Pentecostalism and other forms of charismatic Christianity are the fastest growing forms of Protestantism in Africa. Consequently, they have received a great deal of scholarly attention during the past few decades in different parts of the continent. Many of the studies have concentrated on claims to healing and deliverance. Some have looked at the global media culture and yet others have discussed consumption of commodities in the context of born-again Christianity (Hacket, 1998; Maxwell, 1998; Meyer, 1998; Stambach, 2000). Although faith gospel, also called prosperity gospel or health and wealth gospel, has received attention as well, detailed ethnographic studies on the significance of offerings for accumulation and divine fundraising are more scarce. Pentecostal-charismatic Christianity and faith gospel are here interpreted in the Geertzian spirit, as a model for and model of lived reality. Religious beliefs and ideas inform the ways that economic circumstances are perceived, interpreted and acted upon in specific social and historical contexts. Furthermore, lived reality generates and shapes religious beliefs and ideas (Geertz, 1973:93).
Faith gospel is a theological programme shared by many of Africa's charismatic churches.2 It asserts that God has met all human needs in the suffering and death of Christ and that every Christian should share the victory of Christ over sin, sickness and poverty. A true believer has the right to the blessings of health and wealth and these can be obtained through a positive confession of faith. Several American evangelists contributed to the development of this idea. A. A. Allen taught that God is a rich God and that those who want to share in his abundance must support God's servants. Oral Roberts added the idea of ‘seed faith’, that one prospers through planting a seed in faith and the return of that will meet all needs (Brouwer et al. 1996:26-27, 171; Gifford, 2001:62).3 Approaches to faith gospel in terms of the local and the global have ranged from analysing the homogenising influence of the American originated gospel to analysis of more local, African-born concerns (Brouwer et al.; Maxwell, 1998). I will here discuss the ways that prosperity gospel and its rhetoric gets special form and content from the specifically Tanzanian realities.
Common elements in the broad variety of Pentecostal-charismatic Christianity are baptism of the Holy Spirit and miraculous experiences for the individual believer such as prophecy, healing and speaking in tongues. Pentecostals describe their churches as ‘full Gospel’, meaning that believers are filled with the ‘Holy Spirit’ in a way that was promised to the early Christians in the books of the New Testament; that is, they have access to miraculous power, ‘the gifts of the Spirit’, including rites of healing and driving out demons (Brouwer et al. 1996:5).
The contemporary Pentecostal-charismatic ideas of spiritual change, salvation and material progress seem to be an inversion of Max Weber's views of ascetic religiosity. In his analysis of Calvinism, salvation results from the systematic rationalisation of life. This form of Protestant ethic led to accumulation of wealth and investment rather than consumption (Weber, 2004 [1930]). Whereas early Calvinists accumulated wealth but rejected consumption, in contemporary charismatic Christianity the spiritual change and economic progress together with access to consumption are linked. In this form of Christianity, salvation is the result of the individual choice to become born-again. Here, the construction of the individual in relation to the divine is parallel with neoliberal assumptions of individual ‘choice’. By virtue of becoming born-again and confessing faith the true believer has the right to health and wealth and the possibility of consumption.
This form of Protestantism is a combination of both rationality and the possibility of a miracle in its notions of economic activity and means to prosperity. There is the emphasis on such things as sound business practice and a rational mode of market research in creating wealth. Yet, it also concentrates on developing the charismatically expressive, irrational side of its nature and seems to be satisfying emotional needs that legitimise evolving economic structures (Brouwer et al. 1996:234). Comaroff and Comaroff have found parallels between occult economies, the use of magical means for material ends, and the new religious movements across the world (Comaroff and Comaroff, 2001:23). Both of these economies have two dimensions: a material aspect founded on the effort to produce wealth or to account for its accumulation by appeal to techniques that defy explanation in the conventional terms of practical reason; and an ethical aspect grounded in the moral discourses generated by the production of value through magical means (Comaroff and Comaroff, 2001:19) In both prosperity cults and occult economies, accumulation of wealth, prosperity and the possibility of consumption may take place not by way of rational, but by miraculous means. For those in the margins of the global economy, the Pentecostal-charismatic ideas of economic activity reach beyond where the access to rational means comes to an end.
