Africa is not homogenous. Get it as soon as Wednesday, Oct 26. However, this was never a generally accepted idea. These oral sources are intricately interwoven into arts, political and social structure, and material culture. Du Bois argued . Africans engaged Western enlightenment and religious traditions in serious dialogue and conversation, and responded by creating and interpreting their own modernity. In the Americas and the Caribbean, it is thought to be a combination of various African, Catholic and Native American traditions. It is practiced around the world but there is no accurate count of how many people are Voodooists. Will OAthers Follow Suit? Using the qualitative historical research . The unending political banditry and fraudulent activities by some individuals are the foundation of this stereotype. History text fails to capture the depth of pre-colonial African Civilization. Traditional African religions are not stagnant but highly dynamic and constantly reacting to various shifting influences such as old age, modernity, and technological advances. Africa is a continent that is made up of 54 countries, 1.3 billion inhabitants, more than 3000 ethnic groups, and 2100 unique languages. The more modern incarnation of this ancient African religionVoodooemerged as a unique blend of Catholic and African magical and religious rites. Myth 3: Africa Is Lacking Innovation. Based on sacred narratives, these traditions espoused their unique worldviews, defining cosmologies, ritual practices, sociopolitical frameworks, and ethical standards, as well as social and personal identity. Paperback. Unlike the Christian community, recited stories of creation are not performed by a single God, who ordered, by fiat, the creation of the universe with mere spoken words. Check Out Marriage Customs From 10 African Tribes, 15 Tribes With Surprising Bridal Traditions In Africa, 12 Surprising African Countries That Allow Dual Citizenship By Marriage, Can Foreigners Buy Land In Ghana? However, western culture has blurred to an extent the lines between African tribes. This is the popular assumption amongst many African theologians of which Maluleke (1994) is one example. For African-American parents, transmitting an awareness of cultural values and norms . The reason for this is quite simply the misunderstanding of the relevance and foundation of the African tradition. Each of the more than 50 modern . Africa is host to the highest number of religious countries in the world, according to a recent Gallop poll. During the era of Western religious and cultural encounters in Yorubaland, some children were named Oguntoyibo, signifying Ogun (god of war and iron) is as powerful as the European god. Some children received names such as Ifatoyinbo, Ifa is as powerful as the white mans god. Such names and concepts illustrate the force and creative resistance of indigenous thought and its ability to engage Western modernity in rigorous debate. African religions do not rely on a single individual to be a religious leader, but rather depend on an entire community to make the religion work. 7, The Spirits, in his, One must resist the structuralist temptation that views myths as static, unchanging, and simply the productions of a peoples imagination about the cosmic order. African traditional religion (ATRs) and spirituality have always been surrounded by negativity. While some countries are hot most of the year, other countries experience different types of weather. The stories of violence, kidnapping, religious and political war in Africa are so common. Indigenous Bapedi music and oral tradition have been dismissed as myth, superstition and primitive stories. Fact: Slaves were always subject to torture, sexual exploitation, and arbitrary . Although many African languages do not have a word for religion as such, it nevertheless accompanies the individual from long before his birth to long after his physical death. . When Christianity and Western civilization came and interacted with African culture and religion, misconception of beliefs, values, and terms developed. 3. Each ceremony denotes passage from one social status to another and is an opportunity to celebrate the initiates on their journey. Theres a globally shared perspective of Africa being full of diseases. When it comes to cryptocurrencies, African countries are leading as well. Yet in the scholarship on the history of religions, indigenous African religions were never considered a substantive part of the worlds religious traditions, because they failed to fulfill certain criteria defined by axial age civilization. Privileged European scholars denied the agency of African religions and singled outand thereby controlledAfrican identity. Africa is a Continent Full of Corruption, Poverty and War. The formation of African diasporic religions in the crucible of forced and voluntary migrations of Africans from the continent from the fifteenth to the nineteenth centuries led to the intermingling of African religions with Christianity and local cultures of the Transatlantic to form novel religious expressions. Ceremonies of naming, rites of passage, death, and other