Reverend James Henry Harris is a Distinguished Professor of Homiletics and Pastoral Theology and a research scholar in religion and humanities at the Samuel DeWitt Proctor School of Theology, Virginia Union University. He also serves as chair of the theology faculty and pastor of Second Baptist Church, Richmond, Virginia. He is a former president of the Academy of Homiletics and recipient of the Henry Luce Fellowship in Theology. He is the author of numerous books, including Beyond the Tyranny of the Text and Black Suffering: Silent Pain, Hidden Hope (Fortress Press, 2020). His latest book is N: My Encounter with Racism and the Forbidden Word in an American Classic, a memoir that describes and critically wonders about a graduate English class he took on Mark Twain's Huckleberry Finn, and provides crucial insight into the CRT conundrum.
Harris and I conversed by Zoom about his book Black Suffering on September 13, 2022. We discussed his "Hegel and his Dialectics." Here is an edited version of that exchange.
This podcast and transcript have been edited for condensation and clarity.
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THE EDITED TRANSCRIPT IS BELOW
Podcast 7: Understanding Black Suffering with Rev. James Henry Harris: "Hegel's Master/Slave Dialectic"
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John Hawkins: [00:02:34]
I was a fanboy of Hegel as undergraduate at university. So I was stunned the other week when you called him the "poster boy for racism." It hadn't occurred to me. Maybe we can start there, with you defending that statement.
James Henry Harris: [00:04:04]
Well, this is not unique to Hegel. I see it as a trope in European philosophy. Kant and. Hegel. And liberal philosophy and liberal theology as well. I think there is embedded within Hegel's writing in Phenomenology of Spirit, for example, his display of what I call a terrible arrogance. A sense of considering everything and everybody else in a kind of subservient way.
Hawkins: [00:06:31]
Well, let's start with Hegel's triadic dialectic -- thesis, antithesis and synthesis. We can discuss his most famous dialectic, the master-slave dialectic.
Harris: [00:08:10]
The triadic dialectic, this thesis, antithesis, and synthesis. I first learned about that dialectic in a preaching class. We focused on applying the Hegelian dialectic to biblical and scriptural text. And oftentimes we use it as a kind of pedagogical tool or a methodology for teaching folks how to construct sermons. And what I mean is that in almost every scriptural text you can see a thesis and an antithesis. And then you have to figure out how to synthesize those two things. For example, you read the scripture, you see [that] Jesus uses the whole notion of dialectic as well -- sheep and goats, wheat and tares, those kinds of oppositions, because dialectic to a large extent, at least in the Hegelian construction, is a lot about opposites, and trying to pull these opposites together into some kind of synthesis. So from a logical perspective, it just it makes a lot of sense. It's a good logical construction. And I think that's the kind of thing Hegel was proud of.
Hawkins: [00:10:32]
The dialectic was the engine of his of his Spirit, if you ask me. You know, the synthesis becomes a new thesis, and there's a sense of new paradigmatic stuff going on there.
Harris: [00:11:11]
Exactly. And so there is a kind of circularity to his idealism and to his thought pattern or to his logic. And it's maybe a self-creating, in a sense, as well, because if each synthesis becomes a new thesis, and then there's the creation of a new antithesis, and so on, it's just circular phenomenology.
But so my beginning interest in him was grounded in politics, grounded in preaching, grounded in how to, maybe, set up semantic discourse using the notion of thesis, antithesis, and synthesis and [applying it to] the Scripture. For example, like Psalm 34:1-3, I will bless the Lord at all times. His praise shall continually be in my mouth. My soul makes this boast in the Lord, Oh, magnify the Lord with me and let us exalt His name together. Now, based on this text, I come up with a sermon title, something called Learning to Bless the Lord, and then I start with an antithesis. There is so much going on in the world chaos in Washington and around the world. We've come to idolize so much, both in our local personal world and throughout the world. So the antithesis is to ground what you have to say in the real, real life situation, real world. And I go on to give examples. For example, in Paris at the Louvre Museum, throngs of people were gathered around and gazing at Da Vinci's painting of Mona Lisa. I'm thinking about my actual visit to the museum and looking at the Mona Lisa and gazing at the picture as if the Mona Lisa is a deity in a very real sense, and some folk even crying. And so I ground what I have to say in the real, then I contrast that to the focus of the scriptural text itself, which is about blessing the Lord, not about blessing the Mona Lisa or anybody else like that.
