This number has since grown rapidly, to the point that in 1980 there are estimated to be 200 million Christians (or about 45 per cent of the population). It may be, and needs to be, a qualified and critical Yes. GAZETTE: How do you balance your Christian and indigenous African identity? Important lwa are celebrated on saints days (for example: Ogou on St. Jamess Day, July 25; Ezili Danto on the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel, July 16; Danbala on St. Patricks Day, March 17; and the spirits of the ancestors on All Saints Day and All Souls Day, November 1 and November 2). But they used the names of the God who was and is already known by African peoples -- such as Mungu, Mulungu, Katonda, Ngai, Olodumare, Asis, Ruwa, Ruhanga, Jok, Modimo, Unkulunkulu and thousands more. For example, an African amulet might have inside of it a written verse from either the Koran or Christian Bible. Currently I am about to complete a book on this question of the encounter between the biblical faith and African religion. Our editors will review what youve submitted and determine whether to revise the article. Anthropologica, journal of the Canadian Anthropology Society (CASCA) was created from the merger of the Society's former journal, Culture, with Canada's oldest anthropology journal, Anthropologica. "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," said Olupona. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. Then was he not there in other times and in such places as Mount Fuji and Mount Kenya, as well as Mount Sinai? I also celebrate and honor the kings festivals and ceremonies in my hometown and other places where I live and do research. Supreme Court may halt health care guarantees for inmates, Why police resist reforms to militarization, Historian says Fla. dispute shows why AP class in African American studies is needed, Low-carb diet can help manage progression of Type 2 diabetes, Those breezy TV drug ads? There are also other parallels in social, political and cultural areas, just as there are some significant differences. In this case, so-called "salvation history" must widen its outreach in order to embrace the horizons of other peoples histories. In four countries (Chad, Guinea Bissau, Nigeria and Tanzania), the number of Christians and Muslims is more equally divided, with a ratio of less than two-to-one in either direction.2 The other countries surveyed are predominantly Christian with Muslim minorities of varying sizes. In respect and honor of my culture, I also dress in my traditional Nigerian attire when Im in my country. Rituals are aimed at maintaining a harmonious relationship with cosmic powers, and many have associated myths that explain their significance. That which had been seen as the enemy of the gospel turns out (to me) to be indeed a very welcoming friend. During religious rites, believers sometimes enter a trancelike state in which the devotee may eat and drink, perform stylized dances, give supernaturally inspired advice to people, or perform medical cures or special physical feats; these acts exhibit the incarnate presence of the lwa within the entranced devotee. Animism is a common feature of African religions, and misfortune is often attributed to witchcraft and sorcery. What is African Traditional Religion? Christianity is more dominant in the south, while Islam is more dominant in the north. In contrast, witchcraft beliefs persist. (+1) 202-857-8562 | Fax A conference of mainly African theologians, held in Ghana in December 1977, said in its final communiqu: "The God of history speaks to all peoples in particular ways. All too often, the result is conflict and radicalisation. Anthropologica The church is composed largely of people who come out of the African religious background. According to all the major surveys, Christianity and Islam each represent approximately 40 percent of the African population. As a resident fellow, Sherman will teach a study group on negotiation and diplomacy this semester. 0000001586 00000 n Vodou ritual activity (e.g., prayer, song, dance, and gesture) is aimed at refining and restoring balance and energy in relationships between people and between people and the spirits of the unseen world. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. But I feel that the issue of looking at African history in light of the biblical understanding of history is clearly called for. In most countries surveyed, at least three-in-ten people believe in reincarnation, which may be related to traditional beliefs in ancestral spirits. In 1988 the society changed its name to the Canadian Anthropology Society to clarify its identity and emphasize its role as an anthropology association. The council made me aware, perhaps even frightfully so, of the problems of our world. If they are two wavelengths, they make sense only when they move toward a convergence. En ce qui concerne la croyance en Dieu, il semblerait que les Biras se soient servis de la chrtient pour rendre leur dieu traditionnel Mbali plus accessible et plus comprhensif, un changement qui a rendu le Dieu des chrtiens plus compatissant et indulgent vis vis du pch. The original constitution defined the organization's mandate as providing a forum for the exchange of ideas among ethnologists. Below is the article summary. Read our research on: Congress | Economy | Gender. GAZETTE: What is the state of indigenous African religions today? He has researched and written about such diverse religious cultures as the Hare Krishnas, Zoroastrians, Shakers, and the Old Order Amish. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. African religions, Indigenous religions of the African continent. This item is part of a JSTOR Collection. Sign up for daily emails to get the latest Harvardnews. One read Honest to God and a variety of other works in an effort to understand the hot debate then raging in Europe and America. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. His research has helped to introduce and popularize new concepts in religious studies, such as the term reverse missionaries, referring to African prelates sent to Europe and the United States. This approach is intended to shed further light on the problem of African cultural influence and . I completed my doctoral studies at the University of Cambridge in 1963, the year that Honest to God, by J.A.T. In lieu of these traditional African ways of defining oneself, Christianity and Islam are gradually creating a social identity in Africa that cuts across these indigenous African religious and social identities. Religion informs everything in traditional African society, including political art, marriage, health, diet, dress, economics, and death. (See the glossary for more information on juju. The bottom line then is that Africans who still wholly practice African indigenous religions are only about 10 percent of the African population, a fraction of what it used to be only a century ago, when indigenous religions dominated most of the continent. He went on to conduct some of the most significant research on African religions in decades. With it, one began to explore afresh the realm of Gods revelation and other treasures of our faith. Take em with a grain of salt. Christianity has scored a triumph over the traditional religious life of the Bira. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Authoring or editing more than half a dozen books on religion and African culture (including the recent African Religions: A Very Short Introduction, Oxford University Press), Olupona has researched topics ranging from the indigenous religions of Africa to the religious practices of Africans who have settled in America. That finished the interview. Yet consider that in 1900 most Africans in sub-Saharan Africa practiced a form of indigenous African religions. OLUPONA: No, this type of binary thinking is simplistic. 0000000676 00000 n GAZETTE: What allows African indigenous religions to be so accommodating? There are also secret societies, called Bizango or Sanpwl, that perform a religio-juridical function. Overall, however, Christians outnumber Muslims in sub-Saharan Africa by about two-to-one. For starters, the word religion is problematic for many Africans, because it suggests that religion is separate from the other aspects of ones culture, society, or environment. Orthodox Christianity, although influenced by other religions, generally looked negatively upon these syncretistic movements. (+1) 202-419-4300 | Main There is even a community deep in the American Bible Belt in Beaufort County, S.C., called Oyotunji Village that practices a type of African indigenous religion, which is a mixture of Yoruba and Ewe-Fon spiritual practices. After that date there will be more Christians in the south than in the north. What the data says about gun deaths in the U.S. It is essentially a postcolonial approach to what AIR and its essential characteristics is: God and humanity, sacrifices, afterlife and ancestors. Focuses on the influences of Africans and African ideas on the mission enterprise, conversion, religious innovation, and church life, but it neglects to cover the . Its aim is to develop an extensive library of resources, representing many different points of view, but all written from the perspective of sound scholarship. Fewer say it is paramount to their faith to attend religious services (39%), avoid sex before marriage (30%) or oppose abortion . They derive from traditional African religions with some influence from other religious traditions, notably Christianity and Islam . This is not a biblical distinction. Instances of religious syncretismas, for example, Gnosticism (a religious dualistic system that incorporated elements from the Oriental mystery religions), Judaism, Christianity, and Greek religious philosophical conceptswere particularly prevalent during the Hellenistic period (c. 300 bcec. But I am grateful for that one step I may be taking under the light of this vision. Some Africans believe that the ancestors are equal in power to deities, while others believe they are not. But to the disappointment of those theological exporters, this fish was not attracted by the bait. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. What the data says about gun deaths in the U.S. (+1) 202-419-4372 | Media Inquiries. So the church which exists on the African scene bears the marks of its peoples backgrounds. Spirit possession plays an important role in Afro-Haitian religion, as it does in many other world religions. This statistical tilting of Christendom from the north to the south, after 2,000 years, holds tremendous prospects and challenges. 93 0 obj One important task, then, is to see the nature, the method and the implications of Gods revelation among African peoples, in the light of the biblical record of the same revelation. The award allows Olupona a year of study and research in Germany; he is on leave this year (201516). Most people in sub-Saharan Africa now identify with either Christianity or Islam. OLUPONA: The role of ancestors in the African cosmology has always been significant. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. African scholars This rapid spreading of the Christian faith where people have been predominantly followers of African religion provokes interesting questions. One African theologian, Gabriel Setiloane, has even argued that the concept of God which the missionaries presented to the Sotho-Tswana peoples was a devaluation of the traditional currency of Modimo (God) among the Sotho-Tswana. For myself, I negotiate between my Yoruba and Christian identity by, for example, affirming those aspects of African culture that promote good life and communal human welfare. Most people in sub-Saharan Africa now identify with either Christianity or Islam. I was like a snail shyly peeping out of its house after a heavy thunderstorm. mixing of Christianity and traditional African religions What were maroon communities? But I have discovered that there is also the fundamental factor of African religion, without which this phenomenal expansion of Christianity would not be a reality. But for many Africans, religion can never be separated from all these. They constitute an important channel of the churchs prophetic witness today. The suppression of ancestor worship is the only area where mission Christianity has scored a triumph over the traditional religious life of the Bira. interaction between the Christian churches and West African religious culture. Corrections? 43. As the map also shows, the ratio of Christians to Muslims increases the further south one goes in the continent. 0000002505 00000 n The book comprised ideas that I had gathered from 300 African peoples ("tribes" -- a term that today is sometimes used in derogatory ways). While African Traditional religion (ATR) is paramount, it is the purpose of this article to suggest that /// Dans le nord-est du Zare, la communaut rurale Bira a t expose depuis plus de cinquante ans au message chrtien. Consequently, traditional Africans have different ideas on what role the ancestors play in the lives of living descendants. But, it has been a sorrowful, disappointment to me to experience the fact that some individuals who exercise great power in the council are not angels: they sometimes practice the exact contrary of those values and goals to which the council is committed. These initiation rituals are already not as common in Africa as they were only 50 years ago, yet age-grade initiations have always helped young Africans feel connected to their community and their past. Didnt our Lord let it be clearly known that "before Abraham was I am" (John 8:58)? AR-Ndhdnn}H\{%jC!a,]c8F`1LE(3%"w+tj}](q w[,p8i$dd$GrMRD K4wLG4@h\WfPY It is here that I have discovered the church in Burma, in the Pacific islands, the house church in China, the basic Christian communities in Latin America, the struggling church in South Africa, plus countless other endeavors of Christians all over the world. Some scholars choose to call it the African Traditional Religion, while others prefer to name it the African traditional Religions. Model tested on tens of thousands of routine brain scans spotted disease risk with 90% accuracy, Experts on law, policy say originalist view used to overturn Roe could upend 76 ruling based on cruel, unusual punishment clause, Issues revolve around culture of viewing civilians as potential threats, concerns about self-protection in departments equipped with military-grade arms, Khalil Gibran Muhammad says College Board needs to stand firm behind curriculum, 2023 The President and Fellows of Harvard College. Again, it doesnt reflect the multiplicity of ways that traditional African spirituality has conceived of deities, gods, and spirit beings. Olupona earned his bachelor of arts degree in religious studies from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, in 1975. Moreover, the religions developed in the Americas impact Africa in that devotees of the African diaspora have significant influence on practices in Africa. The rural