Eschatology in An African Christian

Perspective by

Jean-Marie Hyacinthe Quenum, S.J.

Abstract:

“Eschatology In An African Christian Perspective” is a study that

discusses the Christian tradition of afterlife in the context of African Christian theology

in reverential dialogue with the socio-cultural realities of ancestral cult. In Christianity

as well as in African traditional religions, death is more that the physical end of earthly

life. Death is the end of the earthly history of a member of a human community. For

African traditional religions, death is a transition into another form of life. The spirit of

the dead survives and acquires a superhuman status of ancestor communicating with

the living and helping them in their needs. The evidence of afterlife in Christian

Scripture and Tradition is based on the death and resurrection of Jesus, the true human

in whom shines all Divinity. The afterlife in Christian perspective is the extension of the

resurrection of Jesus to his disciples participating in the divine nature. African Christian

theology advocates for an eschatology of life and solidarity flourishing on earth in a

culture of life and solidarity. The new heaven and the new earth are a re-created world

of life and brotherly solidarity brought about by the return of Christ and the end of

mourning, sorrow and pain.

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Introduction

The Last Things In African Christian PerspectiveJean-Marie Hyacinthe Quenum, S.J.

“The last things”, death, judgment, heaven and hell are dealt

with in eschatology, a discipline of theology concerned with the

individual and collective final destiny of human beings in Judeo-

Christian perspective. Eschatology is about that which is last or

ultimate, the doctrine of the end times which brings the

Christian understanding of the world into the picture of God

loving his creation and sending his Son Jesus Christ to proclaim

the kingdom of God, present and future.

Christian eschatology is the study of the reign of God preached

by Jesus during his public ministry. In Christian eschatology,

human beings are not destined to death but hope in the risen

Christ for the new creation and the end of history. Christians

expect the universal resurrection of the flesh and the general

reconciliation of the creation with God.

In the Old Testament, prophetic eschatology is about the

expectation of an ideal ruler for Israel. For example, the

prophet Isaiah visualized a descendant of the house of David on

whom “the Spirit of the Lord shall rest” (Isa. 11:2).

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In the New Testament, some scholars speak of actualized or

realized eschatology by showing that the promised events of the

Old Testament have already happened, thus playing down the future

element of eschatology.

Individualized eschatology is about the proclaimed word of Jesus

for the existential decisions made by the believer in the face of

his own death whereas futurist eschatology focuses on the

communal and cosmic dimensions of the final destiny of humankind

by stressing the return of Christ, the rapture of the Church and

the end of the wicked world replaced by the golden age of the

glorious Jesus ruling the new earth with his disciples.

African Christian theology must concern itself with the

traditional “last things”, death1, judgment2, the intermediate

state, heaven3 and hell. These religious views on afterlife as

expressed in the inspired words of God are based on Judeo-

Christian faith. The common Christian teaching4 about the final

destiny of human beings must enter into a reverential dialogue

with the traditional and contemporary African cultural ways of

representing life after death.5 What are the enduring values of

Christian teaching about the last things? How do African

Christians appropriate the teaching of Scripture and the

Tradition of the Church about the last things in the context of

their socio-cultural realities? How does the risen Jesus help

present-day African Christians to develop a culture of life-

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giving hope and solidarity for deeper evangelization and integral

development leading to the last wonders of love?

Our theological reflection on the afterlife will provide an

analysis on the last things contained in the Judeo-Christian

Scripture, the living Tradition and the official teaching of the

Church. It hopes to provide insights into the true nature of

Christian hope based on the human and cosmic salvation which is

already present in Jesus’ resurrection using a theological

approach which will emphasize the picture of the true, living and

loving God of the Christian tradition, Father of our Lord Jesus

Christ, who raises the dead by giving them a new life (Mk. 12:

18-27; Matt. 22: 23-33; Lk.20: 27-38).The genuine experience of

this life-giving and caring God is found in the risen Jesus who

loves, forgives, heals and calls for re-birth and sacrifice of

1 Death, the cessation of life and the end of human personal history, isperceived by the Old Testament as a punishment for sin. The New Testamentreinterprets the universal phenomenon of death as “the wages of sin”Rom.6:23). Because of Christ’s death and resurrection, death gained apositive meaning. 2 By dying a person is brought face-to-face with God. The personal destiny ofthe dead is fixed for ever. Theologically, the particular judgment isunderstood as the ratification by God of all the decisions made by the deadfor or against God during the earthly life. 3 Christian tradition understood heaven under the analogy of a city. It is thecity of God as the great king of the whole creation. Heaven is the city of theelect. In this city the saints dwell in single fellowship with one another andwith God. Heaven is body of Christ perfectly united by the Spirit of love. 4 The Letter on “some Current Theological Questions in Eschatology “ by theRoman Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on May 17, 1979 clarified thecommon teaching of the Catholic Church on the last things. 5 The best book I have ever read on the theology of death in AfricanTraditional Religion is Richard Gehman, Who are the Living dead? A Theology of Death, LifeAfter Death and the Living Dead, Evangel Publishing House, Nairobi, 1999.

