DECOLONIZING AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY AND RELIGION

By Decolonization it means divesting African philosophical thinking of all undue influences emanating from our colonial past. The crucial word in this formulation is "undue". Obviously it would not be rational to try to reject everything of a colonial Ancestry. Conceivably, a thought or a mode of inquiry spearheaded by our colonizers may be valid or in some way beneficial to humankind.
I think that it is a colonial type of mentality that regards African philosophy as something that should be kept apart from the mainstream of philosophical thinking. Compare how things stand or might stand in, say the study of British philosophy. Surely it would be more than mildly idiocy berate for a British teacher of philosophy in a British university to propose  in his teaching of metaphysics.
 In fact there may be no such course in the given British university for the good reason that there may be no need for it. It would be a great day for African insights have become fully integrated into the principal branches of philosophy. In the negative case, that that is, in the case in which critical inquiry discovers a foreign category of thought to be in applicable within African thinking, an additional question of the greatest philosophical interest arises. As far as contemporary African philosophizing is concerned, it is important to understand that the imperative of decolonization does not enjoin anything like parochialism. These include the disciplines of logic and its philosophy and the philosophy of mathematics and natural science. I have called for domestication, in African, of disciplines such as these in previous writings, and I would like to take this opportunity to make a clarification. By domestication, I do not mean the mindless copying of conclusions arrived at somewhere else. I mean taking up broad intellectual concerns relating to certain subject matters. Nevertheless, we do not, to my knowledge, have in Ghana the tradition of logical study as a formal discipline. It does not appear that we have formed within our traditions the habit of trying to set out the principles of reasoning, among which non-contradiction and excluded middle are of a very basic importance, in the manner of a system (as in logic). Nor, consequently, have we tended to investigate the assortment of theoretical questions that arise in such an inter prise (as in the philosophy of logic). The document also tried in finding out whether one reason may be that in their academic training they may themselves have come to internalize such accounts of African thought so thoroughly that they have become part of the future of their minds and that mind may be justly be called colonized on the other hand, if one goes along with Christian package after due reflection he may be entitled to be exempted from the colonized description, and it is worth emphasizing that an African person is not to be debited with the colonial mentality merely because the espouses Christianity or Islam or any other foreign religion, it is clearly asserted that salvation lies else were than in African religions but to dwell more on African should not take it for granted that this is the case simply from having been brought up in a foreign religion and this issue, call for confrontation in the spirit of due reflection. Better still, the colonizers should have the idea to understand that the intellectual responsibility has been to say that religion is a matter of faith rather than reason, and therefore, any critical probing is out of place, and it is create to awareness that Africans to be Christian in a non-colonized manner but it is not clear that such Africans are always to acknowledge the widespread consequences of that persuasion for the evaluation of African religions.
I found two lessons worth looking into, the first is this, and there is nothing necessarily impeccable about a communal philosophy. It is the combining, in an almost imponderable process of the opinions of fallible individual, moreover, these opinions are often only the most sticking of the conclusions of the thinker in question preserved in the popular imagination in separation from the possibly complex and subtle reasoning’s that may have given rise to them such underlying argumentation is usually, although not invariably forgotten. Yet it is this that gives a philosophy its profundity when it has any, it is accordingly, the responsibility of contemporary African philosophers to delve beneath the communal beliefs to find their underlying reasons wherever possible, that is a necessary preparation for construction, two responsibilities complementary to the first.
Another circumstance which makes particularistic studies based on a given language is not particularly impenetrable to non-speakers is that, as a rule they consist of inferences from primary data regarding which there is often little uncertainty and on which consequently, the non-insider can relatively safely depend. It is for this reason that non-speakers, whether they be African or non-African can often evaluate controversies among African philosophers speaking the same language regarding the interpretation of aspects of their vernacular.
It is worth recognizing that African philosophers in our time cannot live by decolonization alone but also by the direct interrogation of reality what is truth, goodness, freedom, time, causality, justice? What is the origin of the universe, meaning of live, and the destiny of human souls (whatever it is)? What are the principles of correct reasoning? What are the best ways of acquiring knowledge? And these grant that colonialism may have led to distorted accounts of the conceptions of our forefathers and fore mother's on many of these issues.


