THE LOCUS OF UBUNTU WITHIN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH IN AFRICA

By Mfuniselwa J. Bhengu (PhD)

Founder and Director: Africa Institute of Ntu-ology An Author, Independent Scholar and Self-Publisher

Introduction

This paper seeks to locate the nexus between Ubuntu and the

Christian church, and differences between the two. In doing

this I will start by looking at the historical evolution of

the Christian Church, and the origin and meanings of Ubuntu,

then develop constitutive rules of both concepts. The outcome

will be a recommendation for a fusion of Ubuntu values with

the Christian Church values.

The Rise of Ancient Christianity

During the entire antiquity, Africa, Asia, and the Middle East

were more advanced in science, technology, philosophical

thought, and literature, than Europe, particularly Western

Europe. The anomaly of the Roman Empire is that its head, the

city of Rome, was, on its own, backward, but was ruling over

vast colonies in Africa and the Middle East which were more

developed than Rome herself.

The struggle against Roman despotism, against slavery and

impoverishment, in Africa and the Middle East, took, among

others, religious forms, giving rise to many religious sects

seeking and preaching salvation from existing misery,

oppression, cruelty, and torment. Christianity was one of

these religious sects, which emerged originally as a reform

movement within Judaism. There was intense struggle and

competition among these sects. It was amidst this intense

struggle that the followers of “Christ” were cast out and

banned from preaching in Jewish temples, and the leaders left

the Temple and took the path of converting Gentiles (Enslin et

al 1938; Morton et al, 1956; Parkes, 1969).

It was from these origins in Africa and the Middle East, that

the new religion of “Christians” came into Europe.

Christianity was brought into Europe by Africans and the

Middle Easterners. The noted Oxford historian, Hugh Trevor-

Roper, wrote: “Like so much in the Roman Empire, their model

is not Italian, not even European, but eastern…We naturally

think of the Empire founded by Augustus as the Roman Empire.

It was Roman arms which conquered it; the Caesars, who founded

its institutions, were Roman; and Rome was its capital. But in

fact Rome was not its natural centre of gravity. The wealth

which sustained it came largely from Asia and Africa. Africa

supplied the city of Rome with two-thirds of its corn. It was

the conquest of Egypt which enabled Augustus to establish the

Empire. The great school of technology, the great library of

learning were in Alexandria. The great westerners –Tertullian,

Apuleius, Augustine- came from Africa” (Trevor-Roper, 1965).

The Early Fathers of the Church, who established Latin prose as the

language of the Catholic Church, were Africans.

Dawson (1950) tells us that: “…it was through monasticism that

religion exercised a direct formative influence on the whole

cultural development of these centuries.” The Monastic

Movement, which resulted in the founding of monasteries all

over Europe, originated in Africa.

The Monastic Movement was the cell out of which emerged the

new Western Culture which became dominant between the fall of

the Roman Empire and the end of the Middle Ages: “It was born

in the African desert as a protest against the whole tradition

of the classical culture of the Greek and the Roman world. It

stood for the absolute renunciation of everything the ancient

world had prized –not only pleasure and wealth and honour, but

family life and citizenship and society. The fame and

influence of the new movement reached their height at the very

moment when Rome was falling a victim to the barbarians. It

was in that generation that leaders of Roman society made

their pilgrimages to the Egyptian and Syrian deserts and

initiated a literary propaganda in favour of the new movement

which had enormous success throughout the Latin West and the

Byzantine East” (Dawson, 1950).

What is also a marked feature of Christianity, what is

decisive in its orientation and philosophy, is its

individualism: as opposed to collectivist tribal/kinship-based

communities, where safety, protection, and nourishment were

for the entire family or community, salvation in Christianity

is for the individual. It targeted the single individuals who

had been splattered and thrown helpless and lost on the floor,

grounds, valleys and streets, as the Shell of the egg holding

the human community cracked and broke, throwing its contents

scattered hither and thither. Even when believers, as a

multitude, are gathered together in a hall, or under a tree,

or inside a large tent, the message is still to the single

individual, who, in turn, responds as an individual, and makes

a commitment to the Savior, or to God, as an individual.

Christianity arose amidst the disintegration of the human

community; its struggle and aim was not to restore the human

community; it struggled and aimed at picking up, comforting,

nourishing, and saving, the broken pieces of the community

(Weber, 1964).

The Triumph of Christianity in Africa.

As stated above, Christianity did not originate in Europe;

that the earliest Christian communities were in the Middle

East and in Africa, and that, in fact, it was Africans and

Middle Easterners who brought Christianity to Europe. The key

Early Fathers of the Church were all Africans; and the

Monastic Movement, which played the most crucial part in

spreading Christianity in the West, was of African origin.

The Middle East and a large part of North Africa were part of

the Roman Empire; these regions were very advanced

economically, technologically, scientifically, and culturally,

compared to the city of Rome and to the European regions of

the Empire. Christianity in the Middle East and North Africa

was one of the religions that emerged as a by-product of the

liberation struggle of these regions against Roman domination

and colonialism. The most vibrant Christian community during

the days of the Roman Empire was in North Africa, in Egypt and

Tunisia (Frend, 1952; Augustine of Hippo, 1967; Brown, 1971).

Indeed, North Africa, particularly Alexandria, remained for

centuries the site of the most daring, incisive, original

thinking in Christianity and Judaism.

It was the rise and triumph of Islam, in the 7th-8th centuries,

A. D., which wiped Christianity and Judaism off the map of

North Africa. Christianity then became confined to Europe.

With European colonialism over Africa, Christianity was then

re-introduced into Africa by Europeans. Christianity now

appears as a European religion ---Alas! It was Christianity

that came to Africa heavily laden with, and shaped by,

European racism and poison against Africa, African culture,

and African people.

What is it that enabled Christianity to strike root and

triumph in South Africa?

First, we must be clear about the fact that African

communities and societies in what is now South Africa had

their own philosophy of life, within which were contained

their religious beliefs and practices. Almost all these

communities/societies were still organized around

Tribal/Family ties. The State was still at an elementary stage

of development; this elementary State structure was still a

mere extension of the tribal/family principle which regulated

relations and the structure of the Community. The political

head did not yet have the power and authority to over-rule, or

cancel out, the Gentile/Tribal/Family principle.

Medicine in pre-industrial societies was part and parcel of

the religious beliefs of society. Medicine, religion, and

political power in pre-industrial society were interrelated

components of one package. That is the reason, then, that

Europeans were not content with only conquering and destroying

the African State; they had to simultaneously begin a vicious

war to destroy African religion, and, most viciously still, to

destroy African medicine. African medicine was declared to be

Witchcraft, and one of the first acts of legislation

prohibited, made criminal, the practice of `Witchcraft’.

