PLO LUMUMBA: SPIRITUALITY VS RELIGION | RELIGION IS A MULTI BILLION BUSINESS | ONE AFRICA RIGHT NOW

foreign [Music] this is the Johnny to one Africa [Music] when you talk about religion we are talking about a different thing from spirituality Africans are spiritual and that spirituality is not unique to African peoples other peoples are spiritual too and Africans whether you are talking about the Yoruba in Nigeria or the Igbo or the Ashante or the baganda the zunu or the ovambo the ofymbundu or the lure they are spiritual because they believe and recognize that they are temporal beings and that there is a superior being that is spirituality knowing that as a mortal being you have limitations and that there is an imminent creator that is to be contradistinguished from religion what the colonizers brought was religion spirituality package in man-made forms and that is why therefore you have things like Roman Catholic you have organizations such as the Anglican Church the Presbyterian Church their Episcopalian Church the Methodist Church that is religion religion is organization of spirituality into a formal thing which is then controlled by man claiming to represent God Africans are therefore spiritual and I do not want the word spirituality to be used as if it were a synonym of religion uh part of the reason why we talk about religion I know there is a a Kenyan called bitty who is written a lot about African spirituality and he says that Africans are notoriously religious and and that to me is a misconception it is not uniquely Africa if you go to other civilizations go to the Hindus and you read Hindu epics such as the Mahabharata or the ramayana you see how spiritual they are if you go to the Jews and you go to the talmuds and you look at the history of Judaism and if you go to the Arabs and see the Quran and you read their hadiths you see spirituality and when you come to African communities you see spirituality who called it black magic it is African religion and spirituality that other civilizations particularly the whites and the Arabs characterize as black magic there is nothing black about it and there is nothing magic about it it is their way of communication with God every other civilization has dark powers and those dark powers are the ones sometimes that are characterized as witchcraft and if you want to know that these are known to all civilization they have a word for it whenever you see that a society has a word for something it means that they are familiar and that they practice that thing so I don't want us to use the word Blackmagic if it is Magic and Witchcraft let it just be Witchcraft and that is only so if you are speaking in English if I were to be speaking in kinyanja okay or kizanaki I would use different words so let us sometimes also recognize very quickly that because we are defining ourselves in a foreign language we carry the baggage of the use of those languages in a condescending Manner and part of the process of decolonizing African Minds is to ensure that we are not yoked by Words which are derogatory of the African peoples it is true that when Christians Embrace Christianity and Islam and indeed any other peoples who have embraced religion they have been extremes and Cults have come about and let me give you a historical context what has happened in shakahona is is not something that is unique or without precedent in 1978 there was the Georgetown Guyana massacres where 900 people there about died with Reverend Jim Jones that was an apocalyptic movement in Georgetown Guyana we don't talk about it and we also remember that in weko in Texas the Branch Davidians of David koresh also were subjected to the same thing so if you look throughout history it is not true that shakahola is without president it follows on a tradition that occurs when a people have been confused and these are doomsday cultic situations that emerge periodically and if you want me to go to the Bible a little there are actually predictions of them if you read the book of Matthew chapter 24 verse 24 24 it says that in the last day there shall come many christs or who claim to be Christ and they shall work wonders and if it were possible even the very elect would be confused because the human Spirit and the human mind is always looking for Solutions and these cultic leaders are capable of confusing people and telling them that if you follow this path then all your problems should be and will be solved and history is replete with that if you look at the Crusades in the Roman Catholic Church you look at the inquisitions in the churches you look at all these religions they have always been individuals who have succeeded in persuading fellow men that they enjoy extraordinary powers and that they are the pathway to eternal life it is our duty therefore to educate the people the people must be educated and the people must be independent because one of the greatest maladies in human Affairs is ignorance the great German Dietrich banehoffer said that one of the greatest things in human history is to have a people who are laboring under ignorance parents they become impervious to reason they are susceptible to manipulation and history is replete with individuals who capitalize and use ignorance as a tool of manipulation shakahola is an example which is now unique to Kenya religion is a big business that is a multi-billion dollar industry when that Jewish philosopher some call him Latter-Day Prophet Malcolm X not Malcolm X Karl Marx when Karl Marx said that religion is an opiate for the poor what it meant is that religion can be used to intoxicate individuals who are ignorant individuals who have no hope and create an environment where they can be subjected to abuse and when they are subjected to abuse those who are in control of their minds will invariably ask for material things is is it is a Wonder that those who want to take you to heaven those who want you to starve to death I themselves not starving to death those who are telling you that material things are not necessary they tell you keep your treasure in heaven where there are no moths and where there is no rust but they themselves are accumulating those material things religion has become a big business billion dollar business and that is why you see this Latter-Day husband and wife formations we are the greatest thing that they preach about is the tithes and offerings and yet we know the context in which tithes and offerings were given even in the judaistic tradition and in the early days of Christianity and it is incumbent upon individuals to ensure that they Shield themselves from such manipulators and such spiritual manipulators who promise heaven and deliver nothing they are there if you look at African spirituality there is a lot of wisdom to be found and and I am a deliberate student of comparative religion and I am convinced that the god of the area is the same God that the Jews are worshiping I'm convinced that the god of the Zulus is the same God that the Indians are worshiping I am convinced that the god of the Damned and the mende is the same God that is being worshiped throughout and he manifests himself in different ways and communicates with people in different ways the only thing that happened is that the colonialists when they came here persuaded us that our God is no God he persuaded us that our way of doing things is hidden he