Why Black History Month Is Important to Me

By Dr. Selwyn R. Cudjoe
November 10, 2016

Dr. Selwyn R. CudjoeThis message was read to the children of the Robert Clark School, Dagenham, Essex (part of greater London) England, on Wednesday, November 9, 2016, in celebration of Black History Month. I thank Lara Akinn for offering me the opportunity to contribute this message to their celebration.

I grew up in Trinidad, West Indies, which possesses a large multicultural population. There are Blacks (Africans), Indians, Portuguese, Chinese, and people of different racial stock. People practice different religions such as Hinduism, Islam, Christianity, and so on. In my case, there were elements of Shouter Baptists and Orishas who maintained elements of African religions even though the society as a whole looked down on (or looked askance) at those practices. Some Africans also practiced Islam which they brought with them from Africa, but that was a small group. Later on, in the 1960s, many other Africans converted into the Islamic religion.

While growing up, I was aware of specific racial/ethnic differences among the groups but only in a sort of intellectual sense. They existed. I knew they existed, but it did not really mean very much to me. We did our thing and they did theirs. I was aware that the Indians had their own ceremonies (such as Ramlelas and Hosay) which we, as Africans, enjoyed and participated in. We as Africans had our own festivals and practices (such as Shango and Carnival). All the other ethnic groups participated in Carnival. It became and is a national festival. Although the Indians tended to keep to themselves, we simply saw this as their way of behavior, and that was that.

There was perhaps one tiny difference in all of this. My name is Cudjoe. My uncle, a cricket enthusiast, always reminded me about the African origin of my name. When I played cricket, each time I walked into bat he would say: “Give dem bat. Yo’ don’t have a slave name. Yo name is Cudjoe. It’s an African name. Always remember that.” So, from a very early age I realized that I had a connection with Africa, but all of that did not mean a lot to me until I arrived in the United States in 1964. There, in that country, I was confronted with my blackness for the first time.

When I arrived in the United States, the country was in the midst of the 1964 presidential elections between Lyndon B. Johnson, a Democrat, and Barry Goldwater, a Republican. The central bone of contention centered on the civil rights of blacks in the United States. The black people in the country had gone through centuries in which they were relegated to being second-class citizens. But at this historic moment, after the assassination of President John Kennedy, President Johnson was promising to make African Americans full citizens. In that year, the first Civil Rights Act was passed. It outlawed discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or national origins.

In 1965, another important event happened in the lives of black people in America: Malcolm X was assassinated in Harlem, New York. The black world was shocked. In 1968, Martin Luther King, that warrior for peace, was also killed and, more than ever, my consciousness about being black and the travails that black people endured kept haunting my heart.

Meanwhile, I was attending Fordham University in New York where I was doing my first degree in English. But, the school was woefully underrepresented when it came to black students. Out of the two or three thousand students, there were only about twenty of us black people there. We demanded that the school enroll more black students and that the curriculum include more subjects about the black experience worldwide.

Because of such agitation, the school began to enroll more black students and in 1969, started a Black Studies Program. I was among the first lecturers in the program. I taught a course on African American literature. I had never studied the field officially while I was a student, but then I had to teach a course on the subject. In a way, that is when my interest in Black Studies began to take a more structured approach. In 1971, I wrote my first academic article, “Criticism and the Neo-African Writer,” published in Black World, formerly the Negro Digest that was owned by John Johnson. He also published of Ebony and Jet magazines. Since then, I have written for other publications and published many books, but the responses I received from that first article told me that folks were interested in what I had to say and that it was important to transmit information about black people’s lives. It was important to know where we had come from and where we were going.

And this is where Black History Month came in. Initially, it was Black History Week and then it was expanded to a month. In that week, we were able to think about how black people shaped the contemporary world and the enormous contributions we had made to science and the humanities. In this context, the works of Carter G. Woodson, the person responsible for creating an interest in black history, became an important beacon for all black scholars. The works of Cheikh Anta Diop, John Henry Clark, and Brother Ben-Jochannan were important conduits through which to examine our contributions to the world.

