Much is made of his religious nature, and the fact is that he was raised a Methodist. Methodists were strongly in favor of abolition in most of the United States, and, though that message was watered down in the South, the fact is that the Turner was being taught the same religious doctrines that led white Methodists in the north to conclude it was not Christian to keep people in bondage. Turner was inspired by a religious vision in which he believed that Jesus was going to bring about judgment day. Turner believed he had a religious duty to fight against the oppression of slaves. However, the main precipitating event for his rebellions was when Turner witnessed a solar eclipse, which he believed was a sign from God that he was to rebel. The actual rebellion was triggered by a similar sign, when the atmosphere appeared an unusual color.
I…...
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Works Cited
Oates, Stephen. The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion. Harper Collins Publishers,
4
As to Nat Turner's rebellion occurring at the wrong time, illiam Lloyd Garrison, the quintessential abolitionist who firmly believed that moral persuasion would convince slaveholders in Virginia to recognize their sinful ways regarding slavery, flat out condemned Nat Turner and his rebel followers. Garrison also warned the South that "if slavery were not abolished peacefully, more insurrections like Turner's rebellion would be inevitable." 5 Also, some historians have argued that in 1831 the state of Virginia was on the verge of abolishing slavery and that Turner's actions destroyed any and all chances of this happening. In reality, this was not true, for it could be said that Turner's rebellion opened the way for debate in Virginia on the issue of slavery. In fact, the Governor Floyd of Virginia, "was convinced by Turner's rebellion that something had to be done to remove slavery gradually from the state." 6 Thus, it…...
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Works Cited
Goldman, Martin S. Nat Turner and the Southampton Revolt of 1831. New York:
Turner was captured on October 30th, tried and found guilty six days later. Turner was hung on November 11th, and then his body was skinned, helping establish a tradition of mutilating blacks accused of wrongdoing, which would survive well into Jim Crow era of the 20th century.
Haiti
At first blush, it seems difficult to comprehend why Virginia whites would be so distraught about an ultimately unsuccessful slave rebellion. Yes, Turner and his followers did manage to kill a relatively high number of whites, but there were certainly greater losses among the slaves in the area. The militia was able to quash the rebellion quickly, to kill the participants, and to strike sufficient fear into the hearts of the remaining slave population that further rebellion seemed unlikely. However, the people of Virginia were well aware that a similar unsuccessful slave revolt in Haiti had ultimately led to the Haitian evolution, and the…...
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References
Gray, T. (1831). The Confessions of Nat Turner, the leader of the late insurrection, in Southhampton (county). Retrieved April 06, 2009, from PBS.org. Web site:
In Stephen B. Oates's The Fires of Jubilee: at Turner's Fierce Rebellion, at Turner was the Black American slave who led the only useful, unrelenting slave rebellion (August 1831) in U.S. history. Spreading terror throughout the white South, his action set off a new wave of oppressive legislation prohibiting the education, movement, and assembly of slaves and stiffened proslavery, anti-abolitionist convictions that persisted in that region until the American Civil War.
His mother was an African native who pass on an ardent hatred of slavery to her son. He learned to read from one of his master's sons, and he enthusiastically absorbed severe religious training. In the early 1820s, he was sold to a neighboring plantation. During the following decade, his religious zeal tended to came close to fanaticism, and he saw himself called upon by God to lead his people out of bondage. He…...
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Nat Turner's revolt put a stop to the white Southern belief that slaves were either satisfied with their fate or too servile to build up an armed revolt. In Southampton, county black people came to measure time from "Nat's Fray," or "Old Nat's War."
The feeling that comes out the strongest and makes the reader think repeatedly about him is the quality of Turner's Character that He is an American mystery. Was he a saint? A prophet? Was the foresight real? How could he have come from the mild Virginia Tidewater society of 1831? Oates answers these questions and more in his vibrant portrayal of Turner, the slave society that fostered him and the transformation of that society because of him.
Thus, in Stephen B. Oates's The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion (1935), readers witness the re-creation of the dramatic but short life of a black revolutionary, a slave convinced he is God's violent instrument for the salvation of his people.
Therefore, he approached the issue from the point-of-view of the common man, and was able to inspire people to the idea of revolution.
Nat Turner is the historical person of which I most disapprove. Turner led the largest antebellum slave rebellion in the United States, which included the slaughter of white civilians. It is not that I disapprove of Turner's actions. As a man wrongfully deprived of his natural right to liberty, who, from descriptions in his wanted posters, bore the scars of routine abuse, and who had undoubtedly witnessed countless atrocities against his friends and family because of slavery, it is clear that Turner had the right to use any means necessary to attain his freedom. The fact that his rebellion led to the slaughter of white civilians would not be morally troubling, given that all of those civilians benefitted from the system of slavery, whether directly or indirectly,…...
