THE AFRICAN AMERICAN MODE
OF TRANSCENDENCE
Molefi Kete Asante
Bujfalo. New York
There is an abiding dilemma in Westem formulations of all
areas of study: the problem of self-aggrandizing disciplines.
Even in its reach for diversity a Westem philosophy or science
creates, inter alia, limitations. Therefore, one may tolerate the
diversity of viewpoints and then establish asingle set of criteria
for what constitutes validity. This is a Westem way of dealing
with diversity. The world of transpersonal psychology may be transcendence
similarly victimized by the same process. To illustrate, tran- is not
scendence is not merely a phenomenon of the East and West. merely
To claim this is not simply ignorance in the sense of ignoring a
the manner in which people in the cradle of humanity and phenomena
civilization have dealt with transcendence; it is more seriously of
the continuation of the Westem imposition of a view of the East
world. The problem is not in the expounding ofthe categories ana'
but in the absolute manner in which they are assumed to West
constitute the whole of human thought. This is unacceptable in
any field on intellectual and cultural grounds.
A powerfully expressive system allows Westemers and increas-
ingly Easterners to speak of the great religions and mean by
such expression Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, [slam, and
Judaism. Indeed the great religious thinkers become Buddha,
Jesus, Mohammed, and Moses. Ido not know what constitutes
their greatness, that is, any more than the greatness of Odu-
duwa of the Yoruba, Okomfo Anokye of the Asante, or
Charninuka of the Shona, As these "great" religions are
religions of literature as opposed to orature, perhaps their
greatness resides in the literature. They are also essentially one-
god religions, and Ican see how that fact might be uppermost in
Copyright e 1984 Transpersonal Institute
The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology. 1984, Vol. I6. No.2 167

the mind 0f Westemers. And yet this is n0t en0ugh t0 explain
the few references t0 Africa in the discussi0n 0f transcendence
(see Katz, 1973, 1982; Van Dusen, 1974), since s0me African
religi0ns als0 express a 0ne-g0d ide0l0gy. When the way t0
transcendence is f0und in a pe0ple’s life as they deify their 0wn
nati0nalism and hist0ry, that may bec0me a sufficiency and
greatness f0r them.
Human civilizati0n began in the Upper Nile Valley 0ver 7,000
years ag0 with the gifts 0f Nubia. The temple 0f Kamak and
Lux0r held the splendid secrets 0f the mysteries which have
been expl0red by Schwaller de Bubicz, Ben.l0chann0n, Budge,
and 0thers in great detail. The ancient mysteries c0ntained in
the b00k 0fthe Coming Forth By Day and the Going Forth By
the Night, 0r as it was called in the West, The Book of the Dead,
key held the key t0 African transcendence 4,000 years bef0re the
to Arab jihads swept 0ut 0f Arabia and 0verran n0rthem Africa,
African stamping 0ut the indigen0us Egyptian language and establish-
transcendence ing Islam. The subsequent dispersal 0f the indigen0us secret
s0cieties t0 vari0us 0ther places 0n the c0ntinent made it
p0ssible f0r the re-emergence 0f these secrets in the Y0ruba Ifa
divinati0n p0etry, the Sh0na Mbira, and the Asante Okyeame
system. These traditi0ns are mainly 0ral, yet they have dem0n-
strated the integrati0n 0f African medicine, the0l0gy, and
agriculture. Jahn says in Muntu that n0 traditi0nal African
ever thinks 0f medicine apart fr0m its c0nnectedness t0
agriculture and the0l0gy (Jahn, 1961:75-92). This wh0lism is
unif0rm and unbr0ken within village life. On the 0ther hand, it
is easy f0r many 0f us in the West t0 believe in science and n0t
believe in the0l0gy. Similarly, we can accept the gr0wth 0f the
c0rn but d0 n0t have t0 accept certain medical practices. This is
imp0ssible within the wh0listic framew0rk 0f African s0cieties.
Of c0urse, such inc0nsistency places an en0rm0us psych0l-
0gical burden 0n Westemized Africans.
The African view is the Sudic Ideal; i.e., the t0tality 0f the
African indigen0us African religi0ns; it is the fundamental basis 0f all
wholism African wh0lism. The African American is t0 a degree a m0st
Westemized African, yet has retained the Sudic Ideal 0f
harm0ny, achieved by rhythm, and passed 0n t0 0ther cultures.
