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The Test of Faith: Christians and Muslims in the Rwandan Genocide

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The Test of Faith: Christians and Muslims in the Rwandan Genocide THE TEST OF FAITH: CHRISTIANS AND MUSLIMS IN THE RWANDAN GENOCIDE A thesis submitted to the University of Manchester for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Faculty of Humanities. Richard M. Benda 2012 School of Arts, Languages and Cultures Table of Contents Table of abbreviations ......................................................................................................................................... 4 Abstract ............................................................................................................................................................... 5 Declaration .......................................................................................................................................................... 6 Copyright Statement ............................................................................................................................................ 6 Acknowledgments: .............................................................................................................................................. 7 Introduction ......................................................................................................................................................... 8 Chapter 1. Religion, Society and State in Pre-colonial Rwanda ....................................................................... 17 1.0. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 17 1.1. ‘Imanism’, a Rwandan doctrine of God. ................................................................................................ 19 1.2. Negotiating the ‘Supernatural’ ............................................................................................................... 28 1.3. Relating to the living: morality in ancient Rwanda................................................................................ 36 1.4. Sacred Monarchy: from religion to ideology ......................................................................................... 42 2.1. A methodological introduction .............................................................................................................. 49 2.2. The Political colonisation of Rwanda .................................................................................................... 51 2.3. Christian missions in the context of colonial politics in Rwanda. ......................................................... 52 2.4. Protestantism in Rwanda........................................................................................................................ 64 2.5. A Critical conclusion: what happened to the stepping stones? .............................................................. 72 Chapter 3: Islam in Rwanda: history of marginalisation ................................................................................... 77 3.1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................ 77 3.2. Askaris and Traders as ‘missionaries’ ................................................................................................... 78 3.3. A difficult entry ..................................................................................................................................... 79 3.4. Social and political marginalisation ....................................................................................................... 85 Chapter 4. A Great Evil: Accounting for ‘Rwanda 94’. ................................................................................... 92 4.1. The State of Research. ........................................................................................................................... 93 4.2. ‘Hijacked’ Experiences’: an insider critique of research on ‘Rwanda 94’ ............................................ 94 4.3. A secularised narrative ........................................................................................................................... 99 4.4. ‘Rwanda 94’ as paradigmatic of evil, sin and suffering ......................................................................... 99 4.5. Genocide as ‘Autocide’: A diachronic approach to ‘Rwanda 94’. ....................................................... 120 4.6. Concluding observations: Contingency and responsibility in ‘Rwanda 94’. ...................................... 124 Chapter 5. Religion in Genocide (1): Islam as a paradigm for resistance ...................................................... 127 5.1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 127 5.2. The Thesis of Good Muslims versus Bad Christians ........................................................................... 129 5.3. A Synthesis: ‘Good Muslim’, a paradigm by imputation and expectation .......................................... 151 Chapter 6. Religion and Genocide (2): Christianity as a Paradigm of Compliance. ....................................... 153 6.1. Methodological pitfalls on the topic .................................................................................................... 153 -2- 6.2. The failure of Christian communities as Sin. ....................................................................................... 157 6.3. ‘Bent Saplings and Spoilt Babes’: Metaphors for a diachronic idolatry .............................................. 161 6.4. “Kill or be killed”, Idolatry through fear ............................................................................................. 176 7. In the Aftermath: Witnessing to Faith-inspired Resistance ......................................................................... 186 7.1. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 186 7.2. Forms of Faith-inspired Resistance to Genocide ................................................................................. 187 7.3. Effects of resistance to genocide on religious experience .................................................................... 201 Chapter 8. In the Aftermath: Religion and Reconciliation .............................................................................. 208 8.1. ‘Necessity’ of reconciliation in post-genocide Rwanda ....................................................................... 208 8.2. Reconciliation: the state of process (and research) .............................................................................. 209 8.3. Islam and Christianity in Reconciliation in post-genocide Rwanda .................................................... 214 8.4. Critique and perspective for the future ................................................................................................ 225 General Conclusion ......................................................................................................................................... 233 Bibliography .................................................................................................................................................... 243 APPENDICES ................................................................................................................................................ 258 Number of Words: 79.807 -3- Table of abbreviations ACHPR :African Commission for Human and Personal Rights ADEPR : Association des Eglises de Pentecôte au Rwanda ADFL : Alliance of Democratic Forces for the Liberation of Congo-Zaire AEE : African Evangelistic Enterprise AMUR ; Association des Musulmans au Rwanda APROSOMA : Association pour la Promotion Sociale des Masses CMS : Church Missionary Society CPPCG : Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide EER : Eglise Episcopale au Rwanda EPR : Eglise Presbytérienne au Rwanda GPU : Global Peace and Unity ICTR : International Tribunal for Rwanda (in Arusha) MLS : Mission Libre Suédoise MOUCECORE : Mouvement Chrétien Pour L’Evangélisation, Le Counseling et La Réconciliation NUR : National University of Rwanda NURC : National Unity and Reconciliation Commission PARMEHUTU : Parti du Mouvement de l’Emancipation Hutu RADER : Rassemblement Démocratique Rwandais RPF/A : Rwandese Patriotic Front /Army SDA : Seventh Day Adventists SMA-PB : Société des Missionnaires d’Afrique- Pères Blancs UNAMIR : United Nations Mission in Rwanda UNAR : Union Nationale Rwandaise -4- Abstract This thesis is a critical inquiry into the response to the Rwandan genocide of 1994 by Christians and Muslims. Structured around the thesis that Muslims resisted the genocide better than Christians, it explores the historical, cultural, political and theological causes that motivated and explain the actions of both faith communities in the face of genocide. The first chapter offers a critique of the dominant colonial perspective from which the topic of religion and genocide has been studied so far. It presents pre-colonial Rwandans as evolving in a complex spiritual universe, Gakondo, where religion, morality and politics were closely linked. The rise of a centralised state and sacred monarchy resulted in the theological marginalisation of the Rwandan divinity Imana and the deformation of the political conscience of the Rwanda subject. The second and the third chapter deal respectively
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