The 1970s are a decade virtually lost to South African historiography. This span of years bridged the banning and exile of the country's best-known antiapartheid leaders in the early 1960s and the furious protests that erupted after the Soweto uprisings of June 16, 1976. "The Law and the Prophets" is an intellectual history of the resistance movement between 1968 and 1977, it follows the formation, early trials, and ultimate dissolution of the Black Consciousness movement. Magaziner argues that only by understanding how ideas about race, faith, and selfhood developed and were transformed in this period might we begin to understand the dramatic changes that took place.