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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What does the word "assuage" from "Down at the Cross" mean?
(a) To reassure.
(b) To placate.
(c) To satisfy.
(d) To deter.

2. When was Elijah Muhammad born?
(a) 1897.
(b) 1921.
(c) 1911.
(d) 1818.

3. The author writes in "Down at the Cross" that "the social treatment accorded even the most successful Negroes proved that one needed, in order to be free, something more than a bank account. One needed" what?
(a) "A backdoor into white society."
(b) "Hope."
(c) "A mechanism to provoke change in the hearts of men."
(d) "A handle, a lever, a means of inspiring fear."

4. In describing white liberal attitudes in "Down at the Cross," the author states that "they could deal with the Negro as a symbol or a victim but has no real sense of him as" what?
(a) "A political power."
(b) "An intellect."
(c) "A master."
(d) "A man."

5. The authors writes in "Down at the Cross," "Yes, it does indeed mean something - something unspeakable - to be born, in a white country, and Anglo-Teutonic, antisexual country, black. You very soon, without knowing it, give up all hope of" what?
(a) "Redemption."
(b) "Communication."
(c) "Inflation."
(d) "Communion."

Short Answer Questions

1. The author states in the beginning of "Down at the Cross" that he believed that God and what were synonymous?

2. Where did Rudyard Kipling live?

3. What does the author claim to be the seeming "sum of our achievement" as humans, in "Down at the Cross"?

4. When dd Elijah Muhammad die?

5. What does the author claim is the only thing to "cause any of those people to treat you as they presumably wanted to be treated" in "Down at the Cross"?

Short Essay Questions

1. What is the subject of the hymn that opens "Down at the Cross"? How does this quote tie in with the essay's themes?

2. What does the author describe discussing with his driver after leaving Elijah Muhammad's home in "Down at the Cross"?

3. What "truth" does the author describe finding through this experiences with Christianity?

4. How would you describe the tone in the second section of "Down at the Cross"? How has the author's perspective changed?

5. How does the author describe his religious faith to Elijah Muhammad in "Down at the Cross"?

6. What does the author point out as the failings of Christianity and Islam in "Down at the Cross"?

7. How does the author perceive the expression of pain and suffering of blacks through Christianity?

8. How does the author describe the setting of Elijah Muhammad's home in "Down at the Cross"?

9. Who was Elijah Muhammad? What was his role within the Nation of Islam?

10. In the second section of "Down at the Cross," the author points out many reasons that American society is not healed in relation to race. How does he propose it might become healed?

(see the answer keys)

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