Summary

I have learned so much about Pygmies and their religion through out my field research.  The BaMbuti view the forest as their God.  They love the darkness of the forest and they believe that the forest is good, without any evil.   When bad things happen they believe that is because they forest is sleeping.  When the forest is sleeping the men go and get the Molimo.  The Molimo used to be the women’s according to legend but now the men are in charge of it.  The Molimo used to be made out of wood from the Molimo tree but the steel pipe makes a better sound and it doesn’t rot.  While the men dance and try to cheer up the forest they blow the Molimo and sing., in order to cheer up the forest.  The women have to go into their huts and pretend like they think the Molimo is a real animal.  The people believe that the forest is their God and they are the children of the forest.  They are grateful for the food, clothes, water, shelter etc. that they forest provides them.  The people believe that evil if it does exist can only exist outside of the forest and they do not want the influence of the different villages witchcraft.   From a Functionalist Anthropology perspective the people all believe in the forest as God individually so that they can maintain they culture and thrive in the forest.  I found this theory to be really valuable because it forced me to think about each individual and what they needed to do in order to survive.  The role of culture is to meet the needs of the individual and this culture allowed the needs of the individual to be met.  The BaMbuti are a band society and rely on each other for hunting and the women and men are both greatly needed in the culture.  Culture is a set of tools that allow them to adapt to their environment so that they can survive, eat, and propagate.  I would not change my theory.