Religious Syncretism and Duplicity: A Reflection on the African Struggles for Spiritual Identity in James Ngugi Wa Thiongo’s The Black Hermit
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Abstract
African religion and culture have existed and served Africans before the colonial incursion and conquest. However, the arrival of alien religions and cultures ignites tension in Africa, destabilizing and disrupting peace and stability of the earth-centered tradition in the continent. The denouement of this tension is hybridity or religious syncretism. Since then, syncretism has continued to gain momentum in Africa unabated owing to persistent neo-paganism revival and promotion. The result is spiritual identity struggles. Based on this, the paper examines both religious syncretism and duplicity in James Ngugi Wa Thiong O’s The Black Hermit to ascertain its implications on the entire African continent. It is a qualitative research method based on direct lifting of information from the text after a careful reading. Anchored on theory of hybridity, it is the submission of the paper that faith fusion brings about spiritual identity crisis as seen in Africa today.
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