Ubuntu and Patience

Abstract The chapter investigates the meaning and role of “patience” within ubuntu eudaimonist virtue theory in the sub-Saharan region in Africa. “Ubuntu” is a Bantu word found in languages such as Zulu and Xhosa in South Africa, which means humanness or humanity (being human). Drawing on ordinary people’s experience, it argues that patience is one of the ubuntu properties, or virtues, whereby an individual continues in a current state, waiting for the appropriate time to change to a better or desired status, for the good of the self and the community. The definition is inspired by the word meaning and utterance meanings (both literal and figurative utterances), which illustrate how it refers to concepts such as expectation, avoidance of haste, and waiting. Common usage shows that there are three words, kuleza mtima, kufatsa, and kudekha, that summarize patience in Chichewa language, one of the Bantu languages. This chapter confirms that in African traditional communities, patience is a central virtue in human flourishing, and it can operate as either a self-regarding virtue or an other-regarding virtue depending on the context. Use of these terms further reveal different functions of patience in ordinary language, where it may be used to order an individual or community to be patient and to advise on how to wait for the right time of action.