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Religion has been at the centre of recent philosophical debate in Africa for two major reasons. The first is that the answers to many central canonical philosophical questions in precolonial African societies take a religious form. As a result any attempt to construct an African philosophy begs attention to the epistemological and ontological standing of claims of this general sort. The second reason religion has been central to African philosophy is that one of the major issues in modern African philosophy is whether distinctively African modes of thought exist. Within this debate influential positions have been argued by reflecting on the character of traditional religious thought and practice and contrasting it with modes of thought purportedly associated with Western science. 1 Religion

Religion is a term whose definition is seen as controversial. Beliefs, institutions and practices can be said to be religious, but the relative importance of belief as opposed to ritual practice, or of ethical belief as opposed to the metaphysical, varies greatly among the belief systems with which Westerners might be familiar - Christianty, Buddhism, Judaism and Islam. Questions of creed, reflecting both the centrality of such questions to Western philosophy and the crucial role of creeds in Christian thinking are at the heart of the literature under discussion in this entry, which derives mainly from philosophers educated in Christian cultures. It will be necessary to draw attention to matters obscured by the focus on matters of propositional belief.

2 ‘African traditional religion and Western science’

Philosopher-anthropologist Robin Horton(1967) wrote a paper with this title in which he argued that the religious ideas of precolonial Africa maintained by many postcolonial Africans were best understood as constituting a body of theory whose fundamental aim, like that of Western science, was explanation, prediction and control of the phenomena of everyday life. Horton made the claim that traditional African religion is like modern Western science. Horton begins with the idea that anthropology’s first task is to provide for one culture, ‘the West’, an understanding of the concepts of another. Translation is the first step of this task. In the preface of Patterns of Thought in Africa and the West (1993) Horton argued that, ‘since translation involved finding equivalences of intention and structure between source-language and target-language, it followed that the scholar in quest of the appropriate translation instruments for African religious thought must be prepared to inquire deeply into the intentions and structures embodied in various areas of Western discourse’ (1993: 2). At the time of writing, ethnographic studies of African religion were dominated by a sort of Durkheimian consensus which held that religious notions were fundamentally symbolic of social relations. Taken to extremes this led to the ‘symbolist’ view that religious practices, far from being attempts to mobilize the world of spirits in the pursuit of mortal ends, were, like art, fundamentally expressive with the aim of representing social norms and ideas. Symbolists wanted to deny in particular that religious appeal to spirits presupposes literal belief in them any more than, for example, the function of Hamlet as drama requires belief in the literal existence of a Danish prince.

One motive for this view, Horton suggested, was the urge to escape the ethnocentrism of Victorian anthropology with its image of childlike primitives. In their rush to avoid ethnocentrism Horton thought that some symbolists, faced with the irrationality of traditional beliefs, insist that these beliefs are both rational and ‘symbolically’ true. Horton shares the urge to avoid ethnocentrism, but argues that the assumption underlying this argument that the beliefs are irrational is equally ethnocentric. False beliefs, simply put, do not have to be irrational.

Against the symbolists Horton argued that if any area of discourse in the West provided a model for the central purposes of African religious thought, it was not art but science. He sketched a picture of the role of science in the West as the development of theories which seek to place events in a wider causal context than that provided by common sense. At the heart of this process, in Horton’s account, was the development of a structure of belief in invisible entities whose behaviour accounted for the manifest behaviour of the visible world. He felt a key element of theory building was the development of analogies between invisible entities and visible ones. In the natural sciences these invisible entities - atoms and molecules - were modelled on everyday inanimate objects like tiny billiard balls speeding about in the vast spaces of the microcosm, crashing into each other from time to time. (All this at his time of writing amounted to mainstream philosophy of science.) In African religions, invisible entities - gods and spirits - were modelled not on objects but on human beings.

Horton pointed to this difference and offered to explain it, suggesting that it arose from the fundamental nature of explanation as the reduction of the unfamiliar to the familiar. In traditional cultures nature is untamed, alien and a source of puzzlement and fear. Social relations and people, on the contrary, are familiar and well understood. Thus, explaining the behaviour of nature in terms of agency is reducing the unfamiliar forces of the wild to the familiar explanatory categories of personal relations. In the West, on the other hand, ‘alienated man’ finds social relations puzzling and problematic and the physical world seems stable and familiar.

