Vol. 34, No. 4 October 2010

Missions and the Liberation of Theology

here is no indication that those credited with penning (Book of Common Prayer [1979], p. 853). While there is no consen- Tthe Jewish and then the Christian Holy Writ—political sus across the Christian world on what is meant by “inspired,” leaders, priests, chroniclers, poets, prophets, sages, amateur a majority of believers would probably assent to the Christian historians, and apostles—imagined that they were contributing Reformed Church’s affirmation that “the Bible is the authoritative to a body of writing Word of God. It contains all that people in any age need to know that would one day for their salvation. We call the Bible God’s Word, believing that, be incorporated into by the power of the Holy Spirit, God speaks to us through this a single volume uni- book” (www.crcna.org/pages/beliefs.cfm). versally known as If Constantine can be credited for his substantial role in giving The Bible. Nor could Continued next page they have known that religious and political leaders of a later era— of whom Constantine On Page may serve as a conve- 195 Mission Is Ministry in the Dimension of nient representative— Difference: A Definition for the Twenty-first would engage in a Century prolonged, factious, Titus Presler and at times ethi- cally unseemly effort 198 Noteworthy to determine which 205 The Missiology of Old Testament Covenant writings should be Stuart J. Foster allowed between the 208 Beyond Contextualization: Toward a Twenty- covers of this sacred first-Century Model for Enabling Mission book, and which ones R. Daniel Shaw should be excluded. 215 Asking the Big Questions: A Statistical Analysis As unsavory to mod- Photograph © Marie-Lan Nguyen / Wikimedia Commons of Three Missiological Journals ern sensibilities as was Gregory J. Liston the process itself—to Emperor Constantine the Great say nothing of the 221 The Legacy of George Leslie Mackay carnal motives and methods of its principals—the result was the James R. Rohrer book that we Christians now honor in word, if less frequently 229 The Legacy of Carl Thurman Smith in deed: The Holy Bible. Wong Man Kong Typical of Christian reverence for their sacred scriptures is 233 Book Reviews the declaration found in the Catechism of the Episcopal Church: Dissertation Notices “Q. Why do we call the Holy Scriptures the Word of God? A. We 243 call them the Word of God because God inspired their human 244 Index authors and because God still speaks to us through the Bible” 248 Book Notes us our Bible, equally notable is his role in providing a remarkably poraries, whether or not they believed in him, so the Good News broad setting for the use of this Bible. From the ecclesiastical scraps through the translated words of the Bible and the observed lives of exasperatingly fragmented Christian sects, he in effect forged of missionaries takes on flesh and dwells among peoples in real a single church body that could function in the vast expanse of time, space, and language. territory bordered by Britain and Spain in the west, Armenia But missionaries, such as the two featured in our Legacies, and Mesopotamia in the east, Hungary and Romania in the are not merely passive channels of inherited theologies. Since north, and northern Africa and Egypt in the south. Depending the days of St. Paul they have lived, sometimes uncomfortably, upon one’s perspective, this was contextualization at either its on the theological frontiers, searching the Scriptures for insight best or its worst—perhaps both. As Paul Stephenson observes, into questions and issues unanticipated by either themselves or “It is because of Constantine’s actions that we have begun to their inherited theologies. Stuart Foster, who has been a part of speak of the Church, still rather incongruously” (Constantine: the Mozambique Bible Society’s Lomwe whole-Bible transla- Unconquered Roman Emperor, Christian Victor [2010], p. 277). The tion project for twenty-four years, argues that Old Testament resulting “unified” church became the willing instrument of a covenant missiology, in its “bold use of pagan customs to com- violent slave state. municate about God,” is integral to the long, complex process The gestations of both the Holy Scriptures and the imperially of conversion. Fraught with risk, yes; but the risk is necessary sanctioned Christian church were arduous and pitifully human and, in any case, as unavoidable for missionaries as it was for processes. Ever since then, the challenge of deducing from the Jesus himself—if outcomes that Daniel Shaw here calls “beyond Bible’s disparate parts a cohesive, sensible, and replicable guide contextualization” are to be realized. to thought and practice has been the task of utterly human Over the centuries individuals and communities have theologians. Mediating this teaching (i.e., the Gospel) to peoples turned to the Bible for both ultimate meaning and everyday whose linguistic and cultural worlds are bewilderingly distinct direction. This process is both easier and more difficult than can from the worlds of either those who originated the Bible’s parts be imagined. Theology—the hard work of making contextually or those who since then have interpreted its contents has been relevant sense of what the Bible teaches about God’s interest in the principal calling of Christian missionaries. As Titus Presler how we human beings live out our lives in his world, and why comments in his article in this issue, “The Christian missionary this matters—is central to the missionary task. But only through enterprise is the world’s most extensive and longest sustained mission can theology be liberated from its otherwise inevitable engagement with human difference.” cultural bondage. Even though the Bible in its original languages and cultural —Jonathan J. Bonk settings is difficult enough to comprehend and correctly apply, conveying its message across the spectra of time, cultures, and Cover image: Colossal Head of Emperor Constantinus I Magnus. Marble, languages is as necessary as it is daunting. Just as God through Roman artwork, 4th century CE. Museo Chiaramonti, Vatican City. Unknown Christ could be seen, known, and understood by Jesus’ contem- sculptor, photograph © Marie-Lan Nguyen, 2006.

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194 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Mission Is Ministry in the Dimension of Difference: A Definition for the Twenty-first Century Titus Presler

ission is ministry in the dimension of difference. This mission, itself a new concept as applied to the church’s work Mdefinition of mission assists reflection in a number of rather than simply to the life of the Trinity, had everything and ways. It makes explicit the distinctive character of mission that only to do with those in cultural groups different from one’s is implicit but unacknowledged in many discussions of mission own. From the North Atlantic standpoint, “mission” designated that focus on particular theological or practical emphases. By ministry with people groups in Latin America, Asia, Africa, and articulating an empirical category—difference—rather than Oceania, where the principal tasks were thought to be Gospel theological content, the definition provides a relatively neutral proclamation, church planting, infrastructure development, and, criterion of analysis and comparison in the practice of churches most ambitiously, the formation of religious cultures envisioned and in mission thought. Yet the criterion of difference has sub- by the churches’ emissaries to be Christian rather than pagan stantial biblical warrant and theological import. Furthermore, or heathen. The emissaries were designated as missionaries, a the definition provides a measure for assessing and comparing term understood to apply to persons who ventured beyond their mission emphases across a range of religions. home societies to initiate, continue, or extend the church’s work The proposed definition distinguishes mission as a particu- in societies other than their own. Missionaries were people who lar kind of ministry and thereby clarifies a common confusion engaged difference in the name of Christ. of these two concepts. It is a simple formulation, rather than Many mission societies were premised on the understand- complex and esoteric. Members of Christian churches readily ing that mission concerned Christian work in other places in understand it, for it focuses a commonplace impression about the world. “Domestic” and “home” appeared in the names of mission, namely, that it concerns engagement with the other. It some mission societies and boards for work within a church’s provides a marker for types of ministry in local and global set- national borders, but this still referred to outreach among groups tings alike, for it applies equally to work around the corner and beyond a church’s historic constituency, such as, in the case of to work across the world. It applies equally to churches based on the United States, frontier settlers, African slaves, and Native all continents in distinguishing their mission work, whether in Americans. Whether at home or abroad, mission addressed the Caracas or Cameroun, Cambodia or California. In highlighting not-us, the different, the other. The common plural term “mis- difference as the marker, it connects missiology with postmodern sions” designated both such missionary-sending groups and the discourse in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. multiple institutions they established on frontiers at home or in other parts of the world. Thus the dimension of difference was Difference Implicit in Mission Thought constitutive in the understanding of what mission was. After the 1910 World Missionary Conference in Edinburgh, The term “difference” in this essay has ordinary meanings: a a high-water mark in missionary confidence, a number of factors state of unlikeness, a point of dissimilarity, or a distinguishing broadened missional understanding in the twentieth century, the characteristic.1 This commonsense understanding has empirical century of self-criticism in the mission of Global North churches. referents, yet difference is itself relative in two senses: it subsists The barbarity of World War I and the genocide perpetrated by in the relation between phenomena, and it depends on observ- the Nazis during World War II prompted European and U.S. ers’ perception and assessment of distinctions in that relation. Christians to realize that their own cultures were sources of evil This relativity alerts us to the inherent subjectivity of judgments as well as good and that there might be good to be discovered in about difference, for ability to perceive distinctions, especially other cultures that had different roots. Long-standing distinctions social differences in the world addressed by mission, is shaped, between the civilized and the uncivilized were undermined as limited, and extended profoundly by personal experience and gifts were both received and conferred across frontiers of societal social formation. Moreover, understandings of identity may difference. Links between Christian mission and the colonial depend on prior perceptions of difference: we may not know expansion of Europe and the United States undercut the positive ourselves until we know the other as well. This epistemological connotation of mission’s reaching over boundaries of cultural, dynamic resonates with the postmodern philosophical intuition ethnic, and geographic difference. Increased world exposure that difference may also be ontologically prior to identity. accelerated a theological trend toward considering that differing Historically, it is ironic at this juncture to suggest difference religions were valid disclosures of the divine, which undermined as a clarifying criterion of Christian mission, for much mission positive assessments of Christian mission’s concern with conver- thought and practice in the Global North from the sixteenth sion. Transformation of “the missions” in the Two-Thirds World through the nineteenth centuries was premised on the view that into indigenous churches—self-governing, self-supporting, self- propagating, and self-theologizing—brought those Christian Titus Presler is an Episcopal priest and missiologist communities into peer relationships with Global North churches. with experience in India and Zimbabwe. He chaired Here liturgical, musical, theological, and even ethical differences the Episcopal Church’s Standing Commission on were phenomena to be explored and celebrated, rather than World Mission and was a researcher for the Global obstacles to be overcome and suppressed. Anglicanism Project. Former president of the Seminary The new environment for mission thought prompted sig- of the Southwest in Austin, Texas, he is the author of nificant shifts in the understanding of difference. Missiology’s Horizons of Mission (Cowley Publications, 2001). grounding became theocentric rather than ecclesiocentric. The —www.tituspresler.com churches’ mixed record helped to push mission reflection back

October 2010 195 to God as the source and author of mission. God’s mission in Christian and non-Christian remains, but historic associations the world became determinative theologically, with the church’s have been scrambled when Christian commitment in many mission regarded as derivative. God was on mission in the world, African countries far exceeds that of many European countries, and the church’s role was to discern that mission movement and signaling that the geography of mission as understood histori- participate in it. Correlatively, mission thought became more cally in the Euro-American tradition has been relativized. “We in comprehensive, reflecting on the whole of God’s intention and the West shouldn’t be evangelizing the rest of the world,” goes action through the church and in the world. From midcentury an emerging European and North American refrain, “Instead, onward, missiology incorporated such foci as J. C. Hoekendijk’s we need them to send missionaries to us!” Indeed, not only are triad of proclamation, community, and service (kerygma, koinonia, traditionally missionary-receiving parts of the world recognized diakonia); the conciliar movement’s summary of these in witness as potentially missionary-sending, but some have actually be- (martyria); economic and infrastructure development as integral come so, with Korea, India, and Nigeria leading the way. Shifts to societal wholeness; Christian presence as articulated by Max toward mutuality in mission have evoked nuanced approaches Warren and others; holistic evangelization as recovered by Vatican to human difference, as the progression of Anglican mission II, the World Council of Churches, and the Lausanne Movement; slogans illustrates: “mutual responsibility and interdependence in the body of Christ” (1963), “partnership in mission” (1971), and “companionship in mission” (1999), this last similar to the The vast missiological accompaniment promoted by Lutherans and Roman Catholics. In all these conceptualizations of mission, however, the literature on inculturation fact of human difference—religious, ethnic, cultural, linguistic, is premised on encounters social, and so on—is an irreducible premise, even if particular formulations do not highlight it. Missio Dei theology, for instance, with difference. is premised on the self-projection of God into the temporal and material, a dimension of difference, that culminates in the in- carnation of God in Jesus Christ. Witness is premised on Gospel Gustavo Gutiérrez’s theology of liberation and its elaboration by testimony in word and deed to a world that is different in need- many in Latin America, Asia, and Africa; reconciliation and its ing such proclamation. Mission as Christian presence proposes a implications for ethnic and political conflict; and the Millennium way of encountering and living with difference that may diverge Development Goals as a practical urgency in the twenty-first from other modes of mission, but it is no less premised on the century. All these emphases have been articulated as grounded in fact of difference. Evangelization assumes differences in religious the nature and action of God and therefore framing the church’s profession. Liberation addresses differences in the distribution work in the world. The church’s mission—what it is sent by God of power, and reconciliation responds to differences that have to be and do in the world—is seen as comprehended by such provoked alienation and enmity. Current emphases on mutuality emphases and therefore encompassing the church’s work both in partnership and companionship propose that difference be at home and abroad, both within itself and beyond itself. explored and embraced in community rather than accentuated The phenomena of human difference tend to be back- by competition and effaced by domination. grounded in such comprehensive characterizations of mission. Difference is a premise in the thought of recent and current For Euro-American mission activists, this has served to assuage mission theologians, among whom a few instances must suffice. widespread unease and guilt about the ignorance, insensitivity, Stephen Neill’s history of Christian expansion is framed as the and arrogance with which the Euro-American mission movement story of how a local faith became a universal religion through sometimes responded to the cultural and religious differences it crossing cultural and national boundaries of difference. David encountered in other parts of the world. For mission activists in Bosch’s distillation that mission is the participation of Christians the Two-Thirds World, comprehensive themes mark a theological in the liberating mission of Jesus is based on biblical analysis of coming of age that transcends wounds that could otherwise be Jesus’ mission as one of crossing boundaries, a model premised fixating. A subtext implicit in comprehensive reinterpretations of on difference. Anthony Gittins’s postulation of the missionary as mission has been: “We need to get beyond us-them thinking. And a stranger is based on difference as the missionary’s fundamental we certainly need to get beyond mission as concerned with the environment. The kingdom-centered missiology of the Missional exotic. God’s mission is to all of us, to all human groups equally, Church Project for North America is centered on evangelism and and to the planet. All of us need God’s mission.” Some particular church nurture in a cultural context understood as essentially comprehensive emphasis—such as development, evangelization, different from the reign of God. Andrew Kirk defines mission interfaith dialogue, or liberation—is often seen as the mission more loosely in terms of God’s purposes in the world, a view priority for all human groups equally, and particular human premised on the difference between church and world. Carlos differences are considered a minor theme in such a mandate. Cardoza-Orlandi defines mission generically as “the participation Moreover, human difference is relativized in a polycentric world, of the people of God in God’s action in the world” but clarifies for in itself every human group is equally different from every that God’s missionary activity is beyond the church’s institutional other. Tying mission to the experience of human difference can limits, outward to areas different from its own. In its focus on seem a vestige of the rightly discredited worldview in which the “frontiers” of secularization, pluralization, and globaliza- Euro-American peoples saw themselves as the standard human tion, David Smith’s Mission After Christendom is premised on beings and others as the different ones who needed to see how phenomena of difference. Francis Oborji understands mission they should conform to the standard. straightforwardly as evangelization and church-planting where The advance of secularism in the West has prompted a simi- the Gospel has not been heard or accepted and thus assumes a lar leveling of historic assignments of difference in the area of quite traditional understanding of difference.2 evangelization, especially as Christian profession receded radi- The now vast missiological literature on inculturation, which cally in Europe. The missionally important difference between includes historical, theological, and anthropological approaches,

196 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 is premised on encounters with difference: peoples’ interactions Implications of the Difference Definition with Gospel proclamation and the many differences encountered between missionaries and receiving peoples. Numerous models In light of the comprehensive definition of Christian mission, the for those encounters have been proposed, such as adaptation, short definition—mission is ministry in the dimension of differ- indigenization, and contextualization; local theology, as devel- ence—achieves its full effect, for it asserts a single distinctive rather oped by Robert Schreiter; translatability, as developed by Andrew than multiple criteria, and it does so in simple nontheological Walls, Kwame Bediako, and Lamin Sanneh; and appropriation language that sharpens the point. It is a functional definition that and transformation, as developed by the present author. 3 All these specifies mission’s nature as a type of religious activity. It invites assume an encounter with difference. Appropriately, formation theological definitions of mission to be articulated, suggesting programs for missionaries preparing to serve cross-culturally tend simply that they be consistent with the criterion of difference. to focus chiefly on how missionaries should perceive, understand, The phrase “dimension of difference” invites reflection on adjust, and respond to linguistic, economic, political, racial, and difference as a category of human experience. It prompts the cultural differences in their places of service. hearer to reflect not only on specific differences but also on dif- In sum, difference is an explicit condition in many mission ference as an existential and social experience and on questions concepts, theologies, and programs, and in others it is an implicit of perspective and identity that it raises. How do I experience and integral premise. Difference is foundational. and define my social location and the group or groups of which I understand myself to be a member? What assumptions about Grounding in Comprehensive Definitions identity operate in our experience? What particular privileges and disabilities do we experience in our group, relative to other The concept of mission as ministry in the dimension of differ- groups? How do our concepts of difference relate to our concepts ence is grounded in more comprehensive definitions of religious of commonality with other human groups? What anxieties and mission and Christian mission. The concept of religious mission fears do my social group and I experience as we engage the is important for comparative interreligious missiology, and it prospect of encounters with people who are different from us in may be defined as the spiritual vision and the practical means major ways? What joys and discoveries do we anticipate as we through which communities project their religious faith and work, engage such difference? The concept of the dimension of differ- and through which they invite the participation and adherence ence invites historical, sociological, and philosophical reflection of others. Sociological rather than theological, this formulation on difference within one’s society and on the world stage. describes human social behavior directed toward presenting The definition affirms the common impression that mission religious faith to communities wider than the originating reli- concerns initiatives and activities of religious communities beyond gious community and thereby to the other and the different. An their own boundaries, defined by membership and particular environment and criterion of difference is implicit in the verb characteristics the membership may have. For example, one “project” and explicit in the concluding phrase “of others,” that Christian asking another about his or her congregation may be is, those not part of the missional community. This definition may told how fulfilling the worship is, that the Sunday school has apply equally to the Hindu Ramakrishna Mission, the Woking Muslim Mission in England, the Guru Ram Das Sikh Mission of America, the Brampton Buddhist Mission Centre in Ontario, and any particular Christian outreach. Ministry to and with the Building on the pan-religious definition, Christian mission other who is different—that may be defined as the activity of sending and being sent, by God is the hallmark of Christian and by communities, across significant boundaries of human social experience to bear witness in word and deed to God’s mission. action in Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit. The claim embedded in the phrase “across significant boundaries of human social experience” is that mission involves crossing boundaries good teachers but a mediocre curriculum, and that adult for- that are significant by virtue of being sociologically identifiable. mation forums are excellent but poorly attended. If the inquirer The boundaries are religious, cultural, linguistic, racial, ethnic, then asks, “And does the church have a mission program?” or sexual, economic, political, national, educational, professional, “Is your church mission-minded?” the listener is likely to under- and geographic—any one of these, any combination of these, stand immediately what is being asked: Does your congregation and others as well, so long as they are major and socially identi- reach out beyond itself to others? Is the church involved in the fiable. The inherent relativity and subjectivity of assessments of life of the wider community in the town or city? Does the par- difference and identity mean that they are always fluid and that ish have connections in other countries and cultures? The term they should not be reified in rigid and static categories. Yet their “mission,” in sum, is widely understood by church members to provisional and powerful validity at any particular point of time refer to the church’s engagement with the other who is different is verified by the fact that the great oppressions within the human from whatever characterizes the social group of the church itself. community are grounded precisely in such differences, readily Thus “outreach” is the most commonly used synonym for mis- evident in racial discrimination, gender violence, sexual slavery, sion, and “reaching out” is the verbal phrase most commonly tribal warfare, ethnic cleansing, interreligious conflict, and, as used to signify mission activity. ever, war between nations. The definition asserts that Christians There is also a common negative association of mission with and our communities are engaged distinctively in mission when difference that the proposed definition engages straightforwardly. we are reaching out beyond who and where we are to encounter The most prevalent critiques of Christian mission concern ways and form community with people and communities who are that missionaries responded to the religious and cultural differ- different from ourselves. Ministry to and with the other who is ences they encountered in other societies. It is commonly thought different—that is the hallmark of Christian mission. that missionaries condemned wholesale the different religions

October 2010 197 they encountered in the Two-Thirds World and in North America, about the common linkage of mission with difference. Mission- and that they insisted that the peoples they found become Chris- of-God theology has associated mission with the full breadth of tian and adopt the missionaries’ own particular Christian brands. God’s action in the world, which is useful in summing up God’s It is likewise commonly thought that missionaries condemned intent in interacting with humanity. More problematically, the wholesale the different cultures they encountered and insisted full breadth of action to which God calls the church and the that the peoples they found adopt the missionaries’ languages human community is said to derive from the mission of God. and ethics, styles of dressing, eating, housekeeping, and the like. God’s action is summarized under one theme—reconciliation, for The charges are often inaccurately universalized to include all instance—and then everything to which God calls the church is missionaries in all times and places, but their substantial truth subsumed under that theme, all worship, education, nurture, and in many instances has prompted the missionary movement to proclamation. But is there truly no missional difference between critique itself thoroughly along these lines, especially since 1900. a men’s prayer breakfast and prayers the evangelism team of- The point here is that differences among human groups and how fers in door-to-door visitation? Between Sunday worship in the to approach them are the issues at stake. Rather than shifting mis- sanctuary and a liturgy offered at the local psychiatric hospital? sion’s definition to another criterion in order to evade critique, the Between the youth group’s weekly meetings and its summer trip proposed definition accepts the encounter with difference as the to paint houses of the elderly in Appalachia? Between Sunday pivotal criterion of mission, with an agenda to discuss how the school in the church and a parishioner spending three years different is encountered and what the response to it should be. teaching former combatants in a postwar setting in Africa? Several current uses of the term “mission” cause confusion It is the criterion of difference that marks the cutting edge of

Noteworthy

Announcing held February 18–20, 2011, will consider the theme “Phases The American Society of Missiology–Eastern Fellowship of Globalization in the History of Christianity.” Presenters (ASM–EF) will hold its annual meeting November 4–7, 2010, will evaluate the transcontinental networks of the East in conjunction with 2010boston, an international mission Syrian–Nestorian Church of the East (thirteenth and four- conference sponsored by the Boston Theological Institute, teenth centuries), the Jesuits (seventeenth century), the with the theme “The Changing Contours of World Mission German Pietists (eighteenth century), and the Protestant and Christianity” (details online at www.2010boston.org). missionary movement and the 1910 World Missionary Confer- Daniel Jeyaraj, professor of world Christianity and director ence in Edinburgh, with special attention to “the beginnings of the Andrew F. Walls Centre for the Study of African and of networking between indigenous Christian elites in Asia Asian Christianity, Liverpool Hope University, will address and Africa,” according to a conference announcement. Papers the topic “Theological Education and Missions” at the will be read in German and English. For further information, ASM–EF luncheon, November 5, at Boston University’s go to www.kg1.evtheol.uni-muenchen.de/veranstaltungen/ Marsh Chapel. Participants attending 2010boston will interact symposien. with mission leaders, including keynote speakers Brian Stan- The 2011 annual meeting of the American Society of ley, professor of world Christianity and director of the Centre Missiology will be held June 17–19 at Techny Towers, Techny, for the Study of World Christianity, University of Edinburgh; Illinois, with the theme “Mission Spirituality in Global Perspec- Dana L. Robert, professor of world Christianity and history of tive,” announced ASM president Robert Gallagher, Wheaton mission and codirector of the Center for Global Christianity College, Wheaton, Illinois. Society members are invited to and Mission, Boston University School of Theology; and propose papers for presentation during multitrack parallel Jeyaraj; these three speakers are IBMR contributing editors. sessions. Topics of volunteered papers are not restricted to the The Evangelical Theological Society (ETS, www.etsjets overall conference theme. Proposals for papers are due before .org) annual conference, November 17–19, 2010, in Atlanta, February 1 to the ASM first vice-president Roger Schroeder, Georgia, will include a world Christianity consultation. Pre- S.V.D., [email protected]. For details, visit www.asmweb senters will be Timothy Tennent, Asbury Theological Seminary, .org/news.htm. The Association of Professors of Mission on India; Raymond Tallman, Golden Gate Baptist Theological (www.asmweb.org/apm) will hold its annual meeting in Seminary, on the Arab-Muslim world; Edward Smither, Liberty conjunction with ASM at the same location. Baptist Theological Seminary, on Brazil; and Robert Yarbrough, The International Fellowship of Mission as Transforma- Covenant Theological Seminary, on Africa. Allen Yeh, assistant tion (INFEMIT) held a Consultation on the topic “Mission as professor of history and theology, Biola University, chairs the Transformation,” March 5–8, 2010, at the Oxford Centre for consultation’s steering committee. Mission Studies (OCMS). Twenty-eight delegates from Asia, The Centre for Mission Studies at Union Biblical Africa, Latin America, Europe, and the United States reflected Seminary, Pune, India, will hold a mission consultation Janu- on INFEMIT’s thirty-five-year history and addressed current ary 12–14, 2011. Under the theme “Witnessing to Christ in challenges facing holistic mission. Those present focused espe- Diverse Contexts,” the conference will examine the varying cially on links with regional bodies, including the Latin Ameri- understandings evident in historic and modern uses of the can Theological Fellowship, Partnership in Mission–Asia, the concept of witness and related terms such as “evangelism” European Fellowship of Mission Theologians, and the African and “mission.” Contact conference organizer Frampton Fox Theological Fellowship. A networking team chaired by Ruth at [email protected] for details. Padilla DeBorst, general secretary of the Latin American The fifthInternational Munich-Freising Conference on Theological Fellowship, San José, Costa Rica, was formed with the History of Christianity in the Non-Western World, to be representatives from Africa, Asia, Latin America, Europe, the