African medicine and African religion were the twin pillars of

the African State. European power over Africans could not be

secure without the simultaneous destruction of the African

State, African medicine, and African religion.

What was the major historical event which prepared the ground

for the entrance and triumph of Christianity in South Africa?

The major historical force was the conquest of the African

kingdoms by Europe as an imperialist and colonizing force.

What we are talking about here is the loss of independence,

dignity, and self-rule, by the African people within those

kingdoms. Independence, dignity, and self-rule are the most

important components of the feeling of well-being in a

community/society, the loss of which is soon followed by the

loss of control over the land, livestock, rivers, forests and

other economic resources.

When members of a community/society lose their independence,

their self-rule, and their dignity, they become stripped

naked, spiritually, psychologically and mentally. It is here

that the full truth of “You cannot live by bread alone” is

revealed.

Independence, self-rule, and dignity, the pillars of which are

the Elders within the family and community, the age-grade

system, the traditional political system, and the monarchic

leader of the State (Ubukhosi), which contained, protected,

nourished, and enriched, the members of the community, much as

the shell of the egg contains, protects, nourishes, and

enriches the contents of the egg.

The conquest of the African kingdoms by European governments,

the conquest of African kingdoms within what now is South

Africa, had the impact of a major, piercing trauma in the

psyche and mind of African people –and trauma it was indeed,

in the psychiatric sense, and remains trauma, indeed, up to

our time. This was the case particularly in those regions,

such as KwaZulu, where the State had reached a high level of

development and crystallization.

The Breaking down of the Shell

The Shell holding African people together, spiritually,

mentally, socially, economically, politically, and culturally,

was broken and shattered by European conquest. This had the

force comparable in its impact on the psyche and mind to the

shattering of the mind and psyche of ancient Romans by the

invasion of the Barbarians.

The mind and psyche of many African people were stripped of

all sense of spiritual security and comfort, their world was

turned upside down, the world they occupied seemed very

disjointed, seemed very doubtful as a real home for them. Much

as it happened to ancient Romans, a longing arose within these

Africans for another and better world.

Still, Christianity did not conquer all of Africa, and not all

of South Africa. A large part of Africa was conquered by

Islam. A large segment of the African population still follows

and practices traditional African religion. Here in South

Africa, Christianity is still not followed and practiced by

the majority of African people. There is still the distinction

of “Amakholwa” as a distinct segment of the population of the

country, coexisting with another segment which is not

Christian. (Vilakazi, 1965; also Vilakazi, Mthethwa, Mpanza,

Shembe, 1986)

Missionary enterprises in Zululand were intense but

conspicuous for its lack of success. The Africans living on

the mission stations were usually brought into the kingdom

from other communities by the missionaries who found it

extremely difficult to change the Zulus from their ways of

life” (Guy, 1982). It was the new elite of African society who

were immediately Christian, those who had gone through the

socialization and educational process in Christian Mission

schools inside the country as well as abroad.

If the truth be told, Christian missionaries were part of the

baggage that came into African society with European conquest.

If, originally, they did not carry arms and fire against

Africans, as soldiers in the battlefield, and the commanders

of the army, did, they were in homesteads as the wives of the

soldiers and commanders who did the killing and maiming of

Africans: the wives did not directly do the killing, they may

even have complained about the cruelty and sin committed, they

may even have bandaged, hidden, and comforted the wounded

Africans, as many wives did, but they bore a moral

responsibility for the crime. (DuBois, 1909; Majeke, 1952).

The White Colonial Christian Church

The situation of “dual power”, the colonial State, on one

side, and the Church, on the other, also existed in the

colonies, as it existed in Europe after the fall of the Roman

Empire. As an institution, the Christian Church was, indeed,

part of the baggage that came with European conquest and

colonialism. Christian missionaries were, indeed, members of

European Christian civilization. However, as colonialism

became consolidated, the position of the Christian clergy

became ambivalent. The clergy were divided.

Yet some individual Christian clergy opposed segregation,

waged a struggle against it, and some lost their lives in the

struggle. The clergy in the Middle Ages were divided between

the High clergy, on one hand, linked to the feudal powers, and

the lower clergy, on the other hand, linked to the oppressed

serfs below. Indeed, the lower clergy often played a

significant role in the leadership of the revolutionary

uprisings of the Middle Ages, almost all of which were rural

revolts.

It was the same in the colonies. While the Church, as an

organization, was largely conservative, there were individual

Christian clergy who indirectly or directly supported the

struggle against colonialism and racism. As in the case of

revolutionary priests in Latin America, who took up arms and

joined the revolutionary struggle, so there were individual

European Christian clergy who supported the revolutionary

struggle, and some who actually fought arms in hand. The

climax of this split of the Christian Church, of the Church

with two heads and two hearts, was the great debate within the

Church as an organization, which led to the decision of the

World Council of Churches to support the armed struggle in

South Africa (Brown, 1971)

Christianity had power behind it: the new White colonial state

was Christian; the new White-controlled economy was managed by

Christians; schools, high schools, tertiary institutions were

managed by Christians; the Judiciary and Police, who enforced

and protected the new social order, were Christian. The

African elite were Christian.

Christianity during and after colonial times did not transform

the entirety of African society; it did not change the “fibre”

of African society. It merely created the `modernized’ part of

South Africa. It changed official South Africa; it changed

urban South Africa; it changed the institutional

infrastructure of White-ruled South Africa, including those

institutions in the country managed by the African elite.

Christian civilization within South Africa is reminiscent of

classical civilization of antiquity –and the pattern remains

the same until the triumph of capitalist industrial society in

the 19th century. One historian has written: “One should always

remember that classical civilization was the civilization of a

fragile veneer: only one man in ten lived in a civilized town”

(Brown, 1971)

Up to 1994, the greater bulk of the African population,

remained rural, underdeveloped, poor, non-industrial,

`functionally illiterate,’ and non-Christian. That is the

reason that ordinary African people in rural South Africa say

that “Freedom has not arrived where we are.” This is similar

to the extent of Christianity in Europe before mass

industrialization in the 19th and 20th centuries. (Fichtenau,

Heinrich, 1964)

At the lower levels of African society, the conquered Africans

did respond to the disorientation, suffering, and racism

brought about by colonialism and capitalism; as splattered,

injured, individuals cast out by the shattered SHELL of

African society, they absorbed from the new Christian Gospel

what suited their needs, and proceeded to form Independent

African Churches, for example, Isonto lama Nazaretha (Shembe), the

ZCC, and Zionist Congregations. (Vilakazi, Absolom, Mthethwa,

Bongani, Mpanza, Mthembeni, Shembe; 1986)

Within the conventional Christian orbit, some of the

dispossessed, oppressed working people in urban areas fell in

the embrace of the Methodist and Baptist churches. This was

true also of Africans held in slavery in the US. Why? Deep

down, the human being is a collective being.