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life, leading to unlimited happiness in a renewed world of

embodied existence called the kingdom of God. The deepest meaning

of the resurrection of Jesus is the starting point of the

unfailing love of God in action in the physical world of our

human experience. God as the lover of his creation is active in

the Christ-event, reconciling human beings with himself and

inviting them to become created lovers who change the face of the

earth through his Spirit. This infinitely good God wills

everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth

(1Tm 2:4). The field of eschatology will bring home the

distinctive message of the love of Jesus of Nazareth who in his

preaching used apocalyptic patterns of thought for his hearers.

Future-oriented eschatology of life and solidarity will be the

key-concept of the last things in the African Christian

perspective which are determined by the Christ event, leading to

a new creation and restored fellowship with God. They presuppose

that human beings will find completion and fulfillment in God for

whom they have been created for intimate life without

interruption and without end.

1- The Enduring Values Of Christian Teaching About The Last

Things

Death6, a natural occurrence, the finality of earthly human

existence, is an absolute and inescapable fact. “No man has power

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to retain the spirit, or authority over the day of death “(Eccl.

8:8). Human beings cease to function in time and space at their

physical death followed by the release of their spirits from

their bodies and by it they are separated from the living through

death. For the Hebrew Scriptures, death is a penalty for human

beings’ disobedience to God, the source of life: “But of the tree

of knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day

that you eat of it you shall die” (Gen. 2: 17).From Christian

perspective however, death occurred because “sin came into the

world through one man and death through sin, and so death spread

to all men because all men sinned” (Rom .5:12). In

phenomenological terms, death is therefore the loss of the

function of the conscious spirit due to separation. Physical

death, spiritual death7 and second death8 are the ways the

Scripture illustrates the mortal destiny of human beings. As

human existence is finite, the purpose of life with consciousness

has been debated throughout history. People from different

cultures in dealing with death as a universal biological event

came to recognize that human beings are more than physical bodies

involved in the cycle of life under the forces of degeneration

and decay. They don’t die completely and absolutely. There is

written upon human mind and heart the hope for immortality.9

From the Stone Age to the present day, people believe that some

kind of life remains after the corpse grows cold and stiff with

the cessation of brain wave activity. Death is not the

extinction of life: “For I know that my Redeemer lives, and at

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last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been

thus destroyed, then from my flesh I shall see God whom I shall

see on my side , and my eyes shall behold , and not another”

(Job:19:25-27). The Hebrew sheol, the equivalent of the ancient

Greek hades was known as a waiting place where the spirits of the

dead were confined. There were two sections of sheol, the lowest

sheol for the wicked and Abraham’s bosom for the righteous. With

the exceptions of Enoch (Gn. 5:24; Heb.11:5) and Elijah (2 Kgs:

11) who escaped the pains of dying, all human beings die (Ps.

103:15-16). However, The Wisdom of Solomon declared that: “God

created man for incorruption, and made him in the image of his

own eternity” (Wis.2.23). The wise possess an individuated and

indestructible conscious spiritual self that helps them to grow

and to mature as human beings, knowing right and wrong, desiring

a life of happiness beyond them, evaluating, interpreting, and

regulating their life experiences toward loving actions in the

community of humankind.10 The conscious spiritual self enhances

companionship and solidarity within the human community. It

gives to human beings a high level of consciousness for caring,

sharing and self-giving. At death, this conscious spiritual self

departs from the body, enters a conscious existence in the

intermediate state11 and joins God, the collective and universal

consciousness for the vision of the Divine Essence (Ecc.12:6).12

According to Judeo-Christian faith, the conscious spiritual self

is at peace in God’s hand, enjoys the beatific vision and waits

for the renewal of the world and the full establishment of the

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kingdom of God. We learn from the Wisdom of Solomon that: “The

souls of the righteous are in the hand of God, and no torment

will ever touch them. In the eyes of the foolish they seemed to

have died but they are at peace” (Wis. 3: 1-3). The conscious

spiritual self of human beings is immortal and at rest with God.

At the end of history, the wise and righteous dead will shine

forth through their spiritual self embodied in a new physicality

in the renewed world of the kingdom of God. The righteous and

wise dead will rise in glory and join the glorious Jesus and

those who are physically alive for an embodied existence in a

renewed earth (1Thess. 4:13-17). This faith in the resurrection

of the dead developed and becomes explicit in the time of

Maccabees. The daily walk of the people of God loyal to the

covenant was no longer limited to the span of earthly life. Those

who are ferociously persecuted in God’s name at the hands of the

enemies of God, such as Antiochus IV Epiphanes, hope for

unlimited life after death (Rev. 6: 7-11). This hope of life

beyond death is based on the power of God’s love, the God who is

the God of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses and Jesus. In their

tribulations, the martyrs of Israel perceived that true life is

one untouched by death of which God became the foundation.