 THE PHILOSOPHICAL STUDY OF AFRICAN RELIGION
The African man is so religious conscious that, even the foreign student instil his culture and it was not so with some early anthropologists felt about the concept God. And Africans generally have so much belief in the existence of God .Africans also sees God as "that than which greater cannot be conceived".
This work also figure of that God created the world out of nothing and this assertion brought about debate by different philosophers, which further demonstrated that the Akan supreme being is thought of as a cosmic architect rather than a creator out of nothing and a Christian philosopher, by named Descartes conflicts sharply with the notion of creation out of nothing. That nothing can come out of nothing is not an empirical insight, but it is a conceptual necessity.
ANALYSIS
  There is also a common-language front, for technical vocabulary is a specialization of common language and may owe some of its characteristics to that origin. It is this link gives technical philosophy much of its cultural identity. Consider, for example the use of the word "idea" in British empiricism. By "idea" Locke says he means the immediate object of our perception. But it turns out that he takes this to means a sensation. Since a sensation is the condition of the human body, this means that the table I perceive is a state of me, if it is an idea. Locke wavered on this, but Berkeley and Hume asserted it without any inhibition. Indeed, by the time we reach Hume, the perceived table has become a momentary state, not a per during object and the perceiver too has become nothing but the same momentary state without a possessor. Philosophers need also to keep a critical eye on the conceptual intimations of the natural languages in which they work. In Kwasi Wiredu contribution to African philosophy and religion which served as the point of departure for other philosophers who wrote and quoted him based on the way he analysed African philosophy and Religion to be of influence to western colonizer who see s African ways of life as the worst and void aspect of living.
Traditional African philosophy is immanent in the social practices, institutions, moral codes, as well as metaphysics, art and oral literature, religion and traditional society. It also contained in the proverbs, folklore, myths, Idioms, religious worship, festival, etc. of people. Ancient traditional African philosophy date back from the oldest stages of African civilization and continues to even the post-colonial era. In many contemporary African societies, the doctrines and principles of traditional world-view are still evident in the thought practices and patterns of the rural and even urban peoples.
Westerners laid much emphasis that African do not have philosophy because of lack of written literature in most part of the ancient African society we are unaware of the various says of who have played role in the evolution of the world-view of the various traditional societies. Consequently, ancient tradition African philosophy has largely come to us as the "collective wisdom". Some have called it "folk philosophy", "group mind", "communal or public philosophy" and "folk thought".
According to Kwasi weridu "Without argument and clarification, there is no philosophy", this type of activity he argue, is lacking in ancient traditional philosophy. But however later acknowledge the philosophical relevance of the world- view.
On the issue of philosophy being "the logical thought of an identifiable individual", According to Omeregbe such identification is impossible in the absence of writing. Writing was one thing ancient traditional thought lacked. Nevertheless, the starting point of the problem is that of African who has learned philosophy in English, for example has most likely become conceptually westernized to a large extent not by choice but on the force of historical circumstances, and to that same extent he may have become de-Africanized.
CONCLUSION
Concluding on the decolonization of African philosophy and religion, Africans have a part to play in trying to redeem themselves with adaptation of embracing our cultural values, creating ideas ourselves, and also the means to be authenticity. It is only when we stand independent and apply our method in the best way we can to save ourselves that decolonization can be worth it for Africans, Africans sure has great potential for developing its philosophy, its religious tenents its language in philosophising, yes it is obvious that decolonization has made us free and independent, but the question is, are we truly free?.
To dwell in a philosophical parlance, I viewed this work so down to earth because it create an awareness to me in the sense that am now aware of the hindrance that were created by the colonizers and the issue of we Africans not having a single language to communicate our philosophy because of the multiplicity of languages in African and this figured out that we don't have a philosophy which is totally something that is not to go for, because before education was brought to us our fore fathers were logically philosophising using premises and conclusions unconsciously.
The average Africans is constantly faced with the problem of culture, coming together under a respective leadership to devise solution is very difficult, therefore Africans should go back to its own roots, values philosophy and tradition and Africans should be Africans.

 By:felix Barnabas
 Published by euclidabz.blogspot.com C.E.O: DABO EUCLID ICEKING AMEL