Revival in Tanzania
Christian revival is not new in Tanzania. East African revival movement that originated in Rwanda spread to the north-west of Tanzania by the end of the 1930s (Munga, 1998; Sendoro, 2000, 2002). It was re-integrated into the Lutheran church during the years after independence (Ludwig, 2002 [1996]:221, 222). Although Pentecostalism appeared in Tanzania in the early 20th century in the form of the Holiness Mission, Assemblies of God, Swedish Free Mission and ELIM Pentecostal Church, it was during the 1970s that it started spreading more rapidly. In consequence of the challenge presented by the Pentecostal churches, charismatic revival has been allowed to exist also within protestant denominations such as the Lutheran church. A distinction is usually made between the older Pentecostal churches and the new charismatic churches and ministries. This case study deals with one such new charismatic ministry (huduma). Today, Pentecostal-charismatic churches are among the fastest growing forms of Protestantism in all of Africa. Ludwig estimated that there were about 500,000 Pentecostals in Tanzania by the early 1990s (2002:222).
Tanzania is one of those African countries where the relationship between different religions had been perceived as harmonious. During the 1980s and 1990s this started changing (Ludwig, 2002:217-219). Some factors contributing to this development are Islamic revivalism, increasing importance of the Pentecostal churches and the growing influence of the charismatic movement in the Protestant churches as well as mass evangelisation crusades (Veller, 1992:139; Ludwig, 1999:16). At the same time, the structural adjustment programme and liberalisation of the economy driven by the World Bank and IMF has provided opportunities for some, but increased unemployment and a lowered quality and availability of social services for many others. This has taken place in the context of mass poverty (Munga, 1998:37), leading to a paradoxical situation where a few who have profited turn to religion for approval and justification, while those who remain poor also refer to God to rescue their aspirations and hopes.
One important development was the birth of the Big November Crusade, an organisation geared toward conducting evangelical crusades in the country (Ludwig, 2002 [1996]:223; Mlahagwa, 1999:301). The organisation united representatives of the Assemblies of God, the Lutheran Church, the Anglican Church as well as some other churches and its first non-denominational crusade was organised in 1986 in Dar es Salaam (Ludwig, 2002:223).4 Pentecostal churches did not join the established Christian Council of Tanzania. Consequently, the Pentecostal Council of Tanzania was established in 1993 as their umbrella organisation. Today, the organising work for some of the large crusades is done by teams from the New Life in Christ ministry.5 Internationally established evangelists such as Reinhard Bonnke have also visited the country.
Today, Pentecostal churches and evangelical ministries run extensive media activities. They run three of the five Christian weekly newspapers: Msema Kweli published by the Word And Peace Organization (WAPO), Nyakati published by the Registered Trustees of Evangelism and Media Network Trust (EMEN) and Habari Njema which also has a Pentecostal background. There are also five Pentecostal radio stations in the country: Safina in Arusha, Uzima in Dodoma run by the Pentecostal Church of Tanzania (Kanisa la Kipentecoste Tanzania, KLPT), Wapo in Dar es Salaam run by WAPO mission, Praise Power in Dar es Salaam under Assemblies of God (AG) and Morning Star in Dar es Salaam run by the Seventh Day Adventists. One of the most challenging of charismatic ministries is run by a professional economist who brings Old Testament analogies to bear on the promises of the market place in his preaching. In the detailed description of the operations of his ministry which follows we see how skilfully these biblical narratives are used to raise expectations about socio-economic conditions in Tanzania, while at the same time we use concepts of ‘gift exchange’ to account for the fact that the returns from donations to the church (or to ‘God’) may not necessarily take monetary form. These ideas are explored in the following sections.
