On a recent trip to Berkeley I encountered this remarkable crew of young street preachers:
One held up a large sign that said (referring to a drawing of a “white” Jesus),
“This is the Devil.
This Image is not Biblical
Jesus is a negro
Not a whiteman
Jesus es negro
No blanco
El Diablo”
Though the message is a little confusing, I took it to mean: “The ‘white’ Jesus is the Devil. The Victorian-era drawings of Jesus as a blue-eyed European are not biblically accurate. The real Jesus was black, not white.”
While the street preachers did have a point about Jesus being overly Europeanized in art during the 19th and early 20th centuries, perhaps they took their point a little too far the other way? Contemporary scholars almost universally agree that the historical Jesus was a Middle-Eastern Jew, and likely had brown hair and brown eyes, along with what is is called an “olive-complexioned” Middle Eastern skin tone.
What I found most intriguing is that while the preachers seemed to be Christian (with one of them reading aloud from the Bible), they still were OK with calling Jesus “the Devil.”
Meanwhile, their next sign listed the 12 tribes of Israel as being various New World nations and ethnic groups — most of which didn’t even exist in pre-Columbian times. (That is to say, the modern nations listed, such as Uruguay and Haiti, didn’t develop until thousands of years after the tribes of Israel were first listed in the Bible; and ethnicities such as “Mexican” or “Dominican” only arose after the European arrival in the New World.)
And the final sign said “America’s destruction is at hand!” along with a picture of a Soviet-era nuclear-tipped ICBM hurtling across the sky.
So: What are we to make of all this?
Combined, the messages say:
- Jesus (or at least “white Jesus”) is the Devil.
- Jesus was actually black.
- The 12 tribes of Israel were actually from the Caribbean, South and Central America.
- The USSR will destroy the United States with nuclear missiles.
I’m trying to piece this all together into a cohesive worldview, and not succeeding. Any suggestions?
(The photo below came out a little better than the top photo, but I missed part of the sign. Sigh.)
What’s it all mean?
(Note: This is not a photo of me, but rather
1senorpancake on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:02 am:
i think it means, “i’m in berkeley and i’m desperately trying to get a reaction out of someone, anyone!”.
Quote
2Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:22 am:
This sounds like an African American sect that seem to put Bible in a black context. I checked the YouTube videos of this group who believe that the descendants of the 12 Tribes of Israel is what you observed as listed on the poster.
I just think it is another form of Replacement Theology, that Christians of black African Hispanic Americans replaced the Jews.
There are many sects and cults out there…and as you noticed, their theology may not be rational.
Quote
3Dane on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:46 am:
I think they might be Rastafarians or some related group. Fairly certain I’ve heard those talking points before (particularly the Tribes of Israel one) in conjunction with Rastafarianism.
Quote
4Ken on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:59 am:
The 12 tribes of Israel were actually from the Caribbean, South and Central America
Don’t know about the others, but this point seems to be one that is passed around by the Black Hebrew Israelites, a group of mostly African-American Jews who claim that “Jews” today are not the true Jews. This view is held to varying extremes by these different groups (some hate “Jews” because they see them as usurpers of the true Jewish heritage which, to them, was mostly black. Others view “Jews” as false Jews but still respect them for mainting the Torah and for suffering for Judaism over the centuries). As far as I know, this isn’t anything new, although I think the Black Hebrew Israelites have mostly been based in New York. Louis Theroux did an interesting and funny interview with them (wherein one of their leaders claimed Tom Jones and William Shakespeare were actually black) in his documentary “Black Nationalism,” which you can find on Google Video. There’s also a small Black Hebrew Israelite (they’re also called “Commandment Keepers,” I think) community that immigrated to Israel. I’m pretty sure I saw them on, of all places, the Jerry Springer Show back in the day.
Quote
5Redbear on Oct 25, 2009 at 2:49 am:
These poor people are trying unsuccessfully to relate their lives and incorrect worldview to 4000 year old doctrine which is obviously n
Ahh - they are nuts - the mother ship needs to come and get them.
Quote
6Roscoe on Oct 25, 2009 at 3:50 am:
Well, since they appear to believe that the destruction of America is going to come from missiles labeled USSR, I think it means that you stepped into some sort of time warp……..otherwise known as Berkeley.
Quote
7Roscoe on Oct 25, 2009 at 3:55 am:
ps………I love the looks you get from some of the people you’re photographing. It’s true what they say about a picture being worth a thousand words………….
Quote
8Starless on Oct 25, 2009 at 5:40 am:
At first glance, the 12 tribes stuff looks either like a bizarro interpretation of the Mormon story, instead of just the lost 13th Battlestar Galactica tribe being lost in the New World, all of the Jewish tribes made a trip across the Atlantic, or a gross twisting a Rastafarianism, where tribe membership is based on the month of your birth, not the place of your birth. The Black Jesus thing is very definitely Rastafarian, but has seeped its way into mainstream black racial identity politicking. It is, in fact, a fairly old and passe claim.
Over all, it looks like the a pastiche millennial religion that springs up among working class and poor who feel oppressed by mainstream culture. Unlike crazy middle and upper class religions which always seem to integrate some sort of technology and aliens in their beliefs.
Oh, yeah. There’s the parallel track in gay identity politicking where activists try to claim as many famous people as they can so that the famous person’s integrity will rub off on them.
