Africa in the Bible: White Man's Religion? (Part 2) | A Day of Discovery Legacy Series

is christianity a white man's religion and should we be looking elsewhere for our faith that's an important question and you may be surprised what a journey back before the days of slavery reveals about the faith of our forefathers as you'll see the faith of our african fathers goes back to the very first followers of jesus christ is the christian faith the white man's religion africa and the bible next on day of discovery hello i'm wentley phipps for many people of color the christian faith is a faith that came with shackles the congregation of this church built in 1850 was made up of former slaves but today for many of african descent the stained glass of churches reflect a stained pass a past stained with their sweat and blood wrung out by those of the so-called white man's religion [Music] nobody knows our songs of slavery were our beloved spirituals one great writer once called the slaves musical expression of faith a disturbing kind of joy because as a slave how do you embrace the faith of the one who has chained you and then find in that faith one's highest expression of joy even today many of african descent still feels shackled as they see it to a white man's faith is the christian faith the white man's religion desmond armstrong wanted to know more about the roots of his faith desmond is a former olympic and world cup soccer player today he's the father of six children and he wanted them to know why they are a christian family why they follow jesus and his teaching and so he began a journey to understand his spiritual heritage i kind of stumbled on the fact that um you know africa and the bible i knew there was something going on in the bible in regards to africa being present in the bible but you never hear that you never see it anyplace and it never had a real real connection to it and so i wanted something that really told me look that's not the only thing about my faith it didn't just start here in the shores of america started way back in africa desmond studied his bible and other books then he also decided to visit a class a class held in boston at the center of urban ministerial education an extension of gordon conwell theological seminary the class was made up of an ethnically diverse group of graduate students laypersons and clergy the title of the course piqued desmond's interest africa and great africans in the bible his only reservation was its teacher who by all appearances was a most unlikely source of information on black history dr catherine craga one of the important figures of north africa was the bishop of carthage his name was quote voldeus that means what god wills and he was a colleague of saint augustine and here we see a picture of quote voldeus however he can also be seen with his black skin where he is buried and the the mosaic over shows that he clearly has dark skin in the san gennaro catacomb in naples she was deep she she had her history down she had a passion even at her age she was she was passionate i mean i felt like i need to get on the ball because this woman she's got more energy than i do well sir he's not dead tonight he's alive with a rousing good sermon for all you sinners who will want to find jesus from 450 a. d you who find yourself before me this day know this that the words of my mouth come forth with the power of god presenting the ancient sermon in period costume is a student named mark who's also a pastor here the poor are not treated one way the rich another the master one way the slave another for there is one entrance for all into life and if this ritual egalitarianism is the case in this fragile and mortal life how much the better will it be for that immortal and everlasting life none of the students miss the real message they have just experienced a handshake with a distant african brother and found him to be noble insightful and compelling dr craiger invited desmond to interact with the students one of my questions to you is this as i studied blacks or africans in the bible and it spoke to me individually i wanted to find out from you all how has this enriched your lives the course work that you've taken here what does it mean to you in terms of your world view you know i was expecting a black person to know more about africa to teach the course so when i came here and i looked at uh dr kroger and i said really just couldn't believe it and you know we have learned so much in this class is unbelievable and things i never knew before because since i was like a little girl you know and you know i was thought that you know the gospel it's like you know is it white even when you're trying to to uh to witness to like you know your black my black people they always say you know this is like a white people gospel it is going to take more like a class what we have here class is like we have here where people can see the dynamic unfold gradually because to say this all in ones even if the ones that are sitting here to receive it all in one swoop would still leave you spinning and not really able to to to digest it i was thinking about what you said desmond about you know the youth today they don't know who they are and it's it's almost like they don't care either but the young the young black men that are in incarcerated they do tend to migrate toward the islam religion because they think that they believe that to be a strong black man is to be you know to become the muslim because my son was incarcerated and he was a you know and of course i raised him up christian just like the rest of my children and then all of a sudden he turned to you know he turned to the five percenters and you know i didn't want to like you know argue back and forth with him because that's not the way that i present the gospel but i didn't have the information that i needed to present the gospel with him from the african side but he was more knowledgeable about me about my about black history but i didn't have the christian the black christian foundation i identify with with what you were saying earlier in regards to being confronted with knowledge about my own religion from someone who opposes it and i was stumped you know i'm stumped you know how do i how can i defend my faith if i don't have proper knowledge that's why this is such an important course and this topic is so important especially for me as i go into those areas in which i'm going to be confronted by individuals who are opposed to my religion and who are exemplifying power in the knowledge that they have and that's what draws the young the young boys it's the power and the authority by which they speak that connotates this is true i need to be here and i can't come and i could not come and counter that i could not go passionately with my own truth for christianity and then to stand with authority it's the truth that we know in terms of when you talk about gathering this knowledge and the awesome responsibility of having this knowledge and almost being scared of gaining more knowledge i don't know if i want any more god i don't know if i can handle