The San of Africa

The San of Africa
The San of Africa are a good group to begin with because they support within their culture the idea of monotheism and insight to spiritual warfare being garnered from an ‘animistic cultures’. The understanding of the spiritual realm and monotheistic cultural memory are easily heard in the quoted parallels to Christian literature.

“To you the creator, to you the powerful, I offer this new plant.. New fruit of the old tree. You are the master, we are the children. To you the creator, to you the powerful.”
In the beginning of Kmvoum, Today is Kmvoum, Tomorrow will Kmvoum.”

Aylward Shorter makes this statement in his book African Christian Theology.
“In most African Traditional theologies the idea of a supreme being is more or less distinctly present. Whether he is conceived as creator or begetter, whether or not he is a part of man’s proximate experience, the idea of the supreme being is strong enough and ubiquitous enough to make nonsense of the term ‘animism’ which is so frequently and mistakenly applied to African religions.”
If this is true of African religions I would argue that it is true of other primal religions. Shorter’s distancing African traditional religions from the term Animism may be the result of the pejorative nature of the label among Christian workers. It also indicates a genuine respect and concern for the people group he is called to. Defining the term and associating it with wisdom contained within the human family as opposed to associating it with prehistoric evolutionary frame works would help remove the pejorative nature of the term as well.

“In anthropology, animism is often considered to be the original human religion, being defined as belief in the existence of spiritual beings.” …The basis for animism is acknowledgment that there is a spiritual realm which humans share the universe with - in other words, this wonderful world of ours in inhabited not only by us human beings, but also by 'spiritual beings'. The concept that humans possess souls and that souls have life apart from human bodies both before and after death are central to animism…' “
George William Gilmore wrote in his 1919 work Animism, that there are three ‘ discoveries’ that should be credited to Animism. Within the context of these articles it would be more accurate to say that these ‘discoveries’ have been retained and unconsciously stewarded, for the benefit of the Church. They are first the existence of the soul, secondarily the existence of the soul after death and lastly the belief in supernatural powers. In regards to the belief in supernatural powers Gilmore writes.
“Whether we regard this from the standpoint of anthropology or culture, or from that of ethics or of religion, it is difficult to estimate, impossible to overestimate, its importance. How vast a power of restraint this belief has exerted as an inhibition upon the lower passions of man, and how great an impulse it has ever been to the growth and unfolding of his higher nature!”

Gilmore point reinforces the idea of educated and trained consciences. In this case the source of the education is and understanding of the supernatural. Shorter’s work in Africa is directed at reconciling the practical aspects of religion lived out ethically in this world and communion with supernatural beings. He states that “Religious experience is both the inner experience of the individual and the mutual affirmation by a community of common insights.” When he speaks about the experience of the individual he is affirming the redemptive value of the individual soul and God’s communication with that soul. When he speaks about the mutual affirmation of the community he is taking about common spiritual experiences that effect both individuals and communities. I will be addressing part of this insight when I speak about individual and community shame. Shorter adds this perspective on religion.
“Religion…is not simply belief, or morality, or ritual, or structures. It is basically prayer-not prayer as formal communication with spiritual beings in worship- but the essential disposition of the man of faith which this worship reflects. Religious faith is the consciousness of the further demission to life, the living communion of man with the ‘spirit world’, not separated or opposed to this world, but discovered and lived in this world.”
In regards to African religion he states that the questions that must be asked are, “What is the shape of this communion? What forms does the relationship take? I would argue that this communion is firmly rooted in a geographic, generational, and genealogical context that attempts to honor man and God in the context of community. It is therefore redemptive in its nature. Donal Dorr is a missionary to Africa, he expounds on this topic in his work “Mission, In Today’s World” Dorr describes, the presence, in primal religions, of redemptive insights about geography, genealogy and generational redemptive gifts. In regards to geography he states, “Certain trees or rocks or caves or rivers are seen as ‘holy’.” This is not just an Animistic insight it is a Biblical one. Moses was told to take off his sandals because the place he was standing was ‘holy ground’. These holy places were designated by many ancient peoples including those that spoken of in the Bible.

