Liberator. The. The Force of Justice. Revolutionary. The. Jesus’s role in religion has always been based on the position of the believer in society. For enslaved peoples, their spirituals echoed a vision of Jesus as the ultimate liberator. In stark contrast, David Walker’s “Our Wretchedness in Consequence of the Preachers of Religion” unleashed a blistering critique of how Christianity was perverted to justify slavery. Both the spirituals and Walker's powerful words invoke Jesus as extremely important to their cause, but their depictions differ in purpose. In the slave spirituals, Jesus is portrayed as the central liberator figure who offers hope and freedom from both spiritual and physical bondage, reflecting the hope for deliverance among …show more content…
126). Jesus is imagined as guiding the slaves through the spiritual darkness, lighting the way with a candle, thus serving as a leader and source of hope. This could also be a veiled reference to a literal escape from a plantation, showing how Jesus was a central tenet of the slave spirituals, acting as the slaves’ liberating guide. The slave spirituals emphasize Jesus’s role in guiding them to freedom and liberation, disproving Higginson’s claim that the slaves did not care about Jesus, and proving that Jesus was an important figure to the slaves in their spirituals. In David Walker’s scathing critique of American hypocrisy, he presents Jesus as a core part of his argument as a figure of justice who condemns the hypocrisy of slaveholders and challenges the distorted Christianity that upholds slavery. For example, Walker says “pure and undefiled religion, such as was preached by Jesus Christ and his apostles, is hard to find on all the earth. God, through his instrument, Moses, handed a dispensation of his divine will to the children of Israel. who through hypocrisy, oppression. departed from the faith” (pp. …show more content…
Thus, Walker portrays Jesus as a figure of justice standing against the hypocrisy in American society, contrasting the purpose of Jesus in the slave spirituals. While the spirituals emphasize Jesus as a source of future salvation, Walker’s portrayal of Jesus demands immediate moral accountability in American society. In the spirituals, Jesus is often depicted as a guide leading the enslaved toward eventual deliverance, as seen in “Ride In, Kind Saviour,” where the refrain “No man can hinder me” (p. 116) highlights Jesus as a protector who will ultimately bring freedom, though not necessarily in earthly life. In contrast, Walker portrays Jesus much more urgently, demanding justice in the present. As shown in the previous paragraph, Walker believes American Christianity has strayed from the teachings of Jesus. Walker asks “[c]an anything be a greater mockery of religion than the way in which it is conducted by the Americans?” (p. 200). Then, he says “DESTRUCTION is at hand, and will be speedily consummated unless you REPENT” (p. 200). Walker believes the Americans will be punished by God presently if they do not repent, proving the differing timelines of Walker and the slave