any more god you know but he calls for us to move on toward maturity why because we're growing closer to him we're growing stronger in him we're losing more of ourselves that we might have more of him filling us up that we might be able to give it over so that we can set the captives free that's what the gospel is for from the class in downtown boston it takes a little less than two hours to reach the old historic new england community on cape cod desmond's been invited to dr krieger's [Applause] house well hi you found me all the way on cape cod bless your heart come in well great great grandmother built this while great great-grandfather was at sea in 1799 and we've it's been in the family ever since now uh this used to be uh the front parlor where grand people were entertained you're a grand person so i'll bring you in here here in 1802 the town fathers met and divided up the town of brewster from the town of harwich they were having a church fight and they weren't getting along too well so what came out of that well the town of rooster was formed they were so mad they spattered ink all over the desk and a great great grandfather became the first representative to the house of representatives in boston you talk about your great great grandfather you have a great and long lineage here look at this bed uh this is where my ancestors were conceived born and died and i live in the same house with it i have this very strong sense of history and it's so important and all that we could find this kind of history for african-american people no question you have a lot of things that are passed down from generation to generation that link you to your past as for me i can only go back as far as my grandmother's grandmother so i find that i want to go back further maybe to africa but it's cut off for me well i believe there are ways of tracing it and they're difficult um often people haven't cared they have mislaid things but they can be retrieved inch by inch it takes a lot of effort but it's important to do all of us need to know who we are and where we came from what our roots were no question i think your research gives us a great opportunity as african-americans to then trace that back as you're talking and also to understand what our spiritual roots are faith of our fathers holy faith such precious and wonderful saints of god that we're africans we need to claim that faith all of us need that but it's so important i think for african americans to understand what their tradition is here's a book you might be interested in um it is my greek new testament but down at the bottom of the page it lists how text can be reconstructed what were other versions after all every trend every copy of the new testament had to be done by hand i've told you about code voldeus the bishop of carthage look how important he is again and again he is quoted and i underline every time that he turns up because he's so important in the history of preservation of the scriptures and interpretation of the scriptures dr catherine krieger is not content to simply teach classes about africa and great africans in the bible though now in her 80s she's leading a study tour to africa and she'll tell you why to instill in persons of african descent a sense of confidence in god's love for them in god's empowerment for them in god's place of importance for them the main motivation for my attending the study tour was really to find out truth and really deal with a lot of the misconceptions that i've experienced as an african-american from my own people you know and from people of other heritage as well the study tour views copies of ancient egyptian drawings on papyrus paper using papyrus to make paper is one of the oldest processes in the world the papyrus paper can last for thousands of years in the dry climate of egypt in fact the oldest known manuscript fragment of the new testament ever found was discovered here in egypt the papyrus manuscript has been dated between 125 and 250 a. d it contains verses from the gospel of john chapter 18.

one side is translated to read therefore pilate said to him then you are a king jesus answered you say that i am a king for this i was born and for this i have come into society to witness to the truth everyone who belongs to the truth hears my voice pilate said to him what is truth john 18 what is truth this fragment stands as a witness and as evidence not only to the truth about jesus the king but the truth about the story of jesus reaching africa just a few decades after the apostle john originally wrote his gospel jerusalem is only a few days walk from egypt jerusalem where jesus revealed his identity it's palm sunday these ethiopian orthodox christians carry palm branches as reminders reminders of the day when jesus entered jerusalem welcomed with palm branches by the jewish people welcomed as the messiah the king just a few days before he was crucified [Music] what is interesting is that these ethiopian orthodox christians trace their spiritual beginnings back to one man back to one of the first gentiles to follow jesus the man the bible names is the ethiopian eunuch and behold there was an ethiopian eunuch a court official of candace queen of the ethiopians who was in charge of all her treasure and he had come to jerusalem to worship acts chapter 8. but did the ethiopian eunuch actually come from the country we know today as ethiopia now of course there's also the key passage in acts 8 about the so-called ethiopian eunuch and that can be somewhat misleading because the term ethiopia comes from the greek word either which meant literally sunburned face and this was used by the greeks of natives who were of dark complexion including natives in india but primarily the area south of egypt which is today the modern country of the sudan now we know more specifically the exact location of the kingdom from which this official came because he is called the treasurer of queen candace and candace is derived from a title called kendake which is the name of the queen mother of the kingdom of meroe german author and scholar dr roland werner has researched christian history in africa we do not only find it in the bible we also have a lot of inscriptions in old maoritic temples in the north of sudan that give this title of the queen mother a candace so we can clearly identify the country that this man in acts 8 came from he came from marrow and the maerik empire again was a very powerful empire and it was often ruled by a queen mother by the name of katoki or kandake or as we say in english of candace and here we have a sandstone relief of one of these queens we don't know her name but what is interesting is that she is in a very african portrayed in a very african way she has two egyptian goddesses on either side and these goddesses have these uh amphora or these jugs uh over their knee knees with water pouring out this is to symbolize the the abundance of water of life that comes from the nile and that she as the queen provides in a way for her people there there is a bracelet that once adorned the arm of a candace from the 1st century a.