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The Arrogance Of Faith: Christianity And Race In America From The Colonial Era To The Twentieth Century

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Wood's case for why Christians are so racially intolerant is a very strong if not an entirely compelling one. The book ranges across a vast stretch of American history and its substance is much wider than just racial intolerance alone.

He suggests that "American Christian led racist intolerance" grows out of a very much morally confused orthodoxy, and is rooted in a religious arrogance that has had four centuries of hard-core practice and evolution, and is the result of three primary sources: (1) an inherent racist predisposition on the part of white Americans that preceded slavery, a predisposition that has since been backed up by Christian theology and its accompanying racist ideology, both of which are grounded in notions of biological race superiority; (2) the worldview and institutional practices and biblical interpretations that both under-girded and grew out of slavery. And last, but most importantly; (3) the utter rigidity and "closed nature" of the Christian religious theology and its accompanying contradictory indoctrination of perverse racist religious interpretations, teachings, thinking, attitudes and practices - most of which clearly run against the grain of the true intent of a healthy Christian theology.

According to the author, it is this third reason, the contradictory interpretations, teachings, attitudes, thoughts and practices that have over four centuries become the scalpel for shaping the Christian worldview. It is these contradictory interpretations, teachings, attitudes, thoughts and practices that have become part and parcel of the Christian socialization process that begin in American children even before they have the ability to think for themselves.

As a result of its contradictory practices, the basic Christian cultural worldview has become a closed, and very much defensive institution, narrow and fearful of challenges to its often ad hoc and perverse interpretations and doctrines. It is this narrowness and insecurity that gets expressed as arrogance and leads Christianity into the darkest corners of intolerance of which racism is just one, but clearly not even the worst of its evils: The worst is that it also leads Christians to treat other religious doctrines and other cultural systems with the same arrogance and disdain as that expressed towards blacks, as if these too were basically hostile, untrue and inferior to Christianity.

This point could not have been put better than by the often quoted Alexis de Tocqueville who in 1835 wrote: "I know of no country in which, speaking generally, there is less independence of mind and true freedom of discussion than in America. In America the majority has enclosed thought within a formidable fence. A writer is free inside that area, but woe to the man who goes beyond it. Not that he stands of auto-da-fe, but he must face all kinds of unpleasantness and everyday persecution. One finds unbelievers in America, but unbelief has, so to say, no organ." The author himself has summarized this point of view elegantly by suggesting early on that the teachers of the Christian faith do not tolerate "general mental disobedience."

Thus what lies at the subtext of the Christian worldview is both arrogance and intolerance, which almost always go hand in hand. Sadly, Christianity has evolved into a closed, rigid cultural system unto itself, one very much incapable of being forward looking, or even looking outwards and assimilating into it or absorbing other forms of religious or cultural experiences and thought. It is this author's well-argued conclusion that, since the colonial era, Christianity, the centerpiece of American culture, has thus become a perverse island unto itself, still forcefully asserting its many contradictions thorough its arrogant and race-based ideology. Its perverse preoccupation with race, as much as anything has been responsible for leading Christianity down this scary, errant and very much anti-religious path.

This is a very well written, scholarly and tightly argued manuscript. Fifty stars!

I really wanted to like this book. Its title is provocative, its subject is the inherent racism in Christianity throughout American history, and it's written from a freethought perspective. There's even a note on the origins of the Janson type it was set in.

However, a history book should be written in some sort of chronological order. This one makes no attempt to follow events and trends as they happened over the years. Instead, it haphazardly skips across various eras with no sense of continuity. In an early example of what the reader will encounter throughout the book, it jumps from 1637 to 1677 to 1441 to 1924 to 1972 in just two pages.

Also, the index is incomplete. A reader wishing to refer to the WPA or the Moors won't find these topics (and many others) in the index. Several people who are quoted at least twice in the book are listed only once in the index.

Then there's the text, filled with far too much useless prose. For example: "It is not uncharacteristic in the study of race relations that the catechisms, as instruments of control, revealed more about the thinking of the slaveholding society and its clerical leaders than they did about the slaves." This could easily be shortened to, "Catechisms revealed more about the slaveholders and their apologists than they did about the slaves." A professional editor could probably condense it even further.

Why do some writers insist on showing off their vocabulary at the expense of concision? Are they indulging in some kind of therapeutic outlet? Or do they get paid by the word? In this case, a quick look at the inside flap provides the answer: the author is a college professor. Which may be why Arrogance reads more like a collection of term papers than a cohesive book. This is not to say that all college professors are bad writers, but too many of them choose to bore readers with their verbosity rather than simply share the knowledge they've gained.

That's unfortunate, because the book contains some good information. It explodes the myth that most slaves became Christians: figures were closer to 10%, roughly the same percentage of the free population that attended church regularly. In fact, most slaveholders preferred not to let their slaves be converted because giving them Sunday off meant less work being done, allowing them a meeting forum could lead to rebellion, and English common law held that once a slave accepted Christianity, that slave should be set free. Another false legend exposed here is that northern churches aided and encouraged efforts to free the slaves: many abolitionists broke away from the mainstream churches because they wouldn't provide assistance to escaped slaves. Northern churches considered slavery a political issue rather than a moral one so as not to offend their southern affiliates. "Spiritual" music was anything but: allowed to sing only religious music, slaves often composed songs that were outwardly biblical, but that were actually coded messages for the underground railroad. Subjugation of all "inferior" races was an integral part of Manifest Destiny. And the Christian bible provides numerous arguments for both sides of the slavery issue.

But too much of the material in this book is just plain gratuitous. In addition to the needless wordiness, many of the points raised are repeated later, sometimes more than once. The major Christian sects are overanalyzed. Discussion of sexual customs in various cultures is always an interesting subject, but one that seems out of place here.

And the omissions are as glaring as the excesses. The author contends that since the few freethinkers were not organized, they had no say in the slavery issue. His research is incomplete: Thomas Paine almost single-handedly abolished slavery in Pennsylvania, the first state where it was outlawed, in 1780. In fact, when did the other northern states abolish slavery? You won't find that answer in this book. He spends an entire chapter discussing politics within the Methodist, Baptist and Presbyterian churches without noting any differences between the three (except that Baptists are more emotional). He often refers to historical events without bothering to explain them, apparently assuming that the reader already knows the details.

Most of the material deals with slavery in the United States during the antebellum period, which is probably the author's special field of study. He spends only a few pages on the genocide of the Native Americans, and almost totally ignores slavery in the Spanish settlements.

Ultimately, the author fails to make this book interesting. The inherent racism in Christianity is one more reason why this bloodthirsty religion should be universally condemned, but the definitive book on the topic has yet to be written.