Concerned about Purity and Power: The Zionist Churches in Southern Africa

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Introduction

The emergence of African Indigenous Churches—also referred to as African Instituted, African Initiated, or African Independent Churches (AICs) [1]—in sub-Saharan Africa from the late nineteenth century onwards constitutes a phenomenon of considerable scholarly interest. As a vigorous grassroots movement, it has drawn sustained attention from cultural anthropologists, political scientists, sociologists, historians of religion, theologians and related disciplines.[2] Establishing the precise number of AICs is difficult, partly because of the varying criteria for recognition and partly because of frequent fluctuations in their existence. Some congregations remain small and endure only while their founding prophet is alive or their supporting family and clan structures remain intact, whereas others emerge through schism, merger, reorganisation or renaming. In spite of these uncertainties, it is generally accepted that there are now well over 10,000 such bodies with some 65 million adherents, representing more than thirty per cent of African Christianity.[3] In 1978 a number of these churches created the Organization of African Instituted Churches (OAIC), headquartered in Nairobi, which has since become an associate member of the All Africa Conference of Churches (AACC) and has established working relations with the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Geneva.[4] This development shows that many AICs are today acknowledged, even by mainstream denominations, as authentic expressions of Christianity.

While some interpret AICs as “a movement towards adaption to a modern secular society without discarding the deep religious disposition … basic to the African world view”[5], others describe it as “a heterogenous movement of churches marked by … institutional and financial independence from European and North American churches, … rootedness in colonial and postcolonial Africa”, and a “spiritual worldview.”[6] Others again see it as a response of “groups” motivated in part by Christian faith to “challenges, such as entrenched poverty, ill health, and the breakdown of African cultural and social systems”, which organize “themselves to confront these obstacles”.[7]

Overall, AICs encompass bodies that are very diverse and heterogeneous in nature. Clus­tered according to characteristic features of their congregational life and practice, their teachings, and their historical background resear­chers formerly used to classify AICs as Ethiopian, Messianic, Full Gospel/Apostolic Faith Missions, and Zionist/Prophet-Healing-Churches, which in West-Africa are called Aladura (Yoruba word for ‘praying person’) churches.[8] However, such grouping has changed in the meantime to more accurately reflect the shift in dynamics of these entities. The Atlas of Global Christianity of 2009 lists “Inde­pen­dents” now as Pentecostal, Apostolic, Zionist, Charismatic, Neo­charis­matic, and “Neocha­rismatic of mixed traditions”.[9] This shift towards spirit filled, Pente­costal or Pentecostal-Charismatic-Churches (PCC), many of which especially in West-Africa (Nigeria, Ghana) propagate a Pros­perity Gospel and operate globally as a result of migration, is attributed not only to the influence of Pentecostalism, but also to a growing self-awareness of being African by taking “seriously spiritual forces” which “mainline churches … tend to regard … as super­stitious.”[10]

Despite the present preponderance of churches of the Pentecostal-charismatic type in sub-Saharan Africa and their polemics against AICs’ local confines and the paraphernalia used, these chur­ches “persist and attract followers. … Especially in South Africa, Zionist Churches still have a mass appeal.”[11]

This article, first, sketches the coming about of AICs of the Prophet-Healer/Zionist type (I) followed, second, by a description of their worship, ritual practice, and congregational life (II), while the concluding third section highlights some issues which invite further interdis­cipli­nary discussion and research (III).

I – Historical roots

African Zionists have nothing to do with Jewish Zionism as the label might suggest. Rather, the name refers to Revelation 14:1-5 in which Mount Zion is visua­lized as the heavenly abode where the Lamb of God stands surrounded by the 144,000, who “have been redeemed from the earth” for not having “defiled themselves” singing “a new song before the throne.”^[12] And because every one of that “great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages” was “robed in white”^[13], the ‘people of Zion’ (Zulu: AmaZioni) also dress in long white garments when congregating for worship. Many of these churches bear Zion in their name, like the ‘Christian Catholic Church in Zion‘ (founded in 1904), the ‚Christian Apostolic Faith Church in Zion‘ (founded in 1942), the ‚Union Public Christian Apostolic Church in Zion’ (founded in 1945), the ‚Swazi Christian Church in Zion South Africa‘ (founded in 1962), and the ‚Christian Bantu Apostolic Church in Zion‘ (founded in 1966), just to mention only a few.^[14] But there are also Zionist churches, which do not have Zion in their name, like the ‚Nazarite Baptist Church‘ (Ama Nazaretha) founded in 1910 by the Zulu Isaiah Shembe, which is genuinely indigenous, and not, as might be assumed, an offshoot of Baptist missionary endeavors.^[15]

