DF Malan and the Rise of Afrikaner Nationalism. Lindie Koorts
year and the first weeks of 1896. Yet, in his speech, Malan alluded to rumours that De Beers used unaccounted funds for election purposes. It is known today that S.J. du Toit, the illustrious leader of the First Afrikaans Language Movement and the polemic founder of the Genootskap van Regte Afrikaners (the Association of True Afrikaners), was in Rhodes’s pocket.[75] It was possibly also known or rumoured at the time.
Malan’s characterisation of the Afrikaners was ambiguous. He appealed to the members of his audience as members of the same nation, ‘whether this country be our adopted country or our native land’.[76] Yet, his subsequent use of the term ‘Afrikaner’ left little doubt that he was referring to the settled white population. He characterised the Afrikaners as a conservative people who were suspicious of progress and endangered by periods of transition:
The Afrikander nation is one very slow and hesitating to accept new things and new ideas. The nation has always been looked upon as extremely non-progressive even so that some call it the retrogressive party. A sudden change is now to come and who knows what may be the result. We may compare the slow progress that our nation is making to a cart that is moving slowly forward. A sudden pull is now given to it and it might be that we remain on the cart, but it might just as well be that we lose our balance, tumble over and remain behind altogether.[77]
This was not a young man who advocated change and progress for his people, but one who advocated protection in times of uncertainty. Not only in terms of economics, but in terms of culture as well, with the Uitlanders (foreigners) in the Transvaal as an ominous warning of things to come.[78]
It is interesting to note Malan’s anti-capitalism and anti-socialism in a speech written at the age of twenty-one. Afrikaners, as a rule, were ambivalent about capitalism and socialism, but Malan’s statement is a very early expression of what became conventional wisdom through the course of the twentieth century. To Malan, capitalism was an evil that plundered the local population and destabilised it by creating economic inequality, which would necessarily lead to socialism and anarchism – as far as he was concerned, the two went hand in hand. He also worried about the effect that these foreign evils would have on the Afrikaners’ ‘national character’.[79] This was a term that was synonymous with the German philosophers Johann Gottfried Herder and Johann Gottlieb Fichte, who wrote extensively about the uniqueness of every culture as a treasure that had to be respected and preserved at all costs. Philosophy was Malan’s other main interest, and it was in this field of study that he felt most at ease.[80]
After completing his B.A. Mathematics and Science, Malan had to decide what his next step would be. It is possible that he toyed with the idea of teaching, and in 1896 he even undertook a short stint as headmaster at a boys’ school in Swellendam. The school itself was in dire straits and on the verge of closing. Malan’s efforts did not meet with much success – he stayed for only one term. In the term after he left, only fifteen of the twenty-one pupils were present at the school’s annual inspection. Of the fifteen, six failed – those who were absent had probably expected to fail as well.[81] It is not known when exactly Malan decided to study theology. He later recounted that he fought an inner battle for three months, trying to choose between law and the church.[82] The former was his own wish; the latter would have pleased his parents. When he finally made his decision, he regarded it as final and did not look back.[83] On an undated piece of paper he listed his reasons for deciding to become a minister of the Dutch Reformed Church, making no mention of his previous wishes.[84] He was fully committed to his chosen path.
He attributed the manner in which he reached his decision to his parents. They were God-fearing and pious and had taught him from an early age that every person had a God-given calling, which meant that one could only be successful in one’s career if one had God’s blessing. He had long prayed for God to show him the way and first became aware of the particulars of his calling two years before pencilling the said note. Self-doubt had prevented him from contemplating the possibility – possibly due to his shyness and feelings of inferiority. Now, he decided, he would surrender his own will to follow God’s will, and be an empty vessel into which God could pour his Holy Spirit.[85] The note was effectively a letter of submission, a prostration, an undertaking to tread a path of which he, like Moses, was deeply afraid but down which he would nevertheless persevere in order to satisfy the will of God.
Malan wrote his admission exams in 1896. He passed cum laude and enrolled at Stellenbosch’s Theological Seminary.[86] At the same time, he enrolled for an M.A. in Philosophy. In doing this, he moved from one world to another. When Malan had arrived in Stellenbosch in 1891, the town encompassed two worlds. On the one hand, there were the professors of the Victoria College, who were Anglophiles and offered their students a classical education. On the other hand, Stellenbosch was dominated by the Theological Seminary.
During Malan’s years at the seminary its professors were N.J. Hofmeyr, J.I. Marais and P.J.G. de Vos. They all had close ties with J.H. Neethling, the local minister. Hofmeyr and his co-founder of the seminary, John Murray, who had passed away by the time Malan was a student, were considered orthodox, and the seminary owed its existence to their victory over liberal factions in the church. N.J. Hofmeyr and John Murray were members of a small, influential clerical clique that also included their brothers Servaas Hofmeyr and Andrew Murray Jr, as well as J.H. Neethling. All of these men had studied theology in the Netherlands at the University of Utrecht, where they were influenced by the Romantic Réveil movement. The Réveil was a reaction to rational critique of church doctrine, which had become a common feature of Dutch theology. In its stead, it advocated a return to ‘pure’ Reformed faith and Calvinist principles.[87] Hofmeyr, who was a patriarchal figure at the seminary, was also influenced by the work of Friedrich Schleiermacher, the German Romantic theologian and philosopher who focused more on the experience of religion than on doctrine.[88] This strengthened the idea that faith was an emotional and individual affair. Not surprisingly, these men all played prominent roles in the Evangelical movement and the Great Revival, which was such a salient part of Malan’s childhood.
There was another dimension to their preaching, however. It was also nationalist in nature. One can reasonably assume that their patriotic approach to theology and faith was due to the influence of Romanticism, which they were exposed to in Europe and which dominated late-nineteenth-century thought. Romanticism was closely associated with the rise of nationalism in Europe, and since Calvinism preached that everything should be rendered unto God, J.I. Marais concluded that patriotism without piety was of little value.[89] At the Stellenbosch seminary, religion was served with a generous helping of nationalism.
This was typical of the times. The late nineteenth century was the age of nationalism, state unification and great empires. The Cape Colony, as part of the British Empire, was not isolated from the proclaimed values and rhetoric of the day. As the young Malan’s negative comments about European anarchists and socialists demonstrate, the newspapers – which Malan avidly read – were filled with news and views from the Continent. His fellow students recalled that he was often late for dinner as he had become absorbed in the newspapers and lost track of time. When he finally did arrive at the dinner table, he would sit down and calmly start discussing what he had read.[90] Rational discussion was his preferred manner of interacting with his friends. He enjoyed philosophical conversations and would take long walks in the area, especially towards the Jonkershoek valley, all the while debating philosophy with his companions.[91] During the course of these discussions, his friends discovered that he would only express his views after he had mulled them over and was convinced that he was right – and to their great annoyance, they found that once he had established his position, it was impossible to convince him otherwise.[92]
The philosophy that Malan studied was dominated by German idealism. His M.A. thesis, which unfortunately has not survived, dealt with Immanuel Kant. From Kant, it was only a short leap to G.W.F. Hegel and Fichte.[93] These philosophers were all firmly rooted in the idealist tradition – which also dominated philosophy in the United Kingdom and the United States at the turn of the century. Idealism held that all reality is shaped first and foremost by the mind.[94] It could also entail the belief that spiritual values shape reality, which is an important key to understanding Malan’s thinking. Throughout his political career, he made it clear that principles should come first and could never be sacrificed for political gain.
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