Christian Higher Education for Africa: Need, Relevance, and Value

by Dr James Kombo, Senior Lecturer & Dean,

Faculty of Postgraduate Studies, Daystar University

I. Africa’s Reality

There isn’t much good news coming out of modern Africa. As a matter of fact, Africa has become used to staring various forms of poverty, starvation, brutal killings, disease especially AIDS[1], and corruption. Who is to blame for these problems? The answer to this question has come in at least three dominant strands. One group sees the answer the answer as part of the dogma of African exceptionalism and therefore sees the fate of Africa as sealed, another group pillories the West and her structures for the current reality of Africa and therefore demands that the West takes responsibility whereas another group believes that Africa in its current shape is to blame for her woes and therefore must shape up.

The dogma of African exceptionalism finds its theological basis in the now discredited Hamitic theory which really is a garbled and tendentious reading of the Bible according to which the myth of the curse on the black descendants of Ham is perpetrated.[2]  According to this position, Africa means three things: essential daftness; domination by other races as exemplified in Africa’s recent history of slavery and colonialism; and multifaceted pauperization. This, admittedly, is an emotive issue and I don’t want to dwell on it so much. The world recently woke up to the shocking confessions of Dr James Dewey Watson, the Nobelist and pioneer gene scientist who stated that all Africans are stupid.[3]  It is important to note that Dr Watson is not alone; other western ‘scientists’ have compared an African brain with that of a mad white man. Notable examples are Richard Hernstein and Charles Murray[4]; the other is Richard Lynn[5]. According to UNESCO Declaration on Race and Racial Prejudice adopted and proclaimed by the general conference its twentieth session on 27 November 1978, these arguments are not worth listening to.[6] There is more to Africa than myths about daftness, pauperization and the Western domination. Perhaps one way of dealing with these perceptions is to locate a mode of discourse capable of capturing the true images of Africa which have long been forgotten or even lost. In doing this, one creates a genuine cultural awareness and reconstructs the real course of events that then form the basis of engagement.[7]

Walter Rodney popularizes the second group. According to Rodney (see his How Europe underdeveloped Africa) and a host of other Africanists (Manning Marrable’s How Capitalism underdeveloped Black America and Eric Williams’ Capitalism and Slavery and the monograph From the Slave Trade to ‘Free’ Trade: How Trade Undermines Democracy and Justice in Africa by. Patrick Burnett and Firoze Manji) the blame is placed squarely on the shoulders of the West. The line of thought advanced by this group of thinkers is that Africa’s multi-facet pauperization is inextricably linked to racial injustice against the Africans, power politics tilted heavily in favor of the West, economic exploitation of the Black race, imbalanced trade which apportions Africa raw produce which fuels western industrial machines and limitations of African capitalism which has guaranteed serious poor-rich divides in the local economies. Those who take this queue see the solution as available primarily in reparation[8] and what George Ayittey calls ‘cargo cult’ or simply Africa’s demand for western Aid. Those who argue for reparation believe that Africa has a case against Europe and the Americas in respect to slavery and colonization. The point here is that slavery and colonization sit in the same category as the German’s holocaust against the Israelis or USA’s illegal detention of the Japanese Americans. In fact those who push for the ‘cargo cult’ see their moral justification in the applicability of reparation. After all, they argue, the West owes Africa. Their argument is exemplied by Thambo Mbeki’s response to the United States at the start of The Earth Summit Johannesburg on 26 August 2002. According to Mbeki, the President of Republic of South Africa, if Africa is to address its environmental squalor then it must get more money from the West. For him “…global human society based on poverty for many and prosperity for a few, characterised by islands of wealth, surrounded by a sea of poverty, is unsustainable."[9]