What Zionists believe in is documented in a noteworthy document, viz. the ordination certificate of Deaconess Jenette Nkosi of the ‚Christian Apostolic Church in Zion of South Africa‘ issued March 5^th, 1965. It asserts: “Zion is the Kingdom of God; Zion’s Gospel is the full gospel of Salvation from sin, healing from disease and Holy living through the power of the indwelling Holy Ghost by whom the sons and the daughters of Zion are being prepared for the coming of Zion’s king.”^[16]

This statement contains the basic tenets of Zionism. It is not a formulation by African Zionists. It, rather, is inspired by the work and teachings of John Alexander Dowie (1847-1907), the “father of healing revivalism in America”.^[17] African Zionists are – or were at least formerly – fully aware of this legacy as acknow­ledged by one of their earliest represent­atives in South Africa, Edgar Mahon (1867-1936): “If you were to ask them [the Zionists] where their spiritual roots were founded you would hear, sooner or later, that ‘sadbuka kwa dowie’ (we originated from Dowie)‘.”^[18] Besides, what makes the cited certificate so remarkable is the fact that there is something written at all, which is untypical for AICs in general and for Zionists in parti­cular, because most Zionists, even their leaders, are often illiterate.^[19] It is further worth noting that this state­ment is used as a printed official credential by the ‚Christian Apostolic Church in Zion of South Africa‘, a church instituted by the Tswana Paulo Mabilitsa of Alexandra, Johannesburg, in 1920, after he dissociated himself from the South African branch of Dowie’s ‚Christian Catholic [Apostolic] Church’ in Zion, which was established there as early as 1904.

Skipping historical detail here^[20], a proper understanding of the emergence of Zionist chur­ches in Africa cannot be reached without knowledge of Dowie’s widely distributed paper Leaves of Healing (a pun referencing Rev. 22:2). This weekly featured articles about the divine healing movement and Dowie’s own faith healing ministry, while also sharing news about the ‚Christian Catholic [Apostolic] Church‘, which Dowie founded in 1896, and about ‘Zion City’ (50 miles north of Chicago, Illinois, USA), a community which he built in 1901 as refuge and “paradise for the righteous”^[21] who desired to live in the King­dom of God according to biblical principles.^[22] The Leaves also disse­minated Dowie’s theological teaching that the Christian Gospel is a simple one and fourfold in its core. It proclaims Jesus as “Savior, Sanctifier, Healer, and Coming King”.^[23]

The Leaves of Healing quickly found their way to South Africa, which at the turn to the 20^th century was a hot spot for foreign missionary activity from Europe and North America, especially the region around the Rand/Witwatersrand with its gold mining industry (since 1886) drawing crowds of people from all over the continent. Here Dowie’s fourfold gospel-message resonated well with people of the Holiness Movement (Keswick Movement)^[24] who were interested in faith healing, too (Faith Healing Movement).^[25] Pieter Louis Le Roux (1864-1943), then a homeland missionary of the Dutch Reformed Church for Africans working on the farms, was one of them. LeRoux was so fascinated by what the Leaves communicated, that he left his former church for membership in the ‚Christian Catholic Church in Zion‘ in South Africa after he and his wife were baptized – anew – along with numerous Africans by a deputy of J. A. Dowie in May 1904.^[26] Shortly thereafter, on July 31^st,1904, Le Roux was ordained as ‚Elder‘ (his wife as ‚Evangelist‘) of that very church. This marks the beginning of Zionist churches in that region of the world and made J. A. Dowie become “the father of Christian Zionism” in Africa, too;^[27] as seen, ‘Zion in Africa’ is still a qualifier in the names of many AIC bodies.

