ti bon ange
English
Etymology
From Haitian Creole, from French petit bon ange (“little good angel”).
Noun
ti bon ange (plural ti bon anges)
- In voodoo, one of the dualistic aspects of the soul, responsible for personality, character, and willpower.
- 1953, Maya Deren, Divine Horsemen, McPherson & Company 2004, p. 44:
- Indeed it is characteristic of the almost anonymous, transcendent, spiritual nature of the ti-bon-ange that it is automatically liberated at the moment of death and hovers over the body for nine days before ascending to heaven.
- 1985, Wade Davis, The Serpent and the Rainbow, Simon & Schuster, p. 182:
- Throughout this period the ti bon ange is extremely vulnerable, and it is not until it is liberated from the flesh to descend below the dark abysmal waters that it is relatively safe.
- 1995, Laënnec Hurbon, in Cosentino (ed.), Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou, South Sea International Press 1998, p. 192:
- For them, the act of zombification is a matter of capturing the ti bon anj and thus exerting an absolute power over the individual.
- 2013, Carol P. Marsh-Lockett, Elizabeth J. West (eds.), Literary Expressions of African Spirituality, p. 103:
- Here we begin to see that there is a cooperative relationship between the tibonanj and the gwobonanj.
- 1953, Maya Deren, Divine Horsemen, McPherson & Company 2004, p. 44:
Alternative forms
- tibonanj, ti bon anj
Related terms
- gros bon ange