Stolen Legacy, by George G. M. James, [1954], at sacred-texts.com

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PART II

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CHAPTER IX:

Social Reformation through the New Philosophy of African Redemption.

Now that it has been shown that philosophy, and the arts and sciences were bequeathed to civilization by the people of North Africa and not by the people of Greece; the pendulum of praise and honour is due to shift from the people of Greece to the people of the African continent who are the rightful heirs of such praise and honour.

This is going to mean a tremendous change in world opinion, and attitude, for all people and races who accept the new philosophy of African redemption, i.e. the truth that the Greeks were not the authors of Greek philosophy; but the people of North Africa; would change their opinion from one of disrespect to one of respect for the Black people throughout the world and treat them accordingly.

It is also going to mean a most important change in the mentality of the Black people: a change from an inferiority complex, to the realization and consciousness of their equality with all the other great peoples of the world, who have built great civilizations. With this change in the mentality of the Black and White people, great changes are also expected in their respective attitudes towards each other, and in society as a whole.

In the drama of Greek philosophy there are three actors, who have played distinct parts, namely Alexander the Great, who by an act of aggression invaded Egypt in 333 B.C., and ransacked and looted the Royal Library at Alexandria and together with his companions carried off a booty of scientific, philosophic and religious books. Egypt was then stolen and annexed as a portion of Alexander's empire; but the invasion

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plan included far more than mere territorial expansion; for it prepared the way and made it possible for the capture of the culture of the African Continent. This brings us to the second actor, that is the School of Aristotle whose students moved from Athens to Egypt and converted the royal library, first into a research centre, and secondly into a University and thirdly compiled that vast body of scientific knowledge which they had gained from research, together with the oral instructions which Greek students had received from the Egyptian priests, into what they have called the history of Greek Philosophy.

In this way, the Greeks stole the Legacy of the African Continent and called it their own. And as has already been pointed out, the result of this dishonesty has been the creation of an erroneous world opinion; that the African continent has made no contribution to civilization, because her people are backward and low in intelligence and culture.

This erroneous opinion about the Black people has seriously injured them through the centuries up to modern times in which it appears to have reached a climax in the history of human relations. And now we come to the third actor, and that is Ancient Rome, who through the edicts of her Emperors Theodosius in the 4th century A.D. and Justinian in the 6th century A.D. abolished the Mysteries of the African Continent; that is the ancient culture system of the world. The higher metaphysical doctrines of those Mysteries could not be comprehended; the spiritual powers of the priests were unsurpassed; the magic of the rites and ceremonies filled the people with awe; Egypt was the holy land of the ancient world and the Mysteries were the one, ancient and holy Catholic religion, whose power was supreme. This lofty culture system of the Black people filled Rome with envy, and consequently she legalized Christianity which she had persecuted for five long centuries, and set it up as a state religion and as a rival of Mysteries, its own mother. This is why the Mysteries have been despised; this is why other ancient religions of the Black

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people are despised; because they are all offspring of the African Mysteries, which have never been clearly understood by Europeans, and consequently have provoked their prejudice and condemnation. In keeping with the plan of Emperors Theodosius and Justinian to exterminate and forever suppress the culture system of the African continents the Christian church established its missionary enterprise to fight against what it has called paganism. Consequently missionaries and educators have gone to the mission field with a superiority complex, born of miseducation and disrespect: a prejudice which has made it impossible for them to accomplish the blessings which missionary enterprise might otherwise have accomplished. For this reason Missionary enterprise has been responsible for a positive injury against the African people, which consists of the perpetual caricature of African culture in literature and exhibitions which provoke laughter and disrespect. This then is only a brief summary of the parts played by the persons of the drama of Greek philosophy and the resultant effects upon the Black people. This drama might be called the Causa Causarum of the social plight of the peoples of African descent, because it has made the White and Black races not only common victims of a false racial tradition about the African Continent but also partners in the solution of the problem of racial reformation.

I believe that a reformation of this kind is possible, if the best minds of both racial groups co-operate in its accomplishment. Both groups have been the common victims of miseducation arising from a false tradition about the African Continent and it has caused them to develop attitudes according to their common belief: The White people, a superiority complex; and the Black people, the corresponding inferiority complex; and if we are to accomplish a reformation in race relations it is obvious that both racial groups must combine their efforts in the abandonment and destruction of that mentality which has plunged the Black people into their social plight.