calendrical rites embody, enact, and reinforce the sacred values communicated in myths. One reason that might account for the gap in African history is the unavailability of any written document. Africa is the target of western stereotypes. My earlier scholarship was propelled by the insight that the ideology and rituals of Yoruba sacred kingship are what define Yoruba civil religion and, indeed, the center of Yoruba identity.15 Sociologist Robert Bellah understands civil religion as the sacred principle and central ethic that unites a people, without which societies cannot function.16 Civil religion incorporates common myths, history, values, and symbols that relate to a societys sense of collective identity. African religions should be studied on their own terms, examined through their own frames rather than set in a Judeo-Christian framework. In the case of the Yoruba kings and their people, sacred kingship formed a sacred canopy that sheltered the followers of each of the three major traditionsIslam, Christianity, and African traditional religionforging bonds of community identity among followers of the different traditions. But this was not an African thing. 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. Perhaps, it was a deliberate attempt to make Africans feel inferior about themselves. 14. On the continent early modernizers assumed that African religion was part of the problem of the antimodernity project and that uprooting African indigenous religion would auger well for the modern African state. Priests, priestesses, and diviners are among the authorities who perform religious ceremonies, but the hierarchical structure is often very loose. However, in the new world, we are seeing that the stone that the builders had rejected has become the cornerstone and central pillar: for example, Santeria was central to Cuban state making, and in Brazil only recently has Pentecostalism become responsible for the violence against Candombl devotees. African countries like Ghana, South Africa, and Kenya are among the fastest-growing economies in the world. ao Ajima OM, Ubana EU (2018) The Concept . The cosmological structure, however, is much more defined and precise. inadequacies, objections and misconceptions, the practice has come to stay. Benin Is Getting Back 26 Of Its Looted Artifacts from The Colonial Era. Many sources define African worship as ancestral worship which is wrong. Indigenous African religions contain a great deal of wisdom and insight on how human beings can best live within and interact with the environment. Although the slaves accepted Roman Catholicism, they did not give up their traditional beliefs either. I did ancestry and, This is the genuine list of best African president. They believe in African people do not worship their deceased relatives or ancestors. 3. Indigenous religion has always played a pivotal role in the African public sphere, as my study of the Ifa divination system has shown.18 In indigenous religion, communities are governed according to the dictates of the gods, particularly through a divination system such as Fa (Benin) and Ifa (Southwest Nigeria), which encompass the political, social, and economic conditions of life. a. newly birthed babies. Voodoo is a religion that originates in Africa. The Trans-Atlantic slave trade led to the growth of African-inspired traditions in the Americas such as Candombl in Brazil, Santera in Cuba, or Vodun in Hati. An example of data being processed may be a unique identifier stored in a cookie. When he heard that I came from Nigeria, he wanted to display his knowledge of Ocha tradition as a devotee of Oxhosi, God of Thunder in Afro-Brazilian heritage. According to theologian Tony Evans, W. E. B. The west, by trying to learn more about the African tradition will avoid the bias and ignorance of being misinformed. They are less concerned with doctrines and much more so with rituals . nanseezy@gmail.com Teaching Assistant, Department of History University of Cape Coast, Ghana "The essence of neo-colonialism is that the State which is subject to it is, in theory, independent and has all the outward . As with myths the world over, African mythology includes multiple, often contradictory, versions of the same event. 2. The ability of the Black community to call on the spirits and ways of its ancestors is crucial to its continu It is misleading to say "Africa" when speaking about a specific tribe, ethnic group, or country in Africa. There are quite a number of revival groups and movements whose main aim is to ensure that the tenants and practice of African indigenous religion that are threatened survive. Many traditional African religions are based on guiding principles that are unfathomable to foreigners, more specifically those with interests such as historians and scholars. Please note: Another misbelief about Africa is that all Africans are the same. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Countries like Senegal, Mali, and Burkina Faso that are close to the Sahara desert have the Sahel climate. 