Abstract
The majority opinion of those who have contributed to the literature on conversion in sub-Saharan Africa suggests that Islam has been more ‘successful’ than Christianity in attracting the faithful. The standard inventory of explanations for this state of affairs include the following: first, it has been commonly noted, Islam has proved to be more compatible than Christianity with indigenous customs, cosmology, and morality. A second point that has been argued with some consistency (though evidencing not a small measure of ethno-centric bias) is that ‘it is easier for the African to govern himself by the few rules set forth by Mohammedanism…than…by the all-embracing stringent laws of Christianity’. A third, more encompassing stance, implies that conversion to Islam can be accounted for sociologically, ‘while the acceptance of Christianity involves the recognition of divine truth’, in which case a similar line of analysis is uncalled for. Thus, according to William Arens, a thorough review of the voluminous literature indicates that there is an ‘ideological flavour’ in much of what is accepted as objective and authoritative material on this topic, and that a more balanced understanding of the facts could be realised if greater attention was given to the study of the social context of evangelical Christianity in Black Africa.
Publisher
Cambridge University Press (CUP)
Subject
Sociology and Political Science,Geography, Planning and Development
Cited by
9 articles.
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