Quote
9Dubya Bee on Oct 25, 2009 at 5:56 am:
It’s easy, really. They, like so many others, have been lead astray by the work of Satan.
Quote
10Throbert McGee on Oct 25, 2009 at 6:05 am:
Don’t miss the blue stripe and fringed edges on the poncho-like coverings of the two guys on the left side of the bottom photo. The guy holding the This Is The Devil sign has a fawn-colored “poncho,” and my first thought was that it was supposed to be some sort of pseudo-Injun costume (i.e., resembling fringed buckskin), going along with the idea that North American Indians are supposedly descended from the Lost Tribes of Israel.
But then it clicked — the “fringed ponchos” are intended to be tallit with tzitzit.
Quote
11Throbert McGee on Oct 25, 2009 at 6:08 am:
Calling the mother ship! Come in, mothership!
Quote
12Starless on Oct 25, 2009 at 8:34 am:
You the mothership is near when the funk begins.
Quote
13Starless on Oct 25, 2009 at 8:35 am:
“You know”, g’dammit.
Quote
14Fenris on Oct 25, 2009 at 8:43 am:
Any idea what that comic-looking sign next to the “12 Tribes of Israel” said? It might put things in context.
Geez, those expressions could kill.
Quote
15Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:00 am:
You are right!
I guess I was not aware of a black Jewish group that thinks white Jewish groups as usurpers of true Judaism…
Quote
16jeff on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:03 am:
The libs are right, racism is indeed alive and well in America.
Quote
17Throbert McGee on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:06 am:
I think it pretty much boils down to “Die, Honky.”
Quote
18Syrah on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:10 am:
This sect is “preaching” here in the streets of Seattle. They are definitely not from the “good news” school of evangelism. I haven’t engaged them to find out what they are about. I tend to shy away from people that scream and shout insults at people passing-by on the street.
Quote
19Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:47 am:
I agree with you on that one! And Zombie took these pictures of these folks and their eyes are not friendly either!! Look at the guy with the blue bandanna…mean looking!!
Zombie, looks like they looked at you…will they remember what you look like after these photos are posted?
Quote
20Throbert McGee on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:01 am:
Well, in the case of the gay activists who try to claim historic figures as “gay,” it is often motivated by a desire to sponge off the “famous person’s integrity,” just as you say.
But occasionally, it’s more a reaction to the “straightwashing” of history, where the quite likely homosexuality of major historical personages is heavily bowdlerized, creating the impression that these personages were actually heterosexual, or at most they had homoerotic urges that were never ever ever given real-life physical expression (implying that it’s more dignified to be a repressed, totally celibate “eunuch” than to be a “practicing homo”).
Thus, in biographies of men like Michelangelo or Walt Whitman, you’ll find formulations like “although homoerotic themes are evident in his writings, there’s NO CONCRETE PROOF that he ever had sexual contact with another man.” To which an unprejudiced reader ought to respond:
Pfffft — how much “proof” does that actually need? We’re not debating whether Michelangelo was really a shapeshifting leprechaun, or if Walt Whitman was a 4,000-year-old extra-terrestrial who’d been stranded on Earth since his people built the Egyptian pyramids. The “True or False?” proposition being considered is “Michelangelo enjoyed slurping on the hot Italian rods of his male models”, and that simply doesn’t belong in the category of Extraordinary Claims That Require Extraordinary Evidence.
Having said that, I will repeat a theme that I brought up in the Kevin Jennings thread: things are much better than they used to be just a few generations ago — yet some gay activists like to pretend that the entire world is still stuck in the late Victorian era, and that there’s some sort of massive “Christianist” conspiracy to censor out any and all references to homosexuality in pre-modern records.
Quote
21Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:12 am:
Throbbert, gay activists think that the right wing Christianity is the only enemy they have…they forget Islam.
And on top of that, I was reading life of a Roman Emperor during the Roman era BEFORE Christianity and he had homosexual lover but the Roman culture would have none of it…so he had to marry a woman he did not love. That to me was an example of a NON-Christian culture that had homophobia in the culture as today’s politically correct people would call it…
Quote
22Throbert McGee on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:19 am:
Erm… they’re “Jews” like members of the Nation of Islam are “Muslim” — or even less so.
Quote
23Ringo the Gringo on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:38 am:
I’ve seen this same group - same outfits, similar signs - “preaching” at Venice Beach and on Hollywood Blvd, but it’s been years since I’ve seen them.
When they would stand along Hollywood Blvd, both tourists and locals would literally cross the street to avoid walking past them and their angry, violent rants. The shop owners hated them.
Quote
24Ringo the Gringo on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:43 am:
These guys are not Rastafarians.
Quote
25stuiec on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:57 am:
Sure, everyone wants to be a Jew… when the crematoria aren’t fired up.
Quote
26buzzsawmonkey on Oct 25, 2009 at 11:12 am:
The same sect shows up on streetcorners in New York, and has for years. I forget their name, but the “Twelve Tribes” stuff is very familiar.
They manage to combine the anti-white racism of the NOI with some weird form of part-Christianity, part-Judaism.
Quote
27Guy Average on Oct 25, 2009 at 11:25 am:
2 Timothy 4:3 (New International Version)
3For the time will come when men will not put up with sound doctrine. Instead, to suit their own desires, they will gather around them a great number of teachers to say what their itching ears want to hear.
