The worship of Ngai, by the Maasai and Kikuyu (respectively) in East Africa, is a very curious case in the history of religions deemed monotheistic. A variety of sources published in the 20^thcentury make statements about the religions of these societies being unequivocally monotheistic and then proceed to the next point of discussion.¹ Generally, these claims are offered with encyclopedic authority, lacking citation and explanation. The ubiquitous nature of this pattern is revealed by its extension to both the Wikipedia entry on the Kikuyu: “The Gĩkũyũ were – and still are – monotheists believing in an omnipotent God whom they refer to as Ngai. All of the Gĩkũyũ, Embu, and Kamba use this name”² and in a children’s book on the Maasai: “Actually, the Masai believe in only one god, Enkai. Enkai is spoken of as the Black God when he answers his people's prayers by sending them rain and tall grass.”³ The consistency of these references might be very easily explained: the information could be accurate. Considering the increasing volume of literature on monotheism in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, three religions unquestionably deemed monotheistic by the 20^stcentury, the absence of scholarship on these religions, so clearly deemed monotheistic, in East Africa is not so easy to dismiss. Although it is beyond the scope of this dissertation to consider the question of this absence further, it is important to observe that, in the wake of European colonialism, the exclusion – by ignorance, or malice – of languages, cultures, and peoples from the attention of Western scholarship is an all too familiar narrative. The case of the Maasai and Kikuyu religions points to the role of power, privilege, and politics in the determination of religions deemed monotheistic.