Arthur C. Jones
© 2004 by The Spirituals Project
No portion of this material may be reproduced by any means without written permission from The Spirituals Project.

Suddenly uprooted from their homes on the African continent and forced, in chains, to journey to a strange land where they would work, uncompensated, for the rest of their lives, subjected to physical, sexual and emotional abuse at the whims of their captors, the enslaved Africans who eventually created and first sang the spirituals required – above all else – a way to survive their physical and emotional trauma. As successive generations were born and raised in bondage, the task of survival was passed to them as well. Of course, many did not survive. Thousands died from disease, fatigue, and suicide in the journey from the coast of Africa to the Americas that was known as The Middle Passage¹. Others died from physical abuse, poor nutrition and overwork in the slave fields. Some lived physically but died emotionally and spiritually. The ordeal of these casualties is documented in the lyrics of a spiritual – No More Auction Block for Me² – that continues to be sung today, standing as a tribute to those many thousand who perished during The Middle Passage and in the crucible of North American slavery, and a defiant collective voice asserting the power and will to survive among the community of those who remained.

That numerous physical and psychological casualties occurred among African captives was to be expected. What was unexpected were the numerous instances in which women and men in bondage not only survived, but actually thrived emotionally and spiritually – an extraordinary feat. In his book Deep River, the late theologian and philosopher Howard Thurman commented on the way in which this will to survive was manifest in the songs of enslaved women and men:

Thurman’s analysis highlights a significant aspect of virtually all of the spirituals that emerged during slavery in North America: Psychologically, each song expresses both poles of an emotional continuum, ranging from deep despair to confident hope. That is, each song comments directly on the sadness, distress and emotional trauma that were inextricably connected with the brutal experience of being a slave. However, at the same time, each song delivers a clear statement of confidence and hope (as paradoxical as that would seem). Various songs emphasize one or the other of these two poles, but in virtually every song, both poles are included, sometimes in subtle, but very definite manifestations. To illustrate this, we can use the song illustration that is found in the quote above from Thurman, “The Blind Man Stood on the Road and Cried.” The lyrics of this traditional spiritual, as commonly sung, are as follows:

As with many spirituals, the lyrics of this song comment on a story told in the Bible, in this case taken from the Gospel of Mark, Chapter 10, Verses 46-52. Bartimaeus, a blind beggar, is sitting at the side of a road in Jericho as Jesus and his disciples approach, accompanied by a large crowd. Bartimaeus cries out, saying “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” Some of the people in the crowd are annoyed at the intrusion of the blind beggar, and ask him to be quiet. However, Jesus silences the crowd and asks that the man approach him. When asked by Jesus what he wants, Bartimaeus says that he wishes for his eyesight to be restored. Jesus replies, “Go your way; your faith has made you well.”

While this story can be interpreted in many ways, the spiritual that was created by slaves emphasizes the act of crying out, and the automatic transformation that comes as a result of the deep faith of the crier. Thurman’s analysis underscores this basic meaning: “’The blind man stood on the road and cried’ – the answer came in the cry itself.” In other words, a spiritually grounded person who cries out in pain, out of the core of her or his deep distress, is transformed in the process of expressing that pain. The transformation process restores ones wholeness. In this song, the despair is represented metaphorically by the physical condition of blindness, while the transformative wholeness is supported by the blind man’s wearing of the gospel shoes (faith), which in turn restores his sight (wholeness).

In the case of Africans in bondage, the spirituals provided the channel for the “cry,” and the deep inner faith of the singers provided the medium for the transformation, from despair, emotional brokenness and hopelessness, to confidence, wholeness, and hope. Dozens of spirituals can be understood in this light. Take, for example, the well known spiritual, “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child”:

The immediate issue that comes up with this song is the fact that the despair is instantly obvious; there is perhaps no feeling of despair and hopelessness that can be more painful than the experience of a child who has lost her mother. So far so good. But where is the confidence, wholeness, and hope? The answer lies in both the subtlety of the lyrics and in the emotional feeling that comes from the repetitive singing of the melody line. At the level of the lyrics, it is noteworthy that if “sometimes I feel like a motherless child,” then implied (even though not stated directly), is that “sometimesI don’t!” “Sometimes,” the unstated lyrics communicate, “I feel strong, like a child of God, no longer lost, ready to go on.” This meaning is reinforced by the soothing, rocking rhythm of the song, which ultimately (in feeling) becomes a lullaby, comforting the weary singer and preparing the way for the strength, confidence and hope to confront the next day. It is therefore no accident that, as Samuel Floyd points out in his important book, The Power of Black Music, that George Gershwin’s famous lullaby “Summertime,” which serves as the opening piece for the opera Porgy and Bess, is based largely on the musical structure of the spiritual “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.”

Gershwin, who conscientiously attended numerous Black church services to gain a deeper understanding of the intricacies of Black sacred music as part of his preparation for writing an opera that depicted the life of a Black community in Charleston, South Carolina, would most certainly have understood the underlying emotional effect that accompanied the singing of “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.” Accordingly, in creating lyrics for “Summertime” that emphasized the song as a lullaby, he reinforced his understanding of the multiple emotional effects of the spiritual on which it was based, “Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child.”