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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. It publishes a journal Anthropologica and has reclaimed the name of its former journal, Culture for its occasional online bulletin. As a resident fellow, Sherman will teach a study group on negotiation and diplomacy this semester. 0000002264 00000 n This is in sharp contrast with the religious composition . Vodou is a worldview encompassing philosophy, medicine, justice, and religion. The editor of The Christian Century has given me an undeserved privilege in asking me to contribute some reflections on "How My Mind Has Changed" in the course of the past decade. All too often, the result is conflict and radicalisation. These were not empty names. I feel deeply the value of biblical studies in this exercise, and the contribution of biblical insights in this development. While African Traditional religion (ATR) is paramount, it is the purpose of this article to suggest that << /Length 5 0 R /Filter /FlateDecode >> 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. Liberia is the only country where more than one-in-ten (12%) identify primarily with an African traditional religion. Corrections? ), 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. The unseen world is populated by lwa (spirits), myst (mysteries), anvizib (the invisibles), zanj (angels), and the spirits of ancestors and the recently deceased. Yet . APUSH Unit 1 Flashcards | Quizlet In Nigeria, the population in 1900 included 4.2 million Muslims and 180,000 Christians. www.ej-theology.org Christianity and Indigenisation in Africa (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. African religions and corresponding beliefs and practices Updates? The rural Bira of northeastern Zaire have been exposed to the Christian message for well over half a century. Modernity has not put a total stop to its influence. The spirituality of Africa - Harvard Gazette There are also other parallels in social, political and cultural areas, just as there are some significant differences. The original constitution defined the organization's mandate as providing a forum for the exchange of ideas among ethnologists. Amen. The theological horizon continues to expand. I am not a historian, and I have not done careful thinking in this direction. L'interdiction de pratiquer le culte des anctres est l'unique domaine dans lequel la mission chrtienne a triomph de la vie religieuse traditionnelle des Biras. Thus, Mbali-God is a creative response on the part of the Bira to the syncretic religious encounter. A follower of African diaspora religions has many choices in terms of seeking spiritual help or succor. Spiritual activities like prayer, thanksgiving, and the making of sacrifices were well-established facts of life for the existence and continuation of the community. Nevertheless, since 1900, Christians in Africa have grown from approximately 7 million to over 450 million today. About Pew Research Center Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes and trends shaping the world. In Kenya I grew up in home, school and church milieus which held that the African religious and cultural background was demonic and anti-Christian. 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. In Africa the traditional religions are a major source for the study of the African experience of God. The continued influence of traditional African religion is also evident in some aspects of daily life. Oral tradition says the first Muslims appeared while the prophet Mohammed was. No doubt there still remain much research and reflection to be done in order to work out a consistent theological understanding of the issues entailed here. Author of. Additionally, I will not discourage, disparage, or try and convert those who practice their form of African indigenous religions. Christianity in Africa dates to the very inception of the church. 0000002884 00000 n Ritual functionaries include priests, elders, rainmakers, diviners, and prophets. This is, obviously, a general statement, one which needs detailed elaboration. I have concentrated these comments on the role of African background in my theological reflection. This statistical tilting of Christendom from the north to the south, after 2,000 years, holds tremendous prospects and challenges. OLUPONA: Yes, and the pluralistic nature of African-tradition religion is one of the reasons for its success in the diaspora. PDF Traditional African Religion and Modern Christianity in Zaire - JSTOR This is not an empty coincidence. 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. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Black Americans who identify with a religion are most likely to say belief in God is essential to what their faith means to them (84%), while large majorities say the same about opposing racism (76%) and sexism (71%). Mozambique, Botswana and South Africa are the only countries surveyed where a significant number of people (roughly one-in-ten) describe their religion as atheist, agnostic or nothing in particular. In all the other countries, the figure is closer to zero. African diaspora religions, also described as Afro-American religions, are a number of related beliefs that developed in the Americas in various nations of the Caribbean, Latin America and the Southern United States. <<6D546C3FADADB2110A00A09A6B9CFF7F>]/Prev 416812>> degree at Harvard Divinity School. This is not a biblical distinction. x\u}4`P}E#(9q"%LCl'KLb)Sfgdq N Afro-American