'It was said at first, before the arrival of missionaries, if we asked,
"By what were the stones made?" "They were made by Umvelinqangi."' 'The
ancients used to say, before the arrival of the missionaries, that
all things were made by Umvelinqangi; but they were not acquainted
with his name.' 'The natives,' says Dr. Callaway, 'cannot tell you his
_name_, except it be Umvelinqangi.'[6] 'The sun and moon we referred
to Unkulunkulu, together with all the things in this world, and
yonder heaven we referred to Unkulunkulu.... We said all was made by
Unkulunkulu.'[7] 'At first we saw that they were made by Unkulunkulu,
but ... we worshipped those whom we had seen with our eyes' (the
ghosts of their fathers), 'so then we began to ask all things of the
Amadhlozi.' This convenient Zulu, Umpengula Mbanda, states my very
hypothesis.[8] But he seems to have been a Christian convert, and
probably constructed his theory after he heard of the Christian God.
'We seek out the Amadhlozi that we may not be always thinking about
Unkulunkulu.' So spiritualists are more interested in ghosts than in
the Christian God. 'In process of time we have come to worship the
Amadhlozi only, because we knew not what to say about Unkulunkulu,'
just as the spiritualist 'knows what to say' about his aunt, who speaks
to him through the celebrated Mrs. Piper.[9]
Dr. Callaway consulted a very old Zulu, Ukoto, whose aunt was the
mother of King Chaka (Utshaka). Mr. Rider Haggard dates Chaka
about 1813-1828. With him began seventy years of Zulu conquest and
revolution, in which old ideas might be obliterated. Ukoto answered
Dr. Callaway's inquiries thus: 'When we were children it was said the
Lord is in heaven.... We heard it said that the Creator of the world
(Umdabuko) is the Lord which is above. When I was growing up, it used
to be said the Creator of the world is above.'[10]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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