Hawkins: [00:14:03]
Right.
Harris: [00:14:06]
Yeah. So that's the kind of construction that I use in terms of semantic discourse. And it's a way for me to grasp Hegel in a much more practical way, because in a sense, Hegel is not very practical. He's very theoretical.
Hawkins: [00:14:30]
How would you sum up Hegel's notion of self-consciousness? What does he mean by it? What is Hegel talking about? Who is he talking to? Who's reading his stuff? And who's going to say agree or disagree with him?
Harris: [00:15:03]
I think he's talking mainly to other philosophers in a very real sense. But, for example, in Phenomenology of Spirit, even in the section on Lordship and Bondage, he talks about self-consciousness, and he says self-consciousness is, in essence, simply being-for- itself, you know, self equal through the exclusion from itself of everything else. And then he goes on to say, which I call a terrible arrogance, [that] its essence and absolute object is I. And in this immediacy, or in this mirror being-for-itself, it is an individual. What is Other, for it, is an unessential, negatively characterized object. This is why I was so interested in the master-slave dialectic, because of the notion of Other. It's a little bit more complex than that, but, when I read Hegel, I see what I call the Other relation of humanity. And I don't know to what extent this 'in and of itself' is a European ideology or what. But I do think that Hegel is clearly the darling of European philosophy.
I have another quote from Phenomenology of Spirit to share. Where Hegel says, in other words, They have not as yet exposed themselves to each other in the form of pure being for itself or as self-consciousness. Each is indeed certain of its own self, but not of the other, and therefore its own self. Certainty still has no truth. And he goes on and on and on. But the thing I want to say about this is that, for Hegel, self-consciousness is technically being-for-itself at the exclusion of everything else. That caught my attention, and kind of gave me pause, as I looked at his construction. For Hegel, consciousness, self-consciousness is life. And it is dialectical. Death is the natural negation of life, or it's really the natural negation of consciousness. What I try to do is to create in some sense a dialectic, my own dialectic between what Hegel construed as consciousness and self -consciousness. And then I throw in somebody like Nat Turner, who in my view, turns Hegel's notion of self-consciousness and consciousness on its head.
Hawkins: [00:21:46]
Nat Turner is a great example because, you know, when I think of Hegel, and specifically the master-slave dialectic, Nat Turner, is a great example of the struggle between the master and slave coming to terms with each --
Harris: [00:21:59]
--Other.
Hawkins: [00:22:01]
Nat Turner and the plantation owner could be a Master-Slave situation. They're fighting to the death almost. But, at some point, they realize they need each other in order to coexist and they have to bind themselves to rules that they can both live by. Language allows us to talk with an Other and together produce a reality that we can both live with. Master-Slave is kind of like that. It's an ontological thing as well, you know, because we don't really know what the Other is. I'm talking with you, but you're not as real as me, James. You might be real. I only know that you're on a screen there now; we're talking, and all that, but it's not the same as my knowing my own thoughts or my own experiences. So we have to figure out how we can deal with that. And it's the same for you. You know, you're looking at me and it's the same thing. You reckon you see me as another, but my reality is nowhere near as real to you as your own. What we have to do is figure out how we can negotiate something in order to work together.
Harris: [00:23:36]
Equal.
Hawkins: [00:23:37]
You know, the synthesis ends up becoming equal rights. We both go through the experience of reality together, abide by the same rules that we've designed together. So but again, the self-consciousness we're talking about is a lot of white Europeans, probably aristocrats, who have the time to read, who can read, and who can read at that level.
Harris: [00:25:23]
Well, I think that the whole notion of ontological negation is inherent in Hegelianism, so evident throughout his language. I think it's embedded in his construction of philosophy, the negation of the Other. And I think of the slaves as the paradigmatic Other. The slave trade is the embodiment of this Otherness. Was was not only in Hegel's consciousness ontological, but it was I think it became, you know, sociological, political, everything, in the sense that otherness became institutionalized. And codified. In the slave-ocracy. And I'm thinking that, in and of itself, is very much a type of interpretation of Hegel's notion of self-consciousness. I just don't think that the slaveholder in that whole system of thought could imagine that the slave was anything bordering on human.