Worldly Economy
Tanzania is one of the world's poorest and most highly indebted countries. Neoliberal policies of structural adjustment in the 1980s and early 1990s sought to dismantle the regulation that was seen to constrain market forces in many postcolonial African economies (Gould and Ojanen, 2003:29). In 1999, the International Monetary Fund and World Bank announced that SAPs would be replaced by poverty reduction strategies.
The PRSP (Poverty Reduction Strategy Process) in Tanzania has been followed and monitored among others by the Tanzania Social and Economic Trust (TASOET), an NGO with Christopher Mwakasege as its Executive Director. Christopher Mwakasege worked as a senior economist at the head office of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Tanzania where he had responsibility for church-run social and development projects. He also served as an advisor under the President's office in matters related to the national external debt crisis and debt reduction strategy. He has been a member of the Government Public Expenditure Review Working Group as a representative of NGOs. He travels internationally on a regular basis to meet with people from the IMF, World Bank, and UN in his role as an economist and NGO activist.
TASOET was established for the purpose of carrying out research, advocacy, negotiations, lobbying and awareness education in the area of social, economic, debt and development issues in Tanzania. A TASOET report on Tanzanian experiences with PRSP concludes that the macroeconomic progress that Tanzania has registered between 1995 and 2000 is not reflected at the grassroots level where poverty is still widely and deeply felt. There are large gaps between urban and rural populations and Dar es Salaam is better off by almost all measures. The report establishes that over half of all Tanzanians live on less than $1 a day and over one-third of them live in abject poverty – below 50 cents a day (Mwakasege, 2001).
Heavenly Banking
Besides this conventional professional activity, Mwakasege has also established a charismatic ministry called Mana (Manna) which links declarations of faith, donations from followers, their expectations and anticipated returns. The leading motto of Mana is from the book of John: ‘Feed my sheep’. This message reflects the spiritual as well as the material needs of Tanzanians: ‘It is not God's will that we are poor’. Mwakasege is an inter-denominational preacher but Lutheran by background. He travels around the country and arranges ‘seminars’ that last up to two weeks. Ten to fourteen meetings take place annually. His strongholds are Dar es Salaam, Arusha, Kilimanjaro, Kilombero and Dodoma. His preaching activities have grown during the 1990s into national and now even international proportions as he has made preaching trips to England and America. The outdoor seminars can presently seat 15,000 people, with the largest attendance estimate (in Moshi) at up to 30,000 on a single day.
Mwakasege has chosen to operate within the established denominations, particularly the Lutheran church and New Life in Christ. The NLC that Mwakasege also heads is often the primary organiser of the seminars, at least in Dar es Salaam. The organising committees are divided into several sub-committees that are responsible for various tasks before and during the seminars such as building, food, security, accommodation and so on. Mwakasege's success does not lie solely in his charismatic character but also in his inter-denominational approach and his respect for the established mainline churches. He insists that born-again Christians should remain in their denominations, an approach which makes him less threatening in the eyes of mainstream leaders.
In addition to organising seminars, the ministry produces audio and videotapes for sale. It also broadcasts on several radio stations such as Radio Free Africa that can be heard in nine countries in East and Central Africa,6 radio Wapo and Upendo in Dar es Salaam as well as radio Faraja in Shinyanga. The Lutheran church in Kilimanjaro allocates two hours of prime time per week at the church-run radio station Sauti ya Injili. Mwakasege writes columns in a Christian weekly newspaper Nyakati and advertisements of his meetings are published in Msema Kweli. Furthermore, he maintains a sophisticated website that includes prayers, testimonies, teachings, questions and answers, pastoral letters, seminar reports and information about possibilities of contributing to the activities of the ministry. The website is being translated into English.7
At the seminars, the morning hours before lunch are often devoted to youth and to prayers. In January 2004 special prayers were organised for the state and the forthcoming general election of 2005. The daily evening sessions start at 4 p.m. with a warm-up of gospel music often performed by some of the most popular gospel groups in the country. Then follow praise and worship, testimonies and prayers, offerings, blessing of personal belongings, burning of amulets and sorcery objects and auctioning of donated goods such as chicken, roosters, calves, pigs, bananas, maize, eggs, clothes, vitenge (wrappers) and so on. Teaching and preaching usually lasts for 1-2 hours, followed by altar prayers for those who want to become born-again. Mwakasege and his wife also perform special prayers for the ill, for the possessed, for those suffering from AIDS, for the youth and for married couples. Testimonies focus on the doings of God and Jesus in the individual's life ever since the person attended a seminar, was prayed for or heard prayers and other services through the media such as radio, TV and the homepage. Mwakasege seems to be particularly interested in having people give testimony about the effect of these media in the work of God. In contrast to some other examples (e.g. Gifford, 2004:50), prosperity, wealth and money are remarkably absent in the testimonies and they tend to concentrate on health and healing. In 2003 about 40,000 people became born-again at the seminars.
