African Trinitology A Response to Ethnocentrism in Kenya.
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Date
2001-02
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Tangaza University College
Abstract
This essay sets out to achieve dual objectives. It serves the purpose of making the
doctrine of the most Holy Trinity intelligible to Africans. This intelligibility lies in the
essay's focus on the communitarian model of the Trinity, which evokes familiar
communitarian sentiments among the Africans. The sentiment is deepened with the use
of African communitarian categories like the ancestors and their descendants.
Besides the objective of intelligibility, the other objective is relevance. The essay
seeks also to make the communitarian Trinity respond to a specific African problem,
ethnocentrism. The relevance of the communitarian Trinity to the question of
ethnocentrism makes the essay not just theoretical but also practical and thus dispels the
abstract connotation that goes with the traditional doctrine of the Trinity.
Therefore, the goal of the essay is to demonstrate the intelligibility and relevance
of the Christian doctrine of the Trinity to an African mindset.
The essay is presented in the methodology of liberation theology designated as
pastoral cycle. The methodology begins with an observation and an analysis of the social
situation, followed by an evaluation from the gospel point of view of the social situation,
and ends with some plans of action(s) towards ameliorating the situation.
Chapter one of this essay tries to analyze the dynamism of ethnocentrism in
Kenya. This analysis is presented in a socio-political frame such that it traces the
evolution of ethnocentrism in the political history of Kenya. In this section of the essay
my sources are both library and some fieldwork. I used some books, journals, and reports
of researches especially from the Kenya Human Rights Commission resource center,
Nairobi. I also tried to check out some bits of information I got from the library materials by actually visiting some ethnic clash sites like Mob, Nakuru, and Likoni. At these
places, with the help of the Sectariate of Catholic Justice and Peace of Kenya, I was able
to interview some of the victims of these clashes. The facts in this chapter represents the
fruit of these researches both in the library and in the field.
The second step in pastoral cycle methodology is the evaluation of the social
situation in the light of the gospel. This second step is used in chapters two. While
chapter one ends with the observation that the reflection on the implications of our belief
in the doctrine of the Trinity could respond to ethnocentrism, chapter two exposes a
nascent model of the Trinity ascribed as the communitarian model. In this chapter this
model is presented and ethnocentrism evaluated from its perspectives.
The final step of the pastoral cycle is planning, the mapping out of courses of
actions to combat the social malady. Chapter three of the essay is dedicated to this
planning. The chapter advocates for a re-definition of the African concept of community
using the trinitarian community as a model and goes further to suggest concrete ways of
executing this plan through the declaration of Christ as the Ancestor of the Kenyan
citizens, based on the trinitarian ancestral concept of the Trinity. On the trinitarian
ancestral interaction is based the christological ancestral relationship to us which forms
the point of the unification of the ethnic groups in Kenya. It is in this manner that an
African trinitology will respond to ethnocentrism in Kenya. However, before delving into
the essay proper, we will present a brief sketch of Kenya.
Kenya lies across the equator in east central Africa on the coast of the Indian
Ocean. It is a moderate sized country with an area of 582, 650 square kilometers in
which only 25 percent is inhabitable and the vast remaining 75 percent is either arid or semi-arid. I Kenya has a population of 28.7milion with an average annual increase rate of
3.4 percent. This population is a conglomeration of 64 ethnic groups ranging from small
to large groups. The 1999 population census2 puts the percentages of some of the groups
as follows: Kikuyu 22 percent, Luhya 14 percent, Luo 13 percent, Kalenjin 12 percent,
Kamba 11 percent, Kisii 6 percent, Meru 6 percent, Asian, European and Arab 1 percent
and others 15 percent. In view of the diversity of ethnic communities in Kenya, Kenyans
speak English language as the official language and Swahili as the national language.
There is also a diversity of religions in Kenya. The religious distribution is: Protestants
46 percent, Roman Catholics 30 percent, Traditional religionists 6 percent, Moslems 16
percent and others 2 percent.3
Historically, paleontologists' researches show that human beings inhabited Kenya
about 2 million years ago. The Arab seafarers established settlements along the coast and
the Portuguese took control of the area in the early 1500. The largest group of the Kenyan
ethnic groups, the Kikuyu, migrated to this region at about the 18th century. This whole
area became a British protectorate in 1890; a crown colony in 1920 when it was ascribed
as British East Africa. In this area, nationalist stirrings erupted in the 1940s and in 1952,
when the famous Mau Mau movement rebelled against the colonial government.
Kenya became independent on December 12, 1963 under the leadership of Mzee
Jomo Kenyatta. From 1964 to 1992, the Kenyan African National Union (KANU), first
under Jomo Kenyatta and then under Daniel Arap Moi, ruled the country of Kenya as
one-party state. It took demonstrations, riots and international pressure to get the government of Moi to repeal the one party state and accept multi-party elections in 1992.
In the Republic of Kenya, there is a one-house National Assembly constituted by 188
members elected for five years by the universal suffrage, 12 nominated members by the
president and 2 ex-officio members, to make a sum total of 202 members of Kenyan
Parliament.
Among the many problems that besiege economic and political growth in Kenya,
is ethnocentrism. Several authors and publications depict this reality.
"Intricately connected to most of the economic and political challenges and
problems that Kenya faces today is the question of the place of ethnic groups"' Atieno
Odhiambo puts it that, "Ethnicity forms the strongest cleavages in the Kenyan society"5
Kiraitu Murungi writing on Multi-Partism in Kenya warns; "We cannot pretend that
ethnicity is not an important factor in Kenyan politics. It is part of our historical and
social reality."6 He then concludes that "the time for lies on this issue is over and an
honest and open national discussion on ethnicity should take place."7
These statements bring us to the end of the introductory pages of this essay. We
shall now delve into the essay proper.
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Keywords
African, Ethnocentrism, Trinitology, Ethnicity