Comparing Religions: A Limitative Approach. An Analysis of Akan, Para-Creole, and IFO-Sananda Rites and Prayers

364 Pages·1982·8.155 MB·English

by  J. G. Platvoet

Comparing Religions: A Limitative Approach
M
Religion and Reason 24
Method and Theory in the
Study and Interpretation of Religion
GENERAL EDITOR
Jacques Waardenburg, University of Utrecht
BOARD OF ADVISERS
Th. P. van Baaren, Groningen
R N. Bellah, Berkeley
U. Bianchi, Rome
H.J.W: Drijvers, Groningen
W. Dupré, Nijmegen
S. N. Eisenstadt, Jerusalem
M. Eliade, Chicago
C. Geertz, Princeton
K. Goldammer,, Marburg
R Ricoeur, Paris and Chicago
M. Rodinson, Paris
N. Smart, Lancaster and
Santa Barbara, Calif.
G. Widengren, Stockholm
MOUTON PUBLISHERS THE HAGUE PARIS NEW YORK
Comparing Religions:
A Limitative Approach
An Analysis of Akan, Para-Creole, and
IFO-Sananda Rites and Prayers
J. G. PLATVOET
Katholieke Theologische Hogeschool Utrecht
MOUTON PUBLISHERS THE HAGUE PARIS NEW YORK
ISBN 90 279 3170 4
© Copyright 1982 by Mouton Publishers, The Hague. All rights reserved, including those
of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book may be reproduced in any
form - by photoprint, microfilm, or any other means - nor transmitted nor translated
into a machine language without permission from the publishers.
Printing: Krips Repro, Meppel. Binding: Lüderitz & Bauer Buchgewerbe GmbH, Berlin.
Printed in The Netherlands.
Preface
This book is in two parts. The first part deals with some of the
methodological issues involved in the comparative study of reli-
gions. It consists of two chapters.
In the first chapter it is argued that global modes of comparison
which impose no restrictions upon the number and types of religions
to be compared should be abandoned in favour of limitative, or re-
strictive, approach to the comparison of religions. This conclusion
emerges from an examination of the roles which subjectivity and
intersubjectivity inevitably play in the scientific study of reli-
gions. The principle is formulated that in a comparative study not
only the religions to be compared must be studied in depth, but also
the authors who wrote on them. The sheer amount which this dual
study entails necessarily leads to the adoption of a severely restric-
ted form of comparison.
In the second chapter the tools for this limitative comparative
study of religions are discussed. They consist of a theory of
'religion' and a number of analytical instruments derived from it.
In view of the emphasis in the first chapter on the need to study
the subjectivities of the authors of the works on the religions to
be compared, it would not have been fair not to present clues to
the subjectivities of the subjectivities of the present researcher.
A brief chronology of his life is presented first, followed by a
discussion of the authors who influenced him in the development of
his theory of religion.
In the second part of this book, the method proposed is applied
to three religious processes, each from a different religion. In
their analyses and comparison, special attention is paid to the
'prayers' recited in them. This part forms the bulk of the book,
because the proposed method of comparison is a microscopic one which
demands attention to numerous details.
In Chapter 2, attention is drawn to the role which Prof. Dr. D.J.
Hoens played in the embryonal stages of this book. In a different
way, Prof. Dr. Th.P. van Baaren's association with it is even long-
er. He and I have been in touch about a dissertation since 1972.
VI Preface
The first three projects I put before him met with his approval, but
failed to find their final shape. This, the fourth one, was, in a
sense, already half completed even before it was recognized and pro-
posed as the subject for a dissertation. I am grateful for the many
wise comments, the encouragement and the free hand which both my
promotores have given me, especially in the past three years.
Several other scholars have given me the benefit of their, often
detailed, comments and criticism. These are first of all my friends and
colleagues in the University of Ghana with whom I had many discus-
sions in 1980 when I served there as a Visiting Lecturer: Mr. Ebo
H. Mends, Senior Lecturer in the Department of Sociology and Anthro-
pology; Dr. Elisabeth Amoah, Dr.Chris Thomas, Prof. J.S. Pobee and
Dr. Patrick Ryan, all of the Department for the Study of Religions;
Mr. K.K. Amos Anti M.A., Ph.D. student in that Department; and Dr.
K. Asare Opoku and Dr. A.K. Quarcoo of the Institute of African
Studies in that University. I- owe special thanks to Mr. C. Crakye
Denteh for his comments on Chapter 5 and for permitting me to use
his unpublished paper on Asantemanso and the origin of the Asante
nation.
On my return from Ghana, Mr. Peter Schoonheym allowed me the
earliest possible use of his book on the economical aspects of
Para-Creole religion. For this and for his detailed comments on
sections 3.2 , 4.2 and Chapter 6, I am very grateful. I am indebted
to Prof. Dr. J.M. Stewart and Prof. Dr. J. Voorhoeve, both of the
Department of African Linguistics of the State University of Leiden,
for checking my use of Twi and Sranan Tongo and my translations of
Twi texts.
Rev. Dr. Peter Staples, of the Inter-University Institute of
Missiological and Ecumenical Studies, and Mr. J.J.A. Spiekerman,
of the State University of Leiden, have carefully revised and emend-
ed my English. I am also grateful to Prof. Dr. J.D.J. Waardenburg,
editor of 'Religion and Reason', and to Dr. G. Moran, desk-editor
of that series, for their help in the editing of this book. I owe
a thanks, greater than words can express, to Mrs. Bori Feltmann-
Goldschmidt for typing the final text of this book in her free time,
which took ten weeks of very hard work.
This book is dedicated to my wife An, who at times despaired of
it ever being completed, and to our three sons, Harmen-Jan, Rogier
and Radboud. It is also dedicated to the memory of my father who
always eagerly followed my explorations into new fields of study
till his early death in 1964.
Strict, perhaps even purist, standarts are set to the compara-
tive study of religions in the first part of this book. I am not
satisfied that these have been met in its second part. It seems to
be part of the human lot to set higher standarts and to attempt more
than can achieved in the time and with the means at one's disposal.
Preface VII
As says a Wassaw proverb: onipa beye_ bi, na w'annme^ye ne nyina,
'man came to do some (work),but he has not come to do it all'.
A proverb from my native dialect counsels, resignation in the face
of this predicament: wat sas as dos was kas, 'what (more) will you
do, when you (have) exert(ed) yourself to the best of your ability' .
So, resignation it is, at least for the time being.
Bunnik, November 1981.