When Methodists and Baptists, in the USA, began their revivals

in the South, large numbers of Negroes were immediately

attracted to this type of religious worship. Why did the Negro

slaves respond so enthusiastically to the proselyting efforts

of the Methodists and Baptists?. The Baptist and Methodist

preachers, who lacked the education of the ministers of the

Anglican church, appealed to the poor and the ignorant and the

outcast. In the crowds that attended the revivals and camp

meetings there were numbers of Negroes who found in the fiery

message of salvation a hope and a prospect of escape from

their earthly woes. The slaves who had been torn from their

homeland and kinsmen and friends and whose cultural heritage

was lost, were isolated and broken men. In the emotionalism of

the camp meetings and revivals some social solidarity, even if

temporary, was achieved, and they were drawn into a union with

their fellow men (Frazier, E.F., 1966).

Split PersonalitiesThe racism of European colonialism and imperialism imposed

anomalous, self-crippling path. European culture and

Christianity put themselves in a sealed container. European

culture and Christianity in Africa refused to cross-pollinate

with African culture and African religion (my emphasis).

Apartheid has been in force in the sphere of culture and

religion from the very beginning of European colonialism and

imperialism in Africa, particularly in the English colonies.

This has seriously harmed European personalities as well as

African personalities. There has been no cross-pollination in

the making of the European personality. If racism had not

erected barriers within colonial society as well as in the

minds and emotions of Europeans and Africans, the European

personality would be a synthesis of African culture and

European culture, of European Christianity and African

religion. The European personality, deprived of this cross-

fertilization of influences and cultures, has been restricted

in its growth and development, has been impoverished. Deep

down in their psyches, Whites and Africans are still strangers

to one another.

The mere fact that Whites, in their overwhelming majority,

cannot speak and read African languages, is an index of their

impoverishment as personalities (Vilakazi, 2011).

When Africans went to school, they had to use Christian names;

the Christian community was separated from ordinary non-

Christian Africans. Here in KwaZulu, the late Albert Luthuli

was made a Chief of Amakholwa, i.e., of African Christian

converts. The African who joined the process of development

and modernization had to achieve the impossible, to `jump’ out

of and beyond his/her own shadow.

The human personality is a product of the past; yet the

African Christian had to jump out of and beyond that past. You

had to reject, to erase, the past inside your being, and

replace it with the Christian model. The African Christian who

went to excesses in implementing and adopting this model, the

African who went to excess in repressing the African past

within himself/herself, created a psychiatric problem parallel

to the excessive suppression of the sexual instinct in

Freudian psychoanalysis (Freud, Sigmund, 1965). Christianity,

in those African converts who went to excess in adopting the

Christian model, created the psychiatric condition of a split

personality. In the process of creating a new society and new

personalities, we still have to deal with this problem.

Europeans discovered that the African State did not stand

alone, that the pillars of this State are African religion and

African medicine. Therefore, waging a war against the African

state was not enough for European rule to be secure; they had

to wage an equally ruthless war against African religion and

African medicine.

The African State did not stand alone. Its pillars were

African medicine and African religion. Therefore, to destroy

and dismantle the African state, the European state and

civilization had to destroy, dismantle, and discredit African

religion and African medicine!

Masses of African people are being constantly warned to stay

away from African medicine!

Somé (1990) argues that this division informed imperialist

societies and these were reproduced in the text on the slave

trade from the 15th century up to today. Humans were to be

found in Western Europe; sub-humans in Africa, Asia and Latin

America. Later, the Enlightenment project refined these crude

ideas and replaced them with new concepts of liberty based on

property and property relations. Colonialism in Africa, Asia

and other parts of the Third World was justified on the basis

that Western societies were bringing civilisation to backward

peoples.

The worst, most dismaying, most painful, most ironic fact is

that many Independent Christian churches attended by ordinary

Africans warn in the most terrifying words that the followers

of these churches must not touch and use African medicine,

because African medicine is the work of the devil; and that

they must only pray and talk to Christ and God, and never talk

to their ancestors, because that is also the work of the

devil. Tens of thousands of African people have been so

traumatized in mind and spirit that they would rather die than

use African medicine, even if they can be cured; and they

would rather die than talk ritually to their ancestors. This

is what the self-hatred instilled in Africans by

European/Christian civilization has done to Africans.

The Ontological and Epistemological perspective of Ubuntu

Mbiti (1989) believes that from the ontology that Africans

have, we can articulate the philosophical systems of different

African peoples. We can arrive at the understanding, attitude

of mind, logic and perception beyond the manner in which

African people think, act or speak in different situations of

life.

An African ontology incorporates a dynamic interactive view of

being, in contrast to the static, isolationist view. This

means that a being is not thought to exist in itself or of

itself, but only has a meaningful existence in relation to its

interaction with other beings and things. Thus a thing is

known by the dynamic web of its relations with the external

world. Whether we speak of art, “religion”, conceptions of

space and time, ethics and morals or the conception of the

individual, this principle of unfailingly applies. African

religions include cosmology, science, art, psychology,

philosophy, etc., all integrated into a holistic system of

thought (my emphasis).

The traditional African view is that ethical concerns are

practical and experiential; they cannot be separated from the

lived experiences of the people in question. However, it is

important to begin with ontological assumptions, as they

underlie the ethical considerations to be discussed. A number

of these ontological assumptions have been discussed elsewhere

and only a few are noted here. These are hierarchies of

beings; God’s essence or life force; the principle of cosmic

unity; the principle of harmony, and the communal (relational)

nature of being.

Secondly, an act that seeks to narrow this African ontology

must be a very bad and taboo as it would seek to create

disequilibrium both on earth and in the universe. It would be

an act that seeks to destabilise and disturb the smooth

flowing life of both the community and individuals, thus

creating a disorder in the community. Creating a harmony in an

African setting is holistic act that integrates a lot of other

sectors and issues of the African village, as explained in the

concept of an African ontology above.

Chukwunyere (1998) cautions that it is crucial to have in mind

the basic ontological principle in African philosophy that

nothing exists of or by itself, but only in relation to other

things. This principle has the consequence that the African

worldview is dynamic as opposed to static in every area of

concern. Thus in the African worldview no person is

essentially good or evil in himself but only in terms of his

relation to others. In the area of moral responsibility it

means that this is a collective rather than individual affair,

whereby the individual’s actions have consequences for others

as well as him or herself.

To live a virtuous life, to cling to the truth and to conduct

harmonious relationships with oneself, one’s family and one’s

neighbours is to live in accordance with Ma’at (Ubuntu). Maat,

therefore, represents a principle or philosophy of living

rather than a static conception of the mind. Maat ensures that

cosmic and human justice is always done. Maat is an ancient

Egyptian word for Ubuntu

In the African weltanschuung (world-view), a person is not

basically an independent solitary entity. A person is human

precisely they are enveloped in in the community of other

human beings, in being caught up in the bundle of life.

