Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 99 (November 1997) 40-46
Indigenisation and liberation
A challenge to theology
in the southern African context
College of the Transfiguration, Grahamstown
Introduction
The contending major theological directions in African theology remain indigenisation, which stresses Africa’s religious and cultural realities, and liberation, with its emphasis on the political, social, and economic realities of the continent. The recent writings of some liberation-oriented theologians in Africa, notably Jean-Marc Ela[1] and Engelbert Mveng,[2] suggests that the tension between the two has not been resolved. Theology in Africa has yet to develop a meaningful marriage of indigenisation and liberation: African theological reality cannot be viewed exclusively in African religious and cultural existence or indeed in political, social, or economic terms. This tension calls for further investigation not only with a view to resolving it but also because “Christianity in (southern) Africa is of global significance, and the directions it takes are of importance to Christians everywhere”.[3]
Ironically, just as the debate which had made this radical separation of African theology from Black theology, and inculturation theology from liberation theology, has gone off the boil, some African theologians are starting up the debate again at a different level. Symbolic of this reactivation is a deep concern about poverty in Africa, and the potential for indigenisation to alleviate the lot of the poor. Thus some African theologians regard the quest for indigenisation or inculturation as what Elizabeth Isichei has described as “a form of false consciousness”.[4] Here indigenisation is seen as fighting the battles of yesterday whilst the more pressing issues are ignored. For these scholars, the contemporary [End of 40] situation that obtains poses a decisive and divisive question for Christian faith in Africa. Poverty thus constitutes their theological point of departure just as race did at some stage in South African Black theology. These theologians are primarily concerned about the relevance of Christianity in the light of the great challenges of Africa today. Ela calls this a “situation of apocalypse” in which “we cannot remain silent”, one that urgently calls for a suspension of theological activities that pose the danger of being too comfortable or immutable.[5] These scholars recognise the need for indigenisation, but are particularly concerned about its liberation praxis.
Thus, this paper provides a brief historical background to the original debate with a view to highlighting the perspective that is emerging. Then it raises some challenges pertaining to the relevance of this debate for theology in the southern African context.
A brief historical analysis of the early debate
The debate on the relationship between inculturation and liberation in African theology started during the first half of the 1970s between John Mbiti and James Cone.[6] The debate on paper was preceded by many conversations during a yearlong course on African and Black theologies they taught jointly at Union Theological Seminary during the academic year 1972-73. Mbiti, however, has never been alone in his convictions. Similar views to his were found in the writings of other African theologians, most notably Harry Sawyerr,[7] Edward Fashole-Luke,[8] and Gabriel Setiloane.[9]
The original concern of Mbiti and his colleagues was to spell out clearly the distinctiveness of the African context by separating African theology from imported theologies. However, they so emphasised the particularity of the African religious and cultural context as to exclude both the Black American and the Black South African contexts and theologies. Mbiti argued that “Black (American) theology cannot and will not become African theology”,[10] and that African and Black theologies should have no more than a coincidental interest in each other. According to Mbiti, Black theology mythologises the concept of libera[End of 41]tion and therefore avoids other main theological issues that do not relate directly to the liberation concept. In his words:
The concerns of Black Theology differ considerably from those of African Theology. The latter grows out of our joy in the experience of the Christian faith, whereas Black Theology emerges from the pains of oppression. African Theology is not so restricted in its concerns, nor does it have an ideology to propagate. Black Theology hardly knows the situation of Christian living in Africa, and therefore, its direct relevance for Africa is either non-existent or only accidental.[11]
James Cone felt that Mbiti had misrepresented Black theology. He argued that Black and African theologies are not as different as had been suggested, and that their common concerns require a dialogue that is important to both.[12] The possibility of substantive dialogue between African and Black theologies is based on their common historical option. According to Cone, “the Black World is one”.[13] This oneness of Africans and Black Americans is grounded in their common historical option for the poor. It is the “poor perspective”, to use an apt phrase from Gustavo GutiJrrez, that makes them one and thereby establishes the possibility of their mutual sharing in the creation of one humanity. Again to quote Cone:
The relation between indigenization and liberation does not have to be antagonistic. In fact, we need both emphases. Without the indigenization of theology, liberation theology’s claim to be derived from and accountable to oppressed peoples is a farce. Indigenization opens the door for the people’s creative participation in the interpretation of the Gospel for their life situation. But indigenization without liberation limits a given theological expression to the particularity of its cultural context. . . . If theology is to be truly indigenized, its indigenization must include a social analysis that takes seriously the human struggles against race, sex, and class oppression.[14]
Thus for Cone the concern for indigenization and upliftment of the poor is not a matter of either/or, but both/and.
