451 - Prophetic Fragments

Prophetic Fragments

By Cornel West

Grand Rapids, Eerdmans, 1988. 294 Pp. $17.95.

"Afro-American intellectual activity is alive and well in the 1980's," writes Cornel West in an essay from his new book. This is due in no small measure to the incisive scrutiny, expansive vision, and profound depth West brings to bear upon an impressively wide range of intellectual concerns. West, the newly appointed Professor of Religion and Director of Afro-American Studies at Princeton University, has taught philosophy of religion at Yale Divinity School, and more recently was Professor of Philosophy and Christian Practice at Union Theological Seminary in New York. This book is a collection of West's essays, articles, reviews, and even fiction. It provides a peek into the vocational workshop of a critical and constructive intellectual who is unstintingly prolific and unfailingly provocative.

West's aim in this book is to "examine and explore, delineate and demystify, counter and contest the widespread accommodation of American religion to the political and cultural status quo." This project is enacted from the perspective of the prophetic stream of the Christian tradition, adopting what West terms a "principled prophetism." This principled prophetism incorporates the best of modernity and secularity (tolerance, fallibilism, criticism) while simultaneously criticizing the idols of modernity and secularity (science, technology, wealth).

The book is divided into three sections. The first and largest section is entitled, "Religion and Politics." Under this rubric, West's essays skillfully explore relationships between American religion and the social, economic, and political crises haunting the national and international scene: racism, sexism, classism, imperialism, and capitalism. Thus, in essays such as the "The Prophetic Tradition in Afro-America," "Contemporary Afro-American Social Thought," and "Toward A Socialist Theory of Racism," West employs a subtle and insightful analysis of the social logics, the philosophical and ideological legitimations, and the political and cultural practices under which racism persists. He deepens and extends the scope of his analysis of racism begun in his first book, Prophesy Deliverance! West's theory of racism is complex (that is, multi-leveled, including economic and cultural factors) and anti-reductionist (that is, he doesn't explain racism's cause with reference to one element, such as the intentions of white racists).

This section also finds West continuing to refine his understanding of the relationship between progressive, Marxist informed social analysis of the crises of capitalist civilization and prophetic Christian belief and

452 - Prophetic Fragments

practice. In both "Religion and the Left" and his essay on Alasdair MacIntyre, West contends that a major contribution of Marxist social analysis to Christian thought is its capacity to examine and criticize the economic circumstances, political situations, and historical conditions under which victimized peoples live. Likewise, Christian thought forces Marxist thinkers to take the culture of the oppressed seriously, allying Marxism with powerful resources of revolt against structures, modes, and forms of cultural alienation and spiritual despair. West's superb essay on Martin Luther King, Jr., contains the crucial insight that King was, in Italian social theorist Antonio Gramsci's term, an organic intellectual who "linked the life of the mind to social change with such moral persuasiveness and political effectiveness."

The second and shortest section of essays is entitled, "Religion and Culture." Here West mainly examines the socio-economic contexts and historical content of the cultural practices, styles, and products (especially Afro-American ones) of postmodern America. Particularly penetrating are his analyses of forms of Afro-American musical expression. In "Sex and Suicide," West criticizes the rejection of transcendent meaning in life and history in the performer Prince, who "in his music and performance style promotes and encourages an orgiastic way of life in which sex is the opiate of the people." In "On Black-Jewish Relations," West tackles a ticklish subject, charting the various stages this relationship has endured, offering suggestions for its repair.

In the third section, "Religion and Contemporary Theology," West comments upon several significant texts, figures, and problems that, in varying ways, bear upon important theological issues. In reviews of books by Juan Luis Segundo, Sharon Welch, and Franz Hinkelammert, West explores various alternatives within current liberation theology. He thinks Segundo's philosophical anthropology is philosophically confused, because it asserts that faith is at once a set of premises that circumscribe knowledge and a kind of knowledge in itself. West concludes that Welch's deep distrust of rational argumentation as a basis for fundamental convictions leads her, ironically, to fail to take seriously an important aspect of her key notion of practice: reflection. "Practice," West says, "possesses a reflective and activist component." In Franz Hinkelammert, West discovers a refreshing voice in contemporary liberation theology that is broadly interdisciplinary, grounds liberation theology in a more detailed social-analytical viewpoint and biblical perspective, and "examines the implication of his views on modern Catholic thought."

"The Crisis in Theological Education" is a hard-hitting critique of the current condition in American seminaries and divinity schools. A major reason for the crisis is that seminary and divinity school faculties "teach as they do with little reflection or consultation about what they do, why they teach what they do, and whether what they teach aids their students in preparation for Christian ministry." What to do? Part of the solution, West thinks, lies in reshaping and reforming the self-image of

453 - Prophetic Fragments

seminary professors (from careerists to vocationally responsible persons creatively linking the life of the mind with service to the people of God). Also, there must be a concomitant loosening of the strangle-hold that the 18th century German "theological encyclopedia" movement has on the theological curriculum, exalting theology as the queen discipline before which biblical studies, church history, and practical matters must intellectually genuflect. Instead, Christian theology (with a "hermeneutical historical consciousness at the center" that yields powerful social analyses) must interpret the Christian faith in conversation with other disciplines such as anthropology, philosophy, and history.

Cornel West's exciting book is important on at least two counts. First, it presents a model of Afro-American intellectual activity that encompasses black life and thought and the larger American and international scene. On the one hand, West's essays show what it means to take Afro-American intellectual and religious traditions, cultural products, and socio-political practices seriously. This means that West isolates and emphasizes crucial features of these traditions, products, and practices that are central to refining black intellectual discourse, examining black cultural production, and ameliorating the black socio-political condition. It also means that West is critical of those elements of black religious and intellectual life, culture, and politics that merit rejection, resistance, or reform in order to achieve these goals.

West also offers a glimpse of the Afro-American intellectual examining, debating, and criticizing ideas, events, and movements outside black life. As such, he provides a helpful understanding of how the term Afro-American functions in the phrase Afro-American intellectual: both as a referent to areas of intellectual enterprise that focus needed critical attention upon all aspects of black existence and as the socio-cultural location that grounds one's intellectual perspective upon a wide variety of political, philosophical, and religious problems and concerns.

Second, West's book reveals the coming of age of Afro-American prophetic Christian thought. His essays link the insights and ethos of the black religious tradition with powerful and often persuasive forms of social analysis and criticism. West's essays also indicate the prophetic black church's enormous potential for turning the corner on liberal and left-liberal social critique to radical interrogation of existing economic arrangements, political options, and historical conditions. Of course, this does not suggest that West's writings express the conscious political radicalism and social criticism of the majority of those who constitute the black church. But his analyses and criticisms are deeply anchored in and shaped by an Afro-American religious tradition that makes it very difficult for his perspective to be ignored or denied.

MICHAEL ERIC DYSON

Hartford Seminary
Hartford, Connecticut