Lugbara Religion

Name: Lugbara Religion
Author: John Middleton
ISBN: 0874746671

by John Middleton

Yes. The Nuer and the Dinka are very famous in anthropology for not being preoccupied with misfortune. The John Middleton book, Lugbara Religion, is about a people who actually live very close to the Dinka but have a very different religion. The focus for the Lugbara is on their ancestors and the power they might give to their living representatives. The preoccupation here is on the worship of the ancestors and on maintaining their goodwill. It is mostly senior men who by virtue oftheir closeness to the dead are invested with the power of their ancestors. With the ancestors behind them they can justifiably punish those who disobey them or disrespect the ancestors or their living representatives. When something bad happens in Lugbara, death or illness, it must either be a punishment for disrespect of the ancestors or it might be witchcraft perpetrated by some malicious neighbour, by someone who knows you. It is often older people who are thought to be witches. So, if someone is ill, there could be a long dispute as to why this has happened. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . This book deals with a long-running dispute over whether a person was being punished for disrespecting the ancestors or for some bad deeds performed, or whether they were a victim of witchcraft by some elderly person who shouldn’t be doing this. Witchcraft is seen as evil and people may be seen as having the evil eye, a mystical power and an evil gift so that if they look at you things go wrong. These people are often those who fail to live up to the norms of society, are greedy or isolated. So, in some ways, the belief in witchcraft regulates society because people don’t want to be accused and so they behave in ways that are thought appropriate and proper. I once whistled, in those days I could whistle, while I was doing fieldwork, and the children all cried out; ‘Whistling after dark! That’s what witches do!’ Yes, and that is interesting. It’s not a universalistic religion. If you are not one of them you are not bound by the rules in the same way. Another thing I used to do and soon stopped doing is complimenting people on their children. You don’t do that in Uganda or most of Africa because it’s what witches do and then the child will get ill or die. But I chose the Middleton book because of that long case history and the idea that good and evil are not clear cut in Lugbara. There is no sharp boundary as there is Christianity. Well, if you’re old an unsociable with lots of relatives who will argue for you then it’s all right. They will just say; ‘Oh, it’s just because she’s old.’ But if you haven’t got a lot of family it is difficult, yes. We are seeing now that witch hunts have started happening in Africa and nobody is sure if this is a reversion to tradition, if the Pax Brittanica imposed rules to stop it and now things have reverted, or if this is a new thing. I suspect it’s a new thing. In the old days someone believed to be a witch could theoretically be killed, but you would always find someone to speak up for them, someone with another interpretation. Yes. Someone who would say; ‘Oh, rubbish. It’s not witchcraft! It’s punishment for something else.’ If you stick around long enough you hear these arguments. Which witch, so to speak.

Recommended by

Jean Fontaine

"Yes. The Nuer and the Dinka are very famous in anthropology for not being preoccupied with misfortune. The John Middleton book, Lugbara Religion, is about a people who actually live very close to the Dinka but have a very different religion. The focus for the Lugbara is on their ancestors and the power they might give to their living representatives. The preoccupation here is on the worship of the ancestors and on maintaining their goodwill. It is mostly senior men who by virtue oftheir closeness to the dead are invested with the power of their ancestors. With the ancestors behind them they can justifiably punish those who disobey them or disrespect the ancestors or their living representatives. When something bad happens in Lugbara, death or illness, it must either be a punishment for disrespect of the ancestors or it might be witchcraft perpetrated by some malicious neighbour, by someone who knows you. It is often older people who are thought to be witches. So, if someone is ill, there could be a long dispute as to why this has happened. Support Five Books Five Books interviews are expensive to produce. If you're enjoying this interview, please support us by donating a small amount . This book deals with a long-running dispute over whether a person was being punished for disrespecting the ancestors or for some bad deeds performed, or whether they were a victim of witchcraft by some elderly person who shouldn’t be doing this. Witchcraft is seen as evil and people may be seen as having the evil eye, a mystical power and an evil gift so that if they look at you things go wrong. These people are often those who fail to live up to the norms of society, are greedy or isolated. So, in some ways, the belief in witchcraft regulates society because people don’t want to be accused and so they behave in ways that are thought appropriate and proper. I once whistled, in those days I could whistle, while I was doing fieldwork, and the children all cried out; ‘Whistling after dark! That’s what witches do!’ Yes, and that is interesting. It’s not a universalistic religion. If you are not one of them you are not bound by the rules in the same way. Another thing I used to do and soon stopped doing is complimenting people on their children. You don’t do that in Uganda or most of Africa because it’s what witches do and then the child will get ill or die. But I chose the Middleton book because of that long case history and the idea that good and evil are not clear cut in Lugbara. There is no sharp boundary as there is Christianity. Well, if you’re old an unsociable with lots of relatives who will argue for you then it’s all right. They will just say; ‘Oh, it’s just because she’s old.’ But if you haven’t got a lot of family it is difficult, yes. We are seeing now that witch hunts have started happening in Africa and nobody is sure if this is a reversion to tradition, if the Pax Brittanica imposed rules to stop it and now things have reverted, or if this is a new thing. I suspect it’s a new thing. In the old days someone believed to be a witch could theoretically be killed, but you would always find someone to speak up for them, someone with another interpretation. Yes. Someone who would say; ‘Oh, rubbish. It’s not witchcraft! It’s punishment for something else.’ If you stick around long enough you hear these arguments. Which witch, so to speak."

African Religion and Witchcraft · fivebooks.com