KWANZAA
Should a Christian
celebrate Kwanzaa?
The
Good, The Bad, the Ugly
First Word
·
My interest in Kwanzaa was elevated when a
friend asked the question; “Should a Christian observe Kwanzaa”? – Since
it occurred around Christmas, I began to study the subject to see if it was in
the Bible in some form or fashion. – I Googled the official Kwanzaa website and
began my assimilation of glowing principles and practices.
·
I found other websites that were just downright
hateful citing very little documentation which I quickly dismissed. - But the more I searched, the GOOD was
trashed with the BAD and the UGLY raised its head. – The Bible says; “In the
mouth of Two or Three witnesses is a thing established, so I sought out more
documentation on the Internet and found more than a dozen commentaries on this
subject. ( Internet search; Ron N. Everett)
·
Some News articles refer to Kwanzaa as more
than a celebration, but as a FAITH.
·
Many African Americans who celebrate Kwanzaa do
so in addition to observing Christmas.
·
I present my findings here and ask that with serious
considerations you prayerfully decide whether or not you as a Christian should
observe Kwanzaa.
Deuteronomy 19:15 – Two or Three Witnesses
15 One witness cannot establish any wrongdoing or sin against a person, whatever that person has done. A fact must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
15 One witness cannot establish any wrongdoing or sin against a person, whatever that person has done. A fact must be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses.
(HCSB)
The Creator
·
The Creator of Kwanzaa is Dr. Maulana Karenga
who is a professor and chair of Africana Studies at California State
University, Long Beach. He holds two
Ph.D.'s; his first is in political science with focus on the theory and
practice of nationalism and his second in social ethics with a focus on the
classical African ethics of ancient Egypt.
·
Google search reveals that Ron McKinley Everett
was born July 14, 1941, the 14th child of a Baptist Minister on a
poultry farm in Parsonsburg Maryland; he was not African nor spoke Swahili. He was also known as Ron Ndabezitha
Everett and Maulana Ndabezitha Karenga. -
·
Maulana in Swahili, is a lofty title
meaning “MASTER TEACHER”.
·
Ndabezitha in ZULU means “YOUR
MAJESTY”.
·
Karenga in Swahili means “KEEPER
OF TRADITIONS”.
Kwanzaa Early Years
·
During the early years starting in 1966, Kwanzaa
was meant to be an "oppositional alternative"
to Christmas. - A rule of Kwanzaa stated that one "should not mix the
Kwanzaa holiday or its symbols, values and practice with any other
culture."
·
Washing Post Interview – Karenga said “People
think Kwanzaa is African, but it’s not.
I came up with it because Black people in this country wouldn’t
celebrate it if they knew it was American.
Also I put it around Christmas because I knew that’s when a lot of
bloods would be partying”.
·
Kwanzaa was altered in
1997 so
that practicing Christians would not be alienated, stating that Kwanzaa
was “A Celebration of Family, Community and Culture”, and “Kwanzaa was not
created to give people an alternative to their own religion or religious
holiday."
·
“The Quotable Karenga” was then name of his book
containing his seven black principals.
·
The Sevenfold path of Blackness became the Bible of the
Black Nationalist civil rights movement. - 1)
Think Black -- 2) Talk Black -- 3) Act Black -- 4) Create Black –- 5)
Buy Black -- 6) Vote Black –- 7) Live Black
THE
GOOD
The Celebration
·
Dr. Karenga said Kwanzaa was "the best of African
thought and practice in constant exchange with the world."- Kwanzaa reflects on what
most experts say is missing from our homes: unity, self-determination,
collective work and responsibility, cooperative economics,
purpose, creativity, and faith. -
www.officialkwanzaawebsite.org
·
Kwanzaa was first
celebrated in 1966-67 to "reaffirm and restore our rootedness in African
culture”. – It was created to be the first specifically African-American
Holiday.
·
It is celebrated just after Christmas on
December 26th through January 1st honoring and
celebrating African American heritage and culture and culminates in a feast with
gift giving. Its length of seven days;
its core focus and its foundation are all rooted in its concern with values. - NYOBS 47.15 - HANUKKAH & YOM KIPPUR FESTIVALS
AND FEASTS
·
Homes are decorated with
fruits,
colorful objects of African art, and cloths especially the wearing of the
Kaftans (long robe or tunic) by women. – The ceremony includes
drums, libations, reading the African Pledge & the Principals of Blackness, candle
lighting and a feast.
