Should Women Love "Wisdom"? Evaluating the Ethiopian Wisdom Tradition

In the face of a world academic community that has been skeptical regarding the existence of a written philosophical tradition in Africa, Claude Sumner of Addis Ababa University has devoted over forty years to finding and studying Ge'ez philosophical texts in Ethiopia, as well as exploring a now written oral tradition of proverbs. Sumner's position on written texts is unique within the debate on African philosophy. Most of the focus of the debate has been on whether or not there is a written tradition of philosophy in Africa. Some suggest that some ancient Egyptian texts are indeed philosophy, and therefore count as the earliest written philosophy (Karenga, James). For those skeptical of the philosophic import of the Egyptian texts, the search is constrained to the last fifty years of professional philosophers writing in or about Africa, both its concepts and its existential situation. Sumner adds a new dimension by championing a collection of written texts from medieval and early modern Ethiopia. He explains that the texts are written in Ge'ez, and are sometimes free translations of earlier Arabic or Greek texts; however, Sumner has argued that their translation turns them into a unique Ethiopian contribution. For example, he argues that the Ethiopian translator, under the influence of the homegrown Ethiopian Orthodox Church, turned Skendes, the main character in Life and Maxims of Skendes, into a Christian (Skendes 120). This Ethiopian Skendes is portrayed as deeply sensitive, thoughtful, and perceptive; in fact, Sumner argues that the Ge'ez version is the most perfect, most morally exalted, and most chastened compared to the Greek and Arabic versions of the Skendes story (Skendes 131).

That there have been such texts takes on added importance in the context of a debate where philosophers, many of them African themselves (like Okolo 27-28; and Houndtondji, African Philosophy: Myth and Reality 33), insist that the history of African philosophy can only be traced back to, at most, the last fifty years. The debate has, for the most part, assumed that written texts are superior to wisdom passed orally; this is a contention that I have debated at length elsewhere ("Oral Philosophy"). However, Sumner has the strength of being able to point to medieval and early modern texts from Africa; thus even the most skeptical critic of oral philosophy must pause at his findings.

The story of Skendes, written around 1438-68 AD (Skendes 118), is just one of five texts that Sumner has collected in Classical Ethiopian Philosophy. He has also completed a five-volume series entitled Ethiopian Philosophy in which each volume is devoted to analyzing the texts. Sumner acknowledges that those who hold a narrow definition of philosophy as critical and introspective would only see one of his texts, The Treatise of Zera Yacob (a seventeenth-century text), as philosophy. Yet Sumner believes that the neglected texts he has uncovered, as well as proverbs, form part of a sapiential or "broad philosophy" tradition dating back hundreds of years. Sapiential philosophy is found in the forms of sayings, maxims, exhortations, and proverbs (Classical 8). Sumner clearly advocates the value of this tradition. He also clarifies that these sapiential texts possess a logic that might evade the casual reader. Calling it "figurative logic," and finding it in proverbs as well as his texts, he demonstrates how written texts based on the form of oral discourse (such as by Walda Heywat, who imagines objections to his views and replies to them) nevertheless put forward reasoned arguments in the logical form of ABA. Sumner also argues that some treatises, such as one by Zera Yacob, portray a "religious rationality," that, while not secular as is Descartes's rationality, are nonetheless rational (Zera Yacob 26-46). Therefore, Sumner's attempt to broaden the definition of philosophy by increasing our notions of forms of logic holds a unique position in the larger debate. Elsewhere (see "Broad") I have discussed Sumner's...