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Before the British colonization (1884), there were no inter-religious conflicts, Nigeria in its present borders did not exist as a single nation and the Muslim populations of northern Nigeria lived peacefully in mutual tolerance with the local animist and even Christian minorities.
The history of the territories which since ca. 1900 have been known under the name of Nigeria during the pre-colonial period (16th to 18th centuries) was dominated by several powerful West African kingdoms or empires, such as the Oyo Empire and the Islamic Kanem-Bornu Empire in the northeast, and the Igbo kingdom of Onitsha in the southeast and ...
The pre-colonial era was characterized by a high degree of religious diversity and tolerance among the different ethnic groups. [10] There was no concept of a state religion or a secular state in pre-colonial Nigeria. [3] Religion was mainly a personal matter, and each group had its own religious institutions and authorities. [3]
The colonial powers of Great Britain, France and Germany divided up his territory, with the British receiving what is now north-east Nigeria. They formally restituted the Borno Empire under British rule before the conquest in 1893 and appointed a scion of the ruling family of the time, Abubakar Garbai, as "Shehu" (Sheikh).
Most of Northern Nigeria is governed under Sharia law, while the rest of the country is governed under secular law. [4] Merchants from North Africa and the Senegalese basin introduced Islam to what is now Nigeria during the 11th century, and it was the first monotheistic Abrahamic religion to arrive in Nigeria.
In the Americas and other colonies in Asia and Africa, most missions were run by religious orders such as the Augustinians, Franciscans, Jesuits and Dominicans. In both Portugal and Spain , religion was an integral part of the state and Christianization was seen as having both secular and spiritual benefits.
Jacob Olupona, Nigerian American professor of indigenous African religions at Harvard University, summarized the many traditional African religions as complex animistic religious traditions and beliefs of the African people before the Christian and Islamic "colonization" of Africa.
Nigerian American professor of indigenous African religions at Harvard University, Jacob Olupona summarized the many traditional African religions as complex animistic religious traditions and beliefs of the African people before the Christian and Islamic "colonization" of Africa.