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We Are All Africans: Exposing the Negative Influence of
the Judeo-Christian-Islamic Religions on Africans by Kwadwo Obeng Two Harbors Press
book review by Nancy Livingstone
"The Qur'an is more that 50% a plagiarized copy of the Bible. It is not a credible religion for Black people. Except for its brutality and viciousness it is not much different theologically from Judaism or Christianity."
Born in Ghana raised a Christian, Kwadwo Obeng has written a 900 plus page book exploring the three faiths Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all of which are practiced in Africa. Obeng has spent years as a minister, but seems to treat all religions evenly here in his dismissal, while even widening his discussion to thoughts about the solar system and paleo-anthropology. The wealth of information concerning the African American people, including one page biographies at the back of the book of famous black Americans such as Frederick Douglass, Rosa Parks, and Barack Obama in a chapter entitled "Black Saviors and Benefactors," is overall impressive.
Thought provoking and provocative, We Are All Africans makes statements such as "the story of Noah is a garbage story and a fairytale" and "you can clearly see that the stories in these 'holy' books are no different from the myths of ancient Greeks, Babylonians, Romans, and their gods and my ancestors Africans and their gods"—though he cites that Adam, if he did exist, was an African. To the reader who is used to works from an Afro-centric prospective, the chapter "Time to Get Out of Religion" may sound like a familiar warning. Many black leaders have warned against religion as doing more harm than good in advancing the struggle toward freedom and liberation for Africans of the Diaspora. Others who read this book may find other sections to consider and other conclusions about the worth of following a given religion.