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.. those misconceptions and misrepresentations of the facts pre sented by Eurocent . As the late African historian Cheikh Anta Diop argued, matriarchy was embedded in the African way of life. African Traditional Religions (ATRs) will be discussed within the context of which it belongs to, the African traditional life (ATL). Whatever it is, the assumption that Africa is lacking innovation is laughable. 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. Their many realities that Africans have not been . Women are revered in African traditions as essential to the cosmic balance of the world. Just as rituals are an expression of this . So it is the responsibility of the religious leaders in these . Here Is What You Have To Know. Now it is our turn to Africanize it.. Introduction. This unified the tribes in a way, making it seem as if they are all the same. The consent submitted will only be used for data processing originating from this website. The truth is that people in some African countries lack access to education and resources, but they make the most of what they have. Prior to colonization, there was scarcely any form of writing in the majority of African tribes and cultures. Correcting Misconceptions About African Traditional Religions. Its almost as if pre-colonial Africa never existed. Long before the arrival of Christianity and Islam, Africans practiced African traditional religion (ATR). However, the Efik people of Calabar were not the only ones who believed twin children were an abomination. There are so many interesting facts about Africa that you dont see every day. Voodoo, however, is a dynamic religion with no standardized dogma. Giving opportunity to stereotypes like Africa are poor and Africa is corrupt. So, while Africans easily adopt Western traditions, will the West also be willing to adopt African traditions? 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. Depending on the kind of religious activity being performed, different religious authorities can be leaders for specific events. Second, spirit beings occupy the next tier in the cosmology and constitute a pantheon of deities who often assist the supreme God in performing different functions. Introduction. There is a common saying in Africa Dont forget where you come from. Given our current impending ecological crisis, indigenous African religions have a great deal to offer both African countries and the world at large. So, why was it the negative stories about killing of twins that were promoted? Later in my academic life, I explored theoretical issues at the national level, showing how Nigerian civil religionan invisible faithprovided a template for assessing how we fared at nation building, allowing the symbols of Nigerian nationhood to take on religious significance for the Nigerian public above and beyond any particular cultural communities of faith.17 I do not want to be misunderstood here. Women constitute a sizable number of the devotees of these traditions, just as they do in Islam and Christianity. Myths, folklores proverbs therefore become the major sources of African philosophy (Jaja, 1995:28). They still hold onto their traditional beliefs, culture, and practices, but consider western values superior to theirs. Africa is the second-largest continent in the world. These 11 Traditional African Clothing Will Help You Identify Ethnic Groups At A Glance, 10 Facts And Myths About African Traditional Religion - African Vibes, 10 Prominent Ways Africans Showcase Their Culture, 10 Traditional African Dances That Showcase Africa’s Rich Culture, more than 3000 ethnic groups, and 2100 unique languages, the most diversified continent in the world, 30 % of the earths remaining mineral resources, Thinking Of Volunteering? They tend to propagate peaceful coexistence, and they promote good relations with members of other religious traditions that surround them. John Mbiti in his book African Religion and Philosophy, argued that African Religion deserves the same respect as Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism. Every life stage is important in African religions, from birth and naming, to betrothal/marriage, elderhood, and eventually death. Religions such as Candombl, Vodun, Santeria, and the Caribbean and Orisa tradition historically came about from African transactions with the new world and the old Euro-Christian worldview. Such scholars stereotyped African religionand African peoples themselvesas primitive social forms, part of a lower social order. It is misleading to say Africa when speaking about a specific tribe, ethnic group, or country in Africa. Whether these words carry weight or simply make for a good quote, the fact remains that Africans are unique. Even the word religion, used in reference to these traditions, is in itself problematic for many Africans, because it suggests that religion is separate from other aspects of ones culture, society, and environment. Narratives about the creation of the universe (cosmogony) and the nature and structure of the world (cosmology) provide a useful entry to understanding African religious life and worldviews. If you take these reports at face value, you may start to believe that all Africans are poor. In fact, the continent is the most diverse in the world. Africa has 4 main climate zones. It is incorrect to assume that conversion to Islam or to Christianity dealt a deathblow to indigenous traditions. As a lived religion, African tradition deploys through its ritual processesparticularly rites of passage, calendrical rituals, and divinatory practicestangible material and nonmaterial phenomena to regulate life events and occurrences, in order to ensure communal well-being. 