WORKING THE SPIRIT

Murphy's Santer°a (1988) was a dramatic firsthand, if scholarly, account of that African-Cuban religion. The Georgetown theology professor's new book—equally scholarly and at once more controversial yet more subdued—more often employs others' eyewitness reports as he traces the threads connecting five African-inspired religions: Santer°a, Brazil's CandomblÇ, Haitian Vodou, Jamaica's Revival Zion, and the ``Black Church'' in the US. The author's basic contention—radical when he applies it to an expressly Christian church like the one he visits in Washington, D.C.—is that in all of these religions, the same force, which he calls ``the spirit,'' may be experienced and manifested by celebrants as they ``work'' it through physical ceremonies involving song, rhythm, and dance. A black Christian transported by ecstatic gospel singing, then, may be communing with the same spirit as a Santer°a initiate ``mounted'' by a Yoruban god—despite the different theological explanations given by the respective religions: The ``actions of ceremony are at least as important.'' Moreover, Murphy says, there's a reciprocity between community and spirit in these religions, with their respective ceremonies—which allow the spirit to manifest in the community—reminding the congregations of their African heritage. Murphy takes each religion in turn, looking at its history, rituals, and relationship to the spirit. His coverage of ritual invariably highlights each discussion, enlivened as it is by, in turn, Maya Deren's account of Vodou ceremony; a recap of a film of a CandomblÇ ritual, complete with possession; and his own observations of Revival Zion and black Christian ceremonies. Surprisingly, though, Murphy (who's white) relies not on his own Santer°a initiation to elucidate that religion's method of ``service'' but on a recent film, The King Does Not Lie. Though couched in well-mannered, even cautious, prose, Murphy's linkages offer a provocative new interpretation of the black American religious experience—one that's likely to inspire Afrocentrics even as it wrinkles the collars of conservative clerics and theologians.