Opinion piece: Ancestral worship is a fallacy
Ancestral Worship is a
shameful fallacy
By Blessing Mhlanga
We cannot speak to the dead
and there’s no such thing as the living-dead. Rituals involving animal
slaughter, sprinkling of blood, drinking of concoction, talking to a dead
person on their grave and consulting a sangoma for intervention is a spiritual
deception that has enslaved the african people. For me personally, I am
extremely ashamed and disgusted by my fellow black people who believe that a
dead person has an influence on their failures or prosperity in their lives.
Some cultures even believe
that the dead are a mediator between God and the living; it’s a shame because
they have forgotten that God is the creator of all men and he doesn’t need a
human being whom he created to be a mediator to those who are living.
According to Truth Magazine
article, ‘if you displease the ancestors, it may be that they will kill someone
else.’ This doesn’t make sense, why would my ancestors, who were somehow my
relatives want to hurt me or someone close to me? This is a sign that the one
who is promising to kill is not my ancestor but a demon, or satan himself whose
mandate is to steal, kill and destroy.
If the dead people have power
to affect the lives of the living, why can’t they raise themeselves from the
dead just like Jesus Christ did?
Ancestral worship is not
different from idolatry. When a person dies, their spirit returns to the
creator, the body goes to the ground: when we idolize dead ancestors by rituals
or worship, we’re not necessarily honoring the ancestors but the forces of
darkness.
A dead person cannot return
back to earth and there’s no connection between the dead and the living - If a
sangoma says, the ancestors are angry, he/she is referring to the demonic
spirit that was living inside the one who has died, which is now looking for
another soul to posses or to renew the blood covenant within the family.
In an article by Mail and
Guardian, a 12 year old girl was ordered to stop going to school because the
ancestors wanted her to pursue her calling as a sangoma. What kind of an
ancestor refuses a child to go to school? Have the ancestors forgotten that the
child has a right to education, according to the chapter 2 of the constitution
in the Bill of rights? This is wickedness and child abuse.
In February 2018, according
Times Lives, a 32 year old Sangoma was arrested for murdering a 13 year old
albino girl and used her for muti ritual. Mind you, sangomas are labelled as
communication agents connected to the ancestors. If ancestors are influencing
sangomas to kill innocent albinos for muti, then ancestors are nothing but
demonic murderers.
Verse 5 of the 10
commandments in Exodus 20, prohibits anyone to bow or serve any image of likeliness of anything in heaven or earth. bowing before a sangoma or on a
grave of a dead person is serving an image: a god of the dead, which is a
spiritual force in itself.
I hate the system of
ancestral worship and talking to the dead because it’s a wicked and destructive
force in the african society. An article by Truth magazine tells a story about
a teenage girl who was being treated for glaucoma at the hospital in Durban,
her mother took her treatment away and sent her to stay with a sangoma who had
promised to cure her. The girl has now suddenly turned blind. Now tell me, who
is to blame? The sangoma or the ancestors or both? Why did the so called
ancestors who allegedly have power over the living fail to heal the girl?
It’s ignorance, foolishness
or spiritual blindness not to realize that the dead have no power over
themselves or over anyone dead or living. While Chapter 2 of the Constitution -
the Bill of rights allows for freedom of religion, belief and opinion, I
suggest that South Africa should become a christian nation to avoid the rubbish
of ancestral worship and the nonsense about talking to the dead. It is makes me
angry. It is a pathetic system. This is my mere opinion.
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………
Sources:
https://googleweblight.com/i?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.truthmagazine.com%2Farchives%2Fvolume35%2FGOT035143.html&geid=NSTNR
[Accessed 24/07/2019]
https://googleweblight.com/i?u=https%3A%2F%2Fmg.co.za%2Farticle%2F2005-04-21-the-ancestors-wont-let-her-go-to-school&geid=NSTNR
[Accessed 24/07/2019]
https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2018-02-28-policeman-reveals-horror-he-found-at-sangomas-premises/
[Accessed 24/07/2019]
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