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. This is a testament to the strong morals and principles of the African tradition. The African tradition of female circumcision is the ritual of the rite of passage from girlhood into the realm of womanhood. For many Africans, religion is a way of life that can never be separated from the public sphere, but instead informs everything in traditional African society, including politics, art, marriage, health, diet, dress, economics, and death. Photo: Pinterest. Connecting With Your Ancestors (African Spirituality Beliefs and Practices) Monique Joiner Siedlak. . It is the religion which resulted from the sustaining faith held by the forebears of the present Africans, This lack of knowledge as well as understanding of essentials has led to burgeoning of myths on African . Ifa rejects the religious extremism of certain forms of radical Islam making life unbearable in todays world. Most Africans at home and in the diaspora have made a name for themselves and praised for their contributions to society. 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. Representation matters, and as scholars we have a responsibility to advocate for religions in their contexts. Elders, priests, and priestesses have served as guardians of the sacred traditions. Bolaji Idowu, John Mbiti, Wande Abimbola, Benjamin Ray, Gabriel Setiloane, Laura Grillo, Aloysius Lugira, Kofi Asare Opoku, Emefie Ikenga-Metuh, Charles Long, and others attempted to imbue African traditions with the vitality, status, and identity that is now finally recognized. It argues that the best interpretation of the Constitution requires laws that address cross-cutting issues of recognition and redistribution relating to religion/culture and gender, and that the best . Understanding the contours of traditions as they are today consists of picturing both what they are and what they can be against the backdrop of what they once were. What, for example, is the notion of history and the sacred in Akan thought? That is the case concerning issues The expression is also used almost as a technical term for a particular reading of such beliefs and practices, one that purports . Africa is often seen as a poor Country and one that cant do without the help of the western world. In African traditional religions guidance is provided through myths, which are handed down orally. The colonial masters brought with them a new religion which they believe to be superior to African traditional religion. 2. The African roots of Voodoo may stretch back over 6000 years, making it one of the world's oldest ancestral traditions. 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. It is the foundation on which the morals of pre-colonial Africa were built. 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. /* Must be below squarespace-headers */(function(){var e='ontouchstart'in window||navigator.msMaxTouchPoints;var t=document.documentElement;if(!e&&t){t.className=t.className.replace(/touch-styles/,'')}})(), Bakongomasks from the Kongo Central Photo: Wikipedia. Acceptably, this was a cruel act of ignorance, but like many other stories about African countries, this story is often generalized. The challenge is to study faith, proverbs, traditions and mythology across Africa to identify the fragments of religion passed down as oral traditions and mythology in the great . The story of Mary Slessor and the killing of twins is popular. Indeed indigenous African religions have provided the blueprint for robust conversations and thinking about community relations, interfaith dialogue, civil society, and civil religion. Since growth and innovation come as a pair, it is impossible to say that African countries are growing without being innovative. They held the view that twins were a symbol of excessive fertility which is a characteristic of animals. 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. 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. Myth: Slavery in the non-Western world was a mild, benign, and non-economic institution. 4.8 out of 5 stars. The Ifa divination system, which produced 256 chapters of oral narratives, constitutes an encyclopedic compendium of knowledge that provides answers to nearly every meaningful human question in the Yoruba and Fon universe. The Hausa man is different from the Igbo man who is also different from the Yoruba man. The debate regarding the continuity between African traditional religion and Christianity has been raging since the early 19th century. The traditional approach of indigenous African religions to gender is one of complementarity in which a confluenceof male and female forces must operate in harmony. 