Then there is the group which thinks that Africa is her own problem. George Kinoti’s Hope for Africa and What the Christians Can Do[10] is a classic example of a contribution from this position. As far as Kinoti is concerned, Africa’s perennial problems manifested in famine, corruption, poor governance, aggressive use of force, tribal and religious conflicts and failure to change behavior in the face of AIDS are Africa’s own problems that she must for the time being bare bravely as she finds homegrown lasting solution. Kinoti’s position has found a true companion in George Ayittey and the Nigerian novelist Chinua Achebe. George Ayittey, President of The Free Africa Foundation. Ayittey angrily argues that Africa has no business attributing every malaise to external agents when it is clear before the eyes of everyone that many African countries are actually "vampire" states whose governments have been hijacked by gangsters who use the instruments of the state to enrich themselves as well their cronies and largesse[11] Chinua Achebe believes that Africa’s trouble is failed leadership manifested in lack of responsibility, accountability, proper use of power, and respect for the freedom of the people. Writing in the context of Nigeria, he says:

The trouble with Nigeria is simply and squarely a failure of leadership. There is nothing basically wrong with the Nigerian character. There is nothing wrong with the Nigerian land or climate or water or air or anything else. The Nigerian problem is the unwillingness or inability or its leaders to rise to the responsibility, to the challenge of personal example which are the hallmarks of true leadership.[12]

Nobody seems to doubt that Africa is in trouble. The problem is that this trouble is seemingly not lifting soon. We know that international initiatives on behalf of Africa are falling flat on their faces one after the other. One such initiative is the effort by international organizations to help poor countries to recover public assets spirited away by those entrusted with their safekeeping to safe havens in the developed countries. Authorities in home countries have had quite a journey trying to get their assets back. But nothing significant seems to be yielding. Yes there is an international framework for return of stolen property from the safe havens in the developed countries. But all the initiatives have done is to recognize that the flow is from South to North—and they have literally stuck here. Any Kenyan who has cared to read the Kroll Report on public assets stolen from Kenya[13] knows that the international initiatives can shout all they want but ultimately, they will end up chasing shadows and addressing problems of yesteryears. Then there is the little story of the millennium development goals—we are now being told that the continent is falling further behind on the development journey.[14] And so I still care to ask: is there hope for Africa? Where is the input of higher education in all these?

2. Areas of input for Higher Education

Generation of ‘New Knowledge’

It seems to me that Africa, and especially Africa’s higher education, must make a choice because it must have a part, and a major part for that matter, in bringing solution to Africa’s problem. The basic element of that choice, I believe, must be ability to embrace new concepts and new ideas and therefore make new choices for life. This indeed is about new knowledge. In the words of Dryden and Vos,

… rich countries have already made the leap from an industrial society to an age of information: an age where human brainpower, knowledge and creativity will continue to replace machinery and buildings as the main capital in society. Poor countries now have the enormous opportunity to telescope history: to leap over the industrial era and straight into the new age of networked intelligence. But that new age also poses stark alternatives. For those with new knowledge: a world of opportunity. For those without: the prospect of unemployment, poverty and despair as the old jobs disappear, the old systems crumble.[15]

The thrust of Dryden and Vos contribution in the above excerpt is that we must break with the way we in Africa have traditionally interacted with our reality, reject status quo and indifference and in a sense earn a new face for Africa. Mr. Thambo Mbeki expects the African intelligentsia to lead from the front in the task of generating and getting hold of new knowledge when he says:

In a world in which the generation of new knowledge and its application to change the human condition is the engine which moves the human society further and further away from barbarism, do we not need to recall Africa’s hundreds of thousands of intellectuals back from their places of immigration in Western Europe and North America, to rejoin those who remain still within our shore?

I dream of a day when these, the African mathematicians and computer specialists in Washington and New York, the African physicists, engineers, doctors, business managers and economists will return from London and Manchester and Paris and Brussels to add to the African pool of brain power, to inquire into and find solutions to Africa’s problems and challenges, to open the African door to the world of knowledge, to elevate Africa’s place within the universe of research, the formation of new knowledge, education and information.