It is very difficult to estimate the finances of the ministry, including possible foreign sources. According to publicly given information, the cost of each seminar lies somewhere between Sh.4-10 million.8 The annual expenses of the seminars are between Sh.80-100 million. Most seminars take place in a tent that has been constructed out of iron bars and pieces of plastic. In Dar es Salaam, however, the meetings take place at various meeting venues. The rent of Diamond Jubilee Hall in Dar es Salaam for example, was Sh.350,000 per day and chairs were rented for Sh.2 million per seminar. The organising committee opened an ‘office’ at the Moshi seminar in January 2004, where people went to ‘buy their own chair’ for Sh.6,000 each.
Apart from the seminars, media activities also require funding. The expenses of the broadcasts are Sh.30 million per year. The broadcasts at Sauti ya Injili in Kilimanjaro cost Sh.5.2 million shillings annually. In January 2004 in Moshi an appeal was made to the audience to support the radio broadcasts on Sauti ya Injili. Within a few minutes more than 50 people had lined up each volunteering to contribute Sh.100,000. At every seminar Mwakasege addresses the importance of giving offerings to God. An insider informant claimed that at the Moshi seminar in January 2003 the collection was Sh.20 million in sixteen days. In other words, whilst the costs are high, the income from believers is probably much higher.
Mwakasege tells us that God determines what the themes of his seminars should be. They are adapted according to the location and particular themes of prosperity and are selected for Dar es Salaam because it is the city of business. The audience is predominantly female and primarily Lutheran town dwellers as well as the farming population from the rural areas in the North. In the urban areas such as Dar es Salaam the seminars appear to attract a relatively well to do urban population, professionals and people in small businesses. Apart from the more biblical message, he discusses the changes in the Tanzanian economy, the consequences of economic liberalisation on the economy of private people, free health care and education, the principles of making a successful business, market research, discovering one's personal talent and so on.
It is Not God's Will That We are Poor!
Establishing the exact theological and media influences from which Mwakasege draws has proved difficult. It seems to be clear, however, that his message is based on the American-born prosperity gospel. In this form of gospel, sacrificial poverty is not a virtue since it denies everything that Christ has won through his death, that is, prosperity for the born-again believers (Hunt, 2000:334). In public Mwakasege has described some difficult personal times in the mid-1980s when he and his wife became born-again but also faced serious economic difficulties. After prayers, they understood that one of the reasons was that they were too tied to the ‘worldly economy’ instead of relying on the ‘economy of heaven’. They also realised that they were more inclined to receiving than to giving or harvesting what they had sown. In his opinion it is entirely justified for born-again Christians to think that they deserve to become healthy and wealthy in this life by virtue of the death of Jesus Christ at the cross. Wealth should be there for the satisfaction of basic human needs and for spreading of gospel:
I know that God wants me to be successful in everything. And if you say that it is God's will that you have not been successful I do not agree on that. God created man as his own image; God is not poor and therefore he did not create man as the image of the poor. Do you think God put these things, food, clothing and soap in the world for Satan and his people? Do you think that once we are in heaven we still need food, clothing and soap? God gave these things for us to use now. God is the one who gives man the power to gain wealth. God is the one who teaches man to make profit. Our God whom we worship is not a God of loss but a God of profit. Man has been created internally in such a way that he likes to be taught to make profit in what he does. If God teaches you to make profit then the way you use to make profit is a just way. The wealth that one gets from God is there to spread gospel. The ones who believe in him and follow his commands will get back hundred-fold when still in this world (Mwakasege, 2004).
