THE BANTU CONCEPT OF TIME

Francis Gillies

The impetus for the present interest in the traditional

African concept of time is the work of Professor John Mbiti,
whose writings cover African religion and Christian
theology (1) . Mbiti's main assertion - one which has many
socio-economic, political and theological implications -
is that the traditional African 'has virtually no concept
of the future' (2) . My aim in this article is to argue
that, by situating the discussion about 'time in traditional
African thought' (3) within a wider philosophical, theo-
logical and anthropological framework, it is possible, using
Mbiti's evidence, to reach conclusions about the nature
of traditional African time-consciousness different from
his ; namely that the time-consciousness of the traditional
African is fundamentally future-oriented .

GENERAL CRITIQUE OF MBITI'S APPROACH

Before considering Mbiti's detailed analysis of African

time-consciousness, it may be useful to situate his method
against a wider background of concepts of time .

First, Mbiti is a member of the Kenyan Akamba tribe,

which is Bantu (4) . His detailed research into the nature
of African time has been confined to the Bantu . For this
reason, it is more accurate to describe his research
findings as pertaining to Bantu concepts of time .

Secondly, Mbiti is primarily an Anglican theologian .

It is this characteristic - that of Christian theologian -

RKP 1980 0048-721X/80/1001-0016 $1 .50/1

16


The Bantu concept of time 17

which makes his writings of interest and application to a

wider audience than those engaged in the field of religion,
because as a good theologian, he does not restrict himself
to a purely descriptive approach to traditional religion,
but attempts to analyse and interpret the interaction of
traditional religion with developmental forces (in this
case Christianity) showing the implications of this
interaction for political, economic and social development
in Africa . However, on the question of Bantu time-
consciousness, his approach of juxtaposing traditional Bantu
time with a too narrow concept of Western time leads him to
conclusions which require some modification . Notice here
that this is not a criticism of Mbiti's method - the
juxtaposition of two concepts of time from two cultural
traditions to both of which he belongs - but rather the
contents of his method, namely restricted assumptions about
the nature of Western time-consciousness and the future,
contained within one theological tradition .

Thirdly, Mbiti presupposes that there is unanimity

(a) amongst Western philosophers about the nature of time
and future, and (b) amongst Christian theologians about
the nature of time and future as expressed in eschatological
theology .

(a) Time in western consciousness is described by

Mbiti as 'an ontological reality', which is experienced
by Western consciousness as an entity, as a form of
existence in its own right (5) . Western time is said by
Mbiti to be linear, possessing a past, present and future(6) .
Again, Mbiti asserts that in Western time-consciousness the
future exists ; few, if any, Western philosophers would
agree with that, because it requires the identification
of the ontological world with the existential one ; yet
Mbiti's argument about the lack of a future concept in
Bantu time is based on the assertion that future events
have not yet occurred, therefore there is no future (7) .
To this linear, ontological, Western time is opposed
traditional Bantu time, which has 'virtually no future' (8),
which is 'simply a composition of events' (9), and which
is 'not an ontological reality in its own right but is
composed of actual events which are experienced' (10) .
Such a description of Bantu time is one which could equally
as well have come from the pen of a Western phenomenologist
trying to describe Western time-consciousness .

From Augustine to Husserl we find constantly

reiterated the complaint that it is impossible to define
time . Husserl tells us that 'as soon as we make the attempt
18 Francis Gillies

to account for time-consciousness, to put Objective time

and subjective time-consciousness into the right relation . . .
we are involved in the most extraordinary difficulties,
contradictions and entanglements . . .one may still say with
St Augustine : "if nobody asks me what time is, I know, but
if I am asked to explain it, I don't know"' (11) . And it
was Augustine who insisted that the word 'time' can be used
only in relation to past and future (otherwise it is not
'time' we are speaking of but something else), but who also
declares that it is incorrect to say, 'there be three times,
past, present and future', but correct to say, 'there be
three times : a present of things past, a present of things
present, and a present of things future' (12) . Neither
Augustine nor Husserl are proponents of linear time, nor of
time as an ontological reality in the way in which Mbiti
understands it, but both of them are central to the Western
philosophical discussion on time-consciousness . Indeed,
the perennial problem in Western philosophy between, on the
one hand, the relationship between the objective world and
our consciousness of it, and, on the other, between objective
time and internal time-consciousness, is not different
from that encountered by Mbiti but is mirrored in his
research into Bantu concepts of time .

