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New Dimensions in African History: The London Lectures of Dr. Yosef Ben-Jochannan and Dr. John Henrik Clarke
1
- GenresHistoryNonfictionAfrica
Hardcover
First published April 1, 1991
About the author
Yosef A.A. Ben-Jochannan
23 books196 followersAlso known as Dr. Ben, Yosef Alfredo Antonio Ben-Jochannan claimed to have been born on December 21, 1918 to a Beta Israel lawyer named Kriston Ben-Jochannan and a Puerto Rican Jewish midwife mother of Yemenite ancestry named Julia Matta-Cruz in Gondor, Ethiopia.
His formal education is elusive, and he was likely an autodidact, but he claimed it to have begun in Puerto Rico and continued in the Virgin Islands and in Brazil. Ben-Jochannan claimed to have earned a BS degree in Civil Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico, but the registrar has no record of his attendance. He claimed to have received doctoral degrees in Cultural Anthropology and Moorish History from the University of Havana and the University of Barcelona in Spain, but Barcelona says that he never received a degree from them. He claimed to have earned advanced degrees from Cambridge University in England, but Cambridge says that he never received a degree from them and furthermore, Cambridge University said it had no record of Ben-Jochannan ever attending any classes there. His claim to have received an MS degree in Architectural Engineering from the University of Havana in Cuba is uncontested, and he held honorary doctoral degrees from Sojourner-Douglass College, Marymount College, and Medgar Evers College.
Dr. Ben-Jochannon taught at City College in New York City and from 1973 to 1987, he was an adjunct professor at Cornell University. He wrote and published 49 books and papers, mainly about how in his mind the Ancient Egyptians and Israelites were black Africans. Two of his better-known works: “Black Man of the Nile” and “Africa Mother of Major Western Religions."
He was eulogized by controversial black supremacist religious leader Louis Farrakhan, "as the last of a great list of scholars of ancient black civilizations and black history.
His formal education is elusive, and he was likely an autodidact, but he claimed it to have begun in Puerto Rico and continued in the Virgin Islands and in Brazil. Ben-Jochannan claimed to have earned a BS degree in Civil Engineering at the University of Puerto Rico, but the registrar has no record of his attendance. He claimed to have received doctoral degrees in Cultural Anthropology and Moorish History from the University of Havana and the University of Barcelona in Spain, but Barcelona says that he never received a degree from them. He claimed to have earned advanced degrees from Cambridge University in England, but Cambridge says that he never received a degree from them and furthermore, Cambridge University said it had no record of Ben-Jochannan ever attending any classes there. His claim to have received an MS degree in Architectural Engineering from the University of Havana in Cuba is uncontested, and he held honorary doctoral degrees from Sojourner-Douglass College, Marymount College, and Medgar Evers College.
Dr. Ben-Jochannon taught at City College in New York City and from 1973 to 1987, he was an adjunct professor at Cornell University. He wrote and published 49 books and papers, mainly about how in his mind the Ancient Egyptians and Israelites were black Africans. Two of his better-known works: “Black Man of the Nile” and “Africa Mother of Major Western Religions."
He was eulogized by controversial black supremacist religious leader Louis Farrakhan, "as the last of a great list of scholars of ancient black civilizations and black history.
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 20, 2021
I Love Ourstory! R.I.P. DR. BEN-JOCHANNAN & DR. CLARKE
December 28, 2018
I am on a journey of self discovery and to do so I have to know my past and history. To know my past and history I have to rediscover Africa through the lenses of an African. There can be no better lenses to rediscover Africa than through the eyes of Dr. Yosef Ben Jochannan and Dr. John Henrik. These two are experts on African history.
Europeans did not only colonise us as a people but they colonised information and erased us from history too. As Dr John Henrik Clarke writes, history is a tool that can be used for oppression or liberation. Thus in my opinion it is a duty of every African to know his/her past. Only then can he/she take his/her seat on the world stage, not as a beggar, or person seeking sympathy or charity but as a proud African who knows that his/her ancestors contributed immensely to world civilisation.
