Episode 582: A Chorus of Voices

The spiritual is a combination of African musical traditions and European Christian hymns. They are meditations on the triumph of the metaphysical over the physical realities of slavery. They attempt to answer profound questions: What happens to an enslaved person when she dies? What does it mean if her life has been so denigrated on earth? What does freedom feel like if your only access to it is in your imagination? What miracles of God are needed to get free?

Today’s Top Ten List explores “Messages – Explicit in Implied – in Some African American Spirituals.” Scriptures referenced include Joshua 3; Jeremiah 8; Jeremiah 46:11; Isaiah 2:4; and Joshua 6.