THE ONLY CONSTANT IS CHANGE: HOW ADAPTIVE BLACK LEADERSHIP IS CRUCIAL IN THE QUEST FOR EQUALITY

This thesis will continue the conversation about black leadership, what it means today considering the changing political and social conditions of our time, and how God calls new forms of leadership to address the current crisis. There are examples of leadership changes based on social conditions and cultural circumstances in the Bible. As so there are leadership changes based on social conditions and cultural circumstances in the black community. Those inter-related social and cultural conditions can be called contextual; that is, the interrelated conditions within which something exists or occurs. This thesis will examine three areas of contextual leadership from the biblical text and the black community. Moses will guide our discussion and theological understanding of inspirational leadership for the Israelites and African American struggle. Bruce Feiler records C.L. Franklin as stating, “In every crisis God raises up a Moses. His name may be Joshua or his name may be David…Abraham Lincoln or Frederick Douglas, but in every crisis God raises up a Moses, especially where the destiny of his people is concerned.”

Chronologically the paper will be guided by a framework and theme crafted by Cornel West in his book Prophesy Deliverance that outlines the black struggle over time; those time periods are the middle of the seventeenth century to 1863, the period after slavery from 1864-1969, and from 1970 to 2016.

In the first chapter I will focus on the ethical and moral theme that binds context and leadership. The start of this paper will examine morality and ethics from a secular and theological perspective and how God intervenes in social justice causes for social salvation. Gary Dorrien’s, Social Ethics in the Making, will be one of our referenced sources for this section.

In the second chapter I will focus on the context of slavery in the book of Exodus and the relationship between the children of Israel under Egyptian domination and black people under American slavery as both socially and theologically analogous. I will focus on the virtuous and prophetic leadership that emerges out of the context with Moses, Harriet Tubman, and Frederick Douglas to challenge the hegemonic structure of slavery for the purpose of social freedom. The Bible along with Howard Zinn’s, A People’s History of the United States: 1492-Present, and Albert Raboteau’s Slave Religion, will be my books of reference for this section.

In the third chapter I will focus on the continuation of moral and prophetic leadership that arose out of the context of hostility toward the promised land for Israelites and civil rights for African Americans. Both groups wanted inclusion as an integral demand of the promise of their new territory. The virtuous and prophetic leaders that emerged out of that push for inclusion are Joshua for the Israelites and Rosa Parks and Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King who challenged institutional antagonism with direct confrontation to bring African Americans into the promise of equality. David J. Garrow’s, Bearing the Cross: Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, will be one of our leading references for this research.

Finally, in examining God in context of oppression and deliverance, this paper will move from Joshua to Jesus and Christ’s call for liberty to set the captives free. Jesus is a continuation of the call for liberty and inclusion that began with Moses and Joshua. In doing this I will examine Christ’s call for justice in the context of today’s black suffering. Where do African Americans stand in terms of progress and leadership? What progress has been made since slavery and the Civil Rights Movement and what areas of progress are still being hindered because of racist actions? Some of our leading sources for reference will include Michelle Alexander’s, The New Jim Crow and Cornel West’s, Race Matters.

The conclusion will argue that black religious leadership is in trouble yet not hopeless. The context of today and the current political administration can spark a new uprising of prophetic leadership to challenge obstacles to black progress and black lives.