Persons in Relationship: African Religious and Biblical Theological Anthropology in Dialogue and Its Implications for Artificial Intelligence (AI)

What do African religious traditions and the Bible teach about the human person, and what might their dialogue contribute to debates about artificial intelligence (AI)? Sustained comparison between African religious sources and biblical anthropology remains rare, while existing comparisons sometimes flatten African diversity or claim agreement without examining disagreement. Using a comparative theological-hermeneutical research design based on textual and documentary analysis, conducted from a deliberately emic standpoint that reconstructs each tradition in its own terms before any external comparative category is applied, and distinguishing African religious sources from African philosophical and Christian theological interpretations, this study examines representative Yoruba, Igbo, Akan, Kikuyu, Luo, Zulu, Sotho, Tswana, and Central African Bantu sources alongside biblical texts on the image of God, human vocation, Johannine relationality, and covenantal justice. Relationality emerges as an important account of personhood across the traditions, while moral responsibility is consistently understood as extending beyond the individual to the community. However, the meaning, source, and theological grounding of relationality differ substantially, and the traditions diverge on revelation, ritual authority, freedom, sin, salvation, and life after death. The comparative anthropology is the article’s main contribution. AI implications follow as a secondary application, proposing relational dignity, shared accountability, epistemic humility, and attention to vulnerable people as principles for responsible AI governance.