humanity's african roots pre publication edition

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Pre-Publication Edition

15 December 2008

Copyright 2008 Joe Holland

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In loving and grateful memory of

JAMES B. MCCONDUIT andWAL TERT. HUBBARDPast Presidents of the National Office of Black Catholics

and courageous leaders in the struggle for justice

on behalf of the African-American community

and on behalf of unions and working people.

On the Occasion of the Inauguration ofBARACKOBAMA

Grandchild of Africa and the First African-American

President of the United States.

May he and hi s gove rnmen t be brought by the Spir it

to full realization of the need

to care for Earth in all its species and bioregions

and to protect the special dignity of human life

in all countries and all its stages.

Write down the vision clearly upon the tablets,

so that one can read it readily.

For the vision still has its time,

presse s on to fu lf il lmen t, and wi ll no t di sappoint .

If it delays, wait for it,

it will surely come, it will not be late.

HABAKKU K

Chapter 2, Verse 2-3


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T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S

Preface by Csar J. Baldelomar 6

Acknowledgements 12

1. INTRODUCTION 14

2. THE SPIRITUAL RENAISSANCE 24OF AFRICAN ROOTS

3. THE CREATOR AND CREATION 30IN ANCIENTAFRICAN CULTURE

4. THE EMERGENCE OF THE 36HUMAN RAC E IN ANCIENTAFRICA

5. THE AFRICAN ROOTS 40OF HUMAN CIVILIZATION

6. THE GIFTS OFWOMEN AND MEN 50INANCIENTAFRICA

5

Bibliography 64

Pax Romana/Catholic Movement 72

fo r In te ll ec tual and Cultural Af fa ir s

The Pax Romana Center for 74

International Study of Catholic Social Teaching


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May this book and other life-giving messages provide hope for many youngpeople, especially for those who are tempted with despair in these difficulttimes.

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A C K N O W L E D G E M E N T S

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eep thanks go to the late Walter T. Hubbard and the late JamesMcConduit for being two inspirational figures behind the writing of

this small book. Both men, great African-American lay Catholic leaders insociety, served as long-term Presidents of the National Office of BlackCatholics. Better known as the NOBC, this office stood out for decades asthe leading voice of African-American Catholics in the United States. When

Walter served as the last Executive Director of the NOBC, he proposedthat I do this book. Both men then provided warm personal supportthroughout the long process of research and writing.

Special thanks also go to Bobby William Austin and The Village Foundation

as well as to Frederick J. Perella, Jr. and the Raskob Foundation for CatholicActivities. These foundations and their executive officers helped at variousstages to fund the project of which this book was a part. Without their ge-nerous help, the book would never have been written.

Special thanks go as well to the countless students in my Philosophy classesat St. Thomas University in Miami Gardens, Florida. With their help overmany years, the book was tested, re-tested, and refined again and again.

In particular, my deep thanks go to Csar J. Baldelomar, past student and

now Executive Director of the Pax Romana Center for International Studyof Catholic Social Teaching. It was his idea that we publish the bookthrough the Center, and he deserves extra thanks for his final and carefulediting and layout of the text.

Deep gratitude also needs to be expressed to the many thoughtful groupsand insightful individuals who have knowingly or unknowingly contributedtheir wisdom to this text. Their voices came especially from the rich wis-dom which I have been blessed to receive from friends in the African-

American community of the United States, in the rest of the African Dias-pora, and also in Africa itself.

Lastly, deep gratitude is also due to the growing list of scholars who havedone marvelous research on the richness of the ancient African and modern

African-American heritage, and on the still living influence of this heritageacross the entire human family. Much of what is offered here is at best onlya humble summary of their pioneering work.

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I N T RO D UC T I O N

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his small book is offered asthe first in a series of study-

books especially for use in formingfuture young visionary leaders for the new

postmodern planetary civilization nowbeing born. It seeks to help thesefuture young leaders to develop alife-giving vision for the future.

