A Missing Hand at the Dinner Table: the Response to the Plight of Farmers in South Africa

Verbum et Ecclesia ISSN: (Online) 2074-7705, (Print) 1609-9982 Page 1 of 8 Original Research A missing hand at the dinner table: The response to the plight of farmers in South Africa Author: This article investigated the plight of farmers in South Africa. The intention is to enlighten 1 Kelebogile T. Resane South Africans of the importance of farming and the respect of farmers’ life and dignity. It Affiliation: starts by giving the picture of how the farmers are marginalised even in thanksgiving for food. 1Department of Historical Acknowledgement is always given to the provider (God) and the preparer (cook), while the and Constructive Theology, producer (farmer) is unmentioned in appreciation for food. There is a demonstration that God- University of the Free State, human dealings from the beginning were around the garden. Communication of God with a South Africa human being was in the garden; and humanity expressed wisdom, sexual intimacy, and Corresponding author: livelihood in and around the farm. A historical survey of farming from the hunter-gatherers up Kelebogile Resane, to the commercial farmers of today is pointed out. The current farm attacks in South Africa are [email protected] explored through press releases, political statements, and periodicals. Suggestions to address Dates: these attacks through political initiatives, land restitution, decolonised agricultural sciences, Received: 09 Nov. 2017 and the role the church should play are suggested. The farmer as the food provider is to be Accepted: 31 Mar. 2018 respected as a human being that carries the image of God. Published: 31 July 2018 Intradisciplinary and/or Interdisciplinary implications: The article addresses the importance How to cite this article: of farmers, the history of farming in Southern Africa and the biblical basis for agriculture. The Resane, K.T., 2018, ‘A missing hand at the dinner table: The burning issue of farm attacks is a main concern and needs to be addressed through political response to the plight of dialogue, decolonisation of agricultural sciences and church’s participation in teaching the farmers in South Africa’, nation the value of farmers as human beings regardless of the colour of their skins. Verbum et Ecclesia 39(1), a1827. https://doi.org/ 10.4102/ve.v39i1.1827 Introduction Copyright: Many South Africans grow up religious. Prayers offered before meals are part of tradition. These © 2018. The Authors. Licensee: AOSIS. This work prayers come in different names such as blessing the food, saying grace over the food or even is licensed under the sanctifying the food. Our nation from childhood is initiated and indoctrinated in praying over Creative Commons food. Some of these prayers are said at rote level. The prayers by adults go like this: Attribution License. • Bless, O Lord, this food to our use and us to thy service, and keep us ever mindful of the needs of others. In Jesus’ name, Amen. • For this and all we are about to receive, make us truly grateful, Lord. Through Christ we pray. Amen. • For good food and those who prepare it, for good friends with whom to share it, we thank you Lord. • For food in a world where many walk in hunger; For faith in a world where many walk in fear; For friends in a world where many walk alone; We give you thanks, O Lord. • Be present at our table, Lord! Be here and everywhere adored. Your mercies bless, and grant that we may feast in Paradise with Thee. (Or: May strengthened for thy service be.) In the meantime, the prayer for food by children include the following: • For food and health and happy days receive our gratitude and praise. In serving others Lord may we repay our depth of love to thee. • Thank you for the food we eat, Thank you for the world so sweet, Thank you for the birds that sing, Thank you God for everything. • God is great, God is good. Let us thank him for our food. By his hands, we are fed. Let us thank him for our bread. • Bless, O Lord, this food we are about to eat; and we pray You, O God, that it may be good for our body and soul; and if there be any poor creature hungry or thirsty walking along the road, send them into us that we can share the food with them, just as You share your gifts with all of us.1 Read online: Scan this QR code with your These prayers receive different names or titles such as blessings for food, sanctification of food, smart phone or mobile device grace over food and thanksgiving for food. Appreciation is so much on the God who provides this to read online. 