Africans in America; 103; Brotherly Love; Interview with Albert Raboteau, Professor of Religion, Princeton University

and i think it's great for america a lot of change happening it's a time when a black people are beginning to come into philadelphia larger numbers or something and three about six percent populations black people and that last only increase as freed slaves from the upper cell phone moved into the city in search of work and it's a time when there's a good deal of turmoil and creativity flexibility to time for churches of formation growth because of the suspension ah cause of the constitution and rattled establishment in the states it's time for religious freedom it's also a time of increasing

emancipation of blacks in the north and as various anti slavery was caspian to kick it so there's good to movement physical movement movement in terms of the formation of new institutions are new religious institutions and the time purple some hope and excitement yes yes others hope in the sense of new beginnings in the nation and hope in the sense of the possibility of him emancipation for blacks which is assessing the community only four four storm and there's

a sense of form of optimism that something new is taking place in something that will respect the rights of four men as it was in those days and that there will be an opportunity for self determination opportunity for a home gradually devolve into twelve freedom both our national level and on the level of the individual so that second pillar the area where there's hope a sense of an increased freedom a sense of of all boundaries in shackles been removed and sense that the swan label people to define themselves into a sense of self expression and and self creation are armed lowell richard only a wonderful symbol of the sense of

hopefulness and self creation of hers a man who has more himself oh oh freedom he's participated in arm into rickety evangelical revolution that's happening currently with a revolution in in the political realm and in that evangelical revolution the sense of the equality of people across racial lines in the eyes of god has four at least the moment become a reality and the social order and so allen would come into a philadelphia that for him was a place where he could sell or he could work with its own people he came to preach to the black membership at st george's methodist episcopal church and a place where he could as he later put it home for for all of his own in the sixties with the work of his hands and so he would

establish a or several businesses that would be successful all and he would rise in the world and become a leader in on his own community and two yeah a significant extent a leader not just the leader who would be recognized in the larger community as well but his conversion experience as he describes it many years later of the narrative and gospel waivers it was a typical conversion experience and the pattern of a period of wrestling with the depressed state of the sort of feeling of sinfulness and then the sudden and break of sense of god's grace and acceptance and a sense of great

freedom now part of this conversion experience as our talks about it though he doesn't reveal very much about the stage is his going to consultation with older blacks and they're helping him to come through to conversion he mentions having some advice given some advice from older blacks doesn't go into detail about what i mention that because we sometimes think of conversion experience is this that's singular an individual which they are but they also take place in communities and so for our last four for most people this was a conversion experience that was connected with six without with a community that was able to help guide him through the difficulties on this peak or depth experience and so as a young man he was converted unknown became attached to the methodists and particularly to our mcinnis class meeting which he would

attend every two weeks his relationship with slavery yes and then as our oldest brother were slaves in delaware at the time of this conversion experience are both began to methodist class needs and they were intent on attacking the old church that religion would make slaves too independent to make them think too highly of themselves and therefore would make them on and somewhat or rebellious so he says that we work even harder than we had before and recommends a master that religion you know was not bad for slaves ellen also began to invite methodist preachers to

come to the farm where he worked and it was through the preaching of one of these methodist terrorists a white minister named free warm gerritsen that ellen so master was converted to an anti slavery position he came to realize from tourists and sermon that upholding fellow human beings in bondage was wrong and so it was at this moment that they master began to entertain the notion of offering to slits so for alan a connection between conversion preachy the evangelical revival the sense of the quality that the map really methodist were preaching all had a direct impact upon his own state as a slave and the possibilities of his becoming free through working on for his own freedom so there's a there's a relationship here between gospel freedom presented by

the methodists and the actual freedom from slavery liberation from slavery that elements of experienced in and so early life it's been that way the point actually what course are differing opinions between whites and what questions on this issue that is for many whites slavery and christianity would not inconsistent and it's one of the major contributions of black christianity too western plot that it's the black christians who point out clearly and forcefully to the inconsistency between the notion of christian fellowship of

christian compassion and love and the enslavement of others particularly in the enslavement of fellow christians so one of the earliest protests that we have gone by what's this actually comes from a boston are in the period immediately before the revolution and about seventy and seventy it's a petition to the court of massachusetts and the governor in which they mention a great number of us are sincere members of the body of christ how can that be that are masters burton has done with the heavy chains of oppression when christians are supposed to bear one another's burdens so from very early on a black christians question the fundamental but covering between christianity and all for sale that dichotomy would also be part

