Check your ego at the door.
This imperative statement comes equipped with dethroning ones’ judgment and self-righteousness with a pair of rugged plyers and a stern hammer when conversations arise around the topics of race relations and cultural differences.
Racism is not an expression of hatred towards a specific race. However, racism exhibits a power structure to impose superiority among a race of people, which ties in bigotry and other methods of oppression and suppression among a specific race, such as the Slave Bible.
As reported by NBC Newson April 21, 2019, Washington D.C.’s Museum of the Bibleholds the Slave Bible dearly in a 4-cylinder glass case, which is a doctrine considered “incredible for what’s not in it,” said NBC News Reporter, Geoff Bennett.
“The Slave Bible is missing 90 percent of the Old Testamentand 50 percent of the New Testament,” said Museum of the Bible Curator, Anthony Schmidt.
When talks arise around slavery, majority of people link oppression to crippling a group of people socioeconomically. However, to keep the African slaves in line, their oppressors crippled them not only inhumanely, but spiritually with the said doctrine recalled as a missionary book.
According to the Museum of the Bible, the Society for the Conversion of the Negro Slaves (SCNS) the Slave Bible was initially issued in London in 1807 to not only teach African slaves how to read but to stunt their growth spiritually and mentally by withholding missing passages from the doctrine that could have empowered them to revolt. For inquiry minds, leads one to think what is in the Bible that seemed to be a threat to white supremacy to undergo the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade.
Reverend Walter Arthur McCray, an author of “The Black Presence in the Bible,” observes the Bible’s Old Testament doctrine, Genesis 10, to connect scriptures to the ancient genealogical fabric of humankind. The volume prioritizes its attention to the Hamitic Genealogical Blood Line which also includes the Cushites, Egyptians, Putites, and Canaanites.
“Nevertheless, whatever geo-Biblical view one adopts, the historically and otherwise verifiable remains that the roots of humanity and civilization whether in Asia or Africa,” said Reverend McCray.
To understand the context of what is conveyed by Reverend McCray when he states there is a Black presence in the Bible he is implying of Negro characteristics and dark Hu complexion that leads to the genealogical bloodline of African ancestry.
According to Reverend McCray’s research on the Table of Nations, the Black Presence in the Bible can be traced by their names (e.g., “Cush” or “Kedar”). He highlights that it is proven through multiple archaeological and historical studies that the people of the Bible were indeed Black. Namely, the ancient descendants of Persia were of dark Hu complexion despite their lineage to Shem (Genesis 10:22).
Many Christ believers hold to the current whereabouts of where civilization started, which is Asia’s Mesopotamia juxtapose to those who think humankind began in Africa. Before the untimely death of Dr. C. William Joyner, Jr. in February this year, he acknowledged a couple of things in an interview within the sanctuary at Broadway Baptist Churchthat aligns with the beginning of civilization and the overlooked literature of black history that is presented in the Book of Genesis. He states that:
The creation of humankind started from the dust of the ground. Depending on the location of where you were birthed determined your skin tone or Hu complexion.” For example, according to the Book of Genesis 2, when God created the first man, Adam, he created him from the ground of the Mesopotamia, which is red dirt. The dirt from the Mesopotamia played a role in why Adam is historically known as the Red Man or the Zin Man, said Dr. Joyner, Jr.
With Reverend McCray and Dr. Joyner, Jr. briefly highlighting and pinpointing the origin of the Black race to the Bible, does their research expose the dark intentions of the slave masters concealing the majority of the Old and New Testament?
Well, according to J. Rueben Sheeler’s journal article in the Negro History Bulletin, the information reveals the uneasiness that weighed upon the people of the American colonies’ nerves during the eighteenth century concerning that white society would not be able to maintain its supremacy over Negro slaves. To ensure that the servant class remains in its place in American society, the master class instilled methods to welcome superstitions and selective biblical literature to validate the master class’s plans to retain superiority.
Sheeler noted that the initial premise of slavery was a humanizing ritual when oppressing the servant class was justified to transition them into Christianity. Slavery was used as this fallen from grace occurrence. Whereas, slavery was justified as a stepping stone for conversion into freedom, which is becoming a Christian. However, independence did not consist of being free from bondage in America but only in “bright mansions above” for obedience and servitude to their slave master.
Growing up as a black child under a religious household gave many African Americans this birds-eye view or limited portrayal of the savior that took the ultimate sacrifice to die for the sins of humankind. Plus, the feeling of being invaluable and in this senseless competition with White society to prove their significance to America. Feeling the inherited self-consciousness passed down from their enslaved ancestors’ only grooms the future of the Black race to continue the cycle of oppression.
Dr. Rudolph R. Windsor, an author of From Babylon to Timbuktucarefully assessed the grassroots of human civilization that is often debated on how the origin story was developed.
“European civilization developed from ancient black civilization. Without this black civilization, white domination and influence as we know it today would have been improbable,” said Rudolph R. Windsor.
Reverend McCray supports Dr. Windsor’s statement when he lays out the fact in The Black Presence in the Bible that Black genes are like the last names carried on for generations through the sons; the Black genetic code is dominant rather than recessive.
The reason why biblical genealogical research of Reverend McCray and Dr. Windsor is essential is that it empowers and reconnects African descendants to their suppressed history and to inform others how civilization came about by looking to the Bible for biblical context. Even though the research is empowering, racism and oppression flipped on its head would have come with the same outcome of the dark, historical relationship between Black and White people.
Take The Hunger Games, for instance; the franchise is about The Capitol oppressing The District while The District serves The Capitol. The Capitol places the people of The District in these survival games to reinforce their dominance on them. Towards the end of the series, The District overthrew The Capitol and became precisely the people that they were trying to overturn. In essence, the Hunger Games franchise is a catalyst for real-time classism and racism events where the sin the minorities are accusing White society is harbored in their hearts to do the same.
To learn and discover more history about The Slave Bible and The Holy Bible in general, visit www.museumofthebible.org to book your tour.