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In The Finger of God, Robert Edgar gives us an unparalleled exploration of the motives, desires, and resentments of the prophet Enoch Mgijima and his followers as the Israelite movement gained strength in the early decades of last century.... [As] the post-anti-apartheid era drags on, many ostensibly secular political movements promote visions of a de-colonized future redolent of millenarianism. The Finger of God, thus, should not only be required reading for students of the Israelites and the Bullhoek massacre, but also for anyoneseeking to understand the sacred/secular dynamics of contemporary religious and political movements in South Africa today. --International Journal of African Historical Studies This is a remarkable book. Robert Edgar began researching this work on the Israelite Movement when he was a graduate student and has devoted much of his professional life to examining its origins, the actual movement, and its on-going influence in post-apartheid South Africa. There are few historians who have a stronger knowledge of the history of the Eastern Cape. He has exhaustively examined local and national archives, conducted oral histories at a time when that was extremely difficult under apartheid rule, and placed his rich evidence into a convincing narrative. He begins with a history of the Mfengu in the Eastern Cape, traces the history of prophetic movements in this region, and then focuses on the teaching and prophetic career of Enoch Mgjijima. He examines the debates about how to respond to his apocalypic movement of the Israelites, who gathered to await the apocalypse at Bullhoek, the trials of participants, and the divergent ways in which African and Europeans look back on their tragic, shared history. Robert Edgar's book will be the definitive work on the Israelite Movement and the massacred at Bullhoek. --Robert M. Baum, Dartmouth College, is the author of WEST AFRICA'S WOMEN OF GOD and the executive editor the Journal of Religion in Africa The Bulhoek massacre was in its own time a matter of international comment, and did much to draw the attention of the world community to the problem of racial oppression in South Africa. Yet no attempt has been made since 1977 to address the topic at the academic level. The Finger of God will be the cause of widespread rejoicing. Edgar's writing is one of his greatest strengths as a historian. The narrative is gripping and carries the reader along with it. --Jeff Peires, University of Fort Hare

The Bulhoek massacre was in its own time a matter of international comment, and did much to draw the attention of the world community to the problem of racial oppression in South Africa. Yet no attempt has been made since 1977 to address the topic at the academic level. The Finger of God will be the cause of widespread rejoicing. Edgar's writing is one of his greatest strengths as a historian. The narrative is gripping and carries the reader along with it.--Jeff Peires, University of Fort Hare

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Robert R. Edgar, Professor of African Studies at Howard University and Stellenbosch University, South Africa, is the coauthor of African Apocalypse: The Story of Nontetha Nkwenkwe, a Twentieth-Century South African Prophet, among other books.

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