Good News For The Disinherited

“No other publication in the twentieth century has upended antiquated theological notions, truncated political ideas, and socially constructed racial fallacies like Jesus and the Disinherited. Thurman’s work keeps showing up on the desk of anti-apartheid activists, South American human rights workers, civil rights champions, and now Black Lives Matter advocates.” –Rev. Otis Moss III, author of Blue Note Preaching in a Post-Soul World and senior pastor at Trinity United Church of Christ A commemorative edition of the work that inspired Martin Luther King Jr. and helped shape the civil rights movement In this beautiful gift edition of the classic theological treatise, complete with a place-marker ribbon and silver gilded edges, celebrated theologian and religious leader Howard Thurman (1899–1981) revolutionizes the way we read the gospel. Thurman lifts Jesus up as a partner in the pain of the oppressed and reveals the gospel as a manual of resistance for the poor and disenfranchised. In this view, the example of Jesus’s life shows us that hatred does not empower—it decays. Only by recognizing fear, deception, contempt, and love of one another can God’s justice prevail. With a new foreword by acclaimed womanist theologian Kelly Brown Douglas, this edition of Jesus and the Disinherited is a timeless testimony of faith that demonstrates how to thrive and flourish in a world that attempts to destroy one’s humanity from the inside out. Having witnessed firsthand the depths of white supremacy and the heights of human civility, Thurman reiterates the inherent dignity of all of God’s children.

This book examines the meaning of Jesus' humanity, his divinity, and the special significance of his teachings to the poor and the oppressed. The discussion of these issues is shaped around the theology of Howard Thurman (1900-1981), one of the greatest religious thinkers of his generation. It is the only such work which thoroughly defines Thurman's significance as an African American folk theologian who both adopts and transcends his religious heritage. Thurman is depicted as a 'folk theologian' who both perpetuates and transforms African American folk religion. The core of Thurman's theology revolves around his reinterpretation of the meaning of the concept of 'humanity' and 'divinity'. The search for a 'Black Christ', black messiah, has been a prominent feature of African American religious thought in the past two centuries. This book addresses Thurman's treatment of Jesus within the ebb-and-flow of the debates in this area. This is the first work devoted exclusively to the subject of Christology as the center of Thurman's theology.

Famously known as the text that Martin Luther King Jr. sought inspiration from in the days leading up to the Montgomery bus boycott, Howard Thurman’s Jesus and the Disinherited helped shape the civil rights movement and changed our nation’s history forever. In this classic theological treatise, the acclaimed theologian and religious leader Howard Thurman (1900-1981) demonstrates how the gospel may be read as a manual of resistance for the poor and disenfranchised. Jesus is a partner in the pain of the oppressed and the example of His life offers a solution to ending the descent into moral nihilism. Hatred does not empower--it decays. Only through self-love and love of one another can God's justice prevail.

The faith journeys of a major mentor to the civil rights movement Teacher. Minister. Theologian. Writer. Mystic. Activist. No single label can capture the multiplicity of Howard Thurman’s life, but his influence is evident in the most significant aspects of the civil rights movement. In 1936, he visited Mahatma Gandhi in India and subsequently brought Gandhi’s concept of nonviolent resistance across the globe to the United States. Later, through his book Jesus and the Disinherited, he foresaw a theology of American liberation based on the life of Jesus as a dispossessed Jew under Roman rule. Paul Harvey’s biography of Thurman speaks to the manifold ways this mystic theologian and social activist sought to transform the world to better reflect “that which is God in us,” despite growing up in the South during the ugliest years of Jim Crow. After founding one of the first intentionally interracial churches in the country—the Church for the Fellowship of All Peoples in San Francisco—he shifted into a mentorship role with Martin Luther King Jr. and other civil rights leaders. He advised them to incorporate more inward seeking and rest into their activism, while also recasting their struggle for racial equality in a more cosmopolitan, universalist manner. As racial justice once again comes to the forefront of American consciousness, Howard Thurman’s faith and life have much to say to a new generation of the disinherited and all those who march alongside them.

In the small hours of the morning of June 3, 1914, a woman and her husband were found dead in a sparsely furnished apartment in Paris. Only when the identity of the couple was revealed in the English press a fortnight later did the full story emerge. The man, Henry Sackville-West, had shot himself minutes after the death of his wife; but Henry's suicidal despair had been driven equally by the failure of his claim to be the legitimate heir to Knole, one of the largest and stateliest houses in England. Henry's father, Lord Sackville, had been introduced to Pepita de Oliva, a beautiful Spanish dancer born in the backstreets of Malaga, in 1852. Their affair lasted until Pepita's death in 1871, and produced five children, of whom Henry was the youngest. One of his older sisters, Victoria, would eventually become mistress of Knole through a judicious marriage. But Henry and the other illegitimate members of the family, Max, Flora, and Amalia, were gradually eased from the historical record. The Disinherited rescues them from the shadows to which they had been consigned, revealing the secrets and lies that lay at the heart of an English dynasty. It is an absorbing and moving tale of sibling rivalry as the brothers and sisters struggle for their father's love and against the stain of illegitimacy that had condemned them to lives of poverty and disappointment.

Two Cree women tell the story of how they took on the Canadian government and helped change the lives of thousands. This oral autobiography of two remarkable Cree women tells their life stories against a backdrop of government discrimination, First Nations activism, and the resurgence of First Nations communities. Nellie Carlson and Kathleen Steinhauer, who helped to organize the Indian Rights for Indian Women movement in western Canada in the 1960s, fought the Canadian government’s interpretation of treaty and Aboriginal rights, the Indian Act, and the male power structure in their own communities in pursuit of equal rights for Aboriginal women and children. After decades of activism and court battles, First Nations women succeeded in changing these oppressive regulations, thus benefitting thousands of their descendants. Those interested in human rights, activism, history, and Native Studies will find that these personal stories, enriched by detailed notes and photographs, form a passionate record of an important, continuing struggle.

The twenty-first century has seen violence thunder back onto the world stage. Religious fundamentalism and other economic, political, and cultural forces are increasingly in the business of carving out strong nation-states. Religious fundamentalism and illiberal nationalism also work together to generate, catalog, and circulate a fixed platform of "truths" that are deeply mistaken and that generate division and violence. Against this backdrop and on the heels of several commemorations in 2019 of the 150th anniversary of Mohandes Karamchand Gandhi's birth, this edited volume examines and interprets Gandhi's religious and political ideas of truth for our age. Embedded in the political currents, especially those ranging in India and the United States, the authors carefully excavate and creatively employ Gandhi's thought and practice to reimagine a religiously plural and broadly inclusive nationalism rooted in a universal yet many-sided vision of religious truth. Rather than glorify the Mahatma (great soul), this book revisits Gandhi's ideas of truth-force (satyagraha) in the face of fake news, nonviolence (ahimsa) in the face of religious extremism, and freedom (swaraj) in the face of strong nationalism. Book jacket.