BY FELIX NYERHOVWO JARIKRE
Felix Nyerhovwo Jarikre, a leadership consultant and author of the successful book, How to be a Wealth Controller, lives in Lagos, Nigeria. He is the pioneer CEO, Perfect Report, a leadership training group.
“The Bible is now the greatest instrument in creating false industries in the continent of Africa. And that is not to be celebrated: it is to be frowned upon.” — Professor P.L.O. Lumumba
From the words of his opening statement above, P.L.O. Lumumba was unsparing and incendiary as he piled on the attack against the misuse in which the Bible has been deployed to the detriment of the African continent.
It’s not hard to sense how discomfited his audience of mostly church leaders was as they sat listening to the Professor’s well-aimed criticisms of church establishment. Were they prepared for the blistering fusillade coming from him? Hard to tell. Safe to say they never bargained for the hard tackles of Professor Lumumba who charged the church leaders to shed their complacency and move away from their lack of accountability.
Playing off its theme, he wondered aloud if the objective of the conference, hosted by the Bible Society of Uganda, about rediscovering Biblical vision for mentorship, should not be about whether Africans should rediscover the Bible!
This is pertinent because, according to Lumumba, “the Bible has been misused, it has been used to support slavery; it has been used to support colonisation; it has been used to pervert the truth.”
Given the majority of church leaders are swamped by false suppositions gleaned from the theology of Christian orthodoxy, the challenge Lumumba threw at them was startling: “Are you in any position to mentor anybody?”
The unspoken question that dangled in the air seemed to be: “Shouldn’t African church leaders seek to rediscover the Bible first before they talk of mentoring anyone through a Biblical vision?”
If the man’s challenge seemed too wild to be countenanced, he invited his audience to consider the historical facts that when so-called “European missionaries” came to conquer the Africans, partitioned their lands, and subjected them to all sorts of discriminations, these missionaries were being mentored by the same Bible in use today. Not forgetting that using the Bible as justification, it was the Dutch Reformed Church in 1948 that facilitated the cruel, brutal apartheid policy of South Africa, reducing the majority black population to an inferior, subhuman existence.
Yet, when Professor Lumumba went on to say, “we must have the spirit that is a questioning spirit” as a prescription to rediscover mentorship in the Bible, he must have spoken tongue-in-cheek. Needless to say, he is intelligent and aware enough to realise historically that to “have the spirit that is a questioning spirit” is a life-threatening disposition within Christendom.
I am sure he well remembered Jan Hus, the Czech theologian and philosopher, who was burned alive at the stake in 1415 in Konstanz, Germany for opposing the sales of indulgences, and the doctrine of papal infallibility. Knowing the Roman Catholic Church was not averse to the killing of those deemed heretics, one would have thought that another century later, a leading reformer like John Calvin would put a clear distance between himself and such a murderous policy.
Michael Servetus, a long-time acquaintance of John Calvin, was put to death by a gruesome, slow burning at the stake because he dared to make critical comments in the margins of Calvin’s Institutes when he returned a copy to the author. This well-intentioned critique inflamed Calvin’s raw anger.
When next time, Servetus, a Spanish physician, scientist and Bible scholar, attended Calvin’s Sunday preaching meeting in Geneva on a friendly visit, he didn’t realise he was keeping an irreversible appointment with his death. He was arrested and charged with heresy by Calvin. The 38 charges filed officially against Servetus included rejection of the Trinity and infant baptism. The city magistrates showed no mercy.
The blood-lust of Calvin knew no bounds. One of his theological opponents, Jaques Gruet, once placed a letter calling him a hypocrite on Calvin’s pulpit. This man was swiftly arrested, tortured for a month before he was beheaded on July 26, 1547 at the order of Calvin.
Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion was officially declared in November 1552 by the Geneva Council to be a “holy doctrine which no man might speak against.”
To disagree with Calvin’s writings was a violation that warranted the death penalty. This, unfortunately, accorded to how Calvin misinterpreted Leviticus 24: 16.
These killings mentioned above were not just isolated incidents. They represent till now the active hostility of Chtistendom toward the intrepid souls who “have the spirit that is a questioning spirit.” The Church establishment has always viewed that passionate soul who dares to interrogate or question official theology as a threat to be silenced, removed or exterminated.
Overtime, men with some modicum of intellect had learned that to keep their head on the neck, or prevent their skin from being seared to the bone by fire, it was better to leave their Bible on the table untouched or unopened. As far as they were concerned, it was safer to be ignorant of the Bible than to be curious!
It is unsettling and frightening for anyone to take a deep dive into the Bible only to realise how far removed the entire Church establishment is from the simple, consistent and precise teaching of Christ. It boggles the mind! It’s distressing to learn how this whole religious industrial complex stretching way back from Constantine’s Roman Church has nothing to do with the love of truth but of the loot and diabolical power.
Today, the church establishment no longer imprisons, burns, hangs, draws and quarters its theological opponents. To discourage any criticism or interrogation of their teachings, church leaders usually subject those who hear them now to emotional blackmail laced with threats in the line of: “Touch not my anointed, do my prophets no harm.”
So, even though the supreme efforts of martyred William Tyndale made the Bible available to the public, and interpretation of scriptures no longer restricted to the Roman Catholic clergy alone, the ignorance or miseducation of Christians today is abysmal and intolerable.
That’s why a murderous despot like John Calvin is still highly revered in Protestant circles, and his writings required reading in theology schools around the world today. People don’t know any better, apparently.
We don’t want to dwell on how Pope Nicholas V issued Romanus Pontifex in 1455 authorising King Afonso V of Portugal to enslave Africans by conquering their lands on the west coast of Africa – thereby starting the Trans-Atlantic slave trade. We all know the untold horrors that came from that. Even though many today tried to downplay this evil papal bull, those with a clear understanding of the Bible know the Pope’s action was inhuman, arbitrary and ungodly.
Yet, the greatest crime against humanity, far beyond the scale of any genocide or holocaust, of the religious-industrial complex, is its clear and deliberate rejection of the eternal inheritance brought to humanity by the blood of Christ. That explains all the gross missteps and atrocities of the Church establishment, starting from Constantine’s Roman Church to present-day Pentecostalism.
Even the erudite professor of law and ex-anti-corruption czar, P.L.O. Lumumba, fell into the same trap of thinking the Ten Commandments given to Moses on Mount Horeb have anything to do with the eternal inheritance that Christ died for. The Ten Commandments and the eternal inheritance, both in diametrical opposition, are never the twain shall meet. This is the truth hidden in plain sight. But the hegemons that control the narrative of this religious-industrial complex want to pretend otherwise. But as long as they think they can sustain this charade of mixing the law of Moses with eternal inheritance, Christianity as a religion will remain a failed project like the Tower of Babel.
Still, for Africa to reclaim its leadership role to the world today, her people must truly go ahead and rediscover the Bible for themselves.
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