Chapter 3 - Rethinking Black Biblical Hermeneutics in Black Theology in Britain

Summary

This chapter is written from a Black theological perspective. In using this term, what I mean to suggest is that the term “Black” comes to represent God's symbolic and actual solidarity with oppressed people, the majority of whom have been consigned to the marginal spaces of the world solely on the grounds of their very Blackness. I am using a Black theological method as a means of posing a number of political and polemic points about the use and abuse of Holy Scripture and Christian tradition as it collides with contemporary Black experience and human life.

Black theology is committed to challenging the systemic frameworks that assert particular practices and ideas as being normative (normally governed by the powerful), whilst ignoring the claims of those who are marginalized and are powerless; often demonizing the perspectives of the latter as being aberrant or heretical.

Finally, by way of an explanatory overview of this work, I should say that this chapter makes reference to working practices of Black communities, whether African or African Caribbean (in the context of the UK), Caribbean or African American (in terms of the US). It should not be assumed that my reference to these communities or contexts denotes a specific or particular problem for these groups alone. There is a sense that all communities have their “blind-spots” and examples of poor practice, aided and abetted by even poorer theology (more of which in a short while) in terms of their relationship to the Bible.