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An Aladura Church in Eastern Nigeria AN ALADURA CHURCH IN EASTERN NIGERIA Caroline Victoria Margaret Moller Thesis presented for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy University of London 1968 ProQuest N um ber: 10752686 All rights reserved INFORMATION TO ALL USERS The quality of this reproduction is dependent upon the quality of the copy submitted. In the unlikely event that the author did not send a com plete manuscript and there are missing pages, these will be noted. Also, if material had to be removed, a note will indicate the deletion. uest ProQuest 10752686 Published by ProQuest LLC(2018). Copyright of the Dissertation is held by the Author. All rights reserved. This work is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States C ode Microform Edition © ProQuest LLC. ProQuest LLC. 789 East Eisenhower Parkway P.O. Box 1346 Ann Arbor, Ml 48106- 1346 ABSTRACT This thesis is a synchronic and diachronic study of an aladura or prayer-healing church - the Eternal Sacred Order of Cherubim and Serafim - in the Ibo town of Onitsha, eastern Nigeria. The major part of the thesis concentrates on analysing the structure of relationships in the prayer-house, the prooesses of role behaviour, and the norms and beliefs that sanction the role structure. The thesis concludes by extending the analysis of roles to the social field of Onitsha where members of the prayer-house earn their living. Chapter 1 begins the thesis with a diachronic analysis of the processes whereby the prophet-founder*s charisma was routinised in the Eternal Sacred Order between 1925 and 1966; and the next chapter examines the emerging role structure of the prayer-house, Onitsha, between 1949 and 1966. Chapter 3 considers the religious beliefs and values of Serafim as a synthesis of customary religion and Christianity. This leads on in Chapter 4 to the process of role control which hinges on the visioners and prophets, and to Chapter 5 which studies role strain and conflict in the prayer-house* Chapter 6 begins with an examination of the principal socio­ economic features of Onitsha as a neo-urban centre. The latter part of the chapter deals with the prayer-house as a segment of the wider social field of Onitsha. The thesis concludes with an assessment of the structural significance of the role structure of the branch of the Eternal Sacred Order at Pegge, Onitsha. PREPACE This study of an aladura churoh in eastern Nigeria is the result of fieldwork carried out in Nigeria during 1965 and 1966. For the most part my research took place in Onitsha, a town in eastern Nigeria. But I also travelled extensively in the east, visiting prayer-housee, participating in services and talking to the elders and members. In order to obtain information on the origins of the Eternal Sacred Order and the course of events up to the time when I did my fieldwork, I went to Lagos where it all began, attended services and interviewed some of the senior elders. I am most grateful for the Hayter studentship administered by the School of Oriental and African Studies from 1963 to 1966; and to the School of Oriental and African Studies for granting me a Governing Body Post-Graduate Exhibition for 1967-1968. The sources of information for this thesis are three-fold: historical, sociological and that of participant observation. The historical data which enabled me to reconstruct the pattern of events in the Order between 1925 when Tunolashe's Praying Band of Serafim was founded, and 1965 when I began my fieldwork, is both oral and written. Interviews were conducted with the present Baba Aladura (or praying father) and other senior elders in Lagos, who were all early members of the Serafim. I checked this information by further talks with the senior elders in Enugu; and the leader of a secessionist section of the Cherubim and Serafim in Port Harcourt. This man was intimately involved in the events leading to the establishment of the Serafim in eastern Nigeria, and knew the elders at. the Lagos prayer-house in the early 1930*s. Similarly, I reconstructed events at the Onitsha prayer-house as from those days in 1949 when it really got underway up to 1966, by interviews with the founding elders at the Onitsha and Enugu prayer-houses. The latter prayer-house is the regional headquarters of the eastern Conference of the Order. An important means of checking the veracity of information obtained by interviews with the elders in Lagos lay in written material. The most significant of these sources is the series of reports on cases submitted to the law courts by quarreling factions in the Cherubim and Serafim. The most important cases are: suit no.151 of 1930 in the Divisional Court, Lagos; suit no.LD/l94/59 in the Western Divisional Court, Lagos; suit no.JDGA/3 