This book is also for people of allages. It may be used in college andhigh-school classes, or in studygroups for religious and other

community groups.In service of a life-giving vision, thisbook invites future young leaders,and indeed all people, to work to-gether in healing the great spiritual,ecological, and social crises of themechanistic-utilitarian cosmology ofmodern culture. This cosmology

constitutes the philosophical root ofmodern cultures tendency to pro-mote selfish individualism and de-structive materialism.

This book is being published by thePax Romana Center for Interna-tional Study of Catholic Social

Teaching, because its theme is

closely linked to the work of theCenter. Catholic Social Teaching(CST) is a global wisdom traditionthat insists that all humans form asingle human family guided by thecommon philosophical-ethicaltruths that are found in the natureand purpose of everything in the

created world.

The new scientific evidence that allhumans living today have common

African ancestors provides a biolog-ical and sociological ground for the

philosophical claim of CST that allhumans are called to follow com-mon ethical truths. Today we speakof these common truths as part of aglobal ethics. For such a philo-sophical vision, we humans are notseparated into radically differentraces that deny our common

humanity. Rather, we form onerace, the human race, and we seek acommon global ethics.

REMEMBERING OURCOMMON AFRICAN ROOT S

This book is also written from aspiritual perspective. It sees all cul-tures and indeed all of creation ascoming from the one Creator. Sincethe human race begins in Africa, itshould not be surprising that muchof humanitys spiritual as well as

cultural wisdom, and even the cul-tural style of world religions, can allbe found to have deep Africanroots.

For example, the distinguishedAfro-Canadian historian, ProfessorAlbert Raboteau from PrincetonUniversity, points out the rich con-

vergences between African religionand the sacramental dimension of

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T H E S P I RI T U AL

RE N AI S S AN C E OF

AF RIC AN RO O T S

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e live during the birth of anew planetary civilization.

All across the world, the modernnationalist era, began approximately

500 years ago in Europe and theAmericas, is now declining, thoughnot without violence and suffering.

At the same time a new postmo-dern planetary civilization is nowemerging. This new civilization isprecipitated by the Electronic Revo-lution, which is transforming the

entire world into a global network.We believe that this new planetarycivilization needs to find spiritualhealing by returning to humanitysancient African roots.

AHEAL ING VISION FORT H E NEW CI V I L I Z A T I O N

The modern Western era was firstEuropean, and then European-

American. It came to dominate theplanet through industrialism andcommerce, and through military

colonialism and neocolonialism.Despite its abiding rich gifts, majoraspects of late modern culture havebecome spiritually, socially, andecologically destructive.

This modern era brought manyimportant human contributions,including:

printed books; an explosion of literacy; nation-states; the birth of democracy; great material progress.But it also brought:

enslavement of millions ofAfricans;

genocidal attacks on nativepeoples;

colonization of the globalsouth; creation of a vast global under-class;

undermining of Earths pre-cious ecology.

The modern nationalist era lasted inround numbers from 1500 CE to2000 CE. The beginning of the new

postmodern global era is symbo-lized by the third millennium of theCommon Era, also the third mil-lennium of Christianity. Now in the21st century, visionary leaders in thenew postmodern planetary era aresearching for a global path basedon:

electronic communications; multicultural diversity; global-local interactions; ecological sustainability; human community; spiritual foundations.

We believe that the great spiritualhunger of this new global civiliza-

tion needs to be nourished by an-cient African wisdom. We believe

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people now suffer rage and despairbecause they see late modern civili-zation as:

marginalizing the poor; poisoning the Earth; not providing adequate work; promoting consumerist mate-

rialism; undermining community; suppressing spiritual meaning.

To suppress spiritual-psychic pain

generated by this reality, some be-loved young people tragically:

become addicted to tobacco,alcohol, drugs, and sex;

attack the weak, elderly, andwomen;

kill their own brothers andsisters;

take their own lives.

DEVAST AT ION OF AF R I C A IT SEL F

Even in Africa itself, as late modern

civilization breaks down and with itthe legacy of modern colonialism,

we have seen increasing rage anddespair, especially in the form ofethnic violence, and also the tragicravages of the plague ofHIV/AIDS.

book, RACE MATTERS (NY: Vintage, 1994).