The significance of all of this, which shows that Zionism in southern Africa^[28] antedates Pentecosta­lism by years, does not lie in the particular people or the church body involved. Le Roux and his wife kept changing their church affiliation afterwards again, and the ‚Christian Catholic Church in Zion‘, Zion City, Illinois, fell apart years later. The events mentioned are significant insofar as they initialized the formation of ecclesi­as­tical bodies other than the conven­tional models set by established European or American mission churches with their acceptance of race segregation, their emphasis on doctrine, and their rejection of polygamy, spirits, and witchcraft. All this never did, nor does it matter ‚in Zion‘. What matters ‚in Zion‘ instead is (1) faithful­ness to the ‚Book’, that is, the Bible as absolute authority, even though many cannot read it; (2) unconditional trust in Divine healing by refusing medical consultation and treatment; (3) holy living by abstaining from pork, alcohol, tobacco, and worldly pastimes like gambling or dancing; (4) adult baptism by at least three times full immersion in flowing waters; (5) no racial segregation; and (6) commitment to do ‘the work of Zion’ so to prepare the place for the Coming King. The latter implies establishing ‘Zion’ as the dwelling place of God on earth on the church premises, a very tricky issue, indeed, especially in the early years of the movement, because the South-African Natives Land Act of 1913, in force until the abolition of Apartheid in 1994, not only prevented Africans from buying plots, it made it also very difficult for them to get land on lease.^[29]

II – Worship, ritual practice, and congregational life ‘in Zion’

Zionists anticipate the heavenly Zion in their services. They seek to experience salvation in the here and now. Worship is the time where the sons and daughters of Zion (amaZioni) escape from their daily troubles and get empowered to face life’s challenges in the days ahead. That is why Zionist services are not bound by any consideration of time. They last for hours without the attendees getting bored[30] following a “ritual time”[31] with lots of move­ment, dancing, clapping, chanting, and praying aloud. Even during the sermon there is much verbal applause and gesturing. Participating in a service is what Zionists call doing ‘the work of Zion’.[32] Doing the work of Zion is at the heart of their congregational life.

What at first glance might appear as an unorderly, tumultuous gathering to outside observers has a structure though. The basic elements of any Zionist service are arranged according to a sequence adhered to almost everywhere. First comes the opening with chanted hymns and praise songs while elaborate confessional prayers simultaneously articu­lated aloud by those present follow second. A sermon of homiletic or catechetic nature by a preacher or the head of the church comes next before the service reaches its climax in the healing ceremony, which is the distin­guishing characteristic of AICs Zionist type. Preaching “properly culminates in healing, while healing in the absence of preaching is rendered ineffectual.“[33] Bengt Sundkler, one of the first scholars taking serious inte­rest in the study of Zionists, observed thus: “While the Roman Church is an Institute of Grace through its sacra­ments, and the Protestant Church in Africa appears as an Institute of the Word through teaching and preaching, the Independent Church, Zionist type, is an Institute of Healing. The Healing Message is the pivot of all Church activity.”[34]

The importance of the common service for Zionists on Sundays, some of which observe Saturday as Sabbath, is emphasized by a dress code and some ritual preparation. When meeting for worship Zionists put on white robes, often adorned with colored sashes and/or other emblems, which differ from church to church and from rank to rank. They enter the building or the designated area under a tree or elsewhere in the open as their ‘Zion’ bare footed, since it is regarded a holy place. When entering a gate-keeper who normally is the leader of the congregation will give them their isikhali (Zulu: weapon), that is a plain wooden ‘holy staff’, sometimes a brazen stick (dependent on the rank), which they keep in hands through­out the service.[35] It is the gate-keeper, too, who has authority to restrict entry for anyone regarded unworthy on account of moral or health issues so to ensure that the effectiveness of doing Zion’s work does not get impaired or its power diminished[36], because an „individual’s illness has an effect on the whole group. … The reason is that a person’s ‘messenger’ [i.e. spirit] is prone to being handicapped by other peoples’ illness. The Zionists speak of the weight of such illness”, which “is mystically communica­ted” while the “metaphor of weight is not necessarily restricted to sin.“[37] Ergo, only those considered sound in body and mind and who show moral integrity qualify for doing the work of Zion.

