Tribute To An African Theological Guru, Professor John S. Mbiti.
(Babila Fochang, Excerpts from my Doctor of Philosophy Dissertation).
African Religion; Praeparatio Evangelica for the Gospel
John S. Mbiti is one of the pillars of African theology. According to Bediako he is by far “the modern African theologian with…the weightiest bibliography” (1999, 303)” According to Kraft (1976, 286) “one of Africa’s most distinguished theologians”, and to Kato (1975, 56) Mbiti is “a prolific writer” “whose intellectual acumen cannot be disputed” with the publication of about three hundred academic articles in books and journals to his credit and some of his works have been “translated into French, German, Dutch, Korean, Spanish and Italian” (Musopole 1994, 29).
Mbiti like his contemporary Idowu was educated according to western academic standards, only to realize that his major preoccupation would be centred on how his roots could assure his growth. He discovered that what he had acquired through Western education “did not deal with questions that the African context was posing, and more personally, the question of what it meant for one to be an African” (Musopole 1994, 19). Although as we shall see later on, Mbiti disagreed with Idowu, yet the two have been lumped together and criticized for setting out to “…Africanize Christianity in terms of African theologies” (Young, 1993, 21). Young is more precise to the point when he states that their theological pioneering work did not really Africanize Christianity, but that rather they “Christianized select elements of African Traditional religion” (Young, 1993, 21). A harsh criticism of Mbiti and Idowu came from the great dissenter, Byang Kato who felt that these two had “come perilously close to being in the tradition of Origen…whose universalism…posited that even Satan will go to heaven (Young, 1993, 158).
A study of Mbiti however reveals that his study of African religions and philosophies is not intended to juxtapose it with the Christian Gospel but rather to show how its richness serves as a preparatory ground for Christianity. Our interest in studying Mbiti like the rest is in so far as their concerns relate to the focus of this thesis; because as Musopole (1994, 9) has pointed out “Mbiti takes very seriously the African worldview, which is exactly what most missionaries did not.” Secondly, it is because for Mbiti “the dilemma of identity does not only translate into personal and historical terms, but into cosmic terms as well” (Musopole 1994, 13); and lastly because “Mbiti has kept the relation of Gospel and culture at the forefront of his theological task” (Musopole 1994, 17). These three points are focal to this research and makes an understanding of Mbiti an imperative.
Towards the end of his book African Religions and Philosophy Mbiti contends that Christianity has been so old in Africa such that it can rightly be called an indigenous African religion, such that it can also boast of her own martyrs. These martyrs could not have given up their lives for something that was foreign” (1969, 223).
Mbiti refuses to share Idowu’s view of indigenization, since you cannot indigenize what has always been indigenous. He asserts that
To speak of indigenising Christianity is to give the impression that Christianity is a readymade commodity, which has to be transplanted to a local area. Of course, this has been the assumption followed by many missionaries and local theologians. I do not share it anymore” (Mbiti, 1979, 66, in Bediako 1999, 305 – 306).
But if he does not share it anymore it means he has simply grown out of an experience which, if others are allowed the time, they too can outgrow.
Mbiti contends that the Gospel in its essence was existent in pre-Christian Africa. This is revealed in the all inclusiveness of African pre-Christian religious worldview better expressed in African ontology. This ontology has five categories with “God as the ultimate explanation of the genesis and sustenance of both man and all things” (Mbiti, 1989, 15 -16). The next categories in descending order are: the spirits consisting of nonhuman beings and the spirits of men who died long ago, man alive and man unborn, the remainder of biological life, and the inanimate objects (1989, 15). The existence of one presupposes the others and to destroy one is to destroy the whole of existence. It is only by understanding the African concept of time that one can come to grips with how this ontology operates since behind it lies the explanation of beliefs, attitudes, practices and general way of life of Africans(1989, 16).
If I understand rightly it means that this all inclusiveness shows how in the pre-Christian African worldview life revealed the essence of the Gospel. Man is not alone. Man’s horizontal relationship with God is expressed vertically not only with fellow man but with all of creation pervading both the cosmic and the meta-cosmic spheres of existence. That is why when the gospel of Salvation comes to the African it must be all embracing. As such, to save the African will demand that
He must be allowed to bring with him into the body of Christ all his many relatives. African traditional religions are not compartmentalized areas of life; they are incorporated into the whole life of the people. If the ultimate goal of preaching and accepting the Gospel is to transpose allegiance from tribal religions to the Lord Jesus Christ, then the process of transposition should be entire and not partial, radical and not casual (Mbiti, 1968, 337).
We realise the Gospel has relevance only when it allows the pre-existent gospel to find fulfilment in the Gospel and the new is in “turn understood in terms of the aspirations brought from the old.” The difference between the two is that the pre-existent gospel is the African values, which are similar to the essence of the Gospel. This leads us to our next point whether anything good could come out of Africa.