These folks are an example of what is described in the Bible passage above.
What’s it all mean?
There is a highly subjective answer for that question somewhere.
Quote
28Ringo the Gringo on Oct 25, 2009 at 11:34 am:
There are quite a few videos of these so called “Black Israelites” at You tube. Here’s one of them confronting a more coventional street preacher: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WAMnbijM-wo
And here is a video of them meeting a US Marine on the street: http://www.worldstarhiphop.com/videos/video.php?v=wshhuG3TB618qX8E5WO4
Quote
29Ringo the Gringo on Oct 25, 2009 at 12:20 pm:
One thing that makes this picture different is that I’ve never seen Hispanic people with this sect before.
Quote
30muchspace on Oct 25, 2009 at 12:53 pm:
That group are the Black Hebrews or as we called them in NYC the “Black Hebros”. When I lived in NYC they were based out of Harlem and they had lots of shows on NYC public access TV. The one show I remember was “The Blacks are the Real Jews” were they said Hashem would enslave all the White people. But basically their show was reading the bible and making racist comments about White people. I used to see them on the street in various places around Manhattan screaming hatred racist crap. It doesn’t surprise me their in Berkeley. The New York Times did an article about them sometime in the 1990’s, it was basically a puff piece though.
Quote
31Starless on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:00 pm:
“Obadiah, his servants. There shall, in that time, be rumours of things going astray, erm, and there shall be a great confusion as to where things really are, and nobody will really know where lieth those little things wi– with the sort of raffia work base that has an attachment. At this time, a friend shall lose his friend’s hammer and the young shall not know where lieth the things possessed by their fathers that their fathers put there only just the night before, about eight o’clock. Yea, it is written in the book of Cyril that, in that time, shall the third one… ”
Quote
32Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 1:30 pm:
I would not be surprised that some would be attracted to the sect. The Hispanics have a popular saying “Viva la Raza!” and now who is racist?
Quote
33MikalM on Oct 25, 2009 at 3:54 pm:
Funny…the so-called “Identity Christians” or “Anglo-Israelites” also promulgate this myth of the Lost Tribes of Israel morphing into a bloc of ethnic nations, the key difference being that they identify the descendents of the ancient Hebrews as being the modern peoples of Great Britain, or more broadly, Western Europe and White America.
(As absurd as their pseudo-theology is, at least the White racist Identity Christians aren’t dumb enough to try to identify modern mixed-thnic nation-states like Cuba and Mexico with the Twelve Tribes. And has anyone informed this brilliant bunch of historical scholars that Argentina, Uruguay and Chile are mostly ethnically White nations?)
Another interesting point is that the Mormons also link the Lost Tribes with modern-day Amerindians. They believe that two groups of Israelites, the Nephites and the Lamanites, emigrated to the New World where the latter eventually exterminated the former, and were “punished” for their transgression by being given dark skin. The Lamanites became modern-day Amerindians, and a whole subculture of Mormon pseudoscholarship has grown up around trying to prove that the Maya, Aztecs, and other groups have a cultural and genetic link to the Biblical Hebrews.
Quote
34dfbaskwill on Oct 25, 2009 at 4:00 pm:
I saw this same crew in Philadelphia in front of the Reading Terminal Market a year ago. They had a bullhorn and loudly read from the Bible in between ridiculous side comments. There were all kinds of crazy outfits too.
Quote
35stuiec on Oct 25, 2009 at 4:01 pm:
What’s it all mean?
So there’s this book, right? And it’s got all this stuff in it about how this God guy is really powerful and can do really good things for people He likes (and really bad things to people He doesn’t like). And it says in this book that the people that God likes the very extra special best are the Jews.
Now, it’s certainly not possible that this book is talking about those hook-nosed, greasy-haired money-grubbers who call each other European names in their crappy German with the funny alphabet. Those people must be impostors who stole the birthright of the real Jews — you know, the Black people and the Hispanic people, the real Israelites.
Everything those big-snouted impostors have was stolen from or cheated away from the real Israelites. The impostors’ wealth needs to be given to its true owners, and the impostors themselves need to disappear… by whatever means necessary.
/nutbag off
Quote
36Ken on Oct 25, 2009 at 4:20 pm:
In that documentary I mentioned, Louis Theroux (who is a great documentarian. just about anything he does is hilarious) goes to see the Black Hebrew Israelites on the reccomendation of, I think, the Nation of Islam. So, that should tell you something. And I seem to remember a scene where Louis passed by a mural of a black Moses riding on a horse that was trampling the Pope. Pretty out there.
Naturally, I’d assume that most black Jews are just like any other Jews. These guys I’m talking about are the fringe of the fringe as far as I know.
Quote
37Guy Average on Oct 25, 2009 at 5:05 pm:
Got a link for that?
Quote
38Incognito on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:20 pm:
Scene 14 from the Life of Brian
http://www.westmont.edu/~fisk/Articles/MontyPython.htm
BORING PROPHET: …Obadiah, his servants. There shall, in that time, be rumours of things going astray, erm, and there shall be a great confusion as to where things really are, and nobody will really know where lieth those little things wi– with the sort of raffia work base that has an attachment. At this time, a friend shall lose his friend’s hammer and the young shall not know where lieth the things possessed by their fathers that their fathers put there only just the night before, about eight o’clock. Yea, it is written in the book of Cyril that, in that time, shall the third one…
Quote
39JJM on Oct 25, 2009 at 9:58 pm:
Redbear nailed it: they’re loons.
