Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-sxzjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T08:35:06.567Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The ‘African National Church’: Self-Determination and Political Struggle Among Black Christians in South Africa to 1948

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Alan Gregor Cobley
Alan Gregor Cobley
Affiliation:
professor of history inthe University of the West Indies, Bridgetown, Barbados.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The first generations of black Christians in Southern Africa went through a painful process of critical examination and experiment as they struggled to assimilate new economic, social, and religious values. These values were presented to them mainly by white missionaries and were based largely on European models. It was as part of this dialectical process that an independent black churches movement—quickly labeled by friends and foes the “Ethiopian Movement”—had emerged at the end of the nineteenth century. The independent black churches spread and multiplied rapidly in South Africa. By 1919 there were seventy-six recognized sects; however, there were many more which were not officially recognized. A black newspaper reported in 1921 that there were “at least one thousand natives within the municipal boundary of Johannesburg who call themselves ministers, but who are unattached to any recognised chuch, and who live on the offerings of their respective flocks.” Although many members of these churches were active politically, the most pervasive influence of the movement was on the ideology of African nationalism, as the role of the church became a recurring theme in debates on the development of an African national identity.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 60 , Issue 3 , September 1991 , pp. 356 - 371
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1991

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

An earlier version of this article was published as part of chapter three in Alan G. Cobley, Class and Consciousness: The Black Petty Bourgeoisie in South Africa, 1924 to 1950 (Westport, Conn., 1991).

1. Union of South Africa, Office of Census and Statistics, Official Year Book of the Union 3 (Pretoria, 1919), pp. 437–438.Google Scholar

2. Quoted by Huss, Bernard, The South African Natives. A Monthly Series Special to ‘The Southern Cross’ (May 27, 1925-August 18, 1948). A Documentation, 2 vols. (Mariannhill, 1977), 1:26.Google Scholar

3. Prominent independent church leaders who were also active in the African National Congress (ANC) included Charlotte Maxeke (AME church pioneer and founder of the ANC Women's Section), her husband Marshall Maxeke (AME pastor and ANC executive member), Henry Reed Ngcayiya (senior chaplain of the ANC and president of the Ethiopian Church), S. P. Matseke (president of the Transvaal African Congress and Chairman of the AME church schools committee), Dr A. B. Xuma (ANC president general and leading AME church layman), R. W. Msimang (drafter of the ANC constitution and active in his father's “Independent Methodist Church”), Richard G. Baloyi (ANC treasurer general and chief trustee of the “Bantu Methodist Church”).

4. Sundkler, B., Bantu Prophets in South Africa (second ed., London, 1961), p. 50.Google Scholar

5. Mahabane, Z. R., “The Evil of the Colour Bar,” presidential address, 18 05 1922Google Scholar at the Third Annual Cape Congress, Queenstown; published in Carter, G. M. and Johns, S. W. III, eds., The Good Fight, Selected Speeches of Rev. Zaccheus R. Mahabane (Evanston, Ill., 1965), pp. 22–30.Google Scholar

6. Cited in Kuper, L., An African Bourgeoisie, Race Class, and Politics in South Africa (New Haven, Conn., 1965), p. 193.Google Scholar The quotation is also reproduced as Doc. 1, in Protest and Hope, 1882–1934 (Stanford, Calif., 1973), vol. 1 of From Protest to Challenge, A Documentary History of African Politics in South Africa 1882–1964, ed. by T. Karis and G. M Carter, p. 12.

7. The founder and bishop of the African Orthodox church in South Africa was a former “Ethiopian” minister named Daniel W. Alexander who lived in Kimberley. He applied to join the AOC in 1924 after reading about it in the Universal Negro Improvement Association newspaper, Negro World; see Hill, R. and Pirio, G., “Africa for the Africans: The Garvey Movement in South Africa, 1920–1940,” in Marks, S. and Trapido, S., eds., The Politics of Class, Race and Nationalism in South Africa (London, 1987).Google Scholar

8. Cited in Huss, B., South African Natives, 1:18.Google Scholar

9. William Ballinger to J. H. Pim, 23 December 1930, in the J. H. Pim Papers, A 881 Univ. of the Witwatersrand Archive (hereafter UW), item B 1 4/141.

10. Sundkler, , Bantu Prophets, p. 51.Google Scholar

11. The African National Congress Is It Dead: No, It Lives ? The Proposed Amendment of its Constitution by P. Ka I. Seme B.A. LL.D. (pamphlet, Newcastle, Natal, 1932), copy in the D. D. T. Jabavu Collection Accession 47, Univ. of South Africa collection (hereafter UNISA), item 1.2.31.

12. Unidentified African writer quoted by Huss, , South African Natives, 1:198–199.Google Scholar Opposition to Seme's proposal was led by Bishop D. W. Alexander of the African Orthodox Church.

13. T. D. Verryn, “A History of the Order of Ethiopia” (unpublished mimeograph, Johannesburg, 1962), copy in the Church of the Province of South Africa Archive, Univ. of the Witwatersrand Library (hereafter CPSA), AB484f. After Dwane's death in 1915 the order survived with varying fortunes. When Verryn investigated it in 1961 it had a membership of some 10,000 communicants and thirteen priests, including one of Dwane's Sons.

14. “An Appeal for the Consecration of a Bishop for the Order of Ethiopia to His Grace the Archbishop of Cape Town and the Bishops of the CPSA in synod assembled October 8, 1944,” signed by P. M. Mpumlwana, in the Order of Ethiopia Records, CPSA AB941, file A.

