Swazi · deity · Swazi traditional religion; continuing · deity
Mvelinqangi, also Mkhulumnqande ('the great-great one'), is the remote high god of the Swazi (emaSwati), a Nguni people of Eswatini. As among other Nguni, he is the self-created first being and origin of all, but he is distant and impersonal; the active religious life of the Swazi is directed not to him but to the royal and family ancestors (emadloti).
Domains
supreme creator
origin of the peoples
Powers
to bring the earth and its peoples into being
to remain remote and beyond direct worship
Sources
Hilda Kuper, An African Aristocracy: Rank Among the Swazi (London: Oxford University Press for the International African Institute, 1947).
Molefi Kete Asante & Ama Mazama (eds.), Encyclopedia of African Religion (Thousand Oaks: SAGE, 2009), s.v. 'Swazi'.