Vince Bantu
He holds a doctorate in the languages these documents are written in. He also runs a test on his church history students, and almost nobody passes it. What that test exposes is the whole reason this documentary exists.
Dr. Vince L. Bantu. Assistant professor of church history and Black church studies at Fuller Theological Seminary. PhD in Semitic and Egyptian Languages, The Catholic University of America. Directs the Meachum School of Haymanot, which provides theological education for urban pastors. Author of A Multitude of All Peoples: Engaging Ancient Christianity's Global Identity (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2020) and Gospel Haymanot: A Constructive Theology and Critical Reflection on African and Diasporic Christianity (2020). Wrote the "What Skin Color Were Africans in Antiquity?" section of the Unspoken Leader's Guide (p. 21).
Also anchors sessions 2.2, 2.5 of the learning path
Who he is
Vince Bantu holds a PhD in Semitic and Egyptian Languages from The Catholic University of America. Hold onto that, because it settles a question people usually argue about with opinions. When he tells you what the Coptic and Syriac sources say, he is reading them.
He is assistant professor of church history and Black church studies at Fuller Theological Seminary, and he directs the Meachum School of Haymanot, which provides theological education for urban pastors. He wrote A Multitude of All Peoples: Engaging Ancient Christianity's Global Identity and Gospel Haymanot, both published in 2020. He also wrote the section of the Unspoken curriculum answering what skin color Africans were in antiquity, which tells you how he operates: he took the question nobody wants to touch and answered it out of the sources.
His interview is the longest in this archive at eighty minutes. He does not spend them making Africa look good. He spends them showing you the receipts, including the ones that complicate his own case.
What you are getting in this dossier
The test he runs on his own church history students, and the harder fact he reports about rooms full of people holding doctorates. The real country he says people are looking for when they say Wakanda. The evidence, from the Book of Acts through Carthage, Nubia, and Ethiopia. His central reversal, which is that the faith walked into Africa freely and something else arrived by force six centuries later. Three objections you will actually meet, with his answers. And the moment he refuses to flatter his own argument, which is the moment you learn whether to trust him.
By the end you should be able to name him, quote him, and go read him.
Hear one now
Before anything else, hear the analogy he hands you. It is the whole argument in fifty seconds, and it is the one you will repeat.
"And so rock and roll was invented by Black people, it was invented in a Black ethos, but very soon after, it was appropriated by White people. The industry became dominated by White people, so now the perception is that rock and roll is a White style of music, when in fact it originated with Black people. And what happened with Christianity is very similar."
The rest of this dossier is part of Unspoken
1,790 more words and 11 more clips of him making the case, including the three objections he answers and the place he refuses to flatter his own argument.
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