Religion and Black Slave Politics
The language of survival and revolt
In an oppressive culture the language of survival and the speech of revolt is forced underground, taking on new forms and frequently adopting the vocabulary of the oppressors. The forcible erosion of a culture such as was attempted in the American South may reinforce this process; rather than eliminating the possiblity of protest it creates for it new channels.
The adoption of Christianity by the Black slaves of North America and the West Indies was related to the search for a new vocabulary of protest, an endeavour both to “play the masters at their own game” and simultaneously create and reinforce their own, self-created sense of identity by exploring and subverting Christian doctrine to their own ends.
The Black church was the creation of a people whose daily existence was an encounter with the overwhelming and brutalizing reality of white power. For slaves it could form the sole source of personal identity and community. White fears of Christianity’s subversive potential were exacerbated by Black unwillingness to attend white run services once Black churches became available.
This article is not intended as an attack upon the very genuine piety that is evidenced among the Black slave communities, but is intended as an exploration of the application of religious language by Black slaves to both survival and revolt.
The most obvious and most popular evidence available of the incorporation of Biblical texts survives in the form of Negro spirituals. Ths superficial meanings of these spirituals are in complete conforminty with the accepted notions of Christian humility. They deal predominantly with waiting for salvation to arrive rather than the creation or emergence of a Black saviour. The first inkling that they do not reflect a passive acceptance of slavery is reflected in the actual choice of texts appropraited. Immediately prior to the outbreak of war, Colonel Thomas Wentworth Higginson printed in the Atlantic Monthly a collection of spirituals complete with commentary. [1]
The most obvious yet most ignored point is that almost all the chosen texts are drawn not merely from the Old Testament but from its most bloody portions. The Old Testament is not noted for its exhortations to accept oppression nor to retain the peace; it is instead a long catalogue of bloody battles in which G*d has taken the side of his chosen people in order to deliver them from injustice and to provide them with land. The saviour selected for honour is not the ever forgiving Jesus, but the war heroes, Moses and Joshua. The most favoured passages are those of war and military defeat for the opposing army.
My army cross over,
My army cross over,
O, Pharoah’s army drowned:
My army cross over.
The extent to which this can be ignored by whites is debatable. Nobody wished to be associated with the villain of the piece yet the allusion to Black enslavement is obvious.
The actual message of this spiritual (as with all others taking the theme of the Israelites) carries two interpretations. The first is potentially a force for pacification; that the enslaved should wait for someone — a saviour — to emancipate them. In this interpretation they take no role in their own liberation and thus is “safe” in white eyes. It is a plea for aid and not a call to arms. A more subversive interpretation acknowledges that Moses was himself an Israelite, the child of a slave. Thus the emancipator is to be found within the community. That Harriet Tubman — who returned from slavery to rescue over two hundred of her fellow cpatives — was frequently referred to as the “Black Moses” indicates an acknowledgement of this interpretation.
A similar excerise is beneficial with the song “One More Soldier Here”:
One more soldier here,
One more soldier here,
One more soldier here,
To help me carry de cross.
Significantly, Colonel Higginson preffered to believe that the original form of the spiritual had been “One more valiant soul here”, thus reinterpreting the song from the active to the passive, and undermining Christ’s attributes as a revolutionary leader.
Slave relations with G*d were grounded firmly in the belief that G*d was on their side. The religion of humility could be interpreted as encouraging a closeness between the slaves and G*d while explicitly excluding the master. The patriarchal nature of slavery having couched itself in the vocabulary of father-and-child, the slave was in the unique position of automatically fulfilling Christ’s injuction to be as a small child. [2]
Hence it was possible for slaves to see themselves as worshippers not merely in closer communion with G*d, but if necessary with a very different G*d. A G*d who did not sit back and watch, but who fought on the side of the oppressed, a combination of the vengeful Judaic deity and the more forgiving deity of the Christian tradition. In political terms this was a way to challenge the white oppresors within their own cultural paradigm.
The intense sense of communion with G*d which the Black slave community appears to have possessed is reflected in both speeches and writings. One of the best examples of specific religious challenge is found in the letters of a runaway slave to his ex-master. Henry Bibb chose to challenge his master’s hypocritical piety in a long correspondence employing the biblical rhetoric to which he had been accustomed.
Listen to the language of
inspiration: “Feed the hungry
and clothe the naked”, “Break
every yoke and let the
oppressed go free”.”Slave Testimony — Two Centuries of Letters, Speeches, Interviews and Autobiograohies”, ed. John Blassingame (Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge, 1977). pp50–51
Bibb was in a priviliged position. As a free man he did not need to mask his anger. The Bible was his tool but was not required as disguise. For many, in the face of harsh oppression, the Bible could be the means to express disaffection and resentment in the guise of humility and acceptance.
The work of the Black preacher was excedingly dangerous. If suspected of stirring revolt the penalties were severe. Consequently many did nothing but preach the Word, allowing their flock to make of it what they would. At the other extreme however their were slave preachers who were adept at combining modern analogies with theological allusions in order to produce sermons in the very face of a white audience. One such preacher was Brother Paul Coteny. Drawing on the white practice of seeing Negro hair as ‘wool’ and the African tradition of assigning the goat to represent white people, he gave a sermon to a mixed audience on the separation by the Lord of the sheep and the goats. The sermon was greeted with appreciative comments from the Black audience, but bemusement among the white.
Any vocabulary may be employed in order to sustain survival and revolt. The applicability of Christianity to the Black Slave experience was that it allowed Blacks to operate with a limited measure of protection within a brutal structure. Simultaneously it challenged white assumptions of racial supremacy within the very paradigm erected as justification.
Editor’s Note: Christis occasionally invites people from other faiths to write for us out of their knowledge or insight into a particular aspect of Christainity. Farah Mendelsohn’s reference to “G*d”, therefore, is due to her Jewish background.