But rage and despair are not fromthe life-giving spirituality of ancient

African roots. They do notrepresent the manly or womanly

wisdom of ancient spiritual mothersand fathers. How important, there-fore, that we all once again recon-nect with Africas ancient roots anddrink of Africas ancient wisdom.

RECOVERY OF

ANCIENT AF R I C A N W ISDOM

Gratefully, there is hope. For sometime now, there has been emerginga renaissance of ancient African

wisdom:

in Africa; in the African Diaspora; in academic scholarship.It is being created by

historians who have researchedthe most ancient truths of

Africa; scholars who have exposed the

modern lies about the Africanheritage; philosophers who are recover-

ing the ethical teachings of an-cient Africa;

novelists who are probing thesoul of the African heritage;

artists who awaken our thirstfor African beauty and imagi-nation;

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community-builders who arerecreating African-style institu-tions;

ritualists who are designinghealing rites of passage foryouth.


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T H E C RE AT O R AND

C RE AT I ON I N AN CI E N T

AF RI C AN C U LT U RE

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he peoples of Africa and ofthe African Diaspora have

always been known for deep faith inGod. So it is only fitting that we

emphasize God, who is the Creatorof all, the one who now is, whoalways has been, and who will beforever.

From time immemorial, the peoplesof Africa have known God. Varioustribes gave God different names.Some of these names, like

Chiuta, Jok, Mulungu, Nyame, Nzambi,

are common to many African lan-guages. So they have a very ancient

origin. The stories of Africa tell usthat God is:

Creator of all things; Sustainer of all creation; One who provides for all crea-

tion; One who guides the universe; Mother and Father; Friend, even Great Friend; good, merciful, and holy; One who is all-powerful, all-

knowing, and present every-where;

One who is limitless, self-existent, and the first cause ofall;

One who is spirit, neverchanges, and is a mystery.

These religious truths, originallydiscovered in Africa, form the deeproots of most world religions. Thus,most world religions are spiritually

indebted to the ancient wisdom ofAfrica.1

CREAT ION

The first human scientists were

Africans in Egypt. These scientistswere often also priests. Thus, inancient Africa, religion and science

were not divided, as in the modernway. We propose that were thesescientists alive today, they wouldrejoice at the modern discovery ofevolution. They would rejoice to

discover that: the universe is evolving; planet Earth is evolving; humanity is evolving.But they would not understandevolution in the modern secular

way as:

simply materialistic; devoid of spiritual meaning; the product of only random

interaction (atomistic forces).

1 For this section, I am especially indebted toTheologian John Mbiti. See his fine workINTRODUCTION TO AFRICAN RELI-GION (Oxford, England: Heinemann Pub-lishers, 1991).

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and to new thingsOf course, many young females arealso drawn to the same attractions.

This may also be the reason whyhuman males are biologically morefragile, for they represent a muta-tion of the original feminine model.Statistically speaking, human males:

die more often as children; die earlier than women; suffer more disease; are more prone to violence.So while the male gift seems to becreative diversity, it is a fragile andeven dangerous gift. Therefore, itmust be carefully protected, and

wisely guided, lest it prove destruc-tive to itself and to others.

But to learn more about humans,we must turn first to the Africancontinent which brought themforth

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T H E E M E RG E N C E O F

T H E H U M AN RAC E

I N AN C I E N T AF RI C A

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s we have seen already, itnow appears that the hu-

man process first developed inAfrica. Thus, Africa is the mother

and father of the human race. Letus now look in more detail at hu-manitys ancient African story.1

ROOT S INT HE GREAT AP ES

Some 40-30 million years ago,quite late in the unfolding of theuniverse, the primates began toappear. They began with monkeysand eventually included the greatapes, who emerged between 14and 6 million years ago.

So close are we to the great apesthat we share some 98% of DNA,that is, of genetic material, withtodays chimpanzees. Geneticallyspeaking, the chimpanzees arecloser to us than they are to thegreat gorillas. Yet we have notdescended from chimps; rather we

share a common ancestor.In our descent from the great apes,

we humans have developed a spe-cial evolutionary characteristic. We

1 For the story of African civilizations, I amespecially indebted to the well researchedand exceptional works of John Reader,

whose three main works are listed in theBibliography.

have retained playful infantile cha-racteristics from our primate an-cestors. The children of all mam-malian species are very playful. We

humans are a species that has nev-er stopped playing. This playful-ness is the source of our artisticand technological creativity. Crea-tive playfulness is the richest waythat we reveal the creative image ofGod.