Quote
40Cynthia on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:42 pm:
:[ These sorts of groups are really pitiful (in the sense of deserving pity). I mean, what do they accomplish, other than confusing people? They don’t seem to understand the spirit of what Christ taught or care that they are probably hurting people. It saddens me, as a Christian, to hear about this.
Quite true.
Quote
41arhooley on Oct 25, 2009 at 10:54 pm:
Why do nutjobs this creative bother with the Bible at all? Why don’t they write their own creation myths, invent their own deities, and chalk up a moral code that calls for weekends off and free donuts?
Quote
42Dane on Oct 26, 2009 at 12:17 am:
“I saw this same crew in Philadelphia in front of the Reading Terminal Market a year ago. They had a bullhorn and loudly read from the Bible in between ridiculous side comments. There were all kinds of crazy outfits too.”
Really? I’m living a few blocks off South Street, pretty close to there, and this is the first I’ve ever seen of anything like this - aside from my previous mention of Rastafarians, who don’t seem to do the whole street preaching thing (and generally look a lot less sullen and a lot more, uh, baked).
Quote
43Rob Taylor on Oct 26, 2009 at 2:38 am:
They’re the Hispanic off-shoot of the Black Israelite movement. While the Nation of Yahweh (run by convicted murderer Hulon Mitchell jr AKA Yahweh Ben Yahweh) expresses a strict Black supremacist ideology some off-shoots of the Black Israeli movement define “Black” so loosely as to include Latinos of European descent, Native Americans and even Asians. The religion is based around the anti-White mythology of the Nation of Islam (in which Mitchell was a member at one point, before being thrown out of embezzlement and I believed suspected child molestation) and a reversal of the Anglo-Israelite movement sprinkled with some of the New Age theories the highly educated Mitchell absorbed through reading. His cult is a known racket that has been probed often by the government and the NOI may still have a hit out on him.
The Hispanic versions of this cult are active in Latin American and Caribbean countries with diverse and ethnically blended population who may still have the remnants of European class systems (like Guyana, Dominican Republic etc.) and are misogynists, violent and dangerous. Document them in public but never interact with these degenerates, especially women. You’ll notice that female members of these cults are never seen publicly. They’re basically enslaved, and when I was in college getting a degree in Comparative Religion informants from that part of the world said it was widely believed they ran rape camps on their cult compounds. That’s rumor, but their misogyny and violence is well documented.
Quote
44Starless on Oct 26, 2009 at 5:05 am:
You forgot to mention the tails. And the horns. And the baking Christian babies into pies.
They achieve what all cultish sects achieve: draw the extremely discontented to them and solidify their groupthink. Considering I quoted Life of Brian above, see the “what have the Romans ever done for us?” scene for a good example of that kind of groupthink.
In order to draw new converts they have to start from a legitimate source — something people people already believe in. From there they can say, “The Bible is sacred and only we know the true interpretation of The Word. All of those conventional sects are blasphemers.” Come into my parlor…
(Speaking of Guyana) See Jonestown, the Branch Davidians, and pretty much every other apocalyptic/millennial cult and at its core you’ll find some form of sexual abuse. It’s the ultimate way to control someone.
Quote
45Incognito on Oct 26, 2009 at 7:32 am:
That was interesting comments, Rob Taylor! Thanks for sharing! We sure have kooky people! Can these folks be arrested for abusing women then?
Quote
46Marauder on Oct 26, 2009 at 10:27 am:
Sorry for hijacking the thread, but - there’s no proof Walt Whitman ever had sex with a man? If you put it that way, there’s no proof George and Martha Washington ever had sex. Unless people have kids, you actually see them having sex, or one’s sexual bodily fluids are found in or on the other, how is there supposed to be proof that they had sex? (George and Martha didn’t have any kids together.)
At any rate, Walt Whitman kissed Oscar Wilde on the mouth when Oscar Wilde was on his American tour, and he (WW) kept a diary of the different guys he picked up and slept with.
Back on topic, I, like some other people here, thought of Mormons while looking at the “tribes of Israel” thing.
Quote
47MikalM on Oct 26, 2009 at 10:32 am:
Rob,
Very interesting info! I’m something of a self-taught expert on kooky kults, but I’ve never heard of a Hispanic split-off from Hulon Mitchell’s murderous sect. Got any sources for more info on them?
Quote
48Ringo the Gringo on Oct 26, 2009 at 11:24 am:
The poster of Jesus with devil horns also features a picture Cesare Borgia, the son of Pope Alexander VI, who they appear to believe was the model for the evil white Jesus.
Quote
49Poteen on Oct 26, 2009 at 12:04 pm:
What’s it all mean?
Don’t take the brown acid!
Quote
50Maria on Oct 26, 2009 at 12:06 pm:
These boys are not Rastas, at least not anything main stream.
I’ve seen gentlemen like these both New York and Atlanta over the years. I have no clue if they are the same group which travels around the country or if there are a handful of true believers in every major city. But both groups had the same sort of signs, (jesus /devil and the tribes stuff) Though the guys in New York had a side table with handouts. Both times I’ve seen them they where shouting into the air and at anyone within hearing distance. They mightily weave insults into their “insights”. I shy away from engaging street screamers (maybe we shyers need to stop doing that…) However, I’ve had one lad specifically tell me: “listen to the mans word and mind your place” so that was all I needed to hear from him.