(b) Eschatology in Christian time-consciousness is,

similarly, reflected in the way in which the Bantu under-
stood eschatology .

Mbiti identifies himself with that school of Christian

theology which he describes as 'intensely eschatological'(13) .
His work and writings demonstrate his desire, and rightly
so, to develop a socio-critical theology within Africa,
based on the acquisition of eschatological consciousness
by African Christians . However, by adopting an unhistorical
approach to the interpretation of Christian theology, he
makes correct assertions about the way the Bantu understood
eschatology but draws the wrong conclusions from this
about the nature of Bantu time .

One of Mbiti's test cases, for example, for the

nature of Bantu time, is the way in which the Akamba of
Kenya, upon conversion to Christianity, understood the
Christian eschatological message (14) . According to Mbiti,
the Akamba, because of their lack of future-consciousness,
turn the future dimension of Christianity and its relation-
ship with the present, into a 'pie-in-the-sky', futuristic
type of religion (15) . But were the Akamba not, in fact,
presented with an eschatology which could only be under-
stood in this way? Mbiti's understanding of eschatological


The Bantu concept of time 19

consciousness was not readily available to English or

Scottish missionaries at the turn of the century .

On top of this, if the Bantu peoples have virtually

no concept of the future, how else could they have under-
stood the Christian eschatological message except as
futuristic Indeed, if Mbiti's conclusions are correct,
then the conversion of the Bantu to Christianity would be
an insuperable task, contradicting the theological motto
that 'grace perfects nature', because, in this case,
Christian eschatological grace would do violence to Bantu
nature . Now, clearly, the conversion of the Bantu,
together with the work carried out amongst them by
Christian missionaries, seems to indicate a future
perspective both on the part of the missionaries and of
the Bantu . Without Christian initiatives, motivated by
the concept of a 'better future', particularly in the field
of education, the development of East and Central Africa
is unthinkable . Perhaps early missionaries, with their
concept of an 'ethical Jesus', preached and practised a
Christianity which was both this-worldly and other-worldly,
and this would account, at the level of eschatology, for
the type of futuristic eschatology which Mbiti finds among
the Akamba . In other words, at one level of Bantu time,
there is an indication of 'future-consciousness' upon which
missionaries actively built, otherwise no development
could have taken place ; at another level Christianity is
transformed into an other-worldly religion . Is not this a
reflection of the theological position and its interaction
with society in Europe at the turn of the century

In addition, Mbiti overlooks certain interpretations

of eschatology which offer a different concept of the
nature of the future . For example, in the theology of
Jiirgen Moltmann, for whom also 'all theology is eschato-
logy' (16), and in that of Johannes Metz, for whom 'every
eschatological theology must become a political theology,
that is a socio-critical theology' (17), the concept
'future' is not treated as a part of linear time, in which
human history unfolds, but as a category separated from
time exercising an influence on the whole of human
development . Rahner, indeed, calls God the 'Absolute
Future' (18) . Nor is the future, within this form of
eschatologizing, considered as part of time as an onto-
logical reality, which is gradually being topped up by
natural and social history, but as the nerve of history .
Perhaps if Mbiti had considered the concept of 'future'
within eschatology as neither linear nor ontological, but
as the reality which penetrates and influences every
20 Francis Gillies

present (19), he would have interpreted his research

findings differently .

Against this wider background of concepts of time

and future in Western philosophy and Christian eschatology,
it is time to look more closely at Mbiti's detailed
research . From Mbiti's writings it is possible to
distinguish three characteristics of traditional Bantu
concepts of time : (i) Traditional Bantu time has virtually
no concept of the future . (ii) Traditional Bantu time is
simply a composition of events . (iii) Traditional Bantu
time moves backwards into the past .

