This entry records that Quimbanda is a Brazilian Afro-diasporic religious tradition, related to but distinct from Umbanda, centered on ritual work with a category of spirits known as Exus and Pombagiras, figures often popularly and inaccurately equated with straightforwardly evil or demonic forces, a characterization scholars of Afro-Brazilian religion generally regard as reflecting outside prejudice, historically reinforced by hostile Christian missionary framing, rather than an accurate account of how Quimbanda practitioners themselves understand these spirits, without presenting Quimbanda's specific prayers or invocations here.
Within Quimbanda's own framework, Exus and Pombagiras are understood as powerful spirits associated with the crossroads, protection, and worldly matters including justice, love and material concerns, approached through specific ritual protocol and offerings by initiated practitioners rather than casually invoked, a considerably more structured and specific religious practice than popular sensationalized depictions typically suggest. Because this ritual material is transmitted through initiation and specific terreiro lineages, similarly to the related traditions of Umbanda and Candomble, this entry limits itself to correcting common misconceptions about the tradition's basic character while describing rather than reproducing its actual liturgical content.