Alyssa Cuevas
David George’s Expedition Towards Christianity
David George, a significant person in religious history, was born in 1742 in Essex County, Virginia. He was the son of two African slaves John and Judith. As a young slave, David would fetch water and pick cotton with age he progressed to join the adults in the tobacco and cornfields. His master was a very bad towards his slaves ; George faced many violent situations growing up. He witnessed his mother and brother being beaten. Their slave owner would whip them up to 500 times, after receiving lashes salt and water would be whipped in with a rag. David had also been whipped, “till the blood has run down over my waistband”(Sanneh). George’s greatest grief was watching his mother be beaten and hearing her begging for his mercy. In 1762, at the age of nineteen, driven away by his master he ran away into the ownership of George Galphin in South Carolina. Under new ownership, George now faced a spiritual pace of life for the rest of his life.
David’s life began to focus on his inner soul when he met an African American preacher by the name of Cyrus. Cyrus confronted David with an excerpt from the gospel “dark night of the soul”; the word had awoken David’s conscious. David married a slave by the name of Phillis and began a family. George was then influenced by another black slave , he began to attend religious services held by a black pastor named George Liele. David was eventually baptized by Brother Palmer, also known as Reverend Wait Palmer. During Liele’s sermon he preached, “Come unto me all ye that labour, and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest”(White). Following the sermon, George approached Liele and spoke to him about feeling overworked and heavy. He also...
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...ich he knew he was not ready for and feared for his personal safety.
David George was born into slavery and faced severe situations under his owner from watching his brother and mother be beaten and being painfully beaten himself. George was brave enough to take the risk of running away and found himself under new ownership, where he was able to explore his religious views. A man named Cyrus who inspired him to attend religious services changed him and by Liele’s sermon David was quickly inspired to follow the gospel. David continued to preach within churches, but continued to face obstacles because he was baptizing whites. His brave efforts to continue to preach drove him to continue to get beaten, this did not stop him from continuing to preach the Lord’s word. David George was a brave man who served as a key figure in the history of the Black Baptist Church.
Howard Thurman in his book, “Jesus and the Disinherited” presented Jesus as a role model for the oppressed on how to find strength, freedom and peace within God and oneself. Thurman shares the story of how Jesus offered an alternative to accepting the Roman rules, like the Sadducees did in hope of being allowed to maintain their Jewish traditions; A solution to remaining silently obedient, like the Pharisees, as hatred and resentment destroyed them from within. Jesus provided an alternative solution to the Zealots of his day who resorted to physical force to advance their justified cause, often paying the ultimate cost, their life. Jesus taught love. Love of God, self, neighbor and especially your enemy. Thurman stresses that Jesus know that “it is man’s reaction to things that determines their ability to exercise power over them”.(Thurman, 18) Jesus taught and modeled the art of strength through humility. He
While reading An Account of the Life of Mr. David George from Sierra Leone, Africa, Given by Himself, and Memoirs of the Life of Boston King, a Black Preacher, Written by Himself, nothing appeared to be majorly contrasting between the two documents. Both included an enslaved, and deeply religious, African American man who survived the American Revolution and ended up settling in Sierra Leone for the last bit of his life. However, after reading these two documents for the nth time, a few key differences appeared within the information hidden in the titles of the documents and the diction in which each man recounted his journey.
The Appeal thus stands as an early manifestation of radical black slavery. David Walker’s Appeal is not only inspired the early abolitionists, but also facilitate the American Revolution of the abolishment for slavery. David Walker’s attitude and opinions are very radical in the Appeal; he encouraged colored slaves to fight for their freedom, challenged and questioned Mr. Jefferson (whom represented the authority) and the Declaration of Independence. In addition, he also utilized religions and the writing style in the Appeal to alert all his American fellows to abolish slavery. Though David Walker's Appeal is very radical, his behavior and action is very reasonable. Precisely because of his radical, more and more people were inspired and start to support abolition slavery. His radical is a logical extension of the principals of the American Revolution.
American history is accompanied by a long list of explorers who first discovered and who explored the massive continent. All of the explorers had an impact on the development of America. The Lewis and Clark expedition, also known as the Corps of Discovery, stands prominently at the top part of this list. The Lewis and Clark Expedition has had a significant political, social, and economic effect on America. They were the first to map out the west and set off westward expansion. Without the success of the expedition growth of America would have taken five times as long, as predicted by Thomas Jefferson.
Dr. Wimberly also spoke about how slavery caused tremendous pain in the black church. The word “wholeness,” he wrote, mea...
In this final research analysis, I will be doing a comparison between the “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass” and the “Narrative of the Captivity and Restoration of Mrs. Mary Rowlandson” to show how both Douglass and Rowlandson use a great deal of person strength and faith in God to endure their life and ultimately gain their freedom.
