Ghana Journal of Religion and Theology

Editor's Note

2025-12-10T16:26:26+00:00

Editor's note

Androcentric Hegemony in the Old Testament

2025-12-10T16:26:26+00:00

The role and functions of women in some societies are presented in such a way that women seem to be inferior to men. Judeo-Christian scriptures have been blamed for contributing to such a disparity between men and women. This paper analyses the androcentric hegemony in the Old Testament and its impact on contemporary Judeo-Christian thought. It examines some Old Testament texts, highlighting the functions of women, and their theological development in the New Testament. Women performed significant functions in the Judeo-Christian scriptures; however, their role has been overshadowed by male dominance. This is due to the androcentric hegemony in the then biblical world. Feminist movements and female theologians have sought to redefine the narrative in their search to raise the image of “woman.” Present-day Christian churches have come to grips with the situation and have begun to assign more roles and functions to women in contemporary Judeo-Christian practice.

Strands of Mother Tongue Biblical Hermeneutics in Ghana

2025-12-10T16:26:26+00:00

Mother Tongue Biblical Hermeneutics (MTBH) has become an influential interpretive method in Ghana, fostering wider availability and reception of mother-tongue Bibles and integrating indigenous languages into ecclesial discourse. By prioritising African socio-cultural, religious, and linguistic worldviews in the interpretive process, this approach has generated three distinct strands, each with unique emphases. Employing a narrative research method, this study critically examines these strands as developed at the Trinity Theological Seminary, the Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission and Culture, and the Department of Religious Studies at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology. The study identifies the specific strand of MTBH promoted by each institution and explores how these can be integrated into a unified framework. It argues that harmonising the three strands will strengthen MTBH as a more coherent, resilient, and effective approach to biblical interpretation in the Ghanaian context.

Protecting the Earth: Leviticus 25 and Galamsey in Ghana

2025-12-10T16:26:27+00:00

Galamsey, Ghana's ongoing illegal mining crisis, persists despite legal interventions, indicating the need for theological engagement. This study employs Ossom-Batsa's communicative approach, integrating biblical exegesis with contextual analysis, to examine Lev. 25 through ecotheological hermeneutics. The research develops a contextual theology of earth stewardship by engaging Lev. 25 with galamsey practices and Ghanaian ecological ethics. The findings demonstrate that both Leviticus and Ghanaian ethics emphasize divine ownership, human stewardship, periodic land rest, and land's inalienability. Galamsey thus represents rebellion against divine proprietorship. The paper proposes an ecotheological reconstruction based on three pillars: (1) reaffirming divine land ownership as foundational for policy and education; (2) institutionalizing Sabbath ecology through legislated fallow periods and restoration programs; and (3) promoting Jubilee justice through land reclamation and equitable resource distribution. This framework offers an alternative approach to Ghana's ecological crisis.

The Paradox of Faith: Moral Contradictions in Kenyan Christianity

2025-12-10T16:26:27+00:00

On June 25, 2024, Kenyan Gen Z's protests at parliament, which disrupted businesses for nearly two months, highlighted widespread moral decay among leaders in a country where over 80% of the population is Christian. Despite Christianity's long presence in Kenya, it has not cultivated an ethical society, growing in numbers but not in quality. Unlike African traditional religions, which enforced moral standards through cultural institutions, Christianity has failed to instill strong moral values, resulting in corruption, human rights violations, and opulence among Christians, including rogue church leaders. This article contrasts this with Asian economies thriving due to virtue-focused religions and recommends that Christianity adopt traditional African strategies to enhance morality. It urges the church to redefine its influence, promote ethical role models, and condemn immoral members to address greed and irresponsibility, restoring moral and social responsibility in Kenyan society.

Faith and Pandemics: Responses of African Indigenous Churches

2025-12-10T16:26:27+00:00

This study traces the resilience of Christian faith during times of global crisis by examining the responses of the African Indigenous Aladura (Praying Ones) movement during the 1918 influenza pandemic alongside those of contemporary Pentecostal and Charismatic churches in Nigeria during the COVID-19 pandemic. It argues that the prophetic impulse which emerged within the Aladura tradition in 1918 foreshadowed the theological and spiritual responses of present-day Pentecostalism. By situating these movements within Indigenous African cosmologies, the study demonstrates how belief in the reality and efficacy of spiritual power continues to shape Christian engagement with disease, suffering, and uncertainty. By employing a comparative historical-theological approach, the article highlights continuities in the use of prayer, prophecy, and ritual as modes of spiritual agency during pandemics. It further shows how Nigerian Christians have drawn upon indigenous understandings of the power of language and spiritual intervention to articulate hope, negotiate fear, and affirm divine sovereignty in the midst of global health crises.

Islamic Education in Ghana: History and New Trends

2025-12-10T16:26:27+00:00

This paper traces the trajectory of Islamic education in Ghana from pre-colonial era to the present Islamic learning avenues in Ghana. The paper bridges the historical context that frames the development and evolution of Islamic literacy and the new trends of Islamic learning in Ghana. It is through such gradual presentation of the narrative that the changes, challenges, successes, and emerging trends would be appreciated. As such, this paper tracks Ghana’s Islamic education journey through the precolonial, colonial to early independence era, and the evolution and graduation transformations in Muslim learning in the decades following political independence. The paper also discusses the Islamic Education Unit (IEU) as a public educational establishment mandated to combine secular and Islamic learning under the Ghana Education Service (GES) for public good. And finally, the paper explores new emerging trends of Islamic education in Ghana.