Most reports about healing ceremonies in Zionist churches, which vary from church to church, from congregation to congregation, even from individual to individual Prophet-Healer are anec­dotal making it almost impossible to say anything of general validity here. Some reports, however, are just descriptive, avoiding observer interpretation overload. Axel I. Berglund, a vigilant eye-witness of the life of Zionists and their services has provi­ded a description of one such ceremony, when attending a worship of the ‘Zion Jerusalem Church of the Twelve Apostles in South Africa’ in the district of Mapumulo, Natal, in 1965. His account deserves extensive citation for the benefit of better comprehending the matter in question even though it documents only one example of a Zionist healing activity. Berglund observed:

“The last part of the service is apparently the most important … Ngema [the Prophet-Healer of said church] sits and takes his place in the middle of the floor inside a circle with four different signs marked in it. He carries with him his brass staff and having asked the congregation to rise, takes up a hymn. … The drummer beats her instrument with much vigour and the sick and suffering find that their chance, their moment of healing, has arrived. … [They] take their places in the circle. The congregation with their staffs in their right hands, start running around the sick in a clock-wise direction and at the end of each verse change the direction to an anti-clockwise movement; the staffs always held in such a way that they are carried in the hand facing towards the circle, the prophet and the sick.”

“The prophet starts his act of healing with one of the women. He lifts her by the neck, stretches her upwards and shouts at the top of his voice: ‘Puma dimone lokufa!’ [Zulu; Demon, get out! Die!]. He repeats the cry several times, rubs the woman up and down her neck, bangs her shoulders with great strength, and beats her on the back. He then tells her that she suffers from an inability to conceive and the woman starts weeping bitterly. He lets his hands pass down the length of her body and places it with a slap on her stomach, holds it there and then he starts a massage of no mild type. He tells her that a snake has been sent by an earlier lover. … But his healing hand will help her and she is to return next Sunday for further prophetic treatment and then next month when the moon is growing, she will conceive. In this manner each one of those seeking help is dealt with, with the exception of the children, who are lifted up from the ground by the prophet by raising them and by holding them around the head … To the mothers he gives the reasons for the children’s illness and further instructions on how to behave so that they may get well again.”

“Before the service closes, the prophet spits in the dish of ashes [placed on a table close to him] and places a little of the mixture on each of the foreheads of the sick, a little on the shoulders and such places of the body that are in need of healing. … Each of the treated people puts a contribution on the prophet’s table and he counts with the aid of the man on his right. The total sum is announced and blessings are called upon the money as this was now being used in the correct way instead of being given for useless medicines at the local hospital. Concluding admonitions of not to buy medicines in future.”[38]

This report rich in detail shows that the Zionist healing ritual within a service is not just an interaction between individuals, the Prophet-Healer and those seeking help. The congre­gation of those considered morally sound and healthy in body and mind is involved, too. Every amaZioni entitled to participate in the healing ritual has previously been installed as a Prayer-Healer (Zulu: thandazo, ‘one who prays’) who during the week also visits the sick at home to pray with them and offer help if need be.[39] The ministry of Prayer Healers is institu­tionalized as a Zionist office when they receive their isikhali for the first time. This staff is their key means for healing during the service. In the example given by Berglund the Prayer-Healers shield with their bodies the inner circle and transfer power to client and prophet in the center with their staff while their dancing in a circle intensifies the energetic atmosphere.[40]

The most important Zionist office/ministry, however, is that of the Prophet-Healer, the umprofethi in Zulu. As the designation suggests, the Prophet-Healer has a dual function, that of diagnostician (prophetic ministry) and that of healer (healing ministry). Surprisingly though, male or female Prophet-Healers do not belong to the hierarchy of the church, and they do not preach.[41] Preaching is left to pastors, bishops, overseers or their represen­tatives. Rather, the task of Prophet-Healers is to diagnose and name ‚diseases‘, advise for appro­priate remedies, and console ‘patients’, a role assigned to them not just in services but at centers and shrines of healing, too.[42] Prophet-Healers qualify for their ministry not by having mastered a systematic education but by either having been called in a vision/dream or by having recovered from a serious disease and/or from an extraor­dinary mental agony. Such unsought experiences, it is believed, endow people with the ‘power to see’ and communicate with the spirit world, which is so essential for any diagnostic activity and therapeutic advising. Once such calling shows off in successful treatments, and once the charisma is officially acknowledged by others, these individuals become a particular church’s Prophet-Healer through baptism in the ‘Jordan’ (any river or stream in the neighborhood) by the bishop or head of that church. The more effective their healing ministry, the more people they draw into their church, people who otherwise would not come. It is the emphasis on healing which makes Zionist church membership attractive especially to people from traditional African religions, less so for members of the mission churches like Catholic or Protestant, even though some migration occurs. In general, Zionist churches do not grow by ‘sheep stealing’ as occasionally assumed[43], healing is “the most potent recruitment instru­ment in these churches”.[44]

