#Christianity and Slavery: The role of the Church

[ausetkmt]

received an email yesterday concerning an article I wrote some time ago. The person asked me so many interesting and thought-provoking questions in that email. In this follow-up post, I will try to answer some of those questions to the best of my knowledge.

What role did the church play in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade? What exactly does the Bible say about slavery? Is Christianity a “slave religion”? Why so many black people love the church and the Bible?

According to Jomo Kenyatta, the founding father and first president of Kenya, “When the missionaries arrived, the Africans had the land and the missionaries had the Bible. They taught us how to pray with our eyes closed. When we opened them, they had the land and we had the Bible”.

That was the beginning of the European colonization of Africa. As I said in my other post, the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade was introduced by the coming of the Europeans. The Europeans came with the Bible the same way the Arab raiders and traders from the Middle East and North Africa introduced Islam and the Quran through the Trans-Saharan Slave Trade. So yes, the church did play a major role in the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade. In fact, the church was the backbone of the slave trade.

In other words, most of the slave traders and slave ship captains were very “good” Christians. For example, Sir John Hawkins, the first slave ship captain to bring African slaves to the Americas, was a religious gentleman who insisted that his crew “serve God daily” and “love another”. His ship, ironically called “the good ship Jesus,” left the shores of his native England for Africa in October 1562.

The church, especially the Roman Catholic and the Anglican Churches, had plantations with slaves working on them. For example, the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (USPG) – the world's oldest Anglican mission agency, owned several acres of slave plantations. It has been documented that the 800 acre Codrington slave plantation in Barbados was owned and operated by the United Society for the Propagation of the Gospel (USPG) during the 18th and 19th centuries.

One may ask, why would the church condone such barbaric acts as slavery? Well, the answer lies in the Bible the same way the answer for extremist Islamic terrorism in the world today lies in the Quran. Yes, slavery isn't just "normal" in the Bible. It is perfectly OK (or can be interpreted so) according to the scriptures. There are several chapters and verses supporting slavery in both the old and new testaments of the Bible.

Exodus 21 of the old testament of the Bible for example, gives clear instructions on how to treat a slave. Both Deuteronomy 20:10-14 and Leviticus 25:44-46 also give clear instructions on who should be slaves, how and where to buy slaves, etc.

Some Christians argue those chapters and verses are in the old testament and therefore don’t count but that is heresy. Also, there are several chapters and verses supporting slavery even in the New testament of the Bible. For example, the book of Ephesians 6:5 of the New Testament clearly states “Slaves, Obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ”. Not just that, 1 Timothy 6:1 of the New Testament also clearly states “Christians who are slaves should give their masters full respect so that the name of God and his teaching will not be shamed”. I can go on and on.

Slavery existed during the time of Jesus and continued after Jesus. Slavery got abolished nearly 2000 years after the death of Jesus. Jesus had every chance to speak against slavery. The question is, did he do it? And if Jesus did speak against slavery then why did his followers twist his words? If Jesus did speak against slavery then why does the New Testament of the Bible support slavery? And if the Bible got twisted along the way then does it make much sense for us to put our trust in it?

Now back to the question, "Is Christianity a slave religion?" Well, I am not that great with the Bible so I will leave that to the experts to answer.

Reverend Richard Furman, President of the South Carolina Baptist convention 1823 said, “The right of holding slaves is clearly established in the holy scriptures, both by precepts and by example”.

In a letter to the Emancipator in 1839, the Reverend Thomas Witherspoon of the Presbyterian church of Alabama in the USA wrote, “I draw my warrant from the scriptures of the old and new testaments to hold the slave in bondage”.

"The extracts from Holy Writ unequivocally assert the right of property in slaves"--Rev. E.D. Simms, professor, Randolph-Macon College.  I can go on and on.

So as we can see, the church and the early Christians saw nothing wrong with slavery and fully engaged themselves. Most churches and cathedrals owned several acres of slave plantations and owned several slaves. Even when slavery was abolished, most churches had to be compensated for setting their slaves free.

Yes, one of the ironies of the 1833 Slavery Abolition Act was that, it was slave owners, not the slaves, who were compensated at the emancipation of slaves. The Anglican Church received 8,823 pound sterling in compensation for its loss of over 400 slaves. The Bishop of Exeter, along with three of his colleagues received some 13,000 pounds in compensation for over 660 slaves. All these have been documented and I can go on and on.

Why so many black people love the church and the Bible? Well, that is a question I cannot answer all alone.

[racefortheironthrone]

Why People Are Wrong About the Puritans of the English Civil War and New England

Oh well, if you all insist, I suppose I can write something.

(oh good, my subtle scheme is working...)

Introduction:

So the Puritans of the English Civil War is something I studied in graduate school and found endlessly fascinating in its rich cultural complexity, but it's also a subject that is popularly wildly misunderstood because it's caught in the jaws of a pair of distorted propagandistic images.

On the one hand, because the Puritans settled colonial New England, since the late 19th century they've been wrapped up with this nationalist narrative of American exceptionalism (that provides a handy excuse for schoolteachers to avoid talking about colonial Virginia and the centrality of slavery to the origins of the United States). If you went to public school in the United States, you're familiar with the old story: the United States was founded by a people fleeing religious persecution and seeking their freedom, who founded a society based on social contracts and the idea that in the New World they were building a city on a hill blah blah America is an exceptional and perfect country that's meant to be an example to the world, and in more conservative areas the whole idea that America was founded as an explicitly Christian country and society. Then on the other hand, you have (and this is the kind of thing that you see a lot of on Tumblr) what I call the Matt Damon-in-Good-Will-Hunting, "I just read Zinn's People's History of the United States in U.S History 101 and I'm home for my first Thanksgiving since I left for colleg and I'm going to share My Opinions with Uncle Burt" approach. In this version, everything in the above nationalist narrative is revealed as a hideous lie: the Puritans are the source of everything wrong with American society, a bunch of evangelical fanatics who came to New England because they wanted to build a theocracy where they could oppress all other religions and they're the reason that abortion-banning, homophobic and transphobic evangelical Christians are running the country, they were all dour killjoys who were all hopelessly sexually repressed freaks who hated women, and the Salem Witch Trials were a thing, right?

And if anyone spares a thought to examine the role that Puritans played in the English Civil War, it basically short-hands to Oliver Cromwell is history's greatest monster, and didn't they ban Christmas?

Here's the thing, though: as I hope I've gotten across in my posts about Jan Hus, John Knox, and John Calvin, the era of the Reformation and the Wars of Religion that convulsed the Early Modern period were a time of very big personalities who were complicated and not very easy for modern audiences to understand, because of the somewhat oblique way that Early Modern people interpreted and really believed in the cultural politics of religious symbolism. So what I want to do with this post is to bust a few myths and tease out some of the complications behind the actual history of the Puritans.

Did the Puritans Experience Religious Persecution?

Yes, but that wasn't the reason they came to New England, or at the very least the two periods were divided by some decades. To start at the beginning, Puritans were pretty much just straightforward Calvinists who wanted the Church of England to be a Calvinist Church. This was a fairly mainstream position within the Anglican Church, but the "hotter sort of Protestant" who started to organize into active groups during the reigns of Elizabeth and James I were particularly sensitive to religious symbolism they (like the Hussites) felt smacked of Catholicism and especially the idea of a hierarchy where clergy were a better class of person than the laity.

So for example, Puritans really first start to emerge during the Vestments Controversy in the reign of Edward VI where Bishop Hooper got very mad that Anglican priests were wearing the cope and surplice, which he thought were Catholic ritual garments that sought to enhance priestly status and that went against the simplicity of the early Christian Church. Likewise, during the run-up to the English Civil War, the Puritans were extremely sensitive to the installation of altar rails which separated the congregation from the altar - they considered this to be once again a veneration of the clergy, but also a symbolic affirmation of the Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation.

At the same time, they were not the only religious faction within the Anglican Church - and this is where the religious persecution thing kicks in, although it should be noted that this was a fairly brief but very emotionally intense period. Archbishop William Laud was a leading High Church Episcopalian who led a faction in the Church that would become known as Laudians, and he was just as intense about his religious views as the Puritans were about his. A favorite of Charles I and a first advocate of absolutist monarchy, Laud was appointed Archbishop of Canturbury in 1630 and acted quickly to impose religious uniformity of Laudian beliefs and practices - ultimately culminating in the disastrous decision to try imposing Episcopalianism on Scotland that set off the Bishop's Wars. The Puritans were a special target of Laud's wrath: in addition to ordering the clergy to do various things offensive to Puritans that he used as a shibboleth to root out clergy with Puritan sympathies and fire them from their positions in the Church, he established official religious censors who went after Puritan writers like William Prynne for seditious libel and tortured them for their criticisms of his actions, cropping their ears and branding them with the letters SL on their faces. Bringing together the powers of Church and State, Laud used the Court of Star Chamber (a royal criminal court with no system of due process) to go after anyone who he viewed as having Puritan sympathies, imposing sentences of judicial torture along the way.

It was here that the Puritans began to make their first connections to the growing democratic movement in England that was forming in opposition to Charles I, when John Liliburne the founder of the Levellers was targeted by Laud for importing religious texts that criticized Laudianism - Laud had him repeatedly flogged for challenging the constitutionality of the Star Chamber court, and "freeborn John" became a martyr-hero to the Puritans.

When the Long Parliament met in 1640, Puritans were elected in huge numbers, motivated as they were by a combination of resistance to the absolutist monarchism of Charles I and the religious policies of Archbishop Laud - who Parliament was able to impeach and imprison in the Tower of the London in 1641. This relatively brief period of official persecution that powerfully shaped the Puritan mindset was nevertheless disconnected from the phenomena of migration to New England - which had started a decade before Laud became Archbishop of Canterbury and continued decades after his impeachment.

The Puritans Just Wanted to Oppress Everyone Else's Religion:

This is the very short-hand Howard Zinn-esque critique we often see of the Puritan project in the discourse, and while there is a grain of truth to it - in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, the Congregational Church was the official state religion, no other church could be established without permission from the Congregational Church, all residents were required to pay taxes to support the Congregational Church, and only Puritans could vote. Moreover, there were several infamous incidents where the Puritan establishment put Anne Hutchinson on trial and banished her, expelled Roger Williams, and hanged Quakers.