198 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 mission and sustains the challenge always implicit in mission. community burns out. The distinction between community and Christians are well aware that their community life is fulfilling mission is clear, and it is grounded in the criterion of difference. for members as networks of relationship develop among those A related dynamic is the aspiration that many North Ameri- who pray, worship, eat, and study together in a congregation. can church institutions express that they become more diverse, a Christians are equally aware that their community life is intended term used to connote racial diversity especially, but also cultural, to strengthen them to reach beyond their community in mission to national, linguistic, and economic diversity. This aspiration others. A self-critique in many congregations is that their prayer, expresses an intuition that fulfilling the mission of the congrega- worship, education, and fellowship are flourishing but that, be- tion, denomination, school, or seminary involves engaging differ- cause the community is not reaching beyond itself to encounter ence and drawing in people different from the existing majority others, it is becoming complacent and self-absorbed. Here the group. If the congregation or school is monochrome—whether congregation is identifying a failure to cross the boundaries of white, black, Asian, or Hispanic—there is a nagging sense of a difference that are peculiar to mission and intuiting that vitality neglected mission frontier. Conviction that the whole people of arises from ministering “outside their comfort zone.” A less com- God should include all available local ethnicities prompts conver- mon self-critique is that a congregation is so engaged in outreach, sation about outreach to the groups not represented. Conversely, a in difference-engaging mission, that it is neglecting its mutually congregation that includes an ethnic, international, and linguistic supportive community life, with the result that members are rainbow often exults in the fulfillment of its mission because it fatigued and jaded. In fact, community and mission are symbi- has succeeded in crossing boundaries of difference and drawing otic: community without mission dies out, and mission without in a diverse range of people. Again, people realize intuitively that

Caribbean, the Middle East, and the South Pacific, as well duced a book, The Literature of Theology: A Guide for Students as from OCMS. Al Tizon, associate professor of evangelism and Pastors (1979). As a board member of the American Theologi- and holistic ministry, Palmer Theological Seminary, Wynne- cal Library Association, he played a key role in the reorganiza- wood, Pennsylvania, represents the United States as dialogue tion discussions that led to a merger in 1992 of all ATLA-related partner. boards into a single board of directors. After retirement from Redcliffe College Centre for Mission Training, Glouces- Yale in 1991, Bollier became director of development for ATLA. ter, U.K., announced two new master of arts degree programs: Also active as a pastor, he served congregations of the United an M.A. in Bible and Mission, and an M.A. in European Mission Church of Christ during much of his career. and Intercultural Christianity. Both programs are validated by Died. Frank L. Cooley, 89, Presbyterian missionary the University of Gloucestershire and were slated to commence scholar, author, March 3, 2010, in Clayton, Georgia. As an in September 2010. Redcliffe also offers M.A. degree programs ordained Methodist minister, Cooley served the YMCA in in Global Issues in Contemporary Mission, Asian Studies in China (1946–51) and was a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Intercultural Contexts, and Global Leadership in Intercultural mission coworker in Indonesia for thirty-three years Contexts. For more information, go online to www.redcliffe (1952–85). Fluent in Mandarin and Indonesian, he was consid- .org/mabibleandmission and www.redcliffe.org/maeurope. ered to be the foremost Protestant historian of Christianity in Indonesia. His 1962 Ph.D. dissertation at Yale University, “Altar Personalia and Throne in Central Moluccan Societies,” was translated Appointed. Stephen J. Fichter, S.J., interim executive director and published in Indonesia, where it is still used as a primary of the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA, textbook. His other books in English included Indonesia: Church cara.georgetown.edu), Georgetown University, Washington, and Society (1968) and The Growing Seed: The Christian Church D.C. After twelve years with CARA, including seven as in Indonesia (1982). The October 1977 issue of this journal executive director, Mary E. Bendyna, R.S.M., stepped down (then known as the Occasional Bulletin of Missionary Research), in June 2010. During her time at CARA Bendyna was the prin- devoted to the theme “Focus on Indonesia,” featured exclu- cipal investigator for dozens of studies on ministry, education, sively Cooley’s thirty-two-page article, with statistical charts, faith formation, priesthood, and religious life, including maps, and artwork. major studies for the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Died. Moishe Rosen, 78, Jewish-born Baptist minister, National Catholic Educational Association, and the Religious missiologist, author, and founder of Jews for Jesus, May 19, Brothers Conference. She is coauthor of Best Practices in Cath- 2010, in San Francisco, of prostate cancer. After graduating olic Pastoral and Finance Councils (2010). A sociologist and from Bible college and deciding to be a missionary to the Jews, CARA’s research associate, Fichter will serve in the interim Rosen was ordained as a Conservative Baptist minister in 1957 post while a search for an executive director is conducted. and founded what became known as Jews for Jesus (www Died. John A. Bollier, 82, divinity librarian and associa- .jewsforjesus.org) in 1969. In 1973 he left the employment of the tion director, June 27, 2010. Bollier’s career, which combined American Board of Missions to the Jews (now called Chosen ministry with scholarship, began at California State University, People Ministries) to incorporate the separate mission. He Northridge, where he was a reference librarian and bibliogra- stepped down as executive director in 1996 and continued pher. In 1973 he was employed by Yale Divinity Library, New as a staff missionary and board member until his death. He Haven, Connecticut, where he was assistant divinity librarian is coauthor with his wife of Christ in the Passover: Why Is This and also served two terms as acting divinity librarian and a year Night Different? (1977, 2006). Among the books recounting the as acting head of the bibliography department of Yale’s Ster- Jews for Jesus story is Not Ashamed: The Story of Jews for Jesus ling Library. Bollier’s bibliographic instruction at Yale pro- (1999), by Ruth Tucker, an IBMR contributing editor.

October 2010 199 difference is the cutting edge of mission and that it is integral to the human spirit—one person, one cup, and one neighborhood the community’s health and fullness. at a time.”5 The word “mission” as used about such statements The distinction between community and mission relates is synonymous with the word “purpose,” and the formulations to the distinction between ministry and mission. One result of could just as well be termed “purpose statements.” refracting God’s comprehensive mission into the existing spec- This blurring of purpose and mission characterizes some trum of the church’s activities is that the phrase “the church’s churches’ adoption of the mission-statement exercise. For mission and ministry” appears often in church leaders’ sermons instance, St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Laguna Beach, Cali- and publications, with no differentiating explanation of the two fornia, articulates its mission statement as follows: “to be open terms. Everything is comprehended in mission, but ministry still to God’s love and guidance, to embrace all in the name of Jesus Christ, to be free to use God’s gifts for the daily expression of our faith, to work in the power of the Holy Spirit.”6 With such Community without fusing of the concepts of purpose, mission, and sometimes vision as well, it is natural for the term “mission” to become mission dies out, vague and diffuse as well as comprehensive. and mission without Some church mission statements, by contrast, are clear in distinguishing purpose, ministry, and mission. Saddleback community burns out. Church in Lake Forest, California, says: “Its purpose is to lead people to Jesus and membership in his family, teach them to worship the Lord and magnify his name, develop them to Christ- seems relevant, so the two are thrown together as a convenient like maturity, and equip them for ministry in the church and a catch-all, lest anything be left out. Often latent in such usage is mission in the world.”7 the notion that mission is the full range of God’s vision, whereas Here one of the largest congregations in the United States ministry is the operationalization of God’s mission through states not its mission but its purpose, not surprising for a church the church’s work: worship, education, proclamation, justice, led by Rick Warren, author of two popular “purpose-driven” and so on. What God is up to is mission, and what we do in books.8 Within its purpose statement, once the missional activity participating in God’s mission is ministry. This terminology, of making disciples is articulated, the congregation’s community however, short-changes ministry, for it disregards deep traditions life is elaborated as the environment that prepares them for of biblical, historical, and theological reflection on ministry, as ministry, which is termed as set “in the church,” and for mission, well as the churches’ contemporary discourse about ministry. It which is set “in the world.” Such conceptualization accords well also tends not to be implemented in practice. Churches continue with defining mission as ministry in the dimension of difference. to highlight as mission outreach such initiatives as baskets for The definition, in turn, grounds the particular use of “mission” the needy at Christmas or a collection for famine victims, and in this purpose statement, for “in the world” is an environment they continue to designate as missionaries their members who different from the church community itself. minister in other cultures. In contrast to comprehensive uses of the term “mission” in It is more useful to encompass within ministry the full range mission statements, its practical uses in secular discourse are of service to which God calls the church. Ministry thus includes premised clearly on encounters with difference. “Space mission” both the work that builds up the community within itself and the came into common usage because astronauts were being sent work that extends the community’s initiative beyond itself. It is to explore the radically different environment of outer space. A this latter kind of ministry, ministry in the dimension of differ- “diplomatic mission” involves sending a nation’s representative ence, that is the community’s mission work. Likewise, particular to negotiate with a different nation, or it denotes the permanent kinds of ministry are found in both the work of the community quarters used by such representatives in a foreign country. “Trade within itself and in the difference-engaging work that is mission, missions” involve sending representatives to other countries to whether these be prayer, worship, proclamation, education, discuss international trade. A “military mission” involves send- health care, elder care, or administration. A church is on mission ing armed forces into combat against those of a different nation when it is ministering in any of these ways beyond itself, with or nonstate entity. In all these uses, encounter with difference is people and communities that are different from its own. Visiting what prompts use of the term “mission,” a premise consistent parishioners in homes and hospitals is inreach, whereas visiting with the understanding of religious and Christian mission sug- inmates of the local prison is outreach. A church member’s work gested here. as a physician at the local hospital is her ministry, but when she The difference definition affirms the now-commonplace rela- joins a parish group in offering a two-week clinic in Haiti, she tivizing of the geography of Christian mission. A frequent critique is on a mission. And a few ministries—evangelization, church- of preoccupation with “overseas mission” or “foreign mission” planting, and justice work—are intrinsically and always mis- is the observation, “Well, mission is not only over there but here sional in their import and impact. in our backyard too.” This is true, so long as the criterion of dif- Yet another confusing contemporary use of the term “mis- ference is fulfilled. A congregation may be very missional while sion” is found in the mission-statement exercise that corpora- never venturing beyond the county line, because it is reaching tions, service organizations, and government agencies under- out to, say, the unevangelized and unchurched, or an immigrant take and that has now become common in congregations and group, or victims of an apartment building fire, or a particular church judicatories as they seek to focus on what God is call- addiction group. In practice, however, missional congregations ing them to be and do in their contexts. Microsoft Corporation, tend to reach out both locally and globally, because they find for instance, says its mission is to “create seamless experiences that mission in one context stimulates mission elsewhere, and that combine the magic of software with the power of Internet multiple and diverse mission experiences inform and enhance across a world of devices.”4 The perhaps over-caffeinated mis- each other. The difference criterion applies to both the local and sion statement of Starbucks Coffee is “to inspire and nurture the global, and it privileges neither.

200 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Similarly, the difference definition applies to the work of minimal, but the Old Testament testifies often to a confidence that churches based in all contexts, among all cultures and ethnic ultimately “the nations” will acknowledge the sovereignty of the groups, in all parts of the world. It is the criterion of reaching God of Israel.11 The contrast between ministry among one’s own across boundaries into difference that marks the specifically mis- and ministry among the peoples is sharp in the Second Servant sional work of churches. Thus the definition does not smuggle Song of Isaiah: “It is too light a thing that you should be my ser- in assumptions from any particular part of the world, nor from vant to raise up the tribes of Jacob and to restore the survivors of any particular geographic directionality—except outward. The Israel; I will give you as a light to the nations, that my salvation ecumenical Friends Missionary Prayer Band, for instance, calls its may reach to the end of the earth” (Isa. 49:6). Sending persons work mission because it sends missionaries, currently more than into the pagan world is not in view, but the witness of the faith- 1,000, from its base in Tamil Nadu in South India to evangelize ful servant is conceptualized as lifted up so that it radiates out and plant churches in North India, where its personnel must to the nations, those who are other and different. learn languages very different from their own and make cultural Jonah was sent into an environment of difference, Nineveh, adjustments similar to those encountered across national borders a major Assyrian city where Jonah expected that Yahweh’s call in western Europe. The Church Mission Society of Nigeria sends to repentance would be greeted with the contempt worthy of missionaries to evangelize in northern Nigeria and in countries a local deity with no sway beyond local borders and certainly such as Mauritania, contexts that are different in both religion not in the Assyrian temple cults. The fear that encounter with and culture. Korean church groups now have almost 13,000 mis- difference evokes in the prospective emissary is spelled out in sionaries on all continents, the vanguard of the growing Majority one of Scripture’s more vivid narratives, the marvel of which is World mission movement.9 Many U.S. congregations that sent that a people so different are said to have repented immediately teams to minister in New Orleans after the devastation of Hur- (Jonah, esp. chap. 3). ricane Katrina in 2005 called them mission teams because they Jesus’ proclamation of God’s reign was shared with all were being sent to minister to and with people very different equally, but a disproportionate number of the stories of specific from themselves and in circumstances very different from their encounters with individuals are devoted to those he had to own. The criterion of difference supports the World Council of cross a boundary to reach: the Gerasene demoniac, the Roman Churches’ 1963 slogan “Mission in Six Continents,” as well as centurion’s servant, the anointing sinful woman, the Samaritan Michael Nazir-Ali’s phrase “From Everywhere to Everywhere.”10 woman, the woman caught in adultery, Zaccheus the tax col- It is not that any and every ministry in any place is mission. It lector, numerous lepers, and others.12 The Synoptic Gospels is rather that, when people from one setting are sent to minister record that this boundary-crossing ministry was so intrinsic to in a different setting among people who are different in some Jesus’ ministry that he developed a reputation for consorting major way—that is mission. with tax collectors and prostitutes, people whose Jewishness Defining mission as ministry in the dimension of difference was compromised by the moral failings of enemy collaboration responds to the needs of the conflicted world as we know it. The and sexual promiscuity.13 From Jesus’ standpoint, his difference- world is dying of difference, for millions of people die on account engaging ministry was extending and redefining God’s covenant of socially constructed differences to which life-and-death valu- community, but the religious authorities believed his boundary ations have been attached. The successive genocides of Jews, violations compromised community purity and faithfulness to Cambodians, Bosnians, Rwandans, and Darfuris since 1940 are God. In defending his outreach in parables—the good Samaritan, instances, as are the wars in Korea, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Liberia, Congo, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Israel/Palestine. Discrimination and violence based on race, ethnicity, gender, age, national ori- Missional congregations gin, sexual orientation, and religion are responses to perceptions of difference. Discrimination and violence are equally though tend to reach out both more subtly active in the world’s continued toleration of abject locally and globally. poverty and its many attendant ills. As Christian mission seeks to participate in God’s healing of the world, understanding itself in terms of engaging difference is a crucial starting place. the Pharisee and the tax collector, the lost sheep—Jesus portrayed God as reaching people over differences, so that salvation was Biblical Warrant in Sending accessible in faithfulness to that outreach, not in inherited identi- ties and purity codes.14 Sending and being sent are constitutive of Christian mission, and In his account of the Canaanite woman’s faith in the district of encounters with difference prove to be foundational in signal Tyre and Sidon, Matthew records Jesus confining his sentness to biblical instances of sending and being sent. Israel—“I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel”— The call of Abram articulates God’s promise to and blessing but this understanding of a purely local calling is challenged on Abram in the context of a sending in which leaving the familiar immediately and successfully by the foreign woman’s impor- and going to the new and different are intrinsic: “Go from your tunity. Matthew characterizes her identity as different not only country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land ethnically and nationally but also by the term “Canaanite,”15 that I will show you.” The world of difference becomes explicit which in Israelite history evoked religious abhorrence and national in the promise’s conclusion, where God assures Abram that he enmity (Matt. 15:21–28). The woman expanded Jesus’ understand- will make a difference in a world defined by difference: “And in ing of his calling to include a sending to the Gentiles. Looking you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen. 12:1–3). to the future, Jesus saw God’s reign culminating in a judgment Israel is defined throughout the Old Testament as God’s over all the nations (Matt. 25:31–46) and consummated in an chosen and holy people, in contrast to the surrounding peoples, embrace of human differences at the messianic banquet: “Then whose different religious loyalties and moral practices are to people will come from east and west, from north and south, and be avoided (e.g., Deut. 7). Missional outreach to the peoples is will eat in the kingdom of God” (Luke 13:29).

October 2010 201 Sending is explicit in Luke’s account of Jesus dispersing the Scripture related to the extension of God’s work in the world twelve disciples: “He sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of are closely associated with depictions of God, Christ, or the Holy God and to heal” (Luke 9:2). No geographic extent or limitation Spirit sending individuals to undertake particular initiatives. is mentioned, but it is understood that they will be arriving as The more major of these sending initiatives concern encounters strangers, albeit as Jewish strangers, in presumably Jewish vil- with persons and groups who are different from those who are lages. In Matthew’s account the disciples become apostles in the sent, different in ways that are sociologically identifiable. Indeed, act of being sent. Their initial trajectory, like Jesus’ own, is “to the environments of difference seem to evoke narratives of sending lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt. 10:6), but the elaborated and being sent. It is around this dimension of difference that instructions envisage proclamation to nations beyond Israel, historically the term “mission” has gathered, so that it has long for the disciples will be “dragged before governors and kings been customary to speak of “Jesus’ mission,” “the disciples’ mis- because of me, as a testimony to them and the Gentiles” (Matt. sion,” “the early church’s mission,” “Paul’s mission,” “the Gentile 10:18). By gospel’s end, Jesus says to the disciples, “Go therefore mission,” and so on. Such terminology not only is appropriate, and make disciples of all nations” (Matt. 28:19). Luke reiterates but it is also quite precise in designating specifically as mission this sending to “all nations” in closing his gospel (Luke 24:47), those ministries that engage the dimension of difference. In this and his second account of the ascension extends it “to the ends way, the difference-based definition of mission clarifies a long- of the earth” (Acts 1:8). standing practice in biblical exegesis and theology. Conversely, The outpouring of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost was a harbin- the definition has solid biblical warrant in Scripture’s association ger of the church as a Mediterranean entity beyond Palestine by of sending with encounters with human difference. virtue of people of different languages and nationalities being present to hear about “God’s deeds of power” (Acts 2:11). This Difference in Contemporary Thought

Defining Christian mission as ministry in the dimension of dif- Sending is intrinsic to ference connects missiology with the philosophy of difference in contemporary thought. In his seminal 1968 work Difference the concept of mission and Repetition, French philosopher Gilles Deleuze asserted the of any kind. ontological priority of difference over identity. “Conceiving the same on the basis of the different” makes identity secondary to and derivative from difference.17 vision was fulfilled initially not so much through explicit send- Michel Foucault elaborates how difference must be liberated ing as through the geographic dispersion of the Jesus movement from abstraction, concept, representation, and dialectic, and in the persecution that began with the stoning of Stephen (Acts celebrates the fruit of such liberation: 8:1–4). Yet the initiatives of Peter and John in Samaria and Philip with an Ethiopian official, each incident on a frontier of differ- The freeing of difference requires thought without contradic- ence, resulted from explicit sendings by the community or by tion, without dialectics, without negation; thought that accepts the Holy Spirit (Acts 8:14, 26, 29). divergence; affirmative thought whose instrument is disjunction; The boundary-crossing initiative of the early Christian thought of the multiple—of the nomadic and dispersed multiplic- ity that is not limited or confined by the constraints of similarity; community that was both its greatest challenge and its lifeline thought that does not conform to a pedagogical model . . . but to survival was the incorporation of Gentile believers into the that attacks insoluble problems—that is, a thought that addresses body of the faithful without the intermediate step of entering a multiplicity of exceptional points, which are displaced as we Judaism. Peter’s venture with the Roman centurion Cornelius at distinguish their conditions and which insist and subsist in the Caesarea emerged from sendings by the Holy Spirit as Cornelius play of repetitions.18 sent servants to Joppa and as Peter accompanied them home (Acts 10:5–8, 17–22). The commission Paul received through Ananias at So central has difference become that the Encyclopedia of his conversion explicitly affirmed proclamation to Gentiles: “He Philosophy defines postmodernism itself in terms of difference: is an instrument whom I have chosen to bring my name before “Postmodern thought means the appeal to differences—dif- Gentiles and kings and before the people of Israel” (Acts 9:15). In ferences in theories, differences in formulations, differences in defending to the Galatians his work among Gentiles, Paul char- identities. Postmodern thought rejects hierarchies and genealo- acterized both Peter’s errand to Jews and his own to the nations gies, continuities and progress, resolutions and overcomings.”19 as prompted by God’s sending: “He who worked through Peter Writing with urgency to mitigate the clash of civilizations for an apostolate for the circumcised worked through me also [for evident in the attacks of September 11, 2001, Jonathan Sacks calls an apostolate] for the Gentiles” (Gal. 2:8, author’s translation). for a shift away from a Platonic view that true knowledge is to “Apostolate” here represents the Greek apostolēn, a “sending,” be found in universals that generalize from particulars. Instead, or “mission” (so RSV).16 Clearly Paul saw himself as sent to the knowledge and wisdom are accessible from the particulars of Gentiles, an understanding that grounds the historic association human communities. Historically universalist cultures, includ- of the word “mission” with Paul’s outreach and supports the ing contemporary global capitalism, he argues, have viewed association of mission with engaging difference. When toward particularities as “imperfections, the source of error, parochial- the end of his ministry Paul summarized his mission, it is clear ism and prejudice” and have therefore marginalized and dimin- that crossing geographic boundaries and their associated ethnic ished difference in favor of universal categories and goals. Sacks and cultural boundaries was central: “from Jerusalem and as far declares: “We need . . . not only a theology of commonality— around as Ilyricum,” as was the crossing of religious boundaries: of the universals of mankind—but also a theology of difference: “not where Christ has already been named” (Rom. 15:19, 20). why no one civilization has the right to impose itself on others Sending is intrinsic to the concept of mission of any kind. by force: why God asks us to respect the freedom and dignity The biblical data indicate that major developments within of those not like us.”20

202 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 “The PhD in Intercultural Studies program trains students to be both theologically astute and anthropologically sensitive, so that they can better apply the Word of God critically in any human or cultural context. The faculty are all experts in their own right, and they contribute to the richness of the program not only by their theological insights but also by their years of significant intercultural experience. The diversity of the students, both in terms of their cultural background and their cross-cultural ministry experience, creates a unique community where theological and missiological thinking is forged in a highly stimulating context.” —Doctoral student How-Chuang Chua came to Trinity after four years of church planting work as a missionary in Japan.

