A crab does not beget a bird.
A blind man does not show the way to a blind man.
One (bad) nut spoils all.
‘The child who breaks a snail's shell cannot break a tortoise's shell'.
(b) Moral Teaching: There are certain things any human being can do and others he cannot because his powers are limited, therefore you must know the limit of your powers and keep your ambitions within them. Do not be overambitious.
Even the dead want an increase in their number, how much more the living?
Explanation: Having more and more people is a desire of the Africans and few libation prayers leave out a request for the bearers of children to bear more children. This need for more members, according to this proverb, is not restricted to the living.
It is the living person who makes the inhabitant of the spirit world long for the mashed yam.
Explanation: The African have a ritual food, oto, made up of mashed yam (plain or mixed with palm oil) and hard boiled eggs. The eggs symbolize life, and the ritual food may be given to a person's guardian spirit on special occasions, when the need arises, to feed it, or wash it, as the African say. Oto is also sprinkled at shrines and their surrounding areas as well as at other sacred places during festivals and other ritualistic occasions.
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