What was most striking towards the end of Fredrick Douglass’ book and the packet including the essays/responses from Fuller, A.C.C. Thompson, and Robert B. Stepto, regarding this “slave narrative” was this concept of the Christina religion weaved throughout. We briefly talked about the importance of Religion is the slave culture when talking about this book as well as Harriet Jacobs, “Incidents in the life of a slave Girl,” as well as in the culture of the slave owners. Harriett’s grandmother uses religion and God as a means of accepting the situation she and the rest of the slaves are in. Often times, when someone is being punished, or Harriet’s brother tries to escape, she simply accepts the situation by saying, “God wants it to be this way” and doesn’t try to do more to change the situation. This approach of how religion taught by the masters is both compelling and monstrous in it’s own way.
The masters create an illusion that they have a direct divine relation to God and that the abuse and manipulation they have over their slaves is justified, and to a certain extent, encouraged. I also noticed that these slave owners turned toward God and Religion to relieve them that this is how one was supposed to treat the slaves, and justified their deplorable treatment. While reading the essays, I came across one passage that remained with me throughout the duration of the reading, “Clergymen to-day command slaves to obey Gospel which they will not allow them to read, and call themselves Christians amid the curses of their fellow men.”(Margret Fuller, 84)- There of course are several other quotes that resonate these beliefs throughout the other essays as well- It was odd for me because in previous books I’ve read prior to this class, it was very important in Christian Society to teach the people how to read so that they would be able to read the bible and transmit the belief to the other people around them, yet this was not the case with highly religious slave masters- an act to keep control of the situation and continue to impose this sadomasochism- master-slave role.
What surprised me even more (mostly disgusted me!) was on page 87, “According to Fredrick, slaveholders professing religion are a great deal worse than others; more gravely cruel, more exacting, and very mean-not even giving their people enough to eat, which in Maryland is very contrary to the public opinion.” Again, I cannot really understand how the slave owners were able to justify their cruel and heinous acts through the excuse of religion, but this passage infuriated me, mostly because these highly righteous masters were not punished by the law, the church, or any of the other people in their community. I am interested in seeing how the Priest and the Church officials reacted to such deplorable treatment, did they defend their followers or did they not approve of such heinous behavior? Did they encourage their followers to treat the slaves this way? Or did they simply look away and rather not acknowledge this was happening? We don’t get much of a description of these church officials/priests in either Jacobs’ or Fredrick’s narrations.
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