There is a unique experience 0f transcendence am0ng Africans
in the West, whether they are Cubans, Brazilians, Haitians,
Jamaicans, Ecuad0rians, 0r citizens 0f the United States; they
share f0rms 0f the same experience in Samba the Brazilian
dance, Sango the Cuban f0lk religi0n, Umbanda the Brazilian
f0lk religi0n, Voodoo the Haitian f0lk religi0n, 0r Mya! a
Jamaican religi0n. At the center 0f all 0f these f0rms 0f human
expressi0n is the same s0urce 0f energy, the rhythm 0r
p0lyrhythms that drive the spirit t0wards transcendence.
168 The Journal of Transpersanal Psychology, 1984, Vol. 16, No.2

COPING AND ADAPTING
During the moments of life crises, most ofthe world believes in
the inexorable nature of adaptation; certain processes are
embedded in our minds from birth to death and the set
formulas for coping are repeated in every media. The advent of
what Anthony Wilder calls the "digitalization" ofthe world, set
in motion as it were, by the predecessors of the logical
positivists, heightened by behaviorists, and made a religion by
some Westem scientists in the twentieth century, seeks to
ignore, if not deny, the transcendent experience. The African
American possesses, by virtue of the unique communion with
the American nation, a way of dealing with life crises that analoguing
should be carefully explored. The means to analoguing the the
digital, i.e, humanizing the numbers, to harmonizing the digital
disharmonies, to holistifying the discrete are found in the
individual's search for harmony in the midst of others.
CLASSIFICATION
Do you remember how the Romans believed in the existence of
numen, the mystical power which the gods gaveto some people
and withheld from others? This power raised those so favored
to the status of kings, noble people, most often men, and
philosophers. Those so favored, those with the numen, were
distinguished from those who did not have nwnen. In other
words, the people of god received the grace which was distrib-
uted selectively. In that system, the person fulfilled himself in
the perpetual conflict between the principles of good and evil.I "the bias
like to call the product of this "the bias of categorization" which of
divides people into teachers and those taught, sinners and categ0rizati0n"
saved, black and white, superior and inferior, weak and strong.
Out of this bias has developed much of the catastrophic
disharmonies which we experience in the world. Cycles within
cycles, wheels within wheels of contradictions were produced
which no amount of what the servants of god called "mysteries"
could resolve.
SUD1C1sM
The African American view of a wholistic personality is
grounded in the African idea ofSudicism, the spiritual commit-
ment to an ideological view of harmony. Puhl (1976) identifies
maturity as a key concept in human personality theory and
explores the concept as a construct of humanistic psychology.
Her analysis places the major theorists and their theories within
the proper context of Westem psychology. But since they did
The African American Mode 0f Transcendence 169

not dcal with Sudicism or thc African vicw of pcrsonality, thc
formulations arc lacking in analytical valuc for anyonc wanting
to cxaminc Afro—Amcrican spirituality or transccndcncc.
In thc African Amcrican vicw thc pcrson must bc harmonizcd
the bccausc an undisciplincd pcrson crcatcs disharmony within thc
quest socicty. Thus it is thc qucst for harmony that is at thc sourcc of
f0r all actions; thc Sudic Idcal which cmphasizcs thc primacy of thc
harm0ny pcrson can only function if thc pcrson sccks individual and
collcctivc harmony. But this is not all. Onc must undcrstand
that to bccomc human, to rcalizc thc promisc of bccoming
human is thc only important task of thc pcrson. Onc only
bccomcs human in thc midst of othcrs. The pcrson is dctincd as
human by hcr actions which lcad to harmony; our attitudc
toward hcr givcs thc dynamism ncccssary to producc 3 harm-
onizcd pcrsonality.
To rcally undcrstand this you must know that thc African
world docs not rccognizc cxtcmal forccs that aid in producing
this sclf-dcfinition of a pcrson. What I mcan is that thc pcrson
docs not go outsidc himsclf for cxtcmal powcrs; thosc powcrs
inhcrc in him as an cxtcnsion into thc futurc of thosc who havc
gonc bcforc; hc is a tcstamcnt to his forcbcars in a diffcrcnt
guisc, living in a diffcrcnt pcriod (Ngubanc, I979). Whcn I
summon thcsc inhcrcnt powcrs, I know that I am not indcbtcd
to any powcr outsidc mysclf. In atranspcrsonal scnsc, thc morc
I rccognizc and dcvclop thosc powcrs, thc morc human I
bccomc. I am in tunc with thc rhythm of thc univcrsc.
