The essentially autobiographical “Go Tell it on the Mountain” allows the reader to examine and relate to the true thoughts and emotions that shaped Baldwin. Several elements draw distinct comparisons between James and Jesus the Messiah. To start, the book itself begins with the protagonist’s birthday. Although it isn’t his actual day of birth, his 14th birthday symbolizes his start of puberty and the beginning of his consciousness, manhood, and realization of who he is. This is very similar to the beginnings of two gospel stories in the Holy Bible that describe Christ’s nativity and “birth”. Furthermore, both Jesus and the protagonist are assisted by a “Gabriel”. In Jesus’ case, the angel Gabriel came down to tell Mary, Jesus’ mother, that she would have a divine child. He delivered the news that out of her virginity, she would give birth to a child of the Lord. In class, we studied a marble statue that interpreted the concept of Gabriel’s delivery of the message that Mary would be impregnated with the seed of God. Gabriel was the messenger that predicted Jesus. In “Go Tell it on the Mountain,” Gabriel is portrayed as a stepfather, and while his seed did not produce the protagonist, his urging of John to embrace Christianity and get saved, allowed John to become the person he would be. John’s desire to please his family and follow in the ways of God truly shapes his thoughts and motivations. However, because he never truly feels the spirit that he anticipates coming when giving oneself to God, he views Christianity from a removed, third-person view. This enables him to recognize and speak about the hypocrisies. James Baldwin uses this knowledge and vantage to apply to his analysis of Black Americans. Additionally, in the biography of James Baldwin that was studied in class, it was only because James had been “saved” that his stepfather allowed him to stay in high school and cultivate his academic prowess. Without his education, he would not have the tools necessary for success. Lastly, both Jesus and Baldwin suffered for their beliefs and for the salvation of others. The Christian understanding is that Jesus suffered for our sins. The suffering element is important as humility is found in the time spent suffering. While Christ had to suffer, he did so to testify for humanity’s sins and to save them. Throughout the story, it is clear that John is suffering. Whether it is his sexuality, the sin of his masturbation, his treatment from his father, his outward appearance, Christianity in general, and his ideas of white people, John is constantly in turmoil. But “John” endures this in order to be able to testify for his people. Without the struggle and experiences of his childhood, he would not have been prepared to speak with credibility about the lives of Black people in his adulthood. His road destined him for service to others.
Month: March 2021
Divine Covenant
In Christianity, the principle of living out your faith and practicing the tenets of religion in one’s daily life is highly emphasized. Even in my theology courses at ND, I have learned about the divine covenant – or the promise God made to the ancient Israelites and all of humanity to protect them as long as they kept His law and were faithful to him. This promise is a condition and relies on the premise that people remain in line with Scripture and God’s teachings to receive his salvation and grace. According to many passages of the Bible, one must carry out one religion successfully to guarantee salvation. Matthew 7:24-27 says:
“Therefore, everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, yet it did not fall because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.” ~ Matthew 7:24-27
One can interpret this to meant that if one does not “live out their faith” and put the principles of their faith in practice, they are foolish and are thought not to be guaranteed salvation. The scene in Go Tell it on The Mountain that depicts John’s hallucination and interaction with Gabriel exemplifies the importance of living out one’s faith in Christianity. Also, it may allude to Baldwin’s struggles with the divine covenant.
When John sees his father in his hallucination, Gabriel did not show him any affection and did not respond to John’s profession of being saved. Baldwin writes, “He did not move to touch him, did not kiss him, did not smile,” and that Gabriel was non-responsive to John’s initial profession of salvation. Gabriel then goes on to only say, “‘It comes from your mouth… I want to see you live it. It’s more than a notion.” This articulation of wanting to see John’s faith in the way he lived goes back to the divine covenant agreement of living out your faith, and its inclusion in this passage displays how important a tenet this is in Christianity. Baldwin writes that John preceded to weep upon his father’s response, which I think represents the struggle Baldwin had with the pressure he felt to live out his faith. James Baldwin spent his whole life thinking he was a sinner because of his sexuality. As a result, he may have constantly struggled with the idea that he would never be able “to live his faith” or gain salvation (as his dad demanded of him in his hallucination). Throughout GTIOTM, John struggles to maintain his faith because he feels like a sinner and a disappointment. I think this speaks to the larger narrative in Baldwin’s life of the constant feeling of being an outsider and not being able to find a home in his family, or faith. A perspective that is reflected in his work.