Examining Ngema’s procedure further, one notices that he did not do an anamneses nor did he ask the sick any question. Maybe he knew about their complaints before since Zionist congregations are normally compara­tively small.[45] Whatever the case, Ngema, does not need doing that, because as a prophet he is seen as someone who is in contact with the spirit world, as is the case with any traditional diviner (isangoma in Zulu). He will be told by spirits – in this context it is assumed to be the Holy Spirit – what people are suffering from. He, thus, can declare up-front what is wrong and then powerfully exorcise the trouble causing demon not just by sternly commanding “at the top of his voice” the demon to leave, to die, but by touching, beating, and massaging the poor woman “in no mild way”. How could his treatment be otherwise? He had to fight a demon after all! Children, however, did not have to suffer from his beating, even though Ngema’s way of lifting them up from the ground and “holding them around the head” is putting them at risk for serious spine injury.

After finishing treatment of everyone seeking his help, Ngema spat into a dish of ashes (symbol of purified matter) and applied the mixture to his ‘patients’ forehead, shoulders and the spots of concern or pain, a procedure obviously analogous to what Jesus did to the man born blind according to John 9:6. His ‘patients’ give him some money in return as a token of their gratitude and get finally charged not to obtain other medicines, a charge not targeted primarily at bio-chemical drugs, but at indigenous ‘medicines’ (Zulu: imithi), which play a vital role in African life and especially in Bantu societies. The “substances … spoken of in English as ‘medi­cines’ … [do not have a] parallel concept … in contem­porary Western society. ‘Medi­cines’ in Africa [are wanted] to secure power, health, fertility, personality, or moral reform; they might be used to heal or deliberately to kill, to make a bride ‘patient and polite’ to her in-Iaws, a chief ‘majestic’, or a judge ‘compliant’ … [They are] useful but horribly dangerous.”[46] The avoidance of anything resembling imithi / ‘medicine’ may also account for the general, almost complete absence of the use of oil in healing ceremonies as would be the expected practice according to biblical directive.[47] Instead, Zionists across the board tolerate only blessed/holy water (Zulu: isiwasho) to be used in their healing rites.

While decency cautions many Prophet-Healers to abstain from such palpable treatment as exercised by Ngema, the beating out of demons during exorcism and the laying-on of hands are a common practice among Zionists. Yet, beating and laying-on of hands are not the most common means, they rate only third as respective surveys show. Ritual vomiting and the external as well as internal cleansing of the sick by washing them with and making them drink blessed/holy water (isiwasho) top the list[48], a further indication of the all-important concern for purity ‘in Zion’. Other therapeutic means occasionally employed are inhalations, enemas, laxa­tives, ‘holy cords’ of different colors (Zulu: ndaza), flags, candles, and sometimes ‘Western medicine’, too.[49] As to be expected, different chur­ches and different Prophet-Healers have different prefe­rences; some use prayer only, while others rely on prayer and isiwasho, others still keep adding further paraphernalia to their therapeutic stock, provided these have nothing in common with any kind of imithi.

When the amaZioni do ‘the work of Zion’ they feel safe and protected thanks to the power residing there. But once they return their isikhali at the end of the service and leave ‘Zion’ unrobed, they plunge into a world full of danger facing threats of misfortune and disease. How to guard against harm in the worldly environment? To stay safe and protected while not ‘in Zion’ but living mainly in suburban slums populated by malicious spirits Zionists adhere to a strict moral regimen. Surrounded by “brewing, drinking, gambling, profanity, promis­cuity, sorcery and medicines”, they shun “every activity not directly related to work and worship and family life”.[50] Compliance with this code of conduct protects them from looming harm while any indolence puts them at risk of dimi­ni­shing their life’s power and wellbeing. „If a Zionist allows himself to be caught up in outside associations and if he does so out of defiance or even through negligence, his membership [sc. in Zion] is clearly wavering. Until his exact position is established through divination [by a Zionist Prophet-Healer], the membership of a sick person, even of a sick prophet, is held in abeyance and he is debarred from exercising office and joining in Zionist work. ‘He has lost his power’ is the common explanation.“[51] Thus, Zionists adherence to strict moral standards is not just motivated by a preoc­cu­pation with purity[52], it is also aroused by the fear of losing vital power.

