In a bid to cope with traumatic difficulties, people more often than not resort to desperate practices such as smoking, drugs, narcotics, alcohol, spirituality, etc. Interestingly enough, Olaudah Equiano, an ex-African slave in London who eventually emerged as a vanguard Promethean literary figure in the purview of the development of African literature in the eighteenth century, sought a singular way out of his predicament by resorting to religion as a momentous means of resilience to withstand the physical and mental traumatism in serfdom. Indeed, his epoch-making autobiographical slave narrative underscores a heavy reliance of the author on Christian religious precepts being nourished with biblical verses, citations and references. Paradoxically, a former slave instead of hating the oppressor’s very
religion that justified his enslavement used it as a remedy to alleviate and contain the tide of traumatic effects on him. A Christ-like figure, he calls his British counterparts for forgiveness and reconciliation on the grounds of Christianity. This article analyses the issue of resilience of a dehumanized black slave in his uphill attempt to weather the traumatic situation in the heydays of slave trade, through the lens of Christian faith. Freud’s psychoanalytical theory on religion and the tenets of resilience inform the study. The aim of the investigation is to demonstrate the contribution of literature in peace-building and in fostering resilience.

Résilience, religion, paix, psychanalyse, Olaudah Equiano, pardon