The Absence of Love
During one of our classes, Professor Mouton-Kinyon had brought up the theme of love, or the absence of it, in John’s relationship with his Mother and Father. The absence of love for the child is shown in John’s family, but also in the history recounted by Florence’s mother who had her children taken away from her during slavery. In the Bible, it is written that God is Love, and so for the people in this story, bringing their children to God is, one can argue, loving them or giving them all the love they need. But, before a child can be brought into this world, there are parental relationships that occur first. I am interested in the absence of love in the romantic relationships in the novel, and how these relationships never were allowed to blossom into love because, 1. they occurred outside of the “rules” of their religion or 2. they were using religion as a safety net.
For example, Elizabeth was never able to love Richard because of his death, but he also was a man who cursed the Lord and religion. Florence, who never connected to religion or the Lord, never understood her husband or really loved herself until she felt that it was almost her time to die. But still she could not find love for her own brother, because in the end she still wanted to show him his hypocritical ways and she seems to say I have come to terms with my faults and lack of love for the Lord, but you have not and it continues to spew hatred not love on those around you. And Gabriel displays this absence of love the most. Gabriel talks about how he hated Deborah after he began to have an affair with Esther, but he has never loved a woman in his life really and I would argue is incapable of love because he has hatred in his heart and the shame he feels that seems to overpower all of his other emotions. He also uses his marriage to Elizabeth as a safety net because he believes she repented to the Lord and is a Godly woman. Using scripture, 1 John 2: 7-11 states: “Whoever says he is in the light and hates his brother is still in darkness. Whoever loves his brother abides in the light, and in him there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes.” I think this describes Gabriel directly because he and Elizabeth cannot provide the love their children need, when they have never experienced it themselves, and refuse to acknowledge that.
Masculinity and Relationship with God
Both in Gabriel and John’s case, their ideas of masculinity cause them to have a flawed relationship with God. Gabriel believes masculinity is his path towards a purer relationship with God, as his main motivation in all of his relationships is to create a holy male lineage. But John seems to have a pure relationship with God except for when he questions his sexuality. His view of other men’s physical power as sexually appealing causes him to question his salvation at the end of the book. Elisha’s ignorance of why John really asks him if he believed in his salvation puts that salvation even further into question, and the reader must wonder whether or not Baldwin believes anyone can truly be saved by God.
Masculine sexuality and holiness are portrayed as contradictory at a number of points by Baldwin. Gabriel’s masculinity’s failure to bring him closer to God is obvious, as he continually tries to “give” women his holy male heir, yet fails when these children end up being violent, dead, or non-existent. Further, his failure is marked by John’s salvation at the end of the book because he reaches union with God as an adopted son whereas Gabriel’s actual children do not even come close to having such an experience. But John questions his salvation at the end of the book due to his own view of his homosexuality as being in conflict with God’s will. When he imagines the strength of the boys in the bathroom in the very beginning of the novel, he believes he has sinned and thus is destined to go to hell after he dies. He then denies his sexuality, such as when he has the scuffle with Elisha in the church. There are queer undertones throughout the whole scene, yet this is viewed as a “straight” encounter by Elisha, who seems to be oblivious to John’s attraction to him. This obliviousness continues to the end of the novel where John is seemingly saved, and thus causes the reader to question whether or not Baldwin believes John was actually saved, or whether humans can be “saved” at all.
Ultimately, at the end of the novel I believe Baldwin thinks salvation itself is a farce, and not something that people should aim their lives toward because it is a futile affair. John’s consistent inquiry of Elisha to pray for him at the end of the book because he has romantic feelings for this man only serves to insight fear in John’s heart even though he just had an experience on the altar that can only be described as fully divine. Gabriel’s jealousy also serves no purpose other than to give him fear and grief, fear over his own ability to be saved and grief over a lineage that he views as failed in the eyes of God. The concept of salvation serves not much more than to drive this father and son mad over how they will reach heaven. Gabriel feels he must make up for his past sins by bringing a divine child into this world, which will likely never happen. John feels that in order to reach heaven he must denounce his sexuality, but this sexuality is what makes him human. One man feels he must exert his masculinity to a greater extent to achieve union with God and the other feels that he must repress his attraction to masculine figures to do the same. Baldwin then must see the concept of salvation as nothing more than a ridiculous and overbearing ideal to strive towards that, in the real world where people should not be expected to act more than human, people are driven to the brink of insanity by the constant fear of failing to please God.