Unlimited life is a gift of God vindicating the faithfulness of

those who stand for his name in the world. It was expected on

“the Day of the Lord”, Day of Judgment when Yahweh will pour out

his wrath on the enemies of his people, destroying them for ever

(Is. 50:11; 66: 24). This hope for the victory of God over death

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and evil, followed by a golden age, was advocated by the

apocalyptists speaking to their own generation in order to

strengthen and encourage people who were being martyred. The

first great apocalypse, the book of Daniel, presents God as the

Lord of time in control of human history, struggling with the

power of evil and acting for the salvation of his people. His

definitive saving act is in the future, at the end of time, when

there will be total subjection of every reality under his

lordship. “And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth

shall awake, some for everlasting life, and some to shame and

everlasting contempt” (Dan.12:2).

The New Testament message of salvation begins with the

incarnation of the Son of God in creation, the Christ event, and

ends with the new creation on the last day, the day of the return

of Christ, followed by the resurrection of the dead, the general

judgment and the establishment of the kingdom of God on earth (2

Pet 3:13; 1 Cor, 15:52; 1Thess. 4:16). For Christianity, the

divine reality has manifested itself in the cosmic structure

through the Christ-Event. Jesus is supremely significant for

human life and history. Jesus is the love of God incarnate in

human history. By coming to where human beings live, breathe,

eat, work, suffer and die, Jesus discloses the relational

character of God who is faithful to his purpose of love. Jesus

came from God in order to inaugurate the kingdom of God by

revealing the enduring value of love. “The last things”, death,

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judgment, purgatory13, heaven or hell are about the last wonders

of love. They teach human beings in their daily process of dying,

the wisdom to be faithful and to respond intentionally to the

love of God abounding in his created, complex and expanding

universe. As people destined to die, human beings are invited to

love each other by building a secure world community in which

justice; peace, truth, beauty; reconciliation and harmony are

enjoyed. Christianity acknowledges death as a journey toward the

unlimited life promised by God who “does not delight in the death

of the living” (Wis. 1:13). For Christianity, death channels

human beings into the unlimited time of God since Jesus, through

his death and resurrection, is the firstborn of those who are

destined for resurrection. This hope is well articulated by Saint

Paul in his letter to the faithful of Thessalonica: “For if we

believe that Jesus died and rose, so too will God, through Jesus,

bring with him those who have fallen asleep…” (1Thes.4:14, 18).

Therefore human unlimited time begins with death as the gate for

a new birth towards the essence of life. Those who die in Christ

rise with him. Through death, human beings are saved, transformed

and made perfect to share the Trinitarian life to the full,

without end and without boundaries. At death, the believing

primal conscious human self, as a vital principle of the human

being, enters into communion with the God of life through Christ

6 The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Nairobi: St Paul’s Publications, 1994states: “Death is the end of the human’s person’s earthly pilgrimage, of thetime of grace and mercy which God offers him or her as to work out the earthlylife in keeping with the divine plan, and to decide his or her ultimatedestiny”(n. 1012)

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(2 Cor.5:1). Through particular judgment which is the final

separation of good from evil, the evil in human life is

eliminated and the orientation of life toward the good is sealed

(Matt. 13:30). The believing primal human self experiences the

goodness and mercy of God through Christ, the conqueror of death,

and he gains final salvation (1Thes. 5:9). Intermediate state of

salvation is provided for brethren “who are yet being purified

after their death”.14The holy souls in purgatory15 are cleansed,

healed and reintegrated into the communion of God. Those who had

the misfortune of separating themselves voluntarily and

deliberately from the path of salvation by failing to follow

Christ will not be qualified for eternal life( Lk. 16: 19-31) .16

Cut off from the flow of love, the self-condemned souls in the

7 By spiritual death the Scripture means human being’s separation from Godcaused by sin. 8 The second death is mentioned twice in the book of Revelation (Rev. 20:14,21:8). 9 Human beings have been created in the image and likeness of God. Theirprofound desire is to live always in communion with God (Ps. 16; 49 and 73). 10 In Greek philosophy the spiritual self is called soul. When a human persondies, the body disintegrates and the soul returns to its eternal realm offorms. This philosophical theory is called the immortality of the soul. Inthis theory there is a biological death of the human person but there is nototal death as the soul survives. 11 The intermediate state is a term which stands for the state of existenceduring the time between a person’s physical death and the moment of hisresurrection at the Second Coming of Christ. Some nineteenth –century Anglicantheologians preferred to call “the state of purgatory” a process by which theHoly souls are cleansed and made fit for their union with God. It is a processof sanctification whereby holy souls are conformed to Christ. 12 The International Theological Commission has affirmed the doctrine of theimmortality of the soul ”The survival of a conscious soul prior to theresurrection safeguards the continuity and identity of subsistence between theperson who lived and the person who will rise , inasmuch as in virtue of sucha survival the concrete individual never totally ceases to exist” ( SomeCurrent Theological Questions in Eschatology,” 221)

