Islamic and Christian Influences

Sources

Islam. Though some rulers and their courts converted to Islam and even made pilgrimages to Mecca and carried on wars in the name of Islam, the religion did not become widespread among the general populace until after 1590. Even some rulers who called themselves converts to Islam followed that religion most faithfully during visits from Muslim traders or diplomats and at other times practiced traditional religions. As in the Ashanti kingdom to the west, the dominant religion in the northern part of West African was animism—nature mysticism. However, Islam had already established a strong foothold in the Yoruba lands of present-day Nigeria as well as in Mali and the surroundingMande territories. Most of what is known about Islam in West Africa, particularly Mali, comes from the writings of Ibn Battuta, a North African Muslim of the Berber ethnic group who received a formal Islamic education in the northern city of Tangier. At the age of twenty-one, he went to Mecca for further studies, distinguished himself as a scholar, and traveled widely, visiting China, Ceylon, India, Assam, and the Middle East as well as West Africa. His travels in the Empire of Mali started on 18 February 1352 at Walaha, where he observed: “these people are Muslims, punctilious in observing the hours of prayer, studying books of law, and memorizing the Koran.” From Walaha he proceeded to the capital city, where, he noted, “the inhabitants have a great sense of fairness, uprightness, justice, and fair dealing among themselves and with foreigners.” He also wrote that the people “are careful to observe the hours of prayer, and assiduous in attending them in congregations, and in bringing up their children to them. On Fridays, if a man does not go early to the mosque, he cannot find a corner to pray in, on account of the crowd. It is the custom of theirs to send each man his boy [to the mosque] with his prayer-mat; the boy spreads it out for his master in a place befitting him and [remains on it] until [his master] comes to the mosque. The prayer-mats are made of the leaves of a tree resembling a date palm, but without fruit.” According to Ibn Battuta, the Malians had a zeal for learning the Quran by heart: “They put their children in chains if they show any backwardness in memorizing it, and they are not set free until they have it by heart.”

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Mansa Musa. Of the many mansas (kings) who ruled Mali, none did more to create the reputation of the empire as an Islamic state than Mansa Kankan Musa (ruled 1312-1337). His 1324 pilgrimage to Mecca with a large and richly equipped entourage enhanced the reputation of Mali not only as a wealthy empire but also as a center of Islamic learning and religion. Musa’s bureaucracy and military created the right conditions for merchants and clerics to work in peace and security throughout the empire and beyond. As Musa expanded the boundaries of the empire, he also extended the influence of Islam.

Christianity. When Christianity arrived in West Africa in the late fifteenth century, the people were initially no more eager to embrace this religion than they had Islam. According to W. Walton Claridge, they wanted to trade with Europeans but objected to a Portuguese policy of converting West Africans to Christianity. In answer to a request by the Portuguese Crown to station a permanent Christian mission among his people, one Ashanti ruler replied:

I’m not insensible to the high honor which your great master, the chief of Portugal, has this day conferred on me. His friendship I have long endeavored to merit by the strictness of my dealing with the Portuguese, and by my constant exertions to procure an immediate lading for their vessels. But never until this day did I observe such a difference in the appearance of his subjects; they have hitherto been only meanly attired, were easily contented with the commodities they received; and so far from wishing to continue in this country, were never happy until they could complete their lading, and return. Now I remark a strange difference. A great number richly dressed are anxious to be allowed to build houses, and to continue among us. Men of such eminence, conducted by a commander who from his own account seems to have descended from the God who made day and night, can never bring themselves to endure the hardships of this climate nor would they here be able to procure any of the luxuries that abound in their own country. The passions that are common to us all will therefore inevitably bring on disputes; and it is far preferable that both nations should continue on the same footing they have hitherto done, allowing your ships to come and go as usual; the desire of seeing each other occasionally will preserve peace between us.

Against the Ashanti king’s objections, however, the Portuguese proceeded to build a church and send missionaries,

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backing the efforts with military force. In 1482 they built Elmina Castle, a fortress that not only provided protection from attacks but also served as a secure base for evangelizing and slave trading.

Sources

Norman R. Bennett, Africa and Europe: From Roman Times to National Independence, second edition (New York: Africana, 1975).

K. A. Busia, The Challenge of Africa (New York: Praeger, 1962).

W. Walton Claridge, A History of the Gold Coast from the Earliest Times to the Commencement of the Twentieth Century, 2 volumes (London: Murray, 1915).

Cheikh Anta Diop, Civilization or Barbarism: An Authentic Anthropology, translated by Yaa-Lengi Meema Ngemi, edited by Harold J. Salemson and Marjolijn de Jager (Brooklyn, N.Y.: Lawrence Hill, 1991).

Ibn Battuta, Travels in Asia and Africa, 1325-1354, 3 volumes, translated by H. A. R. Gibb (London: Routledge, 1929).

Edmund Ilogu, Christianity andIgbo Culture (Leiden: Brill, 1974).

Elizabeth Isichei, A History of African Societies to 1870 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997).