Hawkins: [00:28:08]
If that's just a natural fact that it's not ordinary to find reality in the Other as much as you find the reality yourself. It takes work. And you have to sort of really explore and get to know the other person. Get to know cultures. It takes time and work and energy. And then you come to realize that you're not anything different than the other. You know, you're an Other to that person, to the world, others, you know. I think if we look at it more like instead of ourselves as Others, we're a bunch of Others. Then that might be you know, that might be a different way of approaching it. And we have to come to some consensus on how we're going to get along together in terms of rules of engagement, say the Constitution, Bill of Rights, that kind of thing.
Harris: [00:29:14]
Yeah, I think what you say about that is good. It's just that I'm wrestling with this notion of how does the self establish itself as self first when it is constantly under siege? You know and constantly under the thumb of Other. And so I'm thinking that the world of the slave and the world of the master are two different worlds. There is no incommensurability in this austerity, particularly since there's a propagation of the Otherness in every way imaginable.
Harris: [00:34:53]
Well, I think that another way to put it, I may have said it in the book, is that in some sense, alterity is a production. I mean, it is a kind of alteration of human being. Slavery was a production. It was a system of producing alterity, a system of producing Otherness. And when that is done systematically for two or 300 years, you know, that that seeps into one's ontological understanding of the self in a very real sense.
Harris: [00:36:41]
And the reality that the slaves were forced to produce a product. Let's say tobacco, corn or whatever. That was on an equal par with themselves. I mean, the slave himself or herself was a commodity. And their task was to produce more commodities for the master. So they themselves were a commodification created by society. And then they were forced to commodify other kinds of things products -- sugar cane, tobacco and that kind of thing. And so, in that sense, I've thought about the fact that it's more than degrading in some sense. I don't have the language for some of what has transpired or continues to transpire. I'm speechless. I struggle to find the language to express this systematic and systemic reality.
Hawkins: [00:38:41]
Right. Well, I think that's an interesting point you make -- the commodity creating more commodity. Like economic growth, you know, like we're all here on the earth for these elites to f*ck with us. So for these elites to sort of make us buy hamburgers and buy TVs and that creates more wealth for them. But we don't need any of that stuff. It's just it's like a game of creating more and more growth for them, more power. And, you know, I sometimes wonder, like with the population problem we have, you know, there's 8 billion people and it's going to be 12 billion people. And we're losing resources, particularly water, since we're each 65% water, and we're already started to talk about water wars. We created a problem for ourselves.
Hawkins: [00:39:54]
We're precious to each other. But it seems like we are encouraging population growth for no other reason than to create more people who will buy more TVs and buy more things and who are themselves only regarded as things. Who buy things. That's kind of what you're saying. If the commodity creating more commodities is that we live in a world where we are, ourselves, things that are here for no other reason than to produce and purchase more things, and it just goes on and on like that.
Go out and buy some toasters now. And so this this sort of this whole idea of overcoming slavery, not just the legacy of slavery, as if what I have to worry about is that we think it ended that this idea of slavery has end it. That's the thing that scares me. But actually it's in full blown mode today.
Harris: [00:41:51]
That's a type of criminality in a very real sense. And it propagates and perpetuates the spirit of Otherness and the spirit of commodification. And this notion of alterityisnot original with me, but people like Michael Hardt, Antonio Negri, they talk about Alterity being produced. It's not given. It's produced. It's a production. And that's a part of what I'm trying to argue in my book, Black Suffering, particularly as it relates to the master- slave dialectic.
You may have read Edward Said's Orientalism. That's the spirit that comes through --Otherness is a deliberate and cynical act of consciousness that results in the denigration of certain elements of humanity that is poignantly represented in the production of The Black Slave and the commodification of slave culture as the foundation of a free labor economy. See, my philosophy is that any Black person in the US who has an ancestry grounded in slavery -- and that's almost all African Americans -- should be given a free college education. As a minimum. And, you know, I don't even want to use the language of reparations, but I just think that anybody who has undergone or been, you know, been a victim or even a product, if you will, quote unquote, of slavery, should be able to go to college, at least to any college in America.
