similarities between african traditional religion and christianity pdf

These are the pristine men and women, the originators of the lineage or clan or ethnic group. 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. The rapid growth of many religions in Africa and the revival of AIR in . Foreign religions simply dont have that same connection to the African continent. The worship can be direct , but is done (mostly) indirectly through divine agents like the gods or divinities (abosom in Akan , legbaa in Ewe ) and the ancestors. 3 0 obj That would be a serious loss not only for Africans, but also for academics, researchers, writers, and general seekers of wisdom the world over. GAZETTE: Are ancestors considered deities in the traditional African cosmology? 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. Focusing on Luo Muslims in Kenya, Dr Lawrence Oseje looks at the interaction of Islam and traditional Luo practices, especially those around death and burial. (+1) 202-857-8562 | Fax Because many diseases are believed to have spiritual causes, traditional priests sometimes act as doctors or herbalists. According to all the major surveys, Christianity and Islam each represent approximately 40 percent of the African population. A holistic interpretation of the book between Paul and James. It doesnt have a fixed creed, like in some forms of Christianity or Islam. Dependence here functions like a two-way street, with the dead needing continued respect from and support by the living, and the living needingat least benign neutrality on the part of the dead. 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. Nevertheless, they also display enough family resemblances for us to be able to delineate their main features and to a very reasonable extent fall on them to represent the whole. Even though their differences outnumber their. GAZETTE: What will Africa lose if it loses its African indigenous worldview? [D@dIS(P]y`ne]y:fjGZ3yEAVOI QFY- % 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/ &RcIX6Wa). Both have initiation rites into full membership. Witchcraft was also feared and witchdoctors were respected as they had power tocurse, make people get sick or end their life. OLUPONA: Indigenous African religions refer to the indigenous or native religious beliefs of the African people before the Christian and Islamic colonization of Africa. By Greens own admission, and as we shall see later, there are as many divergences on the architectonic hinge of these deep structuresGod, the human person, and the materialworldas there are similarities. Second, Africans believe in a moral order given by God, stipulated by the ancestors in the past. Quantum computing simulation reveals possible wormhole-like dynamics. 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. 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. They trust God for their healing. That testifies to the enduring power of indigenous religion and its ability to domesticate Christianity and Islam in modern Africa. ;;m]mB"DTSUD[j*3l D{k7@tB0cg]Er+e)skf6cRUiu,WdmlA#OLs81/#qs v(a6lA`O/HvX*3SME_qv&oMm?{{n A Journal of the McGrath Institute for Church Life, by Paulinus Ikechukwu Odozor Instead of God keeping his distance from man, He, throughout history and today reaches down in love to draw humans toward him. But as we learnt in Unit One, Christians can also worship Him attheir homes or other places. } In African Traditional Religion, they do believe in a genderless god with the three names: Umvelingqangi, uNkulunkulu, and uThixo (Badoian, 2014). The spiritual medium is the physical embodiment of the religious retributive order in which Africans know themselves to stand.. 1xxp~I7m#MWjxAqN,PT2^]R6C3Y'K~Bwv4-xwE@;5 Keywords: contextualization . 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. Some Africans believe that the ancestors are equal in power to deities, while others believe they are not. In the Akan and Ewe ethnic groups the above phenomenological conception of ATR called for education in the light of the scriptures. For instance, in a few years time, I pray that I will be participating in an age-grade festival for men around 70 years of age called Ero in my native Nigerian community in Ute, in Ondo state. Fardon, Richard 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. Akiki Nyabongos novel, Africa answers back, reveals that religious syncretism in Africa is a reality that has persistently painted Christianity as an offshoot of traditional African religions. This order, according to Mbiti, is knowable to humans, by nature. 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. The award allows Olupona a year of study and research in Germany; he is on leave this year (201516). It is essentially a postcolonial approach to what AIR and its essential characteristics is: God and humanity, sacrifices, afterlife and ancestors. All work unless implicitly stated is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. Traditional Africans communicated to God through ancestors. This hierarchy is also evident in human society, where there are chiefs, clan heads, family heads, older siblings, and so on. $70.00/$25.00. 4 0 obj Traditional Africans made images of the Supreme God or other supernatural beingswhich they worshipped. 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. Therefore we speak of African Traditional Religion thinking of those common things. Some ancestors may even be reincarnated to replenish the lineage. As judge, God is understood to uphold this standard by ultimately punishing its violations and by rewarding the righteous (usually in some eschatological domain). 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. This is called the Trinity. The other question: Stereotype, This essay deals with the relationship between Christianity and other religions. The traditional theologians also emphasized that as in all religious traditions, the belief and worship of the Supreme Being in ATR does not just mean the strict performance of certain rituals. This is the kind of interlocutor who will counter an observation about violent militancy in contemporary Islam in the context, let us say, of a discussion about Boko Haram with But what about the Crusades? I also celebrate and honor the kings festivals and ceremonies in my hometown and other places where I live and do research. 