Africa’s renewal demands that her intelligentsia must immerse itself in the titanic and all - round struggle to end poverty, ignorance, disease, and backwardness inspired by the fact that the Africans of Egypt were, in some instances two thousand years ahead of European Greece in the mastery of such subjects as geometry, trigonometry, algebra and chemistry.[16]

Whereas Mbeki, Dryden and Vos have argued very convincingly for ‘new knowledge’, they haven’t quiet said what the new knowledge must entail if it is to bring the much desired difference. I see two aspects of the new knowledge: 1) openness to spirituality and 2) recognition of all knowledge.

Openness to Spirituality

Today, much cannot be gained without critical engagement with the reality of the postmodern era best known for recognition of the social significance of religion.[17]. Africa like the proverbial hyena with a den in a sugarcane plantation is living in the midst of so much religion but is apparently unaware of its true value. In Africa we still see the old school of thought whose development strategy is still hooked to modernization and secularization theories whose preoccupation is to dismiss as unscientific anything with the tag of religion. Modern development gurus are of the opinion that there is a direct link between spirituality or religious faith on the one hand and serenity, meaning and harmony that are known to be appropriate climate for development.[18] The same findings also indicate that religious faith espouses a development vision that embraces spiritual disciplines and ethical actions known to provide impetus that drive the market, appropriate public policy and responsive poverty reduction efforts.[19] Thus modern development studies seem to argue that poverty eradication must be fought not just with the mind, the heart and the soul but also on the side of God.[20]

There is also emerging evidence that religious professionals engaged in development see their unique contributions as a direct outgrowth of the value system of the religion of their affiliation.[21] While most of these professionals continue their development efforts in the context of public and private offices, a good number of them see religious faith as the reason for the upsurge in so much development going on in the southern continents and in Africa in particular.[22]

The greatest contribution of religious faith to development, it has been argued, is its recognition of human imperfection. While many development approaches attribute human misbehavior to misunderstanding, or ignorance, or to perverse incentives; religious groups acknowledge human will and have structured avenues for expressing sorrow and seeking and getting forgiveness among a community as well as before a God. Poverty focused agencies such as the World Bank, IMF, ILO, UNFPA, Inter-American Development Bank have in the recent past noted this strength and are actively involved in working with religious individuals and institutions on the intersection points.[23] In fact the Global Civil Society Report 2004/5 argues that it is impossible to achieve a significant measure of development in the southern continents without incorporating the transcendental dimension.[24]

What this means therefore is that African institutions of higher learning must recognize the place of religious faith as an integral part of sustainable livelihood strategy for any society. In fact Rodney warns against marginalizing religious and cultural values in pursuit of any strategic development agenda.[25] Indeed the United Nations 10-year initiative to promote “education” for sustainable development, otherwise known as the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (DESD) argues along the same line. DESD began in 2005 and runs until 2014. As far as DESD is concerned, the transition from conventional to sustainable development requires a shift in values and a serious consideration of religious beliefs as they offer powerful tool for individual and social transformation. The African institutions of higher learning can continue to ignore this advice but at a cost.

Recognition of All Knowledge

But this new knowledge is really about all knowledge. Universities and colleges are about education and ultimately knowledge and not about uncritical preservation and inculcation of particular points of view whatever their origins may be. Education, Bruce W Hauptli, explains:

… is centrally concerned with producing reasonableness. It transforms individuals by developing their capacity for self-sufficiency and autonomy; by enhancing their intellectual powers; by cultivating their character and tastes; and by enabling them to seek, test, and hopefully discover knowledge and truth. Such an enterprise requires a critical orientation. Unfortunately, human fallibility and the elusiveness of knowledge and truth conspire to ensure that these goals are difficult to attain.[26]

But education must be first and foremost contextual and therefore we must be talking here of education for Africa, and not merely education in Africa. We have had so much of education in Africa. African universities are modeled after the Oxfords the Cambridges and the Yales of this world and even after many years of independence, we heartily talk about this as the Oxford of Africa and that as the Cambridge of Africa and the other as the Yale of Africa. One may even suspect that our own quality assurance standards are lifted right out of Europe and America. I must hasten to indicate here that I have no problem with the Oxfords, the Cambridges and the Yales of this world nor do I have a problem with their respective quality assurance mechanisms. These are great institutions. We must however note that they are at the service of their constituencies of which Africa is excluded. 