Contents
Preface V
PART ONE: METHODOLOGY: FROM UNLIMITED
TO LIMITATIVE COMPARISON
1. OBJECTIVE INTENTION AND SUBJECTIVE INVOLVEMENT 3
1.1 The Extent of Comparison 3
1.2 Objectivity 4
1.3 Quantitative and Qualitative Methods 7
1.4 Subjective Involvement in the Study of Religions 8
1.5 The Limited Reliability of the Unlimited Comparative
Study of Religions 13
1.6 Three Modes of Empirical Study of Religions 15
1.7 Disadvantages and Advantages of a Limitative Approach
to the Comparative Study of Religions 18
1.8 Conclusion 19
2. A LIMITATIVE APPROACH TO THE COMPARATIVE STUDY OF RELIGIONS:
ITS GENESIS AND TOOLS 21
2.1 A Biographical Outline 21
2.2 Towards a Theory of 'Religion' 24
2.2.1 E.E. Evans-Pritchard 24
2.2.2 R. Horton, J. Goody, M. Spiro 25
2.2.3 A.M. de Waal-Malefijt 27
2.2.4 J. van Baal, Th.P. van Baaren, D.J. Hoens 28
2.3 A. Theory of 'Religion' 29
2.3.1 Two Preliminary Remarks 29
2.3.2 A Definition of 'Religion' and of a Religion 30
2.4 The Tools 31
2.4.1 'Field', 'Process', 'Context' 31
2.4.2 Their Refinement 31
2.5 Concluding Remarks 34
X Contents
PART TWO: THE LIMITATIVE METHOD APPLIED: A COMPARATIVE STUDY
OF SOME AKAN, PARA AND IFO-SANANDA RITES
3. THE WIDER SETTINGS OF THE THREE RITES 39
3.1 The Asante, Their Society and Religion 39
3.1.1 The Asante 39
3.1.2 Their Traditional Economy 39
3.1.3 Their Traditional Social and Political
Organisation 40
3.1.4 Their Traditional Religion 41
3.1.4.1 God: Nyame 41
3.1.4.2 The Gods: Abosom 41
3.1.4.3 The Ancestors: Nsamanfo 42
3.1.4.4 Man: Onipa 42
3.1.4.5 Animals and Plants 43
3.1.4.6 Suman 43
3.1.4.7 Witchcraft: Bayi 43
3.2 The Para-Creoles, Their Society and Religion 44
3.2.1 The Creoles of the Para District 44
3.2.2 Their Economy 44
3.2.3 Sranantongo 45
3.2.4 Their Traditional Social Structure 45
3.2.5 Their Traditional Religion 45
3.2.5.1 God: Anana 45
3.2.5.2 The Gods: Winti 46
3.2.5.3 The Ancestors: Profen, Kabra, Jorka 47
3.2.5.4 Man 48
3.2.5.5 A Model of Para Traditional Religion 48
3.3 The IFO-Sananda Religion 48
3.3.1 The Setting of the IFO-Sananda Religion 48
3.3.2 The Founders 49
3.3.3 The Tenets of the IFO-Sananda Religion 53
4. THE AUTHORS 56
4.1 'Captain' R.S. Rattray (1881-1938) 57
4.1.1 Biographical Data 57
4.1.2 Rattray's ethnographical merits: an evaluation 62
4.2 C.J. Wooding 68
4.2.1 Biographical Data 68
4.2.2 An evaluation of Wooding as an ethnographer 70
4.2.3 Wooding as a historian of Para-Creole
Culture and Religion 72
4.3 Festinger, Riecken and Schachter 74
4.3.1 Biographical Data and Publications 74
4.3.2 A 'Collaborative Work'? 77
4.3.3 The Theory of Cognitive Dissonance 78
4.3.4 The Research on the IFO-Sananda 'Dooms Day'
Believers 81