Animism
The Lobi are well documented for their animist beliefs. The worshipping of spirit ancestors and fetishes is distinct in Lobi culture and fetish houses outside their mud compounds are daily practices. Christian missionaries working in southern Burkina Faso are reported to have said that an elderly man in a Lobi village once renounced the spirits in favor of Christianity by discarding his fetishes in a nearby lake. As he turned his back on the traditions, the fetishes leapt out of the lake onto his back again to reclaim him. Lobi people who convert to Christianity or Islam now usually burn their fetishes.
In Lobi animism, Thagba is the creator of all living things. They have no direct contact with Thagba, but are dependent on nature spirits known as thila, invisible intermediaries which can harness their supernatural powers towards good or evil. They set rules zosar which dictate how a Lobi should behave in all aspects of life, but similar to Greek or Roman gods the thila themselves are subject to mortal virtues and vices. In Lobi society there is often a village diviner, a thildar which acts as a village priest in interpreting the rules of the spirits. A particularly intuitive and receptive thildar is capable of interpreting as many as 50 spirits at a time.
Villages typically have several priests; often individuals which specialize in the interpretation of singular spirits rather than multiple, as a chief thildar may.
Read more about this topic: Lobi People