·
The Name Kwanzaa derives its name from the
Swahili phrase “matunda ya
kwanza” which means “First Fruits of the Harvest”. - The name is very similar to the Feast of
Harvest mentioned in scripture where the FIRST FRUITS are brought into the
storehouse of the Lord.
·
The seven candle candelabra symbolizes the seven
principals of Kwanzaa and is ruminant of the seven candle Menorah of the Jews.
Ø The three Pan-African colors on the flag are copied
from Marcus Garvey's Universal Negro Improvement Association, the most powerful
1920’s.Black Nationalist movement.
Ø Red: the blood that unites all people
of Black African ancestry, and shed for liberation;
Ø Black: Black people whose existence as a
nation, though not a nation-state, is affirmed by the existence of the flag;
and power.
Ø Green: the abundant natural wealth of Africa.
Exodus 34:22 – Feast of Weeks – First Fruits
22 You shall observe the Feast
of Weeks, the FIRST FRUITS of wheat harvest, and the Feast of
Ingathering at the year’s end.
(ESV)
Seven Principals
·
The celebration focus is on their black identity,
cultural heritage and values of Africa.
·
While many of these
principals
are traditional African principals, some seem more related to the Black
Nationalist Movement and perhaps even supremacist ideology meaning that
a particular age, race, species, ethnic
group, religion, gender, social class, belief system,
or culture is SUPERIOR to other. – Any ideology that goes
against the Bible’s teaching that all races are of equal value, must be prayerfully
re-considered.
·
Nguzo Saba SEVEN principals of Kwanzaa as listed in their official
website. They are expressed in Swahili,
the co-opted language of the Black Nationalist movement of the 1960’s.
- Each principal is represented by a physical symbol, one for each day of
Kwanzaa.
1. Umoja (Unity) - To strive for and maintain unity in
the family community, nation and race.
This principal teaches the oneness of our people, the common ground of
our humanity, the interrelatedness of life and the indispensability of family
and community in our righteous togetherness in love, work and struggle.
2. Kujichagulia (Self-determination) – To define
ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves. -
This principle reaffirms our right and everyone’s right to control our destiny
and daily lives, and build the good communities, societies and future we
conceive, aspire to and struggle to bring into being.
3. Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) - To
build and maintain our community together and make our brother’s and sister’s
problems our problems and to solve them together. This principal teaches us that we come into
being, thrive and flourish in needed and principled relationships. And it teaches
us that it is together that we must conceive and construct the good
communities, societies and world we all want and deserve.
4. Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) – To build and
maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.
- This principle teaches the value and practice of shared work and shared
wealth, the right of people to their own resources and the ethical imperative
of a just and equitable sharing of the good of the world.
5. Nia (Purpose) – To make our collective vocation
the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to
their traditional greatness. - This principle reminds us of the ancient
ethical teaching in the Odu Ifa that we and all humans are divinely
chosen to bring good in the world and that this is the fundamental mission and
meaning, i.e., purpose, of human life. Thus, we are to embrace the collective
vocation of building and developing our people, increasing our capacity to do
good and being rightfully and actively concerned with the well-being of the
world and all in it.
6. Kuumba (Creativity) – To do always as much as we can,
in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and
beneficial than we inherited it. This principal urges us to practice the
ethical teachings of The Husia that put forth the concept of serudj
ta, the moral obligation to heal, repair and transform the world making it
more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.
7. Imani (Faith) – To believe with all our heart in our
people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and
victory of our struggle. – This principal teaches us to hold tightly and
firmly to the faith of our ancestors who taught us to respect each person,
people and culture as a unique and equally valid and valuable way of being
human in the world.