1.These prayers are taken from http://dailyprayer.us/before_meals_prayer.php (viewed 10 March 2017). http://www.ve.org.za Open Access Page 2 of 8 Original Research food and sometimes they are uttered with scanty mention of vegetable production, there was no guarantee of the continuing the poor, the hungry and the underprivileged. crop production as this land was adjacent to the king’s palace. ‘Expansion in Jezreel positioned King Ahab’s palace closer to Scanning through these prayers, one picks up one common the traditional farming land’ (Resane 2015a:180). thread. They mostly, if not all, acknowledge the provider (God) and the hands that prepare (cook) this food. There is a The New Testament is full of farming references. Christ used missing link, that is, the producer (farmer). The farmer is parables, and many of them are related to farming activities. unmentioned in appreciation of food. As a producer, the These were used to uncover the truth and to drive points home. farmer has become insignificant or invisible in human Jesus knew that his audience was familiar with these agricultural livelihood. This producer has become a middle mediator references. It is for this reason that the interpreter of the who is not recognised in prayers of thankfulness. The farmer parables ‘must become thoroughly conversant with the history, is the shepherd of the nation who ensures food security and geography, culture, and customs of biblical times’ (Pentecost textile adornment for humanity. We all know that creatures 1982:16). Without the farming knowledge, interpreting parables eat in order to live, but what is the rationale behind and similes in the Bible would be impossible. acknowledging the sovereign provider, but ignoring the laborious producer? I concur with Conradie (2016), but does Historical survey of farming in this mean that we marginalise the farmer? As stated by Conradie (2016): South Africa All that is alive lives by eating. To eat is to participate in God’s The history of farming dates back thousands of years and its gift of life, even to participate in God’s ‘eternal’ (perhaps development has been determined by climatic, cultural and ongoing?) life. The blessings from God imply that the materiality technological dynamisms. As stated by Sharma (2014): of the world is a doxological expression of God’s gift; creation is The history of agriculture has played a major role in human a Eucharistic sign of thanksgiving. (p. 4) history, as agricultural progress has been a crucial factor in worldwide socio-economic change. (p. 1) God is the agriculturist Back to our South African context, farming has always been Opening the pages of the Bible, a reader is confronted with the socio-economic vocation for survival and livelihood in God as the Creator exercising his activities in the garden – the general. The southern African subcontinent is historically a farm. The creation narrative revolves around the garden farming region of the continent. From the hunter-gatherer wherein a human being interfaces and interacts with the evolution of economic survival to the modern commercial Creator. It was in the garden where humanity exercised farming, this subcontinent has always built its life around humanness in fullness. Out of the garden, God gave the food production in a form of cultivation and livestock human being a liberty to exercise all peculiarities of wisdom. farming. The hunter-gatherer way of life was the economy These included abilities to name creatures by their kinds and (Du Bruyn 1992): species, to make choices of obeying or disobeying God, to based on the extraction from the environment of naturally exercise mutual love after the institution of marriage and to occurring food resources. In collecting edible plants, in hunting, enjoy the essence and the depth of fellowship with God, and in preparing food for consumption they needed no more helpmate and other creatures. Human’s first sexual experience than a few simple implements made of raw materials readily at was in the garden. God is the God of farms. hand. (p. 20) Throughout the canonical narratives, wealth and social status This is the evidence that access to food in a less technologically were derived from farming. People’s wealth had always been sophisticated environment called for some efforts to economy. as a result of farming. The patriarchs were nomadic, not The economic vocation was accessing food either for an because of peasantry, but because of seeking a better welfare individual, the family or the clan in order to reach the for their livestock. The famine in Egypt dreamed by Pharaoh immediate needs for living. and interpreted and predicted by Joseph all centred on farming. God’s people expressed their devotions to God Apart from the hunter-gatherers’ indigeneity to the through sacrificial items (livestock and grain) of farming subcontinent, the Khoi pastoralists are known for their food- activities. Job, the wealthiest man in the east, was a livestock producing revolution. The Khoi herders were and are known keeper and the cultivator of the land.

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