It must be observed that Mbiti’s theological platform is Christian and to be precise Biblical. Mbiti’ interest (and perhaps his emphasis) in African pre-Christian religion is only in so far as it serves as a praeparatio evangelica. It serves as praeparatio evangelica because it failed “to provide a way to restore cosmic harmony” and this Mbiti considers as “a delimma of cosmic proportions” (Musopole 1994, 73). To this end Mbiti asserts that all religions in Africa “are preparatory and even essential ground in the search for the ultimate. But only Christianity has the terrible responsibility of pointing the way to that ultimate Identity, Foundation and source of being” (1969, 271).
Christianity was wrong to officially disregard or even treat African pre-Christian religion as an enemy. As praeparatio evangelica, it was traditional religion which
Laid down the foundation and prepared the ground for the eventual rapid accommodation of Christianity in Africa, and for the present rapid growth of the Church in our continent. Without African religiosity, whatever its defects might be, Christianity would have taken much longer to be understood and accommodated by African peoples (Mbiti, 1973, 86, cf. Bediako, 1999,314).
But since traditional religion was only a preparatory ground, the number of its adherents will dwindle formidably by AD 2000 because they
Will have bequeathed to Christianity some of the riches of African traditional religiosity. As such, Christianity will become an agent of fulfilment in the sense that it will not destroy Traditional Religions as such, but it will have superseded them by bringing into them other dimensions of religion, which they lack and which is not opposed to traditional religiosity. (Mbiti, 1970, 36).
African traditional religions are equally preparatory ground for African theology. Thus African traditional concepts are the resources wherefrom theological reflections ought to be started. There is no via media position in this because “it is within the traditional thought forms and religious concerns that our people live and try to assimilate Christian teaching” (Mbiti, 1973, 52). This is essential because it is this traditional thought forms that colour much of the African’s understanding of the Christian message” (1973, 52). The reference here is however on Christology- which does not make any difference since
The final test for the validity and usefulness of any theological contribution is Jesus Christ. Since His Incarnation Christian theology ought properly to be Christology, for theology falls or stands on how it understands and interprets Jesus Christ, at a given time, place and human situation (Mbiti, 1970, 190).
No doubt any serious theology will require an engagement between Christianity and African religion. This demands that African theologians must seriously ask themselves “to what extent the Christian message as embodied in Christ himself could be seen as the fulfilment of African religiosity” (1970, 189).
The basis for this African theology nonetheless is the Bible “otherwise we shall lose our perspectives and may not claim the outcome to be Christian theology” (1970, 189). The Bible is the Church’s “book of final authority in matters of religion” (1970, 189). The Bible, African religiosity, the theology of the older Churches, and the living experiences of the Church in Africa furnish material for constructing African theology.
As earlier mentioned, theology ought to be Christology. Any African theology, which is not centred on Christ, cannot be termed theology at all. Thus the essence of the Gospel as brought to Africa is Jesus Christ considering that when Jesus Christ comes into any culture He takes what is already there and give it new meaning. Jesus Christ who was Himself not a founder of a religion, brings to Africans “…not a religion, but the life whose quality and full realisation lie in the eternal order (Bediako, 1999, 331).
Mbiti’s project is therefore to Christianize Africa, to Biblicize African theology but above all to “Christologize” African theology and African pre-Christian spirituality. It is here that Mbiti differs with Idowu for to indigenize the Church is to concede that Christianity is a stranger. Mbiti says Christianity has been so old in Africa that it has also become an indigenous religion. Besides, indigenisation presupposes an Africanization of Christianity whereas the essential aim is the Christianization of African religiosity in its entirety.
Mbiti says the African all through had been religiously ready for many centuries so that the sole responsibility of Christianity is
To transpose the existence of this religious man of Africa into the existence brought about by the Gospel of light, by Jesus Christ, so that the entire life of Africa can proclaim Christ as Lord and king. In that road the man of Africa will not have very far to go before he begins to walk on familiar ground (Bediako, 1999, 331).
The only unfamiliar ground for this man of Africa to travel before getting on familiar ground is Jesus Christ who happens to be the only new thing brought by the Gospel. The Gospel’s only significance is that it gave the Africans the opportunity to “utter the name of Jesus Christ… the final and completing element that crowns their religiosity and brings its flickering light to full brilliance.” God in Christ takes us as we are with our relations and our “disrelations” as well; all that we are belonged to Him and must now still belong to Him, as we now understand things differently through Him (Cf. Walls, 2002). Christ demands our all. When he came:
He [Jesus Christ] turned what was a physical life into a sacramental life, and He meant to leave nothing out .He challenged the whole man and all mans activities: he came to reclaim the entire person, the sum total of his activities and aspirations…and in practical terms this means the whole community, the whole society, the whole creation. So, in effect, He came to make man so totally and absolutely religious that no department of man should be left untouched by His Lordship between creature and creator, between man and God, between the child and the heavenly father (Bediako, 1999, 330).