African American religion in the United States

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The African American Religion in the United States refers to religions and forms of religion of the descendants of African Americans who were sold to the United States during the slavery in the United States .

When writing about the history of religion in the USA, the focus is mostly on Puritanism and the religious persecution of the first settlers in Europe, which are seen as the starting point for European settlement. Often too little attention is paid to the fact that "religion in America" ​​was already practiced by the natives ( Indians ) before the settlement and that a large part of the first immigrants did not come to the continent voluntarily, but were sold into slavery . In this context, their descendants developed their own African-American forms of religion .

history

Beginnings

While the first Africans came to North America as indentured servants , the system of slavery was established relatively quickly, in which people from Africa were sold like goods. Whether and to what extent these people should be allowed to practice religion or whether they should be proselytized was initially controversial in the slave-holding society. It was undisputed, however, that the traditional religions that the people brought with them from Africa ( African religions ) were rejected by the slave owners.

Christianization during the Great Awakening

Even if there had been an exchange of religious practices (e.g. superstition ) between the white and black populations of the United States since the first contacts , an actual exchange did not take place until the 18th century when the Great Awakening movement had previously occurred sparked an unprecedented wave of religious enthusiasm. One reason for the great popularity of the revival movement was that it was an outlet for the less privileged (women, poor farm workers without land ownership, Indians) as well as for slaves, who speak for their group in front of participants from all walks of life and important religious ones Could take over functions.

Many African Americans converted to Christianity and used the movement to organize, preach and participate in the movement on an equal footing with “whites”. From 1830 there were African-American clerics who even elected their own bishops. Men like Richard Allen and Andrew Marshall became the theological spokesmen for African American people in the revival.

This relative freedom, however, did not last long in the southern United States, the revival movement became a mass movement in which slavery was also accepted. African Americans living in the northern states responded by establishing their own religious communities. This was much more difficult in the southern states , often had to be done in secret and led to a geographical differentiation from the Afro-American religion.

Religious Practice and Abolitionism

The 19th century was shaped for the African-American population in the United States by efforts to end slavery. Northern and southern states differed greatly in this respect, so that the place of residence had a great influence on the possibility of religious practice.

In the northern states

In the northern states, Methodists like Richard Allen and James Varick began to withdraw from the white church federations and to form their own denominations . The African Methodist Episcopal Church was founded in 1816, the African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church was founded in 1821. In 1840 the Black Baptists organized the American Baptist Missionary Convention, the first of numerous Baptist Conventions (that is, the amalgamation of several individual churches), all of which became the National Baptist Convention of the United States in 1895 . should rise. The ability to form religious bodies of one's own, closely resembling those of white society in terms of beliefs and beliefs, was used by both African-Americans and white representatives of emancipation as an argument for equality or the abolition of slavery.

In the southern states

Restrictions

In the southern states, slavery severely restricted African American religious freedom. Often it was forbidden by law for the slaves to join the churches founded in the northern states or to found their own official religious institutions. Often they also refused to attend the services of white preachers permitted by the slave owners, since obedience and acceptance of slavery were often preached to them on these occasions. A differentiation of religious practice developed into outward adaptation to the demands of the slave owners and inward adherence to independent religious practice.

"Invisible Church"

In order to evade bans, the African Americans in the southern states moved their religious practice to secret places and times ( invisible institution ). The services were typically a common singing, which was enriched by calls from individual participants, who thus shared their thoughts and emotions with the group. Often this communication via improvised music resulted in a re-enactment of certain biblical scenes of particular importance for the African-Americans. Such a scene was e.g. B. the exodus of the Israelites from Canaan, where Jesus was seen as a second Moses who would lead the African American out of slavery. The hope for liberation from slavery expressed in this form linked religious ideas of the expectation of the Last Judgment with the expectation of the secular emancipation movement.

Awakening experience

The awakening experience, a deeply individual event that therefore made authorization by the white clergy superfluous, but which was proclaimed in the (secret) community, was the most important point in the biography of a believer. By converting to God, believers were able to find confirmation of their value as human beings in religion, something that was denied them as slaves in the everyday world. Instead of official rituals and sermons, African American beliefs were expressed in stories, songs and their own traditions.

Outward demarcation

This allowed them to distance themselves from the slavery-affirming religion of the white slave owners. Strict moral principles were upheld within the African American community, but other standards could apply to behavior toward whites. This moral distinction between whites and Afro-Americans, as well as the forms of religious activity, which are even more reminiscent of African customs, were viewed as wrong not only by whites, but also by African-American missionaries from the northern states.

Religious protest against slavery

In faith

Although the Christian Afro-American Bible based their religion on the same text as the white Christians and were sometimes forced to attend the same services, there were, however, differences in faith that enabled them to offer mental or concrete resistance to slavery. They rejected the white doctrine of the Curse of Canaan , which was used to justify the alleged inferiority of African Americans. They also highlighted scriptures that helped them in their situation and dismissed others who approved of slavery.