Walker specifically addresses this point when he writes that "God rules the armies of heaven and among the inhabitants of earth, having his ears continually open to the cries, tears, and groans of his oppressed people; and being a just and holy Being will at one day appear fully in behalf of the oppressed." Thus, Walker's passage suggests that he knows that slave owners see God in a different way than slaves do, in addition to acknowledging that slaves believe this position to be false. Further, Walker goes on to suggest that the God of the slaves is not only opposite of this God, but is also the God of uprising and the end of slavery.
Unlike the slave owners, who understood the concept of slavery as being ordained by God as a benefit to the slaves, slaves understood the concept as a trial and tribulation through which they would…...
African-American Literature
In literature the relationship between the text and paratext is used to introduce the reader to the subject and setting of novel. As the paratext, is utilized to inform and influence their minds before they have started reading the actual book. In African-American literature before the Civil War, this was a standard way publishers used to provide some kind of insights about what people were reading. To fully understand how this is taking place requires comparing the use of this technique in The Confession of Nate Turner to the Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass. Once this takes place, it will offer specific insights as to how the paratext is used to influence the readers.
The Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglas
In the Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas, Lloyd Garrison has written in the paratext. Inside, he discusses meeting Douglas in 1841 and how he came…...
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Bibliography
Douglas, F. (1845). Narrative of the Life of Fredrick Douglass. Staten Island, NY: Forgotten Books.
Gray, T. (1856). The Confessions of Nat Turner. Tale of the Great Dismal Swamp (pp. 338 -- 347). Boston, MA: Crossman and Willet.
Still it is not completely unheard of for a name to be derived from a longer epitaph of Nat, property of man, Mr. Turner. This is how many people's last names resulted in ending with "man."
Nat Turner was born a slave in Virginia in 1800 and grew to become a slave preacher. He did not use tobacco or liquor and maintained a clean, disciplined life. He was very religious man and became passionate about the Scripture. He began preaching to slaves in and around the area of Southampton County, Virginia in 1828. As a result he became well-known and liked in the area. It was at this time he began having visions. It was these visions that inspired him to revolt. hile he waited for further signs, unrest was already evident in on plantations, in the hills and on boats in ports of call (Greenberg, 85). Gradually he built…...
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Works Cited
Short History of Salvador da Bahia, Brazil. Bahia-Online. Retrieved December
47), Turner was preacher only in the sense that he was preaching to his fellows on some days about his God given mission and things to come. The causes and motifs for Turner's rebellion are still debated over. The documents written during the trial and ever since are agreeing on two facts that are certain: the very existence of the rebellion and the fact that it was organized under the leadership of Nat Turner. The facts about what happened during the day of the rebellion indicate that Turner and his acolytes who were approximately seventy people killed in cold blood almost sixty white people, regardless of their age or gender. The rebellion was indeed preceded by events that pointed toward a common cause found through Christianity and offered as a new form of freedom and a new ethnic identity offered by firm beliefs in supernatural and the power of…...
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Works Cited
Greenberg, Kenneth S., ed. Nat Turner: A Slave Rebellion in History and Memory. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003
Akinyela, Makungu M. Battling the Serpent: Nat Turner, Africanized Christianity, and a Black Ethos. Journal of Black Studies, Vol. 33, No. 3 (Jan., 2003), pp. 255-280
Reckord, Mary. The Jamaica Slave Rebellion of 1831. Past and Present, No. 40 (Jul., 1968), pp. 108-125
Woman / Plantation Mistress / Fires of Jubilee
The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion. By Stephen B. Oates. (New York:
HarperPerennial, 1990). 208 pages.
Stephen B. Oates was a professor African-American and U.S. history at the University of Massachusetts for most of his academic career. His most notable works chronicle the antebellum, Civil War, and Reconstruction eras of American history. He is particularly well-known for his biographies of the period including his works on Lincoln. The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion chronicles the life and rebellion of Nat Turner, the famous American slave rebel. Oates offers his historical work as a companion to as well as a rebuttal of some of the existing literature on Turner, including the famous novel by William Styron. Although an academic, Oates writes in an engaging and popular manner that has made many of his historical works of literature best sellers as well…...
Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion," by Stephen B. Oates. Specifically, it will analyze the historical value of the book, and analyze the author's assessment that "His [Nat Turner's] rebellion illustrates a profound truth" (Oates ix). This book is part novel, part biography, and part heartfelt narrative of a time and place that no longer exists. It is a compelling tale of what it was to be a slave in the South in the 1800s, and how it drove some blacks to violence and hatred. Oates has done a masterful job of introducing Turner as a man, a father, a lover, and a slave, who tried to gain his freedom the only way he knew how.
