Tenth International Conference on Religion & Spirituality in Society

Abstract

The Igbo of Nigeria has a lot of commonality between its culture and the tenets of Christianity especially when it comes to life after death. Though Igbo Christians believe that Christianity only helped to advance most of the practices of the Igbo nation, traditional Igbo that are not Christians believe strongly that their teachings and practices are one and the same with beliefs and practices of Christians especially when it comes to the immortality of the human soul or life after death. For them, the difference is only based on semantics. While Igbo culture as regards after life talks of Uwa Ndi Ichie (world of those who lived and died meritoriously according to their tradition) and Uwa Ndi Akamogoli (those who lived a wasted life according to tradition), Christianity on the other hands talks of heaven and hell. The problem this paper addresses is whether Christianity advanced the Igbo understanding of life after death or are they the same in both traditions. This work therefore aims at exposing the understanding of immortality of the soul in Igbo culture as well as in Christianity, and to establish a common ground between the two. To achieve this, the study adopts historical and sociological methods of the interpretation of the primary and secondary data collected. Significantly, this work will be of immense benefit to the Igbo of Eastern Nigeria as well as to Christians in Igbo land in particular, and in Nigeria as a whole.