Now hcrc is thc point. Thcrc is no cnd to this challcngc, this
there challcngc of bccoming a pcrson, bccausc thcrc is no cnd to
is n0 sccking harmony. Whcn onc gocs within oncsclf, that is, when
end t0 wc tum inward to cxplorc thc ctcmal rcality that has thc sccrcts
seeking of thc pcrson, wc find that onc may go on forcvcr in this way; no
harm0ny onc can givc you thcsc dimcnsions, thcsc ncw dimcnsions, and
nobody can takc thcm away. You find thcm, wc say, in your
ctcmal qucst for harmony, and by so doing you bccomc morc
human as thc mastcr of your own powcrs, but always in thc
midst of othcrs.
THREE MAJOR PARADIGMS
Thcrc arc csscntially thrcc major paradigms, or ways, to look at
spiritual transpcrsonal growth. In onc way wc assumc that all that wc
dimension scc, all that wc fccl, all that cxists as mattcr is an illusion, so wc
paradigm scck what many of us call thc spiritual dimcnsion of rcality, of
oursclvcs, of our livcs, of our cnvironmcnt, truly, cvcn of our
H0 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 1984, Vol.l6. No.2

colleagues. We might say, it is not your body but your spirit
that attracts me. Of course that is putting it at one particular
level, nevertheless it is the same paradigm operating, the search
for the answer beyond the material.
On the other hand there isa fundamental paradigm seen often
in Western thought that is based on the logical positivist l0gical
tradition which says, show me the "real" thing, the facts, the p0sitivist
evidence, the "hard" data. Only if I can touch it, smell it, feel it paradigm
or see it, is it real. So if I tell the person that a certain musician
has "soul," he wants me to demonstrate it in the laboratory, to
identify it statistically, to measure lt. This paradigm sees
everything that is not concrete, that is not material, as an
illusion, a misplaced dream.
Then there is the paradigm that answers the questions of the
most intense moments of crisis with the Sudic Ideal: person- pers0nalism
alism, which is itself an ideological commitment to harmony. paradigm
Personalism finds its strength in the idea that anything we want
to happen can happen if W9are committed to following the lead
of n0mm0, the generative quality of the spoken word (Jahn,
l96l).Neither spiritualism nor materialism is anything without
the person. The person is the marker, the tagger for what is real.
Thus, the claim that the Zulu can cause their hearts to stop
beating at will for a few minutes does not introduce any
difficulty into the Sudic Ideal because what the Asante can do
with their hearts the Zulu and the Yoruba can do with theirs
and vice versa. Similarly, it is claimed that some can step on fire
and not be burned, some have planted swords into the earth
that cannot be pulled out by a human, and yet all of this is
nothing. The only thing that really matters is the person. That is
why the drummer goes to recite incantation to the trees before
he cuts them down to make his dru rnsgthat is why the people of
Niger stalk a lion always with words of praise and incantations
before they shoot it, and that is why the lion after it is shot lies
down and dies peacefully, according to the incantation. There
is nothing to the spiritual, nor to the material, that is not
activated by the person. So Ican say that personalism, in the
African and African American sense, is neither spiritualism nor
materialism, but the activating energy contained in the person.
Releasing the energy in the person is done by various libations
and rituals. Each person contains these energies, some cultivate energies
them more than others, but they inhere in all of us. But how inhere
does one go about finding these energies, these essences of in all
personalism? I-Iow can they be located? What pathway leads to 0f as
the infinite ability to make of the material and spiritual what we
desire them to be?
The Afeican American Made 0f Transcendence l7l

THE COLLEcT1vE PATH
To find the answers to these questions requires understanding
what is meant by "African American transcendence." The
energy African finds energy and life in the midst of persons; she does
and not escape to the mountains, or the valleys, or the seashores in
ly’e order to find the energy. There is no tradition, no great
in the tradition of withdrawal with the African or African American
midst tradition; ours is preeminently a tradition of remarkable
of encountering with others. Hermits rarely exist and all would-be
persons Thoreaus are baptized in the fires of human excitement because
it is only in the give and take ofthe nornrno that we find energy,
not in the lives of solitude. In this tradition there is some belief
that hermiticism results from suspicion and distrust of persons
other than one’s self Nothing is more beautiful to me than the
ecstasy that occurs when a group of people have got on the
same road to harmony at the same moment; that is the true
manifestation of spirituality, the true materiality of life, which
can only be detennined by the person joining in the collective
expression of power (Barrett, 1914, 5-29).
