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4.5 AVERAGE
4.5 AVERAGE
hopeful
informative
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
“Jesus rejected hatred. It was not because he lacked the vitality or strength. It was not because he lacked the incentive. Jesus rejected hatred because he saw that hatred meant death to the mind, death to the spirit, death to communion with his Father. He affirmed life; and hatred was the great denial. To him it was clear: thou must not make division. Thy mind, heart, soul and strength must ever search to find the way by which the road to all men’s need of thee must go. This is the Highway of the Lord.”
challenging
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
challenging
inspiring
reflective
medium-paced
The aim of this book is exactly what I was looking for - an attempt to offer a reason for faith in the midst of oppression. There is a clear sense that Thurman is struggling with the real challenge of suffering facing an oppressed people.
While his answer is ultimately incomplete, he offers wise and insightful guidance as to possible ways forward.
Powerful reflections on the crucial importance of addressing the oppressive situation before any other conversations can occur.
Some insight into community formation across racial lines and wise thoughts on hatred and love.
While his answer is ultimately incomplete, he offers wise and insightful guidance as to possible ways forward.
Powerful reflections on the crucial importance of addressing the oppressive situation before any other conversations can occur.
Some insight into community formation across racial lines and wise thoughts on hatred and love.
I don't think I can write a review that will do this book justice. It is a beautiful and timeless masterpiece. The writing is so elegant and stylized yet completely relatable and current. I kept having to remind myself that it was written in 1949. Martin Luther King, Jr. is said to have carried with him at all times two books: the Bible and Jesus and the Disinherited. You can definitely see Thurman's influence in his work. He writes from such a heartfelt, loving, and reflective place. He does an amazing job of contextualizing Jesus and building a framework around this idea that the gospel is a manual of resistance, and that Jesus is the natural ally of the disenfranchised and oppressed. I will return to this book again and again.
challenging
informative
inspiring
reflective
slow-paced
"The opposition to those who work for social change does not come only from those are the guarantors of the status quo".
This book was written about 70 years ago and religious or not, I think this book will appeal to most or at least resonate with some as being just as relevant in this time (since we have consistently failed to solve many of the problems identified). Short but intricate, this book covers SOOO much and is voiced in the most eloquent way that you can't help but allow your perspective to expand.
It covers the story of Jesus as we all know it, but is woven together with the personal and social experiences of the oppressed through generations (especially in relation to people of colour).
Thurman takes us on a journey to understand how he (along with millions of us), can claim to be a Christian, while it was 'Christians' who brought Africans over to the Americas, wrote hymns like "Amazing Grace" while propagating slavery and violence, and makes us think in depth about how the relation of Jesus and his teachings, can speak to a people at different times in history through social and political struggles.
It also provides a powerful reflection on the person of Christ himself and what he can teach us about breaking through the imbalances of power that constantly threaten to separate us from our apparent destiny as sons and daughters of God. This book has thrown me into much conflict with myself as I am someone who 100% believes in a God and more than we can physically see and touch, but also cannot wrap my head around the idea that is is my destiny to live with the PTSD that comes with just being black, before any of the other human experiences that we all have to deal with, because some people are scared of my greatness and my power and magic as a black woman??? I don't want to have to persevere all the time or 'be strong' in the face of this nonsense! What a privilege to never have that be your life and still claim that we all have the same start in life *rolls eyes aggressively like the angry black woman I am**
This book explores both the frustrations that black people feel (that we are no closer to justice as a people) as well as the central ethic of Jesus' message (love) and in particular, love of one's enemy - which in truth, for me, seemed to serve as a further means of control over the same people in need to freedom, liberation and justice.
That being said, I think it is such an open and frank interpretation of the Bible, that doesn't judge and offers the reader the freedom to both agree and disagree all at once! There is a clarity and wisdom to Thurman's writing which makes for beautiful reading. This was a genuine masterpiece.
"There is one overmastering problem that the socially and politically disinherited always face: Under what terms is survival possible?"
*
"Many and varied ate the interpretations dealing with the teachings and the life of Jesus of Nazareth. But few of these interpretations deal with what the teachings and the life of Jesus have to say to those who stand, at a moment in history, with their backs against a wall"
*
"...Jesus was a member of a minority group in the midst if a larger dominant and controlling group"
This book was written about 70 years ago and religious or not, I think this book will appeal to most or at least resonate with some as being just as relevant in this time (since we have consistently failed to solve many of the problems identified). Short but intricate, this book covers SOOO much and is voiced in the most eloquent way that you can't help but allow your perspective to expand.
It covers the story of Jesus as we all know it, but is woven together with the personal and social experiences of the oppressed through generations (especially in relation to people of colour).
Thurman takes us on a journey to understand how he (along with millions of us), can claim to be a Christian, while it was 'Christians' who brought Africans over to the Americas, wrote hymns like "Amazing Grace" while propagating slavery and violence, and makes us think in depth about how the relation of Jesus and his teachings, can speak to a people at different times in history through social and political struggles.
It also provides a powerful reflection on the person of Christ himself and what he can teach us about breaking through the imbalances of power that constantly threaten to separate us from our apparent destiny as sons and daughters of God. This book has thrown me into much conflict with myself as I am someone who 100% believes in a God and more than we can physically see and touch, but also cannot wrap my head around the idea that is is my destiny to live with the PTSD that comes with just being black, before any of the other human experiences that we all have to deal with, because some people are scared of my greatness and my power and magic as a black woman??? I don't want to have to persevere all the time or 'be strong' in the face of this nonsense! What a privilege to never have that be your life and still claim that we all have the same start in life *rolls eyes aggressively like the angry black woman I am**
This book explores both the frustrations that black people feel (that we are no closer to justice as a people) as well as the central ethic of Jesus' message (love) and in particular, love of one's enemy - which in truth, for me, seemed to serve as a further means of control over the same people in need to freedom, liberation and justice.
That being said, I think it is such an open and frank interpretation of the Bible, that doesn't judge and offers the reader the freedom to both agree and disagree all at once! There is a clarity and wisdom to Thurman's writing which makes for beautiful reading. This was a genuine masterpiece.
"There is one overmastering problem that the socially and politically disinherited always face: Under what terms is survival possible?"
*
"Many and varied ate the interpretations dealing with the teachings and the life of Jesus of Nazareth. But few of these interpretations deal with what the teachings and the life of Jesus have to say to those who stand, at a moment in history, with their backs against a wall"
*
"...Jesus was a member of a minority group in the midst if a larger dominant and controlling group"
Read because of this incredible OnBeing episode: https://onbeing.org/programs/rev-otis-moss-iii-the-sound-of-the-genuine-traversing-2020-with-the-mystic-of-the-movement-howard-thurman/