The Bible is Black History | American Black Journal Clip

a new book is addressing the age-old question about whether people of African descent were present in biblical history the Bible is black history explores DNA evidence and the work of historians and scientists to prove that black people were part of the Israelite community in the Bible the book claims the world's first man identified as Adam was a black man from Africa my next guest is the book's author dr. Theron Williams is a pastor in Indianapolis and a Detroit native welcome to American black Journal thank you Steve yeah so this is fascinating research this is something that I've heard people say for a long time right that black people were part of the original human tribes including in the Bible but but the idea of trying to prove that through DNA and records I think gives it an added dimension mhm yeah the book advances the notion that the people who made up the israelite communities both in old and new Testament were people of color namely black people we know that the world's first man that the father of modern humans was a black man in East Africa DNA evidence bears that out in fact the National Geographic Society along with IBM came together and they put together the Gino graphic project it was headed by dr. Spencer Wales and it concluded in 2005 it was a ten year study and they went worldwide dr. Spencer wells and his team collecting DNA evidence from indigenous communities worldwide and they wanted to find who is the father of modern humans and so we know women have two X chromosomes and men have an X and a Y chromosome so they studied the Y chromosome and they traced it back 60,000 years to East Africa and dr. Wales and his team concluded that the the first modern human was a black man in East Africa whom the Bible identifies as Adam so we know that through DNA evidence and then the descendants of Adam obviously would have been black people right tell me what made you interested well what what made me interested Steven is that in the black church we were having a defection of African American young people Millennials and I was trying to figure out why were they defecting from the church and where they going and why are they leaving you know it wasn't like mod universe I'm a baby boomer you know we we came to church and we didn't ask many questions or anything yeah we did it because we were supposed to you know and but this generation of Millennials are now asking questions you know they're questioning the efficacy of the church they're questioning the authenticity of the scripture they're questioning the historicity of Jesus and the church has not answered those questions adequately enough and so this was a study it started off as a study particularly for my Millennials at our at our church and it turned into a nine-month study and then that study turned into a book so it was as if the millennial generation pushed me into writing this book what lessons other than sort of the obvious connection to modern African and African American people what less do you feel we should draw from this evidence this this proof that that black people were among the these early tribes of what it's it's empowering you know because it contradicts the traditional notion that the people of the Bible from Adam all the way to Jesus were people of European descent and that's just not true that's just not factual and so it's empowering to a community to look in the biblical text and see themselves as a part of salvation history not sitting on the sidelines waiting for someone else to win salvation for us yes but that people of African descent were actually the authors of salvation history which draws the African American reader into the story because part of me is in the story that's empowering and you think about the sort of easy logic of some of this truth I mean if you think about where life begins and sort of what part of the world most of the Bible takes place in if you go there even now it's not like you see people of European descent there I'm using people of African and Middle Eastern descent and yet as you point out all of the stories for forever really have been told as though the principal characters are all are all of European descent sure sure and people raised the question to me you know as a lecturer around the country on this on this topic particularly when it comes to the racial makeup of Jesus Christ people asked what difference does it make I mean he died for our sins he's the savior of the world and the answer is that that's the wrong question what difference does this color make that's the wrong question the question is since we know that Jesus Christ was not a Scandinavian because he's depicted as Scandinavian he's depicted as in European and the traditional images of Jesus and we know that he didn't look like that the question is not what difference does his color make the question is why have he been white was why have we done that why we allowed that that's that's the question that we that we should be pursuing yeah in the neighborhood where I was born here in in Detroit there's a Catholic church called st. Cecilia which in the 1960s like many Catholic churches in the city was starting to change in its population as the city was changing and it was becoming more african-american and the priests there told an artist in african-american artists who was a member of the congregation to paint a mural behind the altar and he said I want you to try to reflect what you think why you feel connected to this religion and to this church and this artist painted 3035 foot image of black of Jesus as a as a black man and the controversy that that ensued is legend not just in the neighborhood but but all over the country I mean the Washington Post came and wrote a story about it but that reaction when someone suggested in the late 1960s hey this is who I see when I think about Christ I see an african-american it elicited this very visceral response people are very protective of these other images and I think that speaks again to the importance of making sure the truth is understood I think it's one thing to say everyone should be able to see themselves in the church and in Christ but then there's also the just the the necessity to have fact rule our discussion of those sure it Jesus was a human being a historical figure and he bore the indigenous physical characteristics of his community of the other people from that area as a historical reality and so to negate his color to negate his racial composition it's to negate part of who he is because his race the way he looked is a part of his ontological being it's a part of him so you can't separate Christ from his ethnicity from his color and say you are except in Christ as your Lord and Savior you either accept all of them or you don't accept it and we don't have the luxury to say that I am going to conform Christ into a color that's comfortable for me right you can't do that you know congratulations on the work and thanks very much for already Thank You Man - you all ready god bless

Channel: Detroit Public TV

Views: 246,089

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Keywords: detroit public tv, detroit pbs, wtvs, black lives matter, black history, biblical, bible, christian, christianity, jesus, the bible is black history, pbs, detroit, abj, american black journal

Id: s04ZFeIpTPU

Length: 9min 19sec (559 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 08 2019