Can we get these boys, some Mormons and the KKK together on an episode of the View? I think I’d buy a ticket to that.
As for the fringe, well, you can see the fringe in two ways, that it’s so tattered, frayed, disorganized and unraveling that it hasn’t got what it takes to do wholesale damage or that it’s got us so surrounded that every day more threads become loose.
Quote
51common_sense on Oct 26, 2009 at 12:17 pm:
these are converts to “islam”
expect more middle eastern born ones to join them from the MX border
it’s a warning is all……….back to sleep now everyone
Quote
52pat on Oct 26, 2009 at 3:52 pm:
What does it mean? They are Democrats.
Quote
53Rob Taylor on Oct 26, 2009 at 5:21 pm:
MikalM
On occasion you can find videos on YouTube and other file sharing sites of them. They speak about conspiracies alot so sometimes you can run into them by using keywords like “Illuminati” and such. Also “true Israelite” and the like.
Quote
54Starless on Oct 27, 2009 at 5:18 am:
Are you saying the Mormons, the KKK, and these guys are morally equivalent?
Quote
55Sawam on Oct 27, 2009 at 8:50 am:
My husband was a bit surprised to learn that he is now a “so called Negro” Jew.
He was raised in the Middle East and he also says that there is no way the guy on the far right is Latino.
Quote
56Roscoe on Oct 27, 2009 at 9:33 am:
Don’t know if this is the same group, but………….
http://www.riseisrael.com/israel.html
Quote
57Pvt Bin Jammin on Oct 27, 2009 at 9:55 am:
I have encountered members of this group in downtown Pasadena, CA. They were very rude and confrontational with the passers by. Creepy.
Quote
58Elsa on Oct 27, 2009 at 11:59 am:
They are a bunch of thugged out kids with a mix of revisionist history and new age bullshit. That is all.
Quote
59Ken on Oct 27, 2009 at 4:57 pm:
Even though they’re reading the Bible and wearing what are supposed to be tallit?
Quote
60phoenixgirl on Oct 27, 2009 at 5:08 pm:
the guy with the beard looks like a muslim
Quote
61Scott on Oct 27, 2009 at 6:05 pm:
I find it curious that all of these self-righteous people have decided to “rise up” against whitey. Funny thing is, anthoropologists have identified early Europeans, and they were…(by strict racial identification) black. So all of this angst about who is black, who is white, who is “real” and who isn’t is bunk.
Also, methinks the missile is a Soviet one because Fidel or Hugo would be the ones to launch it…not Vladamir. Just sayin’.
Quote
62Thank You Elsa on Oct 27, 2009 at 6:15 pm:
I think you nailed it.
Quote
63Josephine on Oct 27, 2009 at 6:54 pm:
I came across a group of black men in downtown Toronto this summer. One of them was holding a King James Bible aloft and hollering as he read from it. The sign depicting Jesus with horns caught my eye and I stopped to see the others. They had the same signs as in Zombie’s photos, above, plus others. They let me photograph their signs and books but I took care not to photograph their faces because they were a bit hostile.
They said they were the true Jews, the true Israelites. They wrote a name on a piece of paper for me so I could look for their YouTube videos but I can’t find it. They said their videos kept being taken off YouTube. I asked the name of their religion and they were evasive. I asked who started their religion or church and I can’t remember what they told me. (I also can’t find the email I wrote to friends about my encounter, which means I probably deleted it.)
I can’t remember how they explained why Jews think it’s okay to call themselves Jews or Israelites (something about a misunderstanding based on the way it is written in the Bible) and why they’re wrong.
According to them, the image of Jesus as a white man is a lie and therefore a picture of the devil because Jesus was actually a black man.
They showed me two books: “Nature Knows No Color-Line” by J.A. Rogers and “Sex and Race” (no author’s name on the cover but, according to Amazon, it is by the same author). They showed me a page in the former book with depictions of “Negroes in Coats-of-Arms of Noble Families” in the chapter, “Negro Ancestry in the White Race”. They seemed to think these books were shocking and almost forbidden.
One of their posters had pictures of orthodox Jews, a map showing “The Khazar kingdom in the early 18th century”, a page from Der Sturmer, two book covers — “The Thirteenth Tribe” by Arthur Koestler and “Blood Passover, the Jews of Europe and Ritual Murder” — and in between someone had printed, “Are these the true Biblical Jews? Jeremiah 14:2, Rev. 29:3:9″ and “Imposters!!”
Other posters had bizarre stuff about Chrysler, Masons, Aboriginals (Native Indians), Blacks as slaves and depictions of prehistoric man. Another had the theme of “Coming Soon: World War III” with a quote from Revelations 11:14.
That’s all I know.
Quote
64Phil on Oct 27, 2009 at 8:08 pm:
I found it refreshingly consistent saying that Jesus was black and Judah gave rise to the Negros.
However, there’s a little snag:
The New Testament says that Jesus had no earthly father.
Quote
65Archonix on Oct 28, 2009 at 3:00 am:
When it comes to British Israelism (the anglo-israelism someone mentioned above) at least they have the decency to acknowledge that modern jews are the descendents of the tribes of Judah and Benjamin.
