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IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

21 

 

AFRICAN PHILOSOPHY AS AN ONTOLOGICO-EXISTENTIAL  
HERMENEUTICS   

By 
Kanu, Ikechukwu Anthony, O.S.A., Ph.D 

Augustinian Institute  
Makurdi, Benue State 

ikee_mario@yahoo.com 
Abstract  
One of the recurring ideas in the criticism of the Universalistic School of African 
philosophy against ethno-philosophy is the emphasis on culture and collective thought. 
Very recently, African philosophers of the hermeneutic school, have argued that African 
philosophy must be hermeneutical, that is, an individual interpretation of one’s cultural 
symbols, mediated by one’s understanding and self-understanding. This makes the 
thoughts of philosophers like Placid Tempels, Alexis Kagame and Leopold Senghor valid 
thoughts for inclusion into the corpus of African philosophy. This piece, further argues 
that African philosophy is an ontologico-existential hermeneutics. The hermeneutical 
method that is described as ontological and existential is based on the universal character 
of philosophy and the African context as the locus for philosophical reflection. Using the 
historical and analytical methods of inquiry, it argues that hermeneutics is the 
instrument for analyzing the African experience. 
Keywords: African, Philosophy, Ontologico, Exstential, Hermeneutics. 
 
Introduction  
In the history of African philosophy, in terms of ideological impact, Tempels 
(1959) occupies a fundamental place. He can be regarded as the father of modern 
African philosophy and this is based on his analysis of the Bantu thought system 
in which the notion of Being or ‘Vital force’ is easily noticed. He was the first to 
attribute a developed philosophy to the African people. Thus, Oguejiofor (2009) 
avers that at a time when the concept ‘African philosophy’ evoked a cacophony 
of perspectives about the nature of the philosophy described by the adjective 
‘African’, the work of Tempels became the lightening rod of this debate. In his 
work, we find a dialogue between philosophy and culture through hermeneutics.  
A cursory glance at the historical evolution of African philosophy reveals that 
Tempels bequeathed to the future generation of African philosophers a 
conceptual framework for a distinctive African mode of thought. Kagame (1951) 
in his work followed up and verified the work of Tempels. The African negritude 
of Senghor (1975 and 1993) had also followed the same pattern; the pattern being 
the strong connection of philosophy with culture. This notwithstanding, with the 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

22 

 

advent of Hountondji (1995) on the historical plane of African philosophy, a 
negative eye was cast on the culturally-based philosophical perspectives of 
Tempels, Kagame and Senghor. He coined the word ‘ethno-philosophy’ to 
describe their thought, a word that shows his disdain for the method employed. 
He further described their thoughts in derogatory terms as cultural philosophy, 
collective philosophy, philosophy by exhumation- that is, to search a culture and 
discover a philosophy that has sedimented. He described the consequence of 
Tempels ethno-philosophy thus: 

The consequence was unanimism- the illusion that all men and women in 
all societies speak with one voice and share the same opinion about all 
fundamental issues. This implies the rejection of pluralism, the sweeping 
away of all internal contradictions and tensions, the denial of the intense 
intellectual life, and the extreme cultural richness associated with these 
societies. (p. xviii). 

From Tempels, Hountondji turned the eye of his criticism on Alexis Kagame. He 
wrote: 

Indeed, Kagame, in spite of the very attractive qualities of his analysis and 
relative accuracy of some of his sequences, has remained on the whole the 
prisoner of an ideological myth, that of a collective African ‘philosophy’ 
which is nothing but a revamped version of Levy-Bruhl’s primitive 
mentality, the imaginary subject of a scholarly discourse which one may 
regret Kagame did not apply to something else. (p. 43).  

Reacting further on Senghor’s thought on Negritude, Hountondji avers that: 
Senghor’s theory of Negritude rests upon a theory of culture which 
postulates a reciprocity between the collective character of each race, as 
conditioned by an original formulative environment, and the different 
cultural forms and civilizations to be found in the world. This point of 
view fits properly into the perspective of cultural pluralism, which is a 
development of modern anthropology. It is not for nothing that Senghor’s 
formulation of negritude takes the form of largely of elaborate explications 
of African life and values, of what one might call a synthetic anthropology 
of African world. (p. 18). 