For me, Black History Month is a time when we reflect on the tremendous contributions that blacks have made to the world and the power of ideas in the making of this new world. When I think of Black History Month I think of Walter Rodney, C. L. R. James, Paul Gilroy, Paul Robeson, Alice Walker, Mary Seacole, and Claudia Jones. When I think of Black History Month I think of the challenges that face us as a people and the power of ideas in helping us to fight against the forces that would want to downpress us.

When I think of Black History Month I think of how hard our forefathers and foremothers fought to make us who we are. They prepared the way for us. Our task is to continue to work they have begun; to clear the pathway toward a deeper involvement with our people’s mental and intellectual liberation; each one teaching one, seeking to realize the truth of the African proverb: I am because you are. Because you are, I am.

Black History Month is a way of realizing how far we have come but also acknowledging how much farther we have to go. May God, Allah, Jah, or whatever the powers to whom they pay homage give us the faith to carry on the struggle, always acting with dignity and seeking to find the truth. As one wise man once said, “The truth shall set us free.”

This is what Black History Month means to me and why I am so happy that the students at the Robert Clark School in London wish to honor those who have gone before and pave the way for the realization of their own dreams as they grow into strong black and worthy people.

As the people in FRELIMO say: A luta continua (in English, “The Struggle Continues.”)

Professor Cudjoe is a professor in the Africana Studies Department at Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts, the school where Hillary Clinton was educated.

6 thoughts on “Why Black History Month Is Important to Me”

  1. Thank you Prof. Cudjoe for this article, though I disagree profoundly with what it takes for granted.

    “We” had a name long before someone decided to call us by various bywords, such as “black”, “African”, “negro” etc.

    “We” had a history long before slavery.

    “Black” history month, however laudable, concedes our true history merely by the labeling.

    I honour all those who are honoured during “Black” history month. Their role was laudable. They are/were indeed a necessary part of our raising back up as a people: John Henrik Clarke, Dr. Ben-Jochanan, and all the others of the “Afro-centrist” canon mentioned by the good professor.

    Buttt…. just as one discards the training wheels once one learns to ride, we must discard the implicit assumption that our history as a people started with slavery, or that who “we” are is properly described as “black”, “African”, “negro”, or any other such term that calls us outside our true name.

    What “we” are is Israelite. “We” are the only people on the planet who are a match to the prophecy of Deuteronomy 28:68. That marks us, more than any other people on the planet, as being true Israel.

    So enough of the bywords! Enough of the truncated histories that don’t tell who, really, we are, and why, ultimately, we are in the condition we are in.

    Our true history is recorded in the Book of Yahweh. Every last one of its prophets and apostles was one of us. Israelite of the seed. Call them “black”, “African”, “negro” and you miss the essence of who really they were.

    Not all “black” people are Israelite, e.g. the straight-haired blacks say of India. Not all African people are Israelite, e.g. those who quite selectively kidnapped and sold us as slaves. Some Israelites are black and look like us, but had no sojourn in Africa after the Exodus, e.g. our Israelite brethren the native Fijians. And indeed some Israelites today would be not “black” at all, indeed not “African”, for example the descendants of Gehazi, whoever they may be (for the descendants of Gehazi would be a white people, as prophesied; 2 Kings 5:27).

    Cudjoe (alternative spelling: Kojo) is an Akan day name for a male child born on a Monday. Other such Akan names made it across the Atlantic with the “Coromantees”. Right here in Trinidad, we also have “Quamina” (alt. spelling: Kwamina) as a respected family name. Ignoramuses such as the Mamoo Mattoot probably think Quamina to be English.

    Why do I mention these names? Because right there in these names are retentions that speak to a longer history than celebrated in “Black” History Month. Using his own name as a start, the good professor might well dig deeper to help uncover the deeper history that was covered up along with our enslavement. Come to think of it, look up “Akan”, they are a people referenced in Scripture, and their origin was not in “Africa”. That’s a start right there.