(i) Traditional Bantu time has virtually no concept of the

future
Mbiti has two arguments for the virtual absence of a
future dimension . The first is that verb tenses in the
Kikamba language have no future tense apart from a tense
describing the near future : 'there is no concrete verb
tense to express something happening beyond two years from
now' . This statement is qualified by Mbiti : 'there are
roundabout ways of speaking about events beyond that
period' (20) . 'Two years from now' could be understood as
contradicting the statement that traditional time has
'virtually no future', and the existence of roundabout ways
of saying things ought to make us careful about . basing an
interpretation on linguistic evidence alone .

The second argument advanced by Mbiti is that within

traditional religion, 'African myths are directed to the
past and deal with items like creation, the first men, the
separation of God from men and the coming of death . There
are no African myths about the future' (21) . The coming
of death, however, does suggest a myth about the personal
future .

In these two arguments, the concepts of time and

future are used at different levels, and it is necessary
to distinguish in them the difference between the chrono-
logical future and the imagined future .

The first argument, the linguistic one, is based on

the Bantu's consciousness of chronological time, 'old
Father Time', inseparable from the rhythm of nature, the
basis in the Western world of calendrical .and clock-time .
This time as Chronos, characteristic of Greek thought, is
generally regarded as cyclical, that is without a future,
but this view has often been strongly criticized (22)_
Opposed to the Greek concept of time is the Jewish concept,

The Bantu concept of time 2L

which has been called linear . Such a juxtaposition of

Greek and Hebrew concepts of time has also come in for
heavy criticism (23), yet Mbiti's argument for the virtual
absence of the future in Bantu time relies on the Western
model .

Chronological time-consciousness has its basis in the

inevitability of the rhythm of nature, but it has to be
experienced to become a reality : ' . . .time must be
experienced in order to make sense, to have a meaning and
become a reality . . .since the future cannot be felt it has
no meaning' (24) . Again, 'since what is in the future has
not been experienced, it cannot make sense, and cannot
therefore constitute a part of time . . .unless, of course
it falls within the rhythm of natural phenomena' (25) .
This form of time is in the category of 'inevitable or
potential time' (26) . The unit of measurement of this
inevitable-chronological time is the annual cycle, which,
in its repetition is infinite : 'People expect the years to
come and go in an endless rhythm, like that of day and
night . . . .They expect the events of the rain season, planting,
harvesting . . . dry season, rain season again, planting and
so on, to continue for ever' (27) . (My emphasis .) This
clearly is an affirmation of the future, but, in Mbiti's
understanding, it is not an affirmation about future time .
Obviously the category 'future' here needs to be separated
from 'time' . Now, this category 'future', discernible in
Bantu time is essentially the same as the concept of an
'infinite future' in Western time . The concept of the
infinite future in Western time is founded upon chrono-
logical time, not, as Mbiti argues on ontologically linear
time . It is a fundamental biological category, dictated
by hunger (28) . It is a universal category in man .

Certainly, at this level of the meaning of time, the

traditional African has an identical concept to Western
man . He plans, he plants seeds, he harvests, he has a large
family which, in the future, will co-operate with inexorable
nature to provide for him in old age and so on . The
foundation of this future-directed consciousness is
biological hunger . It is this fundamental anthropological
category which directs consciousness, in its interaction
with the empirical, objective world, to the chronological
future . Every society possesses it . The fact that African
societies did not develop numerical calendars, for
instance (29), is not an indication that they did not
possess this type of future consciousness but only that
they had no need to systematize the category, future, in
more detail . Calendars reflect cyclical, not linear time .
22 Francis Gillies

It is this identical category, future, which exercises

the primacy in Western society . Although the West has
'socialized' nature, my personal planning of the future,
as well as society's planning of the future, are based on
the concept, future, mediated to consciousness through the
experience of chronological inevitability . My present
pension contributions, Mr Brezhnev's five-year plans, my
next year's holiday arrangements, are all based, despite
the numerical time differences between them, on the concept
of the chronological future . There is a difference in the
contents of planning between traditional Africa and the
Western societies, but the source of planning, the
biological necessity of providing for the future, is
identical . The time span is irrelevant, and Mbiti's
analysis demonstrates this, because a future which is
'two years' hence remains a static category impinging on
every present . What Mbiti judges to be an essential
difference is, in fact, only a difference of degree .