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IBMR Trinity Evangelical Divinity School 05 | 13 | 2009 [email protected] Sacks thus puts a different twist on classic philosophical journey of understanding is both outward and inward, both ex- debates about the relative reality of universals and particulars, ploratory and reflexive. Knowing the other authentically requires debates that have involved George Berkeley, David Hume, Ber- mature self-knowledge, yet such maturity is not accessible to the trand Russell, A. J. Ayer, and others. Where past stress on the isolated self, or to the isolated society or the isolated culture—or reality of the particular, as opposed to the universal, has entailed the isolated church. We do not and cannot know ourselves truly religious skepticism, Sacks argues instead for the integrity of without knowing the other as well. Similarly, the Gospel under- the particular and the different in God’s revelation and work. standing that Christians of any particular setting have (and the Certainly a theology of difference would stem from the diver- setting may be a region, culture, or church) is intrinsically and sity intrinsic in God’s creativity and would analyze the ways in inevitably partial and incomplete. Every Christian community, which humanity has distorted God’s abundance of difference to wherever it is located, needs the perspective and insight about create a virtual taxonomy of sin, of which the urge to suppress the Gospel that other communities can offer from experiences difference is one expression. and worldviews that are differently shaped. The truth of what The Christian mission enterprise is the world’s most extensive God has done in Christ Jesus in the power of the Holy Spirit and longest sustained engagement with human difference, and is ultimate, universal, and final, but our apprehension of it is it has reflected thoroughly on that engagement. Recent philo- limited, contextual, and provisional. This provisionality draws sophical insistence on the integrity and autonomy of difference us into a pilgrimage into difference, through which we hope to calls on Christian missiology to articulate yet more precisely see less darkly, toward that place where we will see face to face. its stance toward difference, given that mission’s errand in a Mission is ministry in the dimension of difference. This world of difference is founded on a revelation that celebrates understanding identifies the distinctively missional element in both universality and particularity. It may appear incongruous the history of the Christian movement, and it clarifies missiol- to suggest that missiology can be enhanced by postmodern and ogy’s theological reflection on it. It is grounded in Scripture’s deconstructionist perspectives that dismiss the possibility of witness to the sending activity of God, which typically catalyzes universally valid revelations and therefore oppose all universal- God’s people to engage difference. The definition connects mis- izing projects, including religious ones. Yet postmodernism’s siology with contemporary philosophical and theological dis- exploration of the possible priority of difference over identity course about difference. Finally, it provides a criterion of analysis may help explain the perennial Christian conviction that engaging and comparison in the missional lives of the churches, in mis- the other who is different is intrinsic to Christian faithfulness. sion scholarship, and in interreligious discussions of mission in The other who is different presents a frontier over which the a world of difference.

Notes 1. Random House Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, 2nd ed. (New York: 8. Rick Warren, The Purpose-Driven Church: Growth Without Compromising Random House, 2001), s.v. Your Message and Mission (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995); The 2. Stephen Neill, A History of Christian Missions, 2nd ed. (New York: Purpose-Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For? (Grand Rapids: Penguin, 1986), pp. 13–15; David J. Bosch, Transforming Mission: Zondervan, 2002). Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 9. Christianity Today, March 2006; www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2006/ 1991), pp. 519, 28; Anthony J. Gittins, Gifts and Strangers: Meeting the march/16.28.html?start=2. Challenge of Inculturation (Mahwah, N.J.: Paulist Press, 1989), pp. 10. Michael Nazir-Ali, From Everywhere to Everywhere: A World View of 111–36; Darrell L. Guder, ed., Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending Christian Mission (London: SCM, 1990). of the Church in North America (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998), pp. 11. E.g., Pss. 67, 97; Isa. 62; Jer. 46–51; Joel 3:18–21; Amos 9:11–12. 247, 18; J. Andrew Kirk, What Is Mission? Theological Explorations 12. Mark 5:1–20; Matt. 8:5–13; Luke 7:35–50; John 4:1–42, 8:3–11; Luke (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2000), p. 21; Carlos F. Cardoza-Orlandi, 19:1–10; Mark 1:40–45; and Luke 17:11–19. Mission: An Essential Guide (Nashville: Abingdon, 2002), pp. 45–48; 13. Luke 15:1–2. David Smith, Mission After Christendom (London: Darton, Longman & 14. Luke 10:25–37, 18:9–14, 15:3–7. Todd, 2003); Francis Anekwe Oborji, Concepts of Mission: The Evolution 15. Mark identifies her as “a Gentile, of Syro-Phoenician origin” (Mark of Contemporary Missiology (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2006), pp. 7:26). 3–14, 210. 16. The NRSV represents the sense, though not the syntactic form, of 3. Robert Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis the Greek: “He who worked through Peter making him an apostle Books, 1986); Andrew F. Walls, The Missionary Movement in Christian to the circumcised also worked through me in sending me to the History: Studies in the Transmission of Faith (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Gentiles.” Books, 1996); Kwame Bediako, Christianity in Africa: The Renewal of a 17. Gilles Deleuze, Difference and Repetition, trans. Paul Patton (London: Non-Western Religion (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis; Edinburgh: Edinburgh Continuum, 2005), pp. 50–51. Univ. Press, 1995); Lamin Sanneh, Translating the Message: The 18. Michel Foucault, “Theatrum Philosophicum,” in Language, Counter- Missionary Impact on Culture (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1989); memory, Practice: Selected Essays and Interviews by Michel Foucault, Titus Presler, Transfigured Night: Mission and Culture in Zimbabwe’s trans. and ed. Donald F. Bouchard (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell Univ. Press, Vigil Movement (Pretoria: Univ. of South Africa Press, 1999), pp. 1977), p. 185. 215–48. 19. Hugh J. Silverman, “Modernism and Postmodernism,” in Encyclopedia 4. http://counternotions.com/2008/09/22/mission. of Philosophy, 2nd ed., ed. Donald M. Borchert (Farmington, Mich.: 5. www.starbucks.com/mission/default.asp. Macmillan/Thomson Gale, 2006), 6:318. See also David Ingram, 6. www.stmaryslagunabeach.org. “Postmodernism,” ibid., 7:730. 7. www.saddleback.com/aboutsaddleback/index.html. Many 20. Jonathan Sacks, The Dignity of Difference: How to Avoid the Clash of congregations define their mission outwardly, among them First Civilizations, rev. ed. (London: Continuum, 2003), pp. 19, 21. Methodist Church in Seattle, which declares, “We’re out to change the world,” and then clearly distinguishes ministry from mission; see www.firstchurchseattle.org/who-we-are.html.

204 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 The Missiology of Old Testament Covenant Stuart J. Foster

generation ago, Old Testament scholar G. Ernest Wright detailed sacrificial system and regulations described in Leviti- Acommented in the predecessor to this journal: “The cus have many parallels in documents of the second half of the church which lacks the Old Testament again becomes easy prey second millennium b.c.10 The very language of a Ugaritic hymn to paganism.” He explained: “It is the Old Testament which ini- to Baal could be taken over and turned into a hymn to Yahweh tially broke radically with pagan religion and which thus forms (Ps. 29).11 If so much from pagan religious practice was usable, the basis on which the New rests.”1 Since that time, thinking perhaps when redefined, what were the criteria for determining missiologically about the Old Testament has probably not had what was rejected? the attention it deserves.2 The present article, inspired by Wright, sketches out a more precise formulation of his statement: it is the Covenant in the Ancient Near East worldview communicated by covenant concepts, understood in the historical and religious context of the ancient Near East,3 that This brings us back to one of the most widespread pagan customs makes for a radical break with the worldview of paganism.4 Old of all. Throughout the entire ancient Near East, for almost three Testament covenant provides both a model and a standard for millennia, people made covenants. As Donald Wiseman com- communicating the Gospel across cultures.5 ments, “The covenant idea and its terminology has been shown Covenant concepts, used for the relationship between God to form the warp and woof of the fabric of ancient society.”12 and his people, form a large part of the Bible’s skeletal structure. Covenants were a way of creating family-like relationships They may not integrate everything, but without them there is no beyond the natural family (what Frank M. Cross calls “kinship- integration at all.6 This article reviews briefly what a covenant in-law”).13 In scale, they stretched from the intimacy of marriage was in the ancient world. It then asks the missionary question, relationships14 all the way to international and imperial relations. What was accomplished by using covenant ideas (which every An ancient Near Eastern covenant may be defined in its pagan knew) for something radically different—the relationship prototypical form as (1) a chosen (2) relationship of (3) mutual between the creator God and his people? What was the impact, obligation, (4) guaranteed by oath sanctions.15 In any given context what did it communicate, when this God made covenant with only one of these aspects might be in focus. The relationship was a people (as no pagan god ever did)? This article proposes that chosen, perhaps by one party much more than the other; it was the missiological purpose of covenant concepts in the Old Testa- not something people were born into. It was a personal relation- ment can be put in the following terms: The covenant structure ship analogous to family, so that in suzerain-vassal treaties one highlighted relationship with Yahweh and, within that relation- party is “father” and the other is “son”—even where one party ship, elevated exclusivity, security, accountability, and purpose. has just been wreaking havoc on the other. There were mutual Much recent Old Testament scholarship has emphasized obligations, sometimes assumed, sometimes explicit in massive continuities between Israelite beliefs and those of their neigh- detail. The obligations were not necessarily equal by any means, bors. The “radical break” with paganism Wright mentioned is but both parties in a covenant bound themselves to do something rejected or sharply qualified. Robert Gnuse defends continuity for the other, to treat one another in certain ways. Key relational vigorously: “Above all, it is important that future discussion re- terms in the ancient world all have covenantal associations: flect the sensitive awareness of Israel’s great continuity with the “love,” “peace,” and “loyalty” (also “quarrel”—relationships ancient Near Eastern world.” Similarly, Walter Houston writes: break down). Finally, the commitments made were guaranteed “It is not possible any longer to speak of ‘Canaanite’ culture as by oath. The parties invoked the gods to punish any failure to something foreign to Israel.” Ziony Zevit wrote a book entitled keep the commitment. This invocation could be in words or in The Religions [plural!] of Ancient Israel.7 But a careful reading of ritual—for example, the sacrificial dismembering of an animal the Old Testament itself suggests that its writers were well aware stood for what should happen to the person who broke covenant.16 that continuity with the surrounding religions was the normal thing; that is why they had to argue so vigorously against it. The Old Testament Innovation writers were an embattled minority, resisting the assumptions and practices dominant in society. The “radical break” was not easy.8 Pagan gods were an integral part of covenant-making and It would be much simpler if polemic was the only canonical covenant-keeping, but only as witnesses and enforcers (like ref- mode of religious interaction with paganism. Many pagan reli- erees). They were not themselves parties to covenants (they did gious customs were indeed adopted and adapted in normative not play in the game). This brings us to the radical innovation in Israelite religion, let alone popular practice. Winged creatures the Old Testament. There the creator God, Yahweh himself, took called cherubs supported the thrones of pagan gods, just as, on what had always been a human role and made covenant with figuratively speaking, they did Yahweh’s (Ps. 99:1).9 The highly people (while not abandoning the role of enforcer). Traditional pagan practice was both adopted and transformed. Stuart J. Foster and his wife, Sindia, have worked Beyond particular practices and customs lies a system, an 17 with Serving in Mission (SIM) in Mozambique since “overall synthesis.” Ancient paganism was focused on human 1986, where they are part of the Mozambique Bible needs, on maintaining and enhancing fragile human existence in Society’s Lomwe whole-Bible translation project. He is the face of hostile forces. Gregorio Lete writes of Canaanite religion the author of An Experiment in Bible Translation as that the various mythologies addressed “the origin, function and Transcultural Communication (SUN Press, 2008). cessation of human life and of the real world as it unfolds.” These —[email protected] myths provided a framework of meaning. In contrast, the cult (or formal worship practices) dealt with “the more immediate

October 2010 205 demands of the life of the faithful.” For everyday human life in its component central to his understanding of covenant: “The very natural course, “as a technique, the cult tries to co-ordinate and idea of a covenant, on which the history of Israel and the church control . . . by means of well-defined rituals that put the faithful depends, is grounded in God’s faithfulness—that is to say, God’s in contact with the appropriate god for every case.”18 The world principled decision to act in certain ways, and not others, which was saturated with spiritual powers. These were open to human he has disclosed to us.”23 Once again, it mattered that the creator manipulation, but were ultimately arbitrary.19 Yet the promise of God was making these commitments. If his purposes could be power through technique was very attractive. stymied by other powers, they were not worth very much. If The Old Testament proposed a radical innovation, a new they could not be, they were worth a great deal. system tightly organized around relationship with Yahweh.20 As creator God, he had power. But he also committed himself to Accountable. Within the mutual commitment of covenant, security relationship with his people. The covenant refrain “You will be was never divorced from accountability. One of the great tempta- my people, and I will be your God” echoes throughout Scripture tions of Israelite history was to forget this, to cry “The temple of (literally from Genesis to Revelation: Gen. 17:7; Exod. 6:7; 29:45; Yahweh! The temple of Yahweh!” (Jer. 7:4) and to presume that its Lev. 26:12; Num. 15:41; Deut. 7:6; 14:2; 29:12–13; 2 Sam. 7:24; 1 mere presence, or earlier, that of the ark (1 Sam. 4:3), guaranteed Chron. 17:22; Jer. 7:23; 2 Cor. 6:16; Heb. 8:10; Rev. 21:3).21 The use immunity from disaster. Within the pagan system the fundamen- of covenant concepts communicated that this relationship was tal danger was of inadequate manipulation of the gods (though to be exclusive, secure, accountable, and purposeful. there could also be grim consequences for misbehavior). But the Old Testament record relentlessly makes the point that covenant Exclusive. A personal relationship with deity was not in itself unfaithfulness had the most severe consequences. Oaths with unique in the ancient world. Indeed, the great variety of deities sanctions and curses (as well as blessings) were built into the made it quite easy to have personal favorites and specialists for covenant structure. Yahweh could not be manipulated. He would every need. The pagan religious pantheon put competing pow- not abandon the relationship; neither would he let his people ers at the center of its conception of life. However, the political abandon the relationship. Walter Brueggemann comments that law and grace, conditional and unconditional, are “misguided polarities,” and that covenant relation is a deeper category: “Our Covenant concepts most serious relationships, including our relationship to the God of the gospel, are at the same time, profoundly unconditional provided purpose in and massively conditional.”24 history, an overall narrative This tension between security and accountability did not exclude the presence of genuine bafflement from the life of faith, framework of life and experiences of frightening insecurity, or hardship that defied neat meaning. analysis, where covenant transgression and punishment did not line up. Yet this was the framework within which those very problems were brought to Yahweh (Pss. 44; 89). This was why concepts of overlord and vassal in covenant treaties did not allow covenant people had a right to complain to their covenant God, for competing loyalties. Naturally they existed in practice, but “How long?” (Ps. 13). This framework was bigger than the experi- the purpose of an overlord in creating a covenant relationship ence of blessing, which was the goal of paganism. The primacy was to insist on excluding others from that role in the vassal’s of the relationship could even lead to the paradox of a God who life. Like no pagan religious concept, this was a model for com- inflicted hardship, to humble, to test, to grow covenant children municating monotheism, not in an abstract ontological sense, in their trust of their covenant father and lord (Deut. 8:2–5). but as a demand for commitment. Covenant defined and shaped monotheism. This accounts theologically for the prominence of Purposeful. Covenant concepts also provided purpose in history, the treaty form of covenant in the Old Testament. an overall narrative framework of life and meaning. Purpose came Logically, exclusiveness of covenant relationship with Yah- in two ways: from the structure of covenant itself and from the weh depended on his role in creation. Nature was not an arena nature of the God to whom covenant bound his people. of competing powers, but the realm of one ruler. This gave him Covenant structure set up a relationship in time and through both the right to insist on being treated as overlord and the abil- time. The commitment was made at a specific point between ity to fulfill his obligations. His good intentions were not going specific parties. It was explicitly not a natural part of the cycle to be stymied by any opponent. of life.25 It began. It was renewed across generations. Obligations were made for the future. Consequences, both for good and for Secure. The specific, kinship-type, mutual obligations of covenant ill, could be expected. There were curses as well as blessings to communicated a relationship of both security and accountability. be looked for in the realm of historical events. This outlook was Yahweh’s covenant obligations were expressed as promises, not part of the fundamental framework of paganism, which backed up by oath commitments. Such specific commitments sought to sustain cosmic order as life was threatened by chaos. provided a radical security. Noah and his family knew that The covenant tie to the creator God also linked God’s people no other worldwide flood was coming, that the natural cycle to God’s purpose. Because he declared himself to be acting to would not fail until the end. They could set out confidently to renew and restore his creation by dealing with the people he fill and reshape the world (Gen. 9:17–20). Pagan deities had placed in charge of it, his people shared in his purpose. The implicit obligations to defend and provide for their worshipers covenant relationship was designed to lead to the peace of and temples, primarily out of self-interest. But Yahweh made shalom, a comprehensive, wholesome well-being extending explicit commitments. Old Testament theologian Walther Eichrodt throughout a now-marred creation. In the Old Testament, that highlights the covenantal “atmosphere of trust and security” in intimate relationship was never achieved. Though begun, its full contrast to that of pagan religion.22 Alister McGrath makes this consummation lay in the future with the renewal of creation.

206 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 This eschatological framework of final purpose links the Old There is a huge need to find relevant and creative ways of com- Testament story of God’s covenant people with the overarching municating covenant concepts. Otherwise, the Old Testament’s story of the whole Bible. Thus Christopher Wright argues that the own coherence and impact will be lost to many. It will merely be grand narrative which “embodied Israel’s coherent worldview” assorted stories used to illustrate whatever points the interpreter can be summarized by the sequence of covenants that were made brings to the text. and remade through the Old Testament and into the New.26 As Nonetheless, Old Testament covenant missiology provides N. T. Wright puts it, discussing the problem of evil in creation: both a model and a challenge. Christians who seek to think mis- “The question is no longer a static one, as though the world siologically about God’s world and act for him in it need to be simply existed in a settled state; it is dynamic and relational. If sure they are shaped by covenant. there is an answer to the problem of evil, it will include divine The model is the bold use of pagan customs to communicate action within history.”27 Covenant connected people to this God. about God, appropriating language, rituals, and a whole pack- His divine action would be in and through them. In the overall age of concepts. Some Christians adopt the techniques of sales structure of the Scriptures, the unfinished narrative of the Old and marketing or the therapeutic language of pop psychology Testament sets up a climax of covenant fulfillment focused on or the environmentalist ideology of planet-saving. Others seek Jesus in the New Testament. to reinterpret “Islam” (literally “submission to God”). Others The Assyrians, as one example, were happy to argue that their expect direct interaction with vigorous, active spirit powers. god Asshur willed the expansion of the Assyrian empire—they Others structure their leadership in the traditional patterns of had a purpose in history!28 The point is not that ancient Near their culture. These appropriations are not automatically wrong Eastern religions did not have examples of purpose, of account- by any means; they follow the model. ability, of security, and even of exclusivity. What was distinctive The challenge is to see that any such use leads people to G. was the overall synthesis made by Old Testament covenant-shaped Ernest Wright’s “radical break”—a transformation of underly- theology, which sought to integrate life tightly around relationship ing system and worldview. What is communicated needs to be with Yahweh, using a common cultural form in a startling way. a relationship with Yahweh (through Jesus) that is exclusive in its loyalty, that is secure yet accountable, and that is purposeful, aligning Conclusion people with the grand narrative of what God is doing in history. The Old Testament itself makes it clear that this is no simple, Many societies in the twenty-first century no longer have an one-step process. But it cannot be skipped or ignored by those understanding of ancient covenant customs. For most contempo- who take the Scriptures seriously. Otherwise the people of God rary English speakers the term “covenant” itself is archaic to the may discover that the pagan customs they use are taking control. point of obscurity. Some peoples may have no clear traditional G. Ernest Wright lamented that too many Christians paid custom for making those who are unrelated by birth into family. too little attention to the Old Testament. His implied plea for (Lomwe speakers in northern Mozambique are one example.) redressing missiological neglect of the Old Testament still stands.

Notes 1. G. Ernest Wright, “The Old Testament: A Bulwark of the Church God, p. 325). While I agree, I would also argue that the integrating Against Paganism,” Occasional Bulletin from the Missions Research theme of the creator God who makes covenant ranges across the full Library 14, no. 4 (1963): 8, 9. sweep of the Old Testament and into the New as nothing else does. 2. A major exception is the work of another Wright: Christopher J. H. Yet another Wright, New Testament scholar N. T. (“Tom”) Wright, Wright. His book The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible’s Grand sums up the controlling themes of first-century, Scripture-shaped Narrative (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2006) models Judaism (and Christianity) as “creation and covenant” (Paul: In Fresh an integration of missiology and Old Testament study evident Perspective [Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005], pp. 21–24). in his commentary on Deuteronomy (New International Biblical 7. Robert Gnuse, Heilsgeschichte as a Model for Biblical Theology: The Commentary: Deuteronomy [Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1996]) Debate Concerning the Uniqueness and Significance of Israel’s Worldview and, indeed, in almost all his other publications. By contrast, David (Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1989), p.117; Walter Bosch’s Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission Houston, Purity and Monotheism: Clean and Unclean Animals in Biblical (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1991), while conceding that “the Law (Sheffield, Eng.: Academic Press, 1993), pp. 120–21; Ziony Zevit, Old Testament is fundamental to the understanding of mission in The Religions of Ancient Israel: A Synthesis of Parallactic Approaches the New” (p. 17), gives it only five pages of attention out of 519 (London: Continuum, 2001). pages of text overall. 8. It should be noted that even Gnuse eventually acknowledges “the 3. The development of covenant theology in Reformed theology is complete emergence of a new worldview” in Israel (Heilsgeschichte as outside the focus here. a Model, p.145). He sees this as the culmination of a lengthy process 4. I am aware that for many the terms “pagan” and “paganism” are and dates it rather close to the New Testament era. pejorative. They are not intended here in that sense but are used 9. Othmar Keel, The Symbolism of the Biblical World: Ancient Near Eastern to highlight common elements in many ancient religions, in which Iconography and the Book of Psalms, trans. T. J. Hallett (New York: worshipers related to a multiplicity of often competing spiritual Seabury, 1978), p. 169. powers. It should be noted that G. Ernest Wright’s article addresses 10. Allan Millard, “The History of Israel Against the Background of (among other things) a highly intellectual and sophisticated paganism Ancient Near Eastern Religious History,” in From the Ancient Sites that he saw as very attractive to mid-twentieth-century North of Israel: Essays on Archaeology, History, and Theology, in Memory of America. Aapeli Saarisalo (1896–1986), ed. T. Eskola and E. Junkkaala (Helsinki: 5. An earlier version of these ideas is found in Stuart Foster, An Theological Institute of Finland, 1998), pp. 106–10. Experiment in Bible Translation as Transcultural Communication 11. Jeffrey J. Niehaus, God at Sinai: Covenant and Theophany in the Bible (Stellenbosch: SUN Press, 2008), pp. 74–82, along with a more and Ancient Near East (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995), pp. 163–71. detailed defense of the positions taken here. 12. Donald J. Wiseman, “‘Is It Peace?’—Covenant and Diplomacy,” Vetus 6. Christopher Wright is quick to concede that there is no such thing Testamentum 32, no. 3 (1982): 311. as a single “center” for all Old Testament theology (The Mission of 13. Frank Moore Cross, “Kinship and Covenant in Ancient Israel,” in

October 2010 207 From Epic to Canon: History and Literature in Ancient Israel (Baltimore: officiants and participants in these rituals had a sense of control over Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1998), pp. 6–7. their own destinies” (The Religions of Ancient Israel, p. 585). 14. For a thorough defense of ancient marriage customs as indeed 20. Note Daniel I. Block’s contention that “the Israelite perspective covenantal, see Gordon Hugenberger, Marriage as a Covenant: Bib- . . . appears to have broken new trails in ancient Semitic thought” lical Law and Ethics as Developed from Malachi (Grand Rapids: Baker (The Gods of the Nations: Studies in Ancient Near Eastern National Books, 1998). Theology [Jackson, Miss.: Evangelical Theological Society, 1988], 15. See Stuart Foster, “A Prototypical Definition of bryt, ‘Covenant,’ in p. 22, also p. 166). Biblical Hebrew,” Old Testament Essays 19, no. 1 (2006): 35–46; see 21. The following other texts contain probable allusions to the formula: also Hugenberger, Marriage as a Covenant, pp. 167–215. Deut. 14:21; 27:9; 1 Chron. 17:21; 2 Chron. 20:7; Neh. 9:32; Ps. 33:12; 16. Hayim Tadmor, “Treaty and Oath in the Ancient Near East: A 47:9; 50:7; 95:7; 100:3; Isa. 40:1; Hos. 2:23; Zech. 13:9. Historian’s Approach,” in Humanizing America’s Iconic Book: Society 22. Walther Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament, vol. 1, trans. J. A. of Biblical Literature Centennial Addresses, ed. G. M. Tucker and D. A. Baker (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1961), p. 38. Knight (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1982), p. 135. 23. Alister E. McGrath, “Contributors: An Appreciation and Response,” 17. Robert Gnuse, No Other Gods: Emergent Monotheism in Israel (Sheffield, in Alister E. McGrath and Evangelical Theology: A Dynamic Engagement, Eng.: Academic Press, 1997), p. 229. ed. S. W. Chung (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), p. 348. 18. Gregorio del Olmo Lete, Canaanite Religion: According to the Liturgical 24. Walter Brueggemann, The Covenanted Self: Explorations in Law and Cov- Texts of Ugarit, trans. Wilfred G. E. Watson (Bethesda, Md.: CDL Press, enant, ed. P. D. Muller (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1999), pp. 37, 36. 1999), p. 44. 25. Note the essential role of the historical prologue in the treaty form 19. Ziony Zevit summarizes religious rituals this way, referring to what of many ancient covenants; see Kenneth Kitchen, On the Reliability he considers the majority practice of ancient Israelites: “They were of the Old Testament (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), pp. 287–90. technical ways of guaranteeing much of what communities desired: 26. Christopher J. H. Wright, The Mission of God, p. 325. physical safety, natural and human fertility, placating (untimely) 27. N. T. Wright, Christian Origins and the Question of God, vol. 1, The New death, longevity and access to information about the future. By Testament and the People of God (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1992), achieving these through popular rituals, which presupposed p. 252. a somewhat mechanical, almost automatic and conventionally 28. H. W. F. Saggs, The Encounter with the Divine in Mesopotamia and Israel recognized tit-for-tat arrangement with the divine powers that be, (London: Athlone Press, 1978), p. 84.