III – Comprehending the phenomenon

AICs in southern Africa, especially those of the Zionist type can be understood as group attempts by marginalized populations to cope with the clash of cultural practices of indigenous rural societies with the daily challenges of technocratic urbanization. These attempts have led to a mushrooming of very diverse entities, all of which concerned with ‘healing’ the disintegrating effects of that clash and help people stay sound and healthy. In this capacity they function as not to be under­estimated autotherapeutic self-help groups, which complement the health-care systems of their countries, an aspect deserving further in-depth study and statistical corro­bo­ration.[53]

This prompts the question what ‘healing’ stands for in Zionist chur­ches, because as a broadly used general term the meaning of ‘healing’ fluctuates bet­ween ‘feeling better’ to ‘coping’ to being ‘restored to health’ (restitutio ad integrum), or the ‘status quo ante’ respectively in the strict medical sense.[54] For discerning claim and actual outcome it is crucial to qualify the term more precisely, a task which taps into the field of medicine and the healing arts, especially into that of ethnomedicine, a sub-discipline of medical anthro­pology.[55] “For researchers in clinical medicine, healing is an embarrassing word” since it “exposes the archaic roots of medicine and psychiatry, roots usually buried under the biomedical science facade of modern health care” raising “questions that deal with human values, and meanings not easily reduced to technical problems that can be answered with simple biological explanations.” [56] That is why the term is rarely used in medical circles, save when speaking of the ‘healing’ of wounds or the ‘defective’, only partial ‘healing’ of a condition. However, when studying indigenous healing systems and their agents, ‘healing’ figures prominent.

Irrespective of their naming in different cultures – shaman, medicine-man, isangoma – the help of such male, oftentimes female ‘doctors’ is sought whenever people experience serious physical, mental, or social difficulties. These professionals are then consulted to diagnose a ‘disease’ by naming it, to advise on the remedy, and, sometimes, to also ‘treat’ patients. As experts of communication with the spirit world they can do so, at times, even without the suffering individual present.[57] They facilitate ‘healing’ by helping their clients regain orientation and find meaning in a time of crisis when chaos shows by conversing with the spirits and communicating the spirits directives within a plausibility structure which is shared by healer and clients/patients. The quasi-logotherapeutic ability to meaningfully situate a disturbing happe­ning within the frame of an established worldview is what brings ‘healing’ about in Zionist churches and what accounts for successful treatments. “Providing effective treatment for disease is not the chief reason why indige­nous prac­titioners heal. To the extent that they provide culturally legitimated treatment of illness, they must heal.”[58] To call this ‘faith healing’ as done occasionally, is missing the point.

The Zionist Prayer-Healer (umprofethi) functions in the same way as the traditional Zulu diviner, albeit within a frame of reference shaped by modern outside influence. Discerning a Zionist Prophet-Healer from a traditional diviner (isangoma) or witchdoctor (nganga), Zionists hold that “Prophets go to church, pray and use holy water, whereas diviners use traditional herbs, bones and killing medicine [imithi]”.[59] The Zionist Prayer-Healer is called by the Holy Spirit (Zulu: uMoya) and, thus, enabled to converse with the spirits of ancestors and of the world around. “The Holy Spirit called me but He sends my ancestors as messengers” is an often heard phrase when Prayer-Healers are asked about their work.[60] ‘In Zion’ the umprofethi fight against the ‘spirits of affliction’ evoked by the clash between old and new, like for instance the spirits of migrant workers killed in an accident or of old people dying in urban isolation and buried without the customary burial rites by which they would have been ‘brought home’ into the fold of family and clan. Their spirits roam and cause harm when looking for a new place to rest by getting into people and families, because unlike “the ‘traditional’ spirits, who remain external to man, these [modern] spirit manifes­tations [called amandiki in Zulu, shave in Shona] are believed to actually possess the individual, by entering into his very body”[61] where they trigger ‘diseases’ and impairments needing prophetic treatment by exorcism. Tending to these complaints, Zionist Prayer-Healers become “sources of spiritual and moral rearma­ment” and “the support of a new identity yet to be discovered, which allies the old and the new” while their church is that “therapeutic institution” which “creates an identifying frontier vis-à-vis a global society which is in distress.”[62]

This “therapeutic milieu”[63] of AICs Zionist type is attractive to those who feel threatened by the spirits and powers of the modern times but do not know how to keep them under control. Providing space for managing their diffuse anxieties ‘in Zion’ by employing rede­fined elements of indigenous cultures and creatively blending these with fragments of the holiness and faith-healing traditions of nineteenth century European/North American Christianity accounts for the mass appeal to the grassroots[64] which, by the way, makes these congre­gations also become increasingly interesting to agencies promoting public healthcare, development­al, even political agen­das for pushing their goals.[65] This is yet one other dimension of the phenomenon requiring more rigorous research.