Understood in this way, since the traditional Bantu

still lives at subsistence level, the future probably
exercises him more than it does his Western counterpart,
and is possibly the overriding factor in his daily
consciousness .

This leads to Mbiti's second argument that there are

no myths about the future in traditional Bantu religion .
It is possible to argue that there are no myths, in any
religion, concerning the future . The myths within Judaism
for example the creation story - are similar to the myths
within traditional African religion . They are the products
of a people's imagination introduced to explain something
which cannot be explained empirically . However, the myths
about the future in Judaism - 'a land flowing with milk
and honey' - are not strictly myths in the way that the
creation story is a myth . Myths about the future, certainly
within Judaism and Christianity, are closely connected with
historical events in the past .

The concept of the future introduced here, however,

needs to be distinguished from the concept of the chrono-
logical future . The imagined future occurs within chrono-
logical nature, but it comes to birth as the result of the
attempt to break or transform the inevitability of the
world of natural time, and accompanying social structures .
The Exodus events are good examples of this . It is within
the experience of slavery and exploitation, taking place
within chronological time, that the imagination creates
'an alternative future' . This imagined future, which leads

The Bantu concept of time 23

to action, creates within the objective possibilities of

chronological time, and indeed under the influence of the
category future of chronological time, historical time .
Now the 'myths' of alternative futures contained within
the Jewish and Christian religions are products of the
imagination working under the constraints of the future,
but they are inseparable from historical events, the Exodus
and the resurrection of Christ, which are incorporated
within the religion .

Now, Mbiti's writings show that the Bantu did not

incorporate any historical events within his religion
which would give rise to myths about the future, but that
does not mean that there were no historical events motivated
by an imagined future different from that inevitable future
of chronological time . The imagined future need not be
Utopic, and need not be incorporated within traditional
religion, but simply activated in response to the alienating
nature of the present and the immediate future . However,
Mbiti argues that even at the level of the daydream, the
simplest form of the imagined future, the Bantu have no
concept of a better, or happier personal future : 'traditional
Africans do not build castles in the air', that is they
have no daydreams ; again, 'there is no belief in progress
. . .the future cannot be expected to usher in a radically
different state of affairs' (30) .

There are two ways to approach Mbiti's assertions

here . The first is to contradict him by arguing that there
are myths about the future in traditional Bantu religion,
which are well researched and documented (31) . However,
all such myths either are fairly late developments or there
is disagreement about whether they are 'pure' or contain
an admixture of the Christian myth of the parousia (32) .
Besides, Mbiti is not concerned with 'other-worldly' myths
but with how the messianic kingdom influences human
behaviour in the present, and it seems to me he is correct
to argue that there is no hint of this form of messianism
incorporated within traditional religion . On the other
hand, Mbiti himself has argued for a 'theology of dreams . . .
in the light of the seriousness with which Africans take
some of their dreams' (33) . Here Mbiti is speaking of
night dreams, not daydreams, but they are dreams which
influence the way in which people plan for the future :
Amin's expulsion of the Asians, for example, was based on
a dream he had from God (34) .

The second approach involves denying Mbiti's assertion

that all of traditional life is religious - 'To be is to be
24 Francis Gillies

religious in a religious universe' - (35) and to argue that

traditional Bantu existence is both religious and secular .
Does not the history of traditional Africa reveal a secular
history, with a concept of historical time-consciousness
generated not by Utopian optimism or Messianic hope, but
simply by the hope of something better in the future?
How was Ethiopia possible, or the kingdom of Ghana, or
Zimbabwe? The imagined future, which expresses itself
through historical time, reveals itself within traditional
Bantu time-consciousness, although not within traditional
religion . To deny the imagined future is to deny the basis
of hope, and to assert that Bantu consciousness is hope-less .

