The semi-humorous religion secretly practiced by the people of San Lorenzo, called Bokononism, encompasses concepts unique to the novel. Many of these concepts use words from the San Lorenzan creole "dialect" of English. Assumed within the religion is the presence of God, who evidently works in mysterious ways. Many of its sacred texts, collectively called The Books of Bokonon, are written in the form of calypso songs.[11] Bokononist rituals are equally strange or absurdist; for example, the supreme religious act consists of any two worshippers rubbing the bare soles of their feet together to inspire spiritual connection.
Here are some Bokononist terms:[11]
- karass – A group of people linked in a cosmically significant manner, even when superficial linkages are not evident.
- duprass – a karass of only two people, who almost always die within a week of each other. The typical example is a loving couple who work together for a great purpose.
- granfalloon – a false karass; i.e., a group of people who imagine they have a connection that does not really exist. An example is "Hoosiers." Hoosiers are people from Indiana, and Hoosiers have no true spiritual destiny in common. They really share little more than a name.
- wampeter – the central theme or purpose of a karass. Each karass has two wampeters at any given time, one waxing and one waning.
- foma – harmless untruths
- wrang-wrang – Someone who steers a Bokononist away from their line of perception. For example, the narrator of the book is steered away from Nihilism when his Nihilist house sitter kills his cat and leaves his apartment in disrepair.
- kan-kan – An object or item that brings a person into their karass. The narrator states in the book that his kan-kan was the book he wrote about the Hiroshima bombing.
- sinookas – The intertwining "tendrils" of peoples' lives.
- vin-dit – a sudden shove in the direction of Bokononism
- saroon – to acquiesce to a vin-dit
- stuppa – a fogbound child (i.e. an idiot)
- duffle – the destiny of thousands of people placed on one "stuppa"
- sin-wat – a person who wants all of somebody's love for themself
- pool-pah – shit storm, but in some contexts: wrath of God
- Busy, busy, busy – words Bokononists whisper when they think about how complicated and unpredictable the machinery of life really is
- Now I will destroy the whole world – last words of a Bokononist before taking their own life
- boko-maru – the supreme act of worship of the Bokononists, which is an intimate act consisting of prolonged physical contact between the naked soles of the feet of two persons
- zah-mah-ki-bo – Inevitable destiny
-
Borasisi and Pabu, the Sun god and lunar goddess; the binary trans-Neptunian object 66652 Borasisi and its moon, 66652 Borasisi I Pabu, now bear their names.†
- Borasisi, the Sun, held Pabu, the Moon, in his arms and hoped that Pabu would bear him a fiery child. But poor Pabu gave birth to children that were cold, that did not burn...Then poor Pabu herself was cast away, and she went to live with her favorite child, which was Earth.[12]
