The wars of the 1960s and 1980s–2000s brought new contestations against the continuity of the power of the priests and their power to make peace. The proliferation of guns, the brutality of their power and the complexities of having Southern Sudanese in government who had close relations to the baany e biith all brought new conundrums about hierarchies of authority, the continuity of pollution as a consequence of killing, and the ability to curb and be protected from the power of the gun. For the baany e biith to maintain authority and relevance, rituals were remade to creatively refuse rupture in more orders and cosmological hierarchies. Histories of bany e bith defiance were also experienced and retold, forming a revised cultural archive that demonstrated the baany e biith’s continuity and not absence, despite war.
One of the main challenges to the power of the priests was not the direct threat of the guns of the hakuma, but the proliferation of new divine authorities. These new divine authorities also sought to provide protection against guns and government, but were not subsumed within the existing hierarchies of priestly power. In response to this cosmic politics, baany e biith did not simply push back, but some even co-opted and acquired these new divinities. They creatively remade theological ideas to allow the merging of powers and the continuity of their own authority. They often relied on their ability to carry out violence in order to claim power to make peace. The 1960s and 1990s–2000s saw the growth of the gun and, with it, the presence of government. Yet, this growth did not subsume other cosmic powers but saw the continuity of authority figures who drew on divine might. The cosmic polity had become more contested, but remade ideas of divine authority were central to contesting the power and impunity of the hakuma.