Black Theology

European and American theology had never taken the suffering of black people as a serious theological issue and therefore was incapable of speaking prophetically in the midst of their oppression. Out of this vacuum black theology in its contemporary form emerged.

Black power was the political source of black theology, but black theology had another source - black religion. Black religion, as it evolved from the remnants of African traditional religions and slave religion, was the spiritual source of black theology. Although one can speak about these sources as distinct entities, they are, in reality, inseparable. The traditional Western separation of the physical and the spiritual, the sacred and the secular, is foreign to the Afro-American sensibility. Black religion provides black theology with a worldview and a metaphysical base from which to view the physical world and the social order. It has historically affirmed the inherent worth of black people, their dignity as creations of God even in inhumane situations, and God's special providential care for them.

The emergence of black theology in the 1960s was a continuation of this radical tradition in the form of intellectual freedom from the canons of white theological thought. This radicalism was not limited to the black church, but was seen in a variety of social and political expressions in the black community. However, because the black community did not divide the world into the sacred and the secular, the presence of the spirit of freedom in settings other than the ecclesiastical was quite consistent with the Afro-American religious sensibility.

Black religion, especially its creative use of symbolism, gave black theology a distinctive language with which to express the deepest convictions and longings of an oppressed people. Its prayers, poetry, sermons, songs, and litanies provided the context for the telling of the black story. The folklore of black people contains stories which are more than entertainment. These stories embody, in narrative form, the historical hope and eschatological confidence of black people.

Black theology has always been expressed in the language of black religion and folklore. Because it emerged from the experiential context of black people, black theology expressed the deepest religious commitments of black people in a language they created. Therefore, black theology could not remain true to its identity and adopt the language of Europe and North America . It had to be expressed as a folk theology.

Black theology is also a biblical theology. A great deal of the religious self-understanding of black people is expressed in biblical language. This biblical language is not simply the result of black people reading and reiterating the Bible. Rather, this language has become an integral part of black self-expression. One cannot underestimate the role the Bible played in the formation of the folklore of black people. Biblical images became so interwoven into the fabric of black experience that now it is almost impossible to appreciate black folklore fully without attention to the Bible. As such, the Bible is a text which is not simply the possession of the black church; rather it is part of the language of the black community as a whole.

Black theology, however, has always been intrinsic to the struggle for black liberation. It has always been expressed in the idiom of the black community. Thus, black theology is inseparable from its social context. This does not mean that black theology is reducible to sociology, ideology, or culture. Rather, it means that black theology is always concrete, applied in a particular situation, by a particular people, and in a particular way. Black theology addresses the question, "What does the gospel of Jesus Christ have to do with the struggle of black people for liberation from white oppression?"