This is one of our legacies to America itself I am no longer
this myself, I am a transpersonal being at this moment of collective
moment expression. lam feeling at that moment. It is not a left-brain
of moment, it is joy ineffable, because we are in tune with the
collective feelings of others. Iexperience nornrno and lknow that nothing
expression can save me except the spoken word in the moment of collapse,
but beyond that Iam one with the orality of nommo; Iexist in it
and it exists in me. In my experience, the printed page is silent
compared to the spoken word. This is the message of both
sacred and secular orators in the African American experience.
The rhetoric of Malcolm X was meant to convey his audiences
toward the ultimate goal of possession, that is, attaining of
harmony through style and power.
We stand alone to hold back our personal crises; this is the most
awesome knowledge confronting us. We handle this awesome
knowledge by maturing in a collective sense. This is the secret
of African American spirituality, that is, while we recognize the
our individuality of the responsibility, we know that if cannot be
own carried out without others. We can reach our own transcen-
transcendence dence but never without the help of others. If I run to the sea
and alone, my solitude finds me searching for new ways to come
the together with others. I know myself only in relation to others,
heh? of without whom Iam a Piagetian egocentric. We say that we can
others never truly know ourselves without the knowledge of others,
more precisely, in the productive engagement with the other we
truly experience our own harmony. This is how the Sudic Ideal
172 The Journal of Transpersonal Psychology, 1984. Vol. 16. N0.2

seeks t0 analogue the digital, Richards (1984) expresses this
idea as harmonious interaction.
When the black entertainers introduced the phrase "put your
hands together" it was not for the purpose of applause, as in the ’put
European hand-clapping that is derived from the Germanic your
rattling of swords and spears in approval of a chiefs speech. hands
Rather what they meant to do was to call an audience to a together"
collective generative experience. Since the traditional per-
formers and audiences in Africa were one, it was not far fetched
for the entertainers, especially singers, to call their audiences to
these touching moments. Inherent in this rhythmic quality of
touching hands together, of audiences caught up in collective
expression, was the fundamental search for harmony.
POSSESSION
It is this nommo quality which leads directly, if the person seeks
transcendence, to "possession." Now possession is not the same
as Gurdjieffs self-remembering, or Krishnamurti’s self-knowl-
edge, or Sufi concentration, or Kabbalah concentration, or possession
Raja Yoga concentration, although it isa way to enlightenment as the
(Gurdjieff 1976; Fouere, 1974). Possession is almost always result of
accompanied by music and incantation, whether vocal or perfect
instrumental. But you cannot achieve it alone; it is collective harmony
and is the result of "perfect harmony" with self, nature, and the
universe. It is sense experience, a response to feeling, not so
much a response to thought as a following ofthe rhythms of
nature. I would not even go as far as to call it consciousness,
because consciousness is not an entity but a process of atten-
tion; one cannot have consciousness unless one is conscious of
something. That is why Ican only say that in possession there
are no unshared edges, no hanging questions, no impossible
dreams at the moment of feeling. At that moment the digital is
analogued, numbers merge into spirit and we become transcen-
dent. Clearly one may reach the state of transcendence by many
roads (seeKaplan, 1982;Corbin, 1977). Once it is reached, we
are no longer the same; we are compatriots with others who
have crossed the chasm by various means.
It is by no means given that all will reach possession in this not
generative, productive way; some may never know the exper- a/I
ience. But this is so with all ways to transcendence. We must reach
still search in order to find. And those who are not in the search possession
mode will never find. This is also the Sudic truth.
All transpersonal moments are times of energy. That is why we
often hear people speak ofthe possession experience in tenns of
The African American Mode of Transcendence 173

work. They will say, "Boy, they worked themselves up," or
"Girl, he worked himself into a frenzy." There is truth and error
in these statements because work is involved in the first
instance, that is, you cannot have the transpersonal state
promised by the African American mode of spirituality with-
out energy being expended. On the other hand, we cannot
possibly speak of one working herself "up" or "into a frenzy."