of his own flawed and part of his own lights there's another element however and that's the elements of what this question and be due to the slave in his er who work her experience of enslavement that's big money our own songwriting incentive coupled pamphlets one addressed to those who keep slaves and another address to those enslaved on give examples of his blog about the relationship between christianity and slavery to those who keep slaves he points out on again the dichotomy between holding our fellow human beings and slavery in proclaiming the gospel christianity any us lessen very interesting things to say about how the basis of racism and slavery

is a catch twenty two situation in which our black people are accused of being unable to be free and therefore they earn are enslaved and he makes the point that if you would but tried the experiment of allowing our children to be educated as your children are and to have the possibilities of some advancement and society would find that they were by no means inferior to two years turning to the slaves ellen says that in his own experience christianity had led to a relationship with his master which was an amicable relationship and that led to his freedom and he encourages slaves to seek this kind of fellowship through christianity with their slave masters but if that fails he says remember that you are no matter what the

masters as a child of god and that in your religion in your christian faith you can achieve some consolation some sense of joy in the midst of brutality and cruelty of slavery so those pamphlets and articulate for ellen and probably represent the views of the number of other black religious figures at the time the dimensions of a question of religiosity in spiritual audie as it applies to the situations whenever you're in an area where we're kind of victory so yes yes float lee relationship of a conversion experience to the idea of the self that is fundamental and understanding how christianity affected the slaves views of themselves here is a situation

and the situation that is based on an ideology of inferiority and that situation that says that you're less than human that you were equal to the beasts and that your own skin color your own heritage is a mark of degradation the conversion experience on the contrary is an experience that convinces the slaves in a very deep and rounded way that they are of worse and that their ultimate were in the eyes of god but they are chosen children of god and therefore the matter what the etiology of slavery might say the matter what what people might think about them no matter what the conditions of life are

they are of ultimate were from the eyes got other society relies not just with the head home or sit with them often something that they experience deeply within their own experience through conversions and through the permit jeans and rituals of the christian religion they continually reinforced that experience show lesson for themselves so their christianity is essential too a sense of slaves on valuing of themselves and in a sense of their own importance of their own self worth in the midst of a system bent on reducing them to something less than human so the preacher what we were given the importance of the black

churches the main institution the only institution that blacks had control of four won control of unknowns case of his role was home was so complicated he was both a pastor and a preacher but he also was leader in the sense of a community organizer are involved in efforts to help the black community and education in health and many years he was one of the leaders who first political movement of free blacks in the north from the negro convention movement presided over the first one of those conventions and eighteen thirty he was also a leader by his example i mentioned earlier that that allen did quite well in philadelphia left an estate and he died of eighty thousand dollars he owed three properties he owned a three story house brickhouse and he had i managed

and run a chimney sweep business any of blue blocking business and haram very well commercially as a model elle and therefore stood for the possibilities of a person rising from slavery too worldly success for alice wasn't simply a gospel of wealth as it was before and for some people he believed that on what had happened to helen implied and even necessitated a shearing of his achievements with others so it wasn't enough to have money for himself with some of that money for his family this involved compassion for others and compassion which was institutionalized in a range of

self help and educational organizations attached to our mother back for another and sometimes a freestanding so that free african society african society for educating youth on and other mutual benefit society's norms of golf with him was a leader so social philosophy was and based on what he perceived to be the gospel that he had learned from the methods class means of his youth and that might be the social and social philosophy on social philosophy was based in part large part on the gospel of freedom that he had learned from the leftist class means of his youth

and which helped work on why he always remained a methodist when brands like absalom jones moved into other denominations and the gospel was acclaimed gospel that is he wanted to appeal to our plane people to slaves who were largely illiterate an educated and he himself wanted to remain plane and his own and his own wife plain speaking the plain living it involved a set of virtues of those virtues were thrift honesty industry and cents for a sense of of pride and dignity about oneself about men's community so in some sense only being a representative of an early version of foyle of self help well for blacks doing for themselves another aspect of this

social philosophy would be a sense of the quality that blacks were equal with whites or would be equal with whites if they had the opportunity to rise in the world and finally a sense of community responsibility that that people have to take care of one another that people had to have compassion for one another and that this was at the essence of the core of the christian gospels a sense of compassion and and love of people followed this philosophy that was going strong belief that that they would rise that this was a gospel for a people that have been degraded people that were lonely people are depressed and by this route they would rise just as he had risen yes yes