(ii) Traditional African time as a composition of events

What do we mean when we say that time is a composition of
events? Presumably it can be taken to mean something like,
'no event, no time', because time is inseparable from event .
This suggests that time in traditional Bantu thought is not
an ontological reality . Alexis Kagame, writing on the
concept of Bantu time, disagrees with Mbiti . Although
Kagame argues that the ontologizing of time is more defined
in the West, he maintains that Bantu time is ontological :
'In traditional Bantu culture, time is a colourless, neutral
entity, as long as it is not marked or stamped by some
specific event . . . .As soon as the action or the event
impinges on time, the latter is marked, stamped,
individualized, drawn out of its anonymity' (36) . This
seems analogous to the concept of 'materia prima' as the
basis for existential individuation : time here is
individuated by being 'stamped' with the event or action .

Now Mbiti describes Bantu time as 'something which

has to be experienced in order to be real' (37) . Does
not this suggest, that, because it is capable of being
experienced, time is an ontological reality? On the other
hand, it is experienced only along with event . Perhaps,
as Kagame suggests, 'the metaphysical justification for
merging place and time into a single category' (38) rests
upon a form of perception which, in terms of descriptive
psychology, operates with an interacting form of potential
time as well as potential matter . This is precisely the
way in which Husserl understands the relationship between
the objective world (including objective time) and our
perception of it : it requires consciousness to objectify
it but it can be objectified only because it is potentially
objectifiable (39) .

However, Mbiti also argues that time is not only

experienced, but is also produced or 'created' by Bantu
The Bantu concept of time 25

consciousness (40) . Therefore, it would seem that time is

created along with perception of, 'creation' of the event .
The objective world becomes the phenomenal world in the
event-time structure, that is the objective world takes
on meaning only when it is understood as being in motion
(an event caused by somebody other than the observer), or
when it is conceived as the result of human praxis (when
the creator of the event and the observer are the same) .
No consciousness of an event, no human praxis, is equated
with the absence of internal time-consciousness, and time,
which is composed by events, seems to interact with event
in order to make the event meaningful . This indicates
that the traditional Bantu's theory of knowledge is not
passive but active, that is his knowledge arises from his
creation of event .

Mbiti gives a daily timetable to illustrate the

inseparability of time and event (41) . Sunrise is the
time for milking cattle : the cattle (objective world) and
sunrise (objective-chronological time) are given meaning
only through the human activity of milking . Therefore the
traditional Bantu's internal time-consciousness arises from
his experience of transforming and unifying the separate-
ness of objects and chronological time in the natural world .
This indicates that Bantu consciousness operates 'intention-
aliter', that is his knowledge of the time-event structure
depends upon his creation of that structure through human
praxis, through the dialectic between consciousness and the
objective world (and objective time) . Knowledge in this
context is neither exclusively empirical, nor exclusively
rational, but is both produced by, and mediated to,
consciousness through the interaction of consciousness
with the objective world . This is the way in which Husserl,
Merleau-Ponty (42) and the later Sartre (43) understand
the relationship between consciousness and being .

One must agree with Mbiti's statement that in 'Western

or technological society . . .time . . .is a commodity which
must be utilised, sold and bought' (44) . Witness also
Kagame's agreement with this (45) . The implication, of
course, is that in traditional society time is not bought
and sold . Time, obviously, is being used again at a
different level of meaning here . It is not time that is
being bought and sold, but human labour (praxis) and
commodities (the continuation of praxis), and this certainly
is part of traditional African society just as much as it
is part of Western society, even although the economic
structures are totally different .

26 Francis Gillies

Time, therefore, does seem to be an ontological

reality, the objective possibility for the event-time
structure, in traditional Bantu time-consciousness, and
the fact that it is an ontological reality does not
contradict the fact that it is experienced only along
with event .