Therefore, Ubuntu is a philosophy of tolerance and compassion.

It does not give up on people and it starts from the premise

that everybody has a potential to realise the promise of being

human. It embraces an element of forgiveness.

According to English Oxford Dictionary epistemology refers to

the theory or science of the method or grounds of knowledge.

To expand this definition, epistemology is the study of

theories about the nature and scope of knowledge, the

evaluation of the presupposition and bases of knowledge, and

the scrutiny of knowledge claims.

Magesa (1979) argues that man (in a collective sense) is the

product of his society. He belongs to his community. Within

this context African communities shape and direct their manner

of living in terms of what is or is not acceptable to them.

Human experience and responsibility are judged in light of

this goal, which does not change. From the dialectic between

the established goal and human responsibility to realise it

existentially and experimentally arises values and norms of

behaviour, what Africans would generally call “customs”, in

the most morally laden sense of the word. These customs help

the community and individuals within it to keep the goal of

life in sight, to strive toward it, and to have a basis with

which to deal with their shortcomings in this endeavour.

Coetzee et al (2002) add that, although epistemology is

universal, the ways of acquiring knowledge vary according to

the socio-cultural contexts within which knowledge claims are

formulated and articulated. From this, we can, then, talk of

an African articulation and formulation of knowledge. The

question whether or not there is an African epistemology

cannot be addressed without taking due cognizance of the

answer to the latter would imply a negative answer to the

former. Similarly, to assert the existence of an African

philosophy is to also to imply the existence of an African

epistemology, to the extent that an African epistemology is a

subset of African philosophy.

The traditional African belief, argues Mbiti (1989) is that

the Great One (UMvelingqangi) brought the divinities into

being. He therefore is the Maker and everything in heaven and

on earth owes their origin to Him alone. The belief is that

the universe is a composite of divine, spirit, human, animate

and inanimate elements, hierarchically perceived, but directly

related, and always interacting with each other. Some of these

elements are visible and some are invisible. They correspond

to the visible and invisible spheres of the universe: the

visible world being composed of creation, including humanity,

plants, animals and inanimate beings, and the invisible world

being the sphere of God, the ancestors, and the spirits.

An African does not have to look for God outside, above or

beyond his own creation. He sees and feels 'Ntu's finger and

presence and the indivisible unity between the Creator, man

and other created beings (nature). Hence we say: ‘I’m one with

the nature’. This concept, Creator-God, (Ntu) enables us to

trace and understand the origin of the philosophical concept

of Ubuntu, which is an element that is present in all human

beings. Therefore, u-ntu + umu-ntu = Ubu-ntu. The word muntu

simply means "God-Man", whose abstract noun is Ubuntu. God +

Man = Supreme Goodness (Ubuntu). This element, the Supreme

Goodness, is found within all members of the human race.

God, according to Mbiti (1989), is the great kings above all

kings and cannot be compared in majesty. He is above all

majesties and divinities. He dwells everywhere. Thus He is

omnipotent because He is able to do all things and nothing can

be done nor created apart from Him. He is behind all

achievements. He alone can speak and accomplish his words.

Therefore, there is no room for failure. He is Absolute, all

wise Omniscient, all seeing, and all Knowing. He knows all

things and so no secrets are hid from Him.

In the private and public life of the African religious rites,

beliefs, and rituals are considered an integral part of life.

Life then is never complete unless it is seen always in its

entirety. Religious beliefs are found in everyday life and no

distinction is made between the sacred and the secular. The

sacred and the secular are merged in the total persona for the

individual African. Life is not divided into compartments or

divisions. Thus there are no special times for worship, for

everyday and every hour is worship time.

There are no creeds written down because through the

traditions of the Elders all creeds and functions are carried

in the individual’s heart. Each individual by his very nature

and life style is a living creed from the time one rises until

one retires at night. An understanding of the basic nature of

the African religious tradition surely illuminates the meaning

of spirituality in contemporary Africa.

An African ontological life cannot be separated from his

spirituality and religion. The very word ‘spiritus’, the life-

giving force which stems from God, quickens the baptised

Christian and transforms the relationships he/she has with

his/her fellow human beings. There is nothing cerebral or

esoteric about spirituality.

The way humanity relates to the environment and the nature of

inter-personal relationships are also part of the spiritual

make-up of the African. Issues of moral behavioural patterns;

natural plagues and disasters; familial inter-connectedness;

domestic animals; fields and several rites directly linked to

particular events in the life of the individual and the

community, together belong to the African religio-cultural

substratum. Social and economic relations, especially in the

traditional society, continue incessantly to pervade the

spiritual realm of the African.

Religion and culture are inextricably intertwined. Most of the

religious rituals are appropriated into the cultural scheme of

things and the cultural domain shapes and influences the

religious philosophy and practices. It is in this context and

against that background that any attempt to dichotomise

African spirituality into the sacred and the secular; the

physical and the spiritual; the individual and the corporate,

results in gross distortion and mis-construal of its theology

and its praxis: I am because we are; and since we are, therefore, I am.

The depth of Ubuntu, argues Mbiti (1989), is indicated by the

African attachment to the concept of communalism, hence the

African popular saying: I’m because you are, and you are

because I’m or in my essential “being” I depend on the

essential “beingness” of the “Other”. This instils in Africans

an awareness of the other person who is my counterpart in

society. It creates a feeling that “being-for-others” appears

to be a necessary condition for “being-for-myself”. It instils

a feature of conscious togetherness; or an awareness of the

significance of the “other” in human existence.

The awareness and feeling of the internal and external

presence of the “Other” in one’s life generates great interest

and concern about one’s neighbour’s health, economic and

social welfare in the society. This is the kind of depth I

mean about this philosophy, which is less evident in European

settings.

‘Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu’, meaning that each individual's

humanity is ideally expressed in relationships with others

and, in turn, individuality is truly expressed. Or a person

depends on other persons to be a person (this is a universal

Ubuntu maxim). Ubuntu is a set of relationships in which

people are able to recognise that their humanity is bound up

in the other's humanity. Central to this thesis is the fact

that life and thought appeal to society to move beyond racial

distinctions as determinative of human identity.

The beauty of Ubuntu is that instead of there being warring

factions, instead of being manipulative and self-seeking, that

a person who lives in Ubuntu is more willing to make excuses

for others and even discover new meaning in other persons.

Whatever happens to the individual happens to the whole group,

and whatever happens to the whole group happens to the

individual. The individual can only say: "I am because we are;

and since we are, therefore, I am". This is a cardinal point

in the understanding of the African view of man.

