Time to get a watch: Grounding John Mbiti’s Sasa and Zamani in Four-Dimensionalism

Mogomotsi Jaba ORCID iD 

Issue: Vol. 7 No.4  2026 Article 13 pp.1142 – 1151
DOI: https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.20267413| Published online 26th May 2026

© 2026 The Author(s). This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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John Mbiti’s viewpoint on the concept of African time includes two assertions that have sparked considerable debate. Firstly, he posits that time possesses an inherent two-dimensionality, consisting exclusively of the past and the present. Secondly, he argues that African time lacks a sense of the future. Most scholars, however, criticise his assertions. For instance, he is criticised, especially for his separation of time into two separate dimensions. According to their argument, the separation of time violates African cosmology, which holds that all aspects of the African worldview are interconnected. Notwithstanding, this study employed a desktop methodology and an analytical conceptual framework to ground Mbiti’s concept of time within the context of four-dimensionalism, while also engaging with his critics throughout the study. In the study, the researcher argued that four-dimensionalism uses better conceptual frameworks to explain and reinvigorate Mbiti’s concept of time. The study concludes that grounding Mbiti’s concept of time within a four-dimensional framework offers a more nuanced understanding of African time, which may enrich African religious experiences. The significance of this study, therefore, lies in the reconfiguration and revitalisation of Mbiti’s notion of time in response to his critics. The study enhances the discourse in African religious studies and philosophical enquiries into the nature of time.

Keywords: African religion, cyclical time, four-dimensionalism, linear time, two-dimensional time.

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Mogomotsi Jaba, PhD, Research Fellow, Faculty of Theology and Religion, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa.

Jaba, Mogomotsi. “Time to get a watch: Grounding John Mbiti’s Sasa and Zamani in Four-Dimensionalism.”E-Journal of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences 7, no.4 (2026): 1142 – 1151. https://doi.org/10.38159/ehass.20267413

© 2026 The Author(s). Published and Maintained by Noyam Journals. This is an open access article under the CCBY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

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