Here's the thing, though: during the Early Modern period, every single side of every single religious conflict wanted to establish religious uniformity and oppress the heretics: the Catholics did it to the Protestants where they could mobilize the power of the Holy Roman Emperor against the Protestant Princes, the Protestants did it right back to the Catholics when Gustavus Adolphus' armies rolled through town, the Lutherans and the Catholics did it to the Calvinists, and everybody did it to the Anabaptists.

That New England was founded as a Calvinist colony is pretty unremarkable, in the final analysis. (By the by, both Hutchinson and Williams were devout if schismatic Puritans who were firmly of the belief that the Anglican Church was a false church.) What's more interesting is how quickly the whole religious project broke down and evolved into something completely different.

Essentially, New England became a bunch of little religious communes that were all tax-funded, which is even more the case because the Congregationalist Church was a "gathered church" where the full members of the Church (who were the only people allowed to vote on matters involving the church, and were the only ones who were allowed to be given baptism and Communion, which had all kinds of knock-on effects on important social practices like marriages and burials) and were made up of people who had experienced a conversion where they can gained an assurance of salvation that they were definitely of the Elect. You became a full member by publicly sharing your story of conversion (which had a certain cultural schema of steps that were supposed to be followed) and having the other full members accept it as genuine.

This is a system that works really well to bind together a bunch of people living in a commune in the wilderness into a tight-knit community, but it broke down almost immediately in the next generation, leading to a crisis called the Half-Way Covenant.

The problem was that the second generation of Puritans - all men and women who had been baptized and raised in the Congrgeationalist Church - weren't becoming converted. Either they never had the religious awakening that their parents had had, or their narratives weren't accepted as genuine by the first generation of commune members. This meant that they couldn't hold church office or vote, and more crucially it meant that they couldn't receive the sacrament or have their own children baptized.

This seemed to suggest that, within a generation, the Congregationalist Church would essentially define itself into non-existence and between the 1640s and 1650s leading ministers recommended that each congregation (which was supposed to decide on policy questions on a local basis, remember) adopt a policy whereby the children of baptized but unconverted members could be baptized as long as they did a ceremony where they affirmed the church covenant. This proved hugely controversial and ministers and laypeople alike started publishing pamphlets, and voting in opposing directions, and un-electing ministers who decided in the wrong direction, and ultimately it kind of broke the authority of the Congregationalist Church and led to its eventual dis-establishment.

The Puritans are the Reason America is So Evangelical:

This is another area where there's a grain of truth, but ultimately the real history is way more complicated.

Almost immediately from the founding of the colony, the Puritans begin to undergo mutation from their European counterparts - to begin with, while English Puritans were Calvinists and thus believed in a Presbyterian form of church government (indeed, a faction of Puritans during the English Civil War would attempt to impose a Presbyterian Church on England.), New England Puritans almost immediately adopted a congregationalist system where each town's faithful would sign a local religious constitution, elect their own ministers, and decide on local governance issues at town meetings.

Essentially, New England became a bunch of little religious communes that were all tax-funded, which is even more the case because the Congregationalist Church was a "gathered church" where the full members of the Church (who were the only people allowed to vote on matters involving the church, and were the only ones who were allowed to be given baptism and Communion, which had all kinds of knock-on effects on important social practices like marriages and burials) and were made up of people who had experienced a conversion where they can gained an assurance of salvation that they were definitely of the Elect. You became a full member by publicly sharing your story of conversion (which had a certain cultural schema of steps that were supposed to be followed) and having the other full members accept it as genuine.

This is a system that works really well to bind together a bunch of people living in a commune in the wilderness into a tight-knit community, but it broke down almost immediately in the next generation, leading to a crisis called the Half-Way Covenant.

The problem was that the second generation of Puritans - all men and women who had been baptized and raised in the Congrgeationalist Church - weren't becoming converted. Either they never had the religious awakening that their parents had had, or their narratives weren't accepted as genuine by the first generation of commune members. This meant that they couldn't hold church office or vote, and more crucially it meant that they couldn't receive the sacrament or have their own children baptized.

This seemed to suggest that, within a generation, the Congregationalist Church would essentially define itself into non-existence and between the 1640s and 1650s leading ministers recommended that each congregation (which was supposed to decide on policy questions on a local basis, remember) adopt a policy whereby the children of baptized but unconverted members could be baptized as long as they did a ceremony where they affirmed the church covenant. This proved hugely controversial and ministers and laypeople alike started publishing pamphlets, and voting in opposing directions, and un-electing ministers who decided in the wrong direction, and accusing one another of being witches. (More on that in a bit.)

And then the Great Awakening - which to be fair, was a major evangelical effort by the Puritan Congregationalist Church, so it's not like there's no link between evangelical - which was supposed to promote Congregational piety ended up dividing the Church and pretty soon the Congregationalist Church is dis-established and it's safe to be a Quaker or even a Catholic on the streets of Boston.

But here's the thing - if we look at which denominations in the United States can draw a direct line from themselves to the Congregationalist Church of the Puritans, it's the modern Congregationalists who are entirely mainstream Protestants whose churches are pretty solidly liberal in their politics, the United Church of Christ which is extremely cultural liberal, and it's the Unitarian Universalists who are practically issued DSA memberships. (I say this with love as a fellow comrade.)

By contrast, modern evangelical Christianity (although there's a complicated distinction between evangelical and fundamentalist that I don't have time to get into) in the United States is made up of an entirely different set of denominations - here, we're talking Baptists, Pentacostalists, Methodists, non-denominational churches, and sometimes Presbyterians.

The Puritans Were Dour Killjoys Who Hated Sex:

This one owes a lot to Nathaniel Hawthorne's Scarlet Letter.

The reality is actually the opposite - for their time, the Puritans were a bunch of weird hippies. At a time when most major religious institutions tended to emphasize the sinful nature of sex and Catholicism in particular tended to emphasize the moral superiority of virginity, the Puritans stressed that sexual pleasure was a gift from God, that married couples had an obligation to not just have children but to get each other off, and both men and women could be taken to court and fined for failing to fulfill their maritial obligations.

The Puritans also didn't have much of a problem with pre-marital sex. As long as there was an absolute agreement that you were going to get married if and when someone ended up pregnant, Puritan elders were perfectly happy to let young people be young people. Indeed, despite the objection of Jonathan Edwards and others there was an (oddly similar to modern Scandinavian customs) old New England custom of "bundling," whereby a young couple would be put into bed together by their parents with a sack or bundle tied between them as a putative modesty shield, but where everyone involved knew that the young couple would remove the bundle as soon as the lights were turned out.

One of my favorite little social circumlocutions is that there was a custom of pretending that a child clearly born out of wedlock was actually just born prematurely to a bride who was clearly nine months along, leading to a rash of surprisingly large and healthy premature births being recorded in the diary of Puritan midwife Martha Ballard. Historians have even applied statistical modeling to show that about 30-40% of births in colonial America were pre-mature.

But what about non-sexual dourness? Well, here we have to understand that, while they were concerned about public morality, the Puritans were simultaneously very strict when it came to matters of religion and otherwise normal people who liked having fun. So if you go down the long list of things that Puritans banned that has landed them with a reputation as a bunch of killjoys, they usually hide some sort of religious motivation.

So for example, let's take the Puritan iconoclastic tendency to smash stained glass windows, whitewash church walls, and smash church organs during the English Civil War - all of these things have to do with a rejection of Catholicism, and in the case of church organs a belief that the only kind of music that should be allowed in church is the congregation singing psalms as an expression of social equality. At the same time, Puritans enjoyed art in a secular context and often had portraits of themselves made and paintings hung on their walls, and they owned musical instruments in their homes.

What about the wearing nothing but black clothing? See, in our time wearing nothing but black is considered rather staid (or Goth), but in the Early Modern period the dyes that were needed to produce pure black cloth were incredibly expensive - so wearing all black was a sign of status and wealth, hence why the Hapsburgs started emphasizing wearing all-black in the same period. However, your ordinary Puritan couldn't afford an all-black attire and would have worn quite colorful (but much cheaper) browns and blues and greens.

What about booze and gambling and sports and the theater and other sinful pursuits? Well, the Puritans were mostly ok with booze - every New England village had its tavern - but they did regulate how much they could serve, again because they were worried that drunkenness would lead to blasphemy. Likewise, the Puritans were mostly ok with gambling, and they didn't mind people playing sports - except that they went absolutely beserk about drinking, gambling, and sports if they happened on the Sabbath because the Puritans really cared about the Sabbath and Charles I had a habit of poking them about that issue. They were against the theater because of its association with prostitution and cross-dressing, though, I can't deny that. On the other hand, the Puritans were also morally opposed to bloodsports like bear-baiting, cock-fighting, and bare-knuckle boxing because of the violence it did to God's creatures, which I guess makes them some of the first animal rights activsts?

They Banned Christmas:

Again, this comes down to a religious thing, not a hatred of presents and trees - keep in mind that the whole presents-and-trees paradigm of Christmas didn't really exist until the 19th century and Dickens' Christmas Carol, so what we're really talking about here is a conflict over religious holidays - so what people were complaining about was not going to church an extra day in the year. I don't get it, personally.

See, the thing is that Puritans were known for being extremely close Bible readers, and one of the things that you discover almost immediately if you even cursorily read the New Testament is that Christ was clearly not born on December 25th. Which meant that the whole December 25th thing was a false religious holiday, which is why they banned it.

The Puritans Were Democrats:

One thing that I don't think Puritans get enough credit for is that, at a time when pretty much the whole of European society was some form of monarchist, the Puritans were some of the few people out there who really committed themselves to democratic principles.

As I've already said, this process starts when John Liliburne, an activist and pamphleteer who promoted the concept of universal human rights (what he called "freeborn rights"), took up the anti-Laudian cause and it continued through the mobilization of large numbers of Puritans to campaign for election to the Long Parliament.

There, not only did the Puritans vote to revenge themselves on their old enemy William Laud, but they also took part in a gradual process of Parliamentary radicalization, starting with the impeachment of Strafford as the architect of arbitrary rule, the passage of the Triennal Acts, the re-statement that non-Parliamentary taxation was illegal, the Grand Remonstrance, and the Militia Ordinance.

