Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1954369
Anthony G. Reddie
A central aspect of Black theology has always been the necessity to rethink historically accepted norms, particuarly in terms of socio-cultural and political phenomena, within the realms of theological and religious traditions. It can be argued that the most central aspect of this facet of rethinking can be seen in the attempt by Black theology to rehabilitate the Black body against centuries of deleterious thinking. Alongside this central necessity, Black theology has sought to rethink all aspects of White, Euro-American hegemony. This issue of Black Theology: An International Journal contains five articles, all of which, draw into our purview substantive attempts to rethink historic phenomena, religious traditions and epistemological norms. Carol Troupe’s article opens this particular issue of our journal. Her work, emerges from a Council for World Mission’s (CWM) funded pilot project that is a part of their prophetic and epoch making “Legacies of Slavery” programme. As part of the Council for World Mission’s Legacies of Slavery project, the author, from her perspective as a descendant of enslaved Africans, explores the themes that emerged during her initial encounter with historical missionary magazine material. This research involved several visits to the London Missionary Society archives held at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS, in the University of London), in order to interrogate aspects of the historical literature held in their “Special Collections”. Drawing on insights from Black and Womanist theologies, she asks questions about what reflection on these themes can offer to contemporary practice and church mission. Willy L. Mafuta and Chammah J. Kaunda’s jointly written article draws on the insights of the famed British philosopher of religion, John Hick. Drawing from John Hick’s soteriological criterion of religious pluralism, this essay questions the way in which Christianity is often portrayed as the normative standard by which other so called “Primitive” religions are assessed, in terms of their veracity to be seen as legitimate forms of expression of the human quest for matters of ultimate concern. This essay claims that with a modern understanding of the globalized world, it is no longer the norm for a non-Christian religion to meet Christian-like features to be considered a “world religion”. By adopting a universal model that is gained through observing concrete particularizations, where no one religion can claim to serve as the clear and dominant standard for any other, this essay attempts to re-imagine and re-construct African Traditional Religions. While the focus of this article is on African Tradition Religions, particular focus is given to the Zulu religion, its deity, uNkulunkulu, and its moral fabric. This article rethinks how we have conceptualized “World Religions”.
黑人神学的一个核心方面一直是重新思考历史上被接受的规范的必要性，特别是在神学和宗教传统领域内的社会文化和政治现象方面。可以说，这种重新思考的最核心的方面可以从黑人神学试图恢复黑人身体来对抗几个世纪以来的有害思想中看出来。除了这一核心必要性之外，黑人神学还试图重新思考白人、欧美霸权的各个方面。本期《黑人神学:一本国际期刊》包含五篇文章，所有这些文章都将重新思考历史现象、宗教传统和认识论规范的实质性尝试纳入我们的研究范围。Carol剧团的文章是这期杂志的第一期。她的作品来自世界宣教理事会(CWM)资助的试点项目，该项目是其预言性和划时代的“奴隶制遗产”项目的一部分。作为世界传教会奴隶制遗产项目的一部分，作者从被奴役的非洲人后裔的角度，探索了她最初接触历史传教士杂志材料时出现的主题。这项研究包括几次访问在伦敦大学东方和非洲研究学院(SOAS)的伦敦传教士协会档案，以便询问其“特别收藏”中的历史文献的各个方面。根据黑人和女性主义神学的见解，她提出了对这些主题的反思可以为当代实践和教会使命提供什么问题。Willy L. Mafuta和Chammah J. Kaunda共同撰写的文章借鉴了英国著名宗教哲学家John Hick的见解。从约翰·希克(John Hick)关于宗教多元主义的救赎论标准出发，本文质疑基督教经常被描绘成规范标准的方式，而其他所谓的“原始”宗教被评估的标准，就其真实性而言，被视为人类对终极关切问题的追求的合法表达形式。这篇文章声称，随着对全球化世界的现代理解，非基督教的宗教不再符合基督教的特征，被认为是“世界宗教”。通过采用通过观察具体的特殊性而获得的普遍模型，没有一个宗教可以声称作为任何其他宗教的明确和主导标准，本文试图重新想象和重建非洲传统宗教。虽然这篇文章的重点是非洲传统宗教，但特别关注的是祖鲁宗教，它的神，uNkulunkulu和它的道德结构。这篇文章重新思考了我们如何概念化“世界宗教”。