CL/59 in Grade ,*A,t court at Ijebu-Ode, western Nigeria; suit no.LD/635/61 in the High Court, Lagos; suit no. LD/194/63 in the High Court, Lagos and suit no.LD/635/63 in the Supreme Court, Lagos. The most recent case concerning the division in the national headquarters at Mt. Zion, Lagos, between those supporting the present Baba Aladura, and those challenging him, is still in the law courts. The many circulars issued by the governing body of the Eternal Sacred Order since 1962 constitute another mine of information. Although they do not go back very far, they do cover the principal doctrinal and organisational changes which have done much to bring the Order’s adminis­ trative machinery up to date. The prayer-house files at Enugu also proved useful in reconstructing the history of the Order between 1949 and 1966, for the Enugu prayer-house is the regional head-quarters of the eastern Conference of the Order. Unfortunately, I was not permitted to investigate the files at the Onitsha prayer-house; and many of those relating to the early years have been lost. Finally, there are the publications of the Order. Although not much has been done in the way of putting forward the doctrines, liturgy or history of this Church in comparison with the publications of aladura bodies like the Church of the Lord, the three main publications do constitute an additional source of literary information. There is t h e "history" of the founder’s death called "Ojokoro" published in the early 1960’s; the substantial pamphlet called "The Order" issued in the early 1960’s, which sets out the liturgy, rules of behaviour and the doctrine of the Order; and the Cherubim and Serafim Bible Reading Pamphlets of 1961 and 1965, which give information on anniversaries, deceased members and the elders currently holding positions in Nigeria, Ghana and Dahomey. The second source of information which I mentioned previously was obtained by sociological methods. In order to acquire some hard facts about the local origins, education, previous denomination, marital status and so forth of the Serafim in Onitsha, I conducted a survey of 113 members at the Fegge and Inland Town prayer-houses. This sample was compared with a control group of 103 non-members interviewed in Fegge and Inland Town; and I explain the sample design in Appendix A. These two surveys provided me with the information to examine the changing social composition of the prayer-house. They also provided a means of assessing the extent to which the social characteristics of the members of the prayer-house diverge from those of the wider population. The survey of members therefore gave me much of the factual information which I used to explain social changes in the Fegge prayer-house since 1949* The sample of non-members was also important in enabling me to set out some of the socio-economic characteristics of the Onitsha population in c Chapter 6. This information was supplemented by government publications on education, employment, reports on wages and salaries, seven year plans and the Census of 1953 - among other texts. In 1966, I conducted a survey of elders and pastors working in mission and aladura churches in Onitsha. The purpose of this survey was to provide an additional source of factual information on other religious bodies in the town than the Eternal Sacred Order: I explain the design of this survey in Appendix B. The third source of information for this study of an aladura church in eastern Nigeria was that of participant observation. After a couple of months I was given the white prayer-gown of Serafim, went out on open-air preaching, attended conferences and so on. Some weeks after I had declared several visions, it was announced that the Spirit had revealed that I was a member of the Cherubim band of angels who guard the throne of God. I therefore tried to get the "feel" of being a Serafim as much as was possible. In writing the thesis I have therefore relied on material obtained from three different kinds of souroes: the historical, the sociological and the personal of participant observation. The oral and written sources of information enabled me to undertake a diachronic analysis of the development of the Order between 1925 and 1966} and also of the development of the prayer-house, Onitsha^between 1949 an& 1966. Then the surveys I conducted in 19^5 and 1966 in Onitsha provided much of the data for my account of changes in the social composition of the prayer- house; and of the present socio-economic characteristics of the members as well as of the wider population. Finally the method of participant observation, in addition to providing an invaluable access to gossip, back-biting and local politicking, helped me to see the situation as Serafim view it.
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