Quote
66r4 ds games on Oct 28, 2009 at 4:27 am:
Thanx for the valuable information. I can’t remember how they explained why Jews think it’s okay to call themselves Jews or Israelites and why they’re wrong. keep posting. Will be visiting back soon.
Quote
67Starless on Oct 28, 2009 at 5:34 am:
By strict racial definition, early everyone was black.
The missile in the image says “USSR” on the side. There are two problems with that: firstly, if it was supposed to be a depiction of a real Soviet missile, it would say “CCCP” not “USSR”, and secondly, it looks more like an MX than anything in the Soviet ICBM arsenal (except maybe an SS-19). IOW, whoever created that image doesn’t know shit about ICBMs.
Quote
68common_sense on Oct 28, 2009 at 9:52 am:
Ken, see Phoenixgirl’s post beneath yours for a second (sort of) of my muslim connection
Phoenixgirl, I think the younger one next to him ALSO looks a little muzzy-ish
Quote
69Starless on Oct 28, 2009 at 11:55 am:
If the guy on the end looks Moslem, then this guy does too. Is it the brown skin? The beard?
Quote
70Ken on Oct 28, 2009 at 4:11 pm:
Are you kidding me? He “looks” like a Muslim because he has a beard? Well, maybe he is Middle Eastern in origin..but, y’know, I don’t think too many Muslims read the Old Testament or wear an improvised tallit. They’re obviously not Muslims.
Quote
71Throbert McGee on Oct 28, 2009 at 5:03 pm:
I think Ken is basically correct here, although it’s possible that some of these guys have flirted with Islam and/or been involved with the pseudo-Muslims of NoI.
Quote
72Timothy (TRiG) on Oct 28, 2009 at 5:23 pm:
Is anyone’s?
TRiG
Quote
73Ringo the Gringo on Oct 28, 2009 at 6:39 pm:
They look straight out of a bad spaghetti western if you ask me.
Quote
74Josephine on Oct 28, 2009 at 9:02 pm:
Re. #66: I’m not sure if you were being sarcastic? It happened four months ago and I was hurrying to get to a meeting that was more important to me than my chance encounter with this fringe religious group.
At any rate, I’ve found the email I sent to a friend. This is part of it:
Now that you know how nonsensical their answer was, perhaps it will be easier to understand why I didn’t remember it clearly.
Quote
75Kini on Oct 28, 2009 at 11:51 pm:
Maybe some clinic was giving away free medical marijuana samples?
Quote
76Starless on Oct 29, 2009 at 6:51 am:
I’d liken these guys to a platypus. You could look at some animals and wonder how in the hell they got put together, but with a platypus at some point you find yourself asking, “WTF? A duck bill? A beaver tail? It lays eggs? Who came up with this one and why?” So with most religious sects, you can make the argument that they’re not rational, but these guys (black Jews, bizzaro Muslims, whatever the hell they are) don’t make sense even within an irrational religious context.
Quote
77Guy Average on Oct 29, 2009 at 10:37 am:
It would be the perfect front group for an Islamic Sleeper Cell. They could openly claim credit for any terrorist action and The Press would announce the blame to be on Christian Radical Right-Wingers. the use of al-Taqiyya would make it acceptable in Islam.
Quote
78Ken on Oct 29, 2009 at 4:46 pm:
but with a platypus at some point you find yourself asking, “WTF? A duck bill? A beaver tail? It lays eggs? Who came up with this one and why?”
Starless is my new favorite person on Zombietime. End of story.
Quote
79phoenixgirl on Oct 29, 2009 at 7:58 pm:
ken…impovrished tallit? more like some kind of home made arts and crafts cover up……
starless…..the beard at the one on the end is consistent with a muslim male….in my opinion, he looks like a muslim, the guy in your link looks like a cuban terrorist who has killed his own people, his beard is not as neatly kept the kid in the guy in zombies picture…
Quote
80stuiec on Oct 29, 2009 at 8:51 pm:
Platypuses are perfectly understandable. God left the remote where one of His toddlers could reach it.
Quote
81common_sense on Oct 29, 2009 at 10:53 pm:
#69 Starless: nope, if it was those attributes, I would have said so
(and I think Alphonso Jackson (in cabinet (HUD) of Bush) woulda been a terrorist if that were all it took)
I don’t see the facial structure of hispanics, meztizos or mulattos
I see middle eastern
but that’s only my opinion, I am no anthropologist
and it’s only a couple of the subjects in the photo
Quote
82Anonymous on Oct 29, 2009 at 11:29 pm:
People forget their history. One of the main reasons that modern Spaniards generally look the way they do (that is, dark hair, dark piercing eyes, angular features) is because they are part Arab. Remember that the Arabs conquered most of the Iberian peninsula starting in the 8th century, and despite the later revisionist history (they were oh-so-tolerant and better than the Catholics, etc.) the harsh reality was that one of their methods of “conquering” was to mass rape all native Spanish women under their control, as a form of ethnic cleansing, to permanently intermingle the bloodlines. (Admittedly, this has always been a standard post-invasion tactic in the pre-modern era). Only a few areas of northern Spain managed to avoid this decades-long rape and forced-marriage campaign. By the time the Arabs were driven out in 1492, a substantial percentage of “Spaniards” themselves had at least one Arab ancestor.