yes it's been a mistake it will only get to remember that we often think of the gallery incidents in georgia's is the origins of the black church and it's a very famous probably the most famous incident in afro american religious history ah and there's a tendency to therefore miss a very important point which is that richard allen had proposed the creation of a black church years before the gallery incident and the peak oh the st george incident with the galleria in blacks leaving on mars has become such a

famous incident in the history of african american christianity that it tends to blind us to very important fact and that fact is that years before the gallery incident richard allen had already proposed the idea of an independent black church to the white methodist altar at st george's an accordion now on this request was refused with insulting integrating language and alan spoke with absalom jones and some other members of the black community about the possibility of creating an independent black church but he didn't receive the support the majority of the leaders of the black community because that many of them were members of different churches and so initially well i'm with absalom jones and saluted mr found that free african society which was a mutual aid society and it also had a

pause i religious function in that there were rules moral rules that the members had to observe strangely when about two years ago in iowa when it's no longer attending the meetings of the three african society and was eventually dismissed from that by committee who claimed that he was grieving the century not sure of exactly what that dissension was but many historians think alan was continuing to try to create a black methodist church out of every african society and because again the membership was made up of people of different denominations and they wanted to keep it into denominational gradually the free african society began to move towards creating an independent church and it was at this time in about seventeen and three when the galleria incident occurred and that gallery incident really served as a catalyst convincing many

black christians that there was a need for an independent our church and the free african society membership i turned their dues into a church building fun and the approach some white benefactors such as benjamin rush to assist them in getting money for a building and at this point ritual murders back in contact with that free african society and he is part of a committee that's commissions to find property and to build the church yes yes yes well what happens is what happens is the church's built for the congregations is established then there's an issue of which to nomination will the affiliate with was a

crucial issue because it involves the ordination of a pastor to lead the congregation and because the methodists are still adamantly against an independent black church they refuse to have anything to do with the group coming out of the congregation come to know the free african society the episcopalians will entertain the possibility of ordaining one of their main and so the group becomes awfully it's with the episcopalians and creates a timeless african gospel church with absalom jones recounts close friend as the first pastor and when that church is is as built one when funds are age forty and ground is broken for there's a banquet in which blocks surf whites and whites serve blacks sign of the fellowship

that's that's going on here however decides that he wants to remain with the methodists end he makes that decision because he thinks that the methodists argument plain speaking people can read their sermons sermons or extend or a spiritual sermons and that this is what will have the most power in the most appeal to black people so he has leadership remains with the methodists and eventually they built a church which his mother dies and the congregation grows slowly and after several years they discover an unpleasant fact that they have known and that is that the charter of the church had been written in such a way that the property was actually owned by a methodist boulders they have had found that out when the methodist older demanded the keys to the church and they

refused and then they were shown and by a lawyer that richard was not what they thought where also advise them that they could change the church by writing by writing and passing a supplement and they did they would supplement with legal help are in which they took back control of physical control of the property end of oregon this and it was approved overwhelmingly by the congregation the methodists holders contested this and there were altercations back and forth with the methodist older attempting to come to the church and to preach home the full congregation blocking the aisles so that he could preach as threatening to excommunicate the group does have an inscription but some of the methodist

denominations eventually leads to a court fight goes all the way up to the state supreme court and the black methodist of bethel church where and the supplement is this approved as legal and they take possession finally of the church which they had built on which they fall along was the room and this was a major moment us all remember them so they'd also by the methodists and baltimore who were engaged in similar struggle without white church elders there and daniel coker pastor and leader of the church in baltimore actually preached a sermon on the occasion of the philadelphia but for churches independence though it represents if we can return to our initial notion of hope and independence that represents

a victory of black people on many of them recently out of slavery over a white power structure along with regard to a matter of crucial importance to their own self definition that has their own religious community of their own religious identity and their own a religious interpretation so that alone for the first time you have the black church in which there's a sense of leadership and that's no longer being suppressed by a larger white power structure of the least and it depended and in a few years they will achieve even greater independence by connecting with other independent black methodist churches and forming the

african methodist episcopal church the first independent black denomination why didn't it amazingly didn't break his relationships with some of those white methodist so bishop asbury for example remained a friend and confidant of a gallon and other white methodist leaders did that i think he was so i think at home was very realistic man who saw friends we were friends and saw our position where we're there was opposition the arm initial introduction prologue to manual of discipline that the african methodist episcopal church would adopt expresses some of this realism that talks about those methodists who would've who abandoned

