Most important terms are introduced and defined as they arise in the text. Here I confine myself to a discussion of two key terms.
1.4.1 Revival
It is important to define what we mean by ‘revival’. As noted, theological and sociological definitions differ over the role played by divine initiative, but beyond that, there is a broad consensus.81 I propose the following working definition:
A Christian revival is a communal event that assumes an element of decline, out of which believers are called to renewed heights of spiritual vitality and moral probity, issuing in efforts to spread the gospel in and beyond the local community, and resulting in a widespread sense of sorrow for sin, extensive conversion experiences, and altered religious and socio-cultural landscapes.
This definition distances itself from the modern use of the term, popular in Africa, to refer to organised evangelistic campaigns.82 As Bebbington notes, we need to discriminate between ‘spontaneous popular revival, deeply rooted in the community,
53, refers to evidence of both indigenisation and rejection of African customs in the East African Revival.
81 For theological definitions, see Orr, Africa, vii; J. I. Packer, ‘Revival, Theology of'’, in Sinclair B.
Ferguson and David F. Wright (eds.), New Dictionary of Theology, Leicester: IVP, 1988, 588; Davies, Revivals, 15; Peter Hocken, ‘The Pentecostal-Charismatic Movement as Revival and Renewal’, Pneuma, Spring 1981, 34-5. For more sociological definitions by social historians, see Blumhofer and Balmer,
‘Introduction’, xi; Randall Balmer, Encyclopedia of Evangelicalism, Louiseville/London: Westminister John Knox Press, 2002, 485; Richard Carwardine, Transatlantic Revivalism, xv; McLoughlin, Revivals, 2, 7-12.
and meetings carefully designed to promote the work of the gospel.’83 Because of this, some have preferred the expression ‘renewal’ when writing about African revival movements.84 While this makes room for spontaneity, revitalisation, and innovation within the Church, it takes insufficient account of the broader effects of the phenomenon in the wider community. This thesis uses the term ‘revival’ to describe the movement that began among the Igbos of Eastern Nigeria during the civil war, and reached its climax in 1970/’71.85 It was also the expression generally used by participants to describe what happened, both at the time and retrospectively.86 Henceforth, I will refer to it as the Civil War Revival.
1.4.2 African Pentecostalism
There has been an ongoing debate about the appropriateness of ‘Pentecostalism’ as an umbrella term for African movements and churches, which stress the experience of the Spirit. Western definitions that focus on historical continuity with the Azusa Street Revival or adherence to a doctrine of ‘initial evidence’ have proved inadequate, due to the great variety of movements elsewhere. This thesis follows Hollenweger and Anderson by adopting a more inclusive definition. They use the term ‘African
82 This is often traced to the North American revivalist, Charles Finney.
83 David Bebbington, Evangelicalism in Modern Britain. A History from the 1730s to the 1980s, London:
Unwin, 1989, 116.
84 See for example Asamoah-Gyadu, ‘Renewal within African Christianity’, 36-7.
85 It is difficult to know exactly when the revival began. Bolton regards 1970 as the starting-point.
Frances Lawjua Bolton, And We Beheld His Glory. A Personal Account of the Revival in Eastern Nigeria in 1970/’71, Harlow: Christ The King Publishing, 1992. Okorocha suggests that it began during the civil war. Cyril C. Okorocha, The Meaning of Religious Conversion in Africa. The Case of the Igbo in Nigeria, Aldershot: Avebury, 1987, 274. This thesis follows Nebo, by taking 1967 (the beginning of the civil war) as the starting point. Chinedu Nebo, ‘West Africa’, in Cyril C. Okorocha (ed.), The Cutting Edge of Mission. A Report of the Mid-Point Review of the Decade of Evangelism, London: Anglican Communion Publications, 1996, 78.
86 For example,Uchenna Emezue, Letter to Roberts, 31 August 1970; Okorocha, Religious Conversion, 274; Bolton, Glory; Ben. Chuka Osisioma, The Ancient Pathway, Enugu: Snaap Press, 1998, xi; Nnaji Chukwuka, Looking Beyond the Night, Enugu: Snaap Press, 1997.
Pentecostalism’ to describe any African church or movement that stresses the experience of the Spirit and the practice of spiritual gifts.87 In this sense, it includes older AICs, called ‘prophet-healing churches’ by Turner,88 mission-related Pentecostal churches, and newer (post-1970) African-founded Pentecostal churches, fellowships, and ministries. Members from each of these broad categories feature in the story of the Civil War Revival.
In Igboland, members of other churches usually refer to ‘prophet-healing’ AICs as prayer houses (ulo ekpere, Igbo),89 ‘prayer-healing,’90 Aladura (Yoruba: ‘praying’),91
‘spiritual,’92 ‘white garment,’ or ‘hand-clapping’ (uka akuluaka, Igbo) churches, reflecting their interest in prayer, their stress on the Holy Spirit and belief in lesser spiritual beings, their preference for wearing white robes, and their lively worship. I use the term ‘prayer house’, as this was the most common designation used by my
87 Hollenweger, Pentecostals, 149; Allan Anderson, ‘Introduction: World Pentecostalism at a Crossroads’, in Allan H. Anderson and Walter J. Hollenweger (eds.), Pentecostals after a Century.
