Moses Orimolade Tunolase (1875–1933) is the founder of the first Indigenous or African Independent movement, generally known as White Garment Churches, the Eternal Sacred Order of the Cherubim and Seraphim, which was established in 1925. The church was born out of the Anglican church community among the Yoruba people in Western Nigeria.
History Moses Orimolade Tunolase was born in 1879 into the royal family of Ayibiri in the Okorun district of the Yoruba town of Ikare-Akoko in the Ondo State of Nigeria. Orimolade unlike most babies could walk from birth, but his father was ashamed of this and took his son to a herbalist which caused him to lose the use of his legs. His parents had taken him to St. Stephen's Anglican Church, the only church in Ikare at the time. Orimolade was often left in the custody of the clergyman at this Church (Missionary Society) establishment of the Anglican Communion. Later, Moses would report various miracles and prophetic dreams related to this part of life.
Orimolade started his missionary work as an itinerant preacher in Ikare (his Yoruba town of birth) with no formal education, particularly targeting traditional worshippers.
Egbe Aladura The African people were converted to the Christian faith by the members of the Church Missionary Society for the Anglican Church and were introduced to the Bible. Some of the Christianized Western world views and European moral values contradicted and contravened the nature and culture of the African people. The manifestations of the gifts of the Holy Spirit among the African converts were misunderstood and mistaken by the missionaries for African voodoo. Polygamous marriages were dissolved resulting in the bastardization of the children from these African traditional marriages.
The availability of translations of the scriptures in African languages brought the Bible to life among the African people and changed their views of the missionaries and the missions. Drumming, clapping, and dancing as methods of worship were embraced by the African people but created challenges for the missionaries and their European concept of worship. The difference in understanding of religious expression resulted in clashes and conflicts between the missionaries and the African leadership in the Anglican Church. The blind insistence of the missionaries on the superiority of the European concept of Christianity provided the moral impetus for the denial of the African leadership the right to succeed Bishop Samuel Ajayi Crowther and left the African people in the Anglican Church disconnected and discontent.
In response, the people started gathering into prayer groups called Egbe Aladura. The Aladuras promoted and popularized the power of prayer to heal. When the 1918 influenza pandemic spread to West Africa the people sought healing among the Aladuras. The healing and survival of so many Nigerians among the Aladuras during the Spanish flu spurred the growth and spread of these prayer groups in the early 1920s. Moses Orimolade arrived in Lagos on July 12, 1924, and lodged at Holy Trinity (Anglican) Church with the Sexton of the Church, Emmanuel Olumodeji from his hometown. He started preaching and praying for people all over Lagos in Nigeria. Many people in and around Holy Trinity sought Orimolade for spiritual inquiry and counseling. He developed a reputation for seasoned preaching and fervent prayer and became known among the people as the "Baba Aladura" (Father who prays). The prosperity and popularity of Moses Orimolade were not welcomed among the Anglican leadership and led to his ejection from the premises of Holy Trinity on 11 September 1924. This aroused the sympathy and support of people in and around the Church. They followed Orimolade out of Holy Trinity and thereafter to his places of residence. Orimolade called this group of supporters and sympathizers the "Aladura Band" and continued his preaching and prayer with them.
Separation from Anglicans On 18 June 1925, the Aladura Band was called to the rescue of an unconscious Methodist teenage girl, Abiodun Akinsowon, who had fallen into a trance when she tried to look into the chalice carried by the Catholic Archbishop on Corpus Christi public procession. Abiodun remained in the trance for 21 days in the care of the Aladura Band. She regained consciousness after 21 days and joined the Aladura Band. She became the first visioner in the band. The name of the band was changed to the Seraph Band on 9 September 1925 by Moses Orimolade. The addition of Cherubim to the name was advised by a spiritual injunction on 26 March 1926 to reflect the heavenly representation of the Cherubim and Seraphim. The band was fully formed and functional by the end of 1925. Moses Orimolade reigned as the Sole Founder and Spiritual head of the band from 1925 to 1933.
Schism Abiodun Akinsowon led the evangelistic tours of the band from Lagos westward. She was sent to establish most of the early branches of the band in the west of Nigeria. She earned the appellation "Captain Abiodun" in the band. She was loved by Moses Orimolade and admired by many members of the band. Abiodun Akinsowon rode with Moses Orimolade in the hammock chair to the envy of many men and women in the band. However, she was advised to step aside from the band in 1929 to form the Cherubim and Seraphim Society after she failed to convince Moses Orimolade to refuse the volunteer housekeeping services of a widow (Iya Ijesha) who had been healed in the band. The elders of the western Conference of the band declared independence and formed the Sacred Order of Cherubim and Seraphim following their futile effort to reunite Abiodun Akinsowon and Moses Orimolade.