the quality of methodist and wanted to lord it over other people and in that phrase working it over others i don't get back at those owners who had attempted to release welch the independence of the fold methodists yes in the us fb be your fever the yellow fever epidemic in philadelphia which occurred my memory scripted

sentiment three was an occasion when black people in the city who was mistakenly believed were not susceptible to go fever were asked to help with on the people were sicker people weren't were dying and people who had died then allen and absalom jones as leaders of the community helped lead the organization of members of the community to bury the dead to turn the city out of their houses after the fever they were accused in the press by matthew carry a prominent publisher newspaper publisher and editor of actually having proper cured from home the epidemic by stealing things from sick people by buying demanding money home and this was an outrageous charge was an outrage to know mantooth jones and so they've co authored a template

in which they defended strenuously the behavior of law of the black community and they're real here was of blacks who had attempted to help whites during the yellow fever epidemic of course it turned out that blacks were not resistant to yellow fever and died also the probe to pull off big president i don't yeah i don't get it it would be that's a very interesting question and i think we have enough sources to know whether it changed over time i think my son's loans that don't sell was plain and his style but that he was a very complex and very sophisticated in terms of his understanding of

human beings of society and the way in which this period between slavery and freedom om for himself early on them for many blacks afterwards actually worked so i think that element was so was a canny man who wonder stood on power and understood power relationships among whites and blacks were probably changed over the years i think was not so much his view people as his own sense of a lot of his authority of his leadership in his own power as she became a major figure within with in philadelphia and so when ellen was accused of being a runaway slave by a slave catcher the church was so was quickly

dismissed because everyone you know and slave catcher was jailed and after several weeks own was kind enough to us to suggest that he be released from jail where she had suffered enough so i don't see a great huge change in an ounce of thought but i see a man who has smart enough canny enough to maneuver whether space to exercise power exercised power will be helpful to deal with allies such as rush in and others when that would be helpful on but also to be willing to speak out and defend himself and in his community against attacks is this

yes well one of the ways in which i think we can think about the founding of the denomination and we don't often think of it this way is that this is one of the major exercises of farm one of america's basic freedoms is the freedom of religion and remember that for the great majority of blacks freedom of religion it's not a reality and would not hear reality for decades more confidence that a great majority of blacks were enslaved and from slave codes did not permit for human for religious assembly so placed in that context the creation of the first black denomination are independently control independently run our power to ordain clergy portland full of holding property polar of organizing our a national or at least partly a national class structure was

extremely important and arguably the league and the church was leaning black institution most of the night in central utah are black olive baptist home began to organize nationally after emancipation and the nomination served sort of trained leaders it served as a forum for political organization for economic cooperation and served as a a place where blacks could express themselves in a public arena it served as a focal point for the word innovation and free black communities it's brilliant and it served very directly and

say contact with slaves of allen's own house it served as a way station of the underground railroad so he and i'm an sa wives he was married twice we're on a posts to fugitive slaves and served directly up and it has served to be a direct contact with slavery in the sense that many of those people were members of the home stretch were themselves former slaves and had rolled oats who were enslaved we sometimes forget that for many few blocks north probably most that i'm going connections with relatives who were unswayed himself they're also were connections in that allen and the church we're on a local medium for attacking the american colonization society

but it was not that known or many of the free blacks were against the idea of immigration issue were voluntary but what they were afraid of is that the american compositions society would serve as a lobbying group which would in effect try to remove all free blacks from the country and forced them to emigrate to repatriate to africa and this one of course meant that the major voice crying out against slavery and the country would have been silenced and precisely that fact that it was free blacks and property we free blacks through the agency of the church as the pope that's on the press i was free blacks or the major voices attacking the existence of slavery in the country on one final theory of

connection with slavery is there were in the churches in the south that is majoring in the church was in charleston south carolina pastor by morris brown and the church was aware of what was happening in eighteen sixteen but was not able to send official delegates and the church was su was disbanded and the church buildings actually raised to the ground and eighteen twenty two after the denmark easiest way the conspiracy was discovered because a number of the leaders of the denmark easy a conspiracy or members of the charleston in the church are great but to take care for the same reason in some senses yes it was important to raise the church in a negative way it

shows the importance of these black institutions for on a sense of black independence and autonomy as the same reason that black churches and wander far for brunch today it represents a sense of of crucial autonomy for black people and autonomy which in charleston had turned dangerous and so the church was razed to the ground and ironically well the church would be reconstructed after emancipation and the design of the church would be drawn by the sound of music oh matthew carry attacked the black community in the local paper for supposedly proper cheering during the