The story of the evolution of hu-

manity, largely within Africa, isbeginning to be formulated into asignificant scientific theory. Everyyear we learn new things about ourevolutionary origins, so the theoryis still being developed.

Let us begin the human story byreviewing some major landmarks

of human emergence, according tothe best of contemporary scientificresearch.

APPEARANCE OF EARL Y HO M I N I D S

Some 5-4 million years ago, earlyhominids emerged, that is, human-like species brought forth by Godfrom within the family of greatapes. Remains of these early homi-nids have been found in the Afri-can region of todays Kenya, Tan-

zania, and Ethiopia.

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T H E AF RIC AN RO OT S O F

H U MAN C I VI L I ZAT I O N

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SCIENT IFIC LI ES AB OUT AF R I C A

n earlier modern times, Euro-

pean and European Americanscholars, including philosophers,theologians, and later natural andsocial scientists, developed what

were eventually called scientifictheories of race.

But these theories were really racistfalsehoods used to degrade the dig-

nity of many people, especially Af-ricans, Asians, Native Americans,and also Jews. These scientifictheories falsely taught that Africa

was always a place of savagery andbarbarism, without learning or cul-ture, and without civilization.

Early modern elites used these rac-

ist doctrines to justify their mercan-tile Atlantic slave system and theirconquest of the Americas, with itsrape, murder, and exploitation ofboth Native American and Africanpeoples. Later modern elites usedthese racist doctrines also to justifytheir industrial colonial plunder of

the global south.

The claim that Africa had no civili-zation was a lie. As noted, Africahad great ancient civilizations andsome scholars today even argue that

African civilization stands at theroot of all human civilizations.

AF R I C A S ANCIENT C IVIL IZAT ION S

Early in the Twentieth Century,pioneering thinkers like W.E.B.DuBois and Marcus Garvey re-trieved the truth about Africas an-cient genius. Their work is an im-portant root of the African SpiritualRenaissance.

Scientific evidence currently indi-cates that humanity first took shapein East Africas long Rift Valley. Asearly humans increased, they spreadout in search of food and land.

They spread all over Africa, andlater they spread all over the world.

As they spread, they learned many

new things and developed creativenew ways, which eventually becamehuman civilization.

Civilization means a way of lifelinked to cities. The Latin wordcivitas, from which we get the

word civilization, simply meanscity. The city is founded onknowledge, originally the achieve-ment of scholars and priests. Cen-tral to this knowledge was the

working of metal, for with metalcame powerful tools:

to cut stone and trees for cities; to plow land for farming; to make weapons for war.

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T H E G I F T S O F

W O M E N & M E N

I N AN C I E N T AF RI C A

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efore ending our review ofhumanitys ancient African

roots, let us look at the role in tradi-tional Africa of women and men,

and also of the spiritual formationof African girls and boys.

FEMAL E & MAL E I N BIOL OGY

In the earliest forms of simple cellu-lar life (millions of years before theemergence of humans), there weremetaphorically speaking at first onlyfemale life forms, which repro-duced by mother-daughter clon-ing. Later there came genetic diver-sity from recombinant DNA, madepossible by the emergence of twosexes, male and female.

In this metaphorical sense, the fe-male role was originally the onlyone, and so it was the mother oflife. The male role came later, butbrought with it the change and di-

versity of creative evolution.

As we also noted earlier, perhapsthis ancient biological root stillpersists in some aspects of the fe-male and male psyche. Perhaps thisis why among humans sometimes itseems that feminine spirituality ismore oriented to nurture and care,

while male spirituality is more

oriented to adventure and achieve-ment.

