The Origins of African-American Christianity - Essay Example

Traditional Ibo Religion and Culture written by Olaudah Equiano in the book’s first chapter adequately describes the traditional black religion. He specifically narrates the dichotomy of people involved in this ancient tradition. Hence, the account gives the reader an insight about the set-up of the mentioned African religion. Equiano gives an example that in the Ibo religion, places of worship merit no importance. Yet, he briefly explains that the traditional religion has priests and magicians as superiors of their worship.

At the same time, the author expounds this information by explaining the multiple tasks of these religious leaders in the form of traditional witch-doctors (Equiano 14-16). Equiano does not only focus on the key personalities in Ibo religion, he also expounds on their beliefs and the rituals that form a specific culture. He narrates the burial culture of the African people and the accompanying beliefs that they incorporate death with poison (Equiano 17-18). However, the author gives light to Christianity that the blacks had encountered in America.

He mentions the belief in God and the injustice that is created with the slave trade (Equiano 18). African Religions in Colonial Jamaica by Bryan Edwards in the book’s next chapter further expounds the traditional African religion in the American colonies in the Caribbean. Once again, this specific segment brings the reader into the context of slavery where the blacks retain the tradition they had come to know in their native African home. The discourse of Edwards in this portion is indeed simple: he shares to the audience the taboo rituals of the African slaves which is predominant in the Christian lands of the American colonies (Edwards 20-23).

How important is the second chapter to the first? Edward’s narrative tends to explain the strength of the African tradition and religion that is presented in the first. It is in this part that he details the culture that has been formed during the height of the slave trade in the Americas. This chapter solidifies the transposition of the African experience unto foreign soils, thus creating an African Diaspora. The third chapter acts as glue to the first and the second because it discusses the eventual conversion of the African slaves to Christianity.

Slave Conversion on the Carolina Frontier by Francis Le Jau is to be considered as the most reliable primary source when it comes to the history of black Christianity in the Americas. This particular account divulges Le Jau’s efforts of converting the native and African Americans in South Carolina to Anglicanism, the state religion of the British Colonial Empire. It explains the primary reason of their utter conversion – the opposition to black slavery and the abuses of the planters. The Reverend’s first hand experiences with the converts gave him an initial view of what America would turn into after the British rule – a society of mixed white and black Americans.

This chapter also serves as basis for the growth that black Christianity would experience up to the outburst of the American Revolution. As what each chapter has narrated, the reader can see the importance narrative development in the respective authors’