The relationship between a loa and servitor is a reciprocal one. The Vodoun community benefits from the power of the loa in exchange for the power of their belief expressed through ceremony. The loa is sustained through both spiritual offerings, such as ritual and dance, and physical offerings, like food or items that appeal to the loa’s tastes. Unlike deities of most religions, the loa can only manifest through possession of a trained devotee. However, this possession is not an act of control or displacement, but a ritualised union of human and spirit,⁵ “a double movement of attenuation and expansion”.⁶ The possession is an act of worship by the servitor and a necessity for worship for the loa, forming an interdependency between the two.

The mechanics of possession are centred on the three-part identity of the servitor, the gros bon ange, the petit bon ange, and the corps cadavre. The loa enters the servitor’s body (corps cadavre) using the petit bon ange as a conduit and takes the place of the gros bon ange, which is said to be the double of the material body and the life force. The petit bon ange is the personality and consciousness of the servitor and it both supports the loa during possession and relies on the loa to be its anchor. Should a person ever lose this important spiritual connection with their loa, they risk losing their petit bon ange and becoming an empty husk, a zombi.

As the possession allows a practitioner to connect with the loa and spirit world, it can raise them above the physical world to transcend their life circumstances for a short while.⁷ Within Vodoun, the practitioners have an important role, in which they have a degree of control as necessitated by the reciprocal nature of their relationship with the loa. Could this distinguishing factor of their religion be a way of empowering them by forming a contrast with their relationship to their captors, in which they have little power or autonomy?

The Loa

The Vodoun pantheon can be divided into two main families or rites, the Rada and the Petro. The former most closely resembles the deities found in the African homeland of the Haitian slaves and the latter came into being in the New World as a result of many cultural traditions coming together. Each loa has a distinct personality and features, requiring specific ritual acts during la cérémonie, the Vodoun ceremony. However, the exact manner of worship of a loa can vary between hounfours and each loa may have a number of facets to their personality (and as many names). This means that there are essentially hundreds of different loa. In addition, a Vodoun servitor may become a loa after their death, being worshipped by their family and, if they have been especially wise and beneficial, the Vodoun community as a whole.