The book is composed of lectures given by these two esteemed scholars in London. The book touches on:
1. the scramble of Africa which began more than 2000 years ago
2. African contributions to science and technology
3. the Nile river valley civilisations
4. Pan Africanism.
Its a great read, and I absolutely loved the book. More importantly the book provides a comprehensive reading guide for the study and teaching of African world history.
Europeans did not only colonise us as a people but they colonised information and erased us from history too. As Dr John Henrik Clarke writes, history is a tool that can be used for oppression or liberation. Thus in my opinion it is a duty of every African to know his/her past. Only then can he/she take his/her seat on the world stage, not as a beggar, or person seeking sympathy or charity but as a proud African who knows that his/her ancestors contributed immensely to world civilisation.
The book is composed of lectures given by these two esteemed scholars in London. The book touches on:
1. the scramble of Africa which began more than 2000 years ago
2. African contributions to science and technology
3. the Nile river valley civilisations
4. Pan Africanism.
Its a great read, and I absolutely loved the book. More importantly the book provides a comprehensive reading guide for the study and teaching of African world history.
May 15, 2026
ESSAYS AND Q&A SESSIONS WITH TWO VERY POPULAR AUTHORS/LECTURERS
Yosef Alfredo Antonio Ben-Jochannan (1918-2015; known as ‘Dr. Ben’) was an Afrocentrist writer historian and author. John Henrik Clarke (1915-1998) was an African-American historian, professor, and a pioneer in Pan-African and Africana studies.
Clarke explained in the ‘Explanatory Note’ to this 1991 book, “These lectures were delivered for the Minority Ethnic Unit of the Greater London Council, England, March 6-8, 1986. They were addressed mainly to the African community in London consisting of African people from the Caribbean and African people from Africa. These lectures are being published here with additional material because both Dr. Yosef ben-Jochannan and I are veterans in the field of teaching African world history and we have had a number of requests for these lectures in book form.”
Clarke states in the Introduction, “In his book, ‘The African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality,’ the African historian Cheikh Anta Diop has said, in effect, that the history of Africa will be out of kilter until Egypt is seen in proper focus in relationship to the rest of Africa. Professor Chancellor Williams … writes a short history of the people the Greeks later called ‘Egyptians.’ He explains the circumstances of the migration from the Upper to the Lower Nile River… Professor ben-Jochannan has presented new evidence on the southern African origins of Egypt from their own writings… ‘There is no attempt there at settling the issue of the ‘racial’ and or ‘indigenous physical characteristics’ of the ancient Egyptians or Nubians. I will concentrate on the type, quality and reason for the colossal monuments, artifacts, and other remaining effects of the Lower Nile with respect to Egypt---‘The Gift of the Nile’ as Nubia.’” (Pg. 4-5)
He reports, “The revolts by slaves in South America and the Caribbean started 100 years before 1619, when slaves formally arrived in the British colony that became known as the United States, and before the arrival of the Mayflower in 1620… The African slaves who arrived in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619 were not chattel slaves, in the general sense; they were indentured servants. Lerone Bennett … explains that most of the first indentured servants and those that arrived for the next 100 years were white. He also explains that Africans would have inherited their chains from the Indians and poor whites of whom were indentured servants in large numbers before the arrival of Africans.” (Pg. 9)
He says of Booker T. Washington, “As an educator, he was misunderstood then, and he is misunderstood now. Many people regarded his political views as weak, but he was a great and imaginative educator who taught and practiced self-reliance. They failed to assess properly his views and methods, which were both strong and beneficial to Black people in the United States and abroad.” (Pg. 13)
Ben-Jochannan asserts, “I do not know why Nigerians do not change that stupid colonial name. ‘Nigeria’ was a name that came out of Lugard’s woman, Flora Shaw of the London Times mind. She called it after the River Niger because he constantly wrote her about it; thus, she suggested the name ‘Nigeria.’ It’s about time these Africans found a suitable name!” (Pg. 21)
Clarke notes, “When an ethnic group remains together, they keep their language together and, most importantly they keep their loyalty system together. A loyalty system that transcends language, religion and geography… No matter where you are and no matter what religion you might belong to, and no matter what kind of schooling you have gone through you are distinctly an African person. You are a supporter of some loyal feelings for every African person that walks this earth and if you have confusion about that, you have confusion that is detrimental to the freedom of your own people.” (Pg. 31)