In 1930 a committee of elders was chosen to draft the Article of Association in preparation for the incorporation of the band. The first draft of the Article of Association was rejected by Moses Orimolade because of a clause that transferred the executive power and control of the band to the membership of the band. Upset, the authors pulled out of the band in 1930 to form the Praying Band of the Eternal Sacred Order of the Cherubim and Seraphim under the leadership of Ezekiel Davies. The Northern Conference of the band continued as the Holy Order of the Cherubim and Seraphim Movement. The Parent Body was registered and incorporated in 1930 as the Eternal Sacred Order of the Cherubim and Seraphim (ESOC&S), with Moses Orimolade alias Baba Aladura as the Sole Founder and Spiritual Head "ALAGBA".
Family background His family were traditional worshippers of the Yoruba religion. His father was an herbalist and a popular Masquerade known all over the town. According to Elder George Olanrewaju Tunolase who is a cousin to Orimolade, when Orimolade was in the womb he would be talking to his mother and advising her on what to do. The mother found it difficult to deliver him, while the beads of the then Owa-Ale of Ikare were demanded to be put on the mother’s neck for her to deliver safely, still, she didn’t deliver the child. However he was eventually delivered, and the very day he was born he started walking, this caused his father to use juju on him to avoid embarrassment. However, an epileptic woman who was being treated by the father of Moses fell on him when she had fit but that did not kill the newly baby boy as he grew up to be a very powerful preacher and miracle healer.While some said he was lame from birth, George denied that he was not, he used to carry my father on his shoulder to the farm., so it is not true that he was lame’’...
Married life During his lifetime, he neither married nor had children. Speaking to The Nation, Pa Tunolase who is still living in the family house said ‘’my late father who was the elder brother to the late founder of Cherubim and Seraphim told me that Moses did not marry at all. He said Moses told his father that they could go and marry but for him, he had chosen to be a Eunuch, as there are three types of Eunuch, the ones that the kings castrated and kept watching their Queens, the ones from heaven and those who became eunuch in order to serve God of which Moses chose’’. The Uncle continued ‘’my father told me that Orimolade said that his children would be like the sand of the seashore. We were confused, but now the Aladura sect is numerous all over the world as they cannot be counted.
Myth surrounding his miracles Many mysteries are woven around Moses. He was said to have possessed a supernatural power that no one ever had. According to Most Superintendent Kunle Ayanfe, Moses was said to have been a special person with a supernatural power. He would get to where he and his group were going before any of them and they wondered how. Till he died nobody was able to unravel the mystery.’’
According to Ayanfe ‘’ some white men who heard about his good works came to approach him to come and heal their boss who resides overseas. Moses refused to go with them in the aircraft they brought and promised to meet them there. Before the white men got there, he had gone and come back. When the messengers got to their boss and saw him healed and bouncing, he told them he had been healed by a man whom he described with the features of Moses, the man they came to meet in Nigeria. He had the power he used to pass through the rock and water while people wondered how he managed to perform such a feat.
Tombs Before his death on October 19, 1933, he instructed his followers to exhume his body forty years after his death and bury him in his hometown, Ikare, Akoko in Ondo state. Accompanied by the late Highlife musician I.K Dairo who was also popularly called Baba Aladura, and on October 19, 1975, his body was exhumed and taken to Ikare, Akoko. Where he was buried. In fact, his body was said to be fresh and intact, not decayed while his clothes were as white as snow. Ojokoro Empty Tomb At Ojokoro where the first Aladura church was established is a big mausoleum. A giant statue of the founder is erected there on top of an empty grave. In the grave are three candles which are usually lighted during service. The church faithful would dance around the mausoleum, and sleep in the mausoleum where two graves of the senior leaders were buried. Not only this, the faithful also placed kegs of water and other things where they prayed over them invoking the God of Moses Orimolade to heal, assist, and answer their prayers. Asked if the spirit of Moses is still there, an elder in the church said ‘’ Moses Orimolade shed his blood here, his flesh dried here, so it is only the body that was removed to his hometown Ikare Akoko in Ondo State. We believe His spirit is still here. While this reporter asked whether it was not blasphemy, Matthew Akeusola denied it and said they needed to appreciate and honor him. Ikare Tomb Here, at Mercyland known as Oke -Anu which is in Iku in the Iyometa Area, of Ikare Akoko Ondo State where the exhumed body of Orimolade was eventually buried in 1975. Placed by the tomb are A Holy Bible, candles, crucifix, and other things while at the entrance of the mausoleum are kegs of water and other things while people file out praying on the mountain.
Special Room In the family house of the Orimolade Tunolases at Okorun also in the Iyometa Area of Ikare is a special room where the late founder lived before he died. The room has been kept sacred and reserved as the faithful visit there for special prayers. The room is divided into two, while the inner one is where some paraphernalia of his office is kept. Ayanfe who led this reporter there at the initial stage fell into a trance and later came back alive, he said ‘’This room is a powerful room and nobody is allowed to come in anyhow. It is sacred’’.