How to mitigate the horrific consequences of witchcraft belief in Africa

Datos Bibliográficos

ID11419965
AutoresEmmanuel Ofuasia (0000-0002-2028-6005, Philosophy, Lagos State University, Lagos, Nigeria, autor de correspondencia)
Año2021
Volumen40
Número4
Páginas350-361
Fecha de publicación2021-10-02
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessNo
TipoARTICLE
RevistaSouth African Journal of Philosophy (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0258-0136 • E-ISSN: 2073-4867
EditorialInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/02580136.2021.1996141
OpenAlexW4200247112
IdiomaEN
Referencias citadas16

It is pertinent, at this point in human intellectual history, to address the pervasive but misleading position among Africans that witchcraft is necessarily feminine and cruel. The medieval era’s untenable conception and detection of witchcraft as an absolutely callous and womanly affair filtered into colonial and then contemporary Africa to become full-blown via Pentecostalism, with horrendous social consequences. From personal research, I foreground two fundamental theses: (1) for ancient Africans, witches are neither necessarily malicious (since they can be benevolent sometimes, if propitiated correctly) nor essentially feminine (since it is possible for men too, to engage in the “craft”); and (2) there is no conclusive evidence from revealed scriptures which endorses Christianity’s understanding of witches as predominantly women. I arrive at this finding by employing the methods of philosophical and hermeneutical analyses of the Ifá literary corpus and the Judeo-Christian Bible. These findings do not, however, excuse the evil done in the name of the craft in contemporary Africa, hence the urgency for intellectual intervention. As a panacea, this study posits that with proper medical and scientific explanations, the horrific scourges induced by the belief in witches among contemporary Africans can be tackled almost effortlessly

Art · Christianity · Colonialism · Craft · Excuse · Literature · Political science · Sociology · African cultural and philosophical studies · Anthropological Studies and Insights · History · Law · Philosophy · Religion, Society, and Development · Religious studies