ipl-logo

Frederick Douglas: Blatant Hypocrisy Of Southern Christianity

467 Words2 Pages

Anthony Rizzo Mr. Curdt English 100 4/12/16 Frederick Douglass’s view on Southern Christianity Although Frederick Douglass condemns the blatant hypocrisy of Southern Christianity most forcefully in his account of his desire of a Sabbath School, a close reading of when Frederick describes about Mr. Johnson reveals how Douglass celebrates those who, in their compassion and charity, reflect the true model of Christ. Douglass condemns the blatant hypocrisy of Southern Christianity most forcefully in his account of witnessing his Sabbath School forcefully broken apart. During Douglass’s time at St. Michael’s, a white man named Mr. Wilson starts up a Sabbath school designed to teach slaves how to read the New Testament on the Sabbath. Mr. West and Mr. Fairbanks were the ones who “broke up our virtuous little Sabbath school.”(75)These two men who led classes to teach scripture to whites, on the grounds that they don't want slaves to learn to read at all. …show more content…

Johnson reveals how Douglass celebrates those who, in their compassion and charity, reflect the true model of Christ. Douglass says that Mr. Johnson is “ whom I can say with a grateful heart,”(97) “I was hungry, and he gave me meat; I was thirsty, and he gave me drink; I was a stranger and he took me in.”(97) This passage quoted is Matthew 25:35 where Christ welcomes those who cared for their fellow men, though strangers, for they will inherit His kingdom which, to Douglass, describes how Mr. Johnson treats him with compassion. Also, Mr. Johnson gave Douglass his name from a poem named Lady of the Lake, (96) which is significant because in that poem a man named Lord James of Douglass was wrongfully exiled. Which is a complement because Mr. Johnson is saying that Douglass deserved to be more than a slave. Douglass proving shows that Mr. Johnson can be described as a follower of living the Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy as a true model of

Show More
Related
555 Words | 3 Pages

The Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass challenges and enhances information from the textbook America a Narrative History. In Chapter 13 of the textbook, the Second Great Awakening is mentioned, and the author talks about how large camp meetings were held, which resulted in many converting to Methodism. Similarly, Douglass, as his master attended one, mentions a camp meeting, where Douglass hoped his master would become kinder or emancipate his slaves, however, instead it made his master crueler. In addition, in Chapter 15 the conflict between a true Christian and a Southern Christian is brought up. In both the narrative and the textbook, the fact that slavery is endorsed by the bible is brought up as part of the pro-slavery movement.

Read More
486 Words | 2 Pages

Douglass tells us this by saying that he believes anyone who is a slave owner cannot be a Christian. In his view, he believes being a slave owner violates the very principles of being a Christian. Auld quote he believes that the Christianity practiced by the Slave owners and the Christianity practiced by non-slave owners are two

Read More
1572 Words | 7 Pages

Douglass who grew up under the hand of many different Christian overseers and masters, shared that, “religious slaveholders [were] the worst.” When Douglass was abiding with Mr. Thomas Auld (Mr. Auld’s brother), He described him as a man, “incapable of managing his slaves either by force, fear, or fraud,” until his religious conversion. Mr. Thomas Auld was converted at a Methodist camp-meeting, and Douglass expressed, “I indulged in a faint hope that his conversion would lead him to emancipate his slaves, and that, if it did not do this, it would, at any rate, make him more kind and humane.” Douglass was let down in both respects, and he said, “If it had any effect on his character, it made him more cruel and hateful in all his ways… after his conversion, he found religious sanction and support for his slaveholding cruelty.” One of his master’s justifications involved reciting religious passages and quotes from the Bible while whipping his slaves.

Read More
873 Words | 4 Pages

Both King and Douglass were advocating for the same thing: their constitutional sanction of freedom. Both men, in their respective letters touch upon parallel thoughts and beliefs that revolve around the much bigger topic of racial inequality and discrimination. Both men were discriminated against and they talk about their experiences and plight in their very distinctive yet special styles. Born in the year 1817, in an era of open and unashamed slave trade, Frederick Douglass’s story begins as a serf to Mrs. Hugh in the city of Maryland.

Read More
1157 Words | 5 Pages

Douglass is relentless when attacking the church, he states, “The American Church is Guilty” (Douglass 1039). This has a slightly taste of irony, because here Douglass, a colored man, is calling out the most “sacred” body of people. It almost as if he was the master and they were the slave now. Next, the main theme expressed by

Read More
633 Words | 3 Pages

In Frederick Douglass’s book, he writes accounts of his time in slavery and beyond. Throughout the book, Douglass writes about not only the physical hardships slaves endured, but the mental and emotional hardships as well. In Chapter X, Douglass describes a battle he had with a temporary slave owner named Mr. Covey. After the fight concludes, Douglass writes, “This battle with Mr. Covey was the turning point in my career as a slave. It rekindled the few expiring embers of freedom, and revived within me a sense of my own manhood.

