Deng, Bringer of Fertility and Rain

Deng, Bringer of Fertility and Rain

Classification: God

Culture/Religion: Dinka and Nuer of the Sudan and South Sudan

 

Associated: Storms and Fertility

 

 

Deng, also known as Denka, is a sky, rain, and fertility god in Dinka mythology for the Dinka people of Sudan and South Sudan. He is the son of the goddess Abuk.

She is the only well-known female deity of the Dinka. She is also the patron goddess of women as well as gardens. Her emblem or symbols are, a small snake, the moon and sheep.

 

Among his followers, Deng is regarded as the intermediary between humans and the supreme being. Closely linked with the supreme god Nhialic, he was regarded as the son of god and sometimes as the son of the goddess Abuk. In some areas of Dinka country, Deng and Nhialic are "regarded as one and the same".

 

He was an important sky god, to some clans an ancestor and creator god of the Dinka people, and he manifested himself in the fertilizing water that fell from the heavens.

The Dinka believe that in the beginning the sky was very low, so low that man had to be extremely careful when hoeing or pounding grain so as not to hit the sky. One day the greedy woman Abuk pounded more grain than she was allotted, using an especially long pestle. Deng was so angered by this that he cursed mankind, saying people would have to work harder for the fruits of the earth and in the end would also have to die.

 

Lightning is Deng’s club, and rain and birth are manifestations of his presence. If one is struck by lightning, one is not to be mourned because it is believed that Deng has taken that person directly to himself.

Among the Nuer, Deng is considered to be "a foreign deity" and "a bringer of disease".