    I do not deny Africa or my African-ness. I am also “Merikin” by recent history, but my forebears were defined by a bloodline, not by a landmass that some of them happened to sojourn in.

    God told His Chosen, the Israelites, that we would be scattered into every kingdom of the earth. So said, so done. The question that we must examine, is why. For along with our scattering, He said we would be “cursed in our basket and store”, whether we would be in the “city” or in the “field”; Deuteronomy 28:16-17. So said, so done. Again, the question we must examine is why. For to know why, it to know what we must do to overcome that condition.

    Black History Month is a start. At best. Let it not become another stagnant cultural tradition that keeps us enslaved. Let us continue to dig and dig deep. Our African Emancipation Committee makes the mistake of definition of thinking, if we are “African”, then the authentic us must require a return to Africa in the mind. NO!! If fact we must get “Egypt” out of our mind! Our forefathers who were gathered up out of captivity from Egypt found it hard to let go of Egypt. Still today, some of us want to worship the gods of “Egypt”, i.e. Africa. That is not who we are. To worship the Orisha is to violate the first of the commandments given to us by our God, and is one of the prime reasons why we were scattered out of the Holy Land, and indeed back into captivity. So names and categories are important. I think it is important that we not concede an essential LIE, merely by lazy convention of naming.

    What I suggest is that what our enemy did to us is exactly what also was prophesied: they sought to “cut us off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance”; Psalms 83:4. By assuming the names they have given us — “black”, “African”, “Negro”, we aid their purpose.

    They went so far as even to steal our identity, so that many of us would think that the Book of Yahweh belongs to another, and has no relevance to us as a people. In fulfillment of that conspiracy, they have given us these and other bywords to name us by.

    But that is NOT who we are. We are sons of Israel. Those who are not, –as a matter of literal bloodline,– are nevertheless of the “house of Jacob”; Exodus 19:3.

    We, the house of Jacob, are a fulfillment of every prophecy by which true Israel would be identified in the latter day. By all means, let the scholars and historians do the historical digging. But in all that digging, what I, as a Nazarite servant of the Most High, can guarantee, is that the core answers to what really ails us will be found in the Book of Yahweh, and the Word of God.

    May the Most High continue to wake us up as a people, and to raise us back up when the day comes, in accordance with His promise.

    Shalom.

    “Thy sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as a wild bull in a net: they are full of the fury of Yahweh, the rebuke of thy God. Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine: Thus saith thy Lord Yahweh, and thy God that pleadeth the cause of his people, Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again: But I will put it into the hand of them that afflict thee; which have said to thy soul, Bow down, that we may go over: and thou hast laid thy body as the ground, and as the street, to them that went over.” (Isaiah 51:20-23)

    1. Yoruba wrote
      “Black History Month is a start. At best. Let it not become another stagnant cultural tradition that keeps us enslaved. Let us continue to dig and dig deep.”

      Learn not the ways of the white man and follow after his tradition. The black man does not need history to feel good about his accomplishments. Yoruba “Israelite” heritage denies him of his black heritage. He is always seeking to be someone else whilst pretentiously propagating his affinity with the Jewish race.

      The black experience in Trinidad has been good. He has held the reigns of power since independence with a few intrusion by others during short bouts of change. Yes savouring the fat of land and drinking milk and honey, yet complaining about being victims of slavery.

      Tribalism is the core belief that we must stick together to the exclusion of others, it is the bane of the black man to be tribal. He cannot get away from the past.

      Historically the struggle for equality emanated from the relationship between black and white people. White people constructed evolution and teaches it is schools today to show that the black man is close cousin of the baboons. This is morally and ethically wrong. People should not be programmed to think less of themselves.

      Slavery created a fallen psyche that the black man to this day is struggle to rid himself of. This must be noted in Yoruba, Kian and Nealos. They are always seeking to distance themselves from their own prejudices and hide behind the fig leaves of race.