“The Hebrew word translated standing stones is massebah and means to set up. To honor their covenant with God, the Israelites also set up standing stones as a reminder of God’s supernatural acts on their behalf. The Bible records several of these significant events: - Jacob set up stone pillars at Bethel in order to remember his powerful dream, in which God reaffirmed his covenant with him (Gen. 28:18—21, 35:14—15). - After receiving the Ten Commandments and other laws, Moses built twelve standing stones at the foot of Mount Sinai (Ex. 24:2—4). - The Israelites erected standing stones to remember their miraculous crossing of the Jordan River (Josh. 4:2—3, 8—9). - Joshua built another standing stone when the covenant was renewed at Shechem (Josh. 24:27).”

Dorr states that in regards to other redemptive structures such as family, primal people attach a truly religions significance to family and there is a ‘much stronger family solidarity than is customary in the West’. The family solidarity he speaks about is rooted in generational reverence that treats those who have recently died as if they were still alive. “The more remote ancestors also play a vital role in the community; for the sense of being linked to them gives people a feeling of connectedness…which goes on from one generation to the next.” The reverence for family and the reverence for place are complementary concepts that support one another. It also gives people a sense of their unique place in time as well. The importance of this insight becomes profound to animistic people groups when the message of Christ comes that focuses on sonship and being born within the context of a specific time frame and genealogical or tribal line. These are concepts they would understand. They are concepts and insights that indigenous evangelist share with related people groups and with the evangelistic people group that initially brought them the Gospel. Each people group then grows in redemptive knowledge because of the insights that God has planted in the various people groups around the world. Can a western teenage steeped in individualism understand the engrafting of the gentile into the tribes of Israel more than a San teenager raised in a tribal context in Africa that honors generational and genealogical connections? I don’t have the means to test this question but I would assume not. I would assume that if each were lead to Christ the San teenager would be able to accommodate the concept of Christ coming in the “fullness of time” in a more profound manner than the western teenager.
“But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under law, to redeem those under law, that we might receive the full rights of sons. Because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, the Spirit who calls out, "Abba Father." So you are no longer a slave, but a son; and since you are a son, God has made you also an heir. (Galatians 4: 4-7)
Primal Religions are still very mysterious to western missionaries. However, the value that missionaries place on the wisdom of those that practice animistic religions has improved. Missionaries like Dorr can now say, “We need to admit that we have largely lost the very ‘grounded’ sense of wonder of those that live close to the earth.” He further states that “It is likely that it is in the effort to inculturate the Christian faith in indigenous cultures that we will begin to get some sense of the values of primal religions.” I would further state that the “wonder’ that Dorr is referencing is a Biblical wonder and not a Primal wonder. Capturing that wonder makes us more Christ like not simply more grounded. Dorr’s work is essentially dedicated to finding the wonder and making both western and primal peoples more Christ like.

Shorter, Aylward, African Christian Theology. (Orbis Books, 1977). Pg 98
Shorter, Aylward, African Christian Theology. (Orbis Books, 1977). Pg 97
http://www.holistic-life-living.com/what-is-animism.html (holistic-life-living, 2007)
Gilmore, George. Animism, 1919 http://www.sacred-texts.com/sha/anim/anim18.htm chapter XVI
Gilmore, George. Animism, 1919 http://www.sacred-texts.com/sha/anim/anim18.htm chapter XVI
Shorter, Aylward, African Christian Theology. (Orbis Books, 1977). Pg 96
Shorter, Aylward, African Christian Theology. (Orbis Books, 1977). Pg 97
Shorter, Aylward, African Christian Theology. (Orbis Books, 1977). Pg 97
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (Orbis Books, 2000) pg 41
“Standing Stones” That the World May Know Ministries http://www.followtherabbi.com/Brix?pageID=1708
“Standing Stones” That the World May Know Ministries http://www.followtherabbi.com/Brix?pageID=1708
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (Orbis Books, 2000) pg 40
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (Orbis Books, 2000) pg 41
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (Orbis Books, 2000) pg 41
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (Orbis Books, 2000) pg 41
Dorr, Donal, Mission In Today’s World. (