Religious Syncretism in Brazil and the United States: A All these spirits are believed to live in a mythic land called Ginen, a cosmic Africa. The God of the Christian Bible is understood to be the creator of both the universe and the spirits; the spirits were made by God to help him govern humanity and the natural world. Regardless of the variation, it is still true that Nigeria has both the largest number of Muslims and the largest number of Christians in the region. The God described in the Bible is none other than the God who is already known in the framework of our traditional African religiosity. The Church in Africa, 1450-1950. This approach is intended to shed further light on the problem of African cultural influence and . stream This is in sharp contrast with the religious composition of the region about 100 years ago, when, according to a Pew Forum analysis of historical information from the World Religion Database, less than a quarter of the population identified as either Christian or Muslim. I simply and honestly answered him that "for us in Africa, God is not dead." 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. I completed my doctoral studies at the University of Cambridge in 1963, the year that Honest to God, by J.A.T. While every effort has been made to follow citation style rules, there may be some discrepancies. (+1) 202-419-4372 | Media Inquiries. GAZETTE: How would you define indigenous African religions? Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa. 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. In four countries, for instance, half or more of the population believes that sacrifices to ancestors or spirits can protect them from harm. The book comprised ideas that I had gathered from 300 African peoples ("tribes" -- a term that today is sometimes used in derogatory ways). <> %PDF-1.7 % I find the traditional Western distinction between "special revelation" and "general revelation" to be inadequate and unfreeing. 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. It was during the Belgian colonial period that the first Catholic and Protestant missionaries came to this region of Zaire. Please refer to the appropriate style manual or other sources if you have any questions. The missionaries who introduced the gospel to Africa in the past 200 years did not bring God. Its fundamental principle is that everything is spirit. 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. In one case the thinking and experience of the people produced a written record of Gods dealings with the Jewish people in particular. Unlike in Europe and the United States, very few people in sub-Saharan Africa say they are unaffiliated with a particular faith. 93 0 obj Prayers and sacrificial offerings are usually directed toward secondary divinities, who are intermediaries between the human and sacred realms. Most people in sub-Saharan Africa now identify with either Christianity or Islam. 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. The more I peeped into African religious insights about God, the more I felt utterly unable to use the word "only" in this case. I am very excited, for example, by the estimate that in 1987 there will be a statistical balance of Christian population between the north (Europe, Soviet Union and America) and the south (Latin America, Africa, Asia and Oceania). Updates? Vodou represents a syncretism of the West African Vodun religion and Roman Catholicism by the descendants of the Dahomean, Kongo, Yoruba, and other ethnic groups who had been enslaved and transported to colonial Saint-Domingue (as Haiti was known then) and partly Christianized by Roman Catholic missionaries in the 16th and 17th centuries. For terms and use, please refer to our Terms and Conditions In the 17th century a movement led by the German Protestant theologian George Calixtus aimed at reconciling the differences between the Protestants in Germany, but his efforts were disparaged by orthodox Christian leaders as syncretistic. Revelation is given not in a vacuum but within particular historical experiences and reflections. 1"7$X9Xyyyb GNpL!9I&mxo0++44cA@5c. 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. %PDF-1.3 We can list some obvious and often publicized factors. What is African Traditional Religion? Indigenous African practices tend to be strongest in the central states of Africa, but some form of their practices and beliefs can be found almost anywhere in Africa. 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. 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. But I feel that the issue of looking at African history in light of the biblical understanding of history is clearly called for. Didnt our Lord let it be clearly known that "before Abraham was I am" (John 8:58)? 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 was not a stranger to African peoples. They will certainly be overwhelming, and I feel very excited about them. But after braving that first blizzard in a land far from his native Nigeria, Olupona stuck it out and earned his Ph.D. 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. It is a subsidiary of The Pew Charitable Trusts. 1996 Canadian Anthropology Society 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. When this happens, then a passage such as Hebrews 1:1-3 rolls down like mighty waters, full of exciting possibilities of theological reflection. 