Introduction to Conversion Sagas - Why Convert to Islam?
Religion is a fundamental aspect of life for most African Americans. As Vu (2009) states in her essay “African-Americans Most Religiously Devout Group,” a recent survey revealed that “African-Americans are the most religiously devout racial group in the nation when it comes to attending services, praying and believing that God exists” (para. 1). This study explores the reasons why incarcerated African American men with Christian backgrounds are converting from Christianity to Islam. Does it have to do with their present environment and their lack of positive strategies and hope for a meaningful existence? Does Islam provide a community in which they find safety, respect, support, understanding, and a hope for future success in a way that Christianity does not? Are they leaving Christianity because of its lack of understanding for their conditions, its lack of forgiveness for past transgressions, and/or its lack of avenues for their rehabilitation sociologically, psychologically, and theologically? What does Islam provide that attracts these incarcerated men? Have the men developed a sense of manhood that they feel can only be realized through Islam?
Drawing upon the experiences of former Christian African American men in four South Carolina prisons, this study explores reasons that such conversions occur. Ultimately, the study examines the men’s perceptions of both Islam and Christianity in the promoting of Black self-sufficiency and autonomy in the American society as well as their opinions regarding the theological importance of each religion in their lives. Further, the study investigates the sociological, psychological and theological understandings articulate...
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David Walker was “born a free black in late eighteenth century Wilmington,” however, not much more information is known about his early life. During his childhood years, Walker was likely exposed to the Methodist church. During the nineteenth century, the Methodist church appealed directly to blacks because they, in particular, “provided educational resources for blacks in the Wilmington region.” Because his education and religion is based in the Methodist theology, Methodism set the tone and helped to shape the messages Walker conveys through his Appeal to the black people of the United States of America. As evident in his book, Walker’s “later deep devotion to the African Methodist Episcopal faith could surely argue for an earlier exposure to a black-dominated church” because it was here he would have been exposed to blacks managing their own dealings, leading classes, and preaching. His respect and high opinion of the potential of the black community is made clear when Walker says, “Surely the Americans must think...
The Nation of Islam, which Malcolm X was an important member of, is not a religious organization as the name suggests but rather an organization whose goal was to make the lives of African Americans better instead of actually teaching the proper ethics of Islam. One of the main objectives of this organization was Black Nationalism, through which Black leaders can control the areas where there is a majority of African Americans. This cause was greatl...
"God of the Oppressed" is brilliantly organized into ten chapters. These chapters serve as the building blocks to the true understanding of Cone’s Black Theology. This progressive movement begins with an introduction of both him and his viewpoint. He explains that his childhood in Bearden, Arkansas and his membership to Macedonia African Methodist Episcopal Church (A.M.E) has taught him about the black Church experience and the sociopolitical significance of white people. “My point is that one’s social and historical context decides not only the questions we address to God but also the mode of form of the answers given to the questions.” (14) The idea of “speaking the truth” is added at this point because to go any further the reader must understand the reason and goal for Black Theology. Through the two sources in that shape theology, experience and scripture, white theology concludes that the black situation is not a main point of focus. Cone explains the cause for this ignorance, “Theology is not a universal language; it is interested language and thus is always a reflection of the goals and aspirations of a particular people in a definite social setting.” (36) This implies that one’s social context shapes their theology and white’s do not know the life and history of blacks. As the reader completes the detailed analysis of society’s role in shaping experiences, Cone adds to the second source, scripture.
For centuries religion has played a huge role in the black community. From slavery to freedom, religion has help black folk deal with their anger, pain, oppression, sadness, fear, and dread. Recognizing the said importance of religion in the black community, Black poets and writers like Phillis Wheatley and Richard Wright, use religion as an important motif in their literature. Wheatley uses religion as a way to convince her mostly white audience of how religious conversion validates the humanity of herself and others. Wright on the other hand, uses religion in order to demonstrate how religion, as uplifting as it is can fail the black community. Thinking through, both Wheatley and Wright’s writings it becomes apparent that religion is so complex,
Race and religion are two concepts in American culture that can really tie people together, or clearly separate them apart. A group forged by strong common roots in both race and religion can be a powerful societal force, if it wants to be. The Nation of Islam is a small but growing religion in America that has become somewhat of a social movement because of its strong and radical ideas on race. In this paper, I will try to explore the beliefs of the Nation of Islam, and the ramifications it could and has had on racial relations in America. The Nation of Islam, or NOI, is a relatively new religion. The first temple of Islam was established in Detroit by Master Fard Muhammed in 1930. Much of the theology was based on the simple facts that: "Allah is god, the white man is the devil, and the so-called Negroes are the Asiatic black people, the cream of the earth."(1) And, in accordance with their bizarre view of creation, involving a mad scientist creating the white race from the black race, the twentieth century represents the time for black people to regain their rightful position as god¹s chosen people. (1) The Nation of Islam was spawned from Orthodox Islam, an age-old religion. However, Orthodox Islam has openly denounced the NOI as a heretic sect for three main reasons: the NOI¹s rejection of the belief in an afterlife, its tendency to view human leaders as deified figures, and its strong racist attitudes. (2) For a brief time, during the seventies, Wallace Deen Muhammed became the leader of the NOI and tried to take it in a new direction, more conforming to "true Islamic beliefs." This group is now called the American Muslim Mission and still exists in small numbers today. (1) ...