Bira of northeastern Zaire have been exposed to the Christian message for well over half a century. OLUPONA: Indigenous African religions refer to the indigenous or native religious beliefs of the African people before the Christian and Islamic colonization of Africa. But the basic truth seems to be that Gods revelation is not confined to the biblical record. Dr. Mbiti is on the staff of the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey, Switzerland. One of the things these diaspora African religions testify to is the beauty of African religions to engage a devotee on many spiritual levels. The recipient of many prestigious academic honors and research fellowships, Olupona also received the 20152016 Reimar Lust Award for International and Cultural Exchange, considered one of Germanys most prestigious academic honors. As the map in the preface to this report shows, sub-Saharan Africa is much more religiously mixed than northern Africa, where the population is overwhelmingly Muslim. Reuben Kigame, the Kenyan Christian musician and apologist, has rightly suggested that considering the fact that Christianity existed in Africa for a good eighteen centuries before the. 0 That would be a serious loss not only for Africans, but also for academics, researchers, writers, and general seekers of wisdom the world over. Of course, behind all these factors is the Holy Spirit working through them. A magisterial historical synthesis of the formative period of African Christianity written by one of its foremost scholars. The defining line between deities and ancestors is often contested, but overall, ancestors are believed to occupy a higher level of existence than living human beings and are believed to be able to bestow either blessings or illness upon their living descendants. The idea is that the traditional African practitioner who constructed that amulet believes in the efficacy of other faiths and religions; there is no conflict in his mind between his traditional African spirituality and another faith. Ritual sacrifices and witchcraft beliefs are still common. My findings were used in teaching, but eventually I put them together in a book, Concepts of God in Africa, published by the British publisher SPCK (1970). I am tantalized by the fact that my vision cannot cope with that horizon. Indigenous religion in Africa is the way Africans understand and worship their god. (a) The Structures of African Traditional Religions: Sometimes it is a difficult task among scholars to choose a unanimous name for the religious traditions and beliefs of the African people. In Nigeria, the population in 1900 included 4.2 million Muslims and 180,000 Christians. In Cameroon, Ethiopia, Liberia and Mozambique, Muslims account for between 15% and 30% of survey respondents. In most of the 19 countries surveyed by the Pew Research Centers Forum on Religion & Public Life, 90% or more of the respondents say they belong to one of these faiths. But whatever the shortcomings of these and my other publications, the materials that went into these two have raised extremely important issues for me that have continued to engage my reflection. One of Jacob Oluponas earliest memories in Massachusetts is of nearly freezing in his apartment as a graduate student at Boston University during the great snowstorm of 1978. But in practical terms, there is a Christian Yes to African religiosity. But today that is not the case due to more exclusive-minded types of Christianity and Islam that see patronizing indigenous African beliefs and practices as violating the integrity of their Christian or Muslim principles, but I believe that one can maintain ones religious integrity and also embrace an African worldview. Indigenous African spirituality today is increasingly falling out of favor. The word Vodou means spirit or deity in the Fon language of the African kingdom of Dahomey (now Benin). 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. Many other familial feasts (for the sacred children, for the poor, for particular ancestors) as well as initiations and funerary rituals occur throughout the year. GAZETTE: What else would we lose if we lost traditional African Religions? <<6D546C3FADADB2110A00A09A6B9CFF7F>]/Prev 416812>> 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. Since Christianity came in contact with the traditional religion, there has always been a sharp conflict between traditionalists and Christians. This is, obviously, a general statement, one which needs detailed elaboration. (1981) and Ph.D. (1983) in the history of religions from Boston University. We have already noted that the overseas missionaries did not bring God to Africa. 0000001519 00000 n {PB,`s (+1) 202-857-8562 | Fax While Islam and Christianity tend to . 