This I suggest should be done by a world wide dissemination

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of the truth, through a system of re-education, in order to stimulate and encourage a change in the attitude of races toward each other In combining their efforts, both races must not only preach and teach the truth that the Mystery system of the African Continent gave the world philosophy and religion, and the arts and sciences, but they must see to it that all false praise of the Greeks be removed from the textbooks of our schools and colleges: for this is the practice that has blind-folded the world, and has laid the foundations for the deplorable race relations of the modern world. (a) The name of Pythagoras, for instance, should be deleted from our mathematical textbooks: in Geometry, where the theorem of the square on the hypotenuse of a right angled triangle is called the Pythagorean theorem, because this is not true. (b) we must point out to the world the deception in attaching the authorship of Socrates to the precept 'man know thyself'; and in attaching the authorship of Plato to the four cardinal virtues; since Socrates obtained the self-knowledge precept from the Egyptian temples where it was used as an inscription; and Plato reduced the ten virtues of the North African Mystery system to four (c) we must also prove to the world that the doctrines of the so-called Greek philosophers originated from the ancient Mystery System of North Africa.

This proof has been set forth in chapters five to eight of 'Stolen Legacy,' and in order to carry out our world-wide crusade we must recommend 'Stolen Legacy,' for adoption and study in the schools and colleges of both racial groups and in our fraternities, sororities and inter-racial groups, in order that young and old of our present generation might all get to know the truth and be able to pass it on to future generations.

This I believe would be a very helpful method by which this process of re-education would become universal and effective in the creation of a much needed racial reformation. The White people of 'our modern age cannot be regarded as wholly responsible for social conditions which are the result

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of false racial tradition. It is this that makes race relations a challenge to the best minds of both racial groups to combine their efforts in its solution.

But our disturbed race relations have also another cause. This I would say is both supplementary and intensive; for the false tradition about the backwardness of the African Continent, created by Alexander the Great and Aristotle's School has been dramatized by missionary literature and exhibitions, as the will of Roman Emperors and as a source of laughter and disrespect. There is no doubt that this policy has created bitterness and dissatisfaction in the minds of natives, who have been compelled to question the sincerity of the missionary. In the meantime missionary enterprise gains the sympathy and support of a miseducated world, in order to carry on its programme.

What can we do to eradicate this second and more subtle evil: the dramatization of a false tradition so as to make it appear as true? I suggest that since the missionary dramatizes false tradition because he himself also believes it, we should combine our efforts, first of all in re-educating him so that he might know the truth and change his superiority complex which is responsible for his mistaken policy. His re-education should not only consist of a thorough study of the ideas and arguments contained in my book 'Stolen Legacy'; but he must also be given special training in the language, customs and ideals of Africans, in order to make him cultivate an attitude of respect for the culture of the African Continent, seemingly the oldest specimen to have been developed by mankind; because that continent is the birth place and the cradle of the Ancient Mysteries. With a world enlightened as to the real truth about the place of the African Continent in the history of civilization, false tradition and belief should cease to be effective, disrespect and prejudice should tend to disappear, and race relations should tend to be normal and peaceful. This brings us to the final problem, the problem of African redemption. The aims of 'Stolen Legacy' are not only to stimulate a reformation

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in race relations and scientific research; but also to cultivate race pride in the Black people themselves and to offer them a New Philosophy of African Redemption as the Modus Operandi of achieving racial reformation.

This New Philosophy of Redemption consists of a simple proposition as follows:

'The Greeks were not the authors of Greek philosophy, but the Black people of North Africa, The Egyptians.'

Now, in order to explain the value of this proposition, three questions must be asked and answered.

This proposition will become a philosophy of redemption to all Black people, when they accept it as a belief and live up to it. This brings us to our final question and that is, how to live up to this philosophy of redemption? In other words, how shall the Black people work out their own salvation?

From the outset my readers and co-workers in the solution of a common problem, must be reminded that our philosophy of redemption is a psychological process, involving a change in belief or mentality to be followed by a corresponding change in behaviour. It really signifies a mental emancipation, in which the Black people will be liberated from the chain of traditional falsehood, which for centuries has incarcerated them in the prison of inferiority complex and world humiliation and insult. This mental emancipation or redemption, it must be remembered,

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has two functions. It is general, when, on the one hand, the phenomenon of our unwholesome race relations is regarded as a general problem needing a general emancipation of both races in order to effect a solution. In this general sense emancipation transcends the limitations and boundaries of race, and therefore includes the whole world, White and Black people, since we are all victims of the same chain of the traditional falsehood, that has incarcerated the modern world. On the other hand, emancipation or redemption is specific, when we refer to the effects of the phenomenon of unwholesome race relations upon the Black people. It is freedom from such conditions that constitutes the specific function of emancipation or redemption.

We digressed somewhat in order to explain the terms philosophy and philosophy of redemption, believing it to be necessary before proceeding to answer the next question: how to live up to this New Philosophy of Redemption? How must it be worked out?