Gabriel, David Baldwin, and Saul
In Gabriel’s first meeting with baby John, the child is enthralled by the music he hears and Gabriel says, “Got a man in the Bible, son, who liked music, too. He used to play on his harp before the king, and he got to dancing one day before the Lord. You reckon you going to dance for the Lord one of these days?” (Baldwin 177). In these phrases, Gabriel refers to David who played his harp for King Saul (1 Sam 16:19-23) and later danced before God (2 Sam 6:14-16). The introduction of David and Saul into Go Tell It on the Mountain is exceptionally fruitful as it connects both to the text and Baldwin’s life. Though the connections between the biblical David, John, and Baldwin are equally rich, I want to focus here on the link between Saul, Gabriel, and David Baldwin and the way Saul adds to our reading of the text. In the Bible, David plays his harp for Saul because the king is “troubled by an evil spirit from God” (1 Sam 16:15). This description implies some mental trouble for Saul, presumably a mental illness. Undoubtedly, Baldwin recognized parallels between Saul’s evil spirit and his father’s mental illness. The shift from serving as God’s messenger to having a mental illness that impairs thought is startling but, as Saul’s example shows, it is not unprecedented nor is it disconnected from God’s larger plan. In the Bible, the evil spirit troubles Saul once the spirit of God leaves him and fills David instead. The spirit of God leaves Saul because he disobeys the Lord in battle. God commanded Saul to “go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass” (1 Sam 15:3). Though Saul follows through on killing women and children and fails by not killing the leader of Amalek, God’s command here is worth pondering. God’s instructions illustrate the difference between the Old Testament God and the New Testament Christ; the lack of mercy on anything and anyone seems antithetical to Christ’s message. For Christians, these instructions represent a rift in the faith: is Christianity about love (as Baldwin would assert) or about follow God’s commands on the path to heaven? Ideally, these options are the same but Saul’s case shows that is not always the case. Baldwin favors the Christianity of love and forgiveness, but Gabriel, and presumably David Baldwin, seem to follow a Christianity that features an angry God and a constant serpent in the grass, looking to provoke his ire. In Go Tell It on the Mountain,Baldwin repeats Saul’s internal battle between following God, doing the right thing, and keeping up appearances in the story of Gabriel’s life. In trying to balance these impulses, Gabriel fails; the Bible shows that Saul also falls short. Strikingly, the punishment for that failure is also the same. Saul not only receives an evil spirit from the Lord but also loses the right to keep the kingship and spirit of Lord within his lineage; he cannot choose his heir. Gabriel experiences the same reality. By naming their son “Royal,” Esther forces her imperfect child to serve as Gabriel’s heir. Furthermore, Gabriel hopes that he can pass on the spirit of the Lord to Roy, but he seems to have only passed on the “evil spirit from God.” Rather, God chooses Baldwin, the unlikeliest of heirs like David, to continue his work on Earth, spurning Gabriel’s desires. By looking at Saul in comparison to Gabriel and David Baldwin, Baldwin illustrates how God’s control over the world, both real and perceived, affects the characters in the text.
Love
As mentioned in class, Go Tell It on the Mountain seems to be all about love but also about loneliness. Some characters are looking for love, some wanted love, others have an absence of love which is what leaves the room for loneliness. When Roy and Elizabeth are talking about Gabriel beating him, Roy responds to Elizabeth’s assertion that Gabriel beats Roy because he loves Roy (P. 21) with “That ain’t the kind of love I understand, old lady. What you reckon he’d do if he didn’t love me.” (P. 21). In a way, Roy is sensing an absence of love from Gabriel.
Elizabeth never loved her mother as her mother seemed to not love her (p. 147-148). She was separated from her father, whom she loved by her aunt who deemed him unfit to care for Elizabeth as he was “the first cousin of the devil (P. 149-150). In not loving Elizabeth’s father, Elizabeth comes to the conclusion that her aunt could not love her (P. 150) and the lack of love was reciprocated by Elizabeth.
Then God ripped Richard, a man she loved, away from her as retribution (P. 152). In a way, Elizabeth is aware that Gabriel does not love John or herself (P. 169-170), that his spirit is not right despite his promise to love her and John until he died (P. 182). It is this idea that all throughout her life, Elizabeth’s love has been taken away from her and that she has and will always lack love.
Most importantly, John is looking for love from everyone. He feels utterly alone for most of the book, searching for reasons why Gabriel doesn’t love, and searching for a way to know what others think of him. So many characters in the book have this feeling of loneliness and solitude. I think James Baldwin in a way is commenting on the ways in which people are constantly looking for love and a place to call their own. That the world is full of people who live without love and cannot see themselves actually being loved despite their great need for it.
