The 1st Black Man to See the Baby Jesus

100 Amazing Facts About the Negro: What do we really know about Balthasar's origins?

By: Henry Louis Gates Jr



Adoration of the Magi, artist Nicolas Poussin, 1633

(The Root) -- Amazing Fact About the Negro No. 11: Who was the first black person to see the baby Jesus?

African Americans have long been fascinated by the presence of black people in the Bible. This concern, for my generation, became quite intense about the time that Rev. Albert Cleage founded the Shrine of the Black Madonna in Detroit in 1967, and many black Christians sought to reconcile their faith with a growing involvement in black cultural nationalist politics.