Killing the Buddha is featuring a special online version of Jeff Sharlet’s profile of Cornel West, which appeared in the May 28 issue of Rolling Stone:
He calls himself “a Martin man,” after King, but not predictably so. His religion is rooted in the angry prophets of the Old Testament and a Christ story as awful as it is redeeming, “the painful laughter of blues notes and the terrifying way of the cross,” he says—a radical Christianity diametrically opposed to the suburban sermons of Rick Warren and Joel Osteen. It’s not a belief in a Christ gladly crucified on Good Friday or risen from his tomb in time for church Easter Sunday, but a faith drawn from a recognition of the despair of the Saturday in between. ”That Saturday,” West tells me, the normal humor of his voice giving way to a growl, “it’s the full-fledged experience of the death of God. Which is spiritual abandonment. By any of the positive powers in the universe.” West rears up and spreads his arms and his fingers wide, his voice suddenly loud and staccato. “That’s Christ on the cross: ‘My God, my God why hast thou forsaken me?’” He laughs and shifts into a Richard Pryor voice: “‘Hey man,’” this Jesus says to the Lord, “‘I thought you were coming through!’”
Continue reading at Killing the Buddha.