Beyond Contextualization: Toward a Twenty-first-Century Model for Enabling Mission R. Daniel Shaw

n one course I taught recently, I had forty-two students intrinsically cross-disciplinary, drawing from a multiplicity of Ifrom thirteen nations, with a combined 313 years of mis- sources, including theology, the social sciences, and religious sion experience in forty-six countries. Such prior knowledge of studies.2 Having moved beyond the dated boundaries of colo- the world generates an expectation of rich classroom participa- nial paradigms, missiology seeks to integrate perspectives and tion and dialogue. Managing the interaction is both reward- data from social, political, economic, and religious spheres long ing and challenging for professors who seek to ensure that all held separate. voices are heard. Such a teaching experience is symptomatic of With more missionaries coming from the non-Western world, our contemporary world and reflects the shifts taking place in Ajith Fernando’s call for changing the missionary job description the nature of mission. How can we build maximally on these must be taken seriously. He argued that local people must be changes to reflect the glory of God throughout the earth? These allowed to do what they best know how to do, while outsiders shifts signal the need for a new approach in the way we teach should assist in ways that reflect their strengths.3 Fernando’s missiology, as well as in how we approach the challenging task and Massey’s observations underscore an increasing need for we call world mission. missiologists also to incorporate the contributions of recent In the circumstances of our post–9/11 and increasingly post- psychological, linguistic, and anthropological explorations into Christian world, what resources does missiology as a discipline “mind-brain” processing. The implications of this growing cog- have for responding to current challenges? A decade ago Doreen nitive discipline place new emphasis on the processes involved Massey, in an article reflecting on the state of affairs throughout in mission and raise questions about appropriate ways to equip the social sciences, emphasized the need for crossing disciplin- future “message bearers.”4 ary boundaries.1 Missiology, itself a very young discipline, is Global understanding of what mission is has shifted; height- ened awareness of contemporary world conditions is called for.5 R. Daniel Shaw, Professor of Anthropology and At the same time, the heart of mission hears the call to discern Translation, School of Intercultural Studies, Fuller God’s intent for human beings and to consider how we who go Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California, served in Christ’s name can enable people everywhere to understand with the Summer Institute of Linguistics in Papua what that intent might mean for their spiritual well-being.6 These New Guinea (1969–81). He is the author of ten books two—the conditions of our world as disclosed by the human on culture and translation, folk religion, and herme- sciences and God’s Good News that Christ is the source of our neutics, including two ethnographies of the Samo. reality—form twin points of reference as I seek to apply recent —[email protected] cognitive models of cultural understanding to mission practice.7

208 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Twentieth-Century Colonial Models to God. Using their own understanding, they can connect with the message that clearly impacts them and do so in ways that From William Carey through most of the twentieth century, the outsiders, in large measure, cannot fathom.14 More attention Protestant approach to missions can be viewed in large measure began to be paid to the fact that Scripture emphasizes incarna- as one of cargo. It was perceived as a matter of conveying the tion instead of communication. God demonstrated the concept in Gospel, however defined, as a product from Christendom to poor the Garden of Eden, and the theme extends all the way through benighted heathen. Though largely altruistic and well-meaning, the canon to Revelation. Christ’s sojourn on earth was the ultimate this approach to mission coincided with expansive Western colo- expression of “God with us” (John 1:14, 1 John 1:2), but the entire nization as well as with burgeoning Western business enterprise canon is about God’s desire to interact with human beings, who around the globe.8 As a result, a Western understanding of God are viewed as the crown of creation (Ps. 8:5), among whom God became hegemonic, one that had been developed over centu- seeks to dwell (Exod. 6:7). ries by wedding Hellenistic logic to the scholastic method. As Westerners, missionaries assumed a realist perspective, that held The Need for a New Model truth (God’s truth) to be timeless and culture-free. Any contex- tualization attempted was culturally conditioned to fit Western A revolution in the social sciences began in the mid-twentieth categories and was relevant to the colonial powers rather than century. Following the philosophical developments of Jean Piaget being connected to local cultures. and Lev Vygotsky in psychology, Noam Chomsky in 1959 spoke In the mid-twentieth century the work of Eugene Nida took out strongly against the behaviorist approach to understanding Protestant mission theory a step beyond this product-oriented human experience (language, culture, and emotion).15 Chomsky’s model. Nida adapted communication theory to develop a Source- work—which sought to isolate the underlying triggers of meaning Message-Receptor (S-M-R) model of mission. 9 The S-M-R model that can be expressed in a myriad of ways, linguistically as well focused on codes presented by a communicator that receptors in as culturally—excited anthropologists and psychologists. Ward turn had to process in order for them to make sense. To the extent that the forms used by receptors matched the meanings presented by the source, the message was deemed communicative. The com- Source Encode Message Decode Receptor municator, however, retained control of the content, and Western assumptions were almost always operative. The S-M-R model yielded a picture, in effect, Feedback Loop of theologically trained missionaries tak- ing the message of the Gospel to people of differing cultures and circumstances and Each link is dependent on the one before it. Focus is on product or result. telling them to follow the missionary’s way to God. This largely prescriptive Figure 1. Serial Processing of Codes approach to communicating the Gospel placed the emphasis on what the Gospel is (especially what it is Goodenough redefined culture, not as the sum total of human for the communicator) and the results it brings rather than on experience but as what people need to know in order to behave the nature of the relationship between people and God. correctly.16 Prototype theory in linguistics, advanced by Eleanor Taking its cue from Nida, the communication model for Rosch, focused on categories that reflect psychological reality. mission that prevailed during the second half of the twentieth She began with color but the concept was quickly applied to century focused on clearly presenting the codes and ensuring that kinship and all manner of linguistic and cultural categories that the message as decoded was the “closest natural equivalent.”10 impact how human beings process information. These studies Conceptually, this encoding/decoding model focuses on the sequential linkages between elements in a “serial processing structure,” with each link dependent on the one before it (see figure 1).11 The model was extremely helpful in enabling mis- Despite having “dynamic siologists to develop the concept of contextualization, as well as equivalence” in its name, making a vital contribution to Bible translation.12 Despite having the model was relatively “dynamic equivalence” in its name, however, the model was relatively static and product oriented: the goal was to present static and product oriented. the Gospel properly, as understood in the West, in a new context and thereby enable people to have God’s Word in their environ- ment so that they could be enriched by knowledge that those contributed to George Lakoff’s work on metaphor.17 Anna in the West had already acquired. Mission became a matter of Wierzbicka’s work on semantic primes and the early work of knowledge transfer, and it remained embedded in an essentially the cognitive linguists helped in developing a new understand- colonial approach to communicating God’s truth.13 By default, ing of mental processes as “connectionist networks” by which the meaning of what God has to say was viewed as bound to the the mind processes information.18 In 1995 Roy D’Andrade laid text, in the possession of the communicator, rather than being out the development of this revolution, particularly focusing on relevant to the context where the receptor lived. the concept of schemas.19 A transition began in the late twentieth century, exemplified Connectionist network theory reflects an entirely different by David Bosch: people must be allowed to find their own way model of how the human brain works. As ideas enter awareness,

October 2010 209 individuals process information based on their experience with should mission theorists engage those findings in developing the schema the information elicits. Incoming information is new mission approaches? Not just cognitive studies, but all fields assessed by comparing it with what the mind-brain already of endeavor in our rapidly changing post-Christian world are knows. While processing new information, individuals uncon- undergoing development. How should mission teachers respond sciously seek to expend the least amount of effort for the greatest so as to equip their students for effective service as Gospel mes- gain. Their perception of value or benefit is directly correlated sage bearers in reaching the world for Christ? These questions with what is considered pertinent within a particular context. dominate the remainder of my discussion. But what is considered pertinent is culturally conditioned, which means that all kinds of information—psychological, linguistic, Seeking Cognitive Balance and cultural—are forced to interact simultaneously. The implications of this approach are vast. The S-M-R, or According to relevance theory, communication is always designed code, model is linear and focused on the result, that is, the deliv- to change the “mutual cognitive environment” by precipitating ery, in as intact a fashion as possible, of a prepackaged product. transformation that results in a new balance.23 The mental- Connectionist network theory, by contrast, directs attention to neurological network is always seeking balance, which, when the processes by which recipients construct meaning in their achieved, is not the same as it was before the new information contexts. The diagram in figure 2 attempts to represent a con- came in. The scope of relevance theory goes far beyond the nectionist network. The complex process shown in the diagram impact of speech and includes all the senses, which are con- is actually slower than the serial processing of earlier linear stantly enhancing human experience and triggering adjustments models, but it more clearly represents how human beings process relevant to understanding.24 Cognitive study encompasses all information.20 This process-oriented model can be related directly aspects of human understanding: cognitive, evaluative, and affec- to Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson’s “inferential model,” or relevance theory 21 of communication. The starting point Cognitive Environment for relevance theory is the intent of the communicator. For Sperber and Wilson, effective or “relevant” communication takes place when an audience infers the intent of the presenter and both the intent and the inferences more or less match. As Feedback anyone who has traveled knows, there is Schema much room for mismatch and therefore individual miscommunication. How much energy and Inference people are willing to expend on process- collective ing information is largely a product of the perceived benefit. Changes come Connectionist/ about from a desire to build relationship Network Ideas Approach through the communication process. The greater the shared experience, the greater the likelihood of effective exchanges that Least effort for maximum understanding. Focus is on processing of ideas. will create mutual understanding and relationship. Communication needs to capture the conceptual awareness that Figure 2. Parallel Distributive Processing of Ideas begins with a communicator’s intent, but it is simultaneously dependent on the knowledge-base of tive. The intent of the source of the communication and the infer- the people in the new audience and on their experience with the ences an audience makes regarding that intent jointly seek a new ideas being introduced. path of least resistance to achieve maximum understanding for It is important to take note of the feedback loop present in mutual benefit. Through interaction both the source and the both the S-M-R model and the inferential model. Feedback is audience expand their mutual but different understandings. crucial to communication, and how people respond is critical Both the message bearer and the receptor are changed; neither to ongoing communication in either model. The difference is cognitive environment is left unaltered. Each arrives at a new the focus of the two models, either on the surface forms and balance that provides insight regarding the entire experience.25 meanings (words, grammar, and all the trappings of communi- When this understanding of the communicative process is cation and culture) or on the deeper, cognitive understanding applied to communicating the Gospel, the stakes grow larger. If of intended meanings. Kraft had it right when he emphasized the intent of Gospel communication is to enable people to become “receptor-oriented communication.”22 In mission theory we must more like God intended them to be, that is, to display God’s im- move to a new model that emphasizes the process rather than age, then transformation in those who bring the Gospel and in the product. The code model asks, “How is an understanding of those who hear and “receive” it will move both toward that goal. God translated or transmitted from one set of cultural forms and This understanding has important theological implications for meanings to another?” The inferential model asks, “How does long-established missiological themes surrounding God’s will, God’s intent become cognitively relevant to and understood by the incarnation, the role of the Holy Spirit, the nature of the mes- human beings?” sage, how the message works itself out in a new environment, The findings of cognitive studies have significant implications and how new disciples will themselves be missional. By implica- for our understanding of effective cross-cultural mission. How tion, theological development is respective to the environment in

210 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 which people think about God, that is, in which they theologize. economic changes represented by globalization, tribalization, Mission practitioners must strive to foster development of a bibli- and cultural upheaval engulf our world, we find ourselves in a cal theology in the new context that is perceived by the receptors Kuhnian period of adjustment.29 to be relevant and that brings change.26 The precipitated change Because cognitivist network theory posits incremental read- should impact those who receive the Word without leaving the justment (people are being constantly bombarded from every message bearers who initiated the process untouched. angle with new input and are in quest for a new steady state), the I found this to be the case in my experience as a Bible trans- model would seem to be at odds with the Kuhnian picture of revo- lator among the Samo in the jungles of Papua New Guinea’s lutionary rather than evolutionary paradigm shift. But gradual Western Province.27 I entered their environment with my theologi- accumulation of small-scale changes is what Kuhn characterizes cal boxes set, all systematized and ready to be communicated. as an era of “normal science.” The period since the Enlightenment The problem was can be viewed that the Samo did as one such era. not have boxes Descriptive— Cognitive— Then comes an similar to mine. Delivery Mission Discover Meaning event or set of cir- It was only as (Doing) (Being) cumstances that they enabled me raises challenges to see the world • Great Commission • Relationship and to the status quo through their Mission (McGavran) Shift from Transformation (Lingenfelter) so significant eyes that I was • Largely Individual Product • Increasingly Group Oriented that suddenly the able to translate • Static and Largely Orientation (teamwork) normalcy of the God’s Word and External (telling) to • Dynamic and Largely Internal old paradigm be- introduce it into • Contextualization Process (enabling) comes problem- their context. My (make Christianity Orientation • Beyond Contextualization atic. Whatever the cognitive envi- like culture) (knowledge transforms— fate of arguments ronment changed • Local Theology (from Doing focus on knowing God) that we are now as I gained new • Church Growth to Being) • Biblical Theology in Context in the throes of a perceptions of (numbers) • Interactive Hermeneutical wholesale para- things I thought Community (discipleship— digm shift, clear- I knew about God missional/emerging church) ly considerable but that, in reality, transformation the Samo under- Figure 3. Contrasting Models of Mission is taking place.30 stood better than The world envi- I did. I learned to think from within their categories, or “boxes,” ronment is now markedly different from what it was even a few and am so much more aware of God because of it. The reality of years ago, posing probing questions both for the world at large the spirit world around them is a case in point. My view cast a and for missiology as a multidisciplinary field.31 disparaging eye on the presence of the hogai (bush spirits), but For mission theory the question becomes one of how to move their perspective enforced the need for protection at every turn, from a sending or transmittal approach to transformational mission leading to camouflage, amulets, and rituals to keep spirits at bay. with a focus on relationships.32 Furthermore, how can those who They would not let me walk a forest trail without an escort—“in are being transformed be encouraged to go beyond themselves case hogai appear.” These were committed Christians who knew and to become missional, that is, sent by God to others who also and understood Scripture and applied their cultural awareness to need transformation? Here we find a need for the old paradigm, interpreting what the Scriptures say about spiritual beings. I have as well as a new model. It is a case of both-and, not of either/or. found that these spiritual forces are very real and that they impact To insist on a rigid choice between the old and the new would our lives whether we realize it or not. I have learned so much! itself be to cling to the old model. The code model and the infer- ential model are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Our desire Implications of Developing a New Model should be to complement the old by adding the strengths of the new, thereby reducing the weaknesses of both. What effect does incarnation—or the theological concept of God New approaches for communicating the Gospel need to with us, which permeates the whole of Scripture—have on the take into account equipping and encouraging members of the human condition? How can missiologists incorporate insights local community to be missional among their own people, for from contemporary academic research into their thinking so as to they best understand their own cognitive environment and make adjustments in present-day approaches to mission? Figure intuitively possess an awareness of how inferences made within 3 presents an oversimplified attempt to contrast the assump- it will effect a response to God’s intent. The dynamism of such tions of the code, or S-M-R, model with those of the inferential an approach is superior to having message bearers tell people model, or relevance theory, and to adumbrate a new approach what outsiders think insiders need to know. A transition is for contemporary mission. For such an effort the concept of para- needed from preaching the Gospel to living the Gospel within digms as used in the social sciences is helpful. Manifestations the context where people live. will vary with every context, but, following Thomas Kuhn, we This point demands that we reexamine our understanding of can understand paradigms as reflecting assumptions, values, contextualization. Instead of outsiders reconfiguring local cultural symbols, and representations of ideas that drive human inter- forms to fit the shape of Christianity with which they are familiar, est. Kuhn maintained that paradigms do not evolve slowly over we need—following the theological implications of the incarna- time; instead they change rapidly within a discipline because of tion—to allow local people to contemplate the implications of the buildup of unforeseen pressures.28 As social, political, and God-in-their-midst. Agbonkhianmeghe Orobator addresses this

October 2010 211 concern in Theology Brewed in an African Pot, where he highlights be interactive, modeled on God’s communication with human the important role of community in theological reflection. When beings. It is relational, with a focus on being rather than doing. situated in the experience of the community, theology enables It is primarily enabling and encouraging rather than static and people to bring biblical understanding to the process of living.33 knowledge-focused. It envisions a biblical theology in context The matter cannot be given the extended discussion it deserves rather than a contextual theology. here, but new approaches require the humility to recognize that What does a missional approach for the twenty-first century where Gospel message bearers now dare to go, God has always look like? From the discussion so far, it must be dynamic and been. interactive, intentional, relevant, global, and transformational. I now present each of these in turn. Toward a New Missional Perspective • Dynamic and interactive. Meaningful relationships with How might a contemporary mission approach be defined? human beings emanate from a vibrant relationship with David Bosch and Paul Hiebert help to point the way for us. God. Who will cross our path today, and how can we be Bosch discussed paradigm shifts with their accompanying used by God to touch them? shifts in epistemological approach as being critical to theologiz- • Intentional. Understanding God’s intention to communi- ing. He cautioned against a monolithic approach to theology, cate, we follow God’s example as we intentionally com- represented by the old paradigm, and advocated a “critical her- municate in ways that recognize the need to be relevant meneutic” that recognizes the biblical text, by its very nature, and appropriate in specific contexts. as contextual. God has interacted with human beings through • Relevant. In order to be relevant, missional message bearers time and space and in multiple contexts so as to communicate must be appropriate from the perspective of those with God’s intent and God’s desire to be in relationship with human whom they interact. Being relevant demands consider- beings, wherever they are found.34 able anthropological research to bring to light things that In discussing contextualization, Paul Hiebert also used people in other cognitive environments simply assume. the term “critical,” pointing out the dangers of uncritically con- Their perspective is reality for them, and the only way textualizing from a strictly local perspective.35 Sadly, he was the message can make sense to them is by connecting not understood, and contextualization became a catchword for with their assumptions. “localization.” For Hiebert, “critical” implied a standard, so the • Global. Because the world is dynamic and integrated— Bible, not another cultural context, must be the standard for connected via 24/7 media coverage, real time Web- judging relevance. Contextualization forces interactive reflec- streaming, and reality TV—there is little isolation.40 But tion, and it is from the interplay between people’s understand- globalization is much more than media coverage; almost ing of God’s intention for all human beings as well as for their any activity affects others half a world away. Local wars particular environment that transformation takes place, that is, become international incidents, the world is awash with transformation that is both true to God’s intent and also relevant migrants, disease in one place impacts every place, and within the context. personal issues become the business of multitudes. We A contextualized biblical theology reflects God’s intention are each other’s neighbor, regardless of where on the for the people of a particular time and place and enables those planet we find ourselves. involved (both insiders and outsiders) to be transformed more • Transformational. Relevance theory demonstrates that fully into the image of God. At this point, cognitive studies become transformation is directly intertwined with cultural, highly significant for contemporary mission: we must value the linguistic, and psychological factors. When processed in “receptional apparatus” God has created. Human beings every- light of new information, the familiar is reframed, and where were created by God with a mind-brain for processing, new understandings arise within the community so that through language and psychosocial awareness, all manner of transformation “makes sense.” In this dynamic interaction human experience, including new transculturated conceptual- all parties are transformed. Relationship is always a two- izations.36 It is necessary to move beyond contextualization, as way street; local people come to see things from a different previously conceived, to recognition of God’s presence in the perspective as do message bearers; everyone comes away midst of people everywhere and to recognition of the ways that changed. Transformation is not a case of one-size-fits-all presence enables people to “know God.”37 for everyone in a context. If anthropology has established This new missional model reflects God’s intention for people anything, it is the fact of variation within any community, “from every race, tribe, nation, and language” (Rev. 7:9 CEV). As even though at one level successful interaction depends a statement of purpose, that wording may not seem new, but the on having people in a society agree on what they hold emphasis the model places on the relevance of every context is to be true. Transformation takes place only when the quite different from twentieth-century approaches to mission. As community reaches a decision that what they have held God’s Word enlightens people of every cognitive environment, to be true needs adjustment based on some standard to it transforms people’s experience in each specific context.38 We which they collectively agree. As Oswald Chambers so must constantly juxtapose the general and the specific. As Charles clearly states, “Reality is Redemption, not my experience Van Engen notes, we must recognize both the “Church” (God’s of Redemption; but Redemption has no meaning for me people) and churches (God’s representatives in a particular place), until it speaks the language of my conscious life.”41 “Theology” (God’s intent for human beings) and theologies (God’s revelation as processed by particular communities of believers), In sum, being missional encompasses the “essential nature “contextualization” (God with us) and what Van Engen calls and vocation of the church as God’s called and sent people,” “re-contextualization” (people knowing God in their midst).39 which, in turn, enables God’s people to represent God’s intention As noted earlier, the new model for mission accents a both- in the world.42 The more complex our world becomes, the greater and approach rather than an either/or perspective. It seeks to the number of options for being missional. What is critical is that

212 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 WILLIAMSELECTED TITLES CAREY FROM LIBRARY

Telling God’s Stories Is Hearing Enough? with Power Literacy and the Great Storytelling in Oral Cultures Commandments

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• GEOSTATUS: 70 Global Diagrams • COSMO-CHRONOLOGY: Chronology of world evangelization from Creation to New Creation • MARTYROLOGY: Th e demographics of Christian martyrdom, AD 33-AD 2001 • GEO-RENEWAL: Four mega-typologies analyzing empirical global Christianity • INDEPENDENCY: Post-denominationalism World Christian Trends, • GEO-TRENDS: Statistical trends over 2,000 years AD 30-AD 2200 • WHO’S WHO: Names and biographies • GLOBALISTICS: Quick-reference global statistical index on 4,200 subjects David Barrett & Todd Johnson • MONITORING: Monitoring global Christianity and world evangelization ISBN: 9780878086085 • MISSIOMETRICS: Science of mission: counting, measuring, and interpreting global Christianity 2001 WCL | 928 pages | hardcover • GEO-SCRIPTURES: Global distribution and density of Christian scriptures, AD 30- AD 2025 Our price: $79.99 • FINANCE: Th e fi nances of global Christianity, AD 1900-AD 2001 3 or more: $54.99 • EVANGELIZATION: Evangelize in 420 dimensions; its historical development • GEO-STRATEGIES: 1,500 global plans to evangelize the world

In so many subject areas of world evangelization, World Christian Trends still represents the most comprehensive analysis ever done! www.missionbooks.org • 1-800-MISSION mission emerges from an attitude of heart that God uses to do The implications of transformational development are God’s work in the world at large. God is about the business of multitudinous and must always be weighed within a context. drawing human beings to God’s self, and they, in turn, desire to The exact manifestations of transformation in various contexts, draw others to God. academic and otherwise, are relative to the time and place and to the needs of the people with whom we interact. Working out Missiological Implications those details is part of the ongoing task placed before the wider missiological community. As a professor, my desire is for students The systems of the world at large—sociocultural structures, to go from my classes prepared to reenter the environments from political relationships, interdependent financial arrangements, which they came, challenged and encouraged to develop new and and even manifestations of increasing religious fundamentalism contextually relevant applications of missiological perspectives. —all indicate that radical changes are afoot. Old ways of interact- My prayer is for them to bring change to the church in those ing with and becoming knowledgeable about these world sys- places and, in the process, send others forth to be a witness in tems no longer work. Similarly, we have begun the transition other places. to a new missiological model that radically reshapes how we As an anthropologist, I realize there is much that I can learn go about connecting human beings with the Gospel. Relevance from every sociolinguistic group. Others know so much about theory is more than a theory of communication. It is a philosophy spiritual power, about relationships, about what it means to be of how we are to relate to each person we meet. Relevance theory human.43 If as message bearers we are to communicate with people offers a fresh understanding of the Gospel, with its potential to everywhere, we first must truly hear their voices and allow them transform both those who bear the message and those who hear to move us beyond what we already know. Reconceptualizing it. As we reach out missionally, we, like Paul, are blessed (1 Cor. the praxis of mission on the basis of relevance theory and an 9:23). But our attitude as we connect with the world at large is inferential understanding of cognition calls for a major overhaul critical. God gives us relationships with believers (for training of traditional missiological models. Jesus came to connect with and equipping for further ministry), as well as with nonbelievers real people who expressed human need. To do so, he entered (for being Jesus in the midst of needy people). We must follow their world, took up their language with its implicit categories, the example our Lord set in sending his disciples to the ends of learning the shapes and contents of their mental and conceptual the earth. He encouraged them, as well as us, to connect with “boxes.” We who call ourselves by his name must, as he did, go people wherever they might be found, to build them up in the beyond our context, learn from those with whom we interact, faith, and to encourage them in turn to do the same for others and become God’s intention to them—the Word in their midst. (Matt. 28:18–20).