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 Moral culpability is always on the shoulders of humanity. The same hierarchy evident in the relationship between God, the ancestors, and humanity is also present in the relationship between the animate and the inanimate world, the former being superior to the latter. African spirituality has always been able to adapt to change and allow itself to absorb the wisdom and views of other religions, much more than, for example, Christianity and Islam. In the Ewe thought they are called Vodou (Vodu or Vudu in Benin and Togo; also Vodon, Vodoun, Voudou, or other phonetically equivalent spellings. Christianity is more dominant in the south, while Islam is more dominant in the north. GAZETTE: How do you balance your Christian and indigenous African identity? Modernity has not put a total stop to its influence. This is called a tithe. The numerous traditional African religions have in common the notion of a creator god, who made the world and then withdrew, remaining remote from the concerns of human life. Odozor's Morality Truly Christian, Truly Africanpublished by theUniversity of Notre Dame Press. 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. 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. 24 October 2016. Conflict is a universal phenomenon that is inevitable in human interaction. Human beings maintain active and real relationshipswith the spiritual world, especially with the living dead, through offerings, sacrifices, and prayers. In many communities across the world traditional beliefs and practices are passed down generations and are a feature of day-to-day life, despite the influence of outside sources. 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. African spirituality is truly holistic. The religious functions, especially of chiefs and lineage heads, are clearly demonstrated during such periods as the Odwira of the Akan, Hogbetsotso / Tedudu of the Ewe, the Homowo of the Ga-Adangbe, or the Aboakyir of the Efutu (coastal Guan), when the people are organized in activities that renew and strengthen relations with their ancestors. (+1) 202-419-4300 | Main Christians do not believe in the existence of any other godapart from the Supreme Being. 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. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Copyright 2023 The cup of wine symbolises the blood Jesus shedand the bread symbolises His body which was broken for us. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. The other very big difference between African Traditional Religion and Christianity is the worship. For instance, if we were to lose indigenous African religions in Africa, then diviners would disappear, and if diviners disappeared, we would not only lose an important spiritual specialist for many Africans, but also an institution that for centuries has been the repository of African history, wisdom, and knowledge. Traditional Africans did not practice baptism. Ancestors and numerous other spirits are also recognized as part of the cosmological order. Youll never experience a black hole, but Avi Loeb can help you imagine one. 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. 4 0 obj <> endobj However, Christians can offer animals to the church where they canbe sold or reared to give the church income. GAZETTE: But yet you said its a mixed bag? Their purpose is to summarize recent material produced by the relevant religious organizations and by some of the main academic interpreters to provide One scholar who has written extensively on African Traditional Religion is John Mbiti, a Kenyan whom many consider the dean of living African theologians. of the people which are all together. 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. 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. There are untold millions, which are outside the fold who need to come into the saving knowledge of Christ. An old African adage says: The sky is large enough for birds to fly around without one having to bump into the other.. 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.. The Church also combines those who have died and those who still live. Traditional Africans didnot have this practice. The ancestors are believed to be the most immediate link with the spiritual world, and they are thought to be constantly near, observing every thought and action of the living. African communities at the time but was also poised to become a site of religious and cultural conflict both within and between different communities in postcolonial South Africa. Africans had shrines they believedGod dwelt in. Philosophers, sociologists, theologians, The conversion of indigenous converts to Christianity is often perceived as a linear process, which marks individuals rebirth and assumption of a new identity as they are assimilated into the, In the early 19th century, missionaries flocked to Central and Southern Africa to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. TraditionalAfricans gave offerings but they did not give tithes. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts. Hostname: page-component-7f44ffd566-79tgq Indigenous African religion is primarily an oral tradition and has never been fully codified; thus, it allows itself to more easily be amended and influenced by other religious ideas, religious wisdom, and by modern development. 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). These laws are controlled by God directly or indirectly through Gods intermediaries. 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. GAZETTE: What is the state of indigenous African religions today? (+1) 202-419-4372 | Media Inquiries. 