And since Spain subsequently went on to colonize half the globe, all the people whom we nowadays call “Hispanic” are approximately half Spanish and half Native American (”mestizos” as they’re called in Mexico). And if most Hispanics in the Americas are partly of Spanish heritage…that means they’re part Arab as well.
So, the guy on the right may self-identify as ethnically Hispanic, but when he shaves his beard like a jihadi…hell, he looks just like his great-great-great-great-great-great-(etc.)-grandaddy sweeping across Andalusia with a scimitar.
Quote
83CattusMagnus on Oct 29, 2009 at 11:45 pm:
Anybody else remember this? It seems that this sort of thing goes on in prominent Chicago churches as well as the streets of Berkeley. I wonder if Obama, having listened to and been spiritually advised by Wright for 20-some years, believes that Jesus was a black man as well. And the missile in the pictures above certainly could be construed as the “chickens coming home to roost.” Although the dear reverend said all this while being considerably better dressed.
Quote
84Starless on Oct 30, 2009 at 5:45 am:
Heh. To be fair, and for purposes of full disclosure, I actually stole that one from an old Robin Williams bit. Not long after he’d gotten off the coke. IOW, when he was still funny.
Here’s a pic of Fidel when his beard was “consistent with a muslim male”, though it’s not a straight on shot.
Exactly. Look at Fidel and tell me the facial structure isn’t similar.
I’ve received six (long) years of Spanish language training and in the process I picked up a little something about Spanish etymology. So, yeah, I do recall some history. While the Moorish genetic expansion through Europe was impressive, IMO it can’t compare to the singular seed-spreading achievements of Eric the Red.
Quote
85Doctor Jeff on Oct 30, 2009 at 6:09 am:
they are just a nutsy, fringe group of discontents, easily tuned out and ignored. I think they take a few separate issues and use the religeous ideas to give them some authenticity and interest; but really, not a very cohesive or coherent message. The whole group borders on frank paranoid schizophrenic behavior! I guess it give some people something to do if nothing else.
Quote
86buzzsawmonkey on Oct 30, 2009 at 7:56 am:
G-d created evolution, and sent the platypus the bill.
Quote
87stuiec on Oct 30, 2009 at 10:35 am:
I frankly doubt that Obama gives Jesus a second’s thought, except when he’s looking for ways to make a speech connect to a Christian audience. Just like he has no use for the Old Testament except when he wants to convince an audience of Jewish clergy that somehow Torah says that the temporal government is “God’s partner in life and death.”
Quote
88Starless on Oct 30, 2009 at 11:14 am:
Wah-wah-waaaaaaaah….
FIFY
Or possibly God’s life partner.
Quote
89beckaholic on Oct 30, 2009 at 12:20 pm:
Anonymous:
Yes, and you can find place names in the Southwest that have Arabic roots, and even architecture (blue rimmed doors and windows to keep out the “evil-eye”, etc) I always thought it was interesting, though, that in Mexico proper, the seriously rich tend to be blond and blue-eyed. Where did that come from? Like the social strata has maintained itself for centuries? But there are still Northern New Mexico villages where the residents were so isolated into the 20th century that they still had red hair and light eyes from their red-haired/light eyed conquistador ancestors. It’s all interesting.
Quote
90Starless on Oct 30, 2009 at 1:11 pm:
If you’re more pale, you’re assumed to be of a higher class (i.e. the old assumption that you don’t have to work outside for a living). Racism/classism in Latin America is often based on increments of skin tone, not on the black/white dichotomy of the U.S. The same sort of thing occurs in Asia.
Quote
91Papa Ray on Oct 30, 2009 at 2:30 pm:
Very entertaining. While watching one of the linked videos (the one with the Marine) it finally came out. The deranged black while screaming at the girl with the Marine, says “She ben tat how great America is”…
And then goes on to tell us exactly how America is not great.
That slip boils it all down to where we can see that this group is in the same small (but still too big) segment of America that Obama and his ilk grew into what they are today. Pure and simple America haters from various Marxist, Commie and extreme Socialists, very extreme.
The circle is almost complete, its time for a revolution.
Papa Ray
Central Texas
The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed - where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.
2009 Judge Alex Kozinski
Quote
92CattusMagnus on Oct 30, 2009 at 2:33 pm:
Yes, I suppose you’re right. But I really don’t think the individuals in these picture really care all that much about Jesus either. I think they’re just peddling Black Liberation Theology.
Quote
93Anne's omnibus on Oct 31, 2009 at 6:36 am:
According to Pravda, America is set to attack Russia (why do all the screwed-up countries - which is sadly most of them - harbour this paranoid belief that the US wants to invade them?), and therefore a preventive nuclear strike may be necessary.
And back off the platypus. It was the original - all the other animals stole from it.
Quote
94Starless on Oct 31, 2009 at 12:24 pm:
Pravda’s just telling it the way it always has.
I’ve got nothing against the platypus, it’s just very confusing.
Quote
95Maria on Nov 1, 2009 at 8:12 pm:
Starless, sorry for the delay in my reply. To clarify, goodness gracious no. My TV episode idea has nothing to do with the actual morality of any of these groups what so ever. Nor was I suggesting moral equivalency.