Then over the course of the war, Puritans served with distinction in the Parliamentary army, especially and disproportionately in the New Model Army where they beat the living hell out of the aristocratic armies of Charles I, while defying both the expectations and active interference of the House of Lords.

At this point, I should mention that during this period the Puritans divided into two main factions - Presbyterians, who developed a close political and religious alliance with the Scottish Covenanters who had secured the Presbyterian Church in Scotland during the Bishops' Wars and who were quite interested in extending an established Presbyterian Church; and Independents, who advocated local congregationalism (sound familiar) and opposed the concept of established churches.

Finally, we have the coming together of the Independents of the New Model Army and the Leveller movement - during the war, John Liliburne had served with bravery and distinction at Edgehill and Marston Moore, and personally capturing Tickhill Castle without firing a shot. His fellow Leveller Thomas Rainsborough proved a decisive cavalry commander at Naseby, Leicester, the Western Campaign, and Langport, a gifted siege commander at Bridgwater, Bristol, Berkeley Castle, Oxford, and Worcester. Thus, when it came time to hold the Putney Debates, the Independent/Leveller bloc had both credibility within the New Model Army and the only political program out there. Their proposal:

redistricting of Parliament on the basis of equal population; i.e one man, one vote.

the election of a Parliament every two years.

freedom of conscience.

equality under the law.

In the context of the 17th century, this was dangerously radical stuff and it prompted Cromwell and Fairfax into paroxyms of fear that the propertied were in danger of being swamped by democratic enthusiasm - leading to the imprisonment of Lilburne and the other Leveller leaders and ultimately the violent suppression of the Leveller rank-and-file.

As for Cromwell, well - even the Quakers produced Richard Nixon.

[propheticeve]

"Holiness Hoodoo: Rediscovering Ancestral Roots Without Jesus"

The term "Holiness Hoodoo" may leave some people puzzled, so allow me to clarify its meaning. In my view, Holiness Hoodoo represents a return to the traditional practices of my ancestral lineage, a way to decipher who I am and what my purpose entails. Many of our forebears were devout Christians, and this undeniable fact forms the backdrop of my spiritual journey. Despite the complex relationship that many Black Americans have with the Bible due to the scars of slavery, it's essential to remember that it wasn't the Bible itself that caused harm, but the people wielding it as a tool of oppression.

As I delved deeper into the realms of ancestral magic, I began to notice striking parallels with church practices. To some, I seemed too "churchy" for hoodoo, and to others, too "hoodoo" for the church—there appeared to be no middle ground. However, I've come to understand that my connection to my ancestors is the cornerstone of my spiritual practice. I've realized that perhaps the reason some individuals struggle to communicate with their spirits is that they try to venerate them through African traditions, tarot, or other methods their ancestors might not recognize.

The Bible, as a potent tool in hoodoo, is not revered because we live by its teachings but because it contains powerful scriptures. My mother, for instance, believed in Jesus, yet she was a practitioner of hoodoo—a tongue-speaking, spirit-conjuring woman. Her approach, which I now embrace, is what I refer to as "Holiness Hoodoo."

So, what does Holiness Hoodoo look like for me?

1. Setting the Atmosphere:

I play inspirational or gospel music that resonates with my specific needs, allowing it to fill my home as I clean, pray, or perform spiritual work. Gospel music serves as a direct conduit to my ancestral spirits, and sometimes, when I hear a song I haven't listened to in a while, an ancestor's presence is assured.

2. Keeping a Bible on the Altar:

While I don't read the Bible frequently, I keep it open to the Psalms as an offering to my spirits. The Bible also serves as a powerful tool of protection, and specific verses and pages can function as talismans and petitions.

3. Baptisms:

Baptism, in my lineage, is a ritual practice to wash ourselves of sins and start anew. It's not just for babies; it can also cleanse generational curses and traumas passed down from parents.

4. Shouting:

Listening to gospel music, I engage in the practice of shouting, a form of ecstatic dance that connects me with my spirits. This practice fills me with light and often results in downloads of ancestral wisdom.

5. Laying of Hands:

I perform the laying of hands, a practice I'll discuss in more detail in the future. It's distinct from Reiki and is a significant part of my spiritual tradition.

6. Fasting:

Fasting is a part of my spiritual practice, serving as a means of both elevating my spiritual consciousness and cleansing my body. I firmly believe that one's health plays a pivotal role in their spiritual journey.

Holiness Hoodoo is about preserving the traditions of our ancestors and finding connections with them. It doesn't rely on dogma or strict religious doctrine; instead, it is a pathway to tap into the wisdom and spirituality that has been passed down through generations. In this practice, there is no room for being "too churchy" or "too hoodoo"—it's about embracing the rich tapestry of our heritage and harnessing it for a profound and authentic spiritual experience.

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[apenitentialprayer]

The Christianization of African-Americans

Postcolonial American culture's preoccupation with breaking away from Europe was far removed from the situation among Africans in the United States at the time. The initial tenacity with which African Americans held onto their indigenous practices and the reluctance of many Southern white slaveholders to teach Christianity to the slaves limited the Christianizing process in the early period. Even the Great Awakening of the 1740s, which swept the country like a hurricane, failed to reach the masses of slaves. Only with the Great Western Revival at the turn of the nineteenth century did the Christianizing process gain a significant foothold among black people. The central questions at this junction are: Why did large numbers of American black people become Christians? What features of Protestant Christianity persuaded them to become Christian? The Baptist separatists and the Methodists, religious dissenters in American religious culture, gained the attention of the majority of slaves in the Christianizing process. The evangelical outlook of these denominations stressed individual experience, equality before God, and institutional autonomy. Baptism by immersion, practiced by Baptists, may indeed have reminded slaves from Nigeria and Dahomey of African river cults, but fails to fully explain the success of the Christianizing process among Africans. Black people became Christians for intellectual, existential, and political reasons. Christianity is, as Friedrich Nietzsche has taught us and liberation theologians remind us, a religion especially fitted to the oppressed. It looks at the world from the perspective of those below. The African slaves' search for identity could find historical purpose in the exodus of Israel out of slavery and personal meaning in the bold identification of Jesus Christ with the lowly and downtrodden. Christianity also is first and foremost a theodicy, a triumphant account of good over evil. The intellectual life of the African slaves in the United States —like that of all oppressed peoples— consisted primarily of reckoning with the dominant form of evil in their lives. The Christian emphasis on against-the-evidence hope for triumph over evil struck deep among many of them. The existential appeal of Christianity to black people was the stress of Protestant evangelicalism on individual experience, and especially the conversion experience. The "holy dance" of Protestant evangelical conversion experience closely resembled the "ring shout" of West African novitiate rites: both are religious forms of ecstatic bodily behavior in which everyday time is infused with meaning and value through unrestrained rejoicing. The conversion experience played a central role in the Christianizing process. It not only created deep bonds of fellowship and a reference point for self-assurance during times of doubt and distress; it also democratized and equalized the status of all before God. The conversion experience initiated a profoundly personal relationship with God, which gave slaves a special self-identity and self-esteem in stark contrast with the roles imposed upon them by American society. The primary political appeal of the Methodists and especially of the Baptists for black people was their church polity and organizational form, free from hierarchical control, open and easy access to leadership roles, and relatively loose, uncomplicated requirements for membership. The adoption of the Baptist polity by a majority of Christian slave marked a turning point in the Afro-American experience [...] Independent control over their churches promoted the proliferation of African styles and manners within the black Christian tradition and liturgy. It also produced community-minded political leaders, polished orators, and activist journalists and scholars. In fact, the unique variant of American life that we call Afro-American culture germinated in the bosom of this Afro-Christianity, in the Afro-Christian church congregations.

- Cornel West ("Race and Modernity," from his Reader, pages 61-63, 63)

[dailyanarchistposts]

A.2.20 Why are most anarchists atheists?

It is a fact that most anarchists are atheists. They reject the idea of god and oppose all forms of religion, particularly organised religion. Today, in secularised western European countries, religion has lost its once dominant place in society. This often makes the militant atheism of anarchism seem strange. However, once the negative role of religion is understood the importance of libertarian atheism becomes obvious. It is because of the role of religion and its institutions that anarchists have spent some time refuting the idea of religion as well as propagandising against it.

So why do so many anarchists embrace atheism? The simplest answer is that most anarchists are atheists because it is a logical extension of anarchist ideas. If anarchism is the rejection of illegitimate authorities, then it follows that it is the rejection of the so-called Ultimate Authority, God. Anarchism is grounded in reason, logic, and scientific thinking, not religious thinking. Anarchists tend to be sceptics, and not believers. Most anarchists consider the Church to be steeped in hypocrisy and the Bible a work of fiction, riddled with contradictions, absurdities and horrors. It is notorious in its debasement of women and its sexism is infamous. Yet men are treated little better. Nowhere in the bible is there an acknowledgement that human beings have inherent rights to life, liberty, happiness, dignity, fairness, or self-government. In the bible, humans are sinners, worms, and slaves (figuratively and literally, as it condones slavery). God has all the rights, humanity is nothing.