Notes 1. Doreen Massey, quoting Immanuel Wallerstein, states that “‘defining 12. Charles R. Taber, “Is There More Than One Way to Do Theology?” a discipline defines what lies beyond it’ . . . [seeing] identity as Gospel in Context 1 (1978): 4–10; Charles H. Kraft, Christianity in constituting itself, through counterposition; through a process of Culture: A Study in Dynamic Biblical Theologizing in Cross-Cultural differentiating itself from what it is not” (“Negotiating Disciplinary Perspective (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1979). Boundaries,” Current Sociology 47, no. 4 [1999]: 6). 13. See Paul G. Hiebert, The Missiological Implications of Epistemological 2. A half century ago Donald McGavran noted the fact of missiology’s Shifts: Affirming Truth in a Modern/Postmodern World (Harrisburg, Pa.: cross-disciplinary character. See Donald A. McGavran, ed., Church Trinity Press International, 1999). Growth and Christian Mission (New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 14. Bosch, Transforming Mission, pp. 307–8, 362. p. 239. 15. Jean Piaget, The Psychology of Intelligence (London: Routledge and 3. Ajith Fernando, “Missionaries Still Needed: But of a Special Kind,” Kegan Paul, 1951); Lev Vygotsky, Thought and Language (Cambridge, Evangelical Missions Quarterly 24, no. 1 (1988): 18–25. Mass.: MIT Press, 1972); Noam Chomsky, Syntactic Structures (The 4. Ryan S. Shaw uses the term “message bearer” in place of the word Hague: Mouton, 1957) and review of Verbal Behavior, by B. F. Skinner, “missionary.” See his Waking the Giant: The Resurging Student Mission Language 35, no. 1 (1959): 26–58. Movement (Pasadena, Calif.: William Carey Library, 2006), p. 8. 16. Ward Goodenough, “Componential Analysis and the Study of 5. Jehu J. Hanciles, “Migration and Mission: Some Implications for the Meaning,” Language 32 (1956): 195–216. Twenty-first-Century Church,” International Bulletin of Missionary 17. Eleanor Rosch, “Natural Categories,” Cognitive Psychology 4 (1973): Research 27 no. 4 (2003): 146–53. 328–50; George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, Metaphors We Live By 6. R. Daniel Shaw and Charles E. Van Engen, Communicating God’s (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1980). Word in a Complex World: God’s Truth or Hocus Pocus? (Lanham, Md.: 18. Anna Wierzbicka, Semantic Primitives (Frankfurt: Athenaum, 1972); Rowman & Littlefield, 2003), pp. 11–21. Ronald W. Langacker, “The Form and Meaning of the English 7. For the language of Christ as the source of our reality, see Oswald Auxiliary,” Language 54 (1978): 853–82, and “Space Grammar, Chambers, My Utmost for His Highest (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1935), Analysability, and the English Passive,” Language 58 (1982): 22–80. entry for December 21. 19. Roy D’Andrade, The Development of Cognitive Anthropology 8. David J. Bosch, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of (Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1995). Mission (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1991), pp. 302–13. 20. James L. McClelland and David D. Rumelhart, eds., Parallel Distributed 9. In his Message and Mission: The Communication of the Christian Faith Processing: Explorations in the Microstructure of Cognition (Cambridge, (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1960), Eugene A. Nida adapted Claude Mass.: MIT Press, 1986). E. Shannon, Mathematical Theory of Communication (Urbana: Univ. of 21. Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson, Relevance: Communication and Illinois Press, 1949), to develop a theory of missional communication. Cognition, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Blackwell, 1995; orig. pub., 1986). 10. Eugene A. Nida and Charles R. Taber, The Theory and Practice of 22. Charles H. Kraft, Communication Theory for Christian Witness Translation, 2nd ed. (Leiden: Brill, 1981; orig. pub., 1969), p. 12. (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1983), p. 25; also Christianity in Culture: 11. A schematic model of telecommunications (e.g., the sending and A Study in Dynamic Biblical Theologizing in Cross-Cultural Perspective receiving of TV signals) would present a similar serial processing (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1979), p. 394. structure. 23. Sperber and Wilson, Relevance, p. 38.

214 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 24. Edward T. Hall, The Silent Language (New York: Doubleday, 1959). 33. Agbonkhianmeghe E. Orobator, Theology Brewed in an African Pot 25. On the relevance of communication style, see Paulo Freire, Pedagogy (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2008), pp. 5–6. of the Oppressed, 30th anniv. ed. (New York: Continuum, 2008). 34. Bosch, Transforming Mission, pp. 421–25. 26. The point cannot be elaborated here, but it should be noted that 35. Paul G. Hiebert, “Critical Contextualization,” International Bulletin fostering the “development of a biblical theology in the new of Missionary Research 11, no. 3 (1987): 109–10. context” differs significantly from developing theologies in a locality 36. R. Daniel Shaw, Transculturation: The Cultural Factor in Translation and as suggested by Robert J. Schreiter, Constructing Local Theologies Other Communication Tasks (Pasadena, Calif.: William Carey Library, (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1985). 1988), p. 5. 27. R. Daniel Shaw, Kandila: Samo Ceremonialism and Interpersonal 37. Shaw and Van Engen, Communicating God’s Word, p. 214. Relationships (Ann Arbor: Univ. of Michigan Press, 1990); From 38. By extension, the new missional model also applies within our society Longhouse to Village: Samo Social Change (Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt (not just cross-culturally) to bring renewed spiritual regard for those Brace, 1996). who suffer cognitive difficulties. In this theoretical configuration the 28. Thomas S. Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, 3rd ed. biologically and cognitively handicapped become an entirely new (Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press, 1996; orig. pub., 1962). mission field. See Henri Nouwen, The Wounded Healer: Ministry in 29. Discussion of tribalization is beyond the scope of this article, but it Contemporary Society (New York: Doubleday, 1972). What would the should be noted that globalization and tribalization are not mutually implications be if the model were applied to the homeless as well? exclusive phenomena. 39. Charles E. Van Engen, “Critical Theologizing: Knowing God in 30. Mike Featherstone, ed., Postmodernism (London: Sage, 1992; reprint of Multiple Global/Local Contexts,” in Evangelical, Ecumenical, and Theory, Culture, and Society, 1988); Barry Smart, Modern Conditions, Anabaptist Missiologies in Conversation, ed. James R. Krabill, Walter Postmodern Controversies (London: Routledge, 1992). Sawatsky, and Charles E. Van Engen (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 31. On globalization and the development of a post-American world, 2006), pp. 88–97. see Fareed Zakaria, The Post-American World (New York: Norton, 40. In the age of cyberspace, boundaries focus more on ideological and 2009; orig. pub., 2008). psychological boundaries than on geography. 32. Sherwood Lingenfelter’s work on transformation utilizes Mary 41. Chambers, My Utmost, entry for December 21. Douglas’s “grid and group” model for understanding people in 42. Charles E. Van Engen, “Mission Described and Defined,” in society. As Lingenfelter shows, this model from anthropology offers MissionShift: Global Mission Issues in the Third Millennium, ed. David much of value for missional concerns. See his Agents of Transformation J. Hesselgrave and Ed Stetzer (Nashville: B&H Academic, in press). (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1996) and Transforming Culture: A Challenge 43. To be truly alive in the fullest sense of the word is a gift of the Spirit. for Christian Mission, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1998; orig. pub., See Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, Becoming Human Together: The Pas- 1992). toral Anthropology of St. Paul (New York: Hyperion Books, 1983).

Asking the Big Questions: A Statistical Analysis of Three Missiological Journals Gregory J. Liston

pinions and discussions about how we should be re- rial demographics (who), theological perspective (which), and Osearching missiology are extremely common: voices methodological approach (how).4 from the South need to be given more prominence;1 the Bible The three journals selected were Missiology, the International should be the primary basis for missiological reflection;2 a Bulletin of Missionary Research (IBMR), and Missionalia. The first missiological encounter with Western culture is essential.3 The two journals have an international focus. Missiology’s subtitle is question that naturally arises from such discussion is how we “An International Review,” and it describes itself as multidisci- actually are researching missiology. The objective of this article is plinary, interconfessional, and practical.5 The IBMR is described to answer this question through examination of several leading as “the very best in missionary research and sound biblical reflec- missiological journals. The aim is to obtain a broad understand- tion on the Christian world mission.”6 These two publications are ing of the what, where, why, who, which, and how of recent among the leading international journals in current missiology. missiological research. Missionalia originates in and focuses on Southern Africa.7 It was The methodology utilized was to select three prominent chosen as a point of contrast to the two U.S.-based international academic missiological journals and to analyze their major arti- journals, for it provides a perspective on academic missiology cles for the period 2003–7, broadly categorizing these articles in the global South. Given that we stand at “the threshold of a in terms of subject matter (what), regional focus (where), autho- new age of Christianity, one in which its main base will be in the Southern continents, and where its dominant expression will be filtered through the culture of those continents,”8 this contrasting Gregory J. Liston is currently pursuing postgraduate perspective is of particular interest. study in theology at Laidlaw-Carey Graduate School, Auckland, New Zealand. His previous roles include Subject Matter Focus—the “What” Question being the senior pastor of a Baptist Church in Auckland, working as a strategic management consultant, and What subjects are currently interesting missiological scholars? earning a Ph.D. in quantum physics. Where are they placing their research efforts? Samuel Escobar’s —[email protected] analysis of contemporary missiological subject matter in “The Iguassu Dialogue” provides an excellent starting point.9 From his

October 2010 215 initial framework, two categories were grouped together because age. Third, somewhat common subjects, but occurring variably. Most of subject matter overlap and eight others were added, giving us of the variance across journals can be explained by the editorial the final set of eighteen categories.10 (See table 1.) focus. For example, articles about biblical patterns for mission and theological education were virtually absent from the IBMR. Table 1. Subject Matter Analysis And Missionalia had no “global church” articles (perhaps because migration to Southern Africa is not that common), but Southern Total Missi- Missio- Africa’s history of anti-apartheid advocacy led to politics and Subject No. % IBMR ology nalia mission (particularly prophecy) being a common topic. Finally, very uncommon subjects occurring sporadically or not at all. Almost Contextualization 53 18 19 24 10 Missions’ organization 33 11 15 9 9 all the statistical articles in this survey appeared in the IBMR’s Old religions 33 11 10 14 9 regular January global statistical update. Short-term mission was Biblical patterns 21 7 2 9 10 addressed only in one themed issue of Missiology.13 And subjects Global church 20 7 8 12 0 such as women and mission, church practice, and a new religios- Poverty and inequality 19 6 4 8 7 ity got very little coverage. A new balance 16 5 6 5 5 Generally these results could be expected. It is no surprise Theological education 14 5 2 5 7 that contextualization and old religions (particularly Islam’s Pentecostalism 13 4 5 4 4 challenge) were common subjects. Or that church practice Postmodern culture 11 4 6 5 0 (more akin to ecclesiology) was not. However, two surprising Ecumenical collaboration 11 4 4 7 0 areas emerged. The first is the limited analysis of the West as a Statistics 11 4 9 1 1 Politics and mission 11 4 4 0 7 missionary challenge. Out of Escobar’s original framework, the Theology of mission 10 3 4 3 3 least-treated subjects were postmodern culture and new religi- Women and mission 10 3 2 4 4 osity—primarily Western subjects.14 Given that Western culture Short-term mission 9 3 0 9 0 is “the most challenging missionary frontier of our time”15 and Church practice 5 2 0 2 3 that the number of Christians in the West is free-falling,16 the A new religiosity 2 1 1 0 1 relative lack of scholarly missiological attention to these subjects Total 302 101 121 80 is a matter of concern. The second surprise is the prevalence of articles on missions’ Of course, many articles (43 percent) focused on more than organization—articles that examine the specifics of how mis- one subject.11 In these cases, primary and secondary subject mat- sionary organizations are structured and function. This subject, ters were recorded. This dual categorization enables us to do an which was not in Escobar’s original framework, accounted for additional “weighted” analysis that takes into account articles approximately 1 in every 9 articles, 1 in every 7 in the IBMR! that deal with more than one subject.12 (See figure 1.) While acknowledging the subject’s importance, we question this emphasis. A common mistake is to leap at organizational solu- Figure 1. Primary and Weighted Subject Matter Analysis tions to solve core problems. They can be implemented easily 20% and often without deep analysis, but experience suggests they 18% Primary Analysis are rarely successful. Perhaps missiological research is jumping 16% Weighted Analysis too quickly to organizational solutions, without first developing 14% Standard Error (~2.3%) deep cultural and theological insight into the reasons why such 12% change is deemed necessary. 10% 8% 6% Regional Focus—the “Where” Question 4% 2% Where are missiologists focusing their attention? Which global 0% areas are the most commonly researched? Certainly a diverse range of locations is being studied, with more than fifty separate

Statistics regional foci. These locations were grouped into six major regions.

Old Religions Old Articles with an intentional global focus or no geographic focus Global Church Global Pentecostalism A New Balance New A Church Practice Church New Religiosity New Biblical Patterns Biblical ns’ Organization ns’ ology of Mission of ology logical Education logical rty and Inequality and rty men and Mission and men ort-Term Mission ort-Term ical Collaboration ical Mission and litics stmodern Culture stmodern Contextualization o e A o e o were also recorded. (See table 2.) Sh Po Po Th W The Pove Missi

Ecumen Table 2. Regional Analysis

Compared with the margin of error (±2.3 percent), the differ- IBMR Missiology Missionalia ences between the primary and weighted subject matter analyses Region No. % No. % No. % are negligible. Secondary subject matter essentially mirrors the primary in terms of prevalence, confirming that within these limits Global 29 29 29 24 3 4 we have an accurate understanding of subject matter prevalence Africa 4 4 9 7 54 68 Middle East 6 6 2 2 0 0 for the analyzed sample. Asia / Oceania 24 24 16 13 2 3 We can divide the subject areas into four groups. First, com- Europe 10 10 6 5 0 0 monly encountered subjects across the three journals. These include Latin America 10 10 12 10 1 1 contextualization, missions’ organization, and old religions. North America 5 5 13 11 4 5 Second, subjects that are somewhat common across the three journals. No regional focus 13 13 34 28 16 20 Poverty and inequality, the new balance of Christian presence, Total 101 121 80 Pentecostalism, and the theology of mission get reasonable cover-

216 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Not surprisingly, Missionalia focused primarily on Africa. the United States. Including other Western countries raises the More than 5 in every 6 Missionalia articles with a regional focus proportion to 81 percent. In contrast, only 10 percent of geographi- (84 percent) dealt specifically with the African continent. The cally targeted articles focused on North America, and 19 percent remaining articles focused on the global situation or came from on the West. (See Figure 3.) one issue about archaeological investigation of American Indian mission stations.17 Figure 3. Comparison of Geographic Focus with The international journals focused primarily on the global Contributor’s Background for Articles in IBMR / Missiology situation. Apart from this result, the variability across the two Latin Other Middle United journals makes it difficult to draw any confident conclusions America Other East Kingdom about missiologists’ predominant geographic foci. Certainly Africa Africa Europe Other N. a broad spread of areas are being researched. Interestingly America Asia Africa (Christianity’s new “heartland”) is addressed relatively Latin infrequently, particularly in the IBMR. But Asia / Oceania (also America Oceania the Global South) accounts for over a quarter of this journal’s Global geographically focused articles. Europe

North United Asia Authorial Demographics—the “Who” Question America States Pacific Who are the people conducting missiological research? Where do they come from? What gender are they, and what mindset do they bring to their research?18 (See table 3.) Geographic Focus Contributor’s Background

Table 3. Analysis of Contributor’s Background A complementary analysis of gender across the three journals reveals that nearly 5 out of every 6 authors are male (83 percent). IBMR Missiology Missionalia In fact, over half of the “international” authors (121, or 55 percent) Region No. % No. % No. % are males from one country, the United States.

United Kingdom 11 11 8 7 6 8 Table 4. Contributor’s Gender Other Europe 6 6 3 2 6 8 Asia 9 9 6 5 1 1 IBMR Missiology Missionalia Oceania 3 3 1 1 0 0 Gender No. % No. % No. % United States 60 59 85 70 12 15 Other North America 1 1 5 4 0 0 Male 85 84 99 82 66 83 Latin America 3 3 4 3 1 1 Female 15 15 22 18 14 18 South Africa 0 0 0 0 46 58 n/a a 1 1 0 0 0 0 Other Africa 3 3 7 6 8 10 Total 101 121 80 Unknown 5 5 2 2 0 0 Total 101 121 80 a “Helsinki 2003: Jesus and His People,” IBMR 28 (Jan. 2004): 23, a confer- ence statement; no authors listed. As expected, the clear majority of Missionalia’s contributors (68 percent) come from Africa, corresponding with the large There are a variety of reasons for the disproportionate role of proportion of Missionalia articles (86 percent) that focus on that U.S. and Western scholars in these journals, many of which are region to research. (See figure 2.) not under the editors’ direct control. Possible reasons include the following: (1) there are vastly more missiologists in the West than Figure 2. Comparison of Geographic Focus in the Majority World, and so much more research is done by them; with Contributor’s Background for Missionalia Articles (2) the research being done by those in the Majority World is not

North United Other as rigorous and/or accessible (particularly for journals based in Latin America Kingdom Europe the United States); (3) Majority World missiologists may choose America Global Other Asia “localized” journals for publishing their research; and (4) U.S. Asia Africa Pacific United universities may entice the best missiologists from the Majority States World to base themselves in the United States. Latin Whatever the reasons, the implication is clear. Today’s “av- America erage Christian” may be a poor, black, Nigerian woman, but today’s “average Christian missiologist” appears to be a rich, South Africa Africa white, American man! If IBMR editor Jonathan Bonk is correct in saying that “to be spoken for implies a degree of powerlessness on the part of those who are represented by the voice of another,”19 then these international journals appear to be accepting, or per- Geographic Focus Contributor’s Background haps even perpetuating, both the voicelessness and “a degree of powerlessness” in the Majority Christian World. Such a correspondence between author and subject is certainly The prevalence of male authors from the United States not the case for the IBMR and Missiology. These journals may be in international journals appears to be largely independent of international in terms of geographic focus, but they are decid- subject matter, geographic focus, and methodology, although it edly not international in terms of the contributors’ background. is interesting to note that almost all of the articles on postmod- Nearly two-thirds (65 percent) of articles were contributed from

October 2010 217 ern culture (91 percent) and theological education (71 percent) one cannot help being struck by the irony. Leading international were written from this (perhaps narrow) cultural perspective. journals have contributors from the (numerically declining) West- It is also relevant to note that this monocultural weighting was ern church telling the (numerically exploding) Majority World not declining between 2003 and 2007, the years of our research. church how it should be doing its missiological job. Perhaps the Even acknowledging the sizable margin of error (±10 percent) reverse would be more justified! in these data points, the trend appears to be quite the opposite. (See figure 4.) Theological Perspective—the “Which” Question

Figure 4. Percentage of Articles Written From which theological perspective do missiologists approach by Males from the United States their research? And what is their theological focus? It is easy to misinterpret theological perspective and/or focus.22 Accord- 80% ingly, if an author did not explicitly state (or clearly imply) his 71% or her theological perspective/focus, it was labeled as generic. IBMR 70% 67% “Generic” implies that the contributor in an article either has no Missiology clear theological perspective/focus or that it is not essential to 62% the article. (See table 5.) 60% 58%

52% 52% Table 5. Analysis of Theological Perspective 50% 50% 48% 43% Theological Total Missi- Missio- Perspective No. % IBMR ology nalia 40% 36% Anglican 1 0 0 0 1 Roman Catholic 18 6 5 6 7 30% Evangelical 14 5 11 3 0 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 Hindu 1 0 0 1 0 Islamic 2 1 0 1 1 Perhaps the most insightful way of analyzing authorial per- Liberal 2 1 2 0 0 spective is to use another Escobar framework from the Iguassu Lutheran 2 1 0 0 2 Dialogue, namely, missiological approach.20 According to Esco- Methodist 3 1 1 0 2 bar, missiological research is postimperial (which follows in the Orthodox 1 0 1 0 0 trajectory of the Western missiological movement, but recognizes Pentecostal 18 6 7 5 6 that new patterns of relationship and forms of Christian mission Presbyterian 3 1 0 1 2 are emerging), managerial (which approaches missiology from a Generic 234 77 72 104 58 N/A 3 1 2 0 1 scientific, statistical, or business-management perspective), orfrom Total 302 101 121 80 the periphery (which stands apart from the major historic thrust of Western Christian mission, questioning not just the degree but Roman Catholic and Pentecostal research (both 6 percent) the kind of missionary action that is required). We categorized were significantly more prevalent than other theological per- each of the analyzed articles into one these three missiological spectives, the former probably because of the Roman Catholic approaches.21 (See figure 5.) Church’s size, the latter because of the Pentecostal church’s Figure 5. Comparison of Missiological Approach growth. But most interestingly, the vast majority (77 percent) of for IBMR / Missiology and Missionalia missiological research had a generic or no clear theological focus and perspective. It appears as if most missiological research does not depend on the detailed theological perspective of the author, Post- nor does it focus on a particular denominational stream of the imperial From the (13%) church. There is a common theological perspective implied in Periphery almost all missiological research—that reaching out with the (21%) love of Jesus (however that is understood) is an important and Post- valid activity for the church of God. The analysis for this article Managerial From the (15%) imperial suggests that this commonality is most often enough to get on (()64%) Periphery (74%) with, and our theological differences (in the main) do not have significant missiological implications. Methodological Approach—the “How” Question

