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Western Culture And Yoruba Ethics: A Philosophical Analysis
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1.8 RELIGIOUS CULTURE
The western
missionaries did not bring the idea of God to Yoruba people. They
believed in the existence of one ‘’Great God’’ as an integral member of
the society as distinct from the western Christian conception of God
staying a loof in heaven, in the community of good Angels.
The
Yoruba people believed in the existence and power of Deities (spirit)
headed by an omnipotent God. Where ever you find a Yoruba man, there
also is his religion. Although Yoruba religion is not written down like
the sacred’’ Bible’’ of the western Christians, yet all the chapter of
the Yoruba religions are written everywhere in the life of the Yoruba
people. Among the Yoruba, there are no irreligious people.
According
to professor John Mbiti, for a Yoruba man to be without religion or not
to live a religious life amounts to a self-communication from the entire
life of the societ,’’5 and Yoruba people do not know how to exist
without religion.’ to the Yoruba’s, man’s character is of supreme
importance vand it is this which Oludumare (God) judges.6n, Man’s
well-being here on earth depends upon his character, so also his place
in the afterlife is determined by Oludumare. The ethics of the Yoruba’s
is a transcendental ethics. This is so because it is ultimately but on
an objective transcendental moral order. Order which is beyond man and
is not within his power to alter
Although, Yoruba religion is
not written down like the sacred ‘’Bible’’, yet unlike the westerners,
Yoruba peoples belief is that, it is not enough to embrace a faith which
is confined to church building which is locked up six days and opened
only once or twice a week.
Through education the western
missionaries were able to produce catechists, pastors, teachers,
priests, church- wardens and converts. As a result, Yoruba traditional
religion was particularly looked up with disfavour as the missionaries
associated it with ‘’idol’’-worship and considered it as hindrance to
Christian evangelism and conversion without any consideration for moral
values the people attached to it.
This is according to some
Yoruba people was the beginning of moral laxity among the contemporary
Yoruba’s. Yet others give western religion a positive took, as the big
hammer that destroyed immoral practices like human sacrifices killing of
twins, euthanasia, cannibalism e.t.c which culminated Yoruba
traditional religion and ethics without or with little consideration for
ethical relativism.
Furthermore, some see western religion as a
tool used to re-integrate the Yoruba youths, which fell prey to social
destabilization and eventually became socially designated as a result of
rural-urban flux. Finally, the universal moral attitude of western
religion has so much transcendental moral or ethical values over and
above the Yoruba tradition in such a way that it creates and maintains
social solidarity among the Yoruba’s.
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