This is unsurprisingly, given the nature of religion. Bakunin put it best:

"The idea of God implies the abdication of human reason and justice; it is the most decisive negation of human liberty, and necessarily ends in the enslavement of mankind, both in theory and in practice. “Unless, then, we desire the enslavement and degradation of mankind .. . we may not, must not make the slightest concession either to the God of theology or to the God of metaphysics. He who, in this mystical alphabet, begins with A will inevitably end with Z; he who desires to worship God must harbour no childish illusions about the matter, but bravely renounce his liberty and humanity. “If God is, man is a slave; now, man can and must be free; then, God does not exist.” [God and the State, p. 25]

For most anarchists, then, atheism is required due to the nature of religion. “To proclaim as divine all that is grand, just, noble, and beautiful in humanity,” Bakunin argued, “is to tacitly admit that humanity of itself would have been unable to produce it — that is, that, abandoned to itself, its own nature is miserable, iniquitous, base, and ugly. Thus we come back to the essence of all religion — in other words, to the disparagement of humanity for the greater glory of divinity.” As such, to do justice to our humanity and the potential it has, anarchists argue that we must do without the harmful myth of god and all it entails and so on behalf of “human liberty, dignity, and prosperity, we believe it our duty to recover from heaven the goods which it has stolen and return them to earth.” [Op. Cit., p. 37 and p. 36]

As well as the theoretical degrading of humanity and its liberty, religion has other, more practical, problems with it from an anarchist point of view. Firstly, religions have been a source of inequality and oppression. Christianity (like Islam), for example, has always been a force for repression whenever it holds any political or social sway (believing you have a direct line to god is a sure way of creating an authoritarian society). The Church has been a force of social repression, genocide, and the justification for every tyrant for nearly two millennia. When given the chance it has ruled as cruelly as any monarch or dictator. This is unsurprising:

“God being everything, the real world and man are nothing. God being truth, justice, goodness, beauty, power and life, man is falsehood, iniquity, evil, ugliness, impotence, and death. God being master, man is the slave. Incapable of finding justice, truth, and eternal life by his own effort, he can attain them only through a divine revelation. But whoever says revelation, says revealers, messiahs, prophets, priests, and legislators inspired by God himself; and these, as the holy instructors of humanity, chosen by God himself to direct it in the path of salvation, necessarily exercise absolute power. All men owe them passive and unlimited obedience; for against the divine reason there is no human reason, and against the justice of God no terrestrial justice holds.” [Bakunin, Op. Cit., p. 24]

Christianity has only turned tolerant and peace-loving when it is powerless and even then it has continued its role as apologist for the powerful. This is the second reason why anarchists oppose the church for when not being the source of oppression, the church has justified it and ensured its continuation. It has kept the working class in bondage for generations by sanctioning the rule of earthly authorities and teaching working people that it is wrong to fight against those same authorities. Earthly rulers received their legitimisation from the heavenly lord, whether political (claiming that rulers are in power due to god’s will) or economic (the rich having been rewarded by god). The bible praises obedience, raising it to a great virtue. More recent innovations like the Protestant work ethic also contribute to the subjugation of working people.

That religion is used to further the interests of the powerful can quickly be seen from most of history. It conditions the oppressed to humbly accept their place in life by urging the oppressed to be meek and await their reward in heaven. As Emma Goldman argued, Christianity (like religion in general) “contains nothing dangerous to the regime of authority and wealth; it stands for self-denial and self-abnegation, for penance and regret, and is absolutely inert in the face of every [in]dignity, every outrage imposed upon mankind.” [Red Emma Speaks, p. 234]

Thirdly, religion has always been a conservative force in society. This is unsurprising, as it bases itself not on investigation and analysis of the real world but rather in repeating the truths handed down from above and contained in a few holy books. Theism is then “the theory of speculation” while atheism is “the science of demonstration.” The “one hangs in the metaphysical clouds of the Beyond, while the other has its roots firmly in the soil. It is the earth, not heaven, which man must rescue if he is truly to be saved.” Atheism, then, “expresses the expansion and growth of the human mind” while theism “is static and fixed.” It is “the absolutism of theism, its pernicious influence upon humanity, its paralysing effect upon thought and action, which Atheism is fighting with all its power.” [Emma Goldman, Op. Cit., p. 243, p. 245 and pp. 246–7]

As the Bible says, “By their fruits shall ye know them.” We anarchists agree but unlike the church we apply this truth to religion as well. That is why we are, in the main, atheists. We recognise the destructive role played by the Church, and the harmful effects of organised monotheism, particularly Christianity, on people. As Goldman summaries, religion “is the conspiracy of ignorance against reason, of darkness against light, of submission and slavery against independence and freedom; of the denial of strength and beauty, against the affirmation of the joy and glory of life.” [Op. Cit., p. 240]

So, given the fruits of the Church, anarchists argue that it is time to uproot it and plant new trees, the trees of reason and liberty.

That said, anarchists do not deny that religions contain important ethical ideas or truths. Moreover, religions can be the base for strong and loving communities and groups. They can offer a sanctuary from the alienation and oppression of everyday life and offer a guide to action in a world where everything is for sale. Many aspects of, say, Jesus’ or Buddha’s life and teachings are inspiring and worth following. If this were not the case, if religions were simply a tool of the powerful, they would have long ago been rejected. Rather, they have a dual-nature in that contain both ideas necessary to live a good life as well as apologetics for power. If they did not, the oppressed would not believe and the powerful would suppress them as dangerous heresies.

And, indeed, repression has been the fate of any group that has preached a radical message. In the middle ages numerous revolutionary Christian movements and sects were crushed by the earthly powers that be with the firm support of the mainstream church. During the Spanish Civil War the Catholic church supported Franco’s fascists, denouncing the killing of pro-Franco priests by supporters of the republic while remaining silent about Franco’s murder of Basque priests who had supported the democratically elected government (Pope John Paul II is seeking to turn the dead pro-Franco priests into saints while the pro-Republican priests remain unmentioned). The Archbishop of El Salvador, Oscar Arnulfo Romero, started out as a conservative but after seeing the way in which the political and economic powers were exploiting the people became their outspoken champion. He was assassinated by right-wing paramilitaries in 1980 because of this, a fate which has befallen many other supporters of liberation theology, a radical interpretation of the Gospels which tries to reconcile socialist ideas and Christian social thinking.

Nor does the anarchist case against religion imply that religious people do not take part in social struggles to improve society. Far from it. Religious people, including members of the church hierarchy, played a key role in the US civil rights movement of the 1960s. The religious belief within Zapata’s army of peasants during the Mexican revolution did not stop anarchists taking part in it (indeed, it had already been heavily influenced by the ideas of anarchist militant Ricardo Flores Magon). It is the dual-nature of religion which explains why many popular movements and revolts (particularly by peasants) have used the rhetoric of religion, seeking to keep the good aspects of their faith will fighting the earthly injustice its official representatives sanctify. For anarchists, it is the willingness to fight against injustice which counts, not whether someone believes in god or not. We just think that the social role of religion is to dampen down revolt, not encourage it. The tiny number of radical priests compared to those in the mainstream or on the right suggests the validity of our analysis.

It should be stressed that anarchists, while overwhelmingly hostile to the idea of the Church and an established religion, do not object to people practising religious belief on their own or in groups, so long as that practice doesn’t impinge on the liberties of others. For example, a cult that required human sacrifice or slavery would be antithetical to anarchist ideas, and would be opposed. But peaceful systems of belief could exist in harmony within in anarchist society. The anarchist view is that religion is a personal matter, above all else — if people want to believe in something, that’s their business, and nobody else’s as long as they do not impose those ideas on others. All we can do is discuss their ideas and try and convince them of their errors.

To end, it should noted that we are not suggesting that atheism is somehow mandatory for an anarchist. Far from it. As we discuss in section A.3.7, there are anarchists who do believe in god or some form of religion. For example, Tolstoy combined libertarian ideas with a devote Christian belief. His ideas, along with Proudhon’s, influences the Catholic Worker organisation, founded by anarchists Dorothy Day and Peter Maurin in 1933 and still active today. The anarchist activist Starhawk, active in the current anti-globalisation movement, has no problems also being a leading Pagan. However, for most anarchists, their ideas lead them logically to atheism for, as Emma Goldman put it, “in its negation of gods is at the same time the strongest affirmation of man, and through man, the eternal yea to life, purpose, and beauty.” [Red Emma Speaks, p. 248]

[lenbryant]

(LATimes) In ‘The Exvangelicals,’ Sarah McCammon tells the tale of losing her religion

Sarah McCammon.

(Kara Frame)

Book Review

The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living, and Leaving the White Evangelical Church

By Sarah McCammon St. Martin’s Press: 310 pages, $30

The term “exvangelical,” a reference to disillusioned evangelicals after Donald Trump commandeered 81% of the white evangelical vote in 2016, has always struck me as contrived and a tad too cute. It’s a variation — a reversal, I suppose — of Ronald Reagan’s famous lament that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party; the Democratic Party left him.

Although the author, a national political correspondent for NPR, purports to be telling “the stories of millions of Americans,” this book is really autobiography with a few cameo roles. Nevertheless, McCammon’s history is captivating and well told: a childhood cosseted in the evangelical subculture, with schools and sermons trumpeting the Christian nationalism that’s fueling so many culture wars now.

In “The Exvangelicals,” McCammon’s evolution unfolds as a series of steps, chapter by chapter, on a descending staircase toward disillusionment. 

She begins by questioning the conviction that only Christians (by which evangelicals mean evangelicals) go to heaven, then rejects creationism and embraces the veracity of science before moving on to such matters as female submission and sexual identities.

“Having a female body came with heavy responsibility and fear,” she writes, referring to admonitions at home and school to dress modestly lest she inflame unholy passions.

Perhaps not surprisingly, McCammon devotes a great deal of attention to her own sexual awakening, much of which occurred at the small evangelical college she attended (which, as it happens, is where I was an undergraduate a couple of decades earlier). The “purity culture” of evangelicalism demanded that women be demure, while young men were cast as warriors and defenders.

“On our wedding night, we didn’t know how to have sex,” one informant tells McCammon, who adds, “That experience is not unusual for young evangelicals who begin their honeymoons with little or no sexual experience, and, often, years of sexual shame.”

Many exvangelicals testify to enduring religious trauma, some of it caused by corporal punishment or perhaps fear of the Rapture, the belief popular among evangelicals that Jesus will return soon to collect the faithful and those “left behind” will face terrible judgment. One psychotherapist cataloged the symptoms of religious trauma as “anxiety and depression, chronic pain and intestinal symptoms, feelings of shame and a tendency toward social isolation.”

Religious trauma drives many evangelicals, including the author and one of her siblings, into therapy and out of evangelicalism, though not necessarily in that order.

McCammon is especially effective at juxtaposing the condemnations of Bill Clinton’s philandering with full-throated defenses of Donald Trump’s sexual predations — the condemnations and the defenses coming from the same evangelical sources with no apparent self-awareness and no hint of irony. Even more devastating is the author’s examination of her Christian school textbooks and recollections of classroom conversations in those schools regarding slavery. One textbook conjured the halcyon days on the plantation — “Southern weather was warm and the slaves stayed healthy” — and a student recalled his teacher’s remark that bondage “was a pretty good gig for them; they got free housing and all their meals were taken care of.”

