That’s it, that’s my take on the Nehanda statue fallout or fall-in. Let’s let the dead die. Let me illustrate something, to help frame my point of view on this. Why does Nehanda matter, to you or to the country? Could it be that you see her as one of these things, maybe even all?
A hero: [noun] a mythological or legendary figure often of divine descent endowed with great strength or ability. an illustrious warrior. a person admired for achievements and noble qualities. one who shows great courage.
A visionary: [adjective] having or marked by foresight and imagination.
A warrior: a person engaged or experienced in warfare — broadly: a person engaged (skilfully) in some struggle or conflict.
A medium: is, literally, an “intermediary” between the spirit world and ours.
Now ask yourself. What is the most important reference point for any of the above? In remembering her what is the most important attribute?
Why are we fascinated by what she looked like? If she is grand or small? History holds the oft-forgotten warning: “do not worship idols”. I’m not referring to biblical scripture – though it fits – but to the greater philosophical meaning. Go beyond the image. The person. The façade.
This idea sits heavy within me. Why? What’s wrong with idols? Well, the simple answer, at least for me, is: because idols replace the actual work. They turn words into stone. They make people feel like the work is complete. Like they do not need to do their part, the hero will. I am reminded of the movie Coco, the main theme of which is, the dead fade because we do not remember them. That’s interesting. Not so much that we lack symbols of them or mementoes, but that we start to act as if they never existed, never taught us anything. We forget to honour their sacrifice; that ever-evolving truth — that life is a hand-me-down.
Any attempt to make a human more than what they were (visually) does us harm. It distorts what is useful, smudges what was true, and sets an unnecessary expectation of what ought to be. It relieves us of the duty to act in the hope that some saviour will come, from the dead or the future, to do the necessary work.
Is it not enough to be human? To have a chance to achieve the extraordinary with very ordinary tools and motivations? Why do we have this inclination to glorify our heroes as superhuman; larger than life? Special? You only need to be reminded that heroes are human – having made gods of them, to start with. Who was Nehanda inspired by? What statue or image gave her pause?
What I love about the divine is that it cares little about what it looks like and much about what it can do. She “Nehanda Nyakasikana” didn’t need much to start off, no grand gesture, a heroine cast in clay or stone; to cox and inspire her. She responded to her calling, with a sense of duty and respect for the wisdom of her ancestors. She responded se “munhu pavanhu. Perhaps that’s it, that’s all we need as well. To remember ‘hunhu” to build better hunhu, individually and as a community.
Let us consider for a bit that Christians do not worship Paul, they reference his words, his wisdom, and his teachings, not him. Muslims do not worship Prophet Muhammad, they revere him, and understand that his message and his teachings are more important than his image, more important than how he is visually remembered. One might argue the purity of what he stood for in Islam is better preserved than in other religions because resources are not used to promote and protect an image of a man, not the Prophet (the Word). For this reason, I find it compelling that both the Bible and the Koran are not full of images to gaze upon while we ignore the message.
Think about this for a minute. What is more important? What Moses looked like, or the bravery of his obedience to the voice of the Divine and the
personal risks he took in leading the Israelites to freedom? Are those principles not worth more celebration than any of his physical attributes? Would the civil rights doctrine have died if Dr King was not immortalized in some form? Would Karl Marx’s ideas be less intriguing? → →
It’s interesting that Nehanda prophecies that her “bones will rise!” Not her imposing frame, or her stricking beauty but the most stripped-down version of herself — her bones. Maybe as a metaphor for the purity of her argument (it didn’t need dressing up), her sense of injustice and courage to speak was enough. Not that she wasn’t a woman (wholly), or of a certain tribe — but a human, “munhu anehumhu” seeking to address “hunhu whevanhu” – being under siege.
Part II – The Logos, not the Medium
Let us contend with the spiritual for a while. The medium is not the voice. The medium is a vessel, not the source or resource. This makes me reflect on the idea of God, and why He is so stubbornly faceless, refusing to show up as a masked character we can claim (a superhero) or a sound we can mimic. Instead, preferring to be an idea — the Logos. The Word. The unseen consciousness.
In the beginning, the Word; in the present, the Word; in the end, the Word. The Word seems more important than the character, the face it carries, and the arranged sound of its vocal cords. In this, Nehanda was not and is not a source. She is a dead soldier. One who accepted her mission and carried it as far as she needed to, more than that she is a dead soldier who cannot fight for us anymore. One who can’t and shouldn’t be appeased or called upon. She is just dead. That’s it — her spirit returned to the source, to mazwi.
Our reliance on dead soldiers is perhaps a brutal rebuttal to our claims of progress and modernism, of the failings of the living soldier. He cannot deliver, he cannot carry the Word through the integrity of his work and thus seeks miracles. Nehanda does not need to speak because the Word is with us. It has always been with us; we have just abandoned it. The Word is no longer in her, it’s waiting in the present for those who will hear (it) and act. Sadly, we now find its meaning and call to action to be burdensome. Too unselfish to be profitable. Hunhu hunonetsa!
I wonder about the spiritual and political connotations of this. Perhaps we should strip all our spiritual and political leaders (heroes) of their faces, their costumes, and, like Nehanda, all that’s left is just their bones.
What promise has been delivered? Whose words are worth rising to inspire a generation, and far more important, on what principles have they as soldiers relied upon?
The question can be asked, if Jesus died for sins of the masses and Nehanda for the freedom of her people, what are our leaders dying for? Who are they saving? Would we cry for their bones to rise, for salvation or inspiration’s sake?
Why did Nehanda promise us bare bones, not the army of the dead to go to war for our cause? Maybe it is not just white skin she was against, but its principles and actions! She just didn’t want us to just defeat the invader in the human sense but to defeat the perversion of our humanity. Hunhu. In this, she left words and an example of integrity, that we may wield these against whoever acted out of principle. Maybe a reason all the rituals and attempts to get her to fix the present are not working because she does not recognize the actions of those beckoning her back to life. Maybe her bones refuse to be rattled by those whose actions have lost the sense of “hunhu”.
To raise the dead, one must speak their language — we have lost our mothers’ tongue and the shadow of our fathers. We have forgotten (hunhu) not just mannerisms, but motives. The why we want what we want. It’s no longer centred in what she died liberating. We have become too much like the invader we defeated and retain too little of ourselves to be heard by those we call out to. Perhaps she refuses to rise because she is just a soldier at rest, no more a vessel that we are, and is asking — what are you doing with what you have been given?
Let me propose this in a practical sense. If the Word is what’s divine, not the medium — if the Word was there in the beginning and will be there in the end – acts and rituals that do not honour the essence of the Word will fail – always, consistently – because the Logos is incorruptible. The truth defies all corruption, both spiritually and politically. It asks repeatedly, what is your hunhu? Where are the acts of your hunhu?
Chenjerai Hove wrote a book, Guardians of the Soil – Speaking to Zimbabwe’s Elders. I mourn the loss of that book to me. I read it too early in life to have understood its meanings in a practical sense. There is a conversation in which a chief in Masvingo said, [paraphrasing] → →
“The commanders of the movement went to the spiritual leaders to ask for guidance and tactics on how to win the war. Rituals were performed and sacrifices made…but Mhiko dzakapiwa… things needed to be done after the war to reset the land and its people, to cleanse ropa rakadeuka nekutenda
vabatsiri. For political expediency and maybe greed and maybe arrogance and maybe too much modernism, this process was forsaken and consequences would follow.”
This is an old book, and its lessons even older. So perhaps statues and rituals should be shelved until their principles are learned and applied. Until “Tai vanhu vane hunhu. Hunu hurimumazwi aNehanda”