template and accuse them of either extorting money were or are actually stealing from plague victims allen and absalom jones were incensed at this and responded with a pamphlet that the corporate arguing that way this was a libel against the heroism of the black community and that they had not profited but indeed have been firework in their efforts to work work with them to be a very good year for those were real one of the crucial differences between workers cheered him like christianity which arm it's fundamental is the distinction between the region of exodus my white americans and read nexus exodus by black americans for white americans america is the promised land and

the journey across the atlantic was a journey across the red sea escaping from the bondage of egypt to freedom for the party nothing suggests the existence of to christianity islam like and white in this country as well as the image of exodus exodus for why christians in america represented a journey that they have made it across the atlantic ocean is across the red sea from bondage in the egypt of the old world to freedom in the promised land of america for black christians that image has been reversed that is for them the trip across the atlantic and it was a trip for freedom into

bondage in an american egypt where in america had no chance of being the promised land until all of americans we're fried so this concept of exodus is on a crucial symbol of the distinctiveness of the religion of a slave and free black christians and it became a symbol that was very real for them and driven deep into their psyches and cultural experience by preaching shelling deeper meanings in which in the states of religious ecstasy are free blacks and slaves are re capitulated remembered the experience of exodus in their own singing i'm dancing and praying so that once again i am the story of exodus was we lived for them imaginatively and dramatically in the liturgical dramas of the

religious services oh yes this sense of god as one who will liberate as people who will act in human history on who will cast under the mighty lift up on the lowly was an important dimension of the spiritual leader of the slaves and the fact that this god was the god who was not merely off somewhere in heaven but about whose power could be felt within the experience of the human person are connected closely with the african sense that god's power the power of the gods is to be experienced within the human person so from both africans and african americans the

primary place of god's presence within the world is within the human person the human person possessed by the gods of africa are the human person are happy in the spirit in the americas and it's in the dancing in the show team and the ecstasy of african american religious worship which expresses the power of the presence of god that one can see echoes of the african religious heritage of these people are were some lonely god comes and lives in the embodied state of the dancers and gestures and movements of all the people now nat turner's forty a song as the local authority that is that was seen as a prophet and profits were once who threatened the

social order with the destruction the destruction that would come from almighty god so when turner sees in the sky science or seasonal in the grass and the leaves are signs that the judgments to come he becomes the execution of god's judgment against the evil of fog of white people and the slave system and so his revolt be the main fund the only successful slavery or revolt are in the nineteenth century in the united states in the sense of actually not being discovered and corinne and them killing a number of whites was based upon the book or understanding of god's judgment wrath being visited upon those who do evil well there's there is

biblical justification in the sense of the old testament god who steps in to assist the army's half of the children of israel as they fight for the promised land of course they fight to preserve their own independence and if one read saw the psalms or books of the old testament there's a good deal of bloodshed and violence that is that is presented now of course another interpretation would be that that this kind of violence and end murder is so i'm not allowed by the christian gospels but the tension between those have been a part of for christianity for four centuries this border the murphys use plot against charleston south carolina

was one of most significant of the attempts to strike against slavery by american slaves probably the most elaborately plant of the conspiracies that we know about and it's interesting answer more guards what other ways in which it's interesting is that it appeals to both from the biblical christianity and to african countries so dan marchese who argued from the bible that blacks should not be enslaved in that if they are mounting resistance that they would would resent it would weigh an over overwhelming white forces on one of the lieutenants of these conspiracy was called jack and jack was a cantor it was called cannot be killed were taken and object even to the conspirators in his company the term was actually grab quo

which they were to keep in their mouths and this in turn would prevent bullets of whites for mom from harming them and anyway so since you're the best of a book charles here both african traditional religion represented jack and actually a biblical tradition represented in denmark easy combining in this plot to overthrow slavery by attacking trust me i don't know which references you appeal to but the sense from the trial record was that he appealed to those sections of the bible which would indicate that one blacks were not by any means less or less than whites so on that has made of

one race or the peoples of the cover of the world versus like that might have been used also our he appealed to verses that indicated though we might be fewer numbers than we would triumph with the help of god's strength so those kinds of pursuits seem to have been one city appealed to and convincing people to join hammond's revolution and this camper hundred years here and there gabriel again like denmark these he used the bible as a way of saying that we're going to find justification for our rebellion and we have deployed shorts that are going to be successful gabriel also

