ABSTRACT
This paper is a critical investigation into the origins of Placide Tempels’s seminal work, Bantu Philosophy – namely, how it originated and the factors that underlaid and influenced its formulation and articulation. Using both historical and critical approaches, I argue that, although it is customary to present Bantu Philosophy as a figment of Tempels’s imagination without corresponding social and practical reality, the truth of the matter is that the work is a result of a combination of existential factors, including European perceptions of Africa and Africans, the failure of the missionary approach to evangelization, and African resistance to Western Christianity. I maintain, further, that instead of perceiving Bantu Philosophy as a book that reinforces conflict, it should be considered primarily as a book that fosters dialogue between the West and Africa. Contrary to popular opinion concerning the value of Bantu Philosophy, I conclude that its value resides not so much in the distinctions it identified between African and Western philosophy – not even in its being one of the first to recognize that the Bantu can also think – but in the dialogue it opened up between Africa and the Western world. It is in maintaining this dialogue that Africa and the West can understand each other better and thus liberate themselves.
