Therefore, the universe has dimensions of order and power as follows: first of all, there is order in the laws of nature. The numerous traditional African religions have in common the notion of a creator god, who made the . They did this as theyoffered libation by pouring water or any other drink to the ground. In the end, I believe that Africans can make room for a plurality of religious points of view without one religious point of view excluding or compromising the other. Christ Jesus, God's own son, takes the "groaning" of humans to God. Even though their differences outnumber their. They claimed or argued strongly that in the light of the more objective or scientific study of religions, ATR can no longer be justifiably characterized as stupid, since the worshippers do not worship the said material objects per se, but the Spirit of the Creator reflected in them. Maybe this is why I am not an Anglican priest. However, the reasons for the growth of Christianity in Africa significantly include the way the Africans have attempted to deal with their threatening fears, especially witchcraft. A classicatory system which attempts to distinguish the principal responses The missionaries succeeded in spreading Christianity in Africa at a time when tribal religions were ignored or denigrated. Since God is seen as the Creator, various aspects of the universe are permeated by the sense of the sacredthe religious mentality affects the way people see the universe. endobj a trans-moral suspension of retribution in the face of self-confessed and inescapable human wrongdoing. Green notes a similarity between this deep structure and that which has developed in Christian theology over centuries of effort at grounding human moral striving in the face of the experiential difficulties that assault moral idealism. In this Christian theological system, the idea of God as creator and sovereign expresses the moral requirements of impartial regard for all. Furthermore, Jesus is the perfect sacrifice that totally pleased God and there is no need for any other. The vibrancy of African Traditional Religion in these two aspectstheological and moralcreates a unique opportunity for Christianity in Africa, one that, as Bediako points out has been lost to Christian theology in the West, "for a serious and creative theological encounter between the Christian and primal traditions." Youll never experience a black hole, but Avi Loeb can help you imagine one. For this reason, l am writing on the topic, which says, Comparing the concept of Spirit and Soul in the Traditional Religion of the Akan and Ewe Tribes to that of the Bible. These spirit do not carry the desires of humans to the Creator God. The . The rapid growth of many religions in Africa and the revival of AIR in postcolonial Africa have made inter-religious . It evolved through many centuries, before the westerner come to Africa. The religious traditions and beliefs of the African peoples have enough differences to merit a study of each in its own right. Prayers and sacrificial offerings are usually directed toward secondary divinities, who are intermediaries between the human and sacred realms. explore the things that fall in between"adiaphora", which the proponents of contextual Christianity may have overlooked with regard to the African cultural and religious heritage. Both have religious leaders or priests whopresent the peoples requests to God. I told my father that I was coming home, he recalled. Enter the email address you signed up with and we'll email you a reset link. Pentecostalism and Shamanism in Asia and Beyond, A Critical Analysis of Byang Kato's Demonology and Its Theological Relevance for an Evangelical Demonology, INITIATION IN AFRICAN TRADITIONAL RELIGION, Veli-Matti Karkkainen, Kirsteen Kim, Amos Yong: Interdisciplinary and Religio-Cultural Discourses on a Spirit-Filled World, Encounter - Journal of African Life and Religion, 12 (2017), REGNUM STUDIES IN MISSION Pentecostal Mission and Global Christianity An Edinburgh Centenary Reader, Van Rheenen, Gailyn: Missions - biblical foundations. They trust God for their healing. The Christian idea of church has similarities with African traditional life in which brotherhood and the extended family play a central role. In some communities masks were used to representcertain gods or ancestral spirits. hand with the study of the people who practise the religion. x + 306. similarities between the traditional beliefs of Africans in Africa. A holistic interpretation of the book between Paul and James. They have also fostered a greater feeling of individual self-worth by acknowledging important milestones in ones life, including becoming an adult or an elder. It is also present in relationships between persons, based on age and function. Notre Dame, IN 46556 USA. Encyclopedia of religious and spiritual development, Adopting Primary Taoism as a Protoevangelion for Contextualization of the Gospel into Asian Culture, Toward a Liturgical Approach