Rastafarianism
Bob Marley, was one of the biggest reggae performers in Jamaica, and is a big influence on the Rastafarian community. He has a song called "Forever Loving Jah", and he repeatedly sings, “ We’ll be forever loving Jah” (Jah is the Rastafarian name for God).
Marley has been performing since the late 50’s and became popular in the late 60’s . All of his songs are a tribute to his religion which is Rastafarianism. Nearly all of his songs are about love, and everyone getting along, and that’s what Rastafarianism is all about. Since the religion was relatively new, Bob Marley had a significant impact on how the religion got popular and known around the world.
According to "The Religions book", Rastafarianism is a religion that has been around since the 1930s. The religion has little to do with traditional African religions, as it is based largely off of the Christian Bible, much like other denominations. They’re religion is much like Christianity, as they believe that there is a god (They call their god “Jah”), and he sent his son to earth as the form of Jesus (They call their form of Jesus “Yeshua”).
Followers of the religion dislike the term Rastafarian and prefer to be called Rastafari. Before this religion developed, Creole religions were made among slaves that were move to the Americas, combining African beliefs with Christian beliefs that slaves adopted from their owners. That is how Rastafarianism was created.
Rastafarians believe that their original African languages (there are roughly 2,000 languages in Africa) were taken from them when they were put into captivity for slave trade. Therefore, they mostly speak English.
Their diet includes no meat whatsoever. They mostly eat fresh fruit and vegetables. This is called an Ital vegetarian diet. The main goal of the diet is to increase livity which is a big role in the rastafarian religion.
Reggae is the main genre of music in the Rastafarian religion. According to "New World Encyclopedia", this jazzy genre was born in Trenchtown Jamaica, which is a very impoverished part of Jamaica. There are many well-known reggae artists, but Bob Marley is one of the best artists known.
Marley expressed his passion for Rastafarianism in many of his songs. His goal in music was to unite the human race as one and bring the world to peace. He preaches this in his songs such as “One Love,” where he includes lines such as, “ Let’s get together and feel all right”. He includes many lyrics like this in most of his songs. Marley will always be a huge influence on the Rastafarian community.
Bob Marley said in a song called "Trenchtown Rock":
“One good thing about music, when it hits you, you feel no pain”.