Read More
814 Words | 4 Pages

Frederick Douglass must have been aware of this because in his narrative, he actively opposes the idea. He describes the masters as people who would “much rather see [the slaves] as engaged in degrading sports, than to see [them] behaving as intellectual, moral, and accountable beings”(48). At a very young age, Douglass learned from the kindly Mrs. Auld how to read, and eventually how to write. He later began a school on the day of the Sabbath for other slaves who desired this knowledge. In Douglass narrative, he proves that unlike the slave owner’s perceptions, African Americans could be “scholars” that “ardently [desired] to learn”(48).

Read More
225 Words | 1 Pages

Annotated bibliography Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. New York: Dover Publications, 1995. Print.

Read More
559 Words | 3 Pages

“ I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, woman-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” (Douglass 100) Douglass does this to show how hypocritical people in the South were being. Churches were teaching the Christian practice of being kind and compassionate while not actually practicing it themselves. Douglass argues that the actions of some people are against religion.

Read More
1049 Words | 5 Pages

Throughout his narrative, Douglass’s descriptions of the white slaveholders expose the Christian hypocrisy found in the American slave system. Douglass first does so by exposing how the lesson taught by Christians to help those in need is contradicted by the experiences Douglass has especially with hunger. Douglass reflects on these experiences when he states that for the “first time during a space of more than seven years” feeling the effects of the “painful gnawing’s of hunger…” (54). This event shows the Christians’ lessons of selflessness and kindness is hypocritical as they treat their fellow humans as subhuman. The Christians at the time rely on scripture to make a case for slavery in America.

Read More
1523 Words | 7 Pages

The American person has no true ideals, or beliefs that make him or her up. Americans are free to believe in what they want, think what they want, preach what they want, and most importantly say what they want . Authors such as Ralph Waldo Emerson, Frederick Douglass, and Walt Whitman show in their texts such as “Self-Reliance” , The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass , and “I Celebrate Myself” that there is no true definition of the American identity. The American identity can be seen in the many aspects of peoples lives, and a a quality that many Americans portray is the ability to have individual thoughts and emotions as well as the capability to not conform to society because they stand up for their own individual rights. A

Read More
660 Words | 3 Pages

and by those too, who profess religion?”(Apess, 6). In this way, Apess argues by pointing out the hypocrisy found in the Christian ideology of the time, insisting that the ideas held on racial superiority and slavery, while not explicitly condemned in the Bible, go against the ideas of the teachings of Jesus. Apess also uses an appeal to authority, to Jesus nonetheless, in order to shame those who would argue for slavery by mentioning that their savior would be discriminated against in American society. Another voice against slavery, Frederick Douglass, not only uses his religion as an argument against slavery, but also condemns the branches of Christianity which supported it over the course of his 1845 “Narrative”. In his appendix, Douglass states “I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt,

Read More
601 Words | 3 Pages

Deshanna Glenn ENG 1300 Letter to my old master, Thomas Auld “Yon bright sun beheld me a slave - a poor degraded chattel - trembling at the sound of your voice, lamenting that I was a man”(Frederick Douglass). Mr. Frederick Douglass spoke intelligently and articulately in this well-written letter to his old master, Thomas Auld. Douglass used metaphors, wit, and irony in this sentence to his master, He sounded, “removed” and placid as he spoke very straightforward, bold, yet respectful way about the degradation of being treated as personal property instead of a human being. There is a little melodrama in there

Read More
850 Words | 4 Pages

Education is the light at the end of the tunnel, when Frederick uses it he discovers hope. In the story the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, Frederick goes through many struggles on his path to freedom, showing us the road from slavery to freedom. At the beginning of the book, Douglass is a slave in both body and mind. When the book ends, he gets both his legal freedom and frees his mind. The path to freedom was not easy, but it got clearer when he got an education.

Read More
692 Words | 3 Pages

Douglass has shown how religious slaveholders are the worst especially when entertainment comes into play. The first being from one of his slaveholders Master Thomas, he whipped a young woman while reading a quote from the scripture to explain his reason for whipping her. The next example was with his other Master Mr.Covey, he would go to church and preach the word but come back beating slaves and going against the almighty God. The last example that is shown is again shown with Mr.Covey, he was guilty of compelling his woman slave to commit the sin of adultery. All of the examples illustrate that religious slaveholders are worst than non-religious slaveholders.

Read More

More about Frederick Douglas: Blatant Hypocrisy Of Southern Christianity

Related Topics

Open Document