Horton went on to argue for a further difference. His summary was that African thought, unlike Western science, operated in a ‘closed’ predicament. His use of language derived from Karl Popper’s distinction between ‘open’ and ‘closed’ societies (see Popper, K.R.), but Horton reduced Popper’s connected set of oppositions to a simpler contrast: that between closed cultures ‘characterized by a lack of awareness of alternatives, sacredness of beliefs, and anxiety about threats to them’ (1993: 223) and open cultures, aware of alternatives and less threatened by the possibility of intellectual change.

These arguments have been subjected over the years to a great deal of scrutiny. The most controversial claims presuppose that precolonial African societies have remain unchanged. The stability of social relations implicit in his explanation of why people are appealed to as models, is belied by the turbulent history of many regions of west Africa since the 1700s. The very same wars and migrations must have made people extremely aware of alternative theoretical possibilities. This question of the openness of traditional cultures will be examined later.

3 Initial criticism

The centrality of Horton’s argument about religion to the debate in Anglophone African philosophy is evident in the quantity of papers devoted to this question in the leading Anglophone African journal Second Order. In the first issue in 1972 Vernon Pratt argued, after Wittgenstein, that Horton had understated the significance of the fact that it was agents not objects that were central to traditional religious theory. Explanations in terms of agency, he argued, differ from causal explanations in two crucial ways. First, agency is intrinsically unpredictable: someone is predictable only if his choice ‘has been made for him’. Second, ‘it is of the nature of an action to break in on a course of events’. Horton (1967) replied that the first of these claims was mistaken and the second claim, although true, did not distinguish agent explanation from the general causal explanation.

A similar debate occurred between Horton and Beattie, the symbolist-anthropologist, in which Beattie (1973) offered a number of arguments in defence of the view that traditional religion does not involve literal belief in spirits. He argued that the reason why spirits are perceived as unobservable is that the practitioners of traditional religion understand that they do not exist. He suggested that religious entities are invoked at the point where a problem cannot be dealt with by ‘available empirically-grounded techniques’ and that they must therefore be dealt with ‘in terms of expressive symbolism’ (1993: 4). Horton responded with the view that there is no reason to suppose either that traditional believers are unconvinced of the existence of the spirits to which they refer or that the only possible response to the failure of ‘available empirically-grounded techniques’ is symbolic, since scientific theory is also a response to such failures.

An interesting philosophical exchange between Horton and John Skorupski (1976) concerned itself with Horton’s proposed explanation of the ethnographic observation that in many traditional religions an object is said to belong to a kind to which, as far as an observer is concerned, it obviously does not belong. (Examples are the Nuer identification of twins with birds, reported by Evans-Pritchard in Nuer Religion (1956) and the Dinka claim that some men ‘are’ lions.) Horton proposed that these should be seen as theoretical identifications, such as the famous identification proposed by Eddington (1928) of the ‘hard, solid table of common sense thought and action’ with the ‘largely empty space, peopled by minuscule planetary systems, of theoretical physics’ (Horton 1993: 84). Skorupski argued that Horton misidentified the character of the theoretical identifications of the sciences, believing instead that they are not inherently paradoxical. He went on to suggest that the right Western analogy can be found in certain Christian biblical tales, such as the identification of Christ’s body and blood with the bread and wine of the Eucharist.

4 Critiques of the analogy between science and traditional religion

The Ghanaian philosopher Kwasi Wiredu (1980) has indicated that it is prima facie very odd to equate traditional African traditional religions

religious belief in west Africa with modern Western scientific theory when the obvious analogy is traditional Western religious belief. Kwame Anthony Appiah (1982), beginning with Wiredu’s observation, has argued that the reason the parallel between science and religion is misleading is not, as the symbolists held, that religious appeals to spirits are not meant literally. Rather, Appiah suggested that religion has changed a great deal in the modern West over the centuries, particularly the religious life of intellectuals which has turned increasingly towards ‘the contemplative, conceived of as spiritual intercourse with God’. Technical questions have ‘remained recalcitrant to scientific investigation - questions about one’s relations with others - and questions that could not even in principle be addressed by science - questions of value’ (1982: 186). This change makes for substantial differences between the religious life of intellectuals in the industrialized world and that of traditional cultures. There is a further crucial change, Appiah argues, in the nature of contemplative religion in the West. As interpersonal relations have become less ceremonious, so have private religious acts. Since the reformation, Christian prayer has become more like intimate conversation. The ceremoniousness, or ritual character of religious activity in traditional cultures is not analogous in the world or the practice of science. Appiah also argues that there is more of a fundamental reason why the equation of religion and science is misleading, stating that the social organization of inquiry in modern cultures is radically different from its traditional counterparts. Horton had acknowledged this in his initial discussions of the contrast between ‘open’ and ‘closed’ cultures. Much attention has been devoted to criticizing Horton’s account and trying to alter it.