The sin is shame
In Go Tell It On the Mountain, James Baldwin mingles Scriptural references and queer-coding to portray John wrestling with his emergent sexuality. While John’s transformation is the focal point of the novel, Baldwin accomplishes a more complex portrait of how the characters relate to sexuality and religion.
John grows up in an environment in which the body and nakedness are seen as sinful. He is ashamed of his baby photo in the living room that shows him naked (26), and he associates sex with sin and shame (10). However, Baldwin portrays many of the characters, not just John, struggling with shame about their sexuality. The church environment shames Elisha and Ella Mae for “walking disorderly” (14). Gabriel has troubled relationships with Deborah, Esther, and Elizabeth and has deep hatred and fear of his sexuality. John’s anxiety about his homosexuality being sinful is especially potent because he is raised in an environment that constantly reinforces that “sin was in the flesh” (15). When sexuality and desire are seen as sinful, disordered, and shameful, it prevents the characters from having healthy or holy relationships with themselves and one another.
Although the Bible is commonly used to hurt queer people and/or reinforce the association of the body and desire with shame, Baldwin’s choice to permeate the novel with Scriptural references serves a different purpose. Baldwin’s use of the Bible underscores the centrality of love in Christianity—not sin or shame. By foregrounding love in a novel about a suffocatingly Christian environment, Baldwin invites new uses of Scripture that break the cycle of shame about (homo)sexuality. Just beside the photo in the parlor that embarrasses John, for example, is John 3:16— “For God so loved the world…” (26). For Baldwin, use of the Bible is meant to foreground love above all.
Language evocative of the Song of Songs intertwines John’s homosexuality with the Bible’s most beautiful love poetry. When John is on the threshing floor, he looks around for Elisha and Roy and realizes that love alone can save him from death, for “[l]ove is as strong as death, as deep as the grave” (193-194; Songs 8:6-7). It’s this realization about love that helps him through his transformation. At the end of the novel, when John and Elisha exchange a “holy kiss,” its mark on John’s face is “like a seal ineffaceable forever” (215). Their gesture of holy love again evokes the Bible’s love poetry: “Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for love is strong as death” (Songs 8:6). Baldwin inseparably entangles the novel’s queer-coding with its religious influences.
Baldwin’s use of Scripture in this novel hints that gay and Christian identities—indeed, sexuality and sanctity—do not have to be polar opposites, as John is just beginning to understand. It’s love, not shame, that will bring the characters closer to God.
False Imprisonment of Black Males
In section 2 of “Go Tell It on the Mountain,” Baldwin writes about the false accusation and suicide of John’s father, Richard. In my opinion, the writing of Richard’s imprisonment and death are very rushed. I feel that there are many missing details that Baldwin failes to provide. We quickly go from Johns arrest, to his trial, and to his suicide, with barely any time to process it all. I believe this was strategic. False accusations of black men have been a common occurrence throughout history, and these stories are often overlooked. Many truths are unknown and the ones that are known often lack detail. I believe Baldwin rushes through Richard’s story to mimic the way these types of stories are ignored in real life. These false accusations are often seen as just things that happened, and not things that highly impact lives. Baldwin allows us to see the impacts that are often ignored and see the lack of attention given to these problems.
In the book, Richard gets arrested for “robbing a white man’s store” (Baldwin 163). When he states that he was not there, the storekeeper replies, “You black bastard…you’re all the same” (Baldwin 166). Richard is eventually found inncoent, yet commits suicide after being released. The storyline of Richard’s arrest and death is common and has repeated itself throughout history.
For one, I see parallelism between Richard’s story and the Trenton 6. In 1948, six black boys are falsely charged for the robbing and killing of a white storekeeper. The only description given of the men is that they were black males. Apparently, that was enough information to arrest 20 black males and charge 6 with the crime. Even with alibis, all were convicted and sentenced to death. However, with push back, four were acquitted and 2 were held guilty. Collis English, one of the ones sentenced to prison, dies of a heart attack at age 27.
In both instances, a white man is robbed and black men are falsely accused of it. In addition, all these men are arrested with no evidence even though they claim that they were not present. The action of categorizing black men, and automatically declaring them guilty is also heavy in both instances. Lastly, English dies in prison and so does Richard. English dies in a physical prison, while Richard dies in a prison of the mind. Overall, the impact false imprisonment has on the lives of black males is large and it needs to change. I believe this is what Baldwin wants to get across.