From the foregoing, the concern of Hountondji is evident in the recurring words 
in his criticism of these philosophers: the emphasis on culture and collective 
thought. Reacting to the position taken by Hountondji, African philosophers 
such as Okere (1983), Madu (1992) and Serequeberhan (1994 and 2000) among 
others argue that African philosophy must be hermeneutical, that is, an 
individual interpretation of one’s cultural symbols, mediated by one’s 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

23 

 

understanding and self-understanding. Thus, the thoughts of philosophers like 
Placid Tempels, Alexis Kagame and Leopold Senghor are regarded as 
hermeneutical and as such, their categorization as myth by Hountondji is 
understood as been based on the ignorance of the true complexities involved in 
the development of their philosophies. This piece, therefore, argues that African 
philosophy is an ontologico-existential hermeneutics. It is ontological because of 
the universal character of philosophy, however, it is existential because of the 
African context which provides the locus for philosophical reflection. 
 
The Import of Hermeneutics  
Hermeneutics, a word which became a common language in the 17th century is 
from the Greek word: hermeneuein, which means to interpret. Folk etymology 
relates the Greek origin of the world to Hermes, the mythological Greek deity, 
whose role is that of the messenger of the gods. Ukwamedua (2012) avers that 
Hermes is the inventor of language, speech, interpreter, a liar, thief and trickster. 
These multiple roles make Hermes an ideal representative of hermeneutics, for 
language consist of signs that could lead to truth and falsehood.  
According to Inwood (1998), the concept hermeneutics carries the meaning of ‘to 
express’, ‘to explain’, ‘to translate’ and ‘to interpret’. Thus Oguejiofor (2009) 
avers that: 

Hermeneutics involves bringing an inner meaning into the open. It entails 
making explicit what is implicit. It is thus a quest for meaning, one’s own 
meaning in one’s life, society and milieu- in short, in the totality of one’s 
universe, which could be said to be constituted by one’s cultural symbols. 
(p. 80). 

As a theory of interpretation, it goes back to ancient Greek philosophy when 
Plato employed the term to differentiate between religious knowledge, that 
which has been revealed and Sophia, which is knowledge of truth-value of the 
utterance; during the Medieval and Renaissance ages, it emerged in relation to 
the scriptures, precisely, its interpretation. During this period, Gadamer (1976), 
Heidegger (1978) and Dilthey (1996) observed that Saint Augustine introduced 
the universal claim of hermeneutics and argued that interpretation of Scripture 
involves a deeper, existential level of self-understanding. The effect of such a 
perspective is evident in Martin Luther’s sola scriptura, the starting point of 
modern hermeneutics. He questioned the authority of traditional interpretation 
of scripture and emphasized the importance of the individual reader of the 
Biblical text who must face the challenge of making the particular text his own. 
Thus, Giambattista (1977and 1984) argued that understanding and self-



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

24 

 