He continues, “we have within ourselves… the ability to regain what we have lost and to build a new humanity for ourselves, first and foremost, and for the whole world ultimately. To do this we must extend the concept of Pan-Africanism beyond its original base to a concept of a world union of all African people, the African in Africa, the African in the Caribbean, the African in South America, the African in the Pacific Islands and, especially, the African throughout the world who has yet to frealize that he is African too.” (Pg. 34)
Ben-Jochannan recounts, “I had a debate on a television show not too long ago against one Rabbi Seltzer, who came with the intent written in his papers to call me an anti-Semite. Before he could speak I said to him, ‘Rabbi, behold, I don’t know what arguments you have. Since we are both Jewish, the only difference is that I’m an African Jew and you are a European Jew. There are things as an African I follow, Jew or not, and things that you follow as a European-American Jew or not. Not one Black person killed one white in Hitler’s Germany. I don’t have to feel sorry for you, because you didn’t come to Ethiopia when Mussolini was exterminating me, African Jews, in Ethiopia. My uncle went to the United States to the European Jews to secure some help against the Italians, and they gave him only $432.” (Pg. 36-37)
He states in a dialogue with Clarke, “I’m going to struggle for my survival, and if I say that Black is beautiful and I’m coming to lead other brothers and sisters to the direction I’m going. I must realize that I must prove to the world that Black is beautiful. I will look like an ass walking in here with a white wife, talking about ‘Black is beautiful.’ For that reason, anyone who wants to have one, that is their business… Can I lay in bed tonight with a white woman, then plan her father’s murder and tell her: ‘I’m going to kill her father tomorrow?’” (Pg. 38)
He clarifies, “I was born of a Black Jewish family. History is history, whether it’s Jewish or not. I will not even call myself a ‘reformed Jew.’ I think I’m going to start calling myself agnostic and that will probably solve the whole thing. The only reason why I’m calling myself ‘Jewish’ is because of a religious and cultural thing which my mother and father were born in, and that is the only reason about me now that one can call Jewish. I don’t feel ashamed of it, some clean aspects of it… Judaism came out of Africa, and not Africa out of Judaism. When there was not an Adam and Eve, or an Abraham, there was Africa.” (Pg. 42)
Clarke asserts, “I have said… that not only Africa is in need of a cultural revolution but there will never be a true cultural revolution until an African head of state prays to an African god in public, without apologizing for me. I was and still am a great admirer of Julius Nyerere [former president of Tanzania], but after he started kissing the Pope’s ring, I began to question how one who condemns white people in the morning can worship them in the evening, without seeing this as a contradiction of what he stands for.” (Pg. 102)
Clarke was asked, “how can we get the Egyptian and Sudanese governments to put a stop to this plundering of our great works of art?” and he replied, “The governments of Egypt and Sudan are not run by Africans… The Arabs don’t give a damn about the treasures of Egypt or Sudan, for in the first place they too like Christians call it ‘pagan,’ ‘heathen,’ and so forth. The only reason they have it is to bring money to the treasury in tourism… So there is no interest by the governments. They don’t see themselves as Africans. They consider themselves are part of the Arab world.” (Pg. 110)
Ben-Jochannan reveals, “I teach my little girls and boys; and by the way, I don’t just lecture. I have twelve biological children, nine girls and three boys with three African women.” (Pg. 115)
Clarke recalls, “I began my search for my people first in the Bible, I wondered why all the characters---even those who, like Moses, were born in Africa---were white. Reading the description of Christ as swarthy and with hair like sheep’s wool, I wondered why the church depicted him as blond and blue-eyed. Where was the hair like sheep’s wool? Where was the swarthy complexion?… I knew Moses had been born in Africa. How did Moses become so white? If he went down to Ethiopia to marry Zeporah, why was Zeporah so white? Who painted the world white?… I began to search for the definition of myself and my people in relationship to world history, and I began to wonder how we had become lost from the commentary of world history.” (Pg. 133)
This book (featuring two ‘Master Teachers’) will be of great interest to those studying African history.
