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| Title: | The role of social anthropology in the debate on funeral rites in Africa |
| Author: | Spijker, Gerard van 't |
| Year: | 2005 |
| Periodical: | Exchange: Journal of Contemporary Christianities in Context |
| Volume: | 34 |
| Issue: | 3 |
| Pages: | 156-176 |
| Language: | English |
| Geographic terms: | Rwanda South Africa Zimbabwe |
| Subjects: | Church death rites |
| External link: | https://doi.org/10.1163/157254305774258654 |
| Abstract: | Missionaries tried to abolish African funeral rites in Christian churches, because of their alleged relation with ancestor cults, which they wanted to destroy. However, by forbidding funeral rites the missionaries did not take into account the social function of these rituals. Using funeral rites he encountered in the region around Kirinda, the oldest Presbyterian parish of Rwanda, and the analyses of A. van Gennep (1909) and R. Hertz (1905-1906) - both social anthropologists in the field of funerary rites - as a point of reference, the author also examines the funeral rituals of the Mamabolo in North Transvaal, South Africa, and the Zezuru and the Shona in Zimbabwe. Parallels between African rituals and those of the Old Testament are also taken into account. The author concludes that funeral rituals are an expression of the basic notion that an individual's death concerns the whole family. They provide the means to overcome the affliction of the whole family. The Christianity adapted to Western culture introduced by the missionaries in Africa is not the only acceptable way to express Christian faith in matters of life and death. This opens the way for a more authentic African hermeneutic. Notes, ref., sum. [ASC Leiden abstract] |