      To the doc point one cannot forget Selma to Montgomery march, 54 miles of open display against an oppressive system akin to arphatheid.
      http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/civil-rights-movement/videos/march-from-selma-to-montgomery
      Today every boy and girl should know about these struggles for equality. Each generation suffering but one generation choosing to change the course of human history.

      Thanks to the civil rights movement we have a lot more freedoms. Unfortunately, many of the civil rights leaders are getting old and dying off. Their history will soon be gone…sadly. But my hope is a new generation of civil rights leaders will emerge. Freedom cannot be taken for granted, if it is then soon it will be lost. The work in educating the young minds by Dr. Cudjoe and others must continue, it black history month allows for this so be it.

  2. Yes but or as to what the white man says YABUT, you are only telling the good side of your story. IS IT THAT ALL AH WE WERE CREATED DOTISH BY GOD? For black people to fully learn about their history and move forward and NOT BE STUCK IN THE MUD OF TODAY, they must talk about the entire truths of slavery. Our people MUST HAVE CLOSURE BEFORE WE MOVE ON. T&T IS STUCK IN THE MUDS OF YESTERDAY. My great great grand mother was an African slave raped continually by the Massa French Slave Master/Owner brought here by the Brits searching for El Dorado. I was born out of this raping years after. I have no more facts than the gruesome little. But I must accept my ancestry. Perhaps you are proud of yours. I know there are MEN from every race that are immense disgraces to mankind. Perhaps from what I know Africans are among the worst in the world and this explains their status in life. To start they bawl at their children for doing the wrong thing. God never bawls at us whenever we fall short. And as some would say you bawl and the baby’s brain shuts down in fear. When I went to Mucurapo’s RC Boy School in St James I was never guava whipped by the priest but by the African teachers there. I was forced to learn. God teaches us EVERYTHING THAT IS GOOD BUT NOT by force. Some Africans make the huge rest pay plenty. She, my great , great grandmother was a queen taken in disrespect by another African and sold. I am told and was picked out by another Trump of a different kind and era. The rapes in white America by Donald Trump was to blondes…he was so racist he only wanted to rape BLONDES. But whites back then in the slave days loved the black slave. Her silky skin was very good for their sexual escapades. And they came cheaply. There are so many stories I KNOW growing up near white filled areas in Trinidad where the whites had good sex with their black african servants long after the slave days. And do not forget what some did to the poor black africans in T&T, others did to the poor indians and chinees. So Trinidad has a lot of bad to own up to. Up the islands this was also very common. It is no surprise we have hit number one in the world on porn. GOD TELLS US …GO FORGIVE YOUR BROTHER BEFORE YOU COME TO ME. Our sins will follow us until we dead or until we atone for them. But Cud Joe your resume sounds nice but it lacks important details as to accomplishments to humanity based on what God allowed you to know and when. And like your PNM government they follow all the whiteman tricks of the trade and give all the paper degrees but not what you achieved by what you learnt. Take the two men behind Trump, Bannon and Julianny they are both the most disgusting human beings on the planet now but they are in line for a top post to advise the crappy President-Elect. God save ALL OF US FROM THEM.

  3. The Mamoo Mattoot:

    The black man does not need history to feel good about his accomplishments.

    As usual, our irrepressible friend, Mamoo the Mattoot, is incoherent. How does one come to know about one’s people’s accomplishments, other than through a study of history, pray tell?

    Actually, I care little about “accomplishments”. I care about who we, my people, *be*. Therein will lie the answer to our maladies as a people. Accomplishments, whether great or little, are a side issue to that fundamental question.

    And who “we” be? The name “Israel” that the Most High gave to my forefather, Jacob, means “prince with God”. It carries the same connotation as “Chosen”.

    In that simple fact lies the answer to the question why it was not sufficient for our enemies to enslave us. They had also to seek to “cut us off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance” (Psalms 83:4). It is hard to keep one enslaved who knows themself to be a “prince with God”.