It is Satan's work to wage war against Christians who want to make money in a just and legal way. Satan knows that if a good Christian has enough money he will use it to spread gospel! Many have failed to build churches because they lack money. The clergy is paid low salaries because there is not enough money. Evangelical conventions and seminars are not held because of lack of money. Who do you think will donate money for the purpose of spreading gospel if not the Christians? And how do the Christians give money if they don't have it? And how would they have money if they think that it is sin to have a lot of money? (Mwakasege, 2003).
Biblical Allegories of Tanzanian Economy
In Tanzania, the Government has placed restrictions on religious organisations and their involvement in politics, and politicians are prohibited from using language intended to incite one religious group against another or to encourage religious groups to vote for certain political parties. But it is undeniable that Pentecostal-charismatic Christianity has political ramifications. In 2005 Mwakasege devoted considerable attention to the general election, the role of the President in the economy as well as the forthcoming economic and spiritual changes in the country. But he carefully avoided politically explicit commentary:
I do not talk politics, I talk about your stomach, of you being satisfied (matumbo yanashiba). We are not in a political meeting, we are in the house of God (Mwakasege, 2005c).
Economic changes are described in terms of three stages in the wandering of the Israelites from slavery to the Promised Land: Egypt, Desert and Canaan. In this rhetoric, ‘Egypt’ refers to the era of colonial rule in Tanzania, ‘desert’ to the period of socialism under president Nyerere and ‘Canaan’ to the present liberalised economy.
In Canaan people had to pay taxes to the king and give tithes (sadaka) to the priests. In the modern language they entered the private sector; it wasn't easy after having been fed for 40 years in the desert by way of miracles! It was like Tanzania now; the economic system of Tanzania is like that of Canaan. But there are three different groups of people: those who still want the system of Egypt (to be fed by the government) when they in actual fact are in Canaan in the private sector. Secondly, there are those who know nothing about Egypt – only hear about it – but who are also not prepared for the private sector and the economic system of Canaan. These people are dependent on their leaders. Lastly, there are the people like Joshua and Caleb who have experience of all systems and who are prepared to change their mind-set. There are people who were born before the Arusha Declaration, 9 people who were born after that and people who have experience of all of them. There are people who were taken care of by the government for more than thirty years as regards free education and health care. In the private sector you have to pay for these. Also, many were educated by the government but they have no employment in the present system (Mwakasege, C & D, 2005).
When God called me he told me of this book. I knew that instructions for me were in the book of Joshua. I knew that I needed to cross the river Jordan because I had a group of people. There is a group of Tanzanians that is ready to take the spiritual step forward. God has given me the word to help them cross Jordan together with me (Mwakasege, 2005c).
I will go to Tanzania again to bring revival (uamsho) that you have not yet seen. But before I bring the anointment (upako) of revival I will bring the anointment of wealth (utajiri) to my people so that they will be able to pay the cost of the forthcoming revival (Mwakasege, 2005a).
If the teacher is not wealthy do not plan to become his disciple. If his education has failed to make him wealthy how is he going to make you wealthy? Some people go to a medicine man who says: ‘I will help you to get money’. But he himself sleeps in a shed. How does he take you to a route that he has not passed himself? Explain to me, who will listen to and believe an evangelist or any other servant who tells you to trust everything with God if he has patched clothes himself! People will ask: ‘If Jesus has failed to give his servant good clothes how could he help an ordinary Christian like me?’ (Mwakasege, 2003).
Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its grapes? Who tends a flock and does not drink of the milk? 10 It does not help me if you say that ‘Mwakasege, I wanted to help you in the service but I do not have money to give you’. In your heart you really want to help me by paying a part of the cost of the service but you don't have the money! God wants to deliver you (akufungue) so that you are rich in everything in order to be generous with everything. It is not enough as such to say that you will pray for me. I do not need just prayers but I need both prayers AND money (Mwakasege, 2005a).
