Tragedy struck the quiet religious center of EKuphaKameni on the evening of April 6 when the Londaukosi (Londa) Shembe was murdered as he slept. The killing leaves South Africa’s third-largest African Independent Church (AIC) without its spiritual leader.
Since the turn of the century, AICS have been an important factor in South African religious life, and today their members number over 29 percent of the black population. The largest of these groups is the Zion Christian Church, with over five million members. This is followed by the predominantly Zulu amaNazaretha with over 360,000 members, a quarter of whom belong to the EKuphaKameni branch of the church.
A lawyer by profession, Shembe was a highly educated, articulate man with a driving ambition to serve his people for the glory of God. His interests ranged from biblical criticism to Freud to Zulu tradition. Many considered him the most profound African religious leader of his generation.
His church, the amaNazareth, was founded by his grandfather, Isaiah Shembe, around 1911 and had experienced rapid growth throughout the past 20 years. It had also been the center of intense missiological and academic debate. Some theologians have claimed that the church was essentially a new religious movement steeped in Zulu traditional religion and therefore not simply an African version of Christianity. This view has been challenged by many North American and European academics.
Nevertheless, when asked if the amaNazaretha were Christian, Shembe would hesitate. His grandfather, he would explain, was a Christian and the church he founded was called the Nazareth Baptist Church. Therefore, in a sense they were and always would be Christian.
But, he explained, one had to remember that for South African blacks, being Christian meant their women had to serve white families dinner on Christmas Day. “How,” he would ask, “can I tell my people to celebrate Christmas when it reminds them of their servitude?”
As of press time, Shembe’s assailant had not been identified. The tragedy occurred one month after Shembe’s marriage.
By Irving Hexham and Karla Poewe-Hexham
