Christianity, Witchcraft, Magic, and Healing in Africa

Christianity, healing, and witchcraft beliefs and practices have been closely connected in African history, but their relations have also vexed scholars. Healing and harming have often been studied as separate categories, although they—and the occult powers linked to them—are closely related. This chapter traces African perceptions of magic in relation to Christianity over a timespan stretching from the late fifteenth to the twenty-first century. A major change can be detected from the early nineteenth century onward, when African societies were increasingly permeated by a large number of Protestant missionaries trusting the power of Christianity and modern education to eradicate magical beliefs. Material inequalities and a failure of colonial as well modern African states to deliver effective public healthcare services are reflected in a continuously high demand for healing and protection from witchcraft offered by contemporary Christian ministers. Tensions between acceptable and unacceptable healing, and sometimes blurred lines between healing and harming, continue to run through therapeutic discourses and practices in modern African churches. African Christians are today ever more connected to transnational and global religious, intellectual, and cultural networks, with complex implications for the future.