In order to give meaning to the existence of slavery, the idea was developed that the Afro-Americans were deported to America because of this, in order to get to know Christianity and then to proselytize Africa after their liberation.

In action

Some African Americans also followed strict moral lifestyles as a way of setting themselves apart from the decadence of whites. They got involved in Christian organizations to improve the education and qualification of African Americans. They also tried to prevent the American Colonizing Society from planning to deport African Americans to Africa. An African-American version of Christianity developed that leaders of anti-slavery rebellions like Turner and Vesey saw as executors of God's will. In some cases, however, it also culminated in “Black Nationalism”: In 1829, David Walker, a free African American from Boston, published a leaflet in which he described African Americans as the true Christians who would end the sin of slavery and then convert the world to Christianity.

After the Civil War

Even after the Civil War, which the northern states also waged to abolish slavery and which the southern states interpreted as an attack on their self-determination, there were considerable geographical differences in the practice of Afro-American religion.

While the African Americans of the northern states tried to arrive in the social mainstream and closely networked their religious practice with and adapted to existing white churches, the liberated slaves of the southern states refused to accept this development. They preferred to found their own churches and continue to cultivate their previously clandestine rituals, beliefs and forms of expression, which still showed strong similarities with African religions.

After the abolition of slavery, the white churches in the north lost interest in working against the ongoing discrimination against the black population and working with their churches. In addition, they were often perceived as patronizing by the African Americans themselves.

The white churches in the south, on the other hand, had great problems accepting the new foundations of their Afro-American fellow citizens.

Recent developments

The African American religions influenced both the Civil Rights Movement and the Black Power Movement of the 20th century.

Beliefs

The practice of religion among Afro-Americans is fed by various religions that were still brought with them from Africa (e.g. animistic religions, Islam) and also from religions that were adopted later, such as Christianity. However, there are a few constants that concern all African American denominations:

Africa as a historical reality and a religious image

The fact that most African Americans can clearly be visually differentiated and the restrictive one-drop rule made it impossible for this group to disappear into mainstream society through assimilation. The group membership based on skin color remained a decisive factor in the self-image, which repeatedly referred to the common origin from Africa (historical reality). At the same time, attempts were made to defuse the devaluation associated with the “African American” category by upgrading the place of origin Africa in a variety of ways in a religious context. Many elements of African American folklore (slave narratives, sermons, Negro Spirituals , Brer Rabbit or High John the Conqueror stories) preserve African elements of religious significance such as trickster figures.

Involuntary presence of African Americans in the US

The settlement of Africans in the United States began as a compulsion. The country represented a bizarre reality for them: they came into contact with a new living space, but were prevented by slavery from developing their own strategies for dealing with it. However, when they conformed to the suppression of the slavery system, they could hardly do so without psychological damage. In order to be meaningful to African Americans, religions had to take this condition into account and offer some form of opposition. So were z. In the course of Christianization, for example, biblical stories and figures of thought were taken over for the practice of religion, but what was particularly chosen was what corresponded to the living environment of the African American (e.g. the liberation of the people of Israel from Egypt).

God as a symbol and experience

The gods of the African religions were less removed from the everyday world than the god of Christianity; the ancestor cult enabled more fluid transitions between everyday life and the supernatural world. This concept continues to work in the Afro-American religions. Instead of the Trinity of Christianity z. B. to be seen as dogma, it is understood more in analogy to the levels of African ancestor worship . The gods of different levels are mediators who can certainly be present in the everyday world, even if they do not necessarily have the power to change this reality. Many Negro Spirituals express the closeness between man and God, and the revival story is also an important genre of the Afro-American religion.

literature

  • David D. Wills: The Central Themes of American Religious History. Pluralism, Puritanism, and the Encounter fo Black and White. In: Timothy E. Fulop, Albert J. Raboteau (Eds.): African American Religion. Interpretive Essays in History and Culture. Routledge, New York and London 1997, pp. 8-20.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Albert J. Raboteau: The Black Experience in American Evangelism. The Meaning of Slavery. In: African American Religion. Interpretive Essays in History and Culture. Timothy E. Fulop & Albert J. Raboteau (Eds.). Routledge, New York and London 1997, p. 92
  2. ^ Albert J. Raboteau: The Black Experience in American Evangelism. The Meaning of Slavery. In: African American Religion. Interpretive Essays in History and Culture. Timothy E. Fulop & Albert J. Raboteau (Eds.). Routledge, New York and London 1997, pp. 102ff
  3. ^ Charles H. Long: A Study of African American Religion in the United States. In: African American Religion. Interpretive Essays in History and Culture. Timothy E. Fulop & Albert J. Raboteau (Eds.). Routledge, New York and London 1997, pp. 22-35