The Spirit of ‘Community’ in Igbo Traditional Life

‘Egbe na-efe anya ufe akokwanaya’

 Introduction

The short article aims to give an idealized account of the experience of communal life in an Igbo community. It begins by elaborating on the concept of community; which is followed by a description of membership in the Igbo community. Next is a focus on the worth or benefits of the membership. Before the concluding section, the question of the responsiveness of the Igbo communal life and traditions to modernity is raised.

The Idea of Community

The word ‘community’ evokes “the moral bonds of membership and leadership”, that is, membership of a certain social unit distinguishable from the wider society, a purposive organisation, an association or institution.  Thus, a community is not an association or just any group of persons. A community has definable characteristics, irrespective of the orientation and the common interests that it exists to serve.

The phrase, ‘moral bonds’, would seem to capture the essence of a community.  It speaks to the quality of the obligations, from one member to the other, inherent in the communal belonging.  The obligations are reciprocal and open-ended, for instance, as pertain to family members and members of extended families.  A strong sense of interdependence which fosters solidarity and mutual respect and the awareness of shared identities sustain the communal bonding.

The other element, i.e. leadership, is vital to keeping any community strong, for the bonds of community are not a constant or a given. Every community is susceptible to forces of social dysfunctions, to the vagaries of politics, and to modern and post-modern trends.  Therefore, community leaders (of all sorts and vocations) will need to learn to create, nurture and strengthen the communal bonds of their communities.

The following main bonds typify a community, including, of course, Igbo communities[1]:

1. A shared history
2. Shared beliefs, cultural traditions and rules for right conduct;

• Reciprocity of obligations and self-interest; and

1. Diversity of interests/motivations of members

It seems obvious that social groups can be communities in diverse ways, depending on what creates the bonding, such as, geographical locality, shared ideals, professional interests, or common origin or ancestry.

Membership in the Igbo Community

Community in the Igbo cultural tradition has very practical significances.  In short, the innate communitarian spirit of the Igbos, much like of the many other African social groups, should be counterpoised to the individualistic ethos, which is characteristic of welfare liberalism of modern Western societies.  “African cultures have an acute sense of solidarity and community life.  In Africa it is unthinkable to celebrate a feast without the participation of the whole village.  Indeed, community life in African societies expresses the extended family.”[2]   John Paul went on to express the hope, and to pray, “that Africa will always preserve this priceless cultural heritage and never succumb to the temptation to individualism, which is so alien to its best traditions”[3].  This commonality of life in the Igbo tradition is all-encompassing; it includes the unborn, the dead and the living, who respectively partake in an immortal existence.  The community thus embodies the different functional roles of its members: the unborn actuates the life force in the perpetuation of the race; the dead live in the spirit world, giving protection to the living and guarding the traditions of the people. On their part the living are expected to participate fully in the life of the community – to act for the good of all.[4]

The membership of the Igbo Community is acquired when one is born to an Igbo family or is of an Igbo parentage. However, the birth alone suffices not, for the child must go through ‘rites of incorporation’ throughout life to be fully integrated into the socio-communal bond.   The rites culminate upon death, when the deceased is finally incorporated into the wider family of the dead and the living.

The Igbo community is composed of the various bonds of community outlined above.  Also, sanctions for breach of social norms and rules of conduct are integral to the life of the community.

The Value of Community Life in the Igbo Tradition

An appeal to the spirit of community is often made, to seek to maintain a proper balance between “the needs of a person and those of the community”.  Such striving for balance augurs well for the flourishing of both the individual and the community.

The Igbo community life protects its members against social pathologies; the perils of fragmented social life are ameliorated, as familial life, work, leisure, religious and ethical life, and finally death are ensconced in the community.  The integrity of the self becomes fortified through the experience of community in the Igbo traditional life.

Whither the Igbo Community (Traditions) in a Changing World?

“Only fools would send their children to school to listen to some teachers’ opinions, unless, of course, those opinions also happen to be true”. St Augustine

In our life experiences in the modern world (as adults and children alike), we may be compared to children sent off to school to learn new things.  This analogy certainly has much more resonance with the Igbo diasporic communities the world over, confronted day-by-day with the newness and otherness of foreign cultural traditions.  However, wherever an Igbo finds himself/herself, it pays to be well acquainted with our responsibility for our cultural traditions, for its protection and preservation.  It is the self-same responsibility that we owe to the other, and by which we are constituted into a community in the first place.  One cannot protect or preserve what one does not understand.

I will refer in this connection to an Irish saying, that “a man’s tradition is that part of him that is older than he is”.  Our tradition, as a part of who we are, is only the start; its valence depends on the extent to which we, the living, have appropriated it. Individually and collectively, we must be able to account for its demands rationally.

On the contrary, what we know or do in conformity to our tradition is to be thought about and deliberated upon; tradition must be revisable to ensure that it meets the needs of the present.  Zygmunt Bauman tells us that ‘tradition’ does not mean ‘custom’ or ‘habit’; that tradition is in fact the very opposite of custom or habit.  Tradition’ is all about thinking, reasoning, justifying – and first and foremost about choice.”[5]

So, it means that our forebears who bequeathed to us the cultural traditions, thought deeply, rightly or wrongly, about things; we dare not then besmear their honour and reputation by supposing that they might have ordained or wished, that we, the living, live and act thoughtlessly.  Mbanu!

Conclusion

The lesson for us from the above reflection is this: that one may not be a real member of the Igbo Community, if in passivity. Belonging to a community requires sympathy for the suffering of others.  As members of diverse Igbo communities, we are called to participate in deliberations on the ways and means of constructing a peaceful and prosperous life for all together wherever; through our moral acts, to negate false, albeit, prevailing opinions about us and about the true realities of life, and to make our communities resilient. 

[1] The specification of the bonds is derived from Philip Selznick, Communitarian Persuasion (Woodrow Wilson Center Press: Washington D.C., 2002), pp.19-20.

[2] John Paul ii, ‘Post-Synodal Apostolic Exhortation Ecclesia in Africa … on the Church in Africa and its Evangelizing Mission Towards the Year 2000’, Yaoundé, Cameroon, 14 September 1995, at p. 17.

[3] Ibid.

[4] See Aloysius Eberechukwu Ndiukwu, Authenticity of Belief in African (Igbo) Traditional Religion: A Critical Appraisal in the Light of Christian Faith (Peter Lang GmbH: Frankfurt am Main, 2014), p.268.

Zygmunt Bauman, In Search of Politics (Polity Press: Cambridge, 1999), pp. 132-133.