Free tuition, room and board, and that kind of thing.
And the fact that African Americans have very minimal or very little net worth is highly correlated with American chattel slavery. I think much of the poverty that exists among African-Americans is a product of slavery. And I also tend to think, taking it even further, some of the violence that you see propagated by African-Americans is also a product of slavery. So part of what I'm saying is what the Sojourner Truth says: What evil has this slavery not done? It's just a terrible reality.
Hawkins: [00:45:57]
Yeah. Chattel slavery hasn't gone away. It's just been transformed into something else. And the danger today is that we're in a postmodern era. A lot of people are atheists. A lot of people don't look to the Lord or a God for moral answer. And it's sort of like what we talked about a few weeks ago -- John Cone and his How can we live in a world where God seems to be indifferent to our suffering? And that's the major question. That's the most important question of our lifetime, really, in the sense of how are we going to find an ontological answer to why we're here and how we can get along with each other. And because some people say if Nothing is true, everything's permitted. But if we sort of extend that further and say that it's all relative, then the stuff that corporates do, and the masters of industry who keep everybody in check to make a buck, you know, we're in a world that turns towards horror and dystopia and that kind of thing. You can see that happening.
Harris: [00:47:27]
Right.
Hawkins: [00:49:23]
So this gets back to Hegel who so influenced Marx and Marx is supposed to be the savior of economics and historical materialism... People of the world unite. You have nothing to lose but your chains"
Harris:
And then my other thing is that, you know, my other criticism is that Hegel. And a lot of the European philosophers. Had nothing to say about American slavery. They didn't say a word. So in some sense it must have been in synchrony with some of their ideology. I'm surmising, naturally.
Hawkins: [00:57:42]
That wasn't part of their consciousness. You know, there was a lot of slavery going on in various parts of the world and it just didn't figure in
Harris: [00:58:18]
Something you said made me think of the fact that there is a level of unconsciousness to the creation of alterity [and of being] oblivious to the humanity of the other"Which brings us back full circle, because that is in many ways the thesis in Black Suffering --that black suffering is so endemic and so pandemic and so ubiquitous that we are not even conscious of it.
Part of my project is about awakened consciousness. I talk about it in connection with Dubois. Because the bottom line is that, in writing these books, sometimes you get so engrossed in them, you know that the reader understands the text in some ways better than the writer.
Harris: [01:04:23]
You know, politics is just evil. I mean, I don't have any confidence in any side of this argument. They both are just corrupt. Maybe [some] to a lesser degree than others, but still terrible.
Hawkins: [01:04:52] Why don't we start next week with how you start with raising consciousness and delivering real hope rather than rhetorical hope that we got somewhat with Obama -- who got waylaid by Bush, and I'd bet the bastards actually set him up that way, you know, with the TARP -- planned to get off of the mortgage [freefall] scam -- waited for Obama to come in so that they could ruin his big plan for infrastructure and [social spending], a much larger idea for the infrastructure than Biden currently just pawned off on u -- and that all got waylaid because of the TARP. Obama was being told that Wall Street's too big to fail and he has to sign off on TARP and whatever planned he had for the first hundred days of his administration was going to be put on hold or be really tepid compared to what he had in mind. And he went along.
Harris: [01:06:01]
Yeah. Something evil about that, too. I mean, I don't know if I would have bought into that philosophy about the banks being too big to fail. I think they should have failed.
Hawkins: [01:06:22]
Even if it ended in revolution.
Harris: [01:06:26]
I think that that would have been a great outcome: revolution. Hey, man. I mean these people are vulgar. I mean, this is vulgar capitalism at its worst. And the thing about it is, they know exactly what they're doing. It's not unintentional.They know exactly what they're doing. You know, so in a sense, they're like the slave owners.
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James Henry Harris did not provide a reading this week, but below is a BONUS, This is an audio excerpt from the memoir