Education for Africa must give the African person meaning to life. We know war and conflicts, economic injustices, as well as deteriorating spirituality and ethical values that enhanced life with dignity. The African institutions of higher education must return us to disciplined understanding of respective training areas. Again I dare say that there is a lot of education going on. Nairobi for instance has become the confluence of universities—local and international.  Very soon, the issue is not going to be whether one has university education but whether the education equips the graduate with lifelong values for today’s opportunities. Today, Kenya for instance is draining the taxpayers’ monies into commissions – commissions that could have been avoided if those under investigation had embraced and practiced eternal values. Africa needs scholars and practitioners. We need engineers and accountants, agriculturalists and architects; we need bankers and professors, historians and anthropologists, doctors and administrators. Scholars and practioners who will pull Africa from its present quagmire will not be the scholars and practioners who tack on morality when and if need arises, but scholars and practioners characterized with impeccable integrity and a wide view of reality.

One way of packaging this new knowledge is to zero in on making the person—a person with a sense of unity of truth, clear thinking, independence, commitment to eternal values, creative, ability to write and to speak, able to fit in and to contribute to the well-being of the human society. One who embraces knowledge must appreciate the entire spectrum of human knowledge, the rich African cultures, and the varied experiences of the African peoples.

3. Christian Higher Education: What is its Mainstay?

The real question here is what then is Christian higher education? Is it spirituality? Is it recognition of all knowledge? Perhaps we can answer this question by interrogating the goal of Christian higher learning. The goal of Christian higher education is not mere spirituality and neither is the goal to embrace all knowledge. The goal is a form of education that gives authoritative place to Jesus Christ and to the Bible in its understanding of the world and the human condition. The commitment here is to glorify God and accomplish His purpose in the universe. Such education also recognizes and seeks to embrace the entire spectrum of human knowledge, culture, and experience seeing them as originating in God. In this case Christian higher education can indeed be said to be Christian liberal arts education.

But there is a problem. The relationship between biblical revelation and other academic disciplines in a Christian liberal arts higher education is not always clearly understood. Some see “Christian” liberal arts as any discipline taught by a Christian in a Christian higher institution. Others assume that Scripture ought to be brought into harmony with an academic discipline by appealing to selected biblical verses. In between these two extremes, there are other variations.

Neither of these views has the capacity to give us a radical break with the past and to launch us on a proper path. The knowledge that can trigger social transformation must strive to a complete commitment to the Bible’s authority. The practical ways it does this, I believe is by seeking to evaluate the presuppositions, theories, goals, and methods of each discipline, and indeed all of life’s activities, by the revelation of God’s truth as contained in Scripture. This must therefore involve examining the heart of every discipline in order to uncover its fundamental attitudes towards God’s truth. A Christian scholar must seek to transform or even reconstruct their disciplines to the extent that their foundational assumptions are irreconcilable with biblical principles. This is what is required of Christian higher education technical fields where there is widespread denial of the religious and uncritical endorsement of relativistic views.

This way of interacting with the Bible must mean that institutions of Christian higher learning must be deliberate and strategic on how they teach the Bible. If we accept the view that we will evaluate the presuppositions, theories, goals, and methods of each discipline, and indeed all of life’s activities in light of the Scripture, then we must present the Bible as unique, authoritative Word of God. This whole process is not simplistic. It must recognize that there are genuine issues that have caused difficulties for some Bible readers as well as positions or interpretations which differ and which could be embraced without much difficulty by persons within any one academic or university community.