5 Critiques of the open-closed dichotomy

Barry Hallen (1977) based his work on his experience of philosophical discussions with Yoruba diviners and healers. He argued that there are certainly African religious traditions that show an awareness of other traditions. Hallen takes as his model Karl Popper’s characterization of critical reflection on tradition. This is a significant gesture considering the Popperian provenance of the open-closed dichotomy which identifies the tradition as a tradition, displays an awareness of its consequences and is aware of at least one alternative and might choose to affirm or reject it. These tests show that the Yoruba diviners are critically appreciative of their tradition (see Yoruba epistemology).

In response to Hallen’s critique, Horton chose to speak not of the closed nature of traditional belief systems but, borrowing a term from Wole Soyinka (1976), of their being ‘accommodative’. He discussed work by students of UK anthropologist E.E. Evans-Pritchard (1937), such as G. Lienhardt’s discussion of Dinka religion in Divinity

and Experience and J. Middleton’s Lugbara Religion, which not only addressed the kind of static body of belief

captured in Evans-Pritchard’s picture of the Azande thought world, but also stressed the dynamic and, as Horton came to admit, ‘open’ way in which they ‘devise explanations for novel elements in… experience’ and ‘their capacity to borrow, re-work and integrate alien ideas in the course of elaborating such explanations’. He claims that it is this ‘"openness" that has given the traditional cosmologies such tremendous durability in the face of the immense changes that the 20th century has brought to the African scene’ (Appiah 1987: 226).

Horton contrasted this accommodative style with the ‘adversary’ style of scientific theory, characterized by the way in which the main stimulus to change of belief is not ‘novel experience but rival theory’ (Appiah 1987: 226). This change from the Popperian terminology of ‘open’ and ‘closed’ allows Horton to reframe the difference between traditional religion and science as not being related to the individual cognitive strategies, but with social ones.

Evans-Pritchard (1937) argued in his classic work that the Azande were not ‘experimentally inclined’; that although inclined to scepticism, their scepticism never reached to the level of general theory; that they did not share their experiences and that their beliefs were ‘generally vaguely formulated’ (1937: 202-4). However, none of this is true of science: it is centrally experimental; scepticism about general theories is one hallmark of great scientists; information is widely disseminated and precision of formulation is regarded as crucial. Each of these differences, as Appiah argued, is central to the social organization of inquiry.

Anthropologist Jack Goody (1977) argued that a key precondition of these forms of social organization of knowledge is the development of distributed literacy. He claimed that oral cultures have been limited by their inability to reaffirm what other theorists have written against experience. It is this fact, Horton went on to argue(1993: 161-93), that accounts for the possibility of the accommodative style. Literacy makes possible the

precise formulation of the issues under discussion as being characteristic of scientific theory. Precise formulation allows inconsistencies to be recognized.

6 The devout opposition

Perhaps the least known of Horton’s controversies outside Africa is the best known among students of African religion because he has taken on a consensus view of African traditional religion developed by a group he dubbed ‘the devout opposition’. This group included many Christian professors working in such places as Nigeria. For these scholars ‘the focal object’ (1993: 165) of African religion is the Christian God. Other spirits are regarded as his agencies and the attitude of believers towards God is one of awe. The group also thought that the aim of religious life was to achieve communion with God. Horton’s views are summarized in the form of a debate with this group in his later work (1993) in which he argued, first, that the ethnographic evidence does not support these claims and that it is the desire not to denigrate traditional belief, combined with Christian theology, that leads the devout opposition to their views. He says that:

‘It is not surprising that the clearest indications of the ideological character of the "devout" position should come from African rather than Western scholars. After all, it is their non-Christian kith and kin whose status is at stake… it is clear that there is a strong link… between establishing that African religions show the essential characteristics of True Religion and establishing the human worth and dignity of Africans’.