These terms have little significance and almost no meaning in
the context of nornmo, Possession is an individual state of
harmony usually reached in a collective experience of a
rhythmic nature. As such it is neither up nor down, perhaps it is
all around; it is not even necessary to say, lest we walk into the
Roman trap of numeflagain and start saying that up is better
than down, north better than south and meditation better than
possession. The experience matters. Harmony matters.
Possession is not the result of a trance, although trance has
been associated wrongly with possession. I have heard people
possession say, "Well, she was in a trance," or "he fell into a trance,"
is not referring to someone who had experienced the complete
trance harmony of possession in the African American mode. A
trance has little growth potential and may be the result of an
accident or illness; possession, on the contrary, must be sought.
Sometimes people will refer to a "trance-like" state in an
attempt to be more precise about what they cannot explain.
Nevertheless "possession" is only explained in the sense of a
person seeking to possess. A trance is basically a physiological
state which may be caused by hypnotism or coma; possession is
spiritual although it is usually accompanied by physiological
changes. It is a cleansing of the spirit and as such produces
euphoria for the individual and a sense of peace for the
collective others who witness the possession (Bourguigon,
1973).
Furthermore, it isa mistake to assume that possession in this
context means that the person is "being possessed." When
Europeans first saw the collective ceremonies and rituals of
possession rhythm produce the state of possession in some people, they
is not interpreted it as the people being possessed; even some African
"being writers, particularly the Cubans and Brazilians, have written in
possessed" this way about candomble and umbanda. To these observers
the person is "possessed" by the gods of Africa, mainly Yoruba,
Shango, Legba, Yemanja, Ogun, Obatala, etc.
But this is incorrect; it is not the person who is being possessed,
but the gods and goddesses. Therefore, the act of possession
always starts as an act of volition on the part ofthe person, not
on the part of the gods. The person possesses the "gods"
I74 The Journal of Tmnspersomzl Psychology, 1984, Vol. 16, No.2

through searching in the proper mode and finding harmony.
Now to speak like this is not to speak wholly of what might be
called a "church" experience, but rather to show that the person
actively and creatively participates in his own experience.
What is more, the experience of "possession" has little to do
with the church context, though it is most visible there. What I
mean is that the church is only one venue for the African
American experience of this harmony. To DG certain about
things, it is one ofthe best environments because so many ofthe
necessary conditions are in the church, Yet the truth is that the
feeling can be found wherever people are congregated and there
is an ample amount of heavy rhythms. The work gangs in the
southem U.S., during and after slavery, produced some of the
most beautiful music in search of harmony with nature.
THE QUEST FOR HARMONY
The call and response mode is important also to our under-
standing of the experience, One can easily assume when one
listens to the experience that it is the speaker calling and the the
audience responding. These roles, however, often shift but base
most of the time the audience calls and the speaker responds, 0f
going as deep or as high as he can. It is this direct search for African
harmony that is at the base of African American spirituality. American
We seek it everywhere and all of the time, and then there are spirituality
those moments when it bursts full blown into our souls and we
take wings and fly for a while.
The graceful basketball player who moves in tune to the
rhythms of the game in just such a way as to bring his body in
harmony with the particular moment of decision on the court is
in search of the experience. The football player who eludes
several other players in his quest to make a touchdown knows
that to have done it well is not enough; one must do it in such a
manner that harmony is served. You must make it look easy,
fluid, natural, inevitable, ln the end, the experience is made to
seem predictable, This is the function of rhythm, this is the "h0w
achievement of enlightenment. As with the old work songs, one t0
leams how to make the load lighter. My great grandfather once w0rk
told me, "Son, you know, only the gods know how to work w0rk"
work." It took me a long time to understand what he meant.
The intense very special work songs that we sang on the
railroads and in the cotton fields were meant to work work. lf
one did not understand how to work work, work would work
her to death. This was the cruelty of slave labor. Now you see
The African American Made 0f Transcendence 175

the unique African American adaptation of rhythm in the
search for harmony. Our sojourn here gave new meaning to the
traditional African forms of the spiritual experience. Whether
we hammer, or hoe, whoop or holler, as they say, slap five up
high, down low, you're too slow, we do it with the rhythmic
motif that leads to harmony. Possession is only the most
complete form of the same rhythmic drive.