In other words, the whole kraal or family is responsible for

the misdeeds and debts of any one of its inmates, and a

principal is always responsible for the acts of his agents or

dependants. The result is that every man in the tribe is a

policeman, and is bound to report to his supervisor any act or

wrong which he may see being done, otherwise he incurs

responsibility in regard to the act.

The individual’s humanity is determined by his relationship

with others. Only in terms of other people does the individual

become conscious of his own being, his own duties, his

privileges and responsibilities towards himself and towards

other people. Underlying Ubuntu is a holism that is foreign to

dualistic Western thinking.

There is no distinction in African tradition between the

material and the spiritual. This is why the African notion of

goodness necessarily involves sharing. Ownership of material

things can never be exclusive (Moyo 2009; 57).

An African Perspective of Morality

Gyeke (1956) defines morality as a set of social rules and

norms intended to guide the conduct of people in a society.

The rules and norms emerge from – and are anchored in –

people’s beliefs about right and wrong conduct and good and

bad character. Morality is intrinsically social, arising out

of the relations between individuals; if there were no such a

thing as human society, there would be no such thing as

morality. And, because morality is essentially a social

phenomenon – for it can emerge only in a human society in

which there is an overriding concern for harmonious and

cooperative living- consideration for the interests of others

an, hence, a sense of duty to others, are intrinsic to the

meaning and practice of morality.

No sane society chooses to build its future on foreign

cultures, values, or systems. Every society is obliged to

search deep in its own history, culture, religion, and

morality in order to discover the values upon which its

development and liberation, its civilization, and its identity

should be based (Magesa, 1979 and Lumeya, 2007). To do

otherwise is nothing less than communal suicide (Davidson,

1978). The problems and solutions of today have to be

envisaged within a historical framework, an indigenous

historical framework, no matter what contribution an external

world has made.

Okere (1983) and Hallen (2002) contend that unsurprisingly, in

Western anthropology, a culture based on tradition is

frequently portrayed as one devoid of change or development

because it is also devoid of critical or reflective thinking.

Beliefs and practices inherited from the ‘ancestors’ are said

to be preserved unchanged in the present and then handed on to

the next generation with the understanding they will be

preserved and observed in a similar manner.

Philosophy in the African context, does not have to replicate

philosophy as defined and practised in Western culture, and

that the removal of Africans from their own self-history is a

problem with the continuous presentation of Africans as a

people with no philosophical history. There is usually a

marginalisation of the question of epistemology as history of

ideas, and intellectual debate in all fields of learning are

introduced with reference to European thought, without concern

or respect for Africans as a people who should be understood

within their own self-constructed status and identity and as

creators of their nations

However, it must be stated here that colonialism created a new

social and political order in sub-Saharan Africa. Urbanization

has given rise to mega-cities in different parts of the

continent. Most communities are no longer homogeneous. They

are heterogeneous and plural in virtually every aspect of

their life. A wedge has been driven between the sacred and the

secular aspects of life.

Every language and culture is sustained by deep and discrete

order. This philosophy, according to Mudimbe (1988), is a

silent domain which has been functioning for centuries,

perhaps in a sort of "frozen" dynamism".

Ubuntu as an African Philosophy

Kagame, Mulago, Tshiamalenga, Wiredu, Appiah, Crahay, Tempels,

and others, have been labelled as "ethno-philosophers", but

what is good is that they have formed a body of judgements

stemming from their analysis and interpretation of African

cultures and which can be summed up in three propositions:-

(1) a good application of classical philosophical grids

demonstrates beyond doubt that there is an African philosophy

which, as a deep system, underlies and sustains African

cultures and civilisations, (2) African philosophy is

fundamentally an ontology organised as a deployment of inter

acting but hierarchically ordered forces; and (3) human vital

unity appears to be the centre of the endless dialectic of

forces, which collectively determine their being in relation

to human existence.

According to Shutte (1996), reality is a force and the world a

process of interplay between forces, that humanity is part of

this universal field of force, that at bottom all force is

alive, spiritual rather than material that the individual's

life and fulfilment are only to be found in community with

others (a community that does not end at death). Morality is

the development of natural tendencies to fuller being and more

abundant life, and that all human life and world process is

directed and empowered by a transcendent origin of life and

force.

As far back as one may go into his past, from the Northern

Sudanese to the Southern Bantu, the African has always and

everywhere presented a concept of the world, which is

diametrically opposed to the traditional philosophy of Europe.

The latter is essentially static, objective, dichotomous; it

is, in fact, dualistic, in that it makes an absolute

distinction between body and soul, matter and spirit. It is

founded on separation and opposition, on analysis and

conflict. The African, on the other hand, conceives the world,

beyond the diversity of its forms, as a fundamental mobile yet

unique reality that seeks synthesis. This reality is being in

the ontological sense of the word, and it is life force. For

the African, matter in the sense the Europeans understand it,

is only a system of signs which translates the single reality

of the universe: being, which is spirit, which is life force.

Thus, the whole universe appears as an infinitely small, and

at the same time infinitely large.

Combining the African ideas, especially those of community, of

morality as the drive to fuller being, and God as the source

and goal of all force. Senghor develops a theory of the

tendency of all peoples to communicate, to merge and

eventually to become a universal community. This is what he

understands by African socialism; he calls it "the

civilisation of the universal”.

Prinsloo (1995) in his paper delivered during the proceedings

of the Colloquium held at University of South Africa, in

October 1995 said that apart from what African thinkers

themselves have to say about Ubuntu, the good and valuable in

human life, is concerned with visions of happiness and

fulfilment and ideas of how these might be realised.

The virtue of respect is explained by him as respect for the

aged, implying a view of personhood in terms of development.

An older person is more of a person than a younger one with

more to offer by way of personal influence and power. This

means that the elderly continue to play an important part in

society in contrast to the dominance of the youth in social

practices in the case of Western societies. Human relations

become interpersonal with emphasis on duties. Interpersonal

relations as being of substantial importance (Prinsloo, 1995).

Ubuntu thinkers formulate their views in terms of a person is

a person through other persons. This point of departure,

argues Prinsloo (1995), qualifies human dignity in terms of

which people are to be treated. Human dignity seems to be

related to morality, and morality and rationality are acquired

from community life and do not follow from, say, fixed

ideologies or universal categories. In this sense, argues

Prinsloo (1995), it follows that we can talk of "communitarian

morality and rationality".

Individualism is …that political and social philosophy that

places high value on the freedom of the individual and

generally stresses the self-directed, self-contained and

comparatively unrestrained individual or ego" (Prinsloo (1995:

115).

This implies "a value system, a theory of human nature, a

general attitude or temper of belief in certain political,

economic or social and religious arrangements. He describes

the value system as: ...all values are man-centred..., the

individual is an end in himself and is of supreme value,

society being only a means to individual ends; and all

individuals are in some sense morally equal, this quality

being expressed by the proposition that no one should ever be

treated solely as a means to the wellbeing of another person

(Prinsloo, 1995: 115)

Therefore, “Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu” is the profoundest

definition of a human being, the profoundest philosophy of a

human being, expressed in all languages of the entire universe

from the beginning of human history to eternity.