understanding cannot be kept apart. Spinoza (2001) introduced a new taste to 
hermeneutics by shifting attention to the scriptural text when he argued that to 
understand the Scriptures one must keep in mind the historical horizon in which 
the particular text was written, as well as the mind which produced it.   
During the modern period, philosophical hermeneutics emerged. 
Schleiermacher, according to Vial (2009) is the Father of modern hermeneutics. In 
the contention of Ricoeur (1977), the employment of hermeneutics as a general 
principle was Schleiermacher’s most important contribution to knowledge. 
Schleiermacher (1984 and 1998) understood hermeneutics as the doctrine of the 
act of understanding, and had posited that thought is the inside of language and 
language the outside of thought. And to understand any speech, two things are 
involved: the language that makes the speech possible and the individual that 
uses the language to speak. For in the speech, the very personality of the actor is 
expressed. Thus, you need to know the speakers language and the speaker in 
order to understand his or her thought. He further observed that the language 
available to speakers is an accumulation of previous speech acts, and contain in it 
the personalities of previous speakers. In Schleiermacher, hermeneutics extended 
its application beyond Biblical texts.  
Following Schleiermacher’s expansion of the capacity of hermeneutics, Dilthey 
(1996) avers that hermeneutics is a core discipline that should be the foundation 
of all the arts and humanities. He however, emphasized the importance of the 
historicity of all interpretations. He understands the human person as a being 
that is made in history, and that the understanding of things occurs through 
history. While agreeing to the emphasis on historicity, Heidegger (1980) added 
that there is the need for an understanding and interpretation of the nature of the 
being in question, the Dasein. Thus, in Heidegger, hermeneutics now becomes 
fundamental ontology, an explanation of the ontological condition of 
understanding. Commitment to understanding the existential horizon of a 
person’s time or a person’s situation is therefore, fundamental to interpretation.  
Gadamer (1976), a student of Heidegger, would argue that thinking is tied to the 
boundaries of language and as such, understanding is language-bound. This 
explains why people who are brought up in a certain linguistic and cultural 
tradition see reality differently from those who come from a different tradition. 
According to Rocoeur (1992), philosophy is the recovery of the self, an 
overcoming of the separation between the self, which is particular and one’s true 
being, which is universal. This raises a tension between the universal task of 
philosophy and its anchor in particular contexts from which it must operate, but 
which it must strive to transcend. Ramose (2005) thus understands philosophy as 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

25 

 

a “particularist interpretation with universal appeal” (p. 145). From the foregoing 
there is an emphasis on history, psychology, context, tradition, culture, language 
etc., which further shows the tension between particularity and universality in 
philosophical hermeneutics. In the development of hermeneutics, we see 
Schleiermacher broaden the concerns of hermeneutics beyond Biblical exegesis; 
Dilthey applied it to culture, Heidegger made hermeneutics existential, and 
Gadamer made hermeneutics to be rooted in history and tradition.   
In the perspective of Oguejiofor (2009), philosophy as hermeneutic process must 
be shaped by the particularity of its birth. He wrote that: 

In spite of the inherent tendency of the discipline (of philosophy), 
universal philosophy is an illusion, since the subject which is at the centre 
of philosophy as hermeneutics is inevitably bedeviled by his/her 
particularity, his/her specificity, generating an ambivalence since this does 
not necessarily exclude universality. (p. 83). 

If African philosophy is to be understood as hermeneutics, it would mean that it 
has to be an interpretation of the African condition, symbols, culture, language, 
history, environment, social institutions etc.  
African Philosophy and Hermeneutics 
In the history of African philosophy, some African thinkers have proposed that 
hermeneutics is the instrument for analyzing the African experience. Three 
African philosophers are notable in this regard: Theophilus Okere, Tsenay 
Serequeberhan and Raphael Okechukwu Madu. Their perspectives will therefore 
be discussed. 
Okere (1983) argued that all philosophies must spring from and deal with non-
philosophical features of lived experience and its expression in religion, culture 
etc. By non-philosophy, sometimes referred to as the irrational or pre-rational or 
transcendent refers to the non-reflected or un-reflected baggage of cultural 
background. This is based on the understanding that for a philosophy to be 
described with the adjective ‘African’, it must have an expression of the African 
life-world; this becomes the apparatus for reflection. In this process, 
hermeneutics becomes a bridge between culture and philosophy for “it is only 
within the context of hermeneutics that African culture can give birth to African 
philosophy” (p. 15). The work of Okere was a reaction to Hountondji’s critique of 
ethno-philosophy, and his intention was develop a better approach to African 
philosophy; an approach that would not disregard the African context and 
culture. Hermeneutics, therefore, becomes a method of interpretation and 
understanding. In hermeneutics, whatever is intelligible is accessible to us 
through and in language and the employment of language calls for 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

26 

 

interpretation. Thus, Ricoeur (1992) argues that “there is no self understanding 
that is not mediated by signs, symbols and texts; in the final analysis self-
understanding coincides with the interpretation given to these mediating terms” 
(p. 15). In Okere, one can philosophize from culture or from the elements of 
culture that can be called symbols because culture is pregnant with meaning and 
has to be explained and understood with the aid of reason within the parameters 
of philosophy. It is in this regard that African philosophy is said to be 
hermeneutical, that is, regarding the question of relation between culture and 
philosophy.     
While Okere like Dilthey focused on culture, Serequeberhan following the path 
of Gadamer emphasized that history is relevant to the nature of hermeneutics. 
This explains why Serequeberhan (1994) avers that: 

In our case, on the other hand, it is neither the theoretical exigencies of 
modern science, nor the crisis of faith in confrontation with a foreign and 
aggressive piety that provokes thought. Rather, it is the politico-existential 
crisis interior to the horizon of post-colonial African which brings forth the 
concerns and originates the theoretic space for the discourse of 
contemporary African philosophy. (p. 18).  

In the West, he argued that hermeneutics grew out of some questions such as: the 
challenge of technocratic society, the reduction of reason to technique, the 
alienation of the self from the social world and the rise of positivistic version of 
social sciences; in Africa, hermeneutics was built around the question of the 
encounter of Africa with a ‘foreign and aggressive piety’, however, in the 
present, it is the question of the crisis resulting from the colonial project of 
Europe. In this regard, hermeneutics emerges as a result of some failure, a quest 
for understanding which begins from misunderstanding. The failure in terms of 
understanding must be defined in encounter and not in essence or in some 
essentialized manner. Thus, the operative of emancipation takes precedence over 
the integrity of theory. In the face of the effects of colonialism and neo-
colonialism, Serequeberhan (2000) sees hermeneutics as a means of constructing 
an identity. In the age of neo-colonialism, he speaks of the state of the African as 
an in-between state which calls for emancipation: 

This nonidentity, this in-between, is the ambiguity of our heritage. For we 
are the ones- in one way or another- who live and have experienced this 
‘ambiguity adventure’ and feel, in the very depth of our being, the 
unnerving experience of being two in one, Europe and non-Europe. (p. 2).  

He therefore sees hermeneutics as not an already established interpretation of 
nature, history, the world and the ground of the world; it is rather an open-



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

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ended project of humanity, a process, which finds itself in a joint struggle. 
Hermeneutics thus, becomes an instrument for the struggle out of the non-place 
or the between place; It involves a practical understanding of oneself as an actor, 
an agent and the situation in which an action has meaning.  
Madu (1992) understands hermeneutics as a tool of knowledge for the extraction 
of philosophical thought from within culture. He Based his perspective on that of 
Ricoeur who was committed to symbols and metaphors and the need to connect 
with human existence rather than an abstract structure and set of functions. 
Hermeneutics was used by his in this regard:  

The choice of the hermeneutic principles of Paul Ricoeur as philosophical 
method is based on the ‘new’ relevance it gives to culture by providing a 
very profound yardstick of interpreting religious symbols and mythical 
languages that characterize most cultures… Previously archaic and 
oriental symbolism was regarded as important only as a datum in the 
development of human consciousness. Such was the disdain philosophers 
felt about symbolic thought, that symbols were regarded as ‘primitive and 
lacking the cogency of reasoning’. (pp. 31-32).  

