Resisting Definitive Interpretation: Seeing The Story Of The Exodus Through Caribbean(ite) Eyes

Abstract

In this essay an attemptis made to heed theologian David Tracy's call for theology to pay greater attention in all its interpretations to the pluralistic and ambiguous reception of its classic texts, including Exodus (Tracy, 1987: 118). The author will present a reflection from the margins, i.e., the perspective of a woman, a descendant of enslaved Africans from the English-speaking Caribbean—a Caribbean(ite) perspective. “Caribbean(ite)” is a deliberately constructed polyvalent term (echoes of Caribbean and Canaanite), part of the important task of naming myself and my reality. She seeks to present a perspective that challenges interpretations of the Exodus that disregard or do not deal effectively with those aspects of the Scriptures, which make us uncomfortable or which we cannot in all honesty name as “liberating” or even inspired. She therefore hopes to question any elitist, privileged and definitive readings of Exodus. In so doing to locate herself in a space that has often been at the receiving end of triumphalist interpretations of the Exodus.