cartoon on early interracial Pentecostalism entitled “Summer Solstice
Sees Strenuous Sects Sashaying” with a holy roller, jumper, and kicker.
Amidst the mayhem is an Angeleno, citizen of Los Angeles, holding a
big combat club with spikes labeled “doxology” as an attempt to beat
these Pentecostals back into racial submission and normalcy. From this
cartoon of interracial Pentecostal mayhem to the 1917 interracial photo-
graph that is being interrogated, the historian could present a narrative
arc where white Pentecostals limit their anarchy to the arena of religious
language, embracing only the anarchy of glossolalia. For these white
Pentecostals, the anarchy of glossolalia stated as the doctrine of initial
evidence will exhaust their insurgency. 20
What is a theology of interracial Pentecostal anarchy? How might one
construe where an interracial Pentecostal photograph of the marvelous
fi ts within theological world of early Pentecostalism? A Pentecostal theol-
ogy framed by anarchy could be a theology in which Pentecostalism is
interpreted as theologically disruptive. It could follow Nimi Wariboko’s
concept of conspiracy as “the spaces they [Pentecostals] conspire together,
conspirare , spirit-together , ‘spaces where people ‘breathe together.’” There
would be space for each race to befriend each other, network together,
and fl ourish while pursuing “varying conceptions of the good,” of racial
good. One could argue that the Bible becomes an anarchic book. The
canon in the canon would accent disruptive activities in Scripture such as
Jesus overturning the tables in the Temple. 21
Gastón Espinosa interprets the history of the Azusa Street Revival and
the Apostolic Faith Mission as being constituted by “subversive” strate-
gies against the racial and social order. He argues that the Apostolic Faith
Mission created a successful “Christian transgressive social space where
people could reimagine their historical, racial, and social identities, and
cross some of the social, gender, racial, and class borders and boundaries
of the day for years.” Espinosa contends that:
the real story is not with those who lacked the courage to implement his
[interracial] vision, but rather with those like leaders in the COGIC and
other denominations and independent churches who fought to keep it
alive over the past century. In this respect, Seymour’s vision and version
of Pentecostalism was not a liminal moment restricted to a few weeks or
months in 1906...Early interracial Pentecostalism is the site of racial transgression, anarchy,
and subversion. 22
222 D.D DANIELS III