en Europeans first arrived in Zululand, they appear to have been welcomed by the Zulu people because of their trade goods and the technological superiority, which the Zulus recognized they possessed. The Zulu kings had great desire to acquire the knowledge the European men offered. The knowledge is in regards to the possession of firearms and, in the eyes of the Zulus, the ability to read. Therefore, when Captain Gardiner told them such things as "They were now a great people, but I wished them to know these words that they might become greater,"(Gardiner 133), the Zulu people listened to what he said with great interest and care. The Zulus felt they were receiving the key to power, when the Europeans were attempting to teach them to read. "The promise to make them 'greater' must have seemed a hopeful one because these new strangers sought to teach the Zulus the art of reading, which to them appears to have been seen as the key to European power"(133).The missionaries and traders who visited the Zulu during this early period of contact did so with an overwhelming confidence in the superiority of their civilization which they were quick to point out to the Zulu people and which they attributed to the Christian religion. Their belief in the truths of Christianity could, however, have been severely challenged by the existence of Zulu society. The Zulus represented a people who appeared not to have heard of the gospel. "The question could therefore have arisen as to how a just God could judge a people who were totally ignorant of his commands"(Isaacs 120). But this question was never on the minds of the missionaries because a theological interpretation of Zulu life existed which allowed for their apparent ignorance of the gospel. This interpretation depended upon the assumption that the Zulu people must at one time have known the truth of God and that their present state of ignorance was a result of willful rebellion against God's...