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lowest sheol are deprived of joy and happiness of heaven until

the final judgment. Heaven is God’s dimension where the risen

Jesus lives. Wherever, Jesus lives is heaven (Mk. 16:19; Ac. 1:9

-11; Eph. 4:10; Heb.4:14). Heaven is the symbolic representation

of the mystery of God who is above all realities. Heaven is the

family of God, the Body of Christ, the communion of the elect

gathered in unity by the Spirit of love. It is a glorious state

attained through discipleship for those who have attained the

likeness of Christ. In heaven the people of God enjoy eternal

life, peace, holiness, immortality and incorruptibility. They

sing praises to God, their Father, and to Jesus, their brother

and the Spirit unites them in rejoicing worship. Heaven is the

goal of Christian discipleship. It is the state or capacity for

increasing and selfless love. Righteous people who step into

eternity after death have the beatific vision of God (1Jn.3:2).

They enjoy in fellowship the full, lasting, complete and eternal

life. They share the Master’s joy (Mt 25:23). Heaven is the

experience of the absolute as eternalized beings. Life

everlasting is experienced in union with God who satisfies

perfectly human hope of true happiness. Heaven is a dimension

where the followers of Jesus, the conqueror of the mystery of

death, experience the unutterable glory of God. According to the

teaching of Pope Benedict XII in 1336, against his immediate

predecessor John XXII17, the beatific vision of God by the saints

is immediate even “before the resurrection of their bodies and

the general judgment.” 18 The Catechism of the Catholic Church stresses

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the theocentric vision for the clean of heart (Mt. 5:8). If a

human person dies, will he live again?” is a fundamental question

for individualized eschatology.19 The evangelist John presents

the astonishing claim that there is life after death. Jesus,

talking with Martha about the death of Lazarus, her brother,

declared: “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in

me, though he die, yet shall he live, and whoever lives and

believes in me shall never die”(Jn. 11:25-26). For those who have

absolute trust in the word of Christian Scripture, life after

death is a concrete reality promised as a hope that strengthens

human life as a journey of faith toward the heavenly city of God

( 1 Jn.3:2). Jesus Christ has conquered physical death through

his own resurrection from the dead. His spirit was reunited with

his transformed body at the first Christian Easter and he is

alive for ever. The resurrection of the dead is the extension to

human beings of the resurrection of Christ. Jesus, during his

public life, taught the last things, death, judgment, hell and

heaven. (Lk. 12:20; Lk. 16:22; Matt. 7: 13-14; Matt.25:41, 46;

Matt.10:28). He announced the inauguration of the kingdom of God

in the perspective of apocalyptic hope. He warned his hearers to

repent, to read the signs of the time and to enter the kingdom of

God. For Jesus, the kingdom of God is a world transforming time

in which the will of God will be done as it is in heaven. God

will be recognized as king of the whole creation. It will be a

time in which the Spirit of God will be given to the disciples of

Jesus to build up an eschatological community. The life of Jesus

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is the foundation of this community where, Jesus, the holy and

absolutely perfect Son of God, is remembered as the lowly Man for

Others, the gracious and social Man for God and the poor and

humble servant who forgives sins, heals people and teaches with

authority the way to the kingdom of God. Unlike the

apocalypticians of his time, Jesus did not give any detailed

picture of the coming of the kingdom “but of that day or that

hour no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son,

but only the Father” (Mk. 13:32). The resurrection of the

crucified Jesus marked the beginning of the fulfillment of the

last things. The Holy Spirit was given to the disciples to

witness to the divine intervention of God in the lives of the

early Christians. The Church as eschatological community and

sacrament of the risen Lord is the school of discipleship that

prepares the followers of Christ for the fullness of salvation

attained when people die in Christ and rise to eternal life.

Those who die in Christ form the mystical body of Christ. They

share fully Jesus’ filial relationship with the Father (Jn.

14:3).The risen Christ as the mediator of human communion with

God is the brother of all who die in him. All who die in Christ

receive the vision of God. They look for the glorious

manifestation of the Lord Jesus Christ (Dei Verbum 1, 4). Saint

Irenaeus gives a glimpse of the timeless dimension of the

glorious vision of God.

Just as those who see light are in the light and share in

its splendor, so those who see God are in God and share in

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his splendor. The splendor of God is life-giving. So those

who see God will share in life. Such is why the

imperceptible, incomprehensible, and invisible God let

himself be seen, understood and perceived by human beings:

in order to give life to those who perceive and see him.