Global Perspectives on a Movement in Transition, Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999, 20;
Anderson, Zion and Pentecost, 26-7, 35-37. It was Robert Mapes Anderson, who suggested that the Pentecostal movement should be seen as a movement concerned primarily with the experience of the Holy Spirit and the practice of spiritual gifts. See Anderson, Vision of the Disinherited, 4. For a critique of inclusive definitions of Pentecostalism, see Gary B. McGee, ‘Pentecostal Missiology: Moving Beyond Triumphalism to Face the Issues’, Pneuma, 16.2, Fall 1994, 276-77.
88 H. W. Turner, ‘A Typology of Modern African Religious Movements’, Journal of Religion and Religions, 1.1, 1967, 23. For a recent discussion of terminology, see Allan H. Anderson, African Reformation. African Initiated Christianity in the 20th Century, Trenton, New Jersey: Africa World Press, 2001, 10-11
89 For example, G. C. Ikeobi, ‘Catholic Response to the Challenge of “Prayer Houses” - Origins of the
“Tuesday Prayer” in Onitsha’, in V. A. Nwosu (ed.), The Catholic Church in Onitsha. People, Places and Events (1885-1985), Onitsha: Etukokwu Press, 1985, 262-75; Bolton, Glory, 7; Charles Chikezie Agu, Secularization in Igboland. Socio-religious Change and its Challenges to the Church Among the Igbo, Frankfurt am Main/Bern: Verlag Peter Lang, 1989, 401.
90 For example, Edmund Ilogu, Christianity and Ibo Culture, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1974, 60-1.
91 For example, Kalu, Embattled Gods; Anyaegbu, ‘Pentecostal/Evangelical’.
92 For example, Augustine Iwuagwu, ‘The “Spiritual Churches” in the Eastern States of Nigeria (a Selected Study)’, Ph.D. thesis, University of Ibadan, 1971.
informants,93 and to distinguish them from the various non-Christian ‘spiritualist’
groups that draw heavily upon traditional religious categories and/or popular ‘occult’
literature imported from abroad.94 Due to their diversity and dynamic nature, they are difficult to classify with any precision, though various typologies have been proposed, which I discuss briefly in chapter two.
Different terms are used to denote the newer (post-1970) locally generated movements, ministries, and churches in Nigeria. In the literature, they are referred to variously as
‘charismatic’,95 ‘Pentecostal’,96 ‘neo-Pentecostal’,97 ‘revivalist’,98 ‘born-again’,99 and
‘Evangelical-Pentecostal.’100 ‘Pentecostal’ is the common term of self-designation, while ‘Charismatic’ usually refers to renewal movements within the mainline mission churches. In this thesis, I use the expression ‘neo-Pentecostal’ (or the abbreviation
‘NPC’) to denote the Igbo-founded churches, to distinguish them from the
93 Though my informants usually used this as a generic term to describe Christian and non-Christian groups.
94 In the literature, these groups are variously labelled ‘vitalistic’, ‘revivalistic’, ‘nativistic’, ‘neo-primal’
and ‘spiritual science.’ See Harold Turner, Religious Innovation in Africa. Collected Essays on New Religious Movements, Boston, Mass.: G. K. Hall & Co, 1979, 83-4; Hackett, ‘Enigma Variations’, 135-37; Kalu, Embattled Gods, 289.
95 Ojo, ‘Charismatic Movements in Africa’, 92-3, uses the term ‘charismatic movements’ to distinguish them from the earlier mission-related Pentecostal churches. See also Hackett, ‘Charismatic/ Pentecostal’, 259, who prefers the term ‘charismatic,’ to distinguish the newer churches from the earlier wave of AICs.
However, Hackett also notes that in Nigerian parlance ‘charismatic’ has tended to describe renewal movements within mainline churches. Ghanaian scholars writing about the Ghanaian context prefer the term ‘Charismatic Ministries’ or ‘Charismatic churches’, as this is the term used by the members themselves. See for example, Asamoah-Gyadu, ‘Renewal within African Christianity’, 29; Cephas N.
Omenyo, ‘Charismatic Churches in Ghana and Contextualization’, Exchange, 31.3, 2002, 265.
96 Hackett, ‘Charismatic/Pentecostal’, 259; Marshall-Fratani, ‘Global and Local’.
97 Peel, Religious Encounter, 314.
98 Hackett, ‘Enigma Variations’, 132.
99 Kalu, ‘Third Response’, 7; Kalu, ‘Preserving a Worldview’, 123; Peel, Religious Encounter, 314-16.
Marshall, ‘Pentecostalism in Southern Nigeria’, 8-9, prefers the term ‘born-again’ because of the importance of this experience for these churches’ self-identity. But this ignores the fact that in the case of civil war revivalists a definite ‘born-again’ identity existed prior to their introduction to Pentecostal doctrines. See chapter three, section 6.6.
100 Kailing, ‘African Christian Problem’, 494-5; Kailing, ‘Pentecostalism’, 224; Ogbu U. Kalu, ‘The Wind of God: Evangelical Pentecostalism in Igboland, 1970-1990’, Pew Charitable Trust Lecture, Centre
related Pentecostal churches.101 The term ‘Charismatic Ministry’ (CM) is used to describe the inter-denominational fellowship groups that arose within the ranks of the mainline mission churches during the revival, often around a charismatic individual(s), and formed the basis for the new churches.