Besides examining the role of church functiona­ries and of the socio-therapeutic contri­bution cultural anthropologists have also been studying Zionists’ creative amalgamation of the traditional and modern by looking at some of the parapher­nalia they employ.[66] Taking the isikhali, the ‘holy staff’ as an example. This is not just any stick picked by chance. For Bantus the ‘holy staff’ is laden with symbolic meaning. “Invariably, it [the isikhali] must be from ‘a tree growing beside the water’, a description which strongly evokes reed symbolism”[67] signifying the origin of humans. “We men come out of a bed of reeds. … [T]he first being … broke off the nations from the reed.”[68] Reeds represent life and fertility in an oftentimes arid environment making people speak of umhlanga, that is of a ‘bushel of reeds’ when referring to their progenitors. This myth of origin translates to the entrance rite of Zionists, too, when they congregate for worship and receive their isikhali from the gatekeeper to whom they hand it back when leaving. They thereby are again and again reminded of where they truly belong to.

On yet another level the isikhali is also a ‘weapon’, as the Zulu term indicates. It represents the sole and only device of the ‘guardians of the heavens’ with which they are expected to protect dwellings and Kraals from looming harm by heavy weather. When such weather is drawing near, the guardians are called for and told “The cattle are going into the fields!”[69] Their task is to keep thunder, winds, and downpouring rain at bay like shepherds who prevent their flock from getting into fields and gardens. With the staff in their hand pointing heaven­wards, the guardians go out to argue with the ‘Lord-of-the-Skys’ to calm down and do no harm. As a strong weapon of protection against evil Zionists integrated the use of isikhali in their services from early on[70], adding further layers of meaning in the course of time by alluding to scriptural parallels[71] and by decorating the staff with colored laces and cords, sometimes topping it with symbols of power, or by replacing a wooden isikhali with a brazen, a copper, or even a silver-plated one, which, of course, entails a significant shift in meaning away from representing vitality and power towards hierarchi­cal status and authority.[72] In whatever way the ‘holy staff’ is made, it is and remains a powerful personal item, which in case of death will also be buried at the funeral along with its owner, or it will be broken into pieces in case of excom­mu­nication.[73] But unlike cultural conven­tion according to which the staff “is a symbol not only of the fathers’ presence but also of his virility – a masculine symbol not carried by women”,[74] women do the ‘work of Zion’ with their own isikhali as a sign of the new order reigning ‘in Zion’.

One last area in which the Zionists’ creative mélange of traditional culture with modern elements can be studied is the religio-theological one. Like other AICs Zionists too claim to be ‘church’. In the initial phase of their history, they were looked at disdainfully by mem­bers of mainline churches who labeled them ‘syncretistic’, ‘post Christian’ or ‘schis­matic’. They were accused of neo-paganism and treated as politically suspect. Only slowly was it recognized that they represent a unique type of church, a church in its own right as South-African Anglican Bishop Desmond Tutu (1931-2021), himself a Xhosa Bantu, frankly admit­ted: “I remember so very well how we in the so-called ‘main-line’ churches looked down disdainfully at the odd phenomenon called independent or indigenous churches. After all were their ministers not nearly all of them illiterate persons heading up churches (often no more than fragmentary minute congregations) with usually rather preposterous names and what was this odd mix of clearly pagan beliefs and practices which so obvi­ously condemned them all as syncretistic – the ultimate heresy we had been led to believe? And they were not even churches, but mere sects at best with hardly any decent theology between them all … Our churches had tended to scorn the healing ministry as it turned out very much to our cost.”[75] Likewise the Swedish bishop and former missionary in South Africa Bengt Sundkler who heralded the study of AICs. He interpreted Zionism first as a neo-pagan phenomenon but later saw that “the Independent Churches have much to contri­bute to the treasure-house of the Church Universal.”[76] But what and in which way?

