This power is not accessible to everyone, and in most cases it is inborn, but the person has to learn how to use it. These differences, I will argue, have significant impact not just on the way people conceive of the moral world or with regard to moral intentions, but also on moral practices. It also taps into a common lay attitude to what might be called a secular common sense, which feels impatience or distaste for all forms of what it considers religious extremism, while at the same time shying away from regarding any one religion as more prone to extremism than others. A network of mutual relationships and responsibilities links the duals worlds of the mundane and the sacred. I also celebrate and honor the kings festivals and ceremonies in my hometown and other places where I live and do research. of the people which are all together. %PDF-1.5 Prayers and sacrificial offerings are usually directed toward secondary divinities, who are intermediaries between the human and sacred realms. It was believed that the animals blood appeased God. Traditional African religious influences on the church and the Bible It is worth noting that Cameroonians ferociously resisted foreign religions in the 18th century to maintain their traditional religions when Christianity entered Cameroon (Betoto, 2012). 1630-1633), HEBREWS' CHRISTOLOGY AND ITS CONTEMPORARY APPREHENSION IN AFRICA 1, New Mind, New Heart, New Strength (A Paradigm on the New Man), Dissertation ETD Libermann and EA in Dialogue Dec 2013, Pentecostalism and Shamanism in Asia and Beyond: An Inter-disciplinary Analysis. INTRODUCTION Man considers life worth living because he finds certain things intrinsically valuable; hence value in its simple connotation means a thing of worth. This article concerned itself with the modern encounter between Christianity and African Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa. It is worth noting that these animals areat no time offered as burnt offerings to God. In the part two of my writing, l will expand on the world populated by spirits called Vodou alongside that of the Akan. Christians acknowledge the existenceof magic and witchcraft. GAZETTE: In trying to understand African spirituality, is it helpful to refer to it as polytheistic or monotheistic? For example, followers can seek spiritual direction and relief from healers, medicine men and women, charms [adornments often worn to incur good luck], amulets [adornments often used to ward off evil], and diviners [spiritual advisers]. Postcolonial, Abstract Interfaith dialogue is commonly used in building peace and understanding among religious groups. Mission Manual Pages Section A Biblical Basis of Mission 1 20, E-journal of Religious and Theological Studies, TITLE A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF SALVATION IN ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY: TOWARDS DEVELOPING AN EVANGELISTIC MODEL IN SPECIAL REFERENCE TO TUENSANG DISTRICT CHAPTER ONE, Baptism and Original Sin in the Early Church : contributions of Tertullian, THE UNIQUELY CHRISTIAN WORLDVIEW - Ethington Book, CHRISTIANITY AND AFRICAN TRADITIONAL RELIGION IN KUMASI: A COMPARATIVE STUDY Department of General Art Studies, SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY @BULLET An Introduction to Bible Doctrine @BULLET, Monotheism in the Qur'an and in the New Testament: Comparative Theological Explorations of the Role of Prophets and the Covenants. Just like in Christianity, traditional Africanreligion has organised practices. This article concerned itself with the modern encounter between Christianity and African Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa. The position I critique in this paper is really a complex of closely overlapping positions, some more theoretically sophisticated or better grounded empirically than others.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 also to a lesser extent in Buddhism, Hinduism and Judaism. It is essentially a postcolonial approach to what AIR and its essential. The Igbo traditional religious worldview maintains a polytheistic religious view, unlike the monotheistic outlook of the Christian religion. Like Mbiti and Green, Magesa notes that the world of African Traditional Religion is a hierarchically ordered place where, On the lowest rung of the ladder are spirits, who are active beings distinct from humans and reside in nature and phenomena such as trees, rivers, rocks, or lakes. Conflict is a universal phenomenon that is inevitable in human interaction. Yet consider that in 1900 most Africans in sub-Saharan Africa practiced a form of indigenous African religions. Both have religious leaders or priests whopresent the peoples requests to God. OLUPONA: If we lose traditional African religions, we would also lose or continue to seriously undermine the African practice of rites of passage such as the much cherished age-grade initiations, which have for so long integrated and bought Africans together under a common understanding, or worldview. They did this as theyoffered libation by pouring water or any other drink to the ground. ^xH&M'YZ7EDi%qN^K 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. But for many Africans, religion can never be separated from all these. When they pray they maykneel down, bow their heads or lift their hands up. However, Christians can offer animals to the church where they canbe sold or reared to give the church income. This is not to say that indigenous African spirituality represents a form of theocracy or religious totalitarianism not at all. In the face of persistent human iniquity, God is believed to furnish means of atonement and forgiveness, thereby tempering justice with mercy., However, although Christianity and African Traditional Religion share some striking similarities, closer examination of African traditional beliefs reveals that the contrasts are far more striking than the similarities. Peel, J. D. Y. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. According to Mbiti, Africans believe that God has ordained a moral order for humans, through which they came to understand what is good and what is evil, so that they might live in harmony with one another and safeguard the life of the people. 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. The religious traditions and beliefs of the African peoples have enough differences to merit a study of each in its own right. However, to them, the entire universe is filled with spirit such as trees, rocks, and rivers. endobj (+1) 202-419-4372 | Media Inquiries. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. 4 0 obj A belief in ancestors also testifies to the inclusive nature of traditional African spirituality by positing that deceased progenitors still play a role in the lives of their living descendants. It is a counter culture in response to the, The move towards contextual Christianity in Africa is an essential venture if Christianity is to communicate with the African cultural heritage. 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. Differences between Christianity and traditional African beliefs and customs (Exodus 20:3-5,Hebrews 10:8-10) 1. Omissions? 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. Updates? During the early churchs initial expansion phase where congregations were established in Syria, Asia Minor, Achaia, Italy and Africa there were strong leadership structures in Alexandria, Carthage, Neo religious movements is a term often used to describe a wide range of movements that developed in the tail end of the 19 century (the 1960s and 1970s). OLUPONA: I was raised in Africa during the 1960s, when the Yoruba community never asked you to chose between your personal faith and your collective African identity. Thus, for example, older persons not only possess a more powerful vital force but a greater responsibility in society and more intense mystical powers. 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 <> In most cases, the earth is conceived as a living thing, a goddess, Mother Earth. According to Mbiti, the earth is symbolically viewed as the mother of the universe, while the heavens/sky are seen as its male counterpart. An old African adage says: The sky is large enough for birds to fly around without one having to bump into the other.. "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. Published online by Cambridge University Press: Below is the article summary. Editorial Statement: This essay is a slightly modified excerpt from the section "Evaluating African Traditional Religion: The Descriptive Task" (98-107) in Fr. The position I critique in this paper is really a complex of closely overlapping positions, some more theoretically sophisticated or better grounded empirically than others. ), 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. People may complain to God and the ancestors, but they will never accuse them of any moral wrongdoing. Feature Flags: { &RcIX6Wa). The Church is the Christian family, in which all are accompanied to one another through belief and baptism in Jesus Christ. Mystical power is found in all of them, in diminishing degrees. These are called Taboos. 1 0 obj Secondly, there is moral and religious order. 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. OLUPONA: Thats a mixed bag. stream I had it. This work investigates the conflicts existing between the two . Indigenous African spirituality today is increasingly falling out of favor. <>/ExtGState<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/Annots[ 9 0 R] /MediaBox[ 0 0 595.32 841.92] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S>> Traditional Africans had to go to specific sacred placesfor them to worship but Christians can worship God anywhere at any time. Sarr, Ramon 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. 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. A Journal of the McGrath Institute for Church Life, by Paulinus Ikechukwu Odozor To understand African tradition, one needs to understand the position of African Traditional Religion on God, the human person, and creation. Ritual functionaries include priests, elders, rainmakers, diviners, and prophets. The . Christians do not have regard for their powers because they believethat they overcome all evil through the name of Jesus. This condition is under a traditional religion belief called the trokosi system or wives of the ancestral gods. These ancestral gods lived in the spiritual world, which according to ATR, is the world populated by spirits. Creative people have bypassed gatekeepers for centuries to distribute what they wanted to share so badly. They find common ground in Houghton Library exhibition. Africans had shrines they believedGod dwelt in. It argues that since the coming of democracy this form of religion has occupied a more important position, Although there is some debate, Francis Oborji in this article argues that one should speak of African Traditional Religion (ATR) in the