'Written' into the Book of Life: Nazarite women's performance inscribed as spiritual text in 'Ibandla lamaNazaretha'

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Periodical article

Title:	'Written' into the Book of Life: Nazarite women's performance inscribed as spiritual text in 'Ibandla lamaNazaretha'
Author:	Muller, Carol
Year:	1997
Periodical:	Research in African Literatures
Volume:	28
Issue:	1
Pages:	3-14
Language:	English
Geographic term:	South Africa
Subjects:	African religions religious rituals Zulu women religious songs literature Cultural Roles Religion and Witchcraft
External link:	https://www.jstor.org/stable/3819916
Abstract:	The colonial confrontation between Western literacy (embodied in the Christian Bible) and Zulu oral and ritual practices has been fixed into the historical record by a group of Zulu-speaking women in South Africa who are members of the Church of the Nazarites ('Ibandla lamaNazaretha'). These women have transferred the power and value attached to a central tenet of mission Christian ideology - that Truth is contained in the written word - onto traditional Zulu ritual performance and attire. Through this transfer, they have textualized these traditional ritual spaces, so that performance can be quantified and, in spiritual terms, becomes equated with 'doing good works'. This 'work' is measured, recorded and accounted for through the metaphor of 'writing' one's name in the 'Book of Life'. This book is consulted at the heavenly gates by the 'Angel of Heaven'. Bibliogr., notes, ref.