Exodus and Deuteronomy

Chapter 9. Before Crossing the Jordan: The Telling and Retelling of the Exodus Narrative in African American History

123 Matthew J. M. Coomber ChAPtEr 9 Before Crossing the Jordan The Telling and Retelling of the Exodus Narrative in African American History In two consecutive centuries, the story of the Hebrew Exodus played a significant role in African American history. From its adoption in the early 1800s to the height of the Civil Rights movement in the mid-twentieth century , the Exodus narrative became a catalyst for societal change in the United States of America. The ways in which African American communities have received the Exodus story has not only had a profound impact on African American history, they have also helped to shape American history and society as a whole. However, while African American receptions of the Hebrew Exodus offer excellent examples of how biblical texts can shape culture and society, tracking the evolution of a cultural or racial community’s use of the Bible is a tricky business, which can easily lead to cataloging a diverse group of people into one neat and concise, yet imaginary, package. Although commonalities within groups that impact identity and influence collective action should not be underestimated, total consensus does not exist. Just as the terms Jewish mind-set or Arab mind-set disregard the great diversity within those groupings, so do claims of universal mind-sets among nineteenth- or twentieth-century African Americans, and should thus be avoided. With that caveat in mind, this chapter will focus on how predominant interpretations and uses of the Hebrew Exodus within African American communities evolved from the 1800s abolitionist movement to the mid-twentieth century struggle for civil rights, and to great effect. 124 Exodus and Deuteronomy Adopting—and Shaping—the Exodus From abolitionists to civil-rights activists, the ability of African American communities to interpret and reinterpret an ancient biblical story to address their evolving societal conditions and needs highlights the malleability of certain biblical texts, which can be used to reinvent a group’s identity, redefine their present circumstances, and effect societal change. Since the Exodus story was primarily transmitted among abolitionist and civil-rights activists through song, sermon, and political speech, a helpful place from which to explore the Exodus’s impact on African American history and U.S. society is through contemplating social-movement rhetoric. Reflecting a common view among rhetoricians, Michael McGee and Bert Klandermans both argue that social movements do not tend to use rhetoric to reflect the events or realities that they experience in the present so much as to create alternate realities through which to engage the challenges that they face (McGee 1980: 242; Klandermans 1992: 80). By employing effective rhetoric to alter or reinvent the terms of a movement’s present circumstances, leaders are able to (1) establish a collective identity through which to engage in collective action, (2) promote a sense of urgency that offers a clear vision of the future and a blueprint for its realization, and (3) provide a means for a movement to sustain itself by both convincing its members of the inevitability of victory and also offering plausible explanations for setbacks and defeats (Selby 2008: 14; Gamson 1992: 57; Smith and Denton 2001: 56, 76–77). Whereas sound biblical scholarship approaches hermeneutics with a careful analysis of a given text’s most probable literary and cultural origins,1 black abolitionists and civil-rights leaders used the Exodus to address immediate needs and in more dire circumstances.2 Rather than simply contemplating ancient meanings of the exodus as an intellectual endeavor, nineteenth- and twentieth-century African American communities successfully employed the above rhetorical elements through the use of differing narrative frameworks. And although the abolitionist and civil rights movements did not use the Hebrew Exodus in 1. Or at least they attempt to convince their readers and themselves that this is what they are doing. See Clines 1995: 76–93. 2. This should not come as a surprise. Although there is great importance in understanding the contexts behind biblical texts and we scholars enjoy working to discern their original meanings, such intellectual exercises hardly fire up the masses and give people the endurance to face the challenges that come with enacting societal change. 125 Before Crossing the Jordan exactly the same way, each of them enabled communities in serious states of societal disadvantage to alter their circumstances and shape their future. Bringing the Exodus to the American Abolitionist Movement African slaves were not the first to use the Exodus...