Although Fredrick Douglass’ account of his interment as a slave outlines in many ways the typical life of an American slave, his narrative utilizes a subjectivity and in-depth perception of his treatment which creates a looking glass of 19th century American slave experience. The narrative itself works in part to both display Douglass’ personal and unique experiences as a slave while at the same time acting as a “cookie-cutter” for the American slave experience itself, that meaning that so many slaves existed in similar conditions to that of Douglass’ that the work doubles as a synopsis for slave lifestyle as a whole. This paper will analyze and expand on the experiences had by Douglass and also attempt to better explain the incidents he experienced throughout his life. Such examples will include Douglass’ account of life on the plantation, his culture shock from being transplanted to Baltimore from the plantation lifestyle and finally the overview of his life as a freedman in the state of New York. Using these particular points from the narrative, an overview of the slave experience with regards to psychological and psychosocial influence will also be reviewed and expanded upon to give the reader a more clear and concise understanding of Douglass’ work.
In David Walker’s Appeal, David Walker is completely fed up with the treatment of Black men and women in America at the hands of White people. He is tired of the constant dehumanization, brutality, and utter lack of acknowledgment of all of the contributions Black people made to the building of this country. Walker was extremely skillful in his delivery of his Appeal. He used concrete history and the fact that he had “travelled over a considerable portion of these United States, and having, in the course of my travels, taken the most accurate observations of things as they exist” (Walker) to build his credibility. He used the very things that White Americans held so dear to their hearts to point out the sheer hypocrisy in their actions and way of thinking, mainly the Bible and their political documents.
Cotton Mather and John Woolman were two men who had very passionate ideas for the slaves. “Negro Christianized” written by Cotton Mather was an appeal to the slave owners to convert their slaves to Christianity. He primarily focuses on the idea that slaveholders should treat the slaves with dignity and respect along with converting them to Christianity. In John Woolman’s work “Some Considerations On Keeping of Negroes,” he talks about how slavery was detrimental to the slaves and the slave holder. He illustrated through his own conduct the principles of compassion and good will that formed the central message of his itinerant ministry.
The fictionalized portrait he penned in “The Heroic Slave” is similar to the personal experience related in his autobiographical work. Both works illustrate the cruel and inhumane treatment of slaves by their masters. Physical abuse, in the form of beatings and inadequate nourishment, is a common prevalence as was mental abuse, in the forms of derogatory language and the separation of family units. The pursuit of freedom from slavery is a shared theme of these two compositions. Douglass felt his pursuit was best served by an education. Madison used his innate intelligence, bravery and perseverance to secure his freedom. Slavery’s direct conflict with fundamental Christian values is illustrated in several places in each work. Abuse of any kind is oppositional to the Christian values of kindness and charity and the subjects of these works endured many instances of abuse. Douglass’s own eloquence is apparent in “The Heroic Slave” in his word choice. Phrases such as “made merchandise of my body” (B: 1263) and “children of a common Creator” (B: 1272) masterfully articulates the inhumane act of owning other humans. The passage describing how a snake would not “stop to take my blows” (B: 1256) illustrates the further degradation of humanity when mandatory compliance is coupled with the cruelty of physical abuse
Slave-owners forced a perverse form of Christianity, one that condoned slavery, upon slaves. According to this false Christianity the enslavement of “black Africans is justified because they are the descendants of Ham, one of Noah's sons; in one Biblical story, Noah cursed Ham's descendants to be slaves” (Tolson 272). Slavery was further validated by the numerous examples of it within the bible. It was reasoned that these examples were confirmation that God condoned slavery. Douglass’s master...
In Frederick Douglass’ Narrative, Christianity is a prominent feature of both slave and slave-owners’ lives. However, Douglass highlights the discrepancies between the religions of these two groups, finding the Christianity of slave holders to be false, malicious and hypocritical. Though he makes clear he is not irreligious himself, Douglass condemns the insincere ideology of slave owning America.
Frederick Douglass is known for being an outstanding orator, but he is mostly acknowledged for being an incredible abolitionist. His work to demolish slavery has been greatly known, detailing his life experience as a slave and expressing his theory on slavery. In “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass,” he demonstrates the way religion and its literature, the bible, had a negative influence and effect on slavery as well as the development of white Christianity.
Douglass, Frederick, and David W. Blight. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave: With Related Documents. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2003. Print.
The story of David is a story of courage, triumph, and failure. It is a story of commitment, a lifelong commitment to God. “David is called the man after God’s own heart” (Jantz, 1998, p. 128). Throughout David’s life, his love of God never faltered. He was committed to God in his time of bravery when slaying Goliath. He was just as dedicated to the Lord in his time as King, even at David’s worst, when he failed God with his act of adultery; he remained steadfast in the knowledge that God loved him. God looks at our inward appearance, not our outward appearance and he can use the most unlikely of people to bring about His glory. David’s life can be a shining example of no matter what happens, God loves us in our times of boldness, success and our failures.