The Evolution of Shame and Sexuality for John
In the beginning of the novel, John is consumed with thoughts about his burgeoning sexuality and what this means for his soul. He concludes that it is a sin because even thinking about his own nakedness brought on feelings of “shame and anger” (26). This feeling occurs when he looks at a picture of himself as a baby. Even in the most innocent and natural form, John hopes to hide his body and everything it signifies. At this stage in the novel, John has not yet made his full commitment to Christ in the Church. There is significant external pressure, but no substantive internal drive. (In fact, he would rather wear nice clothes and go to the movies).
When John has his religious experience on the Threshing Floor, his shame about his sexuality and body seems to lessen while his commitment to the faith grows. During his hours long conversion he thinks about being with Elisha: “In his heart there was a sudden yearning tenderness for holy Elisha” (188) and a desire to “lie where Elisha lay” (188). After these thoughts his mind wanders, from dark places to light. But at the end of it all, the voice of Elisha is the voice that saves him. At the close of his experience it is Elisha who says, “Rise up Johnny” (199). The fact that Elisha is the one guiding him through to salvation says more about the combination of the profane and the sacred. It is John’s love for Elisha, which is sexual desire too, that helps him reach this religious climax. Baldwin seems to be gesturing towards a larger point, that sexuality and religion are not inversely related.
In the final scene of the text Elisha and John share a kiss: “And he kissed John on the forehead, a holy kiss” (215). Although a kiss like this is often found in religious contexts, this kiss is at once religious and sexual. John noted his desire for Elisha throughout the text and their connection is deeper than just a friendship because of their joint effort to bring John through to the other side of his experience. When John is most holy, then, he is also most outwardly affectionate and comfortable in his sexuality. Perhaps, for Baldwin, this release of sexual shame is what really constitutes a religious experience.
Who is Esther?
One of the most important female characters by the end of the book, in my opinion, is Esther. Gabriel and Esther engage in an affair that “lasted only nine days,” yet by the end of the novel this affair threatens not only Gabriel’s credibility but his very chance at salvation. Esther’s legacy is critical to the plot of the story, even if she is no longer alive to speak out against Gabriel herself. For that reason, I wanted to do a close reading of both Esther and her biblical namesake to draw out some of Baldwin’s messaging.
From Part Two onwards, the language that surrounds Esther is associated with salvation (or a lack thereof). Gabriel describes his first sexual encounter with her as a “fall,” with the narrator explaining “so he had fallen: for the first time since his conversion, for the last time in his life. Fallen” (121). But it wasn’t the last time in his life by any means. We learn that Esther “contained in her narrow body all mystery and all passion” –– “sin, death, Hell, the judgement were blotted out” in her presence (121). It is clear that Gabriel views Esther as a seductress, and her beauty is vital to her character. When Esther flees North to Chicago, she flees with money “stole[n]” by Gabriel from Deborah (129).
Esther’s flight offers an important parallel to her namesake, the biblical Esther. In the Bible, Esther is “a young Jewish woman living in exile in the Persian diaspora” (Crawford). According to Bible scholars, Esther’s story is important as an example for all those living in exile. The biblical Esther is beautiful (like Baldwin’s character), and she ultimately becomes the queen of the Persian Empire. There are notable similarities between the two women, but there are also notable differences. For example, both women are highly sexualized, they both flee from their home, and they are descended from enslaved peoples. The most marked difference between the two Esthers, then, would seem to be their success. The biblical Esther successfully saves the Jewish people from genocide by currying favor with the King of Persia.
It might seem, on first glance, that Baldwin’s Esther is “unsuccessful” in her quest to live a happy life up North. Yet at the end of Go Tell It On The Mountain, her story offers a sort of salvation to Florence and all those harmed by Gabriel. Florence boldly declares, with Esther’s legacy as her witness, that Gabriel “done made enough folks pay for sin, it’s time you started paying” (208). Florence explains that she is “going to find some way –– some way, I don’t know how –– to rise up and tell it, tell everybody, about the blood the Lord’s anointed got on his hands” (208). In this way, Baldwin’s Esther offers salvation to Elizabeth, John, the congregation, and anyone who Gabriel claims to have power over. Esther’s tragic death and Gabriel’s abandonment of Roy is evidence that Gabriel is no prophet or anointed one. Hence, like the biblical Esther, Baldwin’s Esther is ultimately a woman who saves her people.