used to apparently revival services that region's educations for holding meetings two points ms marin yes i'm not sure about it it made it may be differences in an individual experiences with her a car is much more visionary much more vivid than ellen's account and her campaign concentrates much more on the power of the spirit and that's a move that's an interesting an interesting fact about your release conversion experience as it as it is about conversion experience is an unknown

number of other black women that we have from the making century that is that they tend to focus on heavily upon a huge release soccer conversion which is more attractive and it's a listener's agonizing there's a refusal to weigh the spirit and her eventual submission to the spirit is very intense very visionary a conversion experience and it's interesting because that's also the case with a number of other black women are conversion narrative center in concentric the strong emphasis on the spirit and the spirit as korean them to do something that is forbidden by the customs of the time that has to stand up and preach to mixed audiences mixed here mean men and women in often the spirit also

emboldened emboldens them to travel to interact to do something that is also not approved for women especially because it means leaving their families onto his case leaving her child allow for extended periods of time to do the work of the spirit and to preach so this kind of pentecostal experience this experience of farm dina i'm empowered by the spirit is our is very important fortunately and i think also for a number of other women preachers in the nineteenth century sure yes yes

your own way yes dream police religious experiences spoken cost were in that kind of cost was an arm is at religious arm the nomination that places heavy stress upon the power of the spirit in the gifts of the spirit and that spirit as i'm calling the christian to do certain things and that nomination doesn't come into existence until the early twentieth century there are a number of figures in the nineteenth century who exhibit the kind of code opened a costco experiences during the way it plays out during his assertion of authority that is by what authority does this woman preach written she approaches original muses what we have no we have no on authority on this matter scripture forbids the us put forbids it and her authority then becomes the

holy spirit and that authority is validated because there are people were becoming converted under her preaching so is the power and spirit working through her invalid in her gifts that becomes a test of legitimacy as preacher she also has a very interesting theological definitions which is pro feminist and its implications she argues that christ died not just for men but for women as well and therefore he died for for both parts of the human race both parts of the immigration be able to preach and then she adds a nice scriptural touched that by saying the first person to preach the gospel was mary magdalene was a woman who went to the disciples to tell them that christ had risen and so she fights friendster authority are within her own experience of the spirit and the validation of that authority to preach

and her success with converts and then also were announced he's both a few article on biblical reason justifying her ability to preach i am yes to do the war with two hundred and has given the region to be on one of the moments in the narrative that's also or quite hard for those two relays the country preaching to slaves who have walked for many many miles north to take your preaching kind of occasion again represents haram the independence that african american spirituality arm created for slates that is slaves sometimes with masters spring ish and sometimes without masters permission would

travel to hear preaching because for their masters will was role to the artist gone before the much greater authority and power of god's will and it was god's will that they travel with a risk whatever was necessary in order to attend these descriptions as they were recalled his religious occasions and in these occasions people were able to assert a subtle form of independence which is an inner independents it might not seem to be rebellious are in terms of extra action but there's no internal independence hero an assertion of the of the rights of conscience arm and she really is a great symbol that because of course she's asserting her own independence as a as a woman on to do something that women weren't supposed to do

her independence says as a black woman in society that is restricting with plaques can do and is connecting with as a free black with slaves alm were also inhabited from the exercise of their religious conscience conscience in the religious right by the laws and they're saying in each case no and asserting their independence by voting with their feet by attending these meetings and listening to too preachy of one of their own well it is yes you're more separation from his family home again would be an exemplar

of an image of of a widespread phenomenon with slavery that would of course be increased by the expansion of slavery into the old self questions from the from the east eastern seaboard states of the year the old self to arm dave schilling yes yes the va traveling of charles ball into the old southwest represents the spread of slavery really from in the eastern seaboard states of virginia and georgia south carolina north

carolina on two alabama mississippi that we see in our arm kentucky from states that were made profitable by the expansion of common culture invention of the cotton gin that enabled sean short stable cotton to be rapidly processed which made slavery are viable and indeed a major our crop staple crop in the new lands that were open after the revolution and sold ball's own individual experience stands for the experience of hundreds of thousands of slaves who would be separated from the places where they had to have been born more important separated from their families and by the internal slave trade which would grow in volume as the nineteenth century continued

they have experience yes though it's it's almost unimaginable i mean it's the closest thing i can and i'll create the closest analogy i can try to create four years as the death of a child because these slaves to realize that there was very little chance that they would see members of the family again if they were separated by sale and especially once the international slave trade begins and people were they're traded from places like virginia to louisiana that's just a tremendous distance and chances of form of reconnecting they're extremely slight and very difficult one more poignant moments of course an