    That is why, at bottom, the enslaved Israelite needed to be given a new name. The indentured labourers that came to these shores all kept their tribal heritage and names — the Madeiran Portuguese, the Chinese, and the Indian. Only the enslaved Israelite was made to change his name. I would like our esteemed Prof Cudjoe perhaps to tell us why. I submit the answer is to be found in the Scripture cited.

    The same Scriptures tell us why the captive Israelite would be called outside of his true name by an array of bywords, each intended more or less to be derogatory in connotation: negro, nigger, coloured, darkie, sambo is a small sample. More recently, the more dignified denotator, “African”, has come to the fore.

    I object to it on the simple basis that it is denotationally loose, lumping us in with a lot of people who are not our people. The enslavement of Israelites was specific to Israelites, and other people we found ourselves among in Africa, were in fact party to that enslavement: Edomite tribes, Ishmaelite tribes, and Hamitic tribes.

    Dig and dig deep I say. Otherwise the logical brain computer of our children will wonder why “Africans enslaved Africans”. When we are denotationally precise, the full historical answer will begin to make sense. And in accordance with Scripture:

    Deuteronomy 28:68 said we would be enslaved by our “enemies”. And Psalms 83:3-6 says who those enemies would be: principally Edom and Ishmael. So said, so done.

    We were kidnapped inland by black Ishmaelite (Arab) tribes, and some black Edomite ones, aided and abetted by local black Hamitic ones. That is history. Dig and dig deep, and hold nothing back. Then we were made to endure a march to the coast and sold to white Edomite –mostly so-called but impostor– “Jews”. That too is fact, well documented in the records of the so-called “Jews” themselves, as detailed in “The Secret Relationship between blacks (sic) and Jews (sic)”, a book produced by the Historical Research Department of the Nation of Islam.

    I do not dwell on these histories to incite hatred for our “enemies”. Today we live among those enemies. They remain complicit in keeping us ignorant of our true identity. That is why they made us to forget who we were, by taking away our names. That is why the Mamoo Mattoot have no problem with any byword by which we may be called, but has seemingly a big problem when it is asserted that really who “we” are is Israelite, and of the *seed*.

    This is not mere wishful delusion. This is hard fact, scriptural and archaeological. And now “we” know it. As God said we would come to know it. The testimony that He gave us provides all the bread crumbs we need to find our way back. It is why that testimony calls itself the Book of *Remembrance*; Malachi 3:16. It is why that testimony specifically mentions the “blasphemy of them which say they are Jews and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan”; Revelation 2:9, 3:9. It is to let the world know that the so-called “Jews” are in fact impostors, whether Sephardic, Edomite, or Khazar. They themselves now so acknowledge; see Arthur Koestler, “THe 13th Tribe”, and Shlomo Sand, “The invention of the Jewish People”, among other sources.

    God is proving Satan a liar, as He said He would.

    We are in the time of apocalypse. This is a fancy Greek word that simply means the revealing or unveiling of that which was formerly hidden, and carefully so. God said He would wake us back up, and “in the third day”, raise us back up; Hosea 6:2. We are in that process now.

    Like it or not.

    By all means let the secular historians do what they do. But in the process, do not perpetuate errors of category. The terms, “black” and “African” are denotationally inaccurate when used to describe Israelites scattered to the West. The fit is in each case too loose to be categorically useful, and because loose, will confound the logical brain-computers of the children we seek to educate. The term “Negro” is clearly a byword put upon us by our enemies, in part to “cut Israel off from beinng a nation”, but at least it is denotationally accurate in referencing those of the house of Jacob scattered to the West. I exhort our learned Prof Cudjoe to take note.

    The Mamoo Mattoot –(uncle bogeymen; Mamoo meaning uncle, and “Mattoot” being Mamoo’s ignorant attempt to make reference to Haitian “Macoute”)– amongst our enemies are sure to object, which is sure proof of the truth of what I say. The last thing they want is for true Israel to be raised back up. As long as we remain “black”, “negro”, or “African” they fear us not at all. To remember and embrace our true identity as Israel — prince with God — is another matter.