For, if his grandeur is inscrutable, his goodness is also

inexpressible, and it is thanks to this that he lets himself

be seen and that he gives life to those who see him. For it

is impossible to live without life, and there is no other

life except through participation in God, and this

participation in God consists in seeing him and rejoicing in

his goodness. Thus human beings see God in order to live,

becoming immortal by this vision and reaching up to God… The

glory of God is a living human being and the life of a human

being is the vision of God. If the revelation of God through

creatures already gives life to all that lives, how much

more will the manifestation of the Father through the Word

give life to those who see God.20

How do African Christians appropriate the teaching of Scripture

and the Tradition of the Church about the last things in the

context of their socio-cultural realities?

2- Eschatology In The Light Of African Socio-Cultural Realities

Jesus of Nazareth, the founder of the Christian faith, known

as the risen Lord of human history is present in sub-Saharan

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Africa as the author of eternal salvation.21The Mystery of

Christ is celebrated in the sacramental life of the Christian

communities. Through the proclamation of the Gospel of God by

Christian missionaries, salvation has come to Sub-Saharan

Africa. As the story is told, the history and person of Jesus

presented by believing preachers build up the faith and the

life of the Christian communities in the diverse settings of

the continent. The critical task of our theological reflection

at this stage is to interpret how African Christians are

experiencing the last things in terms of Jesus’ call to a new

life of faith. Sub-Saharan Africans believe in the living

dead.22 According to African anthropology23, the spirit which

continues to live after the body dies constitutes the dead

person into a living dead.24 For most Africans, death is not

the absolute end of human existence but a transition into

another form of life.25 Those who die in advanced age, with

long human experience, faithful to the customs of their

families and lineages, are assured by the elaborate mourning

and burial ceremonies of gaining superhuman sacred status by

becoming ancestral spirits to be venerated for at least five

generations by their relatives. The living dead continue to

live in the spirit world as senior elders of the living

elders. They interact and communicate with the earthly members

of their communities as their guardian ancestors and heads of

their lineages through rites and ceremonies. Believed to be

near God, ancestors acquire spiritual power to enhance the

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life of their communities. Ancestors act as role models for

their relatives since they have led a good moral life by

keeping the customs and traditional laws of their communities.

Ancestor cult in African traditional religion is rooted in the

belief in life after death. Living on in the spirit world, the

ancestors in their final invisible form of life help the

members of their communities in their needs. From their

ancestral household, the living dead are the guarantors of

traditional ways of living. They look after their communities

by providing a good harvest, increase in cattle and successful

human reproduction. As mediators between the living and the

supreme God, the ancestors are the channels by which the

prayers of their loved ones reach God who is perceived as

closer to them.26 The living dead are not seen in time and

space, but they make their presence felt through dreams,

visions, spirit possessions and the signs they send to the

living. The living dead have the authority to bring harmony,

peace and reconciliation in their communities. They expect

reverential obedience from their loved ones. The living have a

duty of remembering and honoring their ancestors through

regular sacred communication consisting of greetings, prayers,

food offerings, libations, sacrifices and special ceremonies.

The socio-cultural reality of the ancestral cult points to the

belief in life after death. It creates a sense of communion

between the living, the unborn, and the living dead. By giving

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more attention to their living dead, Africans overcome the

irreversible change brought about by the death of a human

person. When a human person dies, the body through which the

deceased used to interact and communicate is lifeless. The

fellowship with the living is broken by the radical separation

of the spirit from the body. The ancestral cult successfully

14 The Council Vatican II, in the Constitution on the Church, n. 51confirmedthe traditional doctrine of purgatory promulgated in preceding councils: NiceaII (787), Florence (1438-45), Second Council of Lyons (1274) and Trent (1545-63). 15 Purgatory is an official and defined teaching of the Catholic Church. It isa post-death process of purification. The Holy souls of purgatory atone andsatisfy their offenses against God and neighbor. Prayers, funeral rites,religious acts and masses of the living could be offered for the purificationof the holy souls of purgatory. The scriptural evidence for the practice ofoffering prayers and good works for the dead is found in 2 Macc. 12: 39-46.Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria and Origen have developed the theologicaltradition of post-death purification. Dante Alighieri in his Divina Commediadeveloped poetically the idea of purgatory as a period of spiritual healingand growth. Also St Catherine of Genoa who says purgatory is something wedesire.13 “The Catholic Church, instructed by the Holy Spirit and in accordance withsacred Scripture and the ancient Tradition of the Fathers, has taught in theholy councils and most recently in this ecumenical council that there is apurgatory and that the souls detained there are helped by the acts ofintercession (suffragia) of the faithful, and especially by the acceptablesacrifice of the altar. Therefore this holy council commands the bishops tostrive diligently that the sound doctrine of purgatory, handed down by theHoly Fathers and the sacred councils, be believed by the faithful and that itbe adhered to, taught and preached everywhere. But let the more difficult andsubtle questions which do not make for edification and, for the most part, arenot conductive to an increase of piety, be excluded from the popular sermonsto uneducated people. Likewise they should not permit opinions that aredoubtful and tainted with error to be spread and exposed. As for those thingsthat belong to the realm of curiosity or superstition, or smack ofdishonorable gain, they should forbid them as scandalous and injurious to thefaithful” A passage from the Council of Trent on purgatory in 1563 (ChristianFaith, 687). 16 God has created human beings for his glory alone. The sinner in the OldTestament is the one who is unfaithful to the covenant made by God with hispeople. In the New Testament, the sinner is the one who opposes himself to Godin Christ. Sin is a rebellion against Christ. The conversion of heart is