Being liberated from inferiority complex by their New Philosophy of Redemption, which is destined to destroy the chain of false tradition which has incarcerated them, the Black people must face and interpret the world according to their new vision and philosophy. Throughout the centuries up to our modern times, world conditions have been influenced by two phenomena which have affected human relations.

(i) The giving of false praise to the Greeks: a custom which appears to be an educational policy conducted by educational institutions. This has led to the false worship of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, as intellectual gods in all the leading universities of the world, and in support of this intellectual worship, these institutions have also organized what are known as Greek lettered fraternities and sororities, as the symbols of the superiority of Greek intellect and culture.

(ii) The second phenomenon is Missionary enterprise whereby the Black people's culture has been caricatured in literature and exhibitions, in such specimens as provoke disrespect

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and laughter. Never let us forget that the Roman Emperors Theodosius and Justinian were responsible for the abolition of the Egyptian Mysteries that is the culture system of the Black people, and also for the establishment of Christianity for its perpetual suppression.

Likewise, never let us forget when we are reviewing this bit of history that the Greeks called the Egyptians Hoi Aiguptoi which meant Black people.

In living up to their New Philosophy of Redemption, the life of the Black people will have to be one of counteraction against these two sets of conditions. In the first place the Black people must adopt a negative attitude towards this type of phenomena, because they have become fully aware that these phenomena are the result of a false tradition, and therefore also partake of the nature of falsehood and insincerity.

In this negative attitude the Black people of the world must shun the false tradition and must teach the truth, which is their New Philosophy of Redemption. This must be done in the home to young children; in the colleges and schools to students; from the pulpits and platforms to audiences; and in the fraternities and sororities to young men and women. This New Philosophy of Redemption, being a revelation of truth in the history of Black people's civilization must become a necessary portion of their education, and must be taught for generations and centuries to come; in order to fill them with inspiration and pride and liberate them from mental servitude.

In the second place, in this negative attitude the Black people must demonstrate their disbelief in the false worship of Greek intellect. This should be done in the following three ways:—

(i) They must discontinue the practice of quoting Socrates, Plato and Aristotle in their speeches as intellectual models; because we know that their philosophy was stolen (ii) They must relinquish membership from all Greek lettered fraternities and sororities and (iii) They must abolish all Greek lettered fraternities and sororities from all colored colleges because

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they have been a source of the promotion of inferiority complex and of educating the Black people against themselves. We come now to the counteraction of the second set of phenomena, the missionary activities in defamatory literature and exhibitions which provoke disrespect for and laughter at the Black people.

Just as in the first set of phenomena, so is it in the second, the Black people must adopt a negative attitude in their attempt to live up to their philosophy of redemption. Of course, they are perfectly well aware that the activities of missionaries are the result of their own miseducation through the medium of a false tradition about Black people; but since their problem is also one of emancipation from certain social evils, the Black people feel that they are entitled to a change in Missionary policy. For these reasons I suggest that the negative attitude of the Black people should consist first of a boycott of missionary literature and exhibitions, and secondly, of a perpetual protest against these forms of missionary policy, until a change is brought about. For as long as Missionary enterprise maintains its policy of militancy against African culture, the Black people will be disrespected. This is the least that the Black people are entitled to: respectful treatment, because they are the representatives of the oldest civilization in the world, from which all other cultures have borrowed. I have frequently seen in the parish magazines of some European churches, pictures of the following description:—An African Chief, dressed in a new silk hat, a long shirt, but no trousers, a frock coat and barefeet; probably to provide amusement for the parishioners and to excite their pity. This is what the Black people must protest against and this is how they must live up to their philosophy of redemption and work it out.

In conclusion, let us remember that the unfortunate position of the modern church in being associated with the drama of Greek philosophy is excusable; because her missionary function has been due to the erroneous mandates and edicts of secular Princes and Emperors, who ruled the church, when it was only

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a department of state. This bit of ecclesiastical history should be well known to the early branches of the Christian church and consequently, they are the ones whom our enlightened age expects to initiate a change in missionary policy, which would free themselves from the error and superstition of human relations.

This lead of the various branches of Catholicism should be followed by Protestantism, so that the entire church of Christ on earth should be united in this racial reformation, and carry to the mission field a practical gospel of happiness; that is happiness that must begin while we are here on earth; a gospel that is interested in the total welfare of the people. A gospel which ignores the social and economic rights of natives and emphasizes only happiness in an unknown world is onesided, misleading, and contrary to Christian tenets and practice. It was early Christianity that established a diaconate for the express purpose of solving the economic problems of its adherents; so that they might begin in their earthly life to experience what happiness really meant.

It is evident that the benefits of religion are intended to be coextensive with human needs and unless the Christian religion changes its missionary policy with respect to the Culture of the Black people, it would be difficult for them to obtain complete emancipation from the social injuries created by Ancient Rome.