Of course, this does not mean thateither of those tendencies is limitedto females or males. Indeed, in con-temporary society more and more

women and men, as well as girlsand boys, are sharing in both attrac-tions:

care and nurture; adventure and achievement.Let us now look beyond biology toecology, and to the impact of cli-mate on the roles of women and

men within differing cultural styles.

MAT RI F OCAL & PAT RI ARC HAL CUL T URES

Senegals Cheikh Anta Diop, a de-ceased brilliant African scholar whoheld a doctorate from the Universi-ty of Paris, described two historicalcultural styles which bear on rolesof women and men:

the communal and cooperativemother-centered way of black

African cultures; the individualistic and competi-

tive father-dominant way ofwhite Aryan cultures.1

1 By Arans, Diop means the lighter-

skinned humans from the colder North ofWestern and Central Europe.

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the emergence of the humanrace from Africa;

the foundation and early de-velopment of human civiliza-tion within Africa and its ex-pansion to the rest of the

world; the symbolic spiritualities of

women and men, and the for-mation of boys and girls inthese spiritualities.

As the mother and father of the

human experience, Africa couldhave gone on to become the per-manent leader of the human race.Unfortunately that did not happen.For the ancient emigrant children of

Africa, once they had separatedfrom her, developed different cul-tural ways and sometimes destruc-tive ones.

For example, when modern Euro-pean first returned to Africa, it wasnot for a ceremony of homecom-ing, but rather to rape and toplunder both the people and theland.

In the second book of this series,we will explore this tragic and vio-lent tale of the devastation of Afri-ca, of the enslavement and murderof Africas peoples in both the

Arab-Muslim and European-Christian slave trades, and the con-tinuing challenges within Africa andacross the African Diaspora, andespecially in the Americas

For now, however, we simply re-joice in the good news that Africa

is: the geological center of Earths

land mass; the place to which all humans

trace their common roots; and the source of human spiri-

tuality and civilization.

We rejoice that God has given us

such a great gift!

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Hutchinson, Earl Ofari. BLACKFATHERHOOD:THE GUIDE TO MALE PARENT-

ING.Los Angeles, California: Middle Passage Press, 1992.

James PhD, David C. WHATARETHEYSAYING ABOUT MASCULINE SPIRITUAL-

ITY? New York: Paulist Press, 1996.

Johnson, MayLee. BLACKWOMANWISE.South Bend, Indiana: n.p., 1992.

Madhi, Louise Carus, Stephen Foster, and Meredith Little. BETWIXT &BE-

TWEEN:PATTERNS OF MASULINE AND FEMININE INITIATION. La Salle, Il-

linois: Open Court, 1987.

Majors, Richard, & Janet Mancini Billson. COOL POSE: THE DILEMMAS OF

BLACKMANHOOD INAMERICA.New York: Simon & Schuster, 1992.

Muzorewa, Gwinyai. THE ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT OFAFRICANTHEOL-

OGY. Maryknoll NY: Orbis Books, 1985.

Phelps, Jamie T. Editor. BLACK AND CATHOLICTHE CHALLENGE AND GIFT

OF BLACKFOLK:CONTRIBUTIONS OFAFRICANAMERICAN EXPERIENCE

ANDTHOUGHT TO CATHOLICTHEOLOGY. Milwaukee WI: Marquette

University Press, 1997.

Raboteau, Albert J. AFIRE IN THE BONES:REFLECTIONS ONAFRICAN-

AMERICAN RELIGIOUS HISTORY. Boston: Beacon Press, 1995.

Van Gennep, Arnold. THE RITES OF PASSAGE. Trans. Monika B. Vizedom and

Gabrielle L. Caffee. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1960.

West, Cornel. RACE MATTERS. New York, NY: Random House, 1994.

West, Cornel. PROPHETICTHOUGHT IN POSTMODERNTIMES. Monroe, Maine:

Common Courage Press, 1993.

West, Cornel. PROPHETICTHOUGHT IN POSTMODERNTIMES. Monroe, Maine:

Common Courage Press, 1993.

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This Pre-Publication Edition is issued by

Pax Romana Center

for International Study of

Catholic Social Teaching

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USA

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Phone: +1 (202) 269.6672

Email: pax-romana-cmica [email protected]

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