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re-creates the link by acknowledging the fact of the survival

of their spirits. The bodies of the ancestors die and return

to dust but the personalities they have developed remain

helpful for their communities. From the household of

ancestors, the spirits of the deceased acquire more spiritual

power to help their kin on earth. Through sacred

communication, the relatives of the ancestors express their

love and their needs hoping to experience the benevolence of

their living dead. This ancestral belief in the survival of

the spirits of good and virtuous members of their communities

prepares the way for the good news of Christian resurrection.

The resurrection of the body, typified by the resurrection of

Jesus, is the cause of life of the beloved Son of God raised

by the Father (1Cor.15:4). If Christ Jesus, the first to rise

is the cause of life, “the first fruits of those who have died”

only in him are African ancestors brought to life through the

creative power of God. The body is what gives human beings

personal existence. It is by the body that human beings

communicate and interact in time and space. At death, the

connection of the body with the physical world is broken. In

Christian perspective only God by the power of his Spirit can

recreate a new link to the past physical existence through the

gift of the glorious body, the one of the resurrected Christ.

required for the sinner (Jas.1: 19). . 17 John XXII had preached in a series of sermons to the people of Avignon in1331 and 1332 that the souls of the righteous had to wait until the generalresurrection to enjoy the beatific vision. 19 Beyond Death: Theological and Philosophical Reflections on Life after Death edited by Dan Cohn-Sherbok and Christopher Lewis, Palgrave- MacMillan, 1995.

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God alone can bring back the dead in line with Christian

revelation. God alone rightfully deserves the spiritual

contact of his children in prayer and fellowship. The

ancestral cult is a complex socio-cultural reality dealing

with the radical separation brought about by the death of a

loved one in African traditional society where physical death

is overcome by venerating the loved ones who have ceased to

exist in time and space. This cultural practice raises the

issue of how African Christians can appropriate the teaching

of the Scripture read in Catholic tradition about the last

things. The meaning of life beyond death as good news of

integral salvation must, in my opinion, help African

Christians in their missionary activities. Human beings are

more than physical bodies. The belief in life beyond death

has the therapeutic power to transform the human attitudes

toward death and the purpose of life. The unknown state of the

last things outside human experience threatens the dying

person, and even the believer is apprehensive about death, the

final event of human life. African Christians in their

missionary activities have the duty to tell their fellow

humans why they exist and where they go at the end of their

bodily existence.

As a common human experience, death as exit from bodily

existence is a journey toward a new kind of a fuller

20 Irenaeus of Lyons, Against the Heresies, trans. D.J. Unger (New York: Paulist,1992)6:33.

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existence. At death the human body dies and very soon

disintegrates. But made in the image of God, human beings as

self-conscious beings have something distinct from the body

which survives at death. This something is the self, the

person each human being has become during the earthly

pilgrimage. This self-consciousness continues to exist without

the body. The self-consciousness which survives after the

death of the body is the personality each human being has

become in the sight of God, the permanent Existent. Christian

hope for a fuller existence after death is based on the

resurrection of Jesus. The resurrection of Jesus is the

Christian evidence for life beyond death. In the early years

of the first century C.E., a Jewish prophet of Galilee, Jesus

of Nazareth, was crucified under the jurisdiction of Pontius

Pilate. His disciples claimed within a few weeks, that he has

risen from the dead and they had seen him. Seen alive after

his death, in bodily form, the risen Jesus became the hope for

life after death.

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also

received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with

the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on

the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he

appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to

more than five hundred brethren at one time, most of whom

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are still alive, though some have fallen asleep”(1 Cor.15:3-

6).

“To them he presented himself alive after his passion by many

proofs, appearing to them during forty days, and speaking of the

kingdom of God” (Ac.1:3). The disciples of Jesus who were

disappointed and depressed after Jesus’ crucifixion are

transformed by their encounter with the risen Jesus. They began

to preach the resurrection of Jesus as the heart of their gospel

of hope. They suffered persecution and martyrdom for their faith.