Another respondent to this debate in 1979 was Desmond Tutu with the publication of his “Black Theology/African Theology: soul mates or antagonists”.[15] Just as the title of his article implies, Tutu agrees with Cone, and argues for a symbiosis of Black and African theologies. According to Tutu, both indigenisation and liberation theologies in southern Africa “are aimed at liberating Africans from all forces that hinder them from living fully as human beings”.[16] [End of 42]
More recently this position has been meticulously articulated by Emmanuel Martey.[17] Martey acknowledges that both the inculturation and liberation strands of theology in Africa have developed in response to different needs. In sub-Saharan Africa, struggles for independence from colonisers resulted in inculturation theology, and the defining aspect of this theology is that it pushes its roots firmly into African culture and traditions. In South Africa, Black Africans struggling against the oppressive system of apartheid turned to liberation theology. For Martey, therefore, liberation and inculturation are not contradictory, but complement each other. He describes inculturation and liberation as “hermeneutic procedures that seek both understanding of the African cultural-political reality and interpretation of this reality in the light of the gospel of Jesus Christ, so as to bring about transformation of the oppressive status quo”.[18] The real hope for African theology, Martey concludes, lies in the dialectical encounter between indigenisation and liberation theologies and in their potential for convergence.
The current debate at a different level
In both The African cry and My faith as an African, Ela constantly issues a warning against what he describes as “the rhetoric about indigenization”, “the search for an African identity” and “the ideology of authenticity”. For him these constructs “constitute an obstacle to the liberation of Africa”,[19] and keep Africans away from facing the problems of the present. For him, there are more pressing problems in Africa that merit the attention of Christians beyond the search for an “authentically African Christianity”[20] and preoccupation with what is “typically African”.[21] As a liberationist theologian, Ela finds it difficult to accept theological constructs that lack liberation praxis. The urgent problem for him is the “situation of domination”, the “Africanization of Roman ecclesiastical models”, and most especially the plight of the poor.[22] However, he recognises the importance of indigenisation when he writes, “it is no longer enough to pose the question of faith on the level of culture alone”.[23] He insists though that indigenisation “must not soak up all our energies. . . The theory of adaptation, like the ideology of authenticity, tends to conceal a situation of domination, thus rendering any assertion of cultural identity illusory”.[24] Thus for him Christianity will be credible today only if it proclaims the gospel in terms of the real situations of oppression, injustice, and poverty. [End of 43]
Mveng’s particular concern is poverty. He describes the kind of poverty from which Africa suffers as “anthropological poverty”.[25] This is a kind of poverty that strikes at the dignity, indeed at the very being, of the indigenes. It is characterised by deprivation, not only of material goods and possessions, spiritual, moral, intellectual, cultural, or sociological order, but also of rights, hopes, ambitions, history and identity. For Mveng this constitutes the cardinal problem of Africa as a whole, and is the result of “slavery, colonialism, neocolonialism, racism, apartheid, and the universal derision that has always accompanied the ‘civilized’ world’s discourse upon and encounter with Africa—and still accompanies them today”.[26] For him, it is the actual suffering of the poor in Africa, and indeed, in the Third World, that constitutes the most decisive point of departure in his theological reflection. He thus locates the problem of poverty more in the political than in the cultural domain.
The significance of the debate for theology in southern Africa
It is indisputable that the presence of the poor in any society, not only in southern Africa, is a burden to and an indictment of that society. Thus, the church in the Third World has, in the last two decades in particular, spoken about “the preferential option for the poor”. In South Africa, the Church Leaders Forum which met in Gauteng in May 1997 formed an Ecumenical Commission on Poverty and appointed the Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town, Njongonkulu Ndungane, as the chairperson. The United Nations has also demonstrated its concern about poverty by declaring the years 1997-2006 as the “First United Nations Decade for the Eradication of Poverty”. Therefore, there can be little doubt that poverty is one of the greatest threats to social stability and the future of our continent. All proponents of liberation theology contend that the masses are not poor by accident. They are made poor by the rich and the powerful few. This means that to do liberation theology, one must do something for (and with) the poor, not merely talk about (and to) them. Briefly stated, this means taking sides with the poor in their suffering and struggle against all forms of tyranny, oppression, and injustice. It also means fighting alongside and uplifting the poor, working with them and not for them. This takes the form of enabling the poor to act as protagonists of history and not mere historical objects. This also involves engaging in the dismantling of social systems that re-enforce poverty by preventing the poor from growing and playing a positive role in their own circumstances.
This is the challenge that faces the church today—the political, social and economic liberation of the poor. However, does it negate indigeniastion, that is, cultural and religious liberation? No, certainly not. Religion itself is the opiate of the poor and the marginalised, often their only consolation. Indeed, indigenisation must involve the liberation of people from all forms of poverty. This includes what Mveng describes as “anthropological impoverishmen”—an [End of 44] impoverishment that drains God’s people of everything that can enable them to recognise Christ and even other people as persons.[27] The domain of indigenisation must be the entire Christian life; it must not be restricted to liturgy and mere trappings. Indeed, a truly African theology cannot escape the reality of poverty and the need for its eradication in all its forms. Poverty is more than just the absence of material wealth. The cry of the poor in South Africa today—the homeless, the hungry, alcoholics, glue sniffers, rape victims, abused children, exploited workers, the unemployed, refugees—is deafening. It obliterates all the nice distinctions between indigenisation and liberation in the reality of southern African life and calls for an integrative approach to ensure that all possible resources are mobilised to speed their upliftment.