(1993: 191) Horton wanted to argue that scholarly discussion of religion can proceed while suspending the issue of whether monotheism is true. However, Appiah (1993: 7) suggested that if there is a God who makes himself known, albeit obscurely, in African religious experience, then his existence and these experiences may be as relevant to

understanding the beliefs of Africans as any other facts about the world in which they live. Horton does not pretend to be a theist, however, his argument with the devout opposition is both anthropological and theological. Appiah felt that Horton was wrong in his contention that the question of God’s existence is irrelevant to the philosophical study of religion.

See also: Latin America, Pre-Columbian and indigenous thought in; Religion and science

K. ANTHONY APPIAH References and further reading

Appiah, K.A. (1987) ‘Old Gods, New Worlds: Some Recent Work in the Philosophy of African Traditional Religion’, in G. Fløistad (ed.) Contemporary Philosophy, vol. 5: African Philosophy, Boston, MA: Kluwer, 1987: 207-34.(A review of African debates about Horton’s work.)

Appiah, K.A. (1982) In My Father’s House: Africa in the Philosophy of Culture, London: Methuen; 2nd edn, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992.(Chapter 6 includes an extended discussion of the character of traditional religious thought.)

Appiah, K.A. (1993) ‘Invisible Entities’, Times Literary Supplement, 17 July: 7.(A review of Horton’s Patterns of Thought in Africa and the West, 1993.)

Beattie, J. (1973) ‘Understanding traditional African religion: a comment on Horton’, Second Order 2 (2): 3-11. (A symbolist anthropologist’s response to Horton’s original claims.)

Eddington, A. (1928) The Nature of the Physical World, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.(An

examination of Eddington’s view that everyday objects have duplicates that can be described in the language of physical theory.)

Evans-Pritchard, E.E. (1937) Witchcraft, Oracles and Magic among the Azande, abridged with intro. by E. Gillies, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1976.(An anthropological classic that has been the focus of much philosophical discussion.)

Evans-Pritchard, E.E. (1956) Nuer Religion, Oxford: Oxford University Press.(This work discusses aspects of Nuer ritual and belief that are closer than Zande magic to what is ordinarily thought of as religion in the West.) Gjertsen, D. (1980) ‘Closed and open belief systems’, Second Order 7 (1): 5-69.(A critique of Horton based on

more recent history of science.)

Goody, J. (1977) The domestication of the savage mind, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.(An important discussion of the significance of literacy for intellectual life.)

Hallen, B. (1977) ‘Robin Horton on Critical Philosophy and Traditional Thought’, Second Order 6 (1): 81-92. African traditional religions

(Hallen criticizes Horton’s claims about the uncritical character of traditional thought by reference to Yoruba diviners.)

Horton, R. (1967) ‘African traditional religion and Western science’, Africa 37 (1-2): 50-71; 155-87.(Horton’s classic paper.)

Horton, R. (1976) ‘Understanding traditional African religion: a reply to Professor Beattie’, Second Order 3 (1): 3-29.(A response to the Beattie paper, 1973.)

Horton, R. (1987) ‘Traditional Thought and the Emerging African Philosophy Department: A Reply to Dr

Hallen’, in G. Fløistad (ed.) Contemporary Philosophy, vol. 5: African Philosophy, Boston, MA: Kluwer, 1987: 207-34. (An unpublished paper in which Horton responded to Hallen’s discussion of traditionalism. The paper appeared in K.A. Appiah’s ‘Old Gods, New Worlds: Some Recent Work in the Philosophy of African

Traditional Religion’.)

Horton, R. (1993) Patterns of Thought in Africa and the West, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

(Summarizes the most significant debates in African philosophy of religion from the point of view of a leading partisan.)

Horton, R. and Finnegan, R. (eds) (1973) Modes of Thought, London: Faber & Faber.(Contains many important articles relevant to evaluating Horton’s position.)

Popper, K. (1962) ‘Towards a rational theory of tradition’, in Conjectures and Refutations, New York: Basic Books.(The account of a critical tradition taken up by Hallen in his critique of Horton.)

Pratt, V. (1972) ‘Science and traditional religion. A discussion of some of Robin Horton’s views’, Second Order 1