Christian salvation is linked with the resurrection of Jesus

(Rom. 10: 9). “Everyone who looks to the Son and believes in him

shall have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day”

(Jn.6:40).

“The time of ignorance God overlooked , but now he commands all

men everywhere to repent, because he has fixed a day on which he

will judge the world in righteousness by a man whom he has

appointed , and of this he has given assurance to all men by

raising him from the dead”(Ac. 17:30-31). By repenting and by

believing in the risen Jesus who is the judge of the whole world,

African Christians who believe in their living dead will find in

him the true savior and true descendant of God the Father, the

original ancestor of humankind.

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3- From The Living Dead To The Risen Jesus, The Head Of The New

Family of God

Sub-Saharan Africans are fond of their living dead, the focus of

their devotion.27 The living dead have shared the life of their

communities and, having being promoted after their death to the

state of ancestral spirits, they are able to empathize with the

needs of their loved ones. Traditional Africans come to God

through the living dead, the heroes of yesterday who today guide

their people in their daily struggles for a better future. They

intercede for the living left behind. Ancestral spirits are the

18 “Since the passion and death of our Lord Jesus Christ, they have seen andsee the divine essence in an intuitive vision and even face to face, withoutthe mediation of any creature as the object of vision. The divine essencerather manifests itself to them nakedly, clearly and openly, and by thisvision they delight in this same essence. By this vision and this delight, thesouls of those who are already dead are truly blessed and possess life andeternal rest. The souls of those who will die later will see this divineessence and will delight in it before the general judgment. Such a vision andsuch a delight in the divine essence make acts of faith and hope disappear inthese souls, faith and hope being properly theological virtues. In addition ,such an intuitive face-to face vision and this same delight have continued,and will continue without interruption , until the last judgment, and , fromthere, forever” Benedict XII , ( Constitution Benedictus Deus, January 29,1336)21 Nyamiti Charles, African Tradition and the Christian God, Spearhead N. 49, Eldoret:Gaba Publications, 1976. 22 The concept of the living dead was elaborated by John Mbiti in his book:New Testament Eschatology in an African Background. London: Oxford University Press,1971. 23 Shorter, Alyward, African Culture: An Overview, Socio-Cultural Anthropology, Nairobi:Paulines Publications, Africa, 1998. 24 Charles Nyamiti in Studies in African Christian Theology, volume .1 and volume.2,Nairobi CUEA 2005 and 2006 has elaborated a systematic ancestral theology thatpromotes the concept of the living dead. 25 Mbiti, S. John, African Religion and Philosophy, Nairobi: East Africa EducationalPublishers, 1969. 26 Mbiti S. John, The Prayers of African Religion, Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books,1975.

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human face of God for Africans. They prefigure the saving

presence and love of God in terms of family relationships. In

African traditional spirituality, ancestral spirits were made to

reflect God the Father, the original ancestor of humankind. Jesus

of Nazareth is truly the first descendant of God the Father.

He is the image of the invisible God, the first born of all

creation, for in him all things were created, in heaven and

on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or

dominations or principalities or authorities – all things

were created through him and for him. He is before all

things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head

of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the first-born

from the dead that in everything he might be pre-eminent.

For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and

through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on

earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross.

(Col. 1:15-20)

Jesus, the Logos incarnate, the self-expression of God is the

same living dead raised by the Father to save the world and to

bring cleansing, wholeness and healing. As God-man and Redeemer,

Jesus, through his death and resurrection, draws the human family

to himself through the Church, his mystical body. Through Jesus

is channeled the cleansing and healing love that make us whole.

As brother-Ancestor, Jesus is the author of eternal salvation

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sharing with the human family his divine sonship, having nailed

on the cross the curse on Adam’s descendants. Source of blessings

for African Christians, Jesus, the Brother–Ancestor is alive, and

those who believe in his resurrection can have a personal

relationship with him. In him a new world of the kingdom of God

is open pointing to the victory of God over death. “Fear not, I

am the first and the last, and the living one; I died, and behold

I am alive for evermore, and I have the keys of Death and Hades”

(Rev.1:17-18). Those weeping in the refugee camps, crushed by the

tyranny of bad governance, exposed to the AIDS pandemic and

dehumanized by poverty, ignorance and negative ethnicity hope for

new heaven and a new earth. In the new world of the kingdom of

God

“The dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them,

and they shall be his people, and God himself will be with

them; he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and

death shall not be more, neither shall there be mourning nor

crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed

away”(Rev. 21: 3-4).

