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Howard Thurman’s Theological Anthropology: A Mystical Political Response to Anti-Black Violence

Thesis advisor: Andrew L. Prevot / This dissertation addresses two critical areas of scholarship on Howard Thurman. Firstly, it aims to clarify Thurman’s theological anthropology, a facet often overshadowed by a focus on his ecclesiology and nonviolent social ethics. While existing treatments of Thurman’s anthropology are typically biographical and limited to his mystical consciousness, this project integrates insights from various aspects of Thurman’s work to offer a comprehensive account of his theological anthropology. Secondly, the dissertation critically examines the violence in Thurman’s historical context and the nuanced choice between violent and nonviolent resistance. Emphasizing Thurman’s nonviolent message directed at those who saw armed resistance as morally plausible, the study places Thurman in dialogue with contemporaries and subsequent Black scholars, elucidating how Christian nonviolent resistance contributes to an anthropology aligned with the imperative to resist all forms of oppression. The methodology involves correlating the revelatory responses of rebellious Black individuals with God’s revelation. Chapters also delve into Thurman’s theological anthropology and non-Chalcedonian Christology. The dissertation concludes by encouraging a nuanced integration of Thurman’s views into the Black Lives Matter Movement through a reflection on the parables of Jesus. / Thesis (PhD) — Boston College, 2024. / Submitted to: Boston College. Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. / Discipline: Theology.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:BOSTON/oai:dlib.bc.edu:bc-ir_109948
Date January 2024
CreatorsWratee, Byron D.
PublisherBoston College
Source SetsBoston College
LanguageEnglish
Detected LanguageEnglish
TypeText, thesis
Formatelectronic, application/pdf
RightsCopyright is held by the author. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0).

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