singular. Religion is part and parcel of daily life. When punishment comes, it comes in the present life. Whatever the difference in the deep structures that undergird the moral life in the Christian conception or in Africa Traditional Religion, Green, like Mbiti, concludes that Africans believe in a morally saturated universe: The role of intermediary agents and spirits in maintaining moral order in African Traditional Religion is quite remarkable, as we have already seen from the work of Mbiti. Victor Christianto, Veli-Matti Karkkainen, International Journal of African Catholicism, Stan-William Ede, Dominic Okoye, Anselm Jimoh, Gregory Ekene Ezeokeke, Louismary Ocha, Overlaps between Judeo-Christian theology and traditional African religions, Vehicles of Divine Mystery: Paul's Danielic Self-Understanding in Ephesians 3, Teach us to number our days: an exegetical and theological analysis of Psalm 90, The Faith Journey of Paul: An Exegetical Analysis of Philippians 3: 1-14, The Concept of God in the Traditional Religion of the Akan and Ewe Ethnic Groups Compared the Bible, Comparing the Concept of Spirit and Soul in the Traditional Religion of the Akan and Ewe Tribes to that of the Bible, Entries. Ritual sacrifices and witchcraft beliefs are still common. between African traditional religion and the Christian faith. Thus, it is because of the existence of this order that different communities have worked out a code of conduct. These could be caves, forests,mountains and so on. These included interviews he conducted with pastors, exorcists, traditional priests, so-called witches and delivered witches. This is not to say that indigenous African spirituality represents a form of theocracy or religious totalitarianism not at all. Everything is said to center on them. African religions behavior is centered mainly on the human person and his or her life in this world, with the consequence that religion is clearly functional, or a means to serve people to acquire earthly goods (life, health, fecundity, wealth, power and the like) and to maintain social cohesion and order.. In five countries (Tanzania, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Senegal and Mali) majorities express this belief. (+1) 202-857-8562 | Fax (+1) 202-419-4300 | Main 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. I told my father that I was coming home, he recalled. These are the pristine men and women, the originators of the lineage or clan or ethnic group. 2017. OLUPONA: No, this type of binary thinking is simplistic. Marshall, Ruth Christianity and Traditional African Heritage, Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Specifically, by reflecting on the wonder and magnitude of the universe, they came to the conclusion that God must exist: they posited the existence of God to explain the existence and sustenance of the universe. Priests undergo vigorous training in the arts of medicine, divination and other related disciplines and are, therefore, consulted on a more regular basis by the public. Indigenous African religions are pragmatic. This is called the Trinity. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. $70.00/$25.00. This order, established by God, guides the functioning of the universe, preventing it from falling into chaos; and it ensures the continuance of life and the universe itself. Acts are wrong if they hurt or damage relationships or if they are discovered to constitute a breach of custom or regulation. To buttress his point Mbiti states that in certain African societies to sleep with someone elses wife is not considered evil if these two are not found out by the society which forbids it, and in other societies is in fact an expression of friendship and hospitality to let a guest spend the night with ones wife or daughter or sister. Mbitis assertions must be read as a limited reference to some African societies and in some limited settings. Featured Image:Edo people, Queen Mother Pendant mask, circa 16th c.; Source: Wikimedia Commons, CC0 1.0. Commonly, God is believed to dwell in the skies. Keywords: contextualization . There are also the lesser gods that take residency in streams, rivers, trees and mountains. The amount of devotees to indigenous practices has dwindled as Islam and Christianity have both spread and gained influence throughout the continent. Exodus 20:3-5 tells us not to make or worship images ofanything in heaven or on earth. This supreme . They believe that Obatala helped Olurun in creating theworld and everything in it. The conviction that people will be reborn in this world again and again tends to be more common among Christians than Muslims. Witchcraft has been a prevailing belief in African cultures and has continually posed problems for the African people groups. . For instance, the Yoruba religion has historically been centered in southwestern Nigeria, the Zulu religion in southern Africa, and the Igbo religion in southeastern Nigeria. One of the things these diaspora African religions testify to is the beauty of African religions to engage a devotee on many spiritual levels. Eternal Rest of the Soul. While the recourse to traditional healers may be motivated in part by economic reasons and an absence of health care alternatives, it may also be rooted in religious beliefs about the efficacy of this approach. 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. Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree. 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