Nuba

Nuba is the remote supreme being of the Sara peoples of southern Chad, credited with creating the world and the first human beings. Across the Sara dialects his name varies: the Madjingaye call him Nə́ɓā, while the Mbaye know him as Lou(w)a or Louba, and colonial missionaries also recorded forms such as Braba. He is conceived as an otiose creator who, having made the cosmos, withdrew from its daily affairs; considered unfailingly benevolent, he attracts no sacrificial cult, and ritual life instead centres on the sun, the immanent besi spirits of trees and initiation, and the ancestral badigi. Some Mbaye traditions also cast him as a giver of thunder and rain. With the spread of Islam and Christianity his name was widely identified with Allah and with the Christian God.

Domains

• creation
• sky
• weather

Powers

• creates the world and mankind
• withdraws into remoteness

Relations

• companion: Kada
• ally: Nga-Ninga

Sources

• "Sara," in Encyclopedia of World Cultures, Vol. IX: Africa and the Middle East (Boston: G.K. Hall, 1995).
• Country study of Chad, "Classical African Religions," summarising Sara belief in Nuba as creator, besi spirits and badigi ancestral dead.
• M. Nadjitolabaye, "Manifestation du sacre en milieu Sara Madjingaye au Tchad," Revue Aflash-MDOU (2019), 321-350.