(iii) The time-consciousness of the Bantu moves into the past

There are two concepts of time within traditional Bantu
thought . The present time (the Swahili sasa) or the 'now
period' encompasses the present, the immediate future and
my own experiential past . The sasa period extending back-
wards beyond my own experience is absorbed within the
zamani period (Swahili), which stretches backwards
infinitely . The zamani is transmitted to the sasa period
through remembrance and communication of the events which
occurred in the zamani period : 'a person experiences time
partly in his own individual life and partly through the
society which goes back many generations before his
birth' (46) . My individual sasa does not end at my death,
but continues as long as I am remembered by the living .
When I finally disappear from living memory, then I enter
the zamani period . The chronological course of the world
only adds to the past : 'each year comes and goes, adding
to the time dimension of the past . Endlessness or "eternity"
is something that lies only in the region of the past' (47) .

Moreover, the zamani period is 'not extinct, but is

a period full of activities and happenings . . .the "golden
age" lies in the zamani and not in some infinite
future' (48) . Certainly, the activities and happenings
of the zamani are extremely important in traditional Bantu
thought and practice . The zamani is the seat of the
ancestors and exercises great control over the present :
Bantu children still obtain leave from their boarding
schools to return, for short periods, to their villages,
because they are troubled by the ancestral spirits . The
zamani is often invoked by the chief as a means of social
control . On the other hand, even at this deeply religious
level, the spirits of the zamani are called upon to protect,
or even to interfere with the future, for example to protect
crops and family, and even to restore life to a dying child .
This surely indicates that although the primacy certainly
belongs to the zamani, the future is not absent from the
Bantu's time dimension even within this religious area .

What is of interest here is the interaction of the

religious world of ancestral expiation with the secular
world of the material future, although it is an immediate

The Bantu concept of time 27

future only . This seems to indicate again that traditional

African consciousness is both religious and secular .
Joshua Kudadjie rejects Mbiti's contention that the African
world is almost completely a religious world : it is both
sacred and secular (49) . In this context too, Mbiti's
research findings can be given a modified interpretation
from that given by him .

CONCLUSION

My motivation for writing this article is a shared feeling

with Mbiti that African Christian theology should become
a critical theology, and the African Christian Church a
critical Church . If my interpretation of Mbiti's research
is correct, then it is possible to discover a future
dimension in Bantu time-consciousness within the three
characteristics of Bantu time given by Mbiti . This future
dimension, present in Bantu daily consciousness and in
Bantu time as an ontological reality, would seem to make
the task of constructing a critical theology more compatible
with traditional time-consciousness, because it confirms
rather than contradicts eschatological consciousness which
is the basis of a critical theology .

Moreover, the form of my argumentation should make

less difficult the task of African theologians whose
purpose is to incorporate the fundamental elements of
traditional religion within Christian theology, because the
natural primacy of the future in practical Bantu time-
consciousness would be a 'natural' foundation for Christian
eschatology .

If the future as I have described it is a major

constituent of Bantu time-consciousness, then it has wide
implications for our understanding of traditional religions,
for our understanding of historical consciousness within
Africa, for the relationship between economic base and
ideological superstructure within traditional Africa ; more
importantly, it has wide implications for the way in which
we understand cross-cultural interaction, because if the
future is the fundamental anthropological category which
is subject simply to differing forms of conditioning,
then what we at present, within the fields of anthropology
and the study of religions, decipher as essential
differences would, in fact, be only differences of degree .
However, I am only pointing directions, not making
analyses, and it could immediately be objected that both
Mbiti and myself are making use of a form of Christian
28 Francis Gillies

consciousness, which is itself conditioned, against which

to measure Bantu time-consciousness . For this latter
reason, I have confined myself within the limits of the
interaction of Bantu time-consciousness with Christian
eschatological consciousness, and leave to others the
task of analysing any wider implications .

