In his interview with the New York Times, the theologian said, The days are over when we will be carbon copies of European Christians, Europe and America westernized Christianity. Every life stage is important in African religions, from birth and naming, to betrothal/marriage, elderhood, and eventually death. Required fields are marked *. Introduction. Ironically, this pivotal source of knowledge and spiritual edificethat modern-day Yoruba reject as constituting paganismis the cornerstone of global Orisa traditions in Brazil, Cuba, and the Caribbean. This is an incorrect representation of the continent that is so vast and with diverse political, social and economic differences. As Jaco Beyers puts it, the African understanding of religion is an understanding of the connectedness of all things. These stages characterized European perceptions of human evolution. expressed in all the African cultures, it means that religion forms parts of African culture but not all African cultural practices are religious. African traditional religions are structured very differently from Western religions in that there is relatively little formal structure. Today as a minority tradition, indigenous African religions have suffered immensely from human rights abuses. Mary Slessor is accredited to ending this savage act in ancient Calabar, Nigeria. Advertisement. 3. The debate regarding the continuity between African traditional religion and Christianity has been raging since the early 19th century. This was amazingly written. In most African cultures, history and beliefs have been explained and passed on through oral traditions and storytelling. Each of these has its peculiar characteristics. In fact, Africa is a vast continent encompassing both geographic variation and tremendous cultural diversity. Jacob K. Olupona is Professor of African Religious Traditions at Harvard Divinity School and Professor of African and African American Studies in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University. These countries are often very hot. The myths held by the west about Africa are mostly founded on misinformation. Africa is the second-largest continent in the world. The culture believes and traditions of the people of Africa is vast and should not be oversimplified in a stereotypical way. African countries like Ghana, South Africa, and Kenya are among the fastest-growing economies in the world. The much-cited dictum by the doyen of African religious studies, the recently deceased John Mbiti, that Africans are notoriously religious still holds true (though I prefer to use the word deeply).1 While, officially, statistics suggest that African Christians and Muslims constitute about 80 percent of the total population, and African indigenous religion constitutes about 20 percent, these statistics do not reflect the truth of the African situation. Many traditional African religions are based on guiding principles that are unfathomable to foreigners, more specifically those with interests such as historians and scholars. Gradually, there was a shift from ATR to Christianity. Benin Is Getting Back 26 Of Its Looted Artifacts from The Colonial Era. Advocating for civil religion in a religiously pluralistic society does not require the erasure of conventional religious traditions. It deals with their cosmology, ritual practices, symbols, arts, society, and so on. The African religion was condemned by the Early European scholars, travelers, investigators and missionaries. The absence of centralized and unified cosmologies indicates the multifaceted nature of African religious life and worldviews. 9 years ago. Prior to colonization, there was scarcely any form of writing in the majority of African tribes and cultures. Africa is not homogenous. These traditions are not religious principles, but a cultural identity that is passed on through stories, myths and tales. Investors are moving to take advantage of the African market. As with myths the world over, African mythology includes multiple, often contradictory, versions of the same event. African people do not worship their deceased relatives or ancestors. At the same time, forms of orature such as the Ifa tradition amongst the Yoruba, can form important sources for understanding the tenants and worldview of these religions that can serve as analogs to scriptures such as the Bible or the Quran. Furthermore, many in places like the US and the UK have converted to various traditional African religions, and the importance of the diaspora for these religions is growing rapidly. Correcting Misconceptions About African Traditional Religions. Your email address will not be published. In certain contexts and communities we have many documented instances of the central role of goddesses as founders of traditions, builders of kingdoms, and saviors and defenders of cities and civilizationsfor example, Moremi in Yorubaland, Nzinga in Angola, and Osun in West Africa. I suggest that, at the conceptual and theoretical levels, we begin to take this interpretive approach seriously. See Luc De Heusch, What Shall We Do with the Drunken King?,. In the Americas and the Caribbean, it is thought to be a combination of various African, Catholic and Native American traditions. Inasmuch as androcentric authority is more prominent within social structures and systems and patriarchy is more pronounced in the social order, women are considered the cornerstone of the African family system.19 The African mother is a vibrant life force, central to African religious understandings of the interrelatedness between the human and the divine, as she embodies the production and sustaining of life. There are rituals that celebrate the passage of time and mark time as it passes for the people, orienting them to the seasonal changes, such as the new yam festival and celebration of the old season and beginning of a new one. 2. The African religious worldview is primarily indigenous, although Islam and Christianity continuously respond to its viability and strength through their transitive