The Blogs: Reconsidering the Historical Narratives of Christianity and Slavery in Africa

[Author’s Note: This is the fourth in a series.]

Most of us have been taught a simplified narrative that European Christian missionaries traveled to Africa primarily to spread the gospel and convert a continent perceived as non-Christian or pagan. Historical evidence, however, reveals a richer and more complicated reality: Christianity had been firmly established in various regions of Africa centuries before European missionaries set foot there. Additionally, another neglected aspect of this history is that European Christians enslaved African Christians, exposing significant moral and religious contradictions.

Early African Christianity

Christianity entered Africa long before European colonial and missionary activities between the 15th and 19th centuries. Africa was actively engaged with Christianity from its earliest days, significantly contributing to its growth and intellectual development.

Egypt: Christianity spread to Egypt as early as the 1st century CE, deeply embedding itself through the influential Coptic Orthodox Church. Alexandria emerged as a central hub for theological scholarship, giving rise to figures such as Origen, Clement, and Athanasius. Egyptian Christianity significantly influenced the development of monastic traditions, later spreading throughout the Christian world.

Ethiopia (Axum Empire): Ethiopia officially embraced Christianity as its state religion around 330 CE under King Ezana, becoming one of the oldest continuously Christian nations. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church developed unique liturgical practices, theological interpretations, and religious art, preserving texts and manuscripts in Ge’ez and sustaining a distinct cultural and religious identity.

Nubia (modern-day Sudan): Between the 6th and 14th centuries, Nubian Christianity flourished, establishing impressive churches, monasteries, and religious scholarship. Archaeological evidence confirms the region’s vibrant Christian culture until demographic and religious shifts occurred in the 14th century.

European Encounters with Established African Christianity

When Europeans eventually arrived in Africa, they frequently encountered long-established Christian communities rather than untouched pagan societies, fundamentally challenging traditional missionary narratives:

Portuguese in Ethiopia (16th century): In the 1500s, Portuguese Jesuit missionaries discovered a sophisticated Christian civilization with rich ecclesiastical traditions. Rather than converting Ethiopians, missionaries sought to reshape local practices to align with Roman Catholic doctrines. These attempts at religious dominance sparked tensions and conflicts, ultimately leading to their expulsion, highlighting European attempts at theological and political dominance rather than genuine evangelization.

Kingdom of Kongo (late 15th century onward): When Portuguese explorers reached the Kingdom of Kongo around 1483, Christianity became the kingdom’s official religion by 1491. Kongolese rulers willingly adopted Christianity for spiritual and strategic purposes. European missionaries later engaged with this existing Christian community, often attempting to dominate Kongolese spiritual life, causing significant cultural and political tensions.

Egypt and North Africa: European missionaries encountering Coptic Christians in Egypt and North Africa attempted to reshape existing practices rather than converting non-believers. Resistance from these communities highlighted the tensions between European religious authority and indigenous traditions, further complicating missionary narratives.

European Christians Enslaving African Christians

Contrary to popular portrayals of Europeans enslaving predominantly non-Christian Africans, historical evidence indicates that Europeans enslaved African Christians:

The Kingdom of Kongo: Despite sharing Christianity, Portuguese traders and other Europeans actively enslaved thousands of Kongolese Christians. The Kongo kingdom had developed religious institutions, including churches and seminaries, and many citizens deeply identified as Christians. Economic incentives prevailed over religious solidarity, making Kongolese Christians among the largest groups forcibly shipped to the Americas.

Convoluted Religious Interpretations

Europeans initially justified slavery and colonialism as acts of spreading Christianity. However, encountering well-established Christian communities in Africa complicated these justifications, forcing Europeans into increasingly convoluted religious interpretations:

Selective Biblical Interpretations:

Curse of Ham (Genesis 9:20-27): Europeans interpreted Noah’s curse on Ham’s descendant, Canaan, as justification for enslaving Africans, incorrectly associating Africans with Ham’s lineage. This narrative persisted despite lacking clear biblical support.
Ephesians 6:5 (“Slaves, obey your earthly masters”): Slaveholders selectively cited this verse to claim divine sanction for slavery, deliberately ignoring broader scriptural messages advocating equality and freedom (e.g., Galatians 3:28).

Doctrine of Discovery:

The Doctrine of Discovery, articulated in papal declarations such as those issued by Pope Nicholas V (1452 and 1455) and Pope Alexander VI (1493), provided religious authority for European colonization and exploitation. The doctrine asserted a divine right for Christian nations to claim non-Christian lands and enslave non-Christian peoples, facilitating imperialism and morally justifying conquest and enslavement.