Romans 2:10-11 – All the races are equal to God
10 But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that works good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: (Gentile is everybody else)
11 For there is no respect of persons with God. (KJV)
10 But glory, honour, and peace, to every man that works good, to the Jew first, and also to the Gentile: (Gentile is everybody else)
11 For there is no respect of persons with God. (KJV)
Celebration Symbols
·
The Celebration includes
1. Mkeka – A mat on which other symbols are placed:
2. Kinara – The seven candle holder
3. Mishumaa Saba - Seven candles.
4. Mazao - Crops
5. Muhindi - Corn
6. Kikombe cha Umoja - Unity cup for
giving “shukrani” (thanks) to African Ancestors.
7. Zawadi – Gifts
·
Nguzo - Supplemental Saba poster
·
Bendera - Supplemental black, red, and green flag,
and African books and artworks.
·
There are also seven
symbols
that go with each principal that I am unable to reproduce.
THE BAD
Karenga’s Gang – Early Years
·
In 1958 Karenga relocated
to Los Angeles
and studied at the Los Angeles Community College and by the 60’s he presented
himself as a “Cultural Nationalist” with a following of a number of
students. He became the first
African-American president of the student body.
·
Through Malcom X an American Muslim
minister, he would come to embrace Black Nationalism and Black supremacy
advocating separation of black and white Americans. Karenga authored a number of books, one of
which is “Black Studies”; a Black/African textbook now in its 3rd
edition.
·
He changed his name to Maulana Karenga and became a major Civil Rights figure
in the Black Power movement of the 1960s and 1970s. – By 1965 His
followers became a gang called US,
the “United Slaves”, a
cultural Black Nationalist group which remain active today. US
referred to; “US” verses “THEM” – US
would challenge the Black Panther Party and their candidate for the
domination of the Afro-American Studies Center at UCLA.
THE
UGLY
Rape, Assault, Torture
·
January 17, 1969 the two gangs had a
shootout and two Black Panthers were killed.
·
Karenga in his paranoia, thought
there were plots to kill him, so he took two of his follower’s hostage. The Los Angeles Times reported on 5/14/71 that
Debora Jones and Gail Davis two of his female followers were threatened at gun
point, made to disrobe, sexually assaulted, whipped with an electrical cord,
beaten with a karate baton, tortured with a soldering iron on their mouth with
their big toe clamped down in a vise with detergent forced down their throats.
– Karenga thought the two were trying to kill him with “crystals” in his
food.
·
In 1971 Karenga spent three years
in the California Penal System convicted of the crime of felonious assault and
false imprisonment. – He was released from prison in 1975 with newly adopted
views on MARXISM and restructured US; the United Slaves
Organization. Within four years after
taking some courses he received a teaching position at UCLA.
·
An
up and coming young 16 year old came on the scene praising Kwanzaa because it
accomplished a much desired “de-whitizing” of the Christmas Season. He would later be known as the Reverend AL SHARPTON. –-- Kwanzaa is now a tax funded
classroom event.
·
You
now have the Good, the Bad and the Ugly. --- Prayerfully consider your part in
Kwanzaa.
In the multitude of counselors,
there is wisdom.
Proverbs 11:14
I
am grateful to those that went before me providing concepts, ideas, historical
information, and scripture verses.
Because of them I can stand on their shoulders and see further that I
otherwise ever could have.
Antiquity of the Jews – Flavius Josephus Matthias
Apocrypha - Goodspeed
Bible Almanac; The – Packer-Tenney-White
Bible Dictionary – Harper and Row
Bible Study Tools - Crosswalk
English Standard Version
Bible – ESV
Expositor’s Bible
Commentary – Frank E. Gaebelein
Illustrated Bible
Dictionary – Nelson’s
Illustrated Bible
Dictionary; The – Tyndale
Kwanzaa – Renew America – Warner Todd Huston
King James Version Bible –
KJV
Man who invented Kwanzaa;
The – Weirdrepublic.com – Thomas clough
Mysteries of the Bible –
Readers Digest
Nave’s Topical Bible - Zondervan
New International
Dictionary of the Bible; The – Douglas -
Tenney
New International Version
Bible – NIV
Temple Institute; The
Temple Mount & Land of
Israel Faithful Movement
Temple Mount Location - Dr. Asher Kaufman
Thru the Bible – J. Vernon McGee
Who’s Who in the Bible – Paul D. Gardner
Wikipedia -
Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia
of the Bible; The – Tenney
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