The transition taking place at this time did not break with the fundamental ontological understandings of the African-derived religiosity: (1) the view that the unmanifested spiritual world had creative agency; (2) the belief in continuous revelation (as opposed to the one-time incarnation experienced by Jesus of Nazareth adhered to by Christians); (3) the conviction that spirits could be invoked for assistance in the day-to-day lives of earthly communities. Rastafari did, however, rework African-derived epistemology--the method by which spiritual energy could be used dynamically. As they gradually came to reject spirit possession as the means of accessing knowledge they instituted in its place a process they call "Reasoning". Rastafari "Reasoning" is a ceremony of varying degrees of formality in which participants access the spirit through the ritual smoking of herb (ganja) and the use of word/sound/power for the purpose of gaining clarity about spiritual, philosophical, and social truth claims. Anthropologists Carole Yawney and John Homiak provide an excellent summary of the process of Reasoning:

Reasoning is a form of collective and visionary discourse in which individuals explore the implications of a particular insight, which could be based on subjects as diverse as a Bible passage or an event in the day's news. Everyone has the opportunity to speak for as long as necessary and the Reasoning is not completed until a general consensus has been achieved. Reasoning is a cooperative affair, not a competitive one. It is designed not to entertain but to elucidate. It gives ample room to the play of inspiration, while demanding a degree of disciplined concentration...The purpose of Reasoning is to reach ever higher heights accreting layer upon layer of meaning, until a satisfactory view of reality in the Light of Jah! Rastafari is reached.

Reasoning differs significantly from Western forms of conversation, debate, or lecture because in Reasoning spirit informs reason. Constraints of time and space are put aside in pursuit, not of knowledge, but of wisdom.

We will sit here for the whole day, and despite all of the noise and all of that, we are not moving from here. We will be here all night, we will be here, right here, and we reason and have tea. This is what you call the most integral part of the Rastaman, to really sit and reason and come into one common interest and whatsoever, whether it is political, economic, business, or about the state of the Jamaican Government...and you find that brethren walk five, ten miles to share that with his brethren--just to burn a spliff or chalice.

The introduction of this epistemological vehicle to a new "initiate"--guided by elders and referred to as a "grounding"--assists the youth coming into the movement to remember his destiny, which in the social context of Rastafari conflates with his memory of Africa. Paget Henry's description of the traditional African education provides an interesting context in which to examine this new knowledge vehicle. Traditional African philosophy, according to Henry, holds that human beings are made up of three components: the Okra or soul, the sunsum or ego, and the honan or body. The divine spark, or Okram inscribes the individuals destiny. Ignorance results from the "misrecognition of one's Okra", not from the failure of knowing man-made tools and forms. One educates by employing direct knowledge in order to empower the sunsum to remember its divine destiny. An individual youth requires such intervention because the sunsum has an inherent tendency to "revolt against the cosmic order of things and subject it (the cosmic destiny) to its own creative and self-creative powers." In traditional African societies deities and ancestors provided the direct knowledge that empowered the ego to remember. They continued to do so in African-derived practices in the Caribbean. The Rastafari, however, replace the ancestors and spirits embodied through ritual dance with a single, permanently embodied spirit.

Rastafari Reasoning, therefore, differs fundamentally from spirit possession. The most significant difference for the purposes of this study lies in the fact that the subject need not be vacated in order for spirit to enter. Reasoning represents a subtle shift in the sunsum/Okra dynamic because the individual ego participates in a way that "accentuate[s] the rational capacity of the believer." The spirit retains a significant role in the process, but once and individual "wakes up" he becomes his "own philosopher" able to make a unique and personal contribution to the ongoing group Reasoning. The individual ego, in constant contact with spirit, informs the truth claims of the group. Reasoning, the dynamic vehicle that guides Rastafari philosophy, makes the role played by the sunsum, or ego, a conscious one. Why this shift? I propose that the Rastafari eliminated the practice of spirit possession in order to provide a more assertive challenge to new social and economic conditions of urbanization and modernization experienced by the Jamaican peasantry during the first decades of the twentieth century. Paget Henry claims that an increase in the autonomy of the human ego (sunsum) in its relationship to spirit (Okra) characterizes the modernization process. Different human cultures break with spirit to different degrees as they modernize. The West, according to Henry, made a radical break, displacing the traditional worldview completely and justifying truth claims entirely through scientific knowledge, a process Sylvia Wynter describes as the "degodding of the universe." Rastafari modernized the Afro-Creole peasant population of Jamaica by devising a vehicle for justifying its truth claims that gives more autonomy to the ego than had been possible in the traditional spirit possessions without making such a radical break.

Rastafari Reasoning and the RastaWoman: Gender Constructions in the Shaping of Rastafari Livity examines the complex ways that gender and race shaped a liberation movement propelled by the Caribbean evolution of an African spiritual ethos. Jeanne Christensen proposes that Rastafari represents the most recent reworking of this spiritual ethos, referred to as African religiosity. The book contributes a new perspective to the literature on Rastafari, and through a historical lens, corrects the predominant static view of Rastafari women.

In certain Rastafari manifestations, a growing livity developed by RastaMen eventually excluded women from an important ritual called "Reasoning"—a conscious search for existential and ontological truth through self-understanding performed in a group setting. Restoring agency to the RastaWoman, Christensen argues that RastaWomen, intimately in touch with this spiritual ethos, challenged oppressive structures within the movement itself. They skirted official restrictions, speaking out in public and written forums whenever such avenues presented themselves, and searched for their own truth through conscious intentional self-examination characteristic of the Reasoning ritual.

With its powerful, theoretically informed narrative, Rastafari Reasoning and the RastaWoman: Gender Constructions in the Shaping of Rastafari Livity will appeal to students and scholars interested in religious transformation, resistance movements, gender issues, critical race studies, and the history and culture of the English-speaking Caribbean.

The bible... worst religon ever. I cant even imagine how that sucker survived this long. Rasta and shamans is the way to go, just live in peace and use your herbs that moder nature gave you.