to Re-Routing Mission, TOWARDS A THEOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE ON THE MYSTERY OF SUFFERING IN THE MIDST OF PROSPERITY THEOLOGY WITHIN THE PENTECOSTAL AND EVANGELICAL CHURCHES IN PAPUA NEW GUINEA, PARTICULARLY YANGORU, Mission in the Spirit: Towards a Pentecostal/Charismatic Missiology (with Julie C. Ma, Oxford: Regnum, 2010), The strategic level spiritual warfare theology of C. Peter Wagner and its implications for Christian mission in Malawi, Evangelism Handbook of New Testament Christianity, The Role of Caprivian Virtues in the Search for Common Moral Discourse A Conversation with Peter J Paris, Sexuality and Judaism, Encyclopedia of Psychology and Religion (pg. Witchcraft has been a prevailing belief in African cultures and has continually posed problems for the African people groups. OLUPONA: One of the basic reasons is that indigenous African spiritual beliefs are not bound by a written text, like Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The final aspect of this deep structure of moral reason in African Traditional Religion Green refers to as morally intentional trans-moral safety valves such as are found in the doctrine of grace or atonement in Weston religions (Christianity) or of liberation from the world of moral causation in Eastern religions. He is not only the covenant giver He gives the power to keep the covenant. This bitter conflict has led to wanton destruction of lives and property, and this has become a source of great worry to the writers. Traditional Religion as a source of African theology just as Christian theology is. Observing this moral order ensures harmony and peace within the community. African religions, Indigenous religions of the African continent. Itis made of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit working together as one. Mbiti says that: According to Mbiti, human beings have a privileged position in the universe. Has data issue: true Nevertheless, since 1900, Christians in Africa have grown from approximately 7 million to over 450 million today. Such activities include the making of sacrifices and the pouring of libations. It is essentially a postcolonial approach to what AIR and its essential characteristics is: God and humanity, sacrifices, afterlife and ancestors. endobj The action of the living, for example, can affect the gods or spirits of the departed, while the support of family or tribal ancestors ensures prosperity of the lineage or state. Christianity is more dominant in the south, while Islam is more dominant in the north. When a missionary asked Africans in Zanzibar to tell him something about their God, they simply said, "God thunders!" The cleric had travelled across the seas in the 19th century to tell "the heathens without religion" or "people with a primitive religion" about God. Traditional Africans communicated to God through ancestors. Traditional theologians explained that one could not worship the Supreme Being formally, without the agency of the divinities or ancestors. As I have discussed elsewhere in Morality Truly Christian, Truly African, for example, some African societies are so conscious of the implications of crossing the line on some ethical matters, like adultery, incest, and murder, that anyone who engages in these acts is considered automatically to be putting the very survival of the community in danger. It is essentially a postcolonial approach to what AIR and its essential. Most African communities offered animals and not humans as sacrifices. Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer, By Anthony Chiorazzi Harvard Correspondent. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Indigenous African religions are pragmatic. There are also the lesser gods that take residency in streams, rivers, trees and mountains. These included interviews he conducted with pastors, exorcists, traditional priests, so-called witches and delivered witches. The success of Christianity and Islam on the African continent in the last 100 years has been extraordinary, but it has been, unfortunately, at the expense of African indigenous religions. GAZETTE: But yet you said its a mixed bag? With regard to the issue of offering ones wife in generosity, this practice, as Laurenti Magesa has shown, applied to a very limited number of African ethnic groups, such as the Masai, and in very tightly controlled situations among friends within the same age group fraternity and on very limited occasions. Traditional African religion does not show any belief in the Trinity. But after braving that first blizzard in a land far from his native Nigeria, Olupona stuck it out and earned his Ph.D. 2 0 obj Traditional Africans didnot have this practice. Indigenous African spirituality today is increasingly falling out of favor. <>/ExtGState<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>> Commonly, God is believed to dwell in the skies. This happened in the past, and these codes were stipulated, considered sacred and binding, by the community leaders: The moral and religious order in the universe is articulated and expressed in a variety of taboos and customs that prohibit specific actions contravening such order. 