Reciprocity & the Heavenly Economy
The issue of donations lends itself to a discussion about gift exchange and reciprocity, including the temporal basis of the exchange, and the nature and value of gifts given and received. In terms of the language of gift exchange, Mwakasege seems to be talking about reciprocal gift exchange between two parties as well as pooling, a form of collective action (Sahlins, 1972). It is about gifts and the spirit of reciprocity, sociability, and spontaneity in which gifts are typically exchanged. But in the examples that he provides, he also seems to discuss the profit-oriented, self-centred, and calculated circulation of money as a commodity.
Mwakasege generates a rhetoric of genuine gift giving, he talks about the nature of a true gift in contrast to the exchange of ‘commodities’. The distinction is that between grace (neema) and law (sheria). Giving offerings according to the law does not give the same spiritual reward (thawabu) as giving a true gift; giving by a rule or regulation reduces the offering to a tax. Offerings are divided into three categories: first fruits (malimbuko), tithes (zaka) and sacrificial offering (dhabihu). He also makes a difference between tithes (fungu la kumi) and those offerings that are meant for the upkeep of servants. What makes the rhetoric of genuine gift giving so convincing is the temporality: the power whose doings cannot be questioned and whose ways are not known to human beings respond whenever it is suitable for him. It is the responsibility of Christians to give to God his due share not only to receive a hundred-fold but also to spread the Gospel.11 Mwakasege uses the biblical narratives as the justification of his activities and actions. In his view, it is the right of every Christian to give contributions to God at his meetings in order to receive hundred-fold and he himself has no right to refuse this experience of a miracle:
One day I was preaching at one church. After I had finished we were outside greeting people. Then a widow came to me and gave me Sh. 300. She said: ‘My son, take this money that I have so that it help you in God's work’. If God had not delivered me I would have returned the money. How can you take the last 300 shillings of a widow who has problems? And I have pockets full of money! But that woman gave her last money to me to help in the work of God. Had it been the time when I was struggling I would have returned the money. But after God taught me a lesson I knew that the possibility of a miracle for that woman was in the fact that she was giving me the money. It is difficult to explain to anybody who has problems that the miracle awaiting you lies in giving the last money to me (Mwakasege, 2003).
We have to remember that it is not God's will that we be poor, that we have hard living conditions (hali ngumu) with clothing, food and health. It is usual that man gives and relies on receiving. One does not necessarily receive from the one to whom one gave but from somebody else (Mwakasege, 2004).
To give offerings is not part of your daily expenses. It is part of your capital that you invest in the company of Lord Jesus. God does not want you to give offerings as part of your daily expenses. God wants you to give offerings as your capital that you invest in the company. Those of you who understand matters of stocks and shares know that they are not part of your expenses; they are your investment. You believe that the company that you have invested in will make profit and you will get returns. God wants you to have enough money to continue buying more of his stocks in the company of Lord Jesus. This means: continue giving. And when you continue giving in this way Lord Jesus continues making profit and he will return back to you (Mwakasege, 2003).
God himself comes to receive the tithes but he does not come empty-handed. He comes with bread and wine in his hands. Bread stands for God's word and wine for the Holy Spirit. And you will be given the word of revelation to move you ahead. If God says that he will bring you word do not expect money. He says that he will bring you revelation to get you out of the trouble but you say: ‘God I want money to get out of this trouble’. God says: ‘No, I have something bigger to give you, I will give the revelation, I will give you the word, and I will give you know-how’. God I will empower you to prosper. It is not a matter of dropping money from heaven (Mwakasege, 2005b).
Ideas about the temporal delay in reciprocating the gift and the different nature of the counter gift relate to two issues. First, the immediate return or an exactly similar kind of counter gift, i.e. money, would mean denial of gift exchange, as the counter gift must be deferred and different from the original gift (Bourdieu, 1977:5; Coleman, 2004:433). Second, by suggesting that God's counter gift is not only different but also essentially non-material, i.e. the revelation and the word, Mwakasege manages to maintain the difference between the sacred and the profane. What is more, he avoids making literal promises about material counter gifts.