The specific contribution of Zionists to the Church Universal does not consist in adding new elements to the essential notions of the Church (notae ecclesiae). The sacraments – the Eucharist especially – play only a marginal role for Zionists if any at all[77], and Baptism has been reinterpreted as a repeatable purification and re-empower­ment rite.[78] Nor does their contribution lie in the realm of theological studies since Zionists barely have the ability to read the scriptures despite the fact that the Bible occupies a dominant place in their rituals as that ‘Book’, which reveals everything about Zion. As such they some­times use the Bible in straightforward magical fashion when placing it upon the sick to bring about healing or when pouring ‘holy water’ (isiwasho) over it to absorb the power of the Word of God.[79] Rather, the unique contribution of African Zionists to the Church Universal rests in (1) their challenge to take the corporeality of salvation seri­ous­ly by actively engaging in healing, and (2) by their emphasis on the life sustaining power of the Holy Spirit (Zulu: uMoya; uMoya ongcwele).

As seen, Zionists do not delegate the healing ministry to institutions. In their services they provide on a regular basis a therapeutic milieu by creating an energetic atmosphere for healing when dancing around in a circle at the center of which their Prophet-Healer commu­nicates with the spirits, showing off the power of the Holy Spirit. All members of the congregation judged sound in body and mind are actively involved in enhancing the healing power while at the same time getting reenergized by benefitting from the powerful presence of the Holy Spirit in their midst. Such emphasis on the presence of the Holy Spirit (uMoya) has led missiologists to assume, that the “specific contribution of these churches will indeed be to force us [sc. in the mainline churches] to reconsider the whole work of the Third Person of the Trinity. … [A]ll dealing with the so-called Amabandla Omoya [amabandla uMoya, the ‘Churches of the Spirit’, i.e. the AICs over against the established mainline churches, the ‘Churches of the Law’] will force us to ask ourselves what existentially we do know and expect of the living power of the Holy Spirit today! As the church is borne and vivified by the Holy Spirit, the question of the survival of the Church in Africa is indeed at stake in this encounter with the self-conscious ‘Churches of the Spirit’.”[80]

However, when Zionists speak of the Holy Spirit (uMoya), they are less concerned about trinitarian doctrine or about the ‘gifts of the Spirit’ such as speaking in tongues or resting in the Spirit according to 1. Cor. 12. Zionists, rather, perceive uMoya as the ultimate source of power and life. Surrounded by the activity of malicious spirits they trust that the protec­tive power of the Holy Spirit will streng­then them not to get harmed by the wickedness of those imma­terial, but lively beings which attempt to hurt them and stain their purity. Proclai­ming and trusting that uMoya is the superabundant power of life is the basis of all Zionist activity and symbolism. This not only appeals to people longing for enhancement and longevity, but also to those who are socially and economically margina­lized, because uMoya “provides a potent counterbalance to the realities of” their “existential situation. … [T]he very marginality that these groups experience is transformed into a benefit. Their theology explains and justifies their marginal position in terms both of salvation and of meaning­fulness in the here and now. It is precisely their marginality to the centers of secular power that provides the true power that comes from on high.”[81]

Conclusion

From whatever perspective AICs Zionist type are studied they show an impressive creative mix of diverse elements mingling the old with new, the traditional with the modern, the rural with the urban, and, also, Christian beliefs with non-Christian ones. Zionists do this not just by accident but in response to dramatic changes of their socio-cultural environment to manage existential survival and stay well and sound in body and mind. The ritual means they have devised ‘in Zion’ and the paraphernalia they employ have proven to be of help to many of their fellow strugglers at the grassroots of society. Ultimately, Zionist Churches in southern Africa can be understood as embodied, lived theologies of survival. Their fusion of spirit, suffering, and sociality does not merely fill the void left by societal, urban dislocation — it generates alternative epistemologies, rooted in ancestral memory and spiritual power, which resist socio-political marginalization and defy biomedical reductionism. In Zion, people are not only healed; they get re-situated within a cosmos of meaning. The prophetic work of healing, the choreography of communal ritual, and the moral rigour of daily life converge into a lived cosmology that makes the invisible visible and the excluded central. These churches do not seek recognition by the religious establishment; rather, they perform a counter-establishment from below — one that integrates where modernity offers fragmentation, and they offer lively breath (uMoya) where institutions offer tested structure. While their message is not coherent, it is to be heard: healing is meaning becoming corporeal.