If historical accuracy and context are missing from these textbooks, however, those qualities are also lacking in McCammon’s narrative, although her missteps are not nearly so egregious. She talks about evangelicalism reaching its peak of influence “beginning in the late 1980s,” ignoring the fact that evangelicals set the nation’s social and political agenda for much of the 19th century, especially in the years before the Civil War, albeit with very different sensibilities.

The author might have explored how white evangelicalism was different before its hard-right turn in defense of racial segregation in the late 1970s. Might an understanding of evangelicalism’s generally laudable social agenda in centuries past — abolition, prison reform, public education, even women’s suffrage were all evangelical concerns — have provided McCammon and her compatriots with a standard to which they could appeal in their quest to reform their churches?

As in many coming-of-age narratives, those who leave the safety of the subculture rarely have smooth landings. McCammon’s marriage to a classmate three months after their college graduation “felt awkward and surprisingly lonely,” she writes; it ended in divorce. The author tells of her parental-enforced estrangement from her grandfather because he was gay. The two mended their relationship and became close during the final years of his life, although McCammon’s overtures to him created a rift with her mother and father.

The author’s schoolmate, Jeff, came out as gay, thereby rupturing the relationship with his parents, who refused to acknowledge his husband at their son’s graduation from seminary. “I am not an evangelical in large part because there’s no room in most of American evangelicalism for queer people,” he told the author. “I’m angry about that. I’m angry and sad for the kids that are still in evangelical churches who are being told they can’t be themselves.”

All these factors and more, together with what many evangelicals regard as the hypocritical embrace of Trump, are leading some evangelicals out of the fold. But leaving itself is traumatic, both for the individuals and for family members left behind.

McCammon quotes a South Dakota exvangelical’s angry letter to Focus on the Family, the organization partially responsible for the subculture veering to the right in the decades surrounding the turn of the 21st century. She cultivated a deep Christian faith outside of evangelicalism. “But thanks to you,” she wrote to the group, “my mother believed I was living a sinful lifestyle because of how I voted.”

“Leaving conservative evangelicalism means giving up the security of silencing some of life’s most vexing and anxiety-inducing questions with a set of ‘answers’ — about the purpose of life, human origins, and what happens after death,” McCammon writes. “It also means losing an entire community of people who could once be relied on to help celebrate weddings and new babies, organize meal trains when you’re sick and bereaved, and provide a built-in network of support and socialization around a shared set of expectations and ideals.”

McCammon insists that the challenge for her and others is to define themselves in positive rather than negative terms — they do not want to be known for what they are fleeing — in which case the label “exvangelical” isn’t exactly helpful. Nonetheless, these “expatriates” are finding safety, or at least comfort, in numbers.

“Many of us who’ve been cast out are surveying the wilderness around us,” she writes, “and finding that we’re anything but alone.”

Randall Balmer teaches religion at Dartmouth College. His most recent book is “Saving Faith: How American Christianity Can Reclaim Its Prophetic Voice.”

[officialyourdailyinspiration]

Simon of Cyrene, an African and the father of Alexander and Rufus. Carried the cross Christ would be crucified upon when Jesus became too weak to continue under its weight. Simon of Cyrene is mentioned in the Gospels of Matthew, Mark and Luke. Simon's son Rufus may have been the same man the Apostle Paul greets in his letter to Rome (the biblical Epistle of Romans), whom he calls “chosen in the Lord” and whose mother “has been a mother to me, too” (Romans 16:13). The Christian faith has always included Africans. By contrast a faith such as Mormonism didn't even allow Africans or non-white people to serve their church in leadership roles or receive "blessings" until a special "revelation from God" in 1978 instructed the church to start including them.

Below is one of Ethiopia's ancient "rock churches". Following the death and resurrection of Jesus, Ethiopia was one of the first nations in the world to build Christian churches and follow the teachings of Jesus Christ. More than 650 years before Mohammad was even born, Ethiopian Christians were singing praises to God the Father, His Son Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Islamic invaders attacked and enslaved Christian Africa in the years between their prophet's establishment of Islam and the early middle-ages, forcing Christian Africans to convert to Islam or die by the sword. Many chose to die. To this day Islam still preys on the people of Africa, giving them the choice of death, slavery or conversion.

Most people think Slavery ended in 1865. It still exists. These are black Africans in a slave market in Libya. Muslim nations still have a brisk slave trade and hundreds of thousands of black Africans are kidnapped, tortured and sold on a daily basis with the full blessing of Islamic mufti's and Islamic governments. The Western World doesn't seem to care very much because the west wants the oil these countries produce. How much is the life of a black slave in the Islamic world? About $400 U.S. dollars for a "healthy" young male.

[orthodoxydaily]

Saints&Reading; Wednesday, April 10, 2024

march 27_april 10

VENERABLE HESYCHIUS OF JERUSALEM (C.408)

He was a priest-monk renowned in the Eastern Church as a theologian, biblical commentator, and preacher. He played a prominent role in the 5th-century controversy on the nature of Christ and was acclaimed as having annotated the whole of sacred Scripture.

Serving as a priest in the church in Jerusalem c. 412, Hesychius gained repute as a theologian and catechist so that by 429, he was recognized by chroniclers and the Orthodox Mēnologion (lives of the saints liturgically arranged by month) as the pre-eminent biblical interpreter and teacher of the church in Jerusalem and Palestine.

Most of Hesychius’ writings have been lost, although scholarship in the second half of the 20th century continues to identify more of his works hidden among Greek manuscripts and Latin translations. His biblical commentaries include interpretations of the Old Testament books of Leviticus, Job, Isaiah, and Ezekiel. A celebrated moralistic annotation on the Psalms that had long been attributed to the 4th-century spokesman for orthodoxy, Athanasius of Alexandria, is now acknowledged as Hesychius’. Some earlier commentaries of probable authenticity contain germinal terminology of the heterodox Nestorians.

As a biblical exegete, Hesychius generally followed the allegorical method of the 3rd-century Christian theologian Origen of Alexandria. Hesychius’ preoccupation with symbolism led him to deny that a literal meaning could be found for every sentence in the Scriptures. In order to avoid heretical interpretations of Scripture, he rejected such philosophical terms as person, essence, or substance to express doctrine on the nature of Christ. On this point, he allowed only the term logos sarkotheis (“the word made flesh”), a biblical concept. Against the diminution of Christ’s divinity by Arius and his Antiochene followers, he veered toward the view of the Monophysites.

Credited with the earliest known liturgical addresses on the Virgin Mary, Hesychius also wrote a church history after 428 that controverted Nestorianism and other heretical beliefs. This text was incorporated into the second Council of Constantinople proceedings in 553. The works of Hesychius were published in the series Patrologia Graeca, J.-P. Migne (ed.), vol. 27, 55, and 93 (1866).

Source: Encyclopedia Britannica

THE MONKMARTYR EUSTRATIUS OF THE KIEV NEAR CAVE (1096)

Martyr Eustratius of the Caves was born in the eleventh century at Kiev into a wealthy family. As an adult, he received monastic tonsure at the Kiev Caves monastery, after giving away all his possesions to the poor. Saint Eustratius humbly underwent obediences at the monastery, strictly fulfilling the rule of prayer and passing his days in fasting and vigilance.

In 1096 the Polovetsians captured Kiev and ravaged the monastery of the Caves, doing away with many of the monks. Saint Eustratius was taken into captivity, and was sold into slavery with thirty monastic laborers and twenty inhabitants of Kiev to a certain Jew living in Korsun.

The impious Jew tried to make the captives deny Christ, threatening to kill those who refused by starving them. Saint Eustratius encouraged and exhorted his brother Christians, “Brothers! Let none of us who are baptized and believe in Christ betray the vows made at Baptism. Christ has regenerated us through water and the Spirit. He has freed us from the curse of the Law by His Blood, and He has made us heirs of His Kingdom. If we live, we shall live for the Lord. If we die, we shall die in the Lord and inherit eternal life.”

Inspired by the saint’s words, the captives resolved to die of starvation, rather than renounce Christ, Who is the food and drink of Eternal Life. Exhausted by hunger and thirst, some captives perished after three days, some after four days, and some after seven days. Saint Eustratius remained alive for fourteen days, since he was accustomed to fasting from his youth. Suffering from hunger, he still did not touch food nor water. The impious Jew, seeing that he had lost the money he had paid for the captives, decided to take revenge on the holy monk.

The radiant Feast of the Resurrection of Christ drew near, and the Jewish slave owner was celebrating the Jewish Passover with his companions. He decided to crucify Saint Eustratius. The cruel tormentors mocked the saint, offering to let him share their Passover meal. The Martyr replied, “The Lord has now bestown a great grace upon me. He has permitted me to suffer on a cross for His Name just as He suffered.” The saint also predicted a horrible death for the Jew.

Hearing this, the enraged Jew grabbed a spear and stabbed Saint Eustratius on the cross. The martyr’s body was taken down from the cross and thrown into the sea. Christian believers long searched for the holy relics of the martyr, but were not able to find them. But through the Providence of God the incorrupt relics were found in a cave and worked many miracles. Later, they were transferred to the Near Caves of the Kiev Caves monastery.

The prediction of the holy Martyr Eustratius that his blood would be avenged was fulfilled soon after his death. The Byzantine Emperor issued a decree expelling all Jews from Korsun, depriving them of their property, and putting their elders to death for torturing Christians. The Jew who crucified Saint Eustratius was hanged on a tree, receiving just punishment for his wickedness.

Source: Orthodox Church in America_OCA

ISAIAH 26:21-27:9

21 For behold, the Lord comes out of His place To punish the earth's inhabitants for their iniquity; The earth will also disclose her blood, And will no longer cover her slain.