Audience
Although Mwakasege himself attempts to convey the message that God's return gift comes in non-material forms such as the revelation and the word, some born-again Christians think literally of the hundred-fold return of their monetary savings. One example is Shose, an unmarried woman of 24. She came from a rather modest background and was not able to continue her education beyond Form 2. She became born-again as a child and is now heavily involved in the revival movement. She explained how she perceives the idea of offerings to God:
I follow these matters a lot. If I give offerings I write down the date and I follow it. It depends what kind of offering I give and what I say to God. ‘God I give you Sh.100, I do not ask you to give me hundred-fold’. I sow the seed for the sake of my life. At other times I say: ‘God, I pray to you. I have placed savings with you, I ask you to give me a hundred-fold, return to me a hundred-fold’. And I follow my offering. It is like you have opened a depositor's book. And I record. I have given to God and how many times have I received? I follow until I have come to fold. I sow the seed, it is my savings.
I prayed to God to give me roofing sheets in order to build a house. Then it happened that God gave me money and I bought 16 roofing sheets. I built a house with earth walls and two rooms, a small sitting room and a bedroom (Shose, Moshi, Tanzania, January 2004).
I took my depositor's book and a calculator and did some calculation. Strangely enough, I had not lost as much as I thought. It was not as much as the savings I had already placed with God.
…. ordinary Christians complain that the reverend just likes money. Only money, the reverend just talks about money. People like that just complain, because they don't understand the meaning of giving to God. But we who are born-again, we know the profit we get from God. You cannot harvest if you have not sown. You wait patiently after you have sown. God replies when it his time to reply. You don't know how many years. But I know that God replies. If he does not reply today, he replies tomorrow. If he does not reply tomorrow then the day after tomorrow (Shose, Moshi, Tanzania, January 2004).
Conclusions
It is evident that prosperity gospel has its global aspect and cannot be understood without reference to its American origins. But it also finds resonance in the hardships that Tanzanians face and their concerns about material wellbeing in this life. I have sketched the logic of receiving through giving by using the anthropological notion of gift exchange. I touched upon the nature and value of the gift and the counter gift as well as the temporality of the exchange in the metaphoric expressions. The distinction between the sacred and the profane is maintained by presenting the ultimate counter gift in essentially non-material form. The relationship between ‘man and God’ is thereby not reduced to a mere business partnership. It goes without saying that the persuasive promise of a hundred-fold return in the indefinite future is an effective means to divine fundraising. The three-way win gives the income to the evangelist, a true gift to God and a promise to the Christian about hundred-fold return in the indefinite future.
Neoliberal rhetoric of free markets and the policies of the international monetary institutions are reflected in the religious language and practices. At the same time, notions of salvation and prosperity are a means to interpret the lived world and criticise economic reforms. Pentecostal-charismatic views of salvation and worldly action echo Weberian ideas, though in a very different setting. Salvation is free individual choice, and prosperity and wealth its divine consequences.
The example of cases such as that described in the present paper provide some insight into the reasons for the current spread of prosperity gospel in much of Africa. To many people Pentecostal-charismatic Christianity offers substantial promise and hope of a better future. The Holy Spirit means not only emotional security at the times of affliction, poverty and uncertainty but it also retains the possibility of miracles that might enable material survival. Economies at the margins must conform to the rules of a global network of business and finance, and to the attraction of the expanded marketplace. Global capitalism fuses hope and hopelessness, possibility and impossibility in the lives of many people, and the neoliberal age emphasises a privatised as well as an individual rather than a communal sense of salvation and prosperity. For the individual struggling to cope with daily life in a context where such distant forces are at work, the immediacy of the promises of the charismatic preacher, in a context of congregational community with reassuring rituals and an explanation for everything, has an obvious appeal.