IBMR / Missiology Missionalia How do missiologists come to their conclusions? What method- The proportion of managerial articles is roughly consistent ological approach do they take? (See table 6.) across all three journals (approx. 14 percent). Missionalia has a As with our analysis of subject matter, so we can divide high proportion of articles from the periphery (74 percent), while these methodological approaches into distinct categories. Five are the international journals are mostly postimperial (64 percent)—a commonly used across the three journals: historical, cultural, missio- significant difference. While recognizing that the root causes of logical, church, and biblical overviews. Sometimes the overview the disparities revealed in our analysis of authorial demographics stands alone, and no implications for the current missiological are historically grounded, complex, and difficult to overcome, situation are drawn. This is common with historical overviews (44 of 75 articles—59 percent). But most often the analysis concludes

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AssociateDr. Lalsangkima Professor of History Pachuau and Theology of Mission Director of Postgraduate Studies

asburyseminary.edu 800.2ASBURY with a series of implications for current missiological practice. rial” and “from the periphery” missiological approaches appear Interestingly, the Southern-based journal has a higher propor- to utilize similar methodologies. tion of biblical overviews. Three more approaches are sometimes used across the three journals: methodological analysis, personal Summary—the “Why” Question overview, and theological overview. The remaining approaches are rarely used or are particular to one journal. Statistical summaries Having examined the what, where, who, which, and how of are an advertised and attractive feature of the IBMR, but they do current missiological research, we come to the last of Kipling’s not feature significantly elsewhere. Case studies predominantly honest serving-men: why.23 Why should missiologists continue occurred in Missiology, particularly one issue that focused on their work, and why should all Christians care? This analysis short-term mission. Publication and conference overviews were reveals both the dimensions of current missiological research, not common in any of the journals. as exemplified in the pages of three flagship journals, and the broad directions it might profitably pursue. Table 6. Analysis of Methodological Approach First, missiological research reveals the breadth of current mission endeavor. God is at work in all corners of the globe. Our Methodological Total Missi- Missio- vision is often myopic, and consequently our emotions oscillate Approach No. % IBMR ology nalia wildly based on localized successes or failures. Missiological research gives perspective and balance. Historical 75 25 30 22 23 Cultural 67 22 18 35 14 Second, we should find the means to give the South a voice. It Missiological 34 11 11 15 8 is hardly a new insight to suggest that the missiological endeavor Church 28 9 10 8 10 needs to listen hard to those who speak “from the periphery.” Biblical 23 8 4 9 10 Most agree with this in theory. This analysis suggests, however, Methodological 16 5 4 7 5 that we have some way to go to achieve it in practice. Personal 16 5 8 4 4 Third, the West matters. This analysis suggests that it is not Theological 16 5 1 12 3 just Western churchgoers who make the mistake of seeing the Statistical Summary 9 3 8 0 1 missionary task as “out there” rather than “right here.” Western Case Study 7 2 0 7 0 missiologists make the same mistake. Most researchers are from Publication 6 2 4 0 2 the West, but proportionally little of the research is about the West. Conference 5 2 3 2 0 Total 302 101 121 80 The need for people of courage and insight—and particularly those with a Southern voice—to tackle this most difficult missionary Again, these results are generally expected. It is no surprise frontier could not be clearer. It is not cowardly or second-rate to that historical and cultural overviews are common. It could be give your life to winning the West. argued that theological or biblical reflection should be given a Finally, we should aim for significant cooperation in our higher priority, particularly in the internationally focused journals, missiological endeavor. Often interdenominational or even cross- but this is a matter of degree. Similarly, having nearly 60 percent cultural dialogues are approached with a good deal of skepticism. of historical overviews drawing no current missiological impli- There are just too many differences. But this analysis suggests cations is notable and perhaps questionable. Nevertheless, the that meaningful collaboration has a viable future, for our meth- most interesting insight is that there appears to be no significant odological approaches have a lot in common. With mission as a difference between the international journals and the Southern central hermeneutic and motivator, we can see that much more journal in terms of methodological approach. Both “postimpe- unites than divides us.

Notes 1. E.g., Wilbert R. Shenk, “Recasting Theology of Mission: Impulses means we still have a statistically significant base from which to from the Non-Western World,” International Bulletin of Missionary work. The Web site for the Southern African Missiological Society Research 25 (July 2001): 98–107. and Missionalia is http://missiological.org.za. 2. E.g., John Stott, “Twenty Years After Lausanne: Some Personal 8. Andrew F. Walls, The Missionary Movement in Christian History: Studies Reflections,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 19 (April in the Transmission of Faith (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1996), p. 1995): 50–55. 22. 3. E.g., Lesslie Newbigin, “Can the West Be Converted?” International 9. Samuel Escobar, “The Global Scenario at the Turn of the Century,” Bulletin of Missionary Research 11 (January 1987): 2–7. in Global Missiology for the Twenty-first Century: The Iguassu Dialogue, 4. Only articles with an analytic focus were included in the sample. For ed. William D. Taylor (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2000), the IBMR, autobiographical articles (“My Pilgrimage in Mission”) pp. 25–46. and biographical articles (“The Legacy of . . .”) were excluded. Also 10. Articles that focused on “a translatable gospel” almost always the analysis did not include editorials and book reviews from any simultaneously dealt with globalization and contextualization (and of the journals. All other articles were included. Other indicators vice versa). Similarly, articles that dealt with “the end of Christendom” could have been chosen, e.g., books published, conference pro- almost always simultaneously dealt with postmodern culture (and ceedings, and articles cited, but it can be argued that these jour- vice versa). As such, these categories have been grouped together. nals offer a good snapshot of current “international” missiologi- Categories that needed to be added were “missions’ organization,” cal interests. “theological education,” “statistics,” “politics and mission,” 5. See www.asmweb.org/missiology.htm. “theology of mission,” “short-term mission,” “women and mission,” 6. E.g., see www.magsdirect.com/internationalbulletinofmissionary and “church practice.” research.html. 11. For example, Paul Gundani’s article “The Land Question and Its 7. At the time this research was performed, the publication of Missiological Implications for the Church in Zimbabwe” (Missionalia Missionalia was not up-to-date—the latest issue analyzed was April 31 [November 2003]: 467–502) primarily addresses the subject “politics 2006. However, the larger number of articles per year in this journal and mission,” but also secondarily, “poverty and inequality.”

220 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 12. The mechanism of the weighted analysis is as follows. If only one 19. Jonathan J. Bonk, “Finding Our Own Voice: The Quest for Authentic subject is recorded, then 100 percent of the article deals with that Conversion,” International Bulletin of Missionary Research 29 (July subject. If two subjects are recorded, then I assume that 60 percent 2005): 113. of the article focuses on the primary subject, and 40 percent on 20. Samuel Escobar, “Evangelical Missiology: Peering into the Future the secondary subject. In the IBMR, for example, eleven articles in at the Turn of the Century,” in Global Missiology for the Twenty-first the sample years have contextualization as their sole focus, eight Century, ed. Taylor, pp. 101–22. articles have this as their primary focus, and six others have it as 21. Some articles (16 percent) had no clear missiological approach, their secondary focus. So the “weighted” subject matter score for especially statistical and historical articles that simply stated facts contextualization is (11 × 1.00) + (8 × 0.60) + (6 × 0.40) = 18.2. This or summarized events but provided no perspective or insight on gives us a more accurate understanding of the treatment of the various those events. These articles have been excluded from this analysis. subjects than we would have by looking only at the primary subject 22. Note that in this analysis we have combined theological perspective matter. For explanations of the statistics used, see http://stattrek (i.e., the theological background or stream from which the authors .com/lesson4/proportion.aspx?tutorial=ap. are doing their missiological research) and theological focus (i.e., 13. See Missiology 35 (January 2007). the theological stream or denominational group that the author is 14. Note that “postmodern culture” includes the topic “the end of focusing on). In almost all cases, the theological perspective and Christendom,” as referenced in Escobar’s article “The Global theological focus match. So, for example, if a Roman Catholic area Scenario.” of focus is being researched, it is almost always a Catholic author 15. Newbigin, “Can the West Be Converted?” p. 7. doing the research. 16. See David E. Bjork “The Future of Christianity in Western Europe,” 23. “I have six honest serving-men / (They taught me all I knew); / Their Missiology 34 (July 2006): 309–24. names are What and Which and Why, / And How and Where and 17. See Missionalia 32 (November 2004). Who” (slightly altered from Rudyard Kipling’s story, “The Elephant’s 18. For the purposes of this analysis, we have used the author’s location Child”). at the time of publication as an indicator of background culture.

The Legacy of George Leslie Mackay James R. Rohrer

eorge Leslie Mackay (1844–1901) was among the most of his death. Presbyterian youth groups can be spotted wearing Gremarkable missionaries of the late Victorian era. Dur- T-shirts bearing Mackay’s likeness, along with his motto, “It is ing his three decades in Taiwan (1871–1901), he received little better to burn up than rust out.” Christian parents can read chil- substantive assistance from other Canadian missionaries yet, at dren to sleep with tales of Mackay printed in cartoon storybooks, the time of his death, left a community of more than 2,400 bap- while a seemingly endless stream of newspaper articles, art prints, tized communicants and a much larger body of regular hearers postcards, posters, wall calendars, mugs, and medallions recalls who attended more than sixty churches led by full-time native his life. Preachers in Taiwan frequently draw upon his book, From preachers.1 Mackay (pronounced “muh-KIGH”) established a Far Formosa (1895), for sermon illustrations, and politicians have hospital, a school for girls, and “Oxford College,” his training appealed to his memory to promote various agendas. center for native church leaders. Just as important, as one of only Indeed, the legendary Mackay at times threatens to eclipse three known missionaries in nineteenth-century China to have the historical missionary. As the Canadian who became “the married an indigenous spouse, he left behind descendents who son-in-law of Taiwan,” Mackay has served as a useful icon for continued to play leading roles in Taiwan’s Presbyterian Church Taiwanese nationalism, a symbol of the warm ties binding the after his death. island to the Western democracies.3 Christians in Taiwan often Mackay’s achievements have been largely overlooked by invoke him, with little historical justification, as the one who modern historians of mission. During his lifetime, however, Ca- brought democratic ideals to Taiwan, a champion of the rights of nadian publications hailed him as one of the greatest evangelists Taiwan’s tribal indigenes, and an early proponent of Taiwanese since the apostolic age.2 In Taiwan, where Christians constitute independence. The actual complex history of his career deserves roughly 5 to 6 percent of the populace, George Leslie Mackay to be better known, not only by scholars of mission, but also by remains a widely known folk hero. Every day thousands of people Taiwanese Christians in search of a usable past. pass by wall-size photographs of Mackay and his students at Taipei’s Mackay Memorial Hospital, one of the most respected Childhood and Education medical facilities in the island. In 2001 the government in Taiwan issued a commemorative postage stamp to mark the centenary George Leslie Mackay was born March 21, 1844, in Zorra Town- ship, Upper Canada, the youngest of six children of George James R. Rohrer is Associate Professor of History at the and Helen Sutherland Mackay. His parents had emigrated to University of Nebraska–Kearney. He teaches Ameri- Canada in 1830 from Dornoch in Sutherlandshire, Scotland, an can religious history and the history of Christianity. area reeling from the harsh Highland Clearances. Sutherland From 1993 to 1998 he taught history in Taiwan under was a hotbed of evangelical dissent from the Church of Scotland. the auspices of the United Church Board for World The common folk flocked to revivals sparked byNa Daoine (“the Ministries. —[email protected] Men”), itinerant Gaelic lay preachers who called upon the people to be born again and who prophetically attacked landlords and ecclesiastical moderates for their injustice against the poor. Com-

October 2010 221 mon people listened also to controversial evangelical ministers From 1867 to 1870 Mackay attended Princeton Seminary, of the established Kirk, such as the fiery John MacDonald, the at the time a favorite choice for North American Presbyterians so-called Apostle of the North, who often visited Dornoch on planning careers as foreign missionaries. At Princeton he became his missionary journeys.4 devoted to Charles Hodge and participated in the Committee of Most Zorra settlers were displaced Highlanders with strong Inquiry, a student organization that investigated mission theories evangelical leanings. The Mackays and their neighbors clung and sponsored visiting missionaries from around the world. tightly to their religious traditions. For many years they contin- Mackay later recalled how he “ransacked” the library’s collec- ued to use Gaelic at home and in worship, and the “family altar” tion of mission books and heard missions debated “a thousand was a central part of their routine. Mackay later recollected the different ways” during these years.8 importance of daily prayer and worship with his parents, and Upon graduation he offered his service to the Canada especially the influence of his mother, who taught him the West- Presbyterian Church as a foreign missionary and then sailed for minster Shorter Catechism by heart while he was still a small child. Scotland to meet another boyhood hero, Alexander Duff. During In 1834 a zealous evangelical named Donald McKenzie received the winter of 1870–71 Mackay sat through Duff’s historic lectures ordination from the Presbytery of Glasgow as a missionary to on evangelistic theology and often visited Duff’s home. He also Canada. The Gaelic-speaking McKenzie settled in Zorra in 1835, studied Hindustani and considered offering himself to the Scot- where until 1872 he shepherded one of Canada’s largest Pres- tish or American Presbyterians as a missionary to India.9 In April byterian congregations while continuing to perform missionary 1871, however, he received instructions from the Committee on duties in nearby counties. Under his leadership Knox Church Missions in Canada to return home to receive ordination. On in Embro became something of a “school for prophets.” During June 14, 1871, the General Assembly of the Canada Presbyterian Church, meeting in Quebec, appointed him their first overseas missionary, with instructions to choose a field in China in consulta- tion with the English Presbyterian missionaries in Amoy. Weeks By the age of ten the young later, a seasick Mackay was bound for the Orient on the steamer George Leslie Mackay had America. Except for two furloughs, in 1880–81 and 1893–94, he decided that he, too, would would spend the remainder of his life in Taiwan, dedicated to the task of building an indigenous church led by native preachers. become a missionary. Mackay later honored William C. Burns, Charles Hodge, and Alexander Duff by naming chapels in Taiwan in their memory. Assessing their precise influence upon his missionary work, the course of his long pastorate, McKenzie watched nearly fifty however, is difficult, for Mackay never committed his own mis- young men from his congregation enter the ministry as pastors siological principles to writing in any systematic fashion. In 1877 or missionaries, among them George Leslie Mackay, whose father and 1890 he characteristically skipped the important Shanghai served the congregation as a ruling elder for twenty-five years.5 missionary conferences held by Protestant missionaries in China, Mackay was only a few months old when his family fol- and throughout his life he showed a marked aversion to corre- lowed McKenzie into the Free Church of Canada. Although the spondence with other missionaries. Even in his private journals ecclesiastical disputes that divided the church in Scotland did not he rarely engaged in theological reflection, leaving us in many exist in Upper Canada, the evangelical leanings of the settlers led cases to read between the lines and to conjecture about his ideas. them to sympathize strongly with the Scottish dissenters. Mis- Still, a few significant influences clearly stand out. First, sionaries from the Free Church of Scotland, such as Robert Burns the blend of evangelical piety and Baconian science that suf- of Paisley and his nephew, the revivalist William C. Burns, soon fused his early years stayed with him.10 Mackay was a lifelong visited Zorra, where the people generously contributed funds amateur naturalist who invested a great deal of energy teaching to support the Free Church back home. Burns became Mackay’s his students the rudiments of geology, zoology, anatomy, and childhood hero, and the Mackay family closely followed his career botany as an essential component of their evangelistic work. after he went to China as a missionary of the English Presbyterian Mackay always insisted that the argument from design was the Church.6 By the age of ten the young George Leslie Mackay had most effective way to convince Chinese people of a sovereign decided that he, too, would become a missionary. God, and that evangelistic preaching ought to begin with the Mackay attended Knox College in Toronto from 1864 to doctrine of creation. 1867. Knox professors conceived of the school as a missionary Second, while never formally disavowing Presbyterian- institution for training evangelists. Mixing evangelical piety ism, Mackay always exhibited the characteristics of a religious and Scottish Common Sense philosophy, the Knox curriculum dissenter who placed his own sense of God’s will ahead of stressed Scripture, biblical theology, and natural science as the denominational loyalty. Throughout his career he exhibited a essential elements of Christian higher education. Knox students fierce independence from the mission committee in Canada, and learned that sound scientific methods inevitably support the he consistently opposed establishing formal Presbyterian gov- authority of the Bible, and that knowledge of natural science ernment in Taiwan as an unnatural “accretion” that should not is vital to effective evangelism. Classmates later remembered be forced upon converts by foreign ecclesiastical authorities. His Mackay as a serious scholar. He especially relished geography, personal scrapbook suggests that he identified with such diverse geology, and natural science and participated in the Knox Liter- evangelists as William Booth, De Witt Talmage, and Dwight L. ary and Scientific Society, which met monthly to present essays Moody, men more renowned for achieving spectacular results and debate controversial topics.7 As a missionary, Mackay drew as preachers and organizers than as theologians.11 heavily upon his Knox experience as he built his own training Third, Mackay, like Duff, regarded the training of native school for native preachers, modeling his lessons upon the Knox clergy as his single most important task, and he repeatedly curriculum and incorporating the lyceum format of the Literary declared that only Chinese Christians could build a church in and Scientific Society into his own teaching methods. China. But unlike Duff, who targeted upper-caste Indian youth

222 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 and emphasized the importance of rigorous Western education, first with a native tutor loaned by the English Presbyterians in Mackay identified more with the common people of Taiwan and Amoy, he began his ministry by studying Chinese characters and sought to adapt the Gospel as much as possible to local patterns the spoken language for as many as sixteen hours a day. Blessed of thinking. Mackay preached and taught only in the island’s with a prodigious memory, he learned to write one hundred new dominant Hokkien language, and he selectively adapted West- characters daily and spent the balance of his time practicing his ern education to suit the immediate practical needs of his native reading and speaking with anybody who would listen to him. preachers. For him, all missionary work, including medical and After only a few weeks his first tutor ran away, but Mackay had educational ministry, was ancillary to evangelism. already met a young literati, Giam Chheng Hoa, who agreed to Perhaps Mackay owed most to the evangelical tradition of move in with him and become his new teacher in exchange for the Scottish Highlands, to Donald McKenzie, and to his boyhood religious lessons. Giam and Mackay forged a deep symbiotic hero, William C. Burns, who had gained notoriety among China relationship grounded upon unfeigned mutual respect and ad- missionaries for his itinerating ministry through the countryside miration. The course Mackay pursued would have been impos- of Fujien Province. Mackay, too, became famous for itineration sible without this foundation. His first convert, and later the first and for his desire to live ordained native pastor, Giam among the common folk knew the island intimately. of Taiwan. Throughout his In a very real sense he became career he stirred controversy Mackay’s teacher and was by criticizing other foreign the catalyst for the conver- missionaries and insisting sion of the other first four upon indigenous leadership recruits. Throughout the first in every facet of ministry. It several years of Mackay’s is tempting to see his cadre ministry, this group marched of Taiwanese preachers as barefoot together through- a parallel to Scotland’s Na out northern Taiwan, dis- Daoine, a zealous group of pensing Western medicine, lay itinerants whom Mackay pulling teeth, preaching, and regarded as superior to any establishing chapels.14 seminary-trained Presbyte- The growth of Mackay’s rians from the West. movement was phenomenal, Mackay’s identification suggesting that social con- with the common people of ditions in North Formosa Taiwan led him in 1878 to were unusually favorable marry Tiu Chhang Mia, the Mackay Family, ca. 1890 for conversion. But Mackay’s seventeen-year-old adopted granddaughter of his first female con- personality and tactics also played a crucial role in his success. vert, Thah-so. “Chhang-a” would play a vital role in his ministry Having launched his itinerating campaign, he often passed weeks throughout the remainder of his life. Believing passionately that at a time without contact with other Westerners. If he suffered the people of Taiwan were equal to Westerners, he married his culture shock, his journals do not reveal it. Instead, he seems to own daughters, Mary and Bella, to native preachers and spent have relished his growing intimacy with the band of men who his life attempting to preserve the independence of his movement traveled with him day and night. As they walked, and whenever from Canadian control. Although Mackay was not completely free they rested, Mackay taught his recruits Bible, theology, natural from the ethnocentric biases that typified Victorian Christians, science, and materia medica; they in turn taught him the details of his deep love for Taiwan was authentic. It would be difficult to their culture and “how to speak like a Chinese” person. Never find any other missionary of his era who more clearly exempli- staying in one place for more than a few days at a time, they spent fied the principles of missionary identification.12 less than six months in the port of Tamsui, Mackay’s ostensible headquarters, during his entire first seven years on the island. Early Ministry in Taiwan Mackay believed that his wandering lifestyle imitated Jesus. He certainly was familiar with the example of William C. Burns. Mackay’s career falls neatly into two major phases. The first But unlike Burns, who had almost no converts to show for his extends from his arrival in Taiwan in December 1871 until his years of itineration, Mackay had already established seven chapels first furlough in 1880, by which time he had already become a and had more than seventy baptized followers by the end of his celebrity in Canada. The second extends from his return to Taiwan third year in Taiwan. By the time he returned to Canada for his in 1881 until his death twenty years later. During the first phase, first furlough, his so-called peripatetic school had trained some Mackay launched an amazing itinerating ministry that quickly two dozen preachers who weekly proclaimed the Gospel to more reaped impressive results. The consummate pioneer missionary, than a thousand regular hearers. Many foreign observers noted he chose as his field the previously unoccupied north end of the the remarkable devotion that existed between the missionary island because he longed for freedom to follow his own meth- and his followers. To them Mackay was not so much the agent ods and to learn by trial and error. Remarkably, by the end of of a foreign religion as a prophet and spiritual father.15 his first summer in Taiwan he already had a cadre of dedicated But where did other Canadian missionaries fit within such converts who remained faithful leaders throughout their life- a movement? Mackay regarded his visible success as incontest- times, and these became the nucleus of a rapidly growing move- able proof of both divine blessing and the wisdom of his meth- ment that more closely resembled an indigenous Chinese sect ods. Throughout his life he stubbornly resisted any pressure than a Presbyterian mission.13 from Canada to change his ways, repeatedly leading him into Mackay had extraordinary linguistic abilities. Working at conflict with church leaders at home. The mission committee