A human being is healthy as a human being when she/he has

healthy relations with other human beings. There are two

aspects to `health’ – (a) physical, and (b) spiritual/mental.

There are requirements for physical health, which ultimately

determine life or death; there are also requirements for

spiritual/mental health. The physical and the spiritual/mental

are interrelated (Erich, 1973)

Relations with other human beings exist within the context of

a community/society.

Relations within the community/society are the shell within

which the human being is contained, nourished, protected, and

enriched, much as the Shell of an egg contains, nourishes,

protects, and enriches the contents of the egg. Religious

forces, divine beings, are part of relations within the

community/society; religious forces, divine beings, add

sacredness to the Shell which contains, nourishes, protects,

and enriches the human beings therein.

The family/kinship group in early history, together with

religious/divine forces within the family/kinship group, were

the Shell that contained, nourished, protected, and enriched

the human beings therein. The localized divine forces, in the

lakes, rivers, seas, forests, mountains, hills, in huge rocks,

in the sky, in thunder and lightening, in rain and wind, in

the sun, stars, moon, and planets, played their roles in

interaction with the family/kinship divines.

As stated earlier, the emergence and crystallization of the

State in history resulted in the deification of the State, and

the leader of the State became a divine force (ancient Egypt,

China, Maya, Inca, Rome, Zulu, etc.). The State before

industrial society became a Shell holding the people together

not just physically but also spiritually/mentally.

Now and then, in historical periods, the Shell holding people

together cracks and breaks, and the contents within the egg

splatter out. This is not only physical violence and injury,

but also deep spiritual/mental violence and injury. When this

happens, there arises an economic/social crisis as well as a

religious crisis.

It is during these times that new religious movements, new

prophets, new saviors, new religions, emerge. Such was the

situation during the age of the fall of the Roman Empire, when

Christianity emerged and triumphed: “In that age religion was

the only power that remained unaffected by the collapse of

civilization, by the loss of faith in social institutions and

cultural traditions and by the loss of hope in life.” (Dawson,

1950)

Mbiti (1989) believes that from the ontology that Africans

have, we can articulate the philosophical systems of different

African peoples and arrive at the understanding, attitude of

mind, logic and perception beyond the manner in which African

people think, act or speak in different situations of life.

An African ontology incorporates a dynamic interactive view of

being, in contrast to the static, isolationist view. This

means that a being is not thought to exist in itself or of

itself, but only has a meaningful existence in relation to its

interaction with other beings and things. Thus a thing is

known by the dynamic web of its relations with the external

world. Whether we speak of art, “religion”, conceptions of

space and time, ethics and morals or the conception of the

individual, this principle of unfailingly applies. African

religions include cosmology, science, art, psychology,

philosophy, etc., all integrated into a holistic system of

thought.

The traditional African view is that ethical concerns are

practical and experiential; they cannot be separated from the

lived experiences of the people in question. However, it is

important to begin with ontological assumptions, as they

underlie the ethical considerations to be discussed. A number

of these ontological assumptions have been discussed elsewhere

and only a few are noted here. These are hierarchies of

beings; God’s essence or life force; the principle of cosmic

unity; the principle of harmony, and the communal (relational)

nature of being.

Secondly, an act that seeks to narrow this African ontology

must be a very bad and taboo as it would seek to create

disequilibrium both on earth and in the universe. It would be

an act that seeks to destabilise and disturb the smooth

flowing life of both the community and individuals, thus

creating a disorder in the community. Creating a harmony in an

African setting is holistic act that integrates a lot of other

sectors and issues of the African village, as explained in the

concept of an African ontology above.

Chukwunyere (1998) cautions that it is crucial to have in mind

the basic ontological principle in African philosophy that

nothing exists of or by itself, but only in relation to other

things. This principle has the consequence that the African

worldview is dynamic as opposed to static in every area of

concern. Thus in the African worldview no person is

essentially good or evil in himself but only in terms of his

relation to others. In the area of moral responsibility it

means that this is a collective rather than individual affair,

whereby the individual’s actions have consequences for others

as well as him or herself.

It is commonly believed that order and chaos are associated

with good and evil respectively. However, this is not always

the case. There exists a chaotic principle within human nature

that will, from time to time, assert its freedom and stray

from the person’s predestined path. This element of human

nature is not seen as being the essentially evil side of the

person. Rather, it is that which makes the person free to

choose between right and wrong and therefore become morally

responsible (Chukwunyere, 1998).

To live a virtuous life, to cling to the truth and to conduct

harmonious relationships with oneself, one’s family and one’s

neighbours is to live in accordance with Ma’at (Ubuntu). Maat,

therefore, represents a principle or philosophy of living

rather than a static conception of the mind. Maat ensures that

cosmic and human justice is always done.

In the African weltanschuung (world-view), a person is not

basically an independent solitary entity. A person is human

precisely they are enveloped in in the community of other

human beings, in being caught up in the bundle of life.

Therefore, Ubuntu is a philosophy of tolerance and compassion.

It does not give up on people and it starts from the premise

that everybody has a potential to realise the promise of being

human. It embraces an element of forgiveness.

According to English Oxford Dictionary epistemology refers to

the theory or science of the method or grounds of knowledge.

To expand this definition, epistemology is the study of

theories about the nature and scope of knowledge, the

evaluation of the presupposition and bases of knowledge, and

the scrutiny of knowledge claims.

Magesa (1979) argues that man (in a collective sense) is the

product of his society. He belongs to his community. Within

this context African communities shape and direct their manner

of living in terms of what is or is not acceptable to them.

Human experience and responsibility are judged in light of

this goal, which does not change. From the dialectic between

the established goal and human responsibility to realise it

existentially and experimentally arises values and norms of

behaviour, what Africans would generally call “customs”, in

the most morally laden sense of the word. These customs help

the community and individuals within it to keep the goal of

life in sight, to strive toward it, and to have a basis with

which to deal with their shortcomings in this endeavour.

Coetzee et al (2002) add that, although epistemology is

universal, the ways of acquiring knowledge vary according to

the socio-cultural contexts within which knowledge claims are

formulated and articulated. From this, we can, then, talk of

an African articulation and formulation of knowledge. The

question whether or not there is an African epistemology

cannot be addressed without taking due cognizance of the

answer to the latter would imply a negative answer to the

former. Similarly, to assert the existence of an African

philosophy is to also to imply the existence of an African

epistemology, to the extent that an African epistemology is a

subset of African philosophy.