    Shalom.

    “And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues.” (Revelation 18:4)

    1. Another poor, debasing attempt to sully my good name on this board. Yoruba if you are Jewish why the need to make it sound superior to your negroidal features? Everytime your emphasis is on your Jewish heritage which I suppose is very meaningful and special to you.

      Your continued and sustained attempt to identify with your dual heritage must be applauded.

      Black folks have come a long way up the food chain, from Mahalia Jackson spirituality to Michael Jackson “bad boy”. There is no need to feel inferior or still behave as though you are under the yoke of massa. You should be proud of doc Cudjoe achievements as I am sure he is seeking to raise up a new generation of black intellectual warriors. To steer them away from the culture of death that unfortunately appears to grip their soul.

      But I digress maybe he is too far ahead for you and the other minions on this board…Salam.

  4. The Mamoo Mattoot wrote:

    1. “Another poor, debasing attempt to sully my good name on this board.”

    It is fair comment. Your “good name” will remain either unsullied, or impeached, as the case may be, according to where lies the truth of the matters in question.

    I attacked your habitual *incoherence*. To the facts in question I note that you have no response.

    I also attack you as the equivalent of a Tonton Macoute (“Mattoot” in your *ignorance*, also habitual). The Haitian term, Tonton Macoute, translates roughly as “Uncle Bogeyman” (though “macoute” has ordinary meaning as a special kind of satchel that hunters, and others, may carry). That is the intended meaning of what I call “Mamoo Mattoot”. Mamoo, your handle of choice, means “uncle” — mother’s brother I suppose — in the local Hindi. A “bogeyman” is a witting or unwitting agent of Satan. Satan sends bogeymen to frustrate the righteous, whenever the latter are engaged in God’s work.

    The story of Nehemiah is instructive. He returned from Babylonian captivity to Jerusalem, charged with the mission to rebuild the wall; Nehemiah 2:17. Sanballat was the Mamoo Mattoot on that occasion, who made it his business to attempt to frustrate the endeavour; 2:19.

    That is what you attempt to do here. Sanballat failed, and so will you.

    2) “Yoruba if you are Jewish …”

    Please show me where I’ve said any such thing. I’ve clarified that matter before. Why do you now persist in the distortion? By all means take issue with anything I say, but please don’t mischaracterize your opponent’s position in order to gain debating advantage. You merely reveal yourself thereby to be of your father the devil. He too was a deceiver and a liar.

    Let me say again: I maintain simply and clearly that the so-called “Negro” scattered to the West are seedline Israelite. Our forefather Jacob looked like us. The bywords by which we are called today were not known to him, but by skin colour and phenotype, he would be what today is called “Negro”, or “negroid”, or –your term of intended disrespect– “negroidal”. There is scriptural evidence for that, as well as archaeological evidence, which I have elaborated before on this group. Jacob, whose name was changed to “Israel” (meaning: “prince with God”), was not in any way phenotypically like the so-called Jewish people today. Those who today call themselves “Jewish” are not of the seed of Judah, nor Levi, nor Jacob/Israel. Rather, Yeshua says it is a blasphemy for them to “say they are Jews” and describes them rather as of the “synagogue of Satan”; Revelation 2:9, 3:9. That is not what I say, that is Scripture. When I say that we the so-called “Negro”, scattered to the West, are seedline Israelite, I most specifically disclaim any connection to the so-called Jewish people today, who are impostors.

    I hope that is clear enough for you now. But then again reading comprehension was never your strong point, so I don’t hold my breath. Nevertheless I thank you for the opportunity to make the matter clear to my Israelite brethren who think perhaps, as Satan intends, that the so-called “Negro” cannot be of the holy seed, given the presence of the impostor in the Holy Land, stinking up the place.

