Proverbs and Teaching

Proverbs play a crucial role in the education of people in the path of wisdom. There are more than 1,000 written collections of African proverbs, and scholars estimate the sum total of African proverbs at more than 1 million. This is an incredible body of wisdom. Proverbs are the repository of the most precious philosophical and religious ideas of Africa. Proverbs are memorable sentences of traditional wisdom reflecting a keen observation of human existence and conduct and a long experience of life throughout the ages. African proverbs transmit fundamental values of life. They deal, among other things, with education, moral teaching, the concept of God, marriage, government, the relationship between individuals, and the meaning of life and death. Proverbs are a particular form of a skillful literary genre. They tend to be a compact statement of wisdom expressed in a poetic and enigmatic fashion. The meaning of a proverb is often hidden, cryptic, or elliptical. They can take various modes of expression. Some take the form of a short maxim, dictum, adage, aphorism, or apophthegm. Others take the form of a riddle or even an allegory, legend, or song. The words for proverbs among the Baluba (nkindi, bishintshi) emphasize the esoteric and enigmatic aspect of their message or meaning. Among the Akan, ehe (plural mme), the word used for proverb, is ety-mologically linked to abe (plural mme), the word used for palm tree. It highlights the richness of its meaning in reference to the tremendous wealth of a palm tree, which produces palm oil, palm wine, palm-kernel oil, broom, salt, or even soap. Because these products are a result of a process of distillation, the proverb stands as a refined product of the reflective process; it is the result of [Page 541]an elaborate and complex thinking process that involves a higher level of imagination and synthesis of human experience. Like palm kernel oil or palm wine (which are not obvious to the eye as the juice of the orange), the meaning of a proverb is deep, profound, and hidden. It is not obvious or direct. To better grasp the meaning of a proverb, one has to dig deeper in his thought. “Proverbs are excellent didactic sayings and precious storehouse of ancestral wisdom and philosophy. They well exemplify the power and beauty of African oral tradition.” By endorsing a symbolic, metaphorical, and poetic form of language, proverbs skillfully abstain from direct talk. In so doing, proverbs help smooth tensions and enable people in conflict to debate issues while avoiding ad hominem attacks. Thus, painful issues can be discussed without anybody feeling directly vilified. In this way, proverbs are not merely didactical; they are a powerful tool of conflict resolution and peacemaking.

The following is a brief survey to illustrate the value of the wisdom of African proverbs. The first category of proverbs deals with the nature of proverbs and the issue of knowledge and wisdom. The Fulani teach that “A Fulani will lie but he will not make a lying proverb.” This vision illustrates well the normative and transcendent nature of proverbs as a reliable source of wisdom. This wisdom is understood as available to all because, as two interesting Akan proverbs have it, “Wisdom is not in the head of one person” (Nyansa nni onipa baako ti mu) and “Wisdom is like a baobab tree; a single person's hand cannot embrace it.” In a world where the use of knowledge for negative or harmful purpose is rejected as mere witchcraft, the Baluba teach that genuine knowledge is to know how to live in harmony with our fellow human beings (Bwino bonso ke bwino, bwino I kwikala biya ne Bantu). Thus, Africans value not any kind of knowledge, but that “knowledge wisdom” called by the Baluba “Bwino.”

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