The traditional African belief, argues Mbiti (1989) is that

the Great One brought the divinities into being. He therefore

is the Maker and everything in heaven and on earth owes their

origin to Him alone. The belief is that the universe is a

composite of divine, spirit, human, animate and inanimate

elements, hierarchically perceived, but directly related, and

always interacting with each other. Some of these elements are

visible and some are invisible. They correspond to the visible

and invisible spheres of the universe: the visible world being

composed of creation, including humanity, plants, animals and

inanimate beings, and the invisible world being the sphere of

God, the ancestors, and the spirits.

An African does not have to look for God outside, above or

beyond his own creation. He sees and feels 'Ntu's finger and

presence and the indivisible unity between the Creator, man

and other created beings (nature). Hence we say: ‘I’m one with

the nature’. This concept, Creator-God, (Ntu) enables us to

trace and understand the origin of the philosophical concept

of Ubuntu, which is an element that is present in all human

beings. Therefore, u-ntu + umu-ntu = Ubu-ntu. The word Muntu

simply means "God-Man", whose abstract noun is Ubuntu. God +

Man = Supreme Goodness (Ubuntu). This element, the Supreme

Goodness, is found within all members of the human race. The

difference is that it is more pronounced and highly actualised

in an African setting.

God, according to Mbiti (1989), is the great kings above all

kings and cannot be compared in majesty. He is above all

majesties and divinities. He dwells everywhere. Thus He is

omnipotent because He is able to do all things and nothing can

be done nor created apart from Him. He is behind all

achievements. He alone can speak and accomplish his words.

Therefore, there is no room for failure. He is Absolute, all

wise Omniscient, all seeing, and all Knowing. He knows all

things and so no secrets are hid from Him..

In the private and public life of the African religious rites,

beliefs, and rituals are considered an integral part of life.

Life then is never complete unless it is seen always in its

entirety. Religious beliefs are found in everyday life and no

distinction is made between the sacred and the secular. The

sacred and the secular are merged in the total persona for the

individual African. Life is not divided into compartments or

divisions. Thus there are no special times for worship, for

everyday and every hour is worship time.

There are no creeds written down because through the

traditions of the Elders all creeds and functions are carried

in the individual’s heart. Each individual by his very nature

and life style is a living creed from the time one rises until

one retires at night. An understanding of the basic nature of

the African religious tradition surely illuminates the meaning

of spirituality in contemporary Africa.

An African ontological life cannot be separated from his

spirituality and religion. The very word ‘spiritus’, the life-

giving force which stems from God, quickens the baptised

Christian and transforms the relationships he/she has with

his/her fellow human beings. There is nothing cerebral or

esoteric about spirituality.

The way humanity relates to the environment and the nature of

inter-personal relationships are also part of the spiritual

make-up of the African. Issues of moral behavioural patterns;

natural plagues and disasters; familial inter-connectedness;

domestic animals; fields and several rites directly linked to

particular events in the life of the individual and the

community, together belong to the African religio-cultural

substratum. Social and economic relations, especially in the

traditional society, continue incessantly to pervade the

spiritual realm of the African.

Religion and culture are inextricably intertwined. Most of the

religious rituals are appropriated into the cultural scheme of

things and the cultural domain shapes and influences the

religious philosophy and practices. It is in this context and

against that background that any attempt to dichotomise

African spirituality into the sacred and the secular; the

physical and the spiritual; the individual and the corporate,

results in gross distortion and mis-construal of its theology

and its praxis. I am because we are; and since we are,

therefore, I am.

The depth of Ubuntu, argues Mbiti (1989), is indicated by the

African attachment to the concept of communalism, hence the

African popular saying: I’m because you are, and you are

because I’m or in my essential “being” I depend on the

essential “beingness” of the “Other”. This instils in Africans

an awareness of the other person who is my counterpart in

society. It creates a feeling that “being-for-others” appears

to be a necessary condition for “being-for-myself”. It instils

a feature of conscious togetherness; or an awareness of the

significance of the “other” in human existence.

The awareness and feeling of the internal and external

presence of the “Other” in one’s life generates great interest

and concern about one’s neighbour’s health, economic and

social welfare in the society. This is the kind of depth I

mean about this philosophy, which is less evident in European

settings.

‘Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu’, meaning that each individual's

humanity is ideally expressed in relationships with others

and, in turn, individuality is truly expressed. Or a person

depends on other persons to be a person. Ubuntu is the

environment of vulnerability, i.e. a set of relationships in

which people are able to recognise that their humanity is

bound up in the other's humanity. Central to this thesis is

the fact that life and thought appeal to society to move

beyond racial distinctions as determinative of human identity.

The beauty of Ubuntu is that instead of there being warring

factions, instead of being manipulative and self-seeking, that

a person who lives in Ubuntu is more willing to make excuses

for others and even discover new meaning in other persons.

Therefore, Ubuntu is an attribute that distinguishes humans

from mere animals.

Whatever happens to the individual happens to the whole group,

and whatever happens to the whole group happens to the

individual. The individual can only say: "I am because we are;

and since we are, therefore, I am". This is a cardinal point

in the understanding of the African view of man.

In other words, the whole kraal or family is responsible for

the misdeeds and debts of any one of its inmates, and a

principal is always responsible for the acts of his agents or

dependants. The result is that every man in the tribe is a

policeman, and is bound to report to his supervisor any act or

wrong which he may see being done, otherwise he incurs

responsibility in regard to the act.

The individual’s humanity is determined by his relationship

with others. Only in terms of other people does the individual

become conscious of his own being, his own duties, his

privileges and responsibilities towards himself and towards

other people. Underlying Ubuntu is a holism that is foreign to

dualistic Western thinking.

Gyeke (1956) defines morality as a set of social rules and

norms intended to guide the conduct of people in a society.

The rules and norms emerge from – and are anchored in –

people’s beliefs about right and wrong conduct and good and

bad character. Morality is intrinsically social, arising out

of the relations between individuals; if there were no such a

thing as human society, there would be no such thing as

morality. And, because morality is essentially a social

phenomenon – for it can emerge only in a human society in

which there is an overriding concern for harmonious and

cooperative living- consideration for the interests of others

an, hence, a sense of duty to others, are intrinsic to the

meaning and practice of morality.

Magesa (1979) and Lumeya (2007) forcefully argue that no sane

society chooses to build its future on foreign cultures,

values, or systems. Every society is obliged to search deep in

its own history, culture, religion, and morality in order to

discover the values upon which its development and liberation,

its civilization, and its identity should be based (Magesa,

1979 and Lumeya, 2007). To do otherwise is nothing less than

communal suicide (Davidson, 1978). The problems and solutions

of today have to be envisaged within a historical framework,

an indigenous historical framework, no matter what

contribution an external world has made.

Okere (1983) and Hallen (2002) contends that unsurprisingly,

in Western anthropology, a culture based on tradition is

frequently portrayed as one devoid of change or development

because it is also devoid of critical or reflective thinking.