October 2010 223 wanted Mackay to accept additional missionaries and to build assemblies at churches and public meetings throughout Ontario, a more traditional mission compound in Tamsui. Beginning Quebec, and the Atlantic Provinces. Contributions for his work with James and Jennie Fraser in 1874, it sent out a series of mis- poured into the Presbyterian mission fund, money that he used sionary couples to assist Mackay. These newcomers soon found upon his return to Taiwan to construct a home for his family, themselves marginalized from the actual life of the community, build larger churches, open a boarding school for girls, and con- Mackay leaving them alone in Tamsui to learn for themselves the struct Oxford College as a training center for native preachers. language and to establish their own roles.16 Except for the last For the rest of his life Mackay would itinerate only twice a year, couple, William and Margaret Gauld, none of the “assistants” the remainder of his time spent teaching and directing affairs at stayed long in the island. “headquarters” in Tamsui. Mackay considered the Frasers, who had small children, a But celebrity and increased wealth proved a mixed blessing, major nuisance. The mission committee in Toronto instructed for with it came mounting pressure from home to expand the him to build a Western-style home for the couple, to give up his Canadian presence and establish a more normal Presbyterian ill-conceived efforts to go native, and to lodge with the Frasers mission. He received especially strong pressure from the Women’s until a “charming” Canadian lady could be sent out to share Foreign Missionary Committee, which wanted to send single his work. Although Mackay grudgingly built the house, he cat- women teachers to assist him.19 Throughout his career Mackay egorically rejected the rest of the committee’s wishes.17 Instead, engaged in a constant battle to keep funding from Canada without strings attached. He demanded freedom to set mission policy without intervention, threatening to resign and take all of the converts with him if not granted autonomy. The mission Nothing resembling the committee in Toronto knew that the irascible missionary was typical Victorian mission not bluffing. For twenty years he successfully blackmailed them compound existed during into giving him free rein to pursue whatever policies he pleased. As a result, nothing resembling the typical Victorian mis- Mackay’s lifetime. sion compound existed during Mackay’s lifetime. His goal was to see his community develop into a fully self-governing and self-propagating native church upon his own death. To this end, at the suggestion of his students, in May 1878 he married Tiu he would allow only one missionary couple at a time to come Chhang Mia, a “little sister” who was well known to all the na- out from Canada to assist him, and he made it clear that these tive preachers. It was a brilliant move on Mackay’s part, sealing newcomers would be required to serve under the supervision with holy matrimony his unusual mode of living. Never again of native Christians. These assistants were allowed to study would Canadian leaders urge him to settle down with other language, plant gardens, help maintain the buildings in Tamsui, missionaries. Instead, “Chhang-a” at first itinerated with Mackay write letters home, and perform small tasks assigned by Mackay. and his students and became the revered spiritual mother of the But they did not engage in direct evangelism or teaching native growing movement. church leaders, responsibilities that Mackay kept tightly in his own hands and shared with chosen native Christians.20 Furlough and Settling Down The real heart of the Christian community in North Taiwan was the expanding network of chapels in the interior of the is- Marriage and the arrival of his first daughter, Mary, in 1879 land. These were the exclusive preserve of the native preachers, required lifestyle adjustments. His first furlough in 1880–81 whom Mackay himself trained and appointed. Critics charged marks the start of the second, or “domestic,” phase of his min- that Mackay was unfaithful to Presbyterianism and acted as a istry. Leaving their infant daughter in Taiwan with Chhang-a’s bishop over the native church. Mackay angrily rejected the no- grandmother, Mackay and his young wife sailed to Canada on a tion that Western institutions could be simply transplanted to world tour, visiting Malaysia, India, the Holy Land, Rome, Paris, Taiwan by fiat. To be lasting, church polity would have to evolve London, and Scotland before arriving in Zorra six months later. gradually out of the “inner workings” of the Chinese mind. In For Tiu Chhang Mia, not yet twenty, this first trip away from home the meantime, he insisted, Christians in North Formosa already and first encounter with the world church must have triggered enjoyed authentic self-government without the creation of for- a mix of emotions. At each stop they explored historical sites, mal Presbyterian structures. Every one of the churches elected mosques, temples, and cathedrals. Everywhere they visited the elders, and he was in constant contact with these leaders, with missions of different Christian denominations. The trip convinced whom he deliberated in all matters confronting the community. Mackay that his own methods were the best for Taiwan, giving He likewise consulted the preachers constantly, and in 1885 he him ammunition that he would later use when answering critics and a group of elders together laid hands on Giam Chheng-Hoa of his mission. and another early preacher named Tan He, ordaining them as Although Mackay’s marriage was controversial, his family the first two native pastors in Taiwan. Henceforth these two men and the local people of Zorra embraced Chhang-a warmly. Unable sat with Mackay and any ordained Canadian assistant in regular to speak any English, she initially feared Mackay’s departure for “mission councils,” discussing policy together. For Mackay, the his obligatory missionary tour of the Canadian churches. By the reality of shared governance mattered more than strict conformity time he returned from his first round of visits, however, her shy- to Presbyterian polity.21 ness had vanished. She informed him that she felt comfortable Mackay himself handled virtually all of the instruction at with his family and that he could travel for as long as he needed. Oxford College, lecturing daily on topics ranging from biblical Dubbed “Minnie” by the locals and the Canadian newspapers, studies to geography to natural science and medicine. His ad- she became a favorite at gatherings of Zorra church women.18 vanced students assisted him with teaching younger students During his furlough Mackay received an honorary doctor of how to read and write Romanized Chinese. In fact, the school divinity degree from Queen’s University and addressed packed more closely resembled a lyceum than a Western college. Each

224 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 student was regularly assigned composition and debate topics, withdrawn.” This time landing in Vancouver, the missionary which they would deliver as formal speeches that were critiqued was dumbfounded when his wife and Koa Kau were not permit- by peers as well as by Mackay. Twice a year, before and after each ted to disembark until a head tax had been paid. Although the term at school, he took his most advanced students on lengthy matter was soon cleared up, Mackay spent the rest of his time itinerating trips into the interior of the island, to give them experi- in Canada speaking out against racism and demanding an end ence preaching in public and facing opposition. The training at to discrimination against Chinese immigrants. As moderator of Oxford College was not designed to instill a liberal arts education, the Presbyterian General Assembly in 1894, he had a very visible but rather to equip self-confident preachers, teachers, and healers platform from which to thunder his opposition to anti-Chinese who would soon hold responsibility for chapels of their own. prejudice in Canada, as well as his faith in the complete equality The boarding school for girls, designed to equip Bible women of Chinese Christians.23 and Christian wives, was likewise under native leadership. Tiu During his furlough, the Sino-Japanese War dramatically Chhang Mia herself, assisted by some of the older Bible women, transformed the situation of the Christians in Taiwan. Claimed served as headmistress and surrogate mother for the girls, who as a colonial prize by the victorious Japanese, Formosa was to came from churches throughout the mission field. In a controver- become a showcase of Japan’s ability to administer an empire sial pamphlet addressed to the Presbyterian women of Canada, as efficiently as the Western powers. Although Mackay stated Annie Jamieson, wife of Mackay’s third assistant John Jamieson, his optimistic belief that the change in government would ul- timately prove a blessing, the transition brought a host of new problems. Perhaps most obvious was the Japanese insistence that all educational and medical facilities on the island conform to modern Western standards. To survive under Japanese rule, Mackay clearly would need to adjust his missionary methods to satisfy colonial administrators. We will never know how successfully Mackay would have adapted to the new reality. Late in the winter of 1901 he discovered a small lump in his throat that turned out to be an aggressive cancer. British physicians at Tamsui and the mainland were helpless to arrest the progression of the disease. On the afternoon of June 2, 1901, George Leslie Mackay breathed his last. As word of his death spread from church to church, a stream of mourners descended upon Tamsui, where Mackay’s body rested in a Oxford College at Tamsui glass-faced coffin in Oxford College. Young and old crowded around the coffin, reaching out to touch his defended Mackay’s refusal to accept Canadian women teachers. face. His daughter Bella described the scene in her diary, noting Tiu Chhang Mia, Jamieson observed, toiled away day after day, that “young men wept like a child as well as old men, women “while ladies in Canada know nothing . . . of what she is accom- and children. Some would remain weeping over the coffin for a plishing.” Chhang-a knew “just how to deal with her own people.” whole hour, then they would go out of the room, then they would She “works away training girls, helping women, attending to the re-enter again and weep more bitterly than before.”24 wants of students, caring for and thinking of everyone but herself. Giam Chheng Hoa presided over the burial of his dear- She is known and loved by converts throughout the whole field.” est friend. Eighteen of the oldest preachers and elders carried Jamieson confessed that she had initially resented Chhang-a the coffin to the grave that Mackay himself had selected years but in time came to understand the wisdom of Mackay’s posi- before. The cemetery was too small to hold all of the mourners tion: “While the Doctor is busy arranging matters or preparing that gathered from around the mission field, including more than messages in front of the house, people will be out back pouring three hundred non-Christian dignitaries who came to honor the stories into her sympathetic ear. I would gladly relieve her, for I fallen missionary. Many converts from distant stations could not am sure she is often tired, but then who of them all would dream arrive in time for the burial. For days they streamed into Tamsui, of coming to me? I did not grow up among the people. I have not to sit beside Mackay’s grave and weep, as Bella recorded, “like been to their homes; I do not know their children and aunts and one having lost a father.”25 uncles and neighbors, and all about their family troubles. How could they be expected to come to me?”22 Legacy

Second Furlough and Death For all his unusual characteristics, George Leslie Mackay was very much a man of the Victorian age. He shared his era’s tendency to In 1893 Mackay and Chhang-a returned to Canada on a second rank races and cultures along an evolutionary scale, sometimes furlough, this time bringing with them their three children and asserting the inferiority of the island’s indigenous tribal peoples a young student named Koa Kau, a future son-in-law whom to the dominant Chinese populace. His journals occasionally Mackay wanted to introduce to the Canadian church. He left engaged in the sort of Orientalist representations of Asian civi- behind the Gaulds, only recently arrived in Taiwan, who were lizations that modern students of culture seek to avoid. He was still unable to speak the language. The furlough, he informed the no champion of interreligious goodwill, confidently predicting mission board in Toronto, would prove that the native preachers the future annihilation of Buddhism, Taoism, and other forms of were fully able to sustain their church alone “if all foreigners were “heathenism” with triumphalistic certainty. His acerbic attacks

October 2010 225 upon Roman Catholic “papistry” were only slightly less virulent. reorienting their lives around the new community that he had Despite his flaws, to a degree that has been rare in any period of called into existence. Possessing an authoritarian temperament, history, George Leslie Mackay allowed himself to truly encounter as his critics correctly charged, he exercised his power to carve and to be transformed by the people he sought to serve. During out for the native Christians a degree of autonomy and freedom his first weeks in Taiwan, as he drove himself relentlessly to learn perhaps unparalleled among China missions of his day. That the language, he recorded in his journal that he wanted “no bar- he is still lionized in Taiwan by Christians and non-Christians riers” between himself and the people. This desire to become one alike, long after most other Victorian missionaries have been with the people, to identify with them as wholly as he possibly forgotten or deconstructed, testifies to the enduring bonds that could, deeply touched many of those whom he encountered. mutual affection and respect can forge between people of sharply Thousands responded by accepting his Lord as their own and different cultures.

Selected Bibliography Mackay’s mission correspondence is located in the United Church of McDonald, Graeme. “George Leslie Mackay: Missionary Success Canada Archives in Toronto, along with valuable correspondence of his in Nineteenth-Century Taiwan.” In Papers on China, vol. 21. Canadian assistants. The Jennie Fraser Papers are especially helpful. His Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard Univ., East Asian Research Center, personal journals are preserved at Aletheia University in Tamsui, Taiwan. 1968. Copies are also held at the Taiwan Theological Seminary Archives in Taipei. Rohrer, James. “Charisma in a Mission Context: The Case of George Leslie Mackay in Taiwan, 1871–1901.” Missiology: An International Works by George Leslie Mackay Review 36 (2008): 227–36. 1895 From Far Formosa: The Island, Its People and Missions. New York: ———. “George Leslie Mackay in Formosa, 1871–1901: An Interpretation Fleming H. Revell. of His Career.” Journal of the Canadian Church Historical Society 47 (2005): 3–58. Works About George Leslie Mackay ———. “Mackay and the Aboriginals: Reflections upon the Ambiguities Ion, A. Hamish. The Cross and the Rising Sun: The Canadian Protestant of Taiwanese Aboriginal Christian History.” In Christianity and Missionary Movement in the Japanese Empire, 1872–1931. Waterloo, Native Cultures: Perspectives from Different Regions of the World, ed. Ont.: Wilfred Laurier Univ. Press, 1990. Cyriac K. Pullapilly, pp. 263–75. Notre Dame, Ind.: Cross-Cultural Keith, Marian. The Black Bearded Barbarian: The Life of George Leslie Mackay Publications, 2004. of Formosa. Toronto: Board of Foreign Missions, 1912. Mackay, R. P. Life of George Leslie Mackay, D.D., 1844–1901. Toronto: Board of Foreign Missions, 1913. Notes 1. Much of this article is based upon the author’s examination of and the Evangelization of the Scottish Highlands, 1700–1850,” Mackay’s journal, held at Aletheia University in Tamsui, Taiwan, International Bulletin of Missionary Research 21 (April 1997): 67–72. and the Correspondence Relating to the Formosa Mission in the On the Na Daoine, see especially George Robb, “Popular Religion Presbyterian Church of Canada Board of Foreign Mission Papers, and the Christianization of the Scottish Highlands in the Eighteenth held at the United Church of Canada Archives in Toronto, Canada and Nineteenth Centuries,” Journal of Religious History 16 (June 1990): (hereafter UCC Archives). The photograph of the Mackay family 18–34. on p. 223 of this article is from R. P. Mackay, Life of George Leslie 5. Obituary of George Mackay, dated March 21, 1884, preserved Mackay, D.D., 1844–1901 (Toronto: Board of Foreign Missions, 1913), in George Leslie Mackay’s scrapbook. I wish to thank Mackay’s p. 35. The picture of Oxford College on p. 225 is from George Leslie granddaughters, Anna, Isabel, and Margaret Mackay, of Toronto, Mackay, From Far Formosa: The Island, Its People and Missions (New for graciously sharing this with me. On McKenzie, see the material York: Fleming H. Revell, 1895), facing p. 291. in the Donald McKenzie vertical file at the UCC Archives. On the 2. Agnes M. Machar, “An Apostolic Missionary in China,” Catholic Scottish community of Zorra, see Graham Leslie Brown, “The Scottish Presbyterian 29 (May 1881): 332–41. Settlement in West Zorra Township, Oxford County” (M.A. thesis, 3. When the directorate general of posts of the Republic of China Univ. of Western Ontario, 1970); William M. Campbell, Zorra (Boston: issued a Mackay commemorative stamp in 2001, the cachet cited Sherman, French, 1915); Marjory Harper, Emigration from North-East his “unselfish devotion to Taiwan” and the directorate’s desire “to Scotland, vol. 1, Willing Exiles (Aberdeen: Aberdeen Univ. Press, 1988), strengthen the bonds of friendship between Taiwan and Canada.” pp. 191–239; W. A. Mackay, Pioneer Life in Zorra (Toronto: Briggs, 1899), 4. On MacDonald, see John Kennedy, The Apostle of the North: The Life and and, by the same author, Zorra Boys at Home and Abroad (Toronto: Labours of the Rev. John Macdonald, D.D. (Glasgow: Free Presbyterian Briggs, 1900); W. D. McIntosh, One Hundred Years in the Zorra Church Publications, 1978). The Sutherland clearances are well described in (Knox United, Embro) (Toronto: Ryerson Press, 1930); and W. A. Ross, John Prebble, The Highland Clearances (London: Secker & Warburg, History of Zorra and Embro: Pioneer Sketches of Sixty Years Ago (Embro, 1963), pp. 57–124. On the evangelical movement in the Highlands, Ont.: Embro Courier Office, 1909). The Woodstock Public Library, see Allan I. MacInnes, “Evangelical Religion in the Nineteenth- Woodstock, Ontario, also has a very useful local history file. Century Highlands,” in Sermons and Battle Hymns: Protestant Popular 6. On Burns, see Islay Burns, Memoir of Rev. Wm. C. Burns, D.D. (New Culture in Modern Scotland, ed. Graham Walker and Tom Gallagher York: Robert Carter, 1870), and Edward Band, Working His Purpose (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Press, 1990), pp. 43–68; Terence P. Out: The History of the English Presbyterian Mission, 1847–1947 (London: McCaughey, “Protestantism and Scottish Highland Culture,” in An Presbyterian Church of England, 1948), pp. 4–72. On the Free Church Introduction to Celtic Christianity, ed. James P. Mackey (Edinburgh: in Canada, see Barbara C. Murison, “The Disruption and the Colonies T. & T. Clark, 1989), pp. 175–205; and several essays by Donald E. of Scottish Settlement,” in Scotland in the Age of the Disruption, ed. Meek: “Evangelical Missionaries in the Early Nineteenth-Century Stewart J. Brown and Michael Fry (Edinburgh: Edinburgh Univ. Highlands,” Scottish Studies 28 (1987): 1–34; “Evangelicalism and Press, 1993), pp. 135–50, and Richard W. Vaudry, The Free Church in Emigration: Aspects of the Role of Dissenting Evangelicalism in Victorian Canada, 1844–1861 (Waterloo, Ont.: Wilfrid Laurier Univ. Highland Emigration to Canada,” in Proceedings of the First North Press, 1989). American Congress on Celtic Studies, ed. G. MacLennann (Ottawa: 7. Knox College Literary Society Records, Archives of the Presbyterian Univ. of Ottawa Press, 1988), pp. 15–36; and “Protestant Missions Church in Canada, Toronto. In addition to Vaudry, on Knox College,

226 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Who has been winning souls Native missionary evangelists like Slavik Rad- and planting churches in chuk have won millions to Christ and planted Russia and the former USSR thousands of new churches in Ukraine, Q. since Communism collapsed? A. Russia and other former Soviet states.

Who provides financial Since 1991 Christian Aid has expended millions of dol- support for native mis- lars to support Slavik Radchuk and other native mis- Q. sionary evangelists in A. sionaries who conduct huge evangelistic campaigns and Russia and other countries of the reach millions through radio and TV broadcasts in the Russian former Soviet empire? language which is understood in 15 countries of the former USSR.

Q. How is Christian Aid financed? For more than 50 years Christian Aid Mission has been A. Christian Aid is supported entirely by sending financial help to indigenous evangelistic ministries freewill gifts and offerings from Bible- based in unevangelized countries. Currently more than believing, missionary-minded Christians, 700 such ministries are being assisted in Asia, Africa, Latin churches and organizations. America and Eastern Europe. They deploy more than 75,000 native missionaries who are spreading the gospel of Christ Q. Are other indigenous missions in need among unreached people within more than 3000 different of financial help for their missionaries? tribes and nations. A. Christian Aid is in communication with Christian Aid Mission more than 4000 indigenous missions, some P. O. Box 9037 based in almost every unevangelized country Charlottesville, VA 22906 on earth. They have over 200,000 missionar- Christian . . . because we ies in need of support. All Christians who love the brethren. 434-977-5650 believe in Christ’s “Great Commission” are Aid www.christianaid.org invited to join hands with Christian Aid in finding help for thousands of native mis- When you contact Christian Aid, ask sionaries who are now out on the fields of the for a free copy of Dr. Bob Finley’s world with no promise of regular financial book, THE FUTURE OF FOREIGN support. MISSIONS. see Brian J. Fraser, Church, College, and Clergy: A History of Theological him. He had never before witnessed such intimacy and devotion Education at Knox College, Toronto, 1844–1994 (Montreal and Kingston: between a missionary and native Christians. See Shore, The Flight McGill-Queen’s Univ. Press, 1995); Michael Gauvreau, The Evangelical of the Lapwing: A Naval Officer’s Jottings in China, Formosa, and Japan Century: College and Creed in English Canada from the Great Revival to (London: Longmans, Green, 1881), pp. 204–5. See Rohrer, “George the Great Depression (Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s Univ. Leslie Mackay,” for additional contemporary testimonials of this Press, 1991); and D. C. Masters, “The Scottish Tradition in Higher nature. Education,” in The Scottish Tradition in Canada, ed. W. Stanford Reid 16. Jennie Fraser deeply resented Mackay’s attitude, thinking him (Toronto: McClelland & Stewart, 1976), pp. 248–67. “unkind . . . to leave us in a strange land as he does. He won’t do a 8. Mackay to Thomas Wardrope, April 23, 1891, Foreign Mission thing but train the helpers.” Jennie Fraser to Maggie Wells, July 8, Correspondence, UCC Archives (hereafter FMC). On Princeton and 1875, Jennie Fraser Papers, UCC Archives. missions, see Daniel B. Calhoun, “The Last Command: Princeton 17. George L. Mackay to William McLaren, undated 1875, FMC. Theological Seminary and Missions (1812–1862)” (Ph.D. diss., 18. In addition to Mackay’s journals and scrapbook, this paragraph draws Princeton Theological Seminary, 1983), esp. pp. 183–234. upon a Mother’s Day “Radio Talk,” dated ca. 1932, written about 9. Mackay, From Far Formosa, pp. 20–21. On Duff, see Michael A. Laird, Tiu Chhang Mia by her daughter-in-law Jean Ross Mackay. A copy “Alexander Duff, 1806–1878: Western Education as Preparation of this document was graciously given to the author by Mackay’s for the Gospel,” in Mission Legacies: Biographical Studies of Leaders granddaughters. of the Modern Missionary Movement, ed. Gerald H. Anderson et al. 19. Mackay to William McLaren, August 4, 1883, FMC. (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1994), pp. 271–76; William Paton, 20. In a characteristic letter to William McLaren, chairman of the mission Alexander Duff (London: George H. Doran, 1923); and George Smith, committee, Mackay rejected instructions that he assign James Fraser The Life of Alexander Duff, D.D., LL.D. (New York: American Tract a larger role in training native students: “I intend to have . . . young Society, 1878). men traveling as usual with me over whom the other brethren in the field 10. On the impact of Baconianism on evangelical religion in the early will have no control. You know men don’t think alike, and as I have nineteenth century, see Theodore Dwight Bozeman, Protestants in an such clear evidence of God’s blessing attending my mode of procedure, I Age of Science: The Baconian Ideal and Antebellum American Religious will yield to no man” (emphasis Mackay’s). Mackay to McLaren, June Thought (Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1977). 10, 1876, FMC. 11. Mackay’s scrapbook. 21. Mackay to Foreign Mission Committee, December 10, 1888, FMC. 12. On this theme, see Jonathan J. Bonk, The Theory and Practice of 22. Annie Straith Jamieson, Some Things That Should Be Known to the Missionary Identification, 1860–1920 (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen Ladies of the Women’s Foreign Missionary Society in Canada (Hong Press, 1989). Kong, 1888), p. 9. 13. I develop this point more fully in “George Leslie Mackay in Formosa, 23. Michael Stainton, “Mackay and the Poll Tax” (paper presented at the 1871–1901: An Interpretation of His Career,” Journal of the Canadian Canadian Asian Studies East Asian Conference, LaMalbaie, Quebec, Church Historical Society 47 (2005): 3–58. November 2007). 14. The crucial role played by Giam Chheng Hoa is clearly described 24. The diary is quoted by Bella Mackay in a letter to “My dear Uncle, in Mackay’s manuscript diaries, which bring the organizational Aunt, Cousins,” July 12, 1901, in the possession of Mackay’s dynamics of the movement into sharp focus. granddaughters. A slightly different version of Bella’s letter was 15. Henry Noel Shore, a British naval officer who had observed many published in the Presbyterian Record and is preserved in the Mackay China missions, spent a month traveling with Mackay in 1880. Shore vertical file, UCC Archives. was “astonished” by the “adoration” Mackay’s converts showed 25. Ibid.