approaches, their theologies, and their knowledge systems. Africans are eager to learn new skills and embrace new technologies. African Vibes is a one-stop global platform that connects the African diaspora to opportunities for growth, development, and social impact in Africa. African Traditional Religion is the traditional religion of the African people before the coming of Islam and Christianity. In fact, we should not misunderstand the notoriety in some people's religious life, just like Most Africans at home and in the diaspora have made a name for themselves and praised for their contributions to society. Africa is a continent that is made up of 54 countries, 1.3 billion inhabitants, more than 3000 ethnic groups, and 2100 unique languages. This article is an edited version of remarks he delivered for the annual Surjit Singh Lecture in Comparative Religious Thought and Culture at the Graduate Theological Union on April28, 2020. Mursi girl in Ethiopia. If you would like to change your settings or withdraw consent at any time, the link to do so is in our privacy policy accessible from our home page.. In Africa, dance is a means of marking life experiences, encouraging abundant crops, honoring kings and queens, celebrating weddings, marking rites of passage, and other ceremonial occasions.Dance is also done purely for enjoyment. As oral narratives, myths are passed from one generation to another and represented and reinterpreted by each generation, who then make the events revealed in the myths relevant and meaningful to their present situation.9. When addressing religion in Africa, scholars often speak of a triple heritage, that is the triple legacy of indigenous religion, Islam, and Christianity that are often found side by side in many African societies. Each of the more than 50 modern . Yes, poverty is an issue in Africa. One of these errors is description of African Religion as African traditional religion' which connote a derogatory epithets: paganism, idolatry, primitive religion, animism, fetishism polytheism, etc (Omoregbe, 1993). Similarly, indigenous religion, worldviews, and rituals such as rites of passage and other religious performances are permeated by other religions, culture, and society in general. Majority of countries on the continent are . Whether one agrees or disagrees with the practice, it is important to note that not all female initiations involve circumcision, and that the rituals associated with initiation are crucial to ensuring that an individuals social position is affirmed by both family and community. John Mbiti, a prominent Christian theologian from Kenya who helped debunk entrenched ideas that traditional African religions were primitive, giving them equal weight with major . However, western culture has blurred to an extent the lines between African tribes. Lilith Dorsey. One of the more fascinating conversations that has emerged in the debate about African indigenous traditions is about the central role of women as bearers and transmitters of the traditions, and also the negotiation of gender dynamics. While some Christian mission historians, such as J. D. Y. Peel, for example, correctly argue that the Yoruba had their own enlightenment (Olaju), this is always presented in the context of Christian conversion and is very much tied to the escalating Christian missionary movement. there is a diversity of religion in Africa; rather, it is the extent of that diversity and the degree to which the term 'African traditional religion' might misleadingly mask both that extent and the mutability of the forms it encompasses. Responding to this erasure of African indigenous religion as a productive and generative practice, scholars rallied in opposition. Indigenous Bapedi music and oral tradition have been dismissed as myth, superstition and primitive stories. With the negative image of the, A lot of people seize the chance of the holiday season to organize their weddings. In spite of the heuristic value of V. Y. Mudimbes distinction between myth and history in Africa, and by extension the cohesion of oral and written narratives,10 the notion that myth is nonrational and unscientific while history is critical and rational is false. Robert Mugabe . Her growing fascination led to an Emerson Foundation-funded research project this summer, titled "Demystifying African Religion." Haitian Vodou is an African diasporic religion that developed in Haiti between the 16th and 19th centuries. Connecting With Your Ancestors (African Spirituality Beliefs and Practices) Monique Joiner Siedlak. The diviner, therefore, is also a counselor, psychologist, medicine man or woman, and the spiritual guardian of villages and towns. Therefore for these people, twins were treasures. It goes a long way to show that information is power and the way a story is told matters a lot. Despite conversion to Islam or to Christianity, Africans continue to accommodate an indigenous worldview that occupies a vital space in the African consciousness. Many people have bought into the narrative of African traditional religious beliefs as something untrue and based on delusions, but they have also forgotten that all religions have the same thing in common. This creates fear and panic resulting in misleading assumptions about Africa. Traditional African religions are less of faith traditions and more of lived traditions. The most difficult task I face in characterizing African indigenous spiritual traditions is accounting for their diversity and complexity. African traditional religious beliefs in East Africa. It was just the belief of a few groups of people known as Efik people, the predominant tribe in Calabar. African religions have also become a major attraction for those in the diaspora who travel to Africa on pilgrimages because of the global reach of these traditions. A frica has 54 countries and more than a billion people. Before colonization, marriages were strictly traditional and depends on the customs, traditions, and believes of, Africa is a beautiful continent. Even