Author of “The Negro Family”, E. Franklin Frazier believed that the centrality of the bible, structure of Black worship, and notion of God that evolved from the invisible institution to the Black Church was confirmation of the power of white influence . These tactics and different developments were merely adaptive methods used by slaves in order to worship freely in a confined space. Frazier’s beliefs were undermined by author Gayraud S. Wilmore’s description of Vodun in his book Black Religion and Black Radicalism. Frazier’s contention that black religion was evidence of white influence assumes a blank and passive slate. While Vodun in West Africa did have organization that was probably “infiltrated by Roman Catholicism” the goal of New World Africans was to adapt and understand their lives (Wilmore 43). Although white influence was forced upon New World Africans, slaves did not accept this influence but rather interpreted it to create a new, place-based Vodun religion. Vodun adapted to New World conditions, functioned as a coping mechanism, and possessed evolutionary qualities.
During a most dark and dismal time in our nations history, we find that the Africans who endured horrible circumstances during slavery, found ways of peace and hope in their religious beliefs. During slavery, Africans where able to survive unbearable conditions by focusing on their spirituality.
...ans had for generations practiced and defended not just slavery, but the hatred and demise of anything black or African. Cone's mission was to bring blackness and Christianity together.”# In 1969, Cone published Black Theology and Black Power. In this book, Cone brought attention to racism in theology and proposes a theology addressing black issues, this theology would provide liberation and empowerment of blacks and “create a new value structures so that our understanding of blackness will not depend upon European misconceptions.”# From these convictions, the idea of black liberation theology was created. Black relate Christianity to the struggles they have endured, therefore it has to be black. “In a society where men are defined on the basis of color of the victims, proclaiming that the condition of the poor is incongruous with him who has come to liberate us.”
The African Methodist Episcopal Church also known as the AME Church, represents a long history of people going from struggles to success, from embarrassment to pride, from slaves to free. It is my intention to prove that the name African Methodist Episcopal represents equality and freedom to worship God, no matter what color skin a person was blessed to be born with. The thesis is this: While both Whites and Africans believed in the worship of God, whites believed in the oppression of the Africans’ freedom to serve God in their own way, blacks defended their own right to worship by the development of their own church. According to Andrew White, a well- known author for the AME denomination, “The word African means that our church was organized by people of African descent Heritage, The word “Methodist” means that our church is a member of the family of Methodist Churches, The word “Episcopal refers to the form of government under which our church operates.”
The sociology of religion is the study of the beliefs, practices and organizational forms of religion using the tools and methods of the discipline of sociology. Thus, the purpose of this comprehensive exam is to give me an opportunity to demonstrate mastery over relevant theories, methods, and empirical findings in major subfields of the sociology of religion. This reading list also provides a strong foundation in the central theoretical perspectives, main classic and current debates, and prominent published empirical studies in the field. Hence, this reading list includes a core set of readings to which we most often refer in our studies and enables comprehensive analyses about the
...e to the audience that the Bible adheres to the deserved emancipation and support of African-Americans, rather than enslavement and oppression. For example, Douglass preaches, “ A worship that can be conducted by persons who refuse to give shelter to the houseless, to give bread to the hungry, clothing to the naked, and who enjoin obedience to a law forbidding these acts of mercy, is a curse, not a blessing to mankind. The Bible addresses all such persons as ‘scribes, Pharisees, hypocrites, who pay tithe of mint, anise, and cumin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy and faith.” By using Matthew 23:23 to assert American Christians as righteously indignant, Douglass infers that if the White American people are truly Christian, they will obey the doctrines of The Bible and negate their duplicity by showing love and mercy to black people.
James H. Cone is the Charles A. Briggs Distinguished Professor of Systematic Theology at Union Theological Seminary in New York City. Dr. Cone probably is best known for his book, A Black Theology of Liberation, though he has authored several other books. Dr. Cone wrote that the lack of relevant and “risky” theology suggests that theologians are not able to free themselves from being oppressive structures of society and suggested an alternative. He believes it is evident that the main difficulty most whites have with Black Power and its compatible relationship to the Christian gospel stemmed from their own inability to translate non-traditional theology into the history of black people. The black man’s response to God’s act in Christ must be different from the whites because his life experiences are different, Dr. Cone believes. In the “black experience,” the author suggested that a powerful message of biblical theology is liberation from oppression.
Why and how did Islam spread so quickly? I will give three reasons to answer this question. One answer is because of the large trading happening, two is that muslims are protected by Islam, three is because of the religion Muhammad created was attractive to people.
Burns, Thomas J. "Islam." Religion and Society. OU Campus' Dale Hall, Norman. 14 Apr. 2014. Lecture.
The personal insight and experience Zaru brings to the article provides an insightful perspective into the subject of oppression and liberation. The author states her argument clearly, but with obvious presuppositions deriving from her life as a Quaker (Zaru 123), thus making her argument slightly confusing at times. For example, as a Quaker, Zaru calls for justice, peace, and nonviolence in all situations, but fails to account for how justice should be sought, and simply acknowledges that a tension exists between peace and justice (135). Additionally, Zaru paints a relatively bleak picture of Old Testament accounts, even claiming that “the God of that portion of the biblical account is the God of people’s consciousness and perception rather than the God who really is” (125). This claim proves incredibly bold and seems to suggest inconsistency between the God of the Old Testament and the New Testament, a claim quite abrasive to those who, like myself, view the Bible as authoritative. Additionally, throughout the article, the author read her own experience into several Biblical accounts (Zaru 127), a practice that can provide clarity into one’s own experience, but should carefully avoid presentism. Despite these few critiques, Zaru offer incredible insight and perspective into the life of someone often viewed as “unchosen” and oppressed due to such views. In her