KIMBANGU, SIMON (1889–1951), African religious prophet and founder of the Church of Jesus Christ on Earth through the Prophet Simon Kimbangu. Kimbangu was born on September 24, 1889, in the village of N'Kamba, located in the Ngombe district of what is now the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In Kikongo, the word kimbangu means "one who reveals the hidden truth." Many legends surround Kimbangu's youth and early religious activities. Some accounts claim that both his mother and father were traditional Kongo healers and that his visionary activities were related to theirs. Only since the mid-1970s has much of the original missionary and government documentation on Kimbangu's early activities become available to scholars.

Kimbangu attended a Baptist Missionary Society school at Wathen, near his home village. He became a Christian as a young man and was baptized on July 4, 1915, along with his wife, Marie-Mwilu, in the Baptist mission at...