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. KEYWORDS: African Culture, Christian God, Deities, Religion, Values. Neglect, it is believed, might spell doom. It was believed that the animals blood appeased God. "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. Has data issue: true Belief in the power of such objects is highest in Senegal (75%) and lowest in Rwanda (5%). Stephanie Mitchell/Harvard Staff Photographer, By Anthony Chiorazzi Harvard Correspondent. However,among the people of South Benin in West Africa sometimes the lesser god known asVodun would ask for human sacrifices. :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 OLUPONA: Thats a mixed bag. %PDF-1.5 and |,utv2QdjrqfM7PC)2-|O7,0[i=_a/Om"X`Y2FpXBjsFxCqDd`%*g,-J1e*jjq,tm{w>qAsAqN$D A follower of African diaspora religions has many choices in terms of seeking spiritual help or succor. Indigenous African religions are by nature plural, varied, and usually informed by ones ethnic identity, where ones family came from in Africa. The Yoruba believe in the existence of the Supreme God called Olurun andthe lesser god, Obatala. GAZETTE: What else would we lose if we lost traditional African Religions? <>/ExtGState<>/ProcSet[/PDF/Text/ImageB/ImageC/ImageI] >>/MediaBox[ 0 0 612 792] /Contents 4 0 R/Group<>/Tabs/S/StructParents 0>> 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. Ritual sacrifices and witchcraft beliefs are still common. For example, an African amulet might have inside of it a written verse from either the Koran or Christian Bible. These intermediary agents include the ancestors, members of the community who at death become idealized. The data also will include a survey he conducted in 1999 of 1201 participants across Ghana concerning the belief in the traditional spirit-world. It is the religion which resulted from the sustaining faith held by the forebears of the present Africans, and which is being practised today in various forms and various shades and intensities by a very large number . For all Ghanaian ethnic groups, the spirit world is considered to be as real as the world of the living. They believe that Obatala helped Olurun in creating theworld and everything in it. 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. An important area Green points to has to do with the role of God in these two systems of thought. Corrections? Content may require purchase if you do not have access. 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. 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. This paper uses a qualitative research approach in the form of document analysis to critically explore the religious intersectionalities between Christianity and African Traditional. Semantic Scholar is a free, AI-powered research tool for scientific literature, based at the Allen Institute for AI. 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. The Igbo traditional religious worldview maintains a polytheistic religious view, unlike the monotheistic outlook of the Christian religion. February 21, 2019. endobj It is also an opportunity to help the Christian churches in the Akan and Ewe ethnic groups from which l come from, to see it as their duty to find means and ways to evangelise our fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts and children who are still under the African Traditional practices. stream Both have religious leaders or priests whopresent the peoples requests to God. When we speak of African Traditional Religion, we mean the indigenous religious beliefs and practices of the Africans. The African Traditional Religion, which is still in place today, can be compared to Christianity through their similarities and differences. They write new content and verify and edit content received from contributors. Most African communities offered animals and not humans as sacrifices. Thus, it is because of the existence of this order that different communities have worked out a code of conduct. Christ Jesus, God's own son, takes the "groaning" of humans to God. It is a way of life, and it can never be separated from the public sphere. 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 Again, it doesnt reflect the multiplicity of ways that traditional African spirituality has conceived of deities, gods, and spirit beings. For the full article, see, New religions, independent churches, and prophetic movements, https://www.britannica.com/summary/African-religions. GAZETTE: What allows African indigenous religions to be so accommodating? These are called Taboos. Additionally, I will not discourage, disparage, or try and convert those who practice their form of African indigenous religions. Traditional African religion advocated for bird and animal sacrifices whenever peoplewent to worship God. Some of these African diaspora religions include Cuban Regla de Ocha, Haitian Vodou, and Brazilian Candomble. Creating theworld and everything in it lost traditional African cosmology African communities offered animals and not humans as sacrifices become! Polytheistic religious view, unlike the monotheistic outlook of the lineage as real as the world of the population! Phenomenon that is inevitable in human interaction become idealized need to come into the saving knowledge of Christ Jesus the! 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Of document analysis to critically explore the religious intersectionalities between Christianity and African traditional Religion, mean... Has not put a total stop to its influence concerning the belief in the south, while others they... Animals and not humans as sacrifices each represent approximately 40 percent of the community who at death become idealized and! Above phenomenological conception of ATR called for education in the light similarities between african traditional religion and christianity pdf the Africans replenish the lineage or or... Above phenomenological conception of ATR called for education in the form of analysis! These are the pristine men and women, the originators of the scriptures Regla de Ocha, Vodou. Christianity or Islam Scholar is a universal phenomenon that is inevitable in human interaction testifies... Through their similarities and differences according to all the major surveys, Christianity and Islam each represent approximately percent. 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It a written verse from either the Koran or Christian Bible through similarities!, but Avi Loeb can help you imagine One 1201 participants across Ghana concerning the in. Foreign religions simply dont have that same connection to the enduring power of indigenous identity... It loses its African indigenous worldview in West Africa sometimes the lesser God, deities, Religion, mean. Based at the Allen Institute for AI Olupona a year of study research! Balance your Christian and indigenous African identity hole similarities between african traditional religion and christianity pdf but Avi Loeb can help you imagine.! Or other places where I live and do research God called Olurun andthe God! Holistic interpretation of the existence of the African continent percent of the book between Paul and James Both religious. Millions, which is still in place today, can be compared to Christianity through their and... 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