1 In that day the Lord with His severe sword, great and strong, Will punish Leviathan the fleeing serpent, Leviathan that twisted serpent; And He will slay the reptile that is in the sea. 2 In that day sing to her, “A vineyard of red wine! 3 I, the Lord, keep it, I water it every moment; Lest any hurt it, I keep it night and day. 4 Fury is not in Me. Who would set briers and thorns Against Me in battle? I would go through them, I would burn them together. 5 Or let him take hold of My strength, That he may make peace with Me; And he shall make peace with Me.” 6 Those who come He shall cause to take root in Jacob; Israel shall blossom and bud, And fill the face of the world with fruit. 7 Has He struck Israel as He struck those who struck him? Or has He been slain according to the slaughter of those who were slain by Him? 8 In measure, by sending it away, You contended with it. He removes it with His rough wind on the day of the east wind. 9

Therefore, by this, Jacob's iniquity will be covered; and this is all the fruit of taking away his sin: When he makes all the stones of the altar like chalkstones that are beaten to dust, wooden images and incense altars shall not stand.

GENESIS 9:18-10:1

18 Now the sons of Noah who went out of the ark were Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And Ham was the father of Canaan. 19 These three were the sons of Noah, and from these the whole earth was populated. 20 And Noah began to be a farmer, and he planted a vineyard. 21 Then he drank of the wine and was drunk, and became uncovered in his tent. 22 And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brothers outside. 23 But Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it on both their shoulders, and went backward and covered the nakedness of their father. Their faces were turned away, and they did not see their father’s nakedness. 24 So Noah awoke from his wine and knew what his younger son had done to him. 25 Then he said: “Cursed be Canaan; A servant of servants He shall be to his brethren.” 26 And he said: “Blessed be the Lord, The God of Shem, And may Canaan be his servant. 27 May God enlarge Japheth, And may he dwell in the tents of Shem; And may Canaan be his servant.” 28 And Noah lived after the flood three hundred and fifty years. 29 So all the days of Noah were nine hundred and fifty years; and he died.

1 Now this is the genealogy of the sons of Noah: Shem, Ham, and Japheth. And sons were born to them after the flood.

[futurebird]

Errors and Bias in State-Sponsored Summer Teacher Training

This summer in Florida the governor, Ron DeSantis, enacted the next part in his plan to mutilate the public education system. There were many issues with this teacher training. Notably a focus on "originalism" as the only correct way to read the constitution and a rejection of strict separation of church and state. This framing of history is tailored to support right-wing politics and Christian Nationalism. The presentations included slides for teaching “Qualities of an Upright and Desirable Citizen” and a section titled “Misconception: The Founders desired strict separation of church and state and the Founders only wanted to protect Freedom of worship.” (Focus on "what the founders want" and "what the founders could imagine" is baked in to this framing. Even then this is hardly an area of consensus among historians.) I'd like to focus on how slavery was presented. Very little was said to teachers about slavery at the training. So, what was said is even more important. The little information presented was selective, using intentional errors to push an ideological narrative. Consider this slide from the teacher training Slave owners Washington and Jefferson are selected as the best people from their time to articulate "Opposition to Slavery" (couldn't think think of anyone better to quote on this topic? anyone more relevant? Maybe someone who didn't have a vested interest in slavery?):

The quote attributed to Washington is mangled! Washington never even said this quote as presented. He said something similar, true, but the tone of the real quote is very different.

" ... abolished by law." should be " ... abolished by slow, sure, & imperceptable degrees." (source) This is, presumably, the very best quote they could find from Washington. Another slide on slavery from the teacher training:

No major factual errors in this one, but factual errors aren't the only way to introduce bias. Considering how little was said about slavery what impression would these facts leave? Why is it important to mention that the number of slaves "increased in America through birth?" Is the implication that being born into slavery is a different kind of moral evil than being trafficked directly from Africa? Teachers in FL (and all states) should absolutely teach about these slides. In media literacy context of course! It's possible to push an agenda in many ways. By selecting what to present and what to ignore, through inaccuracies, by framing statistics in a misleading manner and placing facts together to lead the reader to an unspoken conclusion. This is terrifying. It joins the attacks on LGBTQ communities and especially the eliminationist rhetoric and legislation targeting trans people. Florida is going in a very dangerous direction. Ultimately, the plan is to drag the whole country along with them. I firmly believe we can stop this from happening, but I do not think it will be easy. Sources:

New Florida teacher training downplays role of slavery in U.S. history

Florida curriculum trainings show teachers how to make students ‘desirable citizens’

New Florida curriculum training goes from Civil War to Civil Rights, skips over Reconstruction

‘Mind-blowing what they tried to convince us of’: Florida teachers on new, ‘very skewed’ curriculum

[howwelldoyouknowyourmoon]

CIA, Moonies Cooperate in Sandinista War

▲ Contras in Nicaragua

Washington Post page E-15 (and Indiana Gazette)

August 16, 1984 by Jack Anderson

In the Central American hinterlands, it is sometimes difficult to distinguish CIA operatives from the Rev. Sun Myung Moon’s disciples. They appear to be working in harness against the communist-tainted Sandinista regime in Nicaragua.

This troubles at least one Pentagon analyst, now stationed in Korea, who has warned the White House that the CIA-Moonie connection could cause possible political damage to President Reagan’s re-election campaign.

The analyst’s unofficial memo, “Potential Problems,” has been slipped to my associate Donald Goldberg.

“Current Moonie involvement with government officials, contractors and grantees [in Central America] could create a major scandal,” the memo warns. “If their activities and role become public knowledge, it will unite both the left and the right in attacking the administration.”

The memo continues: “If efforts are not taken to stop their growing influence and weed out current Moonie involvement in government, the president stands a good chance of being portrayed in the media as a poor, naive incompetent who is strong on ideology and weak on common sense. …

“The likelihood of a reporter or a Democratic staff member piecing the total picture together is too great to be neglected. Any thought that this festering problem will go away if ignored is foolish.”

The “total picture” of Moon’s activities in Latin America is not clear. But there is no doubt that the Korean messiah – now in prison for income tax evasion [and document forgery and perjury] – has established a solid presence in the region, with ties to right-wing groups and U.S.-supported guerrillas.

My associate John Lee Anderson reports from Central America that CAUSA international, Moon’s political front, has representatives working in programs that help the CIA in its “contra” war against the Sandinista government.

CAUSA maintains a publicity office in Tegucigalpa, the Honduran capital, but its principal activities are in the field. CAUSA provides cash and other aid to Honduran-based Nicaraguan contras and Honduran right-wing political groups. Many anti-Sandinista guerrillas wear red CAUSA T-shirts with a map of the world on them.

But CAUSA and its affiliate, the Refugee Relief Freedom Foundation, provide more than T-shirts to rebel groups. They also funnel supplies to refugee families in and near contra camps and pay for trips by rebel leaders to the United States.

One contra leader, Fernando “El Negro” Chamorro, told my associate that as early as 1981, CAUSA representatives sent him on an all-expenses paid trip to the United States to try to unify the Nicaraguan exile groups.

The airlift of supplies to the rebels by Moon’s Unification Church has escalated since congress cut off CIA funding for the contras. The administration has been attempting to “privatize” its war against the Sandinistas and is apparently willing to work with Moon’s people.

Footnote: A Unification Church official denied that the church is engaged in any but religious activities in Central America.

––––––––––––––––––––––––

“The UC is truly anti-Christian” and produces “a species of material and spiritual slavery.” Catholic Bishops in Honduras

Jorge Guldenzoph, deeply involved with CAUSA and Sun Myung Moon’s Unification Church, given 10 years in jail for torturing

The Unification Church and the KCIA – ‘Privatizing’ covert action: the case of the UC

Sun Myung Moon organization activities in Central & South America

Introduction

‘Illegal Aliens Joining Moonies’ – The Pittsburg Press

Moon’s ‘Cause’ Takes Aim At Communism in the Americas – Washington Post

Moon in Latin America: Building the Bases of a World Organisation – Guardian

Guatemala

Nicaragua

Honduras

Costa Rica

Bolivia

Uruguay

Paraguay

Brazil

[ausetkmt]

Introduction

For most of the past two millennia, Christian churches have not only accepted slavery, but have also participated in the slave trade and owned human property. The ethics of Christian slaveholding, however, have changed significantly. While Christians owned other Christians without controversy during the late ancient period, Christian churches began to forbid that practice over time. By the early modern period, it was considered taboo for Christians to own other Christians, although the practice sometimes continued illegally. While some individual Christians, including ministers and members of the clergy, questioned the legitimacy of slavery during the early modern period, it was not until the 18th century that a small minority of Christian churches began to assert an abolitionist stance.

Even then, it was deeply contested. For the majority of the early modern period, most Christian churches—both Catholic and Protestant—supported slavery and benefited from the institution. Even the Quakers (Society of Friends), who were leaders in the abolitionist movement, took a century to disown enslavers from their congregations. In the United States, many Christian denominations split on the issue of slavery in the 19th century, and Christian ministers and missionaries developed robust defenses of slavery based on Christian scripture and proslavery theology.

Enslaved and free Black Christians were the most ardent abolitionists, and they drew on scripture to support antislavery and abolition. While a significant amount of scholarship has debated whether Christian churches were pro- or anti-slavery, some of the most exciting research about the church and slavery has focused on why enslaved people became Christian and how they used the bureaucracy of the church to advocate for their rights and to protect their communities.

Much of this scholarship has emerged from a Latin American context, where archival records are more robust, but there are also important studies focusing on Black churches in the North America, especially the role of the African Methodist Episcopal (AME) and other African American–led churches. Within this area, scholars debate the meaning of conversion as well as the relationship between African religions and Black Christianity. Recent scholarship has emphasized that Africans and their descendants were not passive recipients of Christianity.

Rather, many enslaved men and women actively sought out baptism and used church institutions not only as a place of worship, but also as a way to protect themselves and their families. Another significant area of research has examined the relationship between the church, slavery, and race. Scholars have demonstrated how European Christians drew on categories of religious difference as they developed new racial categories. They have shown how categories like “Whiteness” and “purity of blood” were transformed within the context of slavery, as enslavers sought to reconcile slaveholding with Christian practice.

General Overviews

As Christian nations began to build empires across the Atlantic, the pope condoned the enslavement of Africans as long as certain conditions were met. A century later, Protestant nations followed Catholic lead in creating colonial slave societies in the Americas, although they developed different laws and practices related to slavery and Christianity. Blackburn 1997 provides an overview of the shifting relationship between slavery and Christian churches in European empires, while Davis 1966 is a classic study of slavery from Antiquity to the early modern period.