NOTES

1 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, London

1969 ; 'The African Concept of Time', in Africa, Vol . 8,
1967 ; 'New Testament Eschatology and the Akamba of
Kenya', in D . Barrett (ed .), African Initiatives in
Religion, Nairobi 1971 .
2 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 17 .
3 The phrase is taken from an article title : J . Parratt,
Religion, Vol . 7, Autumn 1977 .
4 J . S . Nbiti, 'New Testament Eschatology and the Akamba
of Kenya', op . cit ., p . 18 .
5 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 17 .
6 J . S . Mbiti, ibid .
7 J . S . Mbiti, ibid .
8 J . S . Nmiti, ibid .
9 J . S . Mbiti, ibid .
10 J . Parratt, op . cit ., p . 117 .
11 E . Husserl, The Phenomenology of Internal Time
Consciousness, The Hague 1964, p . 21 .
12 St Augustine, The Confessions of St Augustine, London
1961, p . 198 .
13 J . S . Mbiti, 'New Testament Eschatology and the Akamba
of Kenya', op . cit ., p . 17 .
14 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., passim .
15 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 21 .
16 J . Moltmann, Theology of Hope, London 1967, p . 16 .
17 J . B . Metz, Theology of the World, London 1966, p . 115 .
18 K . Rahner, Gegenwart des Christentums, Herder 1963,
p . 9, 'Gott ist die absolute Zukunft' .
19 E . Bloch, A Philosophy of the Future,
passim .
20 J . S . Mbiti, 'New Testament Eschatology and the Akamba
of Kenya', op . cit ., p . 18 .
21 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 19 .
22 G . E . R . Lloyd, 'Views on Time in Greek Thought', in
P . Ricoeur (ed .), Cultures and Time, Paris 1976, p . 117 .
23 J . Barr, Biblical Words for Time, London 1962,
passim .
The Bantu concept of time 29

24 J . S . Mbiti, 'New Testament Eschatology and the Akamba

of Kenya', op . cit ., p . 19 .
25 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 17 .
26 J . S . Mbiti, ibid .
27 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 21 .
28 E . Bloch, A Philosophy of the Future, op . cit .,
pp . 124-33 .
29 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
30 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 21 .
31 See, for example, J . J . Williams, Hebrewisms of West
West Africa, NewYork193 ; G . Parrinder, African
Mythology, London 1967 ; R . F . Gray, The Sonjo of
Tanganyika, London 1963 .
32 R . F . Gray, op . cit ., passim . The Sonjo, a small tribe
in northern Tanzania, expect a parousia .
33 J . S . Mbiti, 'God, Dreams and African Militancy', in
J . S . Pobee (ed .), Religion in a Pluralistic Society,
p . 38 .
34 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 41 .
35 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy,, op . cit .,
p . 262 .
36 A . Kagame, 'The Empirical Apperception of Time and the
Conception of History in Bantu Thought', in Cultures
and Time, op . cit ., p . 99 .
37 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 19 .
38 A . Kagame, op . cit ., p . 92 .
39 E . Husserl, op . cit ., p . 21 .
40 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 19 .
41 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 20 .
42 M .Merleau-Ponty, The Phenomenology of Perception,
London 1969 .
43 J-P . Sartre, Critique of Dialectical Reason, London
1975 .
44 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 19 .
45 A . Kagame, op . cit ., p . 99 .
46 J . S . Mbiti, African Religions and Philosophy, op . cit .,
p . 23 .
47 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 21 .
48 J . S . Mbiti, ibid ., p . 23 .
49 J . Kudadjie, 'Does Religion Determine Morality in
African Societies ', in Religion in a Pluralistic
Society, op . cit ., pp . 60-77 .
30 Francis Gillies

FRANCIS GILLIES is a Senior Lecturer in Education and

Religious Studies at the College of St Mark & St John, Plymouth
His doctoral thesis (University of Sussex) concerned, 'The
Eschatological Structures of Christianity and Marxism' . At
present he is on secondment to the department of education,
University of Malawi .

Dr F . Gillies, Department of Education, University of Malawi,

PO Box 280, Zomba, Malawi (until July 1980) .