In any good blues or jazz club you can get the same soulful
sound as you get in the church. Christianity claims the
experience but the motif, the rhythm, the feeling, the transcen-
the dence occurs anywhere the conditions present themselves. That
incessant is to say it does not depend upon icons of faith but the incessant
collective collective drive of people for harmony with self. fellow earth-
drive lings, and nature. The lack of this incessant drive causes the
f0r breakdown of the traditional harmonies because rhythmic
harnwny tension must be maintained to produce harmony. Jazz is our
classical music precisely because it contains the riffs, the
counterpoints, the polyrhythms, and syncopation essential to
the experience.
Our orature, which is more important in many respects than
our literature, is best served and serves best when it is in-
fluenced by jazz.
ln this poetry, as in music. as in all the rhythms that lead us to
the complete harmony from whence comes our transcendence,
we are never alone. It is like prayer; we never quite understand
praying alone. Since possession involves rhythm. we must
understand that possession is always accompanied." Hilda
Kuper, anthropologist, says that a female African dancer told
her that the dance is neveralone. One must not dance alone; if
one does dance alone, the villagers would cry "witch." Thus, we
say if we want to dance, we go outside where the people are to
dance. so powerful and predictable are the rhythms. Let me
also say that "Dr. .l,..the famous American basketball player, is
called Poetry in Motion mainly because he is constantly
seeking to attain harmony. One of the most interesting facts
about this search for transcendence is that, although it is not
calculated but rhythmic, that does not mean that the rhythm
remains the same; it can change up on you. Many times sitting
in a jazz club, listening to a musician, you might say, "Wow,
how did he do that?" lt is the same with athletes, who can switch
up in tenns of their movements but still be right in time with the
rhythm. The way we leam to do that is to provide for the time
what is not necessarily there; this is the essence of scatting,
syncopation, possession. We analogue the digital by claiming
the possession that is rightfully every person's and moving off
to harmony through rhythm.
176 The Journal 0f T ranspers0nalPsych0l0gy, 1984. V0!. 16. N0.2

The contagion of popular music throughout the modem world
is due to the heavy insistence of the incessant African rhythms
which gave to the vocabulary the concept of "beat" as in beat on
a drum. All the world is addicted to the music of "popular
dance"; this is a major African contribution to the directed
energies of the world. Furthermore, even in its watered down
version it is a spiritual contribution without parallel. Since
music and dance are never separated in the African context, the
percussive beat which lifts dancers has become the mainstay of
popular music of all varieties.
Since rhythm is a principal path to transcendence for the rhythm as
African American, further exploration of this dimension could ct path of
lead to a transcendental awakening where we seek to find transcendence
harmony with nature and each other.
REFERENCES
BARRETT. L. Soal force: African heritage in Afro-American religion.
New York: Anchor, 1974.
BOURGUlGNOlE,.Religion, altered states ofconscioasness, andsocial
change. Columbus, OH: Ohio State Univ, Press, 1973.
CORBlN,H. Spiritaal body and celestial earth: From Masdean to
Shiite Iran. Princeton, N.J.; Princeton Univ. Press, 1977.
FOUERE, R. Krishnamarti: The man and his teachings. New York:
Gordon Press, 1974.
GuRDJ1E1=i=, G. Making a new world. New York; Harper& Row, 1976.
JAHN, J. Manta: The new African caltare. New York; Grove, 1961.
KAPLAN, A. Meditation and Kabbalah. York Beach, ME: Weiser,
1982.
KATZ, R. Boiling energy: Commanity healing among the Kalahari
Kang. Cambridge, MA; Harvard Univ, Press, 1982
NOUIIANH, K. Conflict ofminds. New York; Books in Focus, 1979.
PUIlL,C. Humanistic Psychology's mature person. In G. Borden & J.
Stone (Eds.), Haman commanication: The process of` relating.
Menlo Park, CA; Cummings. 1976.
RICHARDS, D. The implications of African American spirituality. In
M. Asante & K. Asante (Eds.) The African caltare: Rhythms of`
anity. Westport, CN: Greenwood. 1984.
VAN DUSHN, W. The presence of` other worlds: Thefindings of`
Emanael Swedenborg. New York; Harper & Row, 1974.
Requestsfor reprints to ProfessorMo1ef1 KeteAsante,Temp1e University,
Philadelphia. PA 19122.
The African American Mode of` Transcendence 177