By Robert Beckford
Darton, Longman & Todd. 194 pages. £10.95
ISBN 0 232 52241 3
This book seeks to give expression to black theological thought in Britain. The author, an academic with a black Pentecostal background, wants the 'black church' to interact with the concerns of black popular culture to develop its own theology. (He sees it, at present, as oppressed by the conventions, symbols and structures of white Eurocentric theology.)
This leads him to explore such areas as resistance culture in the churches, Black male sexual representation (and its relationship to Christology), black Muslim art, music and prayer.
'Dread' (cf. dreadlocks) is a term which emerged with the Rastafarian movement in the Caribbean and has come to signify empowerment and freedom from oppression. This points up the author's fundamental concern with bringing together distinctive elements of resistance in black popular culture and elements of black church culture in Britain. His aim is to develop a revolutionary theology concerned with socio-political liberation.
He has a special interest in Christology and what it means for Jesus to be the Christ for oppressed people in Britain - hence the title of his book. As he says: 'To talk of a Dread Christ points us to a Christ of faith who participates in the struggles for black freedom' (p.146).
However, he acknowledges the need to go beyond 'dread' as a concept, seeing it, for example, as 'underpinned by black masculinist presuppositions' (p.151). In this respect, there is an interesting chapter on the development, techniques and challenges of Womanist (i.e. black feminist) theology in Britain.
The book reflects a typical liberation theology methodology. As such, the approach to Scripture is that of eisegesis (reading into the text from one's situation), as opposed to exegesis (reading out of the text into the situation). Perhaps if the author gave more credence to the exegesis, sensitively applied, he might still be able to effectively challenge 'white Eurocentric thinking and praxis' at various points, but at the same time find his own approach critiqued (e.g. can we really treat heterosexism in the same way that we treat racism?).
However, in its own way, this is an important resource and, indeed, an interesting one (see, for example, his comments on Sting and Graham Kendrick (chapter 5) and his chapter 6 on Bob Marley as a black liberation theologian!). Despite my serious misgivings about his methodology, it challenges me to ask myself to what extent my reading of the Bible is conditioned by white, European male assumptions. We can benefit from such challenges.
