AFRICAN PANTHEON IN A WORLD OF CHANGE

Abstract

In the African world, there is only one God, who is high and is expected to be
reached through intermediaries. These intermediaries are called divinities and
share aspects of the divine status. They are the off-springs of the Supreme Being,
and are responsible to God for whatever act they perform in their relationship
with human beings. They are, therefore, not an end in themselves but a means to
an end. They are functionaries in the theocratic governance of God, sometimes
referred to as the executive heads of various divine departments in the Supreme
Being’s monarchical government. In the face of globalization, this piece studies
the relevance of these divinities in African contemporary societies and beyond. In
our world of change, engineered by the advent of Christianity and Western
civilization, this work raises questions as regards the possibility of the
perpetuation of the reverence given to these African divinities. For the purpose of
this research, the hermeneutic and descriptive phenomenological methods of
investigation would be patronized. This piece submits that, rather than speak of
the end of the relevance of the African pantheon, relationship with them have been
repackaged.