe hillock and the Ihwerhe spirits were numerous they tormented people in the day time and much more at night time.
The Bible on yams in Araya.
The Ohwolo spirits were so evidently evil, being insatiable killers, and during floods they were known to help, hinder, misdirect, attack, strike people dumb and sometimes with insanity. They held fishermen captives for days and often made their fishing wooden canoes to capsize.
In addition, there were community shrines including Oriorie, the marital harmony juju, and Osako, the annual town-cleansing juju. But the greatest of the shrines worshipped by the people was the Aya cult. It was therefore perplexing to accept the fact that a Holy Bible could descend from Heaven and land in a predominantly pagan village founded by a diviner known simply as Aya, who, like biblical Jacob, did everything humanly possible to outwit his brethren in order to dominate the fabulous fishing grounds he just discovered a little under six kilometres from Aviara, his birth place. For the avoidance of doubt, Aya is still regarded as the brain behind the Aya cult.
The intriguing story of the Araya Bible Site is that before 1911, there were no reports of any Christian activity in any of the Isoko towns. It was Reverend J.D. Atkins and his counterpart, Reverend H. Proctor, who took the first known gospel of Christ to Oleh, the headquarters of Isoko land and thereafter to other parts of the land.
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History records that the twosome urged the Church Missionary Society, CMS, to take steps to open up the Isoko axis through missionary work and that effort paid off and, by July 1914, Aitken had established a missionary district in Oleh with him as the initial pastor in charge. One of the first fruits of that endeavor was Mr. Isara Ewhoboh of Araya, who though was a stack illiterate bought an English Bible which they put under their pillows. This reporter was told that whenever Aitken visited Araya then, he stayed in the house of Mr. Ewhoboh where a room was reserved for him perpetually.
Ewhoboh, who later became an inveterate soul winner and several new converts to the Christian faith, received revelations, just before the rainy season of 1914, to expect a wonderful blessing/miracle from God to Araya but the form of the miracle/blessing was not disclosed. In those days, farmers moved their harvests by head from their farms to the creek which linked lake Aya to the Ekregbesi creek, which emptied into the Ase River and the River Niger.
It was at such period in 1914 when Mrs. Esievo and other women were hurrying up to ferry their yield when suddenly the woman discovered a large Bible and a supposedly letter on the tubers of yams spread on the sandy beach. The yams and everything else were soaked and dripping with water but the open Bible and the accompanying letter were dry.
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