0000014207 00000 n Their history has a theological meaning. In 1900 there were an estimated 9 million Christians (accounting for about 7 per cent of the population of Africa). Islam And Christianity Christianity came first to the continent of Africa in the 1st or early 2nd century AD. OLUPONA: We would lose a worldview that has collectively sustained, enriched, and given meaning to a continent and numerous other societies for centuries through its epistemology, metaphysics, history, and practices. They were names of one and the same God, the creator of the world, the father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The statistical expansion of the Christian faith in Africa in this century is one of the considerations that led me back to the issue of its relation with African religion. God is not insensitive to the history of peoples other than Israel. That book was followed by a flurry of literature on the so-called "death of God" theology (if "theology" it was, for I would call it "atheology"). The Yoruba diviners, for example, draw on this extensive indigenous knowledge every day by consulting Ifa, an extensive literary corpus of information covering science, medicine, cosmology, and metaphysics. Instead, God brought them. It conducts public opinion polling, demographic research, media content analysis and other empirical social science research. As for the belief in God, it appears that the Bira have utilized Christianity to make their traditional God Mbali less remote and more caring, a change which has also made the Christian God more compassionate and forgiving of sins. In particular, the concepts about God provide one area of great commonality. 0000002264 00000 n I simply and honestly answered him that "for us in Africa, God is not dead." (I myself have consulted with several diviners for my research on specific academic topics regarding African culture and history; consequently, if we were to lose Africas diviners, we would also lose one of Africas best keepers and sources of African history and culture. The missionaries who introduced the gospel to Africa in the past 200 years did not bring God to our continent. Liberia is the only country where more than one-in-ten (12%) identify primarily with an African traditional religion. They include the work of missionaries (of whom there are about 40,000 today, without counting their family members); the work of African Christians in evangelism and pastoral care (their numbers are infinitely greater than those of overseas missionaries, and include men, women and children, both lay and ordained); the role of Christian schools; the translation and distribution of the Bible (which is now available in full or in part in nearly 600 of Africas 1,000 languages); and the ending of the colonial era during the decades 1960-1980. 75 0 obj So, "Lord, help Thou my unbelief!" I had it. On returning home, the learned professor wrote an article using my brief answer as his title. I should also state that there are signs of the revival of African indigenous practices in many parts of Africa. The primary goal and activity of Vodou is to sevi lwa (serve the spirits)to offer prayers and perform various devotional rites directed at God and particular spirits in return for health, protection, and favour. X0#J++?U;_3_gmx9[F\"{,Um1yu 9 ?ce%9EG`N: &U0EHC$p4=$'=DlX6M_7,--" African spirituality is truly holistic. Vodou is a worldview encompassing philosophy, medicine, justice, and religion. In addition, roughly a quarter or more of the population in 11 countries say they believe in the protective power of juju (charms or amulets), shrines and other sacred objects. ), In addition to expressing high levels of belief in the protective power of sacrificial offerings and sacred objects, upwards of one-in-five people in every country say they believe in the evil eye, or the ability of certain people to cast malevolent curses or spells. Author of. Islam has experienced a similar rapid growth. This material was prepared for Religion Online by Ted and Winnie Brock. 1"7$X9Xyyyb GNpL!9I&mxo0++44cA@5c. Current articles and subscription information can be found at www.christiancentury.org. GAZETTE: How would you define indigenous African religions? These were not empty names. I wish to apply "change of mind" here to mean theological growth, and not necessarily a rejection of or turnaround from ideas that I may have held ten years ago. 0000000016 00000 n 0000001791 00000 n And if these shrines are not properly cared for by the designated descendant, then misfortune in the form of illness might befall the caretaker. hb```b``g`a`.ef@ aV68+ +$.0t9$r8A2Or}6=<4. There is no centralized hierarchy, no single leader, and no official spokesperson, but various groups sometimes attempt to create such official structures. Amen. It was during the Belgian colonial period that the first Catholic and Protestant missionaries came to this region of Zaire. Its aims were to encourage formal and informal dissemination of knowledge through an annual conference and publications; promote relations with other academic and professional associations, aboriginal groups, and governments; and publicize ethnological research and activities to further understanding of ethnological practices.
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