9_r'v>#z2"syiBm?mry8%;m8v L,WNHitMJk#RZwEl+M3N1n[nt4]C$i2y]_6Iasrt He sees the other faith as complementing and even adding spiritual potency to his own spiritual practice of constructing effective amulets. (+1) 202-419-4300 | Main 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. Numbers, Facts and Trends Shaping Your World, Tolerance and Tension: Islam and Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa, Next: Chapter 2: Commitment to Christianity and Islam, Chapter 2: Commitment to Christianity and Islam, Chapter 3: Traditional African Religious Beliefs and Practices, Chapter 4: Interreligious Harmony and Tensions, In the U.S. and Western Europe, people say they accept Muslims, but opinions are divided on Islam, In Western Europe, familiarity with Muslims is linked to positive views of Muslims and Islam, Q&A: Measuring attitudes toward Muslims and Jews in Western Europe, Europes Muslim population will continue to grow but how much depends on migration, The Growth of Germanys Muslim Population, Size & Demographic Characteristics of Religious Groups, Pew-Templeton Global Religious Futures Project, 60% of Americans Would Be Uncomfortable With Provider Relying on AI in Their Own Health Care, Gender pay gap in U.S. hasnt changed much in two decades. The councils programs in response to these problems are impressive. Of course, behind all these factors is the Holy Spirit working through them. It is the southern two-thirds of Africa (including Madagascar) which we can rightly call Christian Africa, as the northern one-third is Muslim Africa. In most countries, however, less than one-in-twenty say this is their primary religious affiliation. In five countries (Tanzania, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Senegal and Mali) majorities express this belief. This article concerned itself with the modern encounter between Christianity and African Indigenous Religion (AIR) in Africa. African Traditional Religion in the Context of increasing Christian and Islamic Encounter . While Islam and Christianity tend to be overtly resistant to adopting traditional African religious ideas or practices, indigenous African religions have always accommodated other beliefs. While some African cosmologies have a clear idea of a supreme being, other cosmologies do not. This interview has been edited for length and clarity. And in Botswana, Rwanda, South Africa and Zambia, the survey finds that 5% or less identify as Muslim. 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. Alternate titles: Vaudou, Vodun, Voodoo, Voudou, vodon, Elizabeth McAlister Associate Professor of Religion, Weslyan University. 75 19 Read our research on: Congress | Economy | Gender, Side by side with their high levels of commitment to Christianity and Islam, many people in the countries surveyed retain beliefs and rituals that are characteristic of traditional African religions. The missionaries who introduced the gospel to Africa in the past 200 years did not bring God to our continent. They depended on the labor of enslaved Africans who often constituted the majority of the population in these areas and developed their own forms of cultural and religious autonomy Examples: plantation agriculture, the Carolinas (rice), Barbados (sugar), tobacco Colonial government This article appeared in the Christian Century, August 27- September 3, 1980, pp. GAZETTE: In trying to understand African spirituality, is it helpful to refer to it as polytheistic or monotheistic? The Yoruba, however, do have a concept of a supreme being, called Olorun or Olodumare, and this creator god of the universe is empowered by the various orisa [deities] to create the earth and carry out all its related functions, including receiving the prayers and supplications of the Yoruba people. African religion has equipped people to listen to the gospel, to discover meaningful passages in the Bible, and to avoid unhealthy religious conflict. 0000003641 00000 n 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"). Following a period of parish work in England, I went to teach at Makerere University, Uganda, where I remained for ten years until 1974. Islam has experienced a similar rapid growth. Pew Research Center does not take policy positions. 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. He later earned both an M.A. Since the Bible tells me that God is the Creator of all things, his activities in the world must clearly go beyond what is recorded in the Bible. Indigenous African spirituality today is increasingly falling out of favor. The rapid growth of many religions in Africa and the revival of AIR in postcolonial Africa have made inter-religious dialogue an urgent necessity. There are also secret societies, called Bizango or Sanpwl, that perform a religio-juridical function. GAZETTE: Are ancestors considered deities in the traditional African cosmology? OLUPONA: No, this type of binary thinking is simplistic. National Center for Biotechnology Information - PubMed Central - Vodou's role in Haitian mental health, Learn Religions - An Introduction to the Basic Beliefs of the Vodou (Voodoo) Religion, Ancient Origins - The Origins of Voodoo, the Misunderstood Religion, LiveScience - Voodoo: Facts About Misunderstood Religion, Vodou - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), Vodou - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). The concept of the church as the body of Christ in the whole world is another growing development for me. 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. 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 . Pew Research Center does not take policy positions.