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Islamic Reform and Historical Change in the Care of the Dead: Conflicts Over Funerary Practice Among Tanzanian Muslims

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 May 2011

Felicitas Becker
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Abstract

Muslim radicalism in Tanzania has tended to be perceived as a political problem, and as part of a trans-regional wave of Islamist movements. The present article instead seeks to demonstrate the connections between current debates among Tanzanian Muslims and long-standing ritual and social concerns, by highlighting debates on funerary practice. While these debates focus on the correct ritual process of burial (with reformists decrying elements of traditional practice as inappropriate innovation), their underlying concern is with the ability of the living to safeguard the well-being of the deceased. This concern, in turn, can be connected both to long-term social change and to the interaction between Muslim and indigenous religious notions. As propitiation of God supplants that of ancestors, the fate of the dead is increasingly construed as depending on the supplication of the living. Ultimately this religious debate is as concerned with society as with doctrine or ritual, and the opposing sides share some common ground. They do not, however, construe this as ‘Africanizing’ Islam, but as part of a necessary intellectual debate.

Le radicalisme musulman en Tanzanie a eu tendance à être perçu comme un problème politique s'inscrivant dans une vague transrégionale de mouvements islamistes. Cet article cherche au contraire à démontrer les liens entre les débats actuels entre musulmans tanzaniens d'une part, et les anciennes préoccupations rituelles et sociales d'autre part, en mettant en lumière les débats sur la pratique funéraire. Alors que ces débats se concentrent sur le processus d'enterrement rituel correct (les réformistes décriant des éléments de pratique traditionnelle comme innovation inappropriée), leur préoccupation sous-jacente concerne l'aptitude des vivants à sauvegarder le bien-être des défunts. On peut lier cette préoccupation, à son tour, au changement social à long terme et à l'interaction entre les notions religieuses musulmanes et indigènes. La conciliation de Dieu supplantant celle des ancêtres, on interprète de plus en plus le sort des défunts comme étant tributaire de la supplication des vivants. Fondamentalement, ce débat religieux traite autant de la société que de la doctrine ou du rituel, et les parties en opposition ont des éléments en commun. En revanche, elles ne l'interprètent pas comme une africanisation de l'islam, mais comme faisant partie d'un débat intellectuel nécessaire.

Type
Research Articles
Information
Africa , Volume 79 , Issue 3 , August 2009 , pp. 416 - 434
Copyright
Copyright © International African Institute 2009

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