[dropcap]C[/dropcap]ain Hope Felder, a groundbreaking Bible scholar who called attention to the presence of black people in the Old and New Testaments, has died at the age of 76. [mc4wp_form id=”6042″]
Part of the first wave of black Bible professors in the US, Felder’s research challenged generations of scholarship that ignored or downplayed race in Scripture.
By showcasing the numerous people with dark skin mentioned in the Bible, the longtime Howard University School of Divinity professor argued that white interpreters had erased black people from the text. That erasure, he said, enabled modern, racist readings of the Scripture.
“Black people are not only frequently mentioned,” he wrote, “but are also mentioned in ways that are favorable in terms of acknowledging their actual and potential role in the salvation history of Israel.”
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