Beliefs and practices inherited from the ‘ancestors’ are said

to be preserved unchanged in the present and then handed on to

the next generation with the understanding they will be

preserved and observed in a similar manner.

Amadiume (1997) contends that philosophy in the African

context, does not have to replicate philosophy as defined and

practised in Western culture, and that the removal of Africans

from their own self-history is a problem with the continuous

presentation of Africans as a people with no philosophical

history. There is usually a marginalisation of the question of

epistemology as history of ideas, and intellectual debate in

all fields of learning are introduced with reference to

European thought, without concern or respect for Africans as a

people who should be understood within their own self-

constructed status and identity and as creators of their

nations

However, it must be stated here that colonialism created a new

social and political order in sub-Saharan Africa. Urbanisation

has given rise to mega-cities in different parts of the

continent. Most communities are no longer homogeneous. They

are heterogeneous and plural in virtually every aspect of

their life. A wedge has been driven between the sacred and the

secular aspects of life.

Kagame's views may seem controversial, but they are deductions

of a truly impressive linguistic analysis. More than that

Kagame's work on African philosophy escapes other supported

generalisations from authors such as Tempels's. Kagame is very

prudent. He claims that every language and culture is

sustained by deep and discrete order. This philosophy,

according to Mudimbe (1988), is a silent domain which has been

functioning for centuries, perhaps in a sort of "frozen"

dynamism". However, one must thank our historical fathers of

the African cultures, the creators of our languages and the

first African humans.

Kagame, Mulago, Tshiamalenga, Wiredu, Appiah, Crahay, Tempels,

and others., have been labelled as "ethno-philosophers", but

what is good is that they have formed a body of judgements

stemming from their analysis and interpretation of African

cultures and which can be summed up in three propositions:-

(1) a good application of classical philosophical grids

demonstrates beyond doubt that there is an African philosophy

which, as a deep system, underlies and sustains African

cultures and civilisations, (2) African philosophy is

fundamentally an ontology organised as a deployment of inter

acting but hierarchically ordered forces; and (3) human vital

unity appears to be the centre of the endless dialectic of

forces, which collectively determine their being in relation

to human existence.

According to Shutte (1996), there are certain ideas that are

fundamental to traditional wisdom: that reality is a force and

the world a process of interplay between forces, that humanity

is part of this universal field of force, that at bottom all

force is alive, spiritual rather than material that the

individual's life and fulfilment are only to be found in

community with others (a community that does not end at

death), morality is the development of natural tendencies to

fuller being and more abundant life, and finally that all

human life and world process is directed and empowered by a

transcendent origin of life and force.

As far back as one may go into his past, from the Northern

Sudanese to the Southern Bantu, the African has always and

everywhere presented a concept of the world, which is

diametrically opposed to the traditional philosophy of Europe.

The latter is essentially static, objective, dichotomous; it

is, in fact, dualistic, in that it makes an absolute

distinction between body and soul, matter and spirit. It is

founded on separation and opposition, on analysis and

conflict. The African, on the other hand, conceives the world,

beyond the diversity of its forms, as a fundamental mobile yet

unique reality that seeks synthesis. This reality is being in

the ontological sense of the word, and it is life force. For

the African, matter in the sense the Europeans understand it,

is only a system of signs which translates the single reality

of the universe: being, which is spirit, which is life force.

Thus, the whole universe appears as an infinitely small, and

at the same time infinitely large.

Combining the African ideas, especially those of community, of

morality as the drive to fuller being, and God as the source

and goal of all force, Senghor develops a theory of the

tendency of all peoples to communicate, to merge and

eventually to become a universal community. This is what he

understands by African socialism; he calls it "the

civilisation of the universal”.

Prinsloo (1995) in his paper delivered during the proceedings

of the Colloquium held at University of South Africa, in

October 1995 said that apart from what African thinkers

themselves have to say about Ubuntu, the good and valuable in

human life, is concerned with visions of happiness and

fulfilment and ideas of how these might be realised.

The virtue of respect is explained by him as respect for the

aged, implying a view of personhood in terms of development.

An older person is more of a person than a younger one with

more to offer by way of personal influence and power. This

means that the elderly continue to play an important part in

society in contrast to the dominance of the youth in social

practices in the case of Western societies. Human relations

become interpersonal with emphasis on duties. Interpersonal

relations as being of substantial importance (Prinsloo, 1995).

Ubuntu thinkers formulate their views in terms of a person is

a person through other persons. This point of departure,

argues Prinsloo (1995), qualifies human dignity in terms of

which people are to be treated. Human dignity seems to be

related to morality, and morality and rationality are acquired

from community life and do not follow from, say, fixed

ideologies or universal categories. In this sense, argues

Prinsloo (1995), it follows that we can talk of "communitarian

morality and rationality".

Individualism is …that political and social philosophy that

places high value on the freedom of the individual and

generally stresses the self-directed, self-contained and

comparatively unrestrained individual or ego" (Prinsloo (1995:

115).

This implies, argues Prinsloo (1995) "a value system, a theory

of human nature, a general attitude or temper of belief in

certain political, economic or social and religious

arrangements. He describes the value system as: ...all values

are man-centred..., the individual is an end in himself and is

of supreme value, society being only a means to individual

ends; and all individuals are in some sense morally equal,

this quality being expressed by the proposition that no one

should ever be treated solely as a means to the wellbeing of

another person.

Conclusion

We are challenged to create a new wholesome society, which

means we should attempt to do and accomplish something unique

in the history of the last 3000 years, namely to allow Ubuntu

and African religion to be as much of a participant in

creating the new society as urban culture, urban creativity,

urban philosophy, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism.

In the early history of Christianity, there was a lot of

cross-pollination between Christian thought and Pagan thought,

between Christian practices and Pagan practices. A lot of

thoughts and practices from Paganism were adopted by

Christianity.

Cross-pollination has been the rule in the development of all

human culture and of science, just as the cross-pollination of

genes has been the rule in the development of the Human

species.

This has seriously harmed European personalities as well as

African personalities. There has been no cross-pollination in

the making of the European personality. If racism had not

erected barriers within colonial society as well as in the

minds and emotions of Europeans and Africans, the European

personality would be a synthesis of African culture and

European culture, of European Christianity and African

religion. The European personality, deprived of this cross-

fertilization of influences and cultures, has been restricted

in its growth and development, has been impoverished. Deep

down in their psyches, Whites and Africans are still strangers

to one another.

What comes out clearly here is that there has never been a

cross-pollination of Ubuntu constitutive rules and those of

Christian Church, but there is a great deal of cross-

pollination between Ubuntu and the Independent African

Churches.

It is one’s belief that if Ubuntu is well fused and integrated

into Christian Church, perhaps a new and unique Christian

Church could begin to serve humanity to the fullest.

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