persuaded us that they are God was Superior he persuaded us that they are the ones who must create the pope they must create the Cardinals they must create the Bishops they must create the Provost they must create the deacons and we swallowed it a line who we are now going through a phase of spiritual rediscovery if you look at some of the religions and you look at the manner in which they were founded you'll be amazed whether it's the current Roman Catholic church or the Anglican Church which was founded in 1533 and 1534 to allow King Henry VII to divorce Catherine of Aragon and to marry Anne Boleyn so we know this history and now that we are getting this Enlightenment one is saying that there is need to recognize that throughout the ages God has communicated to his people through different peoples including such as prophets recognized in the Jewish tradition and I believe that even in the African tradition and Africans have heard that in the Democratic Republic of Congo we had Simon kimbangu who created The kimbangoist Movement we had Dona Beatrice Kim pavita who also created a religion and we have had them throughout the ages one of the weaknesses that we have had in Africa in the recent past is that we don't write we don't record all these things the strength of the other religions such as Judaism such as Christianity such as Islam or Hindu or Shintoism is because they have recorded these things in writing therefore there is a point of reference while our tradition has been oral and because of its oral nature it's not susceptible or does not lend itself to being dealt with in the manner that it should be that is dealt with seriously there is a sense in which when you look at development in its totality and I think it is who said it very well that when we talk about development we are not simply talking about roads and buildings and other things those are important but we are talking about the development of the human person so that they have self-esteem so that they are able to be aware of who they are and they know what they are and who their God is and how to relate with that God but religion as we practices in Africa today is indeed one of the factors that is undermining African development I remember myself saying at a different setting that prayers without action is superstition today you see in many African countries factories are being closed and they are being converted into church buildings you see many critical institutions which ought to run being converted into church houses we are not productivity is there there is no production at all it's just consumption and the collection of tithes and offerings and the things that we ought to do for ourselves we are praying and fasting we are praying and fasting so that we may make cars praying and fasting so that we may get into the technological world I've said it and I repeated the things that require technology will never be earned through theology theorial theology has its place and Technology as it space and in Africa we are in my view even disobeying God himself if you look at the Christian Bible it says go ye and subdue the world it says and it says by the sweat of thy brow Thou shalt leave how can you pray and fast and expect to compete Chinese are praying to their God the Japanese the Koreans the others but they are engaged in research because research is about God if God says that he has created you in his own image and has given you a brain to think how then do you think that God is going to supply with man and quail I say sometimes half in just and half seriously as a term of art that if there was a kitchen where they were making manner in heaven and making Quail roasting quail and dropping them to them to man on Earth that kitchen was closed never to be opened it is manipulation once again in the name of religion men have killed men have maimed men have done terrible things in the name of religion the Christian religion had its Crusades where men and women were killed women were raped in the name of religion during the inquisitions in Spanish men who are punished Copernicus and others who are excommunicated simply because they say the word the world was round rather than flat as it was believed in those days in the name of religion slavery had been instituted the apartheid regime in South Africa was instituted by the Dutch Reformed Church with reference to the Bible in the name of religion Muslims have killed throughout the maghreb in the name of religion we have seen both institutions and groups such as al-shaba and we have seen the Taliban kill people in the name of religion that is a misunderstanding of religion and if you ask many of these fellows who speak in the name of religion they don't even understand what they are reading they are manipulated I remember at one time during the period when there was a fatua against Salman rashidi one of the people wanted to kill him was asked have you ever read any of the books of Salman rushed said I've never read them and I had not even heard of him but why are you why do you want to kill him because an Imam has issued a fat to her ignorance is one of the things that leads to religious interns and extremism you know religion even assists are religious in their own stupid way they believe that they create themselves so religion will always be there man and man's spirit will always be in search of something transcendental it is organized religion that we are talking about and I believe that the relationship between man and God is a very personal relationship if one wants to participate through organized religion we give them the freedom that is why the Constitutions in many countries of the world say freedom of conscience you can choose to pray in your own bedroom we will not interfere with you if you think that you want to pray on Friday that you are Muslim so be it if you think that you are Christian and you want to pray and worship on Sunday in a church so be it if you think you are Jew and you want to go to the temple Soviet if you think you are a Seventh-Day Adventist and you want to worship on Saturday so be it if you belong to African traditional religion and you are from Maria so be it the only thing we are saying don't commit a criminal offense if you commit a criminal offense in the name of religion then the laws of the land must be deployed to deal with you family and swiftly friends the human mind is like land it must be tilled and watered through Reading and seeking information man must acquire information the only antidote the only vaccine that you can have against manipulation is acquisition of knowledge if you exercise the ghost of ignorance that is the beginning of personal development and the beginning of immunization from manipulation but if you have no information those with information will put it in your mind and they'll make you a robot to do as they will immunize yourself by acquiring knowledge sound knowledge positive knowledge and there is no shortage as one great philosopher once said there is no end to the making of books and the such of knowledge is a lifelong Enterprise [Music] foreign [Music] foreign

Channel: SWAHILI NATION

Views: 217,705

Keywords: Swahili Nation, One Africa, Africa, Black, Black people, Africans, Pan Africanism, Unity for Africa

Id: zdvAMfGmOqI

Length: 20min 46sec (1246 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 17 2023