{"title":"Editorial","authors":"Anthony G. Reddie","doi":"10.1080/14769948.2021.1954369","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14769948.2021.1954369","url":null,"abstract":"A central aspect of Black theology has always been the necessity to rethink historically accepted norms, particuarly in terms of socio-cultural and political phenomena, within the realms of theological and religious traditions. It can be argued that the most central aspect of this facet of rethinking can be seen in the attempt by Black theology to rehabilitate the Black body against centuries of deleterious thinking. Alongside this central necessity, Black theology has sought to rethink all aspects of White, Euro-American hegemony. This issue of Black Theology: An International Journal contains five articles, all of which, draw into our purview substantive attempts to rethink historic phenomena, religious traditions and epistemological norms. Carol Troupe’s article opens this particular issue of our journal. Her work, emerges from a Council for World Mission’s (CWM) funded pilot project that is a part of their prophetic and epoch making “Legacies of Slavery” programme. As part of the Council for World Mission’s Legacies of Slavery project, the author, from her perspective as a descendant of enslaved Africans, explores the themes that emerged during her initial encounter with historical missionary magazine material. This research involved several visits to the London Missionary Society archives held at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS, in the University of London), in order to interrogate aspects of the historical literature held in their “Special Collections”. Drawing on insights from Black and Womanist theologies, she asks questions about what reflection on these themes can offer to contemporary practice and church mission. Willy L. Mafuta and Chammah J. Kaunda’s jointly written article draws on the insights of the famed British philosopher of religion, John Hick. Drawing from John Hick’s soteriological criterion of religious pluralism, this essay questions the way in which Christianity is often portrayed as the normative standard by which other so called “Primitive” religions are assessed, in terms of their veracity to be seen as legitimate forms of expression of the human quest for matters of ultimate concern. This essay claims that with a modern understanding of the globalized world, it is no longer the norm for a non-Christian religion to meet Christian-like features to be considered a “world religion”. By adopting a universal model that is gained through observing concrete particularizations, where no one religion can claim to serve as the clear and dominant standard for any other, this essay attempts to re-imagine and re-construct African Traditional Religions. While the focus of this article is on African Tradition Religions, particular focus is given to the Zulu religion, its deity, uNkulunkulu, and its moral fabric. This article rethinks how we have conceptualized “World Religions”.","PeriodicalId":42729,"journal":{"name":"BLACK THEOLOGY","volume":"19 1","pages":"99 - 100"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2021-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"44226444","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1954373
Ronald B. Neal
argued way, an important topic especially within Africana interpretive contexts of religion, theology, and biblical scholarship. What, in my view, makes the volume unique and thus interesting is that it deviates from others, especially those in the field of Hebrew Bible studies in terms of its treatment of the biblical Hagar character, by enlisting material from other disciplines such as African American History, Classics, Literature as well as Islamic studies among others, thus foregrounding the need for multi-interand trans-disciplinary studies in the scholars’ engagement with the biblical text. What I find missing though is the author’s omission of a deliberate engagement with the theme of the book’s function in the context of race studies, especially in a context that still sets great store by white supremacy like the U.S. One would certainly recommend Reimagining Hagar: Blackness and Bible to Bible, Theology and Religion scholars and students and the laity in general, and especially those with a keen interest in the (Hebrew) Bible and race studies and in the recovery of the Black presence in the Christian Bible.