african american history is is after emancipation so often when people are her moving and moving in part in search of the family members who have them last two months away it's very poignant things in the sense of looking towards justice so i'm trying to undo the deal which james and his father that's that familial actor for love and devotion and that for me that it also stands as a symbol of hope that as the sun represents the future and and creativity and what one looks forward to

perhaps the hope that someday these changes will be unfastened and as a parent the only thing i can perhaps compared with that since the death of a child because very literally for these people there was a strong sense that they would never see them there their child with their children again but this was there was the death of social death on and it was no longer the reality of it which was arrested but living with the fear that could happen in an eternal metaphor for master died or for menstrual into debt were of the crops failed were you listen to pass these people were pray not only to hunger art and party but were pray to arm their most intimate relationships being them being violated and so the image of the ball team of artists whose son is a disappointment in

terms of the love and the relationship but also i like there's some sense of hope that the summer but in the future there is some future where the chapel's would be removed would be taken off but there even these occurrences is extremely painful the human tragedy in an hour and poignancy of them and some years removing in one wonders how much of this you can take this you as you read about it in a home discovered the real home david a brutality and occasional catastrophe that the slaves and two were an anomaly board it was tremendous a rich sense of

humanity has been sort of thing pratt says it's been i was recently reading a story about escaped slave in canada his name was mary younger and she said something that i think is very significant about this whole tradition of our slaves trying to hold to the christian notion of forgiving those who do evil to you she said if my slave master came here

would treat him kindly to join my humanity actually it's even better than that to shame him with my humanity and i think that sense of awe of in the midst of of inhumane and brutalizing conditions to preserving one's humanity arm and one's sense of work of the of the value of human life on even extending that value to the life of four the person or a person who is wonderful but most deeply spiritual legacies of from the slave communities to us now of course there are times when an enormous fuel anger and as i'm sure are they did towards our masters

and hate and the desire to of retribution but in spite of that to move to a position of four of being able to work to forgive arm is really a deep insight into arm the ability of fought the human spirit not to be itself be degraded by buying a harsh treatment and um you know of course oh martin luther king would be one major ticket leaders of that tradition coming out of the slave experience that in spite of the heat in the evening the brutality not worth that road your own spirit into bitterness and pain and arm that's up a strong legacy for muslim community if your mind

is blank washington pastor would clearly need to be very careful in terms of what was overheard what some what was preached and there are cases of a slave ministers verging on the gospel of apology and suffering beans for but the creatures were also masters of farm of what was called by zora neale hurston getting straight work with a crooked step that his masters of indirection being able to say things in in direct manner that the slaves would recognize that that others step whites would not recognize and that matter interaction also extended to a symbolic level

of the slave mean simply to have a slave preacher known simply hearing the master screeching from white ministers was and it's itself an important symbolic reality for the life of slaves and the preacher as one who created the ambiance the atmosphere through the sermon and two leading the prayers are for the religious service in which slaves felt both of their own sense of are you coming out of the conversion experience and the sense of value them as a community connecting with that image of exodus so for the preacher to be the one who reminded them all four their importance as children and both through the conversion experience them through their shared sense of from the

exodus and that was extremely important in buttressing their sense of their humanity thank you they're i think their concerns would be allowed to some extent summer again north of slavery still in the nineteenth century a place our form of great oppression and racism and so to help your permission appreciate against dignity it's worth would be part of the task of the free public preacher in the north but also to motivate the congregation in terms of organizing itself for freedom organized itself in a society that had very few organizations that would hope free blacks so

organizing for education and children are organizing for burial farms for on how were those endorsements organizing for a loss of hope in issues of growth of health and organizing against costly for home an awareness of the ongoing existence of the vast majority of the black population still under the bondage of slavery all of that will be part of the role of the black minister oh yes many of them to come home for the leadership of the anti slavery movement i was so heavily influenced by a black ministers

so while james did receive pennington julie logan a whole range of black abolitionist on were ministers and were the most vocal statesman ran against slavery and participated caught in the formation of anti slavery societies are in the north so the sense of responsibility for those who were suffering and the self and a sense of trying to improve the conditions of free people in the north so that apologise for slavery could not use the immorality the poverty the ignorance of free blacks as an excuse for going into a moment of a blacksmith solve all of that was a part of that rule for a free black ministers for a moment the

