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the Protestant Reformation involved a Church issue of authority, the 1840s denominational
splits over slavery were provoked by polity issues in the Church, and the 1920s Modernist
controversies concerned hermeneutical issues in the Church. However, the call for "Black
Power" did not originate in the church, was not mediated in the church, but was a secular,
political affair.

In Black Theology and Black Power, James Cone did not write a systematic theology.

He sought to address the reality of the Black experience in America using language and
categories that formal Protestant (what he called "white") theologians did not use. In the course
of expounding these categories, he admitted that his work was "written with a definite
attitude... [an] angry black man, disgusted."

The following year A Black Theology of Liberation

was organized according to traditional theological terms: sources, norms, revelation, God, man,
Christ, and eschatology. Finally, in responding to black and white critics, Cone says, "God of
the Oppressed represents my [his] most developed theological position."

Cones initial thesis

calls for an embrace of Black Power and its criticism of racist "Christian" America:

It is my thesis, however, that Black Power, even in its most radical expression, is not the

antithesis of Christianity, nor is it a heretical idea to be tolerated with painful forbearance. It is
rather, Christs central message to twentieth-century America. And unless the empirical
denominational church makes a determined effort to recapture the man Jesus through a total
identification with the suffering poor as expressed in Black Power, that church will become exactly
what Christ is not.

Cone conceded that "Black Power... [is] not consciously seeking to be Christian"

and "many Black Power advocates shun Christianity and the language of love."

Cone realized

that the status of Black Power was questionable regarding Christianity. In seeking to establish
the possible Christian character of Black Power, Cone freely pointed to two areas of possible
tension: the nature of the Bible and the appropriateness of violence as a means of liberation.

Now, of course, the Christian Church, and its preachers and theologians, ought to

have had a prophetic word to speak to the issues of the turbulent sixties. It did not. Silence in
the midst of sin and confusion is unacceptable.

With such a quiet Christian church, Cone

sought to be a voice crying against the evils of segregation and racism (both individual and
systemic). The necessity of his proposed unique "Black" theology was, and is, an indictment
against broader American Christianitys failure to speak out.

Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 2. Also Stephen R. Prescott notes the experiences that led

Cone to such anger. After being swept up in the call for Black Power, Cone "reacted with blinding anger" to the
1967 Detroit race riots. Stephen R. Prescott, "James Hal Cone: Father of Black Theology." In Here I Stand: Essays
in Honor of Dr. Paige Patterson, eds. Stephen Prescott, N. Allan Moseley, and David Alan Black (Yorba Linda:
Davidson Press, 2000), 275. Prescott concludes, "Based on Cones own testimony, it seems fair to state categorically
that Black Theology was born not from the text of Scripture nor from his theological training, but from his deep
personal offence at the history of racial injustice in America." Idem, 276. Carey says, "The sin which Cone and
Cleage see rampant in white society so dominates their rage and vision that they cannot interpret sin as a universal
human problem which also is applicable to blacks." John H, Carey, "Black Theology: An Appraisal," 697.

Cone, God of the Oppressed (New York: The Seabury Press, 1975), ix. Although he says that his

earlier works give the adequate attention to the Bible and Christology.

Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 1.

Cone, Black Theology and Black Power, 60.

Ibid., 47.

R. Albert Mohlers states, "Preachers are expected to speak when no one else has any idea what to

say." R. Albert Mohler, "Truth-Telling In A Time Of Tragedy" (chapel address, The Southern Baptist Theological
Seminary, 13 September 2001, manuscript), 1. Also consider Martin Luther Kings disappointment with the white
churchs silence during the Civil Rights Movement as noted in his "Letter from the Birmingham Jail." Clayborne
Carson, The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr. (New York: Warner Books, 1998), 187-204.