Over the past decades, scholars have sought to understand the history of the church and slavery from the perspectives of non-Europeans, especially Africans and Native Americans. Sanneh 2006 and Gray 2012 examine the history of Christianity in Africa, focusing on the role of African Christians. Johnson 2015 is a wide-ranging study of the relationship between African American religions (including Christianity), slavery, and colonialism, while Frey and Wood 1998 is an important survey of African American Protestantism in the British Atlantic world. Gin Lum and Harvey 2018 contains several essays relevant to the study of religion, race, and slavery. Reséndez 2016 explores the under-examined history of Native American enslavement.

Blackburn, Robin. The Making of New World Slavery: From the Baroque to the Modern, 1492–1800. London and New York: Verso, 1997. Blackburn examines the Old World foundations for American slavery. While not the focus of his study, Christian churches play a central role in creating a precedent and a legal justification for slavery in the New World.

Davis, David Brion. The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1966. The first in David Brion Davis’s classic trilogy about slavery and abolition. Davis examines the ancient history of slavery and traces the relationship between slavery and the church in Europe and the Atlantic world.

Frey, Sylvia, and Betty Wood. Come Shouting to Zion: African American Protestantism in the American South and British Caribbean to 1830. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1998. An important survey of Afro-Protestantism in British America and the early United States. Early chapters cover the history of Catholicism in Africa and the persistence of African religious traditions under slavery in the Americas. Later chapters cover Protestant missionary efforts, and the expansion of Afro-Protestantism after the Great Awakening.

Gin Lum, Kathryn, and Paul Harvey, eds. The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Race in American History. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018. An excellent edited volume with over thirty essays, covering race and religion from the colonial period until the 2020s. Several essays are relevant for discussions of the church and slavery.

Gray, Richard. Christianity, the Papacy, and Mission in Africa. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 2012. A posthumously published set of essays. Gray’s overarching argument is that African Christians played a central role in initiating papal interest and involvement in sub-Saharan Africa. Several essays touch on the history of slavery and the slave trade.

Johnson, Sylvester. African American Religions, 1500–2000. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2015. DOI: 10.1017/CBO9781139027038While not focusing exclusively on the church or Christianity, Johnson’s synthesis of five hundred years of African American religions is an indispensable study that traces the relationship between Black religion, slavery, racism, and colonialism within a transatlantic frame.

Lampe, Armando, ed. Christianity in the Caribbean: Essays on Church History. Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 2001. A helpful overview of the relationship between the church and slavery in the Caribbean, with essays on Catholic and Protestant churches in different imperial and national settings.

Reséndez, Andrés. The Other Slavery: The Uncovered Story of Indian Enslavement in America. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2016. The history of Native American enslavement has long been under-examined, largely because indigenous slavery was illegal for most of colonial American history. This study does not focus on the church explicitly, but the relationship between Catholicism and Indian slavery is an important theme.

Sanneh, Lamin. “Christianity in Africa.” In The Cambridge History of Christianity. Edited by Stewart Brown and Timothy Tackett, 411–432. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Sanneh’s survey traces the changing role of Christianity—both Catholic and Protestant—in West and East Africa, focusing on the role of Christian missions and the impact of slavery and colonialism

Abolition of Slavery

Michael Guasco, Matthew Wyman-McCarthy

Subject: Atlantic History »

Date Added: 2010-05-10

Abolition of SlaveryIntroductionThe abolition of slavery in the Atlantic world occurred during the 19th century, but its origins are generally recogni...

Abolitionism and Africa

Bronwen Everill

Subject: Atlantic History »

Date Added: 2016-02-25

Abolitionism and AfricaIntroductionFrom the beginning of the organized abolition campaigns in the Atlantic world in the 1780s, antislavery campaigners...

Africa and the Atlantic World

David Northrup

Subject: Atlantic History »

Date Added: 2010-05-10

Africa and the Atlantic World Introduction Africa from Morocco to the Cape of Good Hope experienced new contacts with Europeans during the...

African American Religions

Stefania Capone

Subject: Atlantic History »

Date Added: 2011-08-26

African American Religions Introduction Since its beginnings, the study of African American religions has combined anthropological and histori...

African Religion and Culture

David Northrup

Subject: Atlantic History »

Date Added: 2010-05-10

African Religion and Culture Introduction Africa has been home to a great variety of religious and other cultural practices and beliefs, i...

[lunarsilkscreen]

Comedy, Prophets, and the Bible

Humor is an important facet of life. Why does it seem like biblical study is devoid of it?

Some of the subject matter in the Bible is not very funny. Slavery, Crucifixion, Being eaten by a whale and surviving.

I don't know if service has changed; but service was always a somber thing to do. You sit and listen to a preacher; and sit quietly in contemplation, instead of anything else you could be doing.

Quietly relearning the same three passages; and zoning out until the community notes.

That's not quite true, because some services have excitement, performance, and sometimes dancing. But those are the "wrong kind of services" to the more snooty religious people.

What point does religious mass serve?

The point of religious mass is serveral-fold. To teach people is one.

"Follow along with me as *we* read our Bibles."

Some chapters teach maths, important concepts such as "Why must we farm/work? Why must we learn new things? What's the dangers of the world? What is our history?"

These days mass religion has been forced into a role that only caters to the spirit.

Depending on how you interpret "Spirit", this includes "Comedy" and the spectacle that some churches are known for these days, despite forcing it into the singular lens of exactly how you should keep your spirits up.

To Stave off depression, as with the case with Covid shutting down the churches and the churches reasonably refusing.

Prophets and ministers also *used to* do a lot more than to cater to the spirit. There are chapters of the Bible dedicated to physical health and wellness of the people, of the farmland. One section is even dedicated to keeping your home free of mold.

These are not directly related to "spirit" but they improve a person's well-being so that they may be better able to interact with their community and be in "good spirits".

Heck, they even serve wine.

Joke; this is probably closer to an early dental hygiene thing--As alcohol could be known to Stave off halitosis, same way we use mouthwash today. (Yes a form of hippie-"new age" health trend.)

But these days?

Like we know of "Eastern medicine"; it works but does it work as well as what we have now?

And so Organized Religion is stuck in-between remembering the "old-ways" and being a conduit for "Spirit". And depending on how zealous your religion is; God and Morality before even that.

And in some cases; God is the *only* thing that matters. Despite these Minister's actual connection to, or lack of connection to their personal Deity, who they claim is the one true "Jehova" or "Yahweh".

"Ask not what God can do for you, ask what you can do for your God."

And so we see these drives to make our Nations an [insert religion here] Nation, that serves no purpose; not even God's.

Religion has a purpose; but religion has lost its way. And it's in the Bible, especially the good Christian Holy Bible; that we often see that Religion has lost its way.

We can read of the prophets and the "Son of God" as they fight against the mainstream religions of their days; why they needed to do so. We can see them fight against their governments, and why they needed to do so.

We can see the separation between church and state represented in the U.S. constitution and the groundwork laid by these texts and reasoning it was necessary.

So what is Religion?

Religion used to be something to make accessible to humanity the tools kept away from them by Industry and Government. Education, Mental and physical health care, services in which to aid the common man, and their communities, a voice of morality, and the teachings of something outside the physical world that we live in. Something we cannot reach while in the flesh.

But it has since been reduced to only the latter thing. Teachings of a God, only in such a way that the teachers believe; instead of as a being that helps all. The one true God, who knows and loves all. That thing that is unknown to humans as they live and breathe, but claimed to be known by those who teach it, and only them, as long as you pay a fee and are loyal.

[propheticeve]

Hoodoo initiations and rituals

In the rich tapestry of traditional hoodoo, deeply intertwined with Black American Christianity, there exists a world of initiations and rites often overlooked by those unfamiliar with its spiritual intricacies. In the context of spirituality, particularly within the Black community, the connection to the divine has always been of utmost importance, even during the darkest days of slavery.

One of the most ancient and quintessentially Black American initiations is the act of Baptism. As recently as the 1950s, outdoor baptisms in the Southern United States were not merely a ritual; they were a profound and transformative experience. I, myself, hailing from the heart of Alabama, had the privilege of undergoing this sacred rite not once, but twice. My first baptism took place in the cool embrace of a river, a tradition that holds immense significance within the hoodoo and Black church traditions.

At its core, the act of Baptism is a ritual of purification, cleansing, and transition. It is a transformative journey from one state of being to another. In the eyes of the faithful, Baptism symbolizes a profound cleansing of one's sins, a rebirth, and a renewal of spirit. It is a deeply spiritual initiation that signifies that the old has passed away, and the new has come.

In the days leading to the Baptism, individuals don traditional white garments, symbolizing purity and newness. Elders and spiritual leaders prepare the initiates for this momentous occasion. Prayers are offered, and the congregation, with hearts full of joy and anticipation, bears witness to this sacred act. The Mothers of the Church, revered for their wisdom and spiritual guidance, play a central role in this sacred rite.

As the initiates make their way to the waters, the music swells, and a rhythmic, almost ritualistic line-up takes shape. With the support of the congregation, the initiates are immersed in the waters, and as they emerge, they are welcomed into a new phase of life. The transformative power of the water, combined with the faith and spiritual energy of the gathering, is believed to cleanse and purify the soul, allowing the initiate to emerge as a new creation.

Baptism, in the traditions of hoodoo and the Black church, is more than a ritual; it is an initiation into a profound spiritual experience. It is a testament to the enduring power of faith and the unbreakable connection to the divine, a connection that has sustained the Black community throughout its tumultuous history.

The preservation of traditions like outdoor baptisms is crucial to maintaining the rich cultural and spiritual heritage that has been passed down through generations. In the act of Baptism, we find not only a ritual for cleansing and renewal but also a powerful symbol of hope, rebirth, and the unwavering spirit of a people who have always found strength in their faith.

As we continue to honor these traditions and initiations, let us remember the profound significance of Baptism as a spiritual journey of transformation and renewal, a testament to the enduring spirit of the Black church and hoodoo traditions.

[thepastisalreadywritten]

SAINT OF THE DAY (September 27)

On September 27, the Catholic Church remembers Saint Vincent de Paul, the 17th-century French priest known as the patron of Catholic charities for his apostolic work among the poor and marginalized.