pope the pay to play well both really mathison the baptists in forty four forty five split over the issue of slavery and whether it was possible for armed minority in perspective when it was possible from another perspective too to continue to hold fellowship with god members of the church from south pass who did hold people in slavery and that's the split represented on the fundamental split emerging in the sectional controversy and is in some sense a rehearsal spot for that political split that would

happen a decade and a half later and that it was not unfortunately the case that anti slavery on the part of northern methodist baptist necessarily meant that they were pro black there continued to be a great deal of opposition to black people and in some cases they attack on slavery it was due to a fear of the expansion of slavery are into states that would be informed and in how west iran and any love for or respect for black people saluting fort the sectional controversy over slavery of course begins with the constitutional a compromise and seventy nine these end the fact that arm a whole series of work kept her to result in

the west would come into the union as either slave or free and in tandem balancing powers of north and south would they exploded into controversies in the early nineteenth century that would be pre hour or another one of these controversies would be on division of the churches which represented i'm a split that would happen for the nation in them a decade and a half after this split antique in forty four forty five of the baptist methodists yes for sure for weight of americans this country was the new israel and america was the promised land for black

americans this was still egypt in which an old an old newsreel a dark rich will still wasn't slave to him america an america then was not a new israel that was egypt ocean andrea lee's conversion to release a conversion experience which was a protracted experience was in her own description a very visionary experience and one which was so awful with the power of the spirit and during these narrative and that of several other black women in the nineteenth century place a particular stress upon they're being empowered by the spirit to do something that was not allowed by the church structures or conventions of the time that has two to go out and preach and this emphasis upon

the spirit represents a kind of proto will pentecostal experience and cost lots of course the nomination that comes into being in the early twentieth century lease heavy stress upon the gifts of the spirit and during these experiences of kind of an early version of this question is it which witch accusation people think that ok in seventeen a threefold off it was hit with a yellow fever epidemic and it was believed widely that blacks were not asked acceptance us except able to kitchen yellow fever as where whites which turned out not to be the case and blacks were organized by richard allen and absalom jones or two i

hope those who had died and those who are sick of the dead they helped by curing them out of their houses and two poem burial grounds after the yellow fever epidemic was over an article was published in the local press by that you carry attacking black people for supposedly profiteering dream the epidemic by extorting money from sick people or by stealing from those who were dead of both allen and absalom jones were incensed at this level against the black community and they were pamphlet together in which they defended what they saw was to her wasn't of black people in submitting themselves to the danger of infection in order to help on their own white fellow citizens ms boutte yes oh when

allen died in philadelphia that he had known had increased in size the black community have increased in size and the black community not only in philadelphia but in a number of cities have begun to develop independent institutions to organize a free black community life and that he of course had been a major influence in the creation of these institutions in his role as leader of mother battle in his role as lead or of the aftermath as school church and the symbolism of that is that in the year of his death he presided over the first black political convention on the national negro convention which met here in philadelphia at mother catholic church with which are known are presiding ellen i think was a

man who would exercise leadership not because he enjoyed the power of leadership but because he appreciated the responsibility of leadership and elements spite of his success never moved away from the common people and he remained very much i am attached to the plane gospel that he preached into the plane people whom he wanted to help i think our own didn't want help to retire but like come many black ministers don't know felt constrained by oh the limits of his own understanding of the christian ministry on and try to create what space he could offer her to exercise her gifts because he was able to see reclaim have been empowered by the

spirit actually was born out by the people who came to conclusion and who preach ray yes yes he he does not he cannot officially licensed are really does give her permission to speak because he recognizes are that she does have the gift simply by the open supporter of her preaching i don't remember that no question but it's important to re discovered in an

oil importer rediscovery of rediscover these stories of people like richard alan another african americans because the story of african americans is central to understanding the story of america it's not poorer forty something added it's right there at the center of the national drama and indeed is the proof of the success of the or failure of the american experiment but the difficult history to write because some unlike figures like thomas jefferson arm richard allen left few records are like the puritans the african american religious experience it has not been fully documented in print and so it's a struggle to read through all kinds of different documents it's like a mystery adventure to try to find a nugget hear another period piece together the story on but it's extremely

necessary extremely valuable because the legacy left by african americans both free and slave is a legacy of form of real human wisdom and richness of experience are from which we all weather the american experiment in our freedom yeah for all his song true words not true whether the american experiment in terms of opportunity for all is possible to realize or impossible to realize and finally in the religious troops on whether america is the new israel or whether americans egypt