The re-creation of the world starts with the resurrection of

Jesus, the lion of Judah and the sacrificial lamb. The living

personal presence of God in the risen Jesus takes away death,

tears, sorrows and pain. This vision of the future which dawned

on Easter morning is the Christian message of hope. God in his

continuous work of creation and reconciliation will bring to

consummation the renewed earth by raising both righteous and

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unrighteous dead for final judgment. God in his goodness has

prepared for those who love him “What no eyes has seen, nor ear

heard nor the heart of man conceived” (1Cor.2:9). African

eschatology may be defined as the historical and cosmological

dimensions of Christian hope which brings the living dead in

communion with the Holy Trinity. It is an expectation of the

personal, social and political transformations of the human

environment by the living dead, united in solidarity with the

living and unborn. The living dead are the virtuous members of

Sub-Saharan communities who continue to impact their communities

through sacred communication. Those living dead are the human

faces of God for us. They imitate God, the original ancestor of

humankind in his love for his creatures. Jesus, the first real

living dead and the first descendant of the original ancestor, is

the universal brother-ancestor who came on earth to bring the

love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit in the midst of

human suffering so that the people of God may experience the

fullness of life through his sacrificial death, resurrection and

ascension. In our contemporary African societies the last

things, death, judgment, purgatory, heaven and hell point to the

practice of the love of Jesus Christ through discipleship,

leading to an authentic culture of life. The practice of the love

of Jesus Christ through discipleship is based on a personal

encounter with the risen Jesus. This relationship with the risen

Jesus opens the way to a self-sacrificial lifestyle. By taking up

27 Shorter Alyward, Prayer in the Religious Traditions of Africa, Nairobi: OxfordUniversity Press, 1975.

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the cross of daily life and by dying to self, African Christian

disciples of the risen Jesus hope to build a fellowship of love

flourishing in a culture of life which promotes respect for human

dignity, family relationships, responsibility, conviviality,

cooperation, mutuality and solidarity. The basis and structure of

human existence in sub-Saharan equatorial Africa is solidarity

between the living dead, the unborn, the disabled, the elderly

and the active members of human communities working together for

the transformation of their physical, social and spiritual

environment. By willing the good of others and by being merciful

to each other, African Christians are called to be creative by

raising the standard of living of all in their societies through

good governance, social justice, sustainable human ecology and

democracy. By liberating the poor from their dehumanizing

situations, African Christians witness for a culture of life that

makes each individual aware of belonging to the whole human

family as brothers and sisters to all others. Eschatology in

African Christian perspective is the new earth where the children

of God live in communion with each other in God. The kingdom of

God is the solidarity of the whole creation with God.

Concluding Reflections

The followers of Jesus are promised that they will rise in glory.

The last things are about the fulfillment of God’s promise of the

restoration of the earth in his kingdom. The nation of Israel,

the world and the righteous dead are involved in this process of

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renewal since the stupendous proclamation by the early Christians

of the bodily resurrection of Jesus. Physically alive in God’s

dimension, the risen Jesus is the hope for the bodily

resurrection of the righteous dead who rest in God’s hand and

wait for their ultimate destination: the renewed earth

transformed into the kingdom of God. This newly embodied life on

a renewed earth implies a new personal life through discipleship

leading to acts of justice, compassion and self-sacrificial love.

African traditional people who believe in the living dead

interacting with their earthly relatives are called to put their

trust in God the ancestor of the human family who has sent his

first descendant, the Logos, incarnate on earth to bring

cleansing, wholeness and healing. The crucified Jesus risen from

the dead by the power of God the Father, is the ancestor of

human family, the brother-ancestor who shares his divine sonship

with the sons and daughters of Adam redeemed by his sacrificial

love on the cross. All who are redeemed by the Lamb, the Lion of

Judah are promised a resurrected existence in new heaven and new

earth. As human persons exist in relation to other persons and

the world through the body, the resurrection of the body promised

by the New Testament rather than African immortality as ancestral

spirits is the way human beings are brought into Godhood. By

being in Christ, those who die in Christ as followers of Jesus

share the very life of the God-man in whom Humanhood and Godhood

converge. The Spirit of God purifies the followers of Jesus and

raises them up to the life of God.28They enter the kingdom of

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God, a community of believers united to the Holy Trinity and with

each other through love.

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28 Saint Irenaeus, Adv. Haer., IV, IX, 2.

Author’s name: Jean-Marie Hyacinthe Quenum, S.J.

Brief biographical information: Jean-Marie Hyacinthe Quenum is

the Academic Dean of Hekima College, a constituent College of The

Catholic University of Eastern Africa in Nairobi (Kenya). He is

the Dean of the Jesuit School of theology of Hekima College and

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he has a doctorate in dogmatic theology. He is a specialist in

the area of Eschatology and Sacramental theology.

Title of the Article: “Eschatology In An African Christian

Perspective”

Permanent postal address:

Jean-Marie Hyacinthe Quenum, S.J. Hekima College A Constituent College of The Catholic University of EasternAfrica Joseph Kangethe Road, Off Ngong Road P O Box 2121500505 Ngong Road Nairobi, Kenya

E-mail address: quenum_jm@yahoo.com

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