LITR 4332 American Minority Literature Model Assignments Research Project Submissions 2013 Research Post 1

William Owen

March 21, 2012

                                              The African American Church During the Civil War

                Ever since Jesus Christ walked the earth over 2000 years ago, many people have put their faith in him and have been attending the churches that have been built in his name. The African- American race is no exception. However the right to assembly has not always included the African-Americans and since they were brought to America in slave ships, the story of their faith is different than the majority of Americans. While Americans today can get up every Sunday and go to a place of worship, the African-American has had to struggle for this right along with just about every other right that the majority of Americans have. However, even though the African-Americans has had to put up with so much bigotry including laws such as not being able to learn to read, the church has proved a place of comfort for many slaves not only in their believes in God , but for their hope for freedom as well.

            To understand the African-American Church during slavery we must first recognize that slavery was not just working for free, but it was a crushing of spirits and a forced rejection of oneself. The slaveholders would stop at nothing to break the will of their slaves, and according to PBS.com it states

“concerned that literate slaves would forge passes or convince other slaves to revolt, Southern slaveholders generally opposed slave literacy. In 1740 South Carolina enacted another response to the events that occurred at Stono by passing one of the earliest laws prohibiting teaching a slave to read or write. In other parts of the South the mid-eighteenth century saw an expansion of earlier laws forbidding the education of slaves.” (PBS.com)

Not only was this ridiculous law a hindering to slaves who wanted to go to school, but it was also a hindrance to those who wanted to read the word of God as well. However, there was some tolerance to the no literacy laws as well as laws that allowed African-Americans to worship at white churches.  

            While many denominations in the south had preachers that would try to stick up for slavery by misusing scripture to do so, two denominations, the Methodist and the Baptist allowed African-Americans to worship with their congregations and this was very inspiring to them because the bible teaches that all men are truly created equal.  While we may not understand all of the God of the bible’s ways, we know from scripture that Jesus claimed that there would be a great reward for slaves that obeyed their masters and many slaves put their trust in the teachings of Jesus and it probably made their lives more tolerable. And while the slaves that did go to church worshipped God out in public in the white church, they also worshipped God as well as dreamed of their freedom in their quarters where they lived.

            According to the website docsouth.unc.edu/church/intro.html it states that

“African Americans organized their own ‘invisible institution.’ Through signals, passwords, and messages not discernible to whites, they called believers to "hush harbors" where they freely mixed African rhythms, singing, and beliefs with evangelical Christianity. We have little remaining written record of these religious gatherings. But it was here that the spirituals, with their double meanings of religious salvation and freedom from slavery, developed and flourished; and here, too, that black preachers, those who believed that God had called them to speak his Word, polished their "chanted sermons," or rhythmic, intoned style of extemporaneous preaching. Part church, part psychological refuge, and part organizing point for occasional acts of outright rebellion (Nat Turner, whose armed insurrection in Virginia in 1831 resulted in the deaths of scores of white men, women, and children, was a self-styled Baptist preacher), these meetings provided one of the few ways for enslaved African Americans to express and enact their hopes for a better future. (docsouth.unc.edu)

From this we can gather that many emotions were constantly flowing through the slaves as we would naturally assume. While God proposed a reward for the afterlife, living under the slave conditions must have been horrific, and must have made the slaves very bitter. One can only imagine how one would react being put in such a predicament. When one hears how most of the evidence of how the African Americans worshipped in their Church gatherings, one realizes what a great loss this is for people who are interested in the early American African American Church and their practices. Never the less the church provided a safe haven and an escape from the realities of slavery as they recognized that like their Messiah, they too were called to suffer in this life according to the scriptures which state

Servants, be subject to your masters with all respect, not only to the good and gentle but also to the unjust.¹⁹ For this is a gracious thing, when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. ²⁰ For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if when you do good and suffer for it you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. ²¹ For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you,leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps. (1 Peter 2:18-21) 

 While it may not make sense to everyone, these scriptures makes perfect since to the ones who chose to fear God. In conclusion, I think that had it not been for the African-American slaves being allowed to assemble at the church and hear God’s word about their situations, there would have been more uprisings making slavery bloodier than it already was. While the natural mind might view the slaves revolting as a measure of justice, we must remember that slavery had already been around for thousands of years and the ruthless men who controlled it might have stopped the slave uprising in ways we can only have bad dreams about giving that slavery was so cruel and barbaric already.