15. Ibid.

16. Ibid.

17. For example, two members who joined the order in 1906 were listed in 1910 as “Excommunicate: Joined AME” in the “Order of Ethiopia, list of members and of persons eligible to become members,” notebook in Order of Ethiopia Records 1907- 1917, CPSA AB652.

18. On the African Congregational church see Dinnerstein, M., “The American Board Mission to the Zulu, 1835–1900” (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Columbia, 1971), pp. 201–209;Google ScholarMarks, S., Reluctant Rebellion: the 1906–8 Disturbances in Natal (Oxford, 1970), p. 70;Google ScholarMarks, S., “The Ambiguities of Dependence: John L. Dube of Natal,” Journal of Southern African Studies 1 (1975): 170–173.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

19. Payne, E. A., The Church Awakes: The Story of the Modern Missionary Movement (London, 1942), p. 168.Google Scholar

20. Sundkler, , Bantu Prophets, p. 172.Google Scholar

21. “Bantu Methodist Church (Revised Constitution in the year 1938),” handwritten copy in the T. D. M. Skota Papers, UW A1618, file 8; details of Hlongwana's grievances can be found in R. E. Phillips to J. H. Pim, 16 December 1932, J. H. Pim Papers, UW A881, item B1 1/44.

22. “Mr. S. P. Matseke by Robinson Matseke,” biography written for the third edition of the African Yearly Register, copy in the T. D. M. Skota Papers, UWA1618.

23. For a full discussion of the role of the black petty bourgeoisie in these years see Cobley, A., Class and Consciousness: The Black Petty Bourgeoisie in South Africa, 1924 to 1950 (Westport, Conn., 1991).Google Scholar For a comparison of the role of Afrikaner intellectuals see Moodie, T. Dunbar, The Rise of Afrikanerdom, Power, Apartheid and the Afrikaner Civil Religion (Berkeley, 1975),Google Scholar ch. 4.

24. Skota, T. D. Mweli, ed., The African Yearly Register, Being an Illustrated National Biographical Dictionary (Who's Who) of Black Folks in Africa (Johannesburg, 1931), p. 415.Google Scholar

25. “Constitution of the Order of Africa” in the Skota Papers, file 13.

26. Speech on the Order of Africa (n.d.) in the Skota Papers, file 13.

27. Ibid.

28. Such symbols and images were central to the work of black writers of the late 1930s and 1940s such as Herbert Dhlomo: see Couzens, T., The New African: A Study of the Life and Work of H. I. E. Dhlomo (Johannesburg, 1985).Google Scholar

29. S. S. Tema, “The Separatist Churches and the Sects,” Provincial Board of Missions (PBM) Records, CPSAAB786, file A.

30. “Union of African Churches: A United Church is a Uniting Church,” copy of a statement dated November 1939 in the J. S. Moroka Collection, UNISA, Acc. 46, item 2.5.

31. Sundkler, , Bantu Prophets, pp. 51–52.Google Scholar

32. “PBM Occasional Paper No. 2, May 1, 1940,” in PBM Records, file D.

33. Jabavu, D. D. T., An African Indigenous Church (A Plea for its Establishment in South Africa) (pamphlet, Lovedale, 1942).Google Scholar

34. Reported in “The African Church: Memorandum by H. M. Maimane and J. A. Calata, Priests of the Church of the Province of South Africa,” copy in PBM Records, file A.

35. Bishop of Grahamstown to Father O. Victor, 30 August 1940, in PBM Records, file A.

36. “The African Church: Memorandum.”

37. Bishop of Grahamstown to Father O. Victor, 30 August 1940.

38. “The African Church: Memorandum.”

39. Bishop of Grahamstown to Archbishop of Capetown, 31 August 1940, in PBM Records, file A. He added: “I am of the opinion that the Bishops might care to run over the ground a little before the meeting of the Board of Missions and have some line of action wherewith to meet discussion.”

40. Bishop of Grahamstown to J. A. Calata, 16 October 1940, PBM Records, file A.

41. Ibid.

42. J. A. Calata to Father O. Victor, 6 November 1940, PBM Records, file A. Calata enclosed a copy of the statement by Moroka and others as part of the background to his proposal.

43. J. A. Calata to Father O. Victor, 22 February 1941, PBM Records, file A.

44. “Rough Notes—African Church. Bloemfontein May 1941,” PBM Records, file B. Calata and Maimane had produced a somewhat modified version of their earlier proposal for this meeting, now entitled, “The African Branch of the Catholic Church. The statement presented by Revs. H. M. Maimane and J. A. Calata and accepted by the Provincial Board of Missions Executive for consideration at the Provincial Board of Missions,” copy in the PBM Records, file A.

45. Statement beginning, “An Appeal has been made to us as the Bishops of the Church of the Province of South Africa, by the African members of the Executive Committee of the Provincial Board of Missions,” undated copy in PBM Records, file B.

46. “The African Branch of the Church of the Province of South Africa. Memorandum 2,” copy dated 14 January 1943 and signed by Calata and Maimane in PBM Records, file B.

47. “A Constructive policy for Native Church Development,” H. P. Bull, April 1943, copy of reprint from the Church Weekly in PBM Records, file A.

48. African Orthodox Church Archives, Pitts Theology Library, Emory University, Box 8, Folders 92, 93, 94.

49. Calata to Rev. A. S. Ngubeni, 19 November 1954, in the J. A. Calata Papers, UW A1729, file 20, item G.

50. Biographical details from the J. A. Calata Papers, UW A1729.