Learning in Times of Crisis

    Worldview differences become more apparent during times of crisis, especially at times of death and illness.  Each society has developed its own distinctive rituals for grappling with crises.  When the meanings of these rituals are studied, they reveal significant insights into a people's worldview because "basic beliefs and assumptions are. . .laid bare" (Hiebert 1978, 37).  Some rites are distinctively Christian; others are animistic.  The Christian and the animistic are practiced by people living side by side and sometimes by the same person.

Observing Death

    Missionaries can learn much about animistic worldviews by observing death.  For example, the Kipsigis of Kenya believe that the spirits of the dead will eventually be called back to live in the bodies of another generation.  This is not obvious unless the missionary sees and hears what occurs at traditional burial ceremonies.  When a father dies, his eldest son throws crabgrass into the grave as a parting blessing and verbally bids his father farewell.  "Go safely," he says.  "We will soon call you to come back to us."  This calling back of the dead into life is done when a new child is born.  Such an explicit statement of a cyclical worldview is seldom heard except at times of death and birth.  The traditional Kipsigis hope is this-worldly--to be reborn into the present world.

    In Christian funerals, on the other hand, evangelists stand before a believer's grave and proclaim that our hope is beyond this world.  God placed his spirit in man when he breathed into him the breath of life (Gen. 2:7).  The Bible says that at death the body "returns to the ground from which it came, and the spirit returns to God who gave it" (Eccles. 12:7).  We believe that our brother has gone to be with God who created him.
Hope is redirected in a Christian funeral.  Hope is no longer in reincarnated life in the present world but in resurrected life in new spiritual bodies at home with God (1 Cor. 15:35-50). 

    Certain cultural motifs become apparent to the identificational missionary during death and funeral rites.   Without understanding these motifs, the missionary lives in a cultural void.  Finding answers to the following questions while participating in death and funeral rites helps the missionary understand his context.   

    What is the meaning of life?  It becomes apparent from observing traditional Kipsigis burial rites that the meaning of life is found in maintaining harmony with the ancestors.  The message of Christian funerals, however, shows that the ultimate purpose of life is to live so that we might be united with God. 

    Is the cultural view of time cyclical or linear?  Traditional Kipsigis funeral rites show a cyclical view of time.  The dead are thought to return later in another body.  Christian evangelists struggle to linearize the traditional Kipsigis view of time. 

    What do morality and sin have to do with death?  Traditional Kipsigis believe that sin against other Kipsigis causes societal disharmony and that sin will eventually "eat up" and "kill" the sinner.  Thus Ezek. 18:20--"The soul that sins, he will die"--is interpreted literally.  Christians, on the other hand, recognize that ultimately sin is against God and that only the cleansing blood of Jesus can make one righteous.  

    What is the relationship between the "living dead" (those who have just died) and their family?  Traditional Kipsigis consider the "living dead" as that part of the family who have passed from the realm of the living.  Because they are the spiritual beings closest to the earthly realm, they are appeased and propitiated by the living.  Faithful Christians believe that such appeasement and propitiation denies the all-sufficiency of God.  Weak Christians, however, are tempted to appease and/or manipulate ancestors when they are told that illness or other misfortune has been caused by disgruntled ancestors.

    Thus both animistic and Christian perspectives of life and death are vividly seen by witnessing what happens at death.

Observing Sickness  

    Worldviews also become comprehensible during times of illness.  To many Africans, both Christians and non-Christians, extended illness is thought to be caused by sin.  When I was severely sick with hepatitis in 1979, Christians prayed that God would forgive my sins so that I might be healed.  I replied that I knew of no major sin in my life; Satan was rather tempting me as he tempted Job in the Old Testament; and I needed prayers to overcome Satan.  Unlike Job's friends who refused his proclamations of innocence and declared Job guilty of sin, the Kipsigis Christians were open to discussing other causes of illness.  During these discussions, I discovered much about Kipsigis conceptions of suffering and evil.  The Kipsigis Christians, in turn, learned biblical perspectives which broadened their understanding of human suffering.       

    From a Kipsigis perspective sin is not the only cause of illness:  Ancestors might also produce illness because they are dissatisfied with the activities of the living.  I learned about this cause for illness when Stephen Mibei, an older Kipsigis Christian, became ill.  Instead of praying to the Lord for healing and waiting on him to act, he went to a diviner to find out what was causing his sickness.  The diviner sacrificed a sheep, which Stephen provided, and analyzed the entrails to determine the cause of the ailment.  It was determined that Stephen's failure to pay the bride-price for his wife had angered his deceased father-in-law.  Healing would occur only if part of the bride-price was paid immediately and a libation poured out at the ancestral shrine to appease the deceased.  I felt his emotions as he struggled with his desire to follow conflicting allegiances, either that of Creator God or that of the ancestors.  Although Stephen realized that making sacrifices and libations to ancestral spirits was a denial of his allegiance to God, he followed the advice of the diviner.  In the midst of Stephen's struggles I was not only a cultural learner but a Christian teacher.  While learning that Kipsigis believe that ancestors may cause illness, I taught that a believer must trust in God, wait patiently for him, and never call upon the dead on behalf of the living (Isa. 8:19). 

    By empathetically listening to those who are sick and analyzing rituals of healing, the missionary learns much about the indigenous worldview.  Since animistic religion is greatly concerned about causes of illness, it is imperative for the missionary to learn why people become sick.  In addition to sin and ancestral dissatisfaction, soul-loss, spirit intrusion, object intrusion, the breaking of a taboo, and sorcery are also thought to be causes of illness (Burnett 1988, 179-182).  Through empathic sharing the missionary learns indigenous perceptions of illness, spiritual beings which must be appeased or propitiated for healing to occur, types of magic employed to manipulate spiritual power, and traditional and contemporary medicines used locally for curative and religious purposes.   

    How Christians and non-Christians conceptualize such significant problems as death and illness tells the cross-cultural evangelist much about his adopted people.

Works Cited

Burnett, David. 1988. Unearthly Powers. Eastbourne, England: MARC.

Hiebert, Paul G. 1978. Phenomenology and institutions of animism. Class syllabus from M620 at Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, CA.

Copyright ©2000 by Gailyn Van Rheenen -- excerpt from Communicating Christ in Animistic Contexts (Pasadena: William Carey Library, 1996)

All rights reserved.   If you wish to copy this information, please e-mail Dr. Van Rheenen.