A Roman Catholic theologian, Aloysius Pieris wrote, “inculturation and liberation, rightly understood, are names for the same process”.[28] Indeed, the theological challenge in which both indigenisation and liberation dimensions find common ground is the “anthropological poverty” already noted. This kind of poverty occurs at two different levels: the religious and cultural, on the one hand, and the political, economic, and social, on the other. The solutions to these challenges, therefore, must be both cultural and political, that is, inculturationist and liberationist.
It, therefore, seems to me that the problem related to indigenisation and liberation is twofold.
The first is the lack of awareness of what constitutes culture. Culture is often narrowly defined in terms of the African traditional worldview, customs, beliefs, and symbols. This definition disregards social, political and economic issues. It is this kind of understanding of culture that reinforces the inculturation and liberation dichotomy.
The second problem is the tendency to regard culture as a past, static commodity. The tendency here is to identify southern African culture with pre-colonial, pre-missionary or pre-apartheid eras. In this case, being African means living in the past. This simplistic understanding of culture reduces African culture to a rigid, immutable, self-referential reality. However, southern African culture, like all cultures, is a dynamic reality made up not simply of symbols, but of praxis as well. The danger here lies in the discontinuing of the present, the changing conditions of life, the development of ideas, and the modification of values.
The challenge facing theology in Africa today can no longer be the false dilemma between “indigenisation” and “liberation”. It rather is the struggle for liberation in the social, economic, and political realities of life on the one hand, and, liberation in religious and cultural spheres of life on the other. In South Africa, some Black theologians such as Desmond Tutu, Bonganjalo Goba, Itumeleng Mosala, and Njongonkulu Ndungane, already accentuate both Africanness and [End of 45] blackness, indigenisation and liberation, in their theologies. What hinders us from developing in the same way?
Notes
1 See Jean-Marc Ela, “Christianity and Liberation in Africa,” in Paths of African Theology, ed. R. Gibellini (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1994), 136-50; African Cry (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1986); My Faith as an African (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1988). [Back to text]
2 Engelbert Mveng, “Impoverishment and Liberation: A Theological Approach for Africa and the Third World,” in Paths of African Theology, ed. R. Gibellini (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1994); and “Third World Theology - What Theology? What Third World?: Evaluation by an African Delegate,” in Irruption of the Third World: Challenge to Theology, ed. Virginia M. M. Fabella, and Sergio Torres (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1983), 217-21. [Back to text]
3 Elizabeth Isichei, A History of Christianity in Africa: From Antiquity to the Present (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1995), 1 (italics mine). [Back to text]
4 Isichei, A History of Christianity in Africa, 3. [Back to text]
5 Ela, “Christianity and Liberation in Africa,” 137. [Back to text]
6 John S. Mbiti, “An African Views American Black Theology,” in Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966 - 1979, ed. Gayraud S. Wilmore and James H. Cone (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1979), 477-82; and “The South African Theology of Liberation: Appreciation and Evaluation,” in A Vision for Man: Essays on Faith, Theology and Society, ed. Samuel Amirthan (Madras: The Christian Literature Society, 1978); James H. Cone, “A Black American Perspective on the Future of African Theology,” in Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966 - 1979, ed. Gayraud S. Wilmore and James H. Cone (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1979), 492-502. [Back to text]
7 Harry Sawyerr, “What is African Theology?” African Theological Journal 4, 1971. [Back to text]
8 Edward W. Fashole-Luke, “The Quest for African Christian Theologies,” The Journal of Religious Thought 32, no. 2, 1975. [Back to text]
9 Gabriel Setiloane, “Theological Trends in Africa,” Missionalia 8, 1980. [Back to text]
10 Mbiti, “An African Views American Black Theology,” 481, italics mine. [Back to text]
11 Mbiti, “An African Views American Black Theology,” 481. [Back to text]
12 Cone, “A Black American Perspective on the Future of African Theology,” 494. [Back to text]
13 Cone, “A Black American Perspective on the Future of African Theology,” 495. [Back to text]
14 Cone, “A Black American Perspective on the Future of African Theology,” 500. [Back to text]
15 Desmond Tutu, “Black Theology/African Theology - Soulmates or Antagonists?” in Black Theology: A Documentary History, 1966 - 1979, 483-491. [Back to text]
16 Tutu, “Black Theology/African Theology,” 486. [Back to text]
17 Emmanuel Martey, African Theology: Inculturation and Liberation (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1993). [Back to text]
18 Martey, African Theology, 55. [Back to text]
19 Ela, African Cry, 122; see also Ela, My Faith as an African, 173. [Back to text]
20 Ela, African Cry, 135. [Back to text]
21 Ela, My Faith as an African, 173. [Back to text]
22 Ela, African Cry, 102. [Back to text]
23 Ela, “Christianity and Liberation in Africa,” 140. [Back to text]
24 Ela, African Cry, 148. [Back to text]
25 Mveng, “Third World Theology,” 155. [Back to text]
26 Mveng, “Third World Theology,” 220. [Back to text]
27 Mveng, “Third World Theology,” 220. [Back to text]
28 Aloysius Pieris, An Asian Theology of Liberation (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1988), 111. [Back to text]