© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2008 DOI: 10.1163/157430108X308145 Religion & heology 15 (2008) 28 –52 www.brill.nl/rt & Religion Theology Black Consciousness as an Expression of Radical Responsibility: Biko an African Bonhoeffer Cornel du Toit Research Institute for heology and Religion, University of South Africa, P. O. Box 392, UNISA 0003, Republic of South Africa dtoitcw@unisa.ac.za Abstract he article reflects on the ongoing relevance of Biko’s thought 30 years after his death. It is not so much a comparison between Biko and Bonhoeffer’s thinking as it is a focus on one aspect of Bonhoeffer’s thinking, namely the insistence on independence and self-responsibility in your own situation, which is a premise of Biko’s thinking. As the father of Black Consciousness in South Africa, Biko laid the foundation for black self-understanding and self-responsibility. he value of his thinking lies in a hermeneutics of consciousness, which he established and which is a presupposition of his ideals of self-responsibility and self-emancipation. Biko’s hermeneutics of the self is considered with reference to the forces that kept black people captive. Although Black Consciousness is seen as a historically contingent phenomenon, the challenge of black liberation remains. Biko’s legacy is vital for the establishment of a hermeneutics of poverty and freedom, which is presented as a condition for African liberation in the 21st century. Keywords Biko, Bonhoeffer, Black Consciousness, self-responsibility, hermeneutics of the self, hermeneu- tics of poverty 1. Introduction: Stephen Bantu Biko, an African Bonhoeffer? Black consciousness as personified by Stephen Biko represents a radical assumption of individual and collective responsibility. hat is the thesis con- sidered in this article. Black consciousness was premised on the total isolation of individuals and the oppressed group, and not hoping for liberation to come via some outside agency, be it divine or human. As such it represents a motion of no confidence in the assumption that people actively care about their fellow humans (of a different skin colour). Biko was the eagle who kicked out his nestling so that it could learn to fly; he was Zarathustra’s prophet who encour- aged the student to surpass his master; he was a Bonhoeffer who told human beings to take responsibility for themselves without hoping for divine inter-