“Very many other people took the cleansing oath: they were not allowed to
leave the camp before they had. If people had take the oath willingly they
were sent to the CID: if they were brought back to us we gave them the
cleansing.”88 Which for the most part followed along the identified process for
purification using ng’ondu and the Mutaa solution.89
The major difference was that the participants were sent directly from the colonial
government to Nairobi or nearby detention and rehabilitation facilities.
However, in the case of government sanctioned Mau Mau purification
through the church, the ceremony naturally took on a different form. The
traditional specialist was replaced by the ordained clergy in the church that
offered a Mau Mau oathing purification solution within the parameters of the
Christian faith. Christian church cleansing focused on the individual’s sin as the
negative energy, whereas the traditional purification views the evil force as
separate from the individual. The sinner stands alone carrying this burden in a
request for purification. This differs from the African perspective that viewed the
unclean state as a result of a condition that came from outside of the individual
and that the individual was not alone but represented the entire community that
also shared in the affliction.
The Reverend Kenneth N. Phillips in from the Africa Inland Mission
reveals the relationship between Mau Mau and church in his primary text, From
Mau Mau to Christ.90 This 1958 document to shows the experiences and
accounts of Christian converts in the midst of Mau Mau struggles, some even
dying following their Christian conviction. The relationship between God and
88 Testimony of ChiefPatrais Mulumba. Case file 127 notes, KNA MLA 1/1007-CC 127/1954. Rex vs.
Harun Waau Mutisya, Philip Nthekani Mwo, and Sounsza Kandu. P 14.
89Paul Musuo interview, January 2009. This process was examined in detail earlier in the chapter.
90 Kenneth N. Phillips, From Маи Май to Chris, /Nairobi: Africa Inland Mission, 1958).
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