That said, I do find all three groups to be nutty in their own way; what with their leaps of faith, logical shortcuts and ramrod conviction. There’s different worlds of nutty, you got your creamy peanut butter, your almond milk and then there’s rusted ones that go on the ends of bolts. If you combine them you get a breakfast cereal a transformer would love.
I simply found the thought of all three debating with the hosts of the View ( a show I frankly think is nutty in it’s own way) to be the top of hilarity, at least that day I posted.
Quote
96Starless on Nov 2, 2009 at 7:33 am:
LOL. Okay. The only correction I’d make would be to replace “hosts of the View” with “screeching yenta harridans”.
BTW, Whoopi Goldberg should never, ever, until the day she dies, be allowed to forget her “rape-rape” comment.
Quote
97FatSlice on Nov 9, 2009 at 3:37 pm:
I can tell you exactly what that is. It is a new movement of Oakland’s own Bey created Your Black Muslim Bakery version of Nation of Islam. While Bey was alive and preaching on TV in Oakland he often read from both the Bible and the Koran. He read from the Bible to talk about how wrong it was, and from the Koran to talk about how right it was. But he always use the phrases “so called negroes,” “so called Hatians,” etc to describe any group of “The true race.” Bey hated white people — they are all the devil not just this “jesus” that they conjured. Bey and his followers believed and still teach that the white races are the result of a science experiment gone wrong. “The Nation of Islam teaches a black separatist doctrine. According to its beliefs, blacks were the original people on the Earth but had been tricked out of their power, conquered and oppressed by the Caucasian people via a global system of white supremacy. According to NOI doctrine, the white race was produced through a series of genetic breeding experiments conducted by a bigheaded scientist known as “Dr. Yakub.”
Hate for white people is alive and well in America. And for the record, yes, black people can be racists.
Quote
98THEBERKELELEYISRAELITES on Nov 12, 2009 at 4:52 am:
YOU STUPID IDIOTS U KEEP TAKIN PICTURES AN PUTTING UP BULLSHIT BLOGS OF US THE MOST HIGH WILL JUDGE YOU & HE HATES AMERICA. AMERICA DOESN’T FOLLOW ANY OF THE LAWS IN THE BIBLE YOU. AMOS 9:8 Behold, the eyes of the Lord GOD are upon the sinful kingdom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth; saving that I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the LORD. DAMN PEONS. IF U READ THE BIBLE IT TELLS U THAT JESUS IS BLACK JEREMIAH 14:2 Judah mourneth, and the gates thereof languish; they are black unto the ground; and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up.
HEBREWS 7:14 For it is evident that our Lord (the ONE WHO YOU IGNORANTLY CALL JESUS CHRIST) sprang out of Judah(WHAT COLOR DID THE BIBLE SAY JUDAH WAS? IT DIDN’T SAY OLIVE.); of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.
REVELATION 1:13-15 And in the midst of the seven candlesticks one like unto the Son of man, clothed with a garment down to the foot, and girt about the paps with a golden girdle.
14 His head and his hairs were white like wool(HIS HAIR WAS WHITE IN COLOR & WOOLLY IN TEXTURE), as white as snow; and his eyes were as a flame of fire;
15 And his feet like unto fine brass(BRASS IN BROWN), as if they burned(WHAT HAPPENS WHEN U BURN SOMETHING MEANING THE BY PRODUCT OF BURNING ITS BLACK IN TODAY’S TERMS) in a furnace; and his voice as the sound of many waters. I CHALLENGE ANY OF YOU TO FIND ME A SCRIPTURE IN THE BIBLE WHERE IT SAYS JESUS WAS OLIVE?
Quote
99EMERGEZ319 on Nov 12, 2009 at 3:40 pm:
JOEL3:1, 3, 6 “cast lots for my people…sold a girl for wine” the Africans (inhabitants of Tyre and
Zidon) and Arabs sold us to Esau for WINE. NO FORGIVENESS FOR AFRICANS AND ARABS! ALL
NATIONS WERE AND STILL ARE ENVIOUS THAT ISRAEL IS THE CHOSEN NATION OF THE MOST
HIGH. “the children of Judah and…Jerusalem have you sold unto the Grecians” Judah, Benjamin,
and Levi were sold to the Greeks. All so-called “Whites” originate from the Grks. The Grks were
the first “White” empire. We migrated to down after 70 A.D. when Jerusalem was destroyed.
Quote
100CattusMagnus on Nov 13, 2009 at 6:31 pm:
#98 THEBEREKELEYISRAELITES
Interesting post. However, in my bible, Jeremiah 14:2 says, “Judah mourneth, and the gates thereof languish, they sit in black upon the ground; and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up.” It sure sounds as if black is the color of their dress and not the color of their skin. But of course, this is from the American Standard Bible which I suppose you would probably view as manipulated or something. Anyhoo, peace be with you.
Quote
101THEBERKELELEYISRAELITES on Nov 17, 2009 at 1:58 pm:
well when you read it in hebrew the tanach the word there is QADAR which literally means to be dark as in skin tone the hebrew word for the color black is shachar I use the KJV
Quote
102Kenneth on Nov 18, 2009 at 8:17 pm:
These nutjobs are from an extremist sub-sect of the Hebrew Israelites, an African-American cult based on black Jesus replacement theology.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=4D5B105C57F74A6C
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Hebrew_Israelites
Quote