Deconstructing a Theology of Defiance: Black Preaching and the Politics of Racial Identity

Abstract

From its earliest origins during the slavery trade, the Reconstruction period, and Jim Crow segregation, to the dénouement of the modern Civil Rights movement, the Black Church in America has served as a vital source of collective comfort, an agent of socialization, and an outlet for active and positive social change.1 During the period of chattel slavery (c. 1619–1865), Black sacred worship emphasized an organic theology of liberation which gave its parishioners an idealistic belief that their centuries-long bondage would end by Divine intervention. In addition, the enslaved focused their spiritual energies on fashioning a communal eschatology that related their plight to a future society in which they would be treated with a degree of humanity by the dominant society. This new reality, they hoped, would allow the former slave to fully participate in American life as equal partners to their former owners.2 These lofty ideals, forged from oft-quoted historical analogies based upon preached Judeo-Christian Sacred Texts, were very important sources of inspiration to the slave and resulted in the initial configuration of an organic Black theology.3 Moreover, these theological constructs were also the primary inspiration for unique practice of Black preaching styles. Hence, these innovative practices helped to form the fundamental pillars of Black worship services well into the mid-nineteenth century. In addition, many of these religious practices carried over into the Reconstruction period when slavery had ended and well into the Civil Rights movement of the twentieth century, where the overall political objective of achieving legal and social equality was of paramount importance.