Yosef Alfredo Antonio Ben-Jochannan (1918-2015; known as ‘Dr. Ben’) was an Afrocentrist writer historian and author. John Henrik Clarke (1915-1998) was an African-American historian, professor, and a pioneer in Pan-African and Africana studies.
Clarke explained in the ‘Explanatory Note’ to this 1991 book, “These lectures were delivered for the Minority Ethnic Unit of the Greater London Council, England, March 6-8, 1986. They were addressed mainly to the African community in London consisting of African people from the Caribbean and African people from Africa. These lectures are being published here with additional material because both Dr. Yosef ben-Jochannan and I are veterans in the field of teaching African world history and we have had a number of requests for these lectures in book form.”
Clarke states in the Introduction, “In his book, ‘The African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality,’ the African historian Cheikh Anta Diop has said, in effect, that the history of Africa will be out of kilter until Egypt is seen in proper focus in relationship to the rest of Africa. Professor Chancellor Williams … writes a short history of the people the Greeks later called ‘Egyptians.’ He explains the circumstances of the migration from the Upper to the Lower Nile River… Professor ben-Jochannan has presented new evidence on the southern African origins of Egypt from their own writings… ‘There is no attempt there at settling the issue of the ‘racial’ and or ‘indigenous physical characteristics’ of the ancient Egyptians or Nubians. I will concentrate on the type, quality and reason for the colossal monuments, artifacts, and other remaining effects of the Lower Nile with respect to Egypt---‘The Gift of the Nile’ as Nubia.’” (Pg. 4-5)
He reports, “The revolts by slaves in South America and the Caribbean started 100 years before 1619, when slaves formally arrived in the British colony that became known as the United States, and before the arrival of the Mayflower in 1620… The African slaves who arrived in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1619 were not chattel slaves, in the general sense; they were indentured servants. Lerone Bennett … explains that most of the first indentured servants and those that arrived for the next 100 years were white. He also explains that Africans would have inherited their chains from the Indians and poor whites of whom were indentured servants in large numbers before the arrival of Africans.” (Pg. 9)
He says of Booker T. Washington, “As an educator, he was misunderstood then, and he is misunderstood now. Many people regarded his political views as weak, but he was a great and imaginative educator who taught and practiced self-reliance. They failed to assess properly his views and methods, which were both strong and beneficial to Black people in the United States and abroad.” (Pg. 13)
Ben-Jochannan asserts, “I do not know why Nigerians do not change that stupid colonial name. ‘Nigeria’ was a name that came out of Lugard’s woman, Flora Shaw of the London Times mind. She called it after the River Niger because he constantly wrote her about it; thus, she suggested the name ‘Nigeria.’ It’s about time these Africans found a suitable name!” (Pg. 21)
Clarke notes, “When an ethnic group remains together, they keep their language together and, most importantly they keep their loyalty system together. A loyalty system that transcends language, religion and geography… No matter where you are and no matter what religion you might belong to, and no matter what kind of schooling you have gone through you are distinctly an African person. You are a supporter of some loyal feelings for every African person that walks this earth and if you have confusion about that, you have confusion that is detrimental to the freedom of your own people.” (Pg. 31)
He continues, “we have within ourselves… the ability to regain what we have lost and to build a new humanity for ourselves, first and foremost, and for the whole world ultimately. To do this we must extend the concept of Pan-Africanism beyond its original base to a concept of a world union of all African people, the African in Africa, the African in the Caribbean, the African in South America, the African in the Pacific Islands and, especially, the African throughout the world who has yet to frealize that he is African too.” (Pg. 34)
Ben-Jochannan recounts, “I had a debate on a television show not too long ago against one Rabbi Seltzer, who came with the intent written in his papers to call me an anti-Semite. Before he could speak I said to him, ‘Rabbi, behold, I don’t know what arguments you have. Since we are both Jewish, the only difference is that I’m an African Jew and you are a European Jew. There are things as an African I follow, Jew or not, and things that you follow as a European-American Jew or not. Not one Black person killed one white in Hitler’s Germany. I don’t have to feel sorry for you, because you didn’t come to Ethiopia when Mussolini was exterminating me, African Jews, in Ethiopia. My uncle went to the United States to the European Jews to secure some help against the Italians, and they gave him only $432.” (Pg. 36-37)
