South Africa's Dutch Reformed Church (DRC) and the Afrikaner people it served had, since the 17th century drawn a distinction between white 'Christians' and the apparently unconvertible 'heathen' peoples around them. The Afrikaners' identity as a covenanted people was reinforced by the British conquest of 1899-1902. In the effort to maintain a white-ruled South Africa, some Afrikaners flirted with Nazism, but from 1948 the National Party chose a different path: a doctrine of 'apartheid' or 'separate development', which drew deeply on the DRC's theology. Theology legitimised apartheid, but was also instrumental in bringing it to a sudden and remarkably peaceful end.

The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website: https://www.gresham.ac.uk/lectures-and-events/the-gospel-of-apartheid

Gresham College has been giving free public lectures since 1597. This tradition continues today with all of our five or so public lectures a week being made available for free download from our website. There are currently over 2,000 lectures free to access or download from the website.

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