THE FIRES OF JUBILEE - REVIE
From the opening paragraph, historian and biographer Stephen B. Oates sets the stage for the slave rebellion that would shake Southampton County in Virginia on August 22, 1831.…...
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Works Cited
Oates, Stephen B. The Fires of Jubilee: Nat Turner's Fierce Rebellion. New York: Harper Perennial. 1990.
The women are especially vulnerable because their children can be sent away from them, they can be the brunt of a cruel master's sexual encounters, and they often have to serve the master's family, which can make them targets of abuse.
Most of the southern women in the book are portrayed as kinder than their husbands. He writes of the wife of Mr. Epp "She had been well educated at some institution this side the Mississippi; was beautiful, accomplished, and usually good-humored. She was kind to all of us but Patsey -- frequently, in the absence of her husband, sending out to us some little dainty from her own table" (Northup 198-199). They are sometimes jealous of the slave women, as Mrs. Epp is, but for the most part, they are the gentler part of the slave experience, and they are not as cruel or vindictive as their husbands are.
Nat…...
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References
Northup, Soloman. Twelve Years a Slave. 1997. University of North Carolina. 15 Nov. 2010.
.
Roark, James L. Johnson, Michael P. And Cohen, Patricia Cline. Reading the American Past.
Abolitionist Movement
Black Africans helped the Portuguese and the Spanish when they were on their exploration of the America. During the 16th century, some of the explorers who were of black origin went ahead to settle within the Valley of Mississippi as well as in areas that came to be known as New Mexico and South Carolina. However, Esteban was the most celebrated black explorer of the, who followed the Southwest route in the 1530s. Blacks in the United State and their uninterrupted history can be traced from 1619; this was after 20 Africans were landed within the English colony of Virginia. Though these blacks were by then not slaves, they served as servants who were bound to an employer for a limited number of years as it was to most of the white settlers. By 1660s bigger numbers of Africans were taken to the English colonies. By 1790, the number…...
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Reference
Greene, Meg. Slave Young, Slave Long: The American Slave Experience. Minneapolis, Minn.: Lerner Publications Co., c1999.
Haskins, James. Bound for America: The Forced Migration of Africans to the New World. New York: Lothrop, Lee & Shepard Books, 1999.
Kingdom of Matthias. There are three references used for this paper.
From the Quakers to the Great Awakening to Nat Turner, we have examined numerous variations of where a belief in the 'inner light' or the 'priesthood of all believers' could lead. It is important to examine the cult of Matthias to understand why he was popular, the factors which could have led to his revelations, the social and religious climates and the needs of his followers. It is also important to explore whether the cult was due to the transhistorical appeal or if it offers deeper lessons about early American religious experiences.
Matthias
Robert Matthews was "a carpenter from upstate New York who, after a lifetime of finding God everywhere and economic success nowhere, rode his half-starved horse into Manhattan in 1832, proclaiming his own divinity. He presented himself as not a Christian at all, but as Matthias, the culmination of…...
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Works Cited
Brown, Lee Rust. "The Kingdom of Matthias." The New Republic. (1994): 17 October.
Johnson, Michael P. "The Kingdom of Matthias: A Story of Sex and Salvation in 19th-Century
America" The Nation. (1994): 14 November.
(The Matthias Delusion. (Accessed 27 November, 2004).
The Role of Religion and Spirituality in the Black Radical Tradition: Religion and Slave RebellionIntroductionFrom the onset, it should be noted that there was a rather rigorous policing of slavery in America in an attempt to discourage rebellion. For instance, in the American South, slave rebellions were deemed a source of anxiety owing to the fact that a significant chunk of the population of the region comprised of black slaves. In the said region and further afield, rules were enacted with an intention of not only controlling slave movement, but also slave congregation. This did not, however, prevent rebellions from taking place. To a large extent, this text concerns itself with the role of religion and spirituality in the Black Radical Tradition. More specifically, the editorial will explore the role that religion played in inspiring slave rebellions. In so doing, the editorial will first take into consideration the religious context…...
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Works CitedGerbner, Katharine. Christian Slavery: Conversion and Race in the Protestant Atlantic World. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2018. Irons, Charles F. The Origins of Proslavery Christianity: White and Black Evangelicals in Colonial and Antebellum Virginia. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2009. Jabir, Johari. Conjuring Freedom: Music and Masculinity in the Civil War\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\'s \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"Gospel Army\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\". Columbus: Ohio State University Press, 2017. Roboteau, Albert J. Slave Religion: The \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\"Invisible Institution\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\" in the Antebellum South. New York: Oxford University Press, 2004. Wilson-Hartgrove, Jonathan. Reconstructing the Gospel: Finding Freedom from Slaveholder Religion. Downers Groove: InterVarsity Press.
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