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Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1954370
David Isiorho
{"title":"From Lament to Action, The Report of the Archbishops’ Anti-Racism Taskforce","authors":"David Isiorho","doi":"10.1080/14769948.2021.1954370","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1080/14769948.2021.1954370","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":42729,"journal":{"name":"BLACK THEOLOGY","volume":"19 1","pages":"181 - 182"},"PeriodicalIF":0.2,"publicationDate":"2021-05-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45317384","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1955179
Willy L. Mafuta, C. Kaunda
ABSTRACT Drawing from John Hick’s soteriological criterion of religious pluralism (in his notion of saintliness and morality), this essay questions the validity of the Christian putative, normative status to establish Christian-like features for other religions to be considered a “world religion”. This essay claims that with a modern understanding of the globalized world, it is no longer the norm for a non-Christian religion to meet Christian-like features to be considered a “world religion”. Instead, a universal model is gaining its reality through concrete particularizations, where no one religion can claim to serve as the clear and dominant standard for any other. In this sense, this essay attempts to re-imagine and construct African Traditional Religions, particularly the Zulu religion, its deity, uNkulunkulu, and its moral fabric, as a religious particularization of the global systems.
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Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1955178
M. S. Kgatle
ABSTRACT Pentecostal worship is widely studied with but little attention given to its link with a spirituality of liberation. This article uses literary analysis to demonstrate that African Pentecostal Worship (hereafter APW) is an expression of a spirituality of liberation with implications for Black theology. In order to achieve this, the article introduces Black theology within the theoretical framework of a spirituality of liberation. APW, an African style of worship, is discussed in relation to African Pentecostalism and Blackness. Three aspects of APW are discussed; a Spirit of liberation, the music of liberation and the sermons of liberation to illustrate their connection to a Spirituality of liberation. This Spirituality of liberation in APW has some implications for Black theology as it challenges Black theologians to incorporate African Pentecostalism in their studies. Therefore, Black theologians can no longer ignore the contribution of African Pentecostalism to the development of Black theology in Africa.
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Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1948712
Carol Troupe
ABSTRACT As part of the Council for World Mission’s Legacies of Slavery project, the author, from her perspective as a descendant of enslaved Africans, explores the themes that emerged during her initial encounter with historical missionary magazine material. Drawing on insights from Black and Womanist theologies, she asks questions about what reflection on these themes can offer to contemporary practice and church mission.
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Pub Date : 2021-05-04DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1954371
Michael N. Jagessar
doubt that this will be an effective strategy for change. It is possible that powerful groups within the church will become even more entrenched in their failure to appoint UKME/ GMH people. When this report tells us that Black Church members, despite being highly qualified and experienced, are continually passed over by the overwhelmingly White church systems nothing new is being added to our knowledge base. Black people know this even if White Church people do not want to acknowledge it and must be reminded time and time again. But to whom is this report addressed? Presumably, those who have the power to change things. Who can tell in the strange world and culture of the Church of England? So, do we really need yet another report that draws the conclusion that a great resource for the Church is being underused and marginalized? Yes, we know this. This is the lived experience of Black Christians, particularly their clergy who seek to represent Christ to the world. It is not unlike saying that slum environments prevent academic learning. I understand the contributors of this report would be keen to commission new research to make some sense of the Church of England’s theological foundations of prejudice and discrimination. In this context, I hope they will welcome this review as an initial and meaningful contribution to that process. I do not doubt the sincerity of the writers, but will the Church of England deliver on the recommendations that would seriously change its life and culture as an institutionally racist institution? Some of the recommendations are crucial, others are not so important, so it would not be difficult for readers to predict which ones are likely to succeed. So, will anything change? From Lament to Action runs the tightrope between the optimistic and the naive. This is something readers will have to decide for themselves. Clearly time will tell, so watch this space, but as I said previously, do not hold your breath.
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Pub Date : 2021-01-02DOI: 10.1080/14769948.2021.1895559
Thomas P. Dixon
ABSTRACT This paper places Dr. Martin Luther King and Martin Luther in conversation in order to compare their polyvalent engagements with law in protest speech. Each figure viewed God’s law dialogically and applied this tension to complex censure of unjust human laws, fostering protest that was combative yet constructive. Both insisted on the grounding of human laws in the law of God, and both invoked divine judgment on those in power who misused law to exploit and oppress. Luther marshalled the Apostle Paul to denounce the captivity imposed upon the German people by ecclesiastical authority; King echoed Israel’s prophets (as well as Paul) to threaten the unjust state in the battle for civil rights legislation. Although in drastically different circumstances, the purpose and character of “law” lay at the heart of each movement, particularly because both King and Luther were protesting laws entrenched in putatively Christian nations.
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