1 Their central thrust is to emphasize the similarities rather than the differences between current movements in the world religions, particularly Christianity and Islam, but As a resident fellow, Sherman will teach a study group on negotiation and diplomacy this semester. The spiritual medium is the physical embodiment of the religious retributive order in which Africans know themselves to stand.. Human beings maintain active and real relationshipswith the spiritual world, especially with the living dead, through offerings, sacrifices, and prayers. One scholar who has written extensively on African Traditional Religion is John Mbiti, a Kenyan whom many consider the dean of living African theologians. The conviction that people will be reborn in this world again and again tends to be more common among Christians than Muslims. Thus, for example, older persons not only possess a more powerful vital force but a greater responsibility in society and more intense mystical powers. This article concerned itself with the modern encounter between Christianity and African Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa. In short, the question is whether the notion of mercy exists in the moral order of African Traditional Religion and whether the sacrifices of African religion amount to an expiatory understanding in African religious thought. A network of mutual relationships and responsibilities links the duals worlds of the mundane and the sacred. Africans had shrines they believedGod dwelt in. x][oH~GroA $9,f K3d~VU_% fYU]q{Z?Fo?>w&j/n>>]?b5M._GYTQ|_W/_c\yA,bQQ)xn0ZtK*Q/Xb)zetab~x2e*w1Ym2n}{%2Kt[nQ,^'D^}WI_:'ym;eup|5>)$c4"y"E_C/ When we speak of African Traditional Religion, we mean the indigenous religious beliefs and practices of the Africans. These intermediary agents include the ancestors, members of the community who at death become idealized. For instance, in the southern Volta Region of Ghana, and in Togo and Benin, thousands of young girls of the Ewe (say Ay-vay) tribe are held as slaves in unspeakable conditions under a traditional religion belief called the trokosi system or wives of the ancestral gods. Today Christians worship Godmainly in churches. This is the function of Gods providence and sustenance of the universe. Jacob Olupona, professor of indigenous African religions at Harvard Divinity School and professor of African and African-American studies in Harvards Faculty of Arts and Sciences, recently sat down for an interview about his lifelong research on indigenous African religions. The traditional cosmology expresses belief in a supreme being (referred to by the Akan as Nyame, or by the Ewe Mawu). For example, sickness in the indigenous African worldview is not only an imbalance of the body, but also an imbalance in ones social life, which can be linked to a breakdown in ones kinship and family relations or even to ones relationship with ones ancestors. These shrines were built near waterbodies, next to big trees or near other sacred places. GAZETTE: How do you balance your Christian and indigenous African identity? Wendy Sherman, who was the lead U.S. negotiator in the nuclear deal with Iran, was welcomed by the Institute of Politics at Harvard Kennedy School. O?+dOw\eOoHc_o~ Q:c qeM1ehb/j|-Xyy#=g vnxX,o"\4/I+{U40f_dX!y2#i.7Xi0}zi*_Qk({_8D2M"09E%kR`O"}Ec#O3+lwP/z[r=]jPh!eC6Ci{FKnW4 Traditional Africans made images of the Supreme God or other supernatural beingswhich they worshipped. Their purpose is to summarize recent material produced by the relevant religious organizations and by some of the main academic interpreters to provide The commitment to theory, 2. African traditional religion cannot be discussed without mentioning that it is the way of life of the people of Africa and so cannot be differentiated from the politics, education, and socialisation, etc. These are called Taboos. Feature Flags: { Mbiti makes this point too when he stresses that the majority of African peoples believe that God punishes in this life. Although God is concerned with humanitys moral life and upholds the moral law, there is no belief that a person is punished in the hereafter for his or her wrongdoing in this life. :t\.1biti's approach assumes that "Christianity comes to enhance African traditional religions." This implies that there is no tension between the major elements of African Traditional Religions and the major claims of Christianity." 19 Semantic Scholar is a free, AI-powered research tool for scientific literature, based at the Allen Institute for AI. Omissions? Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. (Hebrews 1:1,Matthew 5:17,Exodus 34:10-28). Green points out that there is a rational basis to African Traditional Religion that shows, in Kantian terms, that there is a deep structure of universal moral and religious reason to it. The three requirements of reason at the heart of this structure are: first, a basic rule or procedure of moral choice; second, a metaphysic grounding the possibility of strict moral retribution; and third, . (See the glossary for more information on the evil eye.). For example, in 14 of the 19 countries surveyed, more than three-in-ten people say they sometimes consult traditional healers when someone in their household is sick. I should add that without claiming to be full members of indigenous traditions, there are many professed Christians and Muslims who participate in one form of indigenous religious rituals and practices or another. Much of Oluponas work is an attempt to provide a fuller understanding of the complexity and richness of African indigenous thought and practice by viewing it not as a foil or as a useful comparative to better understand Western religions, but as a system of thought and belief that should be valued and understood for its own ideas and contribution to global religions. Those to whom this power is accessible can use it for good, such as healing, rainmaking, or divination, while others can use it for harm, through magic, witchcraft, and sorcery. May the Lord assist us to know the truth and walk in it. Content may require purchase if you do not have access. 2 0 obj endobj We will return to these issues later in Morality Truly Christian, Truly African, but for now it is enough to ask whether the similarities in the deep structure between the two religions are indeed as similar as Green suggests. This power is not accessible to everyone, and in most cases it is inborn, but the person has to learn how to use it. Inculturation, as we will argue later in Morality Truly Christian, Truly African, sheds the light of the gospel on cultural practices like this one to reveal what is sinful in them and to show that human beings, especially women, in this case, deserve better treatment than this. In the Ewe thought they are called Vodou (Vodu or Vudu in Benin and Togo; also Vodon, Vodoun, Voudou, or other phonetically equivalent spellings. Indigenous African religions are by nature plural, varied, and usually informed by ones ethnic identity, where ones family came from in Africa. I had it. Sorry, preview is currently unavailable. by Richard Chowning [ ATR Topics Page | Africa Missions Research and Strategy Page | Africa Missions Main Page | Help ] [ QuickStart ] Creator God The supreme being in most African Traditional Religions is seen as the creator of humans and all other living things. A Background to Religion and Magic in Western Thought Our modern usage of the term 'magic' derives from the Greek magike, An important preoccupation of Mbitis work has been to show that knowledge of God and the worship of God have been staples of African life from the earliest times on the continent. This is not to say that indigenous African spirituality represents a form of theocracy or religious totalitarianism not at all. OLUPONA: Yes, its a mixed bag because in the African diaspora mostly due to the slave trade starting in the 15th century indigenous African religions have spread and taken root all over the world, including in the United States and Europe. <> } Mbiti makes a very controversial point when he claims that in African societies there are no acts that would be considered wrong in themselves. Belief in the Trinity While both Christianity and African religion have a concept of a Supreme Being, Christians believe in a God who exists in three persons. stream Consequently, traditional Africans have different ideas on what role the ancestors play in the lives of living descendants. Ifa is an indispensable treasure trove of knowledge that cant be duplicated elsewhere; much of its knowledge has been handed down from babalawo [Ifa priest/diviner] to babalawo for centuries. % The other very big difference between African Traditional Religion and Christianity is the worship. &RcIX6Wa). A third scholar of interest to us here is Laurenti Magesa, the central thesis of whose book on African religion is captured quite succinctly in the subtitle: African religion constitutes a tradition of abundant life. The award allows Olupona a year of study and research in Germany; he is on leave this year (201516). Sign up for daily emails to get the latest Harvardnews. These act as a link between God and the human community. They do this by having Africans increasingly identify themselves as either Muslim or Christian, thus denying their unique African worldview that has always viewed as evidenced in their creation myths everything as unified and connected to the land, the place were ones clan, lineage, and people were cosmically birthed. But it is also the strict commitment, to the observance of certain (written or unwritten) divinely inspired moral prescriptions or codes of ethics, promulgated by the religious authorities and enforced by sanctions. 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