Ethnophilosophers doubled as clergy and inserted Christian dogma into African tradition

Evidence

Furthermore, Towa argues that most of the works of ethnophilosophers coincide with theology. He cites the cases of Roman Catholic priests, such as Tempels, Kagame, and Mulago, and Protestant pastors, such as Mbiti and Bahoken. For him, their positions as priests and pastors push their preoccupations in the direction of theology and not philosophy as such. With such theological absorption, the concept of philosophy is broadened to co-exist with culture. When philosophy is so broadened to co-exist with culture, it can lead to the disappearance of philosophy. In this way, Christian dogma is inserted into African tradition so that it loses its foreign cast in the face of any nationalist who wants to be proud of his cultural identity. — Frans Dokman, Beyond Bantu Philosophy_…, 548

Categorization

• XREF: The clergy-ethnophilosophy link resonates with the reader’s Frankfurt material on the ideological functions of religious institutions and with missionary-inflected accounts of culture.