in areas of Zimbabwe with easy access to Western-type delivery care, the majority of women are cared for and delivered by traditional birth attendants who are members of their extended family. According to the Global peace index, Malaysia, Botswana, and Ghana are among the top 50 most peaceful countries, beating the United Kingdom and the United States that were ranked 45 and 128 respectively. One of the most ridiculous myths about it is that homosexuality did not exist in the continent until white men imported it. As the late African historian Cheikh Anta Diop argued, matriarchy was embedded in the African way of life. African identity and culture are preserved in African Traditional Religion. As spirits, the ancestors are more powerful than living humans, and they continue to play a role in community affairs after their deaths, acting as intermediaries between God and those still living.6 Finally, I would add that Africans live their faith rather than compartmentalize it into something to be practiced on certain days or in particular places. Again, this isnt true. Whatever it is, the assumption that Africa is lacking innovation is laughable. Static.COOKIE_BANNER_CAPABLE = true; Loosely, it encompasses all African beliefs and practices that are considered religious but neither Christian nor Islamic. One approach is to outline, in a systematic way, the essential features of these traditions without paying much attention to whether or not the traditions fit into the pattern of religions already mapped out by Western theologians and historians, who use Western religious traditions as the standard by which to measure religions in other parts of the world. Furthermore the issue of whether ATR should be called in singular or plural is another issue causing problems in the study of african tradional religion. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Another generalization about Africa is that they are all corrupt. For example, in many African cultures, intending couples MUST perform both traditional and white weddings. But this was not an African thing. Traditional African religions are not stagnant but highly dynamic and constantly reacting to various shifting influences such as old age, modernity, and technological advances. The cosmological structure, however, is much more defined and precise. Corrupt government officials also capitalize on the generosity of the westerners to the point of looking like a panhandler. When Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code was released, it generated both curiosity and criticism for its portrayal of Christianity. First, there is a supreme being who created the universe and every living and nonliving thing to be found within the universe. Unique Beliefs, and Too Many Misconceptions Traditional native sweat lodge with hot stones inside . Introduction: Some Standard Misconceptions There have been widespread misconceptions about the African Traditional Religion (hereinafter ATR). Since growth and innovation come as a pair, it is impossible to say that African countries are growing without being innovative. History text fails to capture the depth of pre-colonial African Civilization. These oral sources are intricately interwoven into arts, political and social structure, and material culture. Indigenous African religions contain a great deal of wisdom and insight on how human beings can best live within and interact with the environment. Through their mixing, a new kind of religion emerged, forming the basis for what we have come to know as African diaspora religion. Voodoo has no scripture or world authority. As scholars of the comparative study of religions in Africa, we must begin to rethink the study of African religion in the twenty-first century in order to avoid the continuous mis-assessment of the resilience of indigenous traditions. . Such dismissal has been based on the misconception and assumption that indigenous Bapedi . During the colonial era, most of these traditional believes became a target of the colonial religion. However, since Africans are known for their excellent craftsmanship, these artifacts do tell the story of the ancient African empires. those misconceptions and misrepresentations of the facts pre sented by Eurocent . 3. d. politics, everyday life. On the other hand, we now know from research and archival sources that, by their very nature, sources and records of missionaries, colonial administrators, and indigenous elites, which were preserved by colonial administrations, were equally susceptible to distortion and perforation, having been written from the angle of an invented modernity that the colonizer considered superior to the worldviews of local peoples. They are less concerned with doctrines and much more so with rituals . Hence the misguided notion that Africans are corrupt. Africa is given the image of a place that is hot and sunny all year round. Similarly, there are others like Henry Louis Gates who has appropriated images of the Yoruba deity of Esu in his own work. What is fascinating about this odu (Ifa text) is that it supports a key and cardinal principle of Ifa traditionthat we seek counsel first, before we perform divination (Imoram la nda ki a to da Ifa). In times of crisis they often come to the surface, or people revert to them in secret.8. However, this was never a generally accepted idea. Through a profound process of orality, Ifa as an interpretive tradition espouses an epistemology, metaphysics, morality, and a set of ethical principles and political ideology. Foreign aid has been helpful to many small African countries that are struggling economically. One could argue that colonization began with mental slavery. . Acceptably, this was a cruel act of ignorance, but like many other stories about African countries, this story is often generalized. Kofi Johnson Fayetteville State University kjohnson@uncfsu.edu. African religions command their own cultural ingenuity, integral logic, and authoritative force. 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