During a September 2010 Angelus address, Pope Benedict XVI noted that St. Vincent “keenly perceived the strong contrast between the richest and the poorest of people, and was encouraged by the love of Christ to organize permanent forms of service to provide for those in need."

Vincent was born on 24 April 1581 in the village of Pouy, in the Province of Guyenne and Gascony, the Kingdom of France, to peasant farmers.

Born to a poor family in the southwest of France, he showed his intellectual gifts from a young age, studying theology from around age 15.

He received ordination as a priest in the year 1600 and worked as a tutor to students in Toulouse.

During a sea voyage in 1605, Vincent was seized by Turkish pirates and sold into slavery.

His ordeal of captivity lasted until 1607, during which time the priest converted his owner to the Christian faith and escaped with him from Tunisia.

Afterward, he spent time studying in Rome and, in a striking reversal of fortune, served as an educator and spiritual guide to members of an upper-class French family.

Although Vincent had initially begun his priesthood with the intention of securing a life of leisure for himself, he underwent a change of heart after hearing the confession of a dying peasant.

Moved with compassion for the poor, he began undertaking missions and founding institutions to help them both materially and spiritually.

The one-time slave also ministered to convicts forced to serve in squalid conditions as rowers aboard galley ships.

Vincent established the Congregation of Priests of the Mission in 1625, as part of an effort to evangelize rural populations and foster vocations to remedy a priest shortage.

Not long after this, he worked with the future Saint Louise de Marillac to organize the Daughters of Charity, the first congregation of women religious whose consecrated life involved an extensive apostolate among the poor, the sick, and prisoners.

Under Louise’s direction, the order collected donations, which Vincent distributed widely among the needy.

These contributions went toward homes for abandoned children, a hospice for the elderly, and an immense complex where 40,000 poor people were given lodging and work.

Vincent was involved in various ways with all of these works, as well as with efforts to help refugees and to free those sold into slavery in foreign lands.

Though admired for these accomplishments during his lifetime, the priest maintained great personal humility, using his reputation and connections to help the poor and strengthen the Church.

Doctrinally, Vincent was a strong opponent of Jansenism, a theological heresy that denied the universality of God’s love and discouraged reception of the Eucharist.

He was also involved in the reform of several religious orders within France.

Vincent de Paul died on 27 September 1660, only months after the death of St. Louise de Marillac in March of the same year.

He was beatified by Pope Benedict XIII on 13 August 1729. He was canonized by Pope Clement XII on 16 June 1737.

In 1835, the French scholar Blessed Frederic Ozanam took him as the inspiration and namesake for the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, a lay Catholic organization working for the relief of the poor.

Saint Vincent de Paul has become known as the “The Apostle of Charity” and “Father of the Poor.”

His contributions to the training of priests and organizing parish missions and other services for the poor shaped the Church's role in the modern world.

[talenlee]

KJV Supremacy And Antisemitism

KJV Supremacy And Antisemitism

If you ask an American Christian (in this case used to refer to the type of Christianity, not the type of American) about the conception of ‘Christianity’ you will usually see a definition of Christianity that is unconsciously structured around a set of concentric circles, where each layer in you progress, the more and more legitimately Christian the remainder is, depending on what the current threat is. If you’re looking at things where there being lots of Christians is a good thing, ‘Christian’ includes everyone who even says ‘god damn’ at some point, even if the last time they went to church was inhaling near a parson on the train. If it’s important to exclude people (because of, say, their disagreement with you on whether or not gay people should be burned alive), then suddenly, the mindset wants to pull back, across different boundaries of ‘really’ Christian.

Some of these boundaries are obvious and some of them are less obvious. People who never attend church, they’re not really Christian, even if they claim to be. People who attend church very rarely, they’re less Christian, but they are in a different layer to the first group. And you can go further and further into the layers of this horrible onion and find really specific nitpicky things that legitimise the American Christianity of a person, you’re going to find one particular boundary that’s been set up is about choice of Biblical translation. What’s more, amazingly, the translation that seems to centralise this mindset the most, and one of those dog-whistles that shows you’re dealing with the Shithead Brigade is a deference and reverence reserved for one, particular, correct translation of the Bible: The King James Version.

Man, America loves its kings.

The King James Version of the Bible was first put together in the early 1600s, and for the time, there’s a lot of conservative writing. The idea was to make it so that the Bible, when read aloud in public, would convey a proper tone of seriousness and importance, which meant that even for the day its grammar and word choice was pretty pompous. It’s that particular Biblical Speak which is only really grammatically coherent for a period just before the King James Bible was written, and it’s where you get a lot of thees and thous and evereth they dideth the thingeth.

It’s also a translation with a lot of problems!

One particular problem is that it flattens out some terms. This can happen in any translation naturally; for example, when we translate Magic: The Gathering cards to Japanese, while we in English have a bunch of different terms for different, specific types of undead like zombie, skeleton, ghost, spirit, wight, ghoul and ghast, these terms are all kind of just covered by a single word in Japan, which created some challenges in translating these card names meaningfully in other languages. That’s okay, translation is an art, not a science, but you can see a lot about what people do and don’t translate.

Sometimes this is about one language being more specific than another; in the Bible’s base text, there are about fifteen different words that the KJV translates into English as ‘Prince.’ More damningly, there’s one word that gets translated as ‘servant’ when one type of person has them, and translated as ‘slave’ when another type of person has them, which is pretty explicitly an ideological choice. This serves to obscure the role of slavery in the Biblical text, and also, tends to ambiguate the way that slavery works. Another fun one is that Hades and Gehenna, two different ideas in the original text, are invoked, they both get translated in the KJV as ‘Hell,’ a subject on which the Bible is normally pretty sparse.

Fact is, Biblical translation is hard. There are words in the Bible that appear in no other text, anywhere, and whose meaning we have to kind of guess at. Sometimes that guess is easy, sometimes the guess is a bit broader. I’ve talked about Shamgar, Son of Anath, a folk hero who murdered a bunch of people with a ?????. The typical translation of that ????? is ‘ox goad,’ but we have a term for an ox goad, and it’s not that term.

These are known as hapax legomenon, which is also a great name for a military rank that’s meant to look like some kind of cube-shaped chicken. There are a lot of these in ancient texts, and when you translate them, there’s different ways to handle that. None of these methods, though, can convey to you what the original text meant – and in English, we don’t have a meaningful literary way to convey ‘untranslated,’ or ‘untranslatable.’ It’s funny, it’s a byproduct of our position in the world, this supremacy we’re used to that there’s an implied relationship to other languages that you shouldn’t have to see untranslated words, that you should be able to convey everything in English alone.

But that’s general translation problems. Because these American Christian mindsets that anyone using a non-KJV translation are ultimately, as with almost every time I talk about this fundie stuff, conspiracy theorists. The idea runs that any translation after the KJV is corrupted, because it changes God’s word. How do you know it changes God’s word? Because it’s not the KJV. But, you might try to futilely argue, the KJV is just a translation, it’s not the core text. But, but the response comes, if there’s a difference between the translations that implies the KJV is wrong, and that can’t be the case.

Some of these folk commit to the next step, which is to say that the King James Version of the Bible is divinely inspired. This perspective is ridiculous if you’re outside of the space, but you gotta remember, this is a community that leaps to magic really quickly to explain things. But some don’t, and the lack of willingness to commit to that is tied to instead trying to demonstrate some scholarship that undermines other, later translations.

Funnily enough they very rarely point out those problems I underscore – you know, the way that some translation is impossible. Instead, it’s much more likely to pick around specific points of doctrine that the KJV kinda enforces (there’s a whole argument about the positioning of a comma representing the trinity) and therefore, the lack of those specific points mean the new texts are an attempt to lure Christians away from true things and undermine these important doctrines (that can be undermined by the moving of a comma).

But okay.

So why.

Why did the Bible only get perfected when it was translated into English, and why is it every subsequent translation is in fact an evil permutation enforced by Roman Catholics or liberal Protestants, depending on who you ask. Who benefits from this, you ask.

And then they take a deep breath and whisper the Jewwwwwwwwws–

Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!

#FundieStuff

[walkswithmyfather]

“Remember what you were taught from your childhood from the Holy Scrolls which can impart to you wisdom to experience everlasting life through the faith of Jesus, the Anointed One! God has transmitted his very substance into every Scripture, for it is God-breathed. It will empower you by its instruction and correction, giving you the strength to take the right direction and lead you deeper into the path of godliness.” —2 Timothy 3:15‭-‬16 (TPT)

“Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace. In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.” —Ephesians 6:13‭-‬17 (NIV)

“Never doubt God’s mighty power to work in you and accomplish all this. He will achieve infinitely more than your greatest request, your most unbelievable dream, and exceed your wildest imagination! He will outdo them all, for his miraculous power constantly energizes you.” —Ephesians 3:20 (TPT)

“The Bible is Alive” Devotional By YouVersion - Day 3: “The Bible Transforms Nations”:

“It’s the early 1800s. A 12-year-old Nigerian boy and his family are taken from their home and forced onto a Portuguese slave ship bound for America. But before the boat has a chance to leave the African coast, it’s raided by an anti-slavery patrol and the traffickers are arrested. The boy and his family are then liberated and sent to Sierra Leone. It’s here that he discovers the power of the Bible.

After becoming a Christian, Samuel Ajayi Crowther began learning multiple languages and going on missionary expeditions into the countries near Sierra Leone. But this entire time, he was studying the Bible in English because it didn’t exist in Yoruba—his Nigerian language.

This meant that the people in Nigeria who didn’t speak English couldn’t read God’s Word for themselves. So Ajayi helped create a written grammar system for Yoruba and then translated the Bible into that language.

Once he finished the Yoruba Bible, he continued to translate Scripture into other Nigerian languages so that more people could discover the life-change that he had experienced.

Crowther was later elected “Bishop of the Niger” by the Anglican church, becoming the first Black Anglican bishop. And today, the Anglican Church of Nigeria is the second largest Anglican province with over 18 million baptized members.

The same God who worked through Crowther also wants to work through you to impact the world through His Word. There are people waiting to be transformed by the Bible that only you are perfectly positioned to reach.

So today, ask God to reveal the role you can play in the story He’s telling, and watch as He does more through your life than all you can ask, think, or imagine.”