Even encountering African Christian communities, Europeans labeled local practices as heretical, justifying colonization and enslavement despite shared faith. In Ethiopia, Portuguese Jesuits rejected Ethiopian Orthodox practices, seeking to impose Roman Catholicism, demonstrating increasingly convoluted attempts at religious dominance.

Emerging Racial Ideologies

As religious justifications weakened, Europeans increasingly resorted to racial theories and pseudo-scientific racism to rationalize slavery:

From Religious to Racial Justifications: Initially religious justifications diminished when Europeans faced enslaving fellow Christians, leading to racial ideologies asserting Africans’ inherent inferiority, regardless of their Christian faith.

Pseudo-scientific Racism: Europeans created pseudo-scientific theories proposing biological racial hierarchies, with Europeans at the top and Africans at the bottom. Examples include:

Carl Linnaeus (18th century): Categorized humans into racial groups, assigning moral and intellectual characteristics supporting European superiority.
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach (18th century): Reinforced racial categories describing Africans as inherently inferior, bolstering secular justification for enslavement.

Social Darwinism (19th century): Later distortions of Darwinian theories (“Social Darwinism”) justified imperialism and racial hierarchies by claiming Africans’ supposed natural inferiority.

How the Doctrine of Discovery Enabled Racial Ideologies and Imperialism

The Doctrine of Discovery provided initial religious legitimacy for imperial expansion and exploitation, viewing non-Christian indigenous populations as inherently exploitable. As religious justifications faltered due to contradictions in enslaving fellow Christians, racial theories emerged, asserting inherent racial inferiority, transitioning moral justifications from religious evangelization to racial superiority.

Implications and Historical Complexity

The enslavement of African Christians by Europeans disrupts simplified narratives of missionary work and the transatlantic slave trade, exposing European missionary motives that extended beyond evangelization to cultural dominance and political control. It underscores how religious doctrines were subverted by economic and racial motivations.

Conclusion

Recognizing Christianity’s deep roots in Africa long before European arrival, alongside acknowledging Europeans enslaved fellow Christians, compels a reevaluation of traditional narratives. This understanding highlights contradictions and moral compromises within Europe’s relationship with Africa, challenging simplified stories about religion’s role in colonialism and slavery. The shift from religious justifications to racial ideologies was deliberate, emerging from practical necessity as colonial and economic interests expanded. Originally legitimized through distorted religious interpretations, European colonialism and slavery increasingly relied on racial ideologies, leaving lasting global impacts still evident in contemporary racial and social relations.

Bibliography

Adogame, Afe, Janice McLean, and Anderson Jeremiah, eds. Engaging the World: Christian Communities in Contemporary Global Societies. Regnum Books International, 2014.
Andrews, Kehinde. The New Age of Empire: How Racism and Colonialism Still Rule the World. Bold Type Books, 2021.
Curtin, Philip D. The Atlantic Slave Trade: A Census. University of Wisconsin Press, 1969.
Daniels, David D. III, and Gayraud S. Wilmore, eds. Black Theology: A Documentary History, Volume I: 1966–1979. Orbis Books, 2012.
Hastings, Adrian. The Church in Africa, 1450–1950. Oxford University Press, 1996.
Hochschild, Adam. King Leopold’s Ghost: A Story of Greed, Terror, and Heroism in Colonial Africa. Houghton Mifflin, 1998.
Isichei, Elizabeth. A History of Christianity in Africa: From Antiquity to the Present. Eerdmans, 1995.
Jennings, Willie James. The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race. Yale University Press, 2011.
Kidd, Colin. The Forging of Races: Race and Scripture in the Protestant Atlantic World, 1600-2000. Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Mudimbe, V. Y. The Invention of Africa: Gnosis, Philosophy, and the Order of Knowledge. Indiana University Press, 1988.
Oden, Thomas C. How Africa Shaped the Christian Mind: Rediscovering the African Seedbed of Western Christianity. IVP Books, 2007.
Olupona, Jacob K., ed. African Religions: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford University Press, 2014.
Rodney, Walter. How Europe Underdeveloped Africa. Bogle-L’Ouverture Publications, 1972.
Sweet, James H. Recreating Africa: Culture, Kinship, and Religion in the African-Portuguese World, 1441-1770. University of North Carolina Press, 2003.
Thornton, John. Africa and Africans in the Making of the Atlantic World, 1400–1800. Cambridge University Press, 1998.