Bob Marley: Rastafari Way of Life

(Haile Selassie I)

Although Bob Marley wasn’t the founder of the Rastafari Way of Life, he has become the personification of it to many.  In other words, although there would have been a Rastafari movement without Bob Marley, there would not have been a “Bob Marley” without the Rasta inspiration.

Wikipedia defines “Rasta” as a “new religious movement” that “arose in the 1930s in Jamaica,” a country “where 98% of the people were the black descendants of slaves.”  “Rastafari” is a name derived from the Ethiopian title “Ras” (meaning “Head” or “Duke” in Amharic), plus the birth name (“Tafari”) of Haile Selassie I, Emperor of Ethiopia from 1930 to 1974.  The name “Haile Selassie” means “Power of the Trinity” in Ge’ez.

Haile Selassie I is said to be heir to a dynasty that traces its origins all the way back to King Solomon and Queen Makeda (aka “Queen of Sheba”).  An Ethiopian Orthodox Christian throughout his life, Haile Selassie is “revered as the returned messiah of the Bible” by Rasta adherents.  Some Rastafari refer to him as “Jah” (from the Tetragrammaton YHWH - which in Latin is JHWH, as in the ending of hallelujah).  Others use the acronym HIM, meaning “His Imperial Majesty.”

Many perceive HIM to be the One who will “lead a future golden age of eternal peace, righteousness, and prosperity.”  They refer to Haile Selassie’s many achievements during his years as Ethiopia’s ruler. Wikipedia reports that Haile Selassie’s “political thought and experience in promoting multilateralism and

collective security have proved seminal and enduring.”

Rasta-Man-Vibration explains that “Bob Marley has been able to do what many intellectuals… have not been able to do and that is to articulate the ideas of the Rastafarian community to the wider world.”  Marley himself said:  Mi see myself as a revolutionary.  Who don’t have no help and take no bribe from no one and fight it single-handed with music.  This “it” that Marley was fighting was the “downpression” of people by colonialism and equally-Babylonian “isms.”  

 Resources

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Marley

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rastafari_movement

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haile_Selassie_I

http://www.rasta-man-vibration.com/rastafarian.html

Copyright April 22, 2012 by Linda Van Slyke   All Rights Reserved