    Btw, the proposition that the so-called “Negro” is seedline Israelite, is absolute in its truth and without a shred of doubt. God in His wisdom put such an abundance of evidence before us in that regard, that only the willfully ignorant would doubt the clear implication of Scripture in that regard. He put curses upon His holy seed for our disobedience, and He stated that those curses would be among others for a “sign”. Not only are we the so-called “Negro” a match to every single one of those curses — 43, from Deuteronomy 28:15-68 — there are two of them for which the so-called “Negro” are a unique match. There is not another people on the planet that are a match! There simply is no other candidate to consider. And the so-called Jewish people are by far not a match. One would have to be a determined idiot to believe the so-called Jews to be a match. Therefore, they are not the holy people, and by far.

    3) “…why the need to make it sound superior to your negroidal features?”

    Where have I brought “negroidal (sic) features” into the discussion, let alone suggest that “Jewish” features are superior to “negroidal” features?

    God said He made those of His Chosen seed more beautiful than any other set of people. That is clearly so, to those who have eyes to see. Certainly all the women that descend into the Caribbean in droves for sex tourism see it. But happily, part of the attraction of Israelite men is that they wear their beauty lightly. But that’s another story…

    Satan has covered up the faces of the people, so we think the saying true, that beauty lies in the eyes of the beholder. But God’s conception of beauty is an absolute, like truth, and justice. If He said that His holy seed is most gifted as to beauty, then that is an absolute. It is but for us to see it.

    In any case, the so-called Jews are as unprepossessing a group of people as one could meet. Even their so-called handsome movie stars, to me, leave a lot to be desired. To see them so is the surest sign that we have been put under a spell.

    4) “Your continued and sustained attempt to identify with your dual heritage ”

    I am of the bloodline seed of Jacob through Benjamin. Where is the duality in that, pray tell? It escapes my logical brain computer.

    5) “Black folks have come a long way up the food chain, …”

    Actually, it is the opposite. The children of Israel have come a long way down.

    But we are to be raised back up.

    And we are in the process.

    I have cited chapter and verse.

    6) “… from Mahalia Jackson spirituality to Michael Jackson “bad boy”.”

    How is that going up?

    The Mamoo Mattoot will inevitably see it so. For the children of the devil, like the devil, call evil good, and good, evil.

    7) “There is no need to feel inferior or still behave as though you are under the yoke of massa. ”

    Actually, I not only feel, but know, that I am “prince with God”. That’s what the name, Israel, means.

    8) “You should be proud of doc Cudjoe achievements as I am sure he is seeking to raise up a new generation of black intellectual warriors.”

    Again your reading comprehension is lacking.

    To disagree, and profoundly, with by brother Prof Cudjoe, is in no way to speak of his “achievements”, either ill or good. Neither is it to decry his aim.

    I am trained as an engineer. I know the necessity of building on solid foundation, whether intellectual or literal concrete.

    Therefore, when I take issue with my brother Prof Cudjoe, it is because I seek to strengthen the foundation that we both seek to build upon. I have stated clearly the reasons for the objections I have raised. My brother Prof Cudjoe may agree or disagree.

    In either case, the Mamoo Mattoot have no part in the matter… just as Sanballat had no part in Nehemiah’s mission to rebuild the wall at Jerusalem; Nehemiah 2:20; and likewise Mithredath had no part with Ezra; Ezra 4:3-7.

    You may of course continue to snipe away from the sidelines. It is amusing if nothing else.

    It is also enlightening for those of my Israelite brethren who may have read the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah but not understood all what it implies for the struggle. The Mamoo Mattoot will always be with us.

    ***

    Let me end by turning away from the Mamoo Mattoot, and face my so-called “negroidal” brethren. To them I reiterate what Ezra and Nehemiah respectively said to Mithredath, Sanballat and company, “You have no portion in this”.

    Let me also embrace my bro Prof Cudjoe, whatever our differences, and join with him in saying, “la luta continua”.

    Shalom.

    “… Ye have nothing to do with us to build a house unto our God; but we ourselves together will build unto Yahweh God of Israel…” (Ezra 4:3)

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