Contrary to the opinion of some philosophers that symbols were pre-rational and 
thus unworthy of philosophical attention, Madu, with the intention of 
rehabilitating symbolic, proverbial and mythological thoughts, argued that they 
are relevant to philosophy, and that hermeneutics is the method of abstracting 
the philosophical content of symbols, proverbs and myths. In his analysis of 
symbols, Madu like Ricoeur combines the ontological and existential to save 
hermeneutics from abstraction.       
Conclusion  
The perspectives of Okere, Serequeberhan and Madu on hermeneutics have 
enriched African hermeneutics. In Okere there is a recognition of the relevance of 
philosophy in articulating non-philosophy, even though his hermeneutics is only 
a universal method applied to a particular context with nothing specifically 
African about it; in Serequeberhan the taste of history, praxis and emancipatory 
possibilities are added to African hermeneutics. In Madu, African hermeneutics 
is brought to the service of symbolic structures. The beauty of these perspectives 
is that they teach how philosophy should reflect on the stuff of the world, and 
the manner in which this is realized to save philosophy from being abstracted 
from the particulars of human experience. Through hermeneutics, philosophy 
thinks about but from a place; philosophy becomes a creative act rather than 
simply an analytic act. And this is where African philosophy belongs, it is 
hermeneutics. African philosophy is a hermeneutics of culture, of history that 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

28 

 

leads to paxis. The ontologico-existential character of African philosophical 
hermeneutics balances the tension between university and particularity in 
philosophy. 
The particularist school of African philosophy would argue that African 
Philosophy is the philosophical thought of Africans as could be sifted from their 
various world views, myths, proverbs, etc. It is based on this understanding that 
Tempels (1959) wrote that “I confidently hope to be able to convince my readers 
that real philosophy can be found among indigenous peoples and that it should 
be sought among them” (p. 17). From the perspective of African philosophy as 
hermeneutics, this piece argues that African myths, folklores, proverbs, 
worldview etc., are not African philosophy, however, it would give birth African 
philosophy only within the context of hermeneutics. They could be considered 
the sources of African philosophy, however, can become African philosophy 
through hermeneutics. This therefore, establishes the strong connection between 
African philosophy and African culture. They can be said to be congenial in the 
sense that they need each other to remain germane and perennial. Culture 
therefore becomes a material for the reflection of philosophy, thus, pointing to 
the tension between the particular and universal in hermeneutics: while 
philosophy concerns itself with universal problems, the human person who does 
philosophy must speak from an environment or culture or an experience with 
particular expressions and language, and this particularity decorates philosophy 
with a galaxy of experiences. African culture therefore becomes the source of 
African philosophy’s initial impulse and nourishment. The fact of the recognition 
that philosophy has come from a place does not in any way undermine its 
philosophical character, but rather it helps philosophy to become a task rather 
than an assumption. The interaction between African culture and the 
hermeneutical process which birth to African philosophy, is a creative enterprise 
that requires the presence and ingenuity of a genius; this genius is the African 
philosopher.   
With the emphasis on a genius, Okere (1983) agreeing with Hountondji 
denounced the idea of collective philosophy, asserting that hermeneutics is the 
work of an individual thinker. Contrary to this perspective, Oguejiofor (2009) 
rightly avers that the idea attributed to a people as a whole is in the final analysis 
those which have become so repeated and popularized that they have become 
known to the general populace. This does not mean that the thoughts were 
collectively proposed. Moreover, these thoughts referred to as collective 
thoughts in African philosophy are the reflections of particular African 
philosophers about their experience of particular cultures; they are therefore 



IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

         ISSN 2488-9210(Online)    ISSN 2504 – 9038(Print) 

 

 

(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

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particular interpretations and readings of their experience. The reason why many 
African philosophers have spoken in terms that seem collective is to be seen in 
the foundation of their projects and the circumstances surrounding their 
philosophical interpretation. For instance, in the case of Tempels and Senghor, 
the foundation of their project was to affirm the dignity of the black race as a 
whole. Oguejiofor (2009) avers that “such an aim would be better served if one 
presents the whole race as the architect or repository of a particular philosophy, 
with the ultimate calculation of changing the image, not just of the particular 
thinker but of the people as a whole” (p. 94). Therefore, the fact that it sounds 
collective does not in any way mean that it is a collective philosophy produced as 
a chorus by the community to which it has been attributed to.  
 
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IGWEBUIKE: An African Journal of Arts and Humanities.         Vol. 1 No 1, June 2015. 

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(A Publication of the Augustinian Institute in collaboration with AATREPSCHOLARS) 

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