He states in a dialogue with Clarke, “I’m going to struggle for my survival, and if I say that Black is beautiful and I’m coming to lead other brothers and sisters to the direction I’m going. I must realize that I must prove to the world that Black is beautiful. I will look like an ass walking in here with a white wife, talking about ‘Black is beautiful.’ For that reason, anyone who wants to have one, that is their business… Can I lay in bed tonight with a white woman, then plan her father’s murder and tell her: ‘I’m going to kill her father tomorrow?’” (Pg. 38)
He clarifies, “I was born of a Black Jewish family. History is history, whether it’s Jewish or not. I will not even call myself a ‘reformed Jew.’ I think I’m going to start calling myself agnostic and that will probably solve the whole thing. The only reason why I’m calling myself ‘Jewish’ is because of a religious and cultural thing which my mother and father were born in, and that is the only reason about me now that one can call Jewish. I don’t feel ashamed of it, some clean aspects of it… Judaism came out of Africa, and not Africa out of Judaism. When there was not an Adam and Eve, or an Abraham, there was Africa.” (Pg. 42)
Clarke asserts, “I have said… that not only Africa is in need of a cultural revolution but there will never be a true cultural revolution until an African head of state prays to an African god in public, without apologizing for me. I was and still am a great admirer of Julius Nyerere [former president of Tanzania], but after he started kissing the Pope’s ring, I began to question how one who condemns white people in the morning can worship them in the evening, without seeing this as a contradiction of what he stands for.” (Pg. 102)
Clarke was asked, “how can we get the Egyptian and Sudanese governments to put a stop to this plundering of our great works of art?” and he replied, “The governments of Egypt and Sudan are not run by Africans… The Arabs don’t give a damn about the treasures of Egypt or Sudan, for in the first place they too like Christians call it ‘pagan,’ ‘heathen,’ and so forth. The only reason they have it is to bring money to the treasury in tourism… So there is no interest by the governments. They don’t see themselves as Africans. They consider themselves are part of the Arab world.” (Pg. 110)
Ben-Jochannan reveals, “I teach my little girls and boys; and by the way, I don’t just lecture. I have twelve biological children, nine girls and three boys with three African women.” (Pg. 115)
Clarke recalls, “I began my search for my people first in the Bible, I wondered why all the characters---even those who, like Moses, were born in Africa---were white. Reading the description of Christ as swarthy and with hair like sheep’s wool, I wondered why the church depicted him as blond and blue-eyed. Where was the hair like sheep’s wool? Where was the swarthy complexion?… I knew Moses had been born in Africa. How did Moses become so white? If he went down to Ethiopia to marry Zeporah, why was Zeporah so white? Who painted the world white?… I began to search for the definition of myself and my people in relationship to world history, and I began to wonder how we had become lost from the commentary of world history.” (Pg. 133)
This book (featuring two ‘Master Teachers’) will be of great interest to those studying African history.
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February 11, 2021I need to know about this book in our history and I love history
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 28, 2023
There's no question that this raw and unflinching look at African history and civilization is a necessary part of the gaping, missing discussions that we need to have as a people, but this book feels more disjointed and vague than focused and concrete. If anything, the benefit of each essay, each Q&A, each potential series of academic discussion topics is that they provide a window into other literature that likely offers that focused and concrete assessment of what transpired for hundreds and thousands of years below the Mediterranean. Similar to the long arc of Asian history that gets equally vanquished in favor of a singular, Euro-centric view of "how we got here," there's a ton of room for willing parties to read, discuss, and grow forward, if we're also willing to begin with an acceptance that each of our own commonly understood narratives of human civilization may not be the most complete, accurate, or honest, including this one, because each one presumes something about the whole of the other.
August 20, 2014
Can't put it down. The study guide, at the end of the book, is the best!
April 9, 2017
A formative, foundational view of history with an African-centered lens. A must read for seekers of the truth.
September 4, 2024
I remember reading this in 2021 after I had read Cheick Anta Diops books. The works in this book are backed up.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews