Since the emergence of COVID-19, a number of media commentators and academics have reflected on the spiritualisation of the pandemic among responses in different African settings.

Theres been particular interest in the influence of prominent Pentecostal pastors on public health messaging. Some have expressed concern about the possible consequences of their invocations of spiritual warfare.

Weve examined how idioms of (spiritual) warfare have been deployed in response to the coronavirus pandemic and wish to bring a broader perspective to recent debates about these dynamics. We consider examples from Tanzania and Zimbabwe, drawing on our ongoing research in these settings.

Many Pentecostal Christians, in Africa as well as other continents, portray the coronavirus as a spiritual force of evil rather than as a biomedical disease.

Through this lens, the world is presented as a battleground between God and the agents of Satan. For those who enlist to fight for Jesus, the most effective weapon is prayer.

Spiritual warfare provides a framework for explaining and responding to both mundane and extraordinary events from a cancelled flight to a global pandemic. But despite their close association with Pentecostals, these militarised idioms may also resonate with other groups.

In Zimbabwe, Prophet Emmanuel Makandiwa has been criticised for reassuring his congregants that they will be spared from the virus. This will happen through prayer and the divine protection he mediates. You will not die, because the Son is involved in what we are doing, he says, calling it

the freedom that no medication can offer.

This declaration epitomises a sense of Pentecostal exceptionalism, embodied in the claim to be in this world but not of this world. It clearly risks instilling a level of complacency among his followers about the threat of the virus. It amplifies the possibility of noncompliance with government safety measures.

Prophet Makandiwa has also been accused of perpetuating conspiracy theories. Drawing Biblical allusions to the mark of the beast, he has warned followers about microchip implants. These, he predicts, will accompany future vaccination campaigns. This claim has also been made by pastors elsewhere in the African continent.

In Uganda, steps have already been taken to prosecute pastors spreading misinformation.

Efforts to spiritualise the virus have also been pursued by some African leaders. For example, Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli described COVID-19 as a demon (shetani). Through it Satan seeks to destroy Tanzanian citizens.

Despite the government promoting physical distancing, he declared that churches or mosques would not be closed because this is where God and true healing (uponyaji wa kweli) are found.

Invoking the idiom of spiritual warfare, Magufuli explained that COVID-19

cannot survive in the Body of Jesus (and) will be burned away.

Commentators have observed that Magufuli is himself a Roman Catholic (albeit with Pentecostal ties). Yet few have acknowledged his implication that God can also be found in mosques, nor his recommendation that Tanzanians also embrace indigenous medicinal practices for protection.

In a country where Christians dont constitute a clear religious majority, Magufuli invokes the rhetoric of spiritual warfare to articulate a sense of national religious identity.

These invocations mostly adopt a rhetorical style reminiscent of Pentecostal pastors but maintain a broad, inclusive focus on God (Mungu).

Tanzanians responded enthusiastically to Magufulis call for citizens of every faith to participate in three days of national prayer. Many took to social media to circulate photos and videos featuring the Tanzanian flag and words of prayer.

Yet a growing number of commentators have criticised Magufuli. As with Makandiwa, they argue that his use of spiritual warfare rhetoric generates a dangerous expectation of viral immunity.

Some commentators have taken Magufulis emphasis on prayer to be emblematic of the governments perceived failure to adequately address the pandemic.

The government, say critics, has fallen prey to superstitious thinking. Some draw allusions to the use of water-based medicine in the Maji Maji rebellion against German colonial rule.

As others have observed, the act of giving spiritual agency to the virus as a personal demon can also serve to downplay structural failures which have contributed to its spread. It divests responsibility to both COVID-19 as a sentient enemy and citizens.

There is a risk, however, that exaggerating the idiosyncrasy of the Tanzanian governments response to COVID-19 and indeed that of Prophet Makandiwa may perpetuate another myth of exceptionalism. One which echoes colonial depictions of African populations as singularly superstitious and incurably religious.

In truth, spiritual warfare idioms have been diversely invoked and unevenly received across the continent. They have prompted lively religion and science debates.

Moreover, the plausibility of spiritual warfare idioms should not be exclusively attributed to peoples religious sensibilities. After all, warfare is the signature trope with which global political figures, health experts, and media commentators have framed COVID-19.

Like Magufuli, world leaders like the UKs Boris Johnson, Frances Emmanuel Macron and the USs Donald Trump have all invoked warfare motifs against the single, identifiable enemy.

European governments have also been accused of using this framing to shift responsibility onto citizens as combatants, whether for failing to adhere to physical distancing or for their biomedical frailty. Narratives of individuals heroically winning their war against a decidedly personal demon are no less persuasive to some in Europe than to some in Africa.

None of this is intended to take away from the ambivalent and sometimes plainly harmful effects of attempts to spiritualise the pandemic. Nor is it to imply that religiously informed strategies of communication and implementation are incompatible with more temporal methods.

Religious groups like Pentecostal congregations may indeed constitute an important public health resource when it comes to delivering services and messaging. And they can cultivate a sense of hope and mutual care in the face of uncertainty.

Rather, we suggest as anthropologists and scholars of religion, this warfaring rhetoric might stem from a shared discomfort among Africans and Europeans alike at the prospect of an adversary without discernible self-will or conscience. An impersonal demon.

As literary critic Anders Engberg-Pederson articulates it:

We declare war on the virus, because we want it to be something that it is not.

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Pentecostals and the spiritual war against coronavirus in Africa - The Conversation Africa