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An African Christian Morality

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  21 August 2012

Monica Hunter
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Extract

Statements are frequently made by residents and travellers in Africa about the effects of missions on Native communities, but they are seldom backed by an analysis of concrete facts. The African is subject to the influences of Western European culture in many different ways, and it is extremely difficult to isolate the influence of missions from other contact influences, particularly since African Christians tend, for a variety of reasons, to be more affected by these other influences than their pagan neighbour. By comparing, in one area, the life of pagan and Christian families which are subject to similar non-Christian contact influences it is, however, possible to study specific differences in belief and behaviour. One such observable difference is found in the believed working of religious sanctions. Among the Nyakyusa of South Tanganyika behaviour in the pagan community is directly affected by the belief that certain actions are punished by the ancestors, by witchcraft, or by magic. Christian teachers attack these beliefs. The problem then arises as to how far belief in traditional religious sanctions remains in the Christian community, how far it is replaced or modified, and how far changes in belief affect behaviour.

Résumé

LA MORALITÉ CHRÉTIENNE CHEZ LES AFRICAINS

L'attitude des païens Nyakyusa dans le Tanganyika méridional est affectée par leur croyance en des sanctions religieuses. On peut se demander jusqu'à quel point celles-ci sont redoutées par la communauté chrétienne de la même région, par quoi et comment elles ont été remplacées? Les païens attribuent aux péchés la source de leurs maux, le péché étant puni à leurs yeux par les ancêtres, la sorcellerie ou la magie. L'étude des cas particuliers et des rêves montre que la crainte des sanctions religieuses a également son effet parmi les chrétiens. Chez ces derniers on constate des nuances importantes dans les croyances; quelques-unes ont conservé les notions traditionnelles en ce qui concerne le pouvoir des ancêtres, de la sorcellerie, de la magie, d'autres affirment que le malheur est envoyé par Dieu à ceux qui font le mal; d'autres pensent que l'homme est impuissant à faire du mal à ses semblables par des moyens surnaturels. Mais en général, chrétiens et païens attribuent leurs maux aux péchés qu'ils ont commis, ils pensent que le châtiment vient de l'extérieur et non point de l'intérieur de l'homme; ils diffèrent des païens en ce qu'ils croient que le châtiment ou la récompense peut se produire dans l'avenir aussi bien que dans la vie présente.

Les lois païennes et chrétiennes sanctionnées par la religion ont de nombreux aspects semblables, mais elles diffèrent de façon marquée en ce qui concerne les relations entre hommes et femmes, elles varient aussi suivant les groupes. Dans la croyance païenne la moralité est rarement sanctionnée en dehors du groupe des proches parents ou bien en dehors de la chefferie comptant de 100 à 3,000 adultes, tandis que le christianisme est une religion universelle. Il entraine une séparation entre l'église et l'état alors que chez les païens la religion et l'autorité sont fondues dans la personne du chef et du conseiller. On peut discerner dans l'ensemble les différences d'attitude correspondant aux variétés de croyance.

Type
Research Article
Information
Africa , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , July 1937 , pp. 265 - 292
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 1937

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References

page 266 note 1 Wilson, Godfrey, ‘An African Morality’, Africa, vol. ix, no. 1Google Scholar;‘Introduction to Nyakyusa Law’, Africa, vol. x, no. 1. This article is complementary to these and is not fully intelligible apart from them.Google Scholar

page 266 note 2 Cf. Richter, D. J., Tanganyika and its Future, p. 98, for the numbers attached to Moravian and Berlin stations. The number attached to other congregations is small.Google Scholar

page 266 note 3 Cf. Wilson, Godfrey, ‘An Introduction to Nyakyusa Society’, Bantu Studies, Sept. 1936.Google Scholar

page 267 note 1 I have heard of only one Christian ‘great commoner’. Recently, at the installation of a Christian chief, a young man whom the selectors considered very suitable for appointment as ‘great commoner’ was passed over in favour of a junior pagan brother, because he was a Christian.

page 269 note 1 Ali nenoηgwa means literally ‘He has a case’, and is used of both plaintiff and defendant in a court case, of one who has a quarrel with his neighbour, of one who is believed to be punished for some act by his ancestors, and by Christians of one who has done wrong according to the Christian code. Enoηgwa is here translated as ‘sin’ when the act is believed to be punished supernaturally, that is, by the ancestors, witchcraft, magic, or God (Kyala). The pagan and Christian conceptions of the actions which are sinful are of course different (vide infra).

page 270 note 1 Statement of a deacon.

page 270 note 2 Cf. Wilson, Godfrey, ‘An African Morality’, Africa, vol. ix, no. I.Google Scholar

page 270 note 3 In Nyakyusa ekepanga means primarily an age-village, but is also applied to a Christian congregation. Both translations are used here according to the context.

page 270 note 4 For obvious reasons personal names and place-names are omitted. I know many of the people concerned.

page 276 note 1 Thereby, as the pagans would say, passing out of the power of the members of the age-village which he had angered.

page 278 note 1 A traditional curse implying ‘You are not a human being (omondo)’. The pagan curse implies disinheritance and complete breaking-off of relations between father and son. The son can only return if the father agrees to receive him and a ritual feast has been arranged by intermediaries.

page 280 note 1 Translation of a Nyakyusa text.

page 281 note 1 An introduced technique commonly employed in building schools and churches.

page 282 note 1 A single tree-trunk forms the only bridge to many Nyakyusa rivers.

page 282 note 2 This dream was reported three days after my friend had dreamed it. For some years he had hoped to be appointed as a preacher, but he only was appointed five or six months before having this dream. In his dream he again imagines himself to be hoping for the appointment.

page 282 note 3 Y had committed adultery shortly before her death.

page 283 note 1 X said later: ‘When I was telling the dream to my mother she said: “Well, perhaps that is what Y is doing now. Perhaps she has no place of her own to sleep, but is just in the air.” People talk and say that a person who behaves badly will just wander about and have no place in heaven.’

page 283 note 2 A is Y's own mother.

page 283 note 3 About 3 p.m. Y died at this hour.

page note 4 ‘It is what men do at the Lupa (gold-fields) when they look for gold.’

page 283 note 5 These people, X explained later, were not in heaven.

page 284 note 1 From H's home in a valley at the base of the Livingstone Mountains enormous grass fires are frequently visible on the mountain wall, which rises 7,000 feet above the valley. ‘Fire’ is the word used to translate ‘hell’.

page 288 note 1 Pagans who fail to send the ribs to their chief are believed to be in danger from the power of witchcraft justly exercised by fellow members of their age village.

page 289 note 1 Wives of polygynists may be admitted as full members of the church.

page 290 note 1 Servants in the employment of Europeans are of course exempt from obligatory work as carriers, but the position of unpaid helpers of the mission is uncertain.