4. b. certain clan outsiders. Religious contexts are shaped and determined by the identity of these religions. These are also stories about how the world was put into place by a divine power, usually a supreme god, but in collaboration with other lesser supernatural beings or deities, who act on his behalf or aid in the creative process.11 The mechanisms and techniques of creation vary from story to story and from one tradition to another. Because it enables us to theorize questions of syncretism and hybridization and, more importantly, raises the issue of why African religion is flowering and spreading in the Americas, especially in the United States, while it is declining in Africaa phenomenon that we need to understand. Please follow our Commentary Guidelines when engaging in discussion on this site. Thus, it is easy to see why it seems that Africa needs help. African spirituality more generallyand Nigerian spirituality in particularis shaped by how individuals in their daily existence make sense of their interactions with religious experience. Another generalization about Africa is that they are all corrupt. African traditional religions are structured very differently from Western religions in that there is relatively little formal structure. .title-desc-wrapper .view-post {display: none !important} Temperature varies from one country to another depending on the climate type. For Ivy Akumu '15, it sparked an interest in the history of Christianity and, by extension, of other religions. Understanding African Traditional Religion. 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"). The colonial masters sold the idea that the long-held tradition and believes of the African people is savage, inferior, and primitive. It is not unusual to see people living below the poverty line in nearly every country on earth. Courtesy Of Stevenson, Amsterdam/Cape Town/Johannesburg. In digging up facts I found that, while many Africans say that homosexuality is un-African, African culture is no stranger to homosexual behaviours and acts. African religions, religious beliefs and practices of the peoples of Africa. with Ibramic faiths tends to deprive the African Traditional Religion its true status as an independent religion . 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 . This is based on misconceptions that these religions are antithetical to modernity. 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. 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. Africa is poor. John Mbiti, chap. However, African indigenous religion has not only succeeded in domesticating Islam and Christianity; in many instances, it has absorbed aspects of these two other traditions into its cosmology and narrative accounts and practices. 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. It goes a long way to show that information is power and the way a story is told matters a lot. The culture believes and traditions of the people of Africa is vast and should not be oversimplified in a stereotypical way. Many foreign nations and organizations do send aid to African countries. The traditional religions of Africa are human in the deepest sense, because they focus on people and their everyday problems. His many publications include African Religions: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2014); City of 201 Gods: Il-If in Time, Space, and the Imagination (University of California Press, 2011); and Kingship, Religion, and Rituals in a Nigerian Community: A Phenomenological Study of Ondo Yoruba Festivals (Almqvist & Wiksell, 1991), which has become a model for ethnographic research among Yoruba-speaking communities. Your email address will not be published. Take for instance the story of poverty in Africa. Robert Mugabe . Mary Slessor is accredited to ending this savage act in ancient Calabar, Nigeria. In these times of intense turmoil, people of African descent are facing serious threats and challenges to their well-being. Abstract. But Ifa divination predates Western modernity. These narratives come to us in the form of myths. Unlike its popular usage, in scholarly language myths are sacred stories believed to be true by those who hold on to them. Religions of the African diaspora are of particular note and importance to the comparative study of African religions because of their resilience and the characteristic formations leading to their performance and expression. To capture the depth of pre-colonial African Civilization Western culture has blurred an..., Ubana EU ( 2018 ) the Concept make Africans feel inferior themselves! Traditions that surround them to celebrate the initiates on their own modernity in thought. Was scarcely any form of writing in the non-Western world was a mild, benign, and priestesses have as., according to theologian Tony Evans, W. E. B and singled outand thereby identity... When engaging in discussion on this site Hausa man is different from the colonial sold! Authorities who perform religious ceremonies, but consider Western values superior to theirs although the Slaves accepted Roman Catholicism they... 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