If the mainstay of Christian higher education is to carry out the task of evaluating all of life and thought according to biblical teachings, then both student and the lecturer must be fairly fluent with the Bible. Unfortunately, most instructors if not students lack the basic biblical and theological knowledge necessary even to begin on this task. In situations like these one must emphasize the significance of introductory Bible courses which stress the content (factual data) and the concepts (the basic teachings) of the Bible as well as interpretive skills.

But there are also deeper things which the theological communities in these universities must bring to fore. One must note that content and concepts are merely the beginning points. Much contemporary controversy centers upon proper methods for interpreting and applying biblical teachings. The way we understand the nature of the Bible leads inescapably to our affirmation of the message. We must always do this with a caution: watch the absoluteness of one particular interpretation. Our affirmation of the objectivity of revelation does not legitimize an uncritical adherence to our human religious traditions and interpretations. When interpreting Scripture, the original linguistic, literary, historical, and cultural contexts of the Bible are not to be considered as incidental matters. Rather, they are the setting within which God’s message was given and the intent of the original author is to be found. It is this intent, expressed in its fullest and final form in the person and work of Jesus Christ, that is the norm against which all human understandings and applications of the text are to be measured.

I emphasize this way of teaching the Bible in any Christian liberal arts university not just to require the Bible to be used as a mere object of academic study. The main point here is that behind Scripture stands God Himself; it is God’s person and will that must be the ultimate concern. It must therefore be the desire of every Bible lecturer to see students draw near to God through the work of the Holy Spirit as they assimilate the Word into the whole of their lives. It is expected that this is but a foundation from which should issue a lifelong study of the Bible, a desire to be fully obedient to Christ’s commandments, and a commitment to the life of the church and its mission to the world.

4. Concluding Remarks

Institutions of Christian higher learning are new entrants in Africa’s higher education sector. As such they are by and large unknown. Are they seminaries and Bible schools? Are they forms of Sunday school? Are they merely church institutions where some form of learning takes place? What sets them apart from the rest of the universities and colleges? Can graduates from these institutions contribute to and therefore be interested with insights, understanding and historical contexts of the arts and sciences?

These questions are not only unsettled in the minds of potential constituents of these institutions, but they have also led to the rise of spontaneous and dangerous definitions in the continued absence of appropriate guidance from the establishments themselves. For instance, according to the AAUP 1915 declaration, the Christian universities are called ‘proprietary schools … designed for the propagation of specific doctrines prescribed by those who have furnished its endowment’. In fact a few lines earlier the document says ‘their purpose is not to advance knowledge by he unrestricted research and unfettered discussion of impartial investigators, but rather to subsidize the promotion of opinions held by … persons, usually not of the scholar’s calling.’[27] Of course underlying these sentiments is the assumption that Christian higher institutions are inherently inferior. But nothing can be further from the truth. Professor George M Marsden making a comparison between Calvin College (a Christian college) and the University of California at Berkeley says the following:

What surprised me was that Calvin measured up surprisingly well in the comparison. Berkeley was an exciting place with many wonderful people. Yet Calvin had many professors who were as talented as those teaching at Berkeley and the best Calvin students seemed as good or better. All in all, I was pretty sure that the best students at Calvin were as good or better an education as were the best at Berkeley. They seemed on average to be excited about a wider range of intellectual interests and to relate these to ethical and social questions that would shape their vocations. They were more likely to see some coherence in their education and to view it as preparation for a vocation and not simply for a career.[28]

By the comparison above, Prof Marsden has raised many questions for the secular universities and the critics of Christian universities and colleges. But our focus in this paper is not the secular universities and neither are we here to answer the critics of Christian universities and colleges. We must focus ourselves on ourselves—the Christian universities. I have a question which I feel we must respond to: Are the Christian universities located in Africa institutions of higher learning for Africa or are they merely in Africa?