Ewe Cosmology and Spirituality: Implications for Christianity, Theology and Biblical Scholarship in Africa

Abstract

The study examined the context, content and nature of Ewe Cosmology and Spirituality to decipher their significance or implications to Christianity, Theology, and Biblical scholarship in Africa. The study used the qualitative and phenomenology theory. Together they provided the right framework to engage with the critical issues that emerged thereof. The study analysed the historical trajectories and the nature and forms of their socioreligiocultural engagement with other cultures or people groups. It was observed that the Ewe people’s historical development and encounters with different cultures produced a unique but complex cosmology pervaded by diverse spiritualities. Furthermore, it has created distinctive socioreligiocultural cosmology and spirituality that present very peculiar challenge that Christianity and Theology need to find a way around in order to engage meaningfully and effectively with the Ewe socioreligioculture. Recognition of the uniqueness of the Ewe cosmology and spirituality will inform the development of the right epistemology or nomenclature to fill the impasse created by the sharp dichotomy between the Ewe and Western (missionary) religiocultural cosmologies. The study concludes that the Ewe cosmology and spirituality present very unique and distinctive but legitimate and competitive socioreligiocultural frameworks that present great significance for appropriate epistemological frameworks or nomenclatures for Christianity, Theology and Biblical scholarship in Africa. Keywords: Cosmology, Christianity, Theology, Migration.