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228 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 The Legacy of Carl Thurman Smith Wong Man Kong

arl Thurman Smith was a pastor, missionary educator, Following graduation Smith pursued the bachelor of divin- Cand historian.1 He was born and educated in the United ity degree at Union Theological Seminary, in New York City, States, where he served as a pastor until he reached age forty. graduating in May 1943. He considered himself a “rational He originally had no idea that he would spend the second half religious thinker” as he had begun questioning the soundness of his life on the other side of the globe—in Hong Kong, where and validity of some biblical accounts at the age of twelve. Such he at first taught theology in a seminary. While teaching theol- intellectual concerns did not lead him out of the church; rather, ogy, he developed a keen interest in the history of Hong Kong, he committed his life to pastoral work when he was in univer- which he found included many fascinating stories about Chinese sity. His questions remained unresolved until he took a course Christians. After he ended his connection with his missionary taught by Paul Tillich (1886–1965), then on the Union faculty. agency, he stayed in Hong Kong, where he lived a simple life as Smith acknowledged the power of Tillich’s inspiration but did an independent scholar while pursuing his historical projects, not become a disciple of Tillich. He said, “Tillich’s philosophy is which proved to be of lasting value. He published one solid, too metaphysical. So, I rather chose Karl Barth (1886–1968), from well-researched article after another on South China, Hong Kong, whom I can have a biblical base.” Perhaps he would have become and Macau. On April 7, 2008, he passed away in Macau at the a theologian had he not met Reinhold Niebuhr (1892–1971), who age of ninety. Three lengthy obituaries, in Chinese and English, emphasized combining religious commitment with devotion to appeared in Hong Kong newspapers,2 which was a most unusual social and political affairs. These contributed to the making, for tribute for the passing of a scholar in Hong Kong. It suggests that Smith, of a keen social consciousness that became the basis for Carl T. Smith was dearly missed and that his legacy is significant transforming his passion for theological knowledge into his quest in the history of Hong Kong. of history.5 His thesis at Union combined history and theology as he studied the life and thought of John Casper Stoever (1707–79), Family Background and Education a prominent Lutheran pastor.6

Carl Thurman Smith was born on March 10, 1918, in Dayton, Pastorate in the United States Ohio. He was brought up in a middle-class family; his father was a purchasing agent, and his mother was a teacher. His parents After graduation, Smith served as a pastor for seventeen years. were pious, and they raised their children according to Christian He joined the Evangelical and Reformed Church, which ordained belief, with the family joining the Hale Evangelical and Reformed him in June 1943. He was dispatched to take charge of the ministry Church in Dayton. Carl was confirmed at the age of fourteen and at the Dewey Avenue Reformed Church in Rochester, New York. became a member of the church. He taught Sunday school and In 1945 the Evangelical and Reformed Church planned to start conducted junior church. He wrote, “During my early adolescent a new church in northeast Philadelphia, and in 1947 Smith was years, I independently arrived at a decision to enter some form appointed to start up the congregation “from ‘scratch’ without of Christian service. My home background was religious but no the nucleus of even a few members to act as a foundation for the external pressure was placed upon me in making this choice. new venture in faith.”7 He canvassed the neighborhood, seek- The natural development of my interests led me to this choice.”3 ing those interested in the church. After a year, in April 1948, Carl performed well in high school and university. He at- the congregation had grown from zero to forty, large enough to tended Steele High School in Dayton, graduating in 1936. Those be officially chartered; it was then known as the St. Stephen’s writing commendations for him mentioned that he was “remark- Evangelical and Reformed Church in Philadelphia (now St. Ste- ably level-headed” and had “interest in genealogical studies.” phen’s United Church of Christ). By the time Smith decided to He majored in philosophy and minored in Greek at DePauw leave, the membership had grown to 202. Such growth suggests University, in Greencastle, Indiana, from which he earned a B.A. that Smith was a committed pastor who took good care of the in 1940. According to his Greek professor, Rufus T. Stephenson, congregation. Even after he left for Hong Kong as a missionary Smith was “a likeable young man of the more conservative type, educator, he kept his ties with the congregation through cor- of splendid Christian character” and “an excellent student who respondence and other contacts. In 1998, at the advanced age enjoys going to the bottom of things. He is an easy and forceful of eighty, he flew all the way from Hong Kong to Philadelphia speaker and a leader among young men here. He has excellent to take part in the celebration of the golden anniversary of St. health, is a finely balanced personality, and gives unusual promise Stephen’s.8 of usefulness.”4 As he had decided to enter church ministry, he While building the church, Smith paid attention to self- joined and was elected president of the Oxford Fellowship, a development. He enrolled in a number of courses at the Temple group for preministerial students. School of Theology,9 from which he earned twenty credit units. Of the courses that he took there, he particularly remarked on the Timothy Man-kong Wong is Associate Professor in inspiration he received from Lefferts Loetscher (1904–81), a well- the Department of History and Associate Director known scholar of church history, and Edwin Lewis (1881–1959), of the Modern History Research Centre, Hong Kong a theologian who had gone through a drastic shift of position Baptist University, Hong Kong, China. from liberal to neoorthodox.10 Not surprisingly, Smith found —[email protected] Lewis particularly thought-provoking. While serving as a pastor, Smith responded to the missionary call from his church and offered himself for overseas mission. He became a missionary under the auspices of the United Board

October 2010 229 for World Ministries, a missionary agency of his church, which, the seminary underwent great changes, including merger with after merger, had become the United Church of Christ (UCC). Tsung Tsin Lok Yuk Seminary and its eventual incorporation The board assigned him to affiliate with the Hong Kong Council with Chung Chi College, in which it became the Theology Divi- of the Church of Christ in China, which was looking for a mis- sion and was housed in the college’s Theology Building. These sionary educator to teach theology at its seminary, the Hong changes altered the ways that the seminary operated and posed a Kong Theological Institute. In order to prepare for his future threat to Smith’s position in the college as a missionary educator. work in Hong Kong, Smith took courses in Cantonese at the Yale Institute of Far Eastern Languages in New Haven, Connecticut. A Simple Life in Hong Kong from the 1970s

In Hong Kong and at Union During the 1960s After another five years of service in Hong Kong (1966–70), Smith took a furlough in California. In late 1970, when he had nearly In January 1961 Smith arrived in Hong Kong and immediately finished his furlough, the United Board of World Ministries joined the Hong Kong Theological Institute, where he taught suddenly informed him that the Theology Division of Chung systematic theology, Old Testament, and church history. The Chi College had raised enough money to support itself and to institute needed scholars to provide leadership in adapting to hire an Asian theologian to replace him and teach his subjects. all necessary changes, as it had already been As a missionary-sending agency, the United resolved that it was going to be a part of the Board of World Ministries was pleased to see Chung Chi Theological Seminary, which was that an indigenous church or institution in a to be opened in 1963. Smith performed well in mission field had come of age and could now his teaching and was a key contributor to the support itself. The board decided that Smith seminary. At one time he was its only full-time should be dispatched to another mission field faculty member.11 In particular, he made good where his services would be needed. Smith, efforts in offering new courses, such as the his- though, did not want to start a new career in tory of Christianity and church in Hong Kong, in another mission field, because it would mean which he paid special attention to the overlooked cutting himself off from more than a decade of stories of Chinese Christians. Research literature hard work in research, scholarship, teaching, and books for the general public then available and ministry in Hong Kong. He decided to act provided views exclusively from the missionary against the instructions of the United Board of side. Smith determined that he would write the World Ministries, which then made it clear that history of Chinese Christians from their point his expenses in Hong Kong would no longer of view. be covered. The Theology Division, however, He was keenly aware of the scholarly needs welcomed him back to Hong Kong, although in the future development of the theology divi- Carl Thurman Smith he might be assigned only part-time teaching. sion and engaged in studies accordingly. Between Smith was given the right to reside in staff quar- 1965 and 1966 he enrolled in the master of sacred theology program ters of Chung Chi College until his extended retirement age of at Union Theological Seminary, his alma mater. For his thesis he sixty-five in 1983. Therefore, from 1972 at age fifty-four until his proposed to research “the development of Chinese congregations retirement, he served in various capacities as a part-time lecturer in Hong Kong from 1841 to 1870,” which was intended to shed and honorary lecturer of the college. light on the impact of Christianity in nineteenth-century Hong In Hong Kong Smith was used to living a simple life. Now Kong.12 In 1966 Smith submitted a thesis entitled “Schools and he had to live even more simply. But he had a strong will, as well Scholars: English Language Education in the China Mission in as great determination to keep up his research. Since the pension the First Half of the Nineteenth Century and Its Results,” which he received from his church and the missionary agency did not was a very rich narrative grounded on substantial archival ma- cover his expenses in Hong Kong, he took some part-time jobs. terials and public records, reflecting his research in missionary For example, he worked at the Department of History, University archives in Switzerland, Germany, and England. His readers, of Hong Kong, where he helped establish the History Workshop however, did not find his thesis satisfactory and demanded revi- between 1975 and 1978. The workshop turned out to be a true sions, which were due April 1967. The existing file on Smith at blessing for many scholars in Hong Kong studies.14 He was also Union Theological Seminary does not contain reports by either grateful to many colleagues and friends who helped him in the the supervisors or the examiners. All we have is a reply from midst of financial difficulties. In particular, he was hired as a his supervisor that Smith did not submit the revised thesis. Ac- consultant for historical projects of the Hong Kong Anglican cording to Smith, he was asked to make some adjustment and Church (the Hong Kong Sheng Kung Hui).15 What Smith ap- rearrangement in both the main body and the appendixes of the preciated most was the spirit of care behind such appointments. thesis. He was not convinced of the merit of such requests from Smith was a sedentary scholar who transformed long hours his supervisors and chose not to continue with his program.13 of hard work in libraries and archives into journeys of adventure Despite this frustration at Union, Smith returned to Hong in uncharted lands of the past. He was also keenly aware of the Kong and remained active in teaching and research at the Chung need to take part in Hong Kong society. He was a member of the Chi Theological Seminary. His favorite course to teach was the Council of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, history of Christianity in Hong Kong. He kept doing research, which he served as vice-president for almost two decades be- began to write up his findings, and had articles published in ginning in 1976. After his long years of service, he was elected academic journals and scholarly books. He gradually established honorary vice-president.16 Between 1977 and 1979 he wrote short himself as one of the leading scholars in local history, covering a essays on Hong Kong history for South China Morning Post in a wide range of topics such as education, social leaders, missionar- series called “A Sense of History.” On another frontier, from 1987 ies and Chinese Christians, and communities. From 1966 to 1969 to 1990 he served as a member of the Antiquities Advisory Board

230 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 of the Antiquities and Monuments Office of the Hong Kong gov- He paid less attention to the socially and commercially powerful ernment. In 1996 Hong Kong Baptist University established the Europeans and more to the Chinese mistresses they kept. He ex- Archives on the History of Christianity in China, to which Smith plored the history, not of major Taipans (the leading European or donated his own precious collection of 300 church history–related American businessmen), but of the Jewish, Armenian, and Parsee rare documents in the next year.17 At the invitation in 1996 and merchants in Canton, Hong Kong, and Macau. He examined, not 1997 of the head of the Chung Chi Theology Division of Chung the affluent and powerful Chinese social leaders in Hong Kong, Chi College, he offered courses on the history of Christianity but groups of young maidservants that they kept, known as mui in Hong Kong. His active involvement in numerous capacities tsai (lit. “little sister”). As Smith was fascinated by the rapidly indicated his dedication to promoting study of the history of changing urban landscape, he studied not the central business Christianity in Hong Kong and the history of Hong Kong itself. district, where money and power interacted subtly, but peripheral When he was over the age of eighty, Smith was pleasantly localities, which revealed a truer taste of what Hong Kong was surprised to have a number of academic recognitions bestowed like. Some of his articles are collected in A Sense of History: Studies upon him. The Cultural Affairs Bureau in Macau appointed in the Social and Urban History of Hong Kong (1995). him a full-time researcher and provided stipends that enabled Finally, Smith’s writings reveal his style, his methods, and him to stay in Macau and to continue his work in archives and the fruitfulness of his research. In a new introduction for a reprint libraries. In 2003 the Centre of Asian Studies at the University of edition of Chinese Christians (2005), Christopher Munn high- Hong Kong honored him as one of its distinguished fellows. On lighted the salient features of Smith’s scholarship: “The richness of October 30, 2005, the Inter-University Institute of Macau awarded detail and anecdotes that make the book a pleasure to read often him the degree doctor of letters, honoris causa.18 lead us away from the main point of each chapter: sometimes, indeed, the ‘point’ is in the detail—in conveying an impression of Hong Kong Research and Writing complexity and the muddle of so much of Hong Kong’s history. This is not a fault but a product of Smith’s unusual methodology Smith’s impressive results in scholarship demonstrated the wis- and of his reluctance to generalize.”21 dom of his decision to remain in Hong Kong. From the mid-1960s Smith’s legacy is not merely at the level of scholarship pre- onward, he produced an impressive number of publications. sented in research literature but at the operational level, which Originally he had been more interested in theology, which had has greatly facilitated research into Hong Kong and Macau given him a framework for his biblical interpretation and had history. He developed a unique file-index system to handle his facilitated a sense of social consciousness. After a few years of research materials. The size of his system is enormous, compris- teaching in Hong Kong, he was able to grasp certain features of ing 140,000 note cards that contain all the precious information Chinese culture, out of which came two theological essays in 1967. Yet, for most of his writings throughout his career in Hong Kong, Smith took a more historical approach. Smith’s impressive results While teaching theology in Hong Kong, Smith began to reflect upon history from a left-wing, even a contrarian, viewpoint. His in scholarship demonstrated academic training and the inspiration from such leading schol- the wisdom of his decision ars as Reinhold Niebuhr, Edwin Lewis, and J. C. Hoekendijk in particular enabled him to see things from a sensibly different to remain in Hong Kong and perspective. In particular, he paid more attention to the marginal deeply affected his legacy. groups whose voices were suppressed and who thus became invisible in history.19 Early in his academic career in Hong Kong, Smith chose to that he extracted from the various sources that he consulted. A pursue the history of Christian missions in China. At that time, it considerable number of scholars have made use of his cards. was customary to write from a strongly mission-centric perspec- These cards were microfilmed in the early 1990s by the University tive, giving primacy to missionary voices. This approach, however, of Tokyo, and later by the Genealogical Society of Utah. In 1997 was at odds with Smith’s own academic views. So he embarked Smith permitted the Public Records Office, Hong Kong, to digi- on a long journey of discovering the history of ordinary Chinese tize all his cards. And in 2006 Smith donated the cards to the Christians. He wrote, “I was immediately struck by the paucity library of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. of detailed information about the Chinese converts. From what The cards are now housed at the Hong Kong Central Library. social and economic group had they come? How did becoming a Christian affect their relationship with non-Chinese? Did they Conclusion become less Chinese and more Westernized? Did their social and economic position change? To what extent were they alienated Smith’s critical decision in 1972 to return to Hong Kong deeply from their cultural tradition?”20 These questions led him to exam- affected the legacy for which he is now remembered and cher- ine missionary archives, public records, and other primary source ished. His extensive writings and thorough use of many different materials, which resulted in some remarkable works that shed sources earned him lasting respect from scholars in the field of light on the inner thoughts and feelings of many individuals who Hong Kong and Macau history. And his generous sharing of were otherwise invisible in the prevailing historical depictions. his file-index system has become an extended blessing to those As a sober researcher combing through newspapers, wills, interested in a wide range of topics covering the history of land records, and many other sources, Smith uncovered much Christianity in modern China and many interesting individuals substantive information that enabled him to pursue his investiga- in Canton, Hong Kong, and Macau. tions. Instead of viewing things through the eyes of governors No two Anglo-American missionaries in Hong Kong were or major officials, he was able to write a history “from below.” completely alike, although they may have come from similar He focused not on missionaries but on their Chinese students. backgrounds in following the same religious call. Neither were

October 2010 231 their stories identical. Smith once commented on the contribu- ship in the midst of financial difficulties, cherished moments tions of missionaries in Hong Kong, “The missionary story in of satisfaction in discovery and in the contribution he made in Hong Kong has not been without its moments of failure, lack of scholarship, and treasured moments of pleasure in meeting and vision, pettiness and rivalry, pretensions and pride, but it has making friends who shared the same passion for history. Smith’s also had its better moments which have left their imprint on books and articles will continue to inspire those who seek to Hong Kong.”22 Smith himself struggled with moments of hard- grasp the rich history of Hong Kong.

Selected Bibliography For a bibliography listing Smith’s sixty book chapters and articles 1980 (with H. G. Hollman) Hong Kong Going and Gone. Hong Kong: published in academic journals, see http://cscadocs.blogspot Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. .com/2008/04/carl-t-smith-bibliography.html. 1983 The Body of Christ in Kowloon Tong. Hong Kong: Christ Church Jubilee Committee. Works by Carl Thurman Smith 1985 Chinese Christians: Elites, Middlemen, and the Church in Hong Kong. 1956 (comp., with Hannah Benner Roach) Reference Guides for Course Hong Kong: Oxford Univ. Press. 2nd ed. by Hong Kong Univ. in Genealogical Methods. Philadelphia: Pennsylvania Genealogical Press, 2005. Society. 1995 A Sense of History: Studies in the Social and Urban History of Hong 1974 “A Brief History of the Diocese of Hong Kong and Macao.” In Kong. Hong Kong: Hong Kong Educational Publishing. Chinese The Diocese of Hong Kong and Macao, 1849–1974, pp. 3–10. Hong edition by Hong Kong Educational Publishing, 1999. Kong: Diocesan Office.

Notes 1. I am grateful to a number of scholars who assisted me in preparing 11. Chan Wai Keung, “The Forty Years of the Theology Division of this article. They are Lee Ka-kui (chief editor, Hong Kong Educational Chung Chi College” (in Chinese), in Forty Years of Theology Education Publishing Company), Ying Fuk Tsang (associate professor of in Chung Chi College, 1963–2003, ed. Joseph Tai-wai (Hong Kong: Chi- Chung Chi Divinity School), Leah Rousmaniere (associate director nese Univ. of Hong Kong, Chung Chi College, Theology Division, of development for stewardship, Union Theological Seminary), 2003), p. 52. William Stone (pastor, St. Stephen’s United Church of Christ), and 12. Carl T. Smith student file synopsis. Irene Wong (archivist at the University Library of Hong Kong Baptist 13. Ying Fuk Tsang, “In Memory of Carl T. Smith (1918–2008),” Newsletter University). This article is a substantially revised version of an earlier of the Divinity School of Chung Chi College, the Chinese University article that I coauthored with Lee Ka-kui, “The Reverend Carl T. of Hong Kong, May 16, 2008, p. 3. Smith: A Missionary-Turned-Historian,” Modern Chinese History 14. In 2009 the Department of History at the University of Hong Kong Society of Hong Kong Bulletin 6 (July 1993): 91–97. decided to close the history workshop. The research materials have 2. Ko Tim Keung “A Serious Historian Does Not Earn the Reputation been relocated to various libraries. That He Deserves” (in Chinese), Hong Kong Economic Journal, April 15. Smith wrote quite extensively about the history of the Hong Kong 12, 2008; “Historian Focused on Lives of Ordinary Chinese,” South Anglican Church. Deborah Ann Brown helped organize and type China Morning Post, April 13, 2008; and Lee Pui Tak, “Carl T. Smith his manuscript into eighteen files. She also quoted it extensively in Remembered: A Hong Kong Historian of Quiet Competence” (in her book; see “The History of the Anglican Church in Hong Kong,” Chinese), Ming Pao, April 17, 2008. The last piece was reprinted along in Turmoil in Hong Kong on the Eve of Communist Rule: The Fate of the with Smith’s bibliography in the Journal of the History of Christianity Territory and Its Anglican Church (San Francisco: Mellen Research in Modern China 8 (2008/2009): 65–70. Univ. Press, 1993), pp. 59–110. 3. Carl T. Smith student file synopsis, Union Theological Seminary in 16. Smith played an active role in making possible the success of the the City of New York, 2008. Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. In December 2005 4. Ibid. it organized a special event at the Hong Kong City Hall, “Carl T. 5. Interview with Carl T. Smith, by Wong Man Kong and Lee Ka-kui, Smith: A Celebration of His Works on Hong Kong and Macau,” March 21, 1992. paying tribute to his contributions both to the organization and to 6. “The History of German Lutheranism in Pennsylvania Before scholarship. See Newsletter of the Hong Kong Branch of Royal Asiatic Muhlenberg, with Special Emphasis on John Casper Stoever, Junior” Society, January 2006, p. 4. (B.D. thesis, Union Theological Seminary, 1943). 17. Newsletter of Hong Kong Baptist University, February 24, 1997, p. 1. 7. William Stone, pastor of St. Stephen’s United Church of Christ, e-mail 18. Newsletter of Macau Inter-University Institute 1, no. 2 (November to author, October 1, 2008. 2005): 1. 8. Stone, letter to author, September 30, 2008. 19. May Holdsworth, Foreign Devils: Expatriates in Hong Kong (Hong 9. In 1960 the school became Conwell School of Theology, chartered Kong: Oxford Univ. Press, 2002), p. 148. separately but still on the campus of Temple University until 1969, 20. Carl Smith, Chinese Christians: Elites, Middlemen, and the Church in when it combined with Gordon Divinity School, now Gordon- Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Oxford Univ. Press, 1985), p. xiii. Conwell Theological Seminary, South Hamilton, Mass. 21. Christopher Munn, “Introduction to the Paperback Edition,” in 10. During the 1950s Lefferts Loetscher focused on the Presbyterian Chinese Christians: Elites, Middlemen, and the Church in Hong Kong, tradition, and he published, among others, The Broadening Church: by Carl Smith, 2nd ed. (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Univ. Press, 2005), A Study of Theological Issues in the Presbyterian Church Since 1869 p. xi. (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1954). In the 1920s Edwin 22. Carl Smith, “The Contribution of Missionaries to the Development Lewis was an advocate of liberal theology, but he later shifted to of Hong Kong,” in A Sense of History: Studies in the Social and Urban neo-orthodoxy. His book A Manual of Christian Beliefs (New York: History of Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Educational Pub- Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1927) expresses his earlier position, while lishing, 1995), p. 304. The Faith We Declare (Nashville: Cokesbury Press, 1939) arises from his new position.

232 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Book Reviews

Kingdom Without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Christianity.

By Miriam Adeney. Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter- Varsity Press, 2009. Pp. 294. Paperback $18.

Global Awakening: How Twentieth-Century Revivals Triggered a Christian Revolution.

By Mark Shaw. Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter- Varsity Press, 2010. Pp. 221. Paperback $20.

Like two waves merging from different relations, and environmental stewardship. have propelled the growth, vitality, and angles to crest together, these two Overall, she affirms that “God is doing diversity of global Christianity today. publications break upon the scene of something new in our time. . . . This book While Shaw offers more in-depth current studies in global Christianity is not primarily about us [Christians in historical, theological, sociological, and contribute significantly to its rising the West] or what we should do. It is a and missiological analysis, Adeney tide. For over thirty years now, scholars humble celebration of the kingdom that offers a more artistic montage of have pointed out the recent, seismic shift glows [sic] from generation to generation God’s kingdom in our midst today. in the center of Christianity from Europe and will never be destroyed” (p. 40)—a Together, these complementary texts and North America to Africa, Asia, and kingdom without borders. exemplify, methodologically, the com- Latin America. Yet as Miriam Adeney Shaw notes the remarkable resurgence plex, interdisciplinary nature of studies and Mark Shaw attest, we still grapple to of Christianity worldwide, contrary to in world Christianity. Significantly, both understand and respond appropriately to widespread twentieth-century assump- Adeney and Shaw clearly account for this revolutionary change in our religious tions that secularization would supersede the rise in global Christianity primarily scene. Thus Adeney is compelled to narrate religion, especially Christianity. While in terms of grassroots, indigenous “the untold story of global Christianity” acknowledging multiple factors con- movements worldwide—as opposed to (p. 11), and Shaw to question its causes tributing to the rise of twentieth-century those who persist in interpreting it as and implications. Christianity, Shaw proposes another major right-wing American imperialism or one- Adeney introduces her book as “a driving force not yet adequately recognized: way globalization from the West to the continuation of Hebrews 11, that great namely, revivals. He analyzes the nature rest. Certainly both books are essential list of people down the ages who lived and dynamics of revivals through a series reading for anyone seeking to understand and died by faith” (p. 8). Drawing upon of case studies spanning the globe, from and participate in God’s kingdom in the personal encounters and published the Korean revival of 1907, to subsequent world today. accounts, she employs her notable gift revivals in West and East Africa, India, —Diane Stinton of storytelling to narrate the ordinary America, Brazil, and China. The main but extraordinary lives of Christians thesis of his compelling argument is that Diane Stinton is Associate Professor of Theology around the world. Far from abstract, global revivals are “charismatic people in the World Christianity program at Africa academic discourse, her work creatively movements that seek to change their International University (AIU)/Nairobi Evangelical weaves together real-life experiences with world by translating Christian faith and Graduate School of Theology (NEGST), Nairobi, reflections on the major missiological transferring power” (p. 198). Penetratingly, Kenya. She has written Jesus of Africa: Voices issues they illustrate: for example, he demonstrates the interplay of spiritual, of Contemporary African Christology (Orbis, suffering and martyrdom, Internet use in cultural, historical, global, and group 2004) and edited African Theology on the Way: evangelism and discipleship, interfaith dynamics through which these revivals Current Conversations (SPCK, 2010).

Mission After Christendom: anticipate topics explored at the 2010 Emergent Themes in Edinburgh conference. Contemporary Mission. The essays investigate an impressive range of issues, including globalization, Edited by Ogbu U. Kalu, Peter Vethana- the relationship between mission and yagamony, and Edmund Kee-Fook Chia. migration, race, gender, ecology, dialogue, Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, and short-term missions. As usual in a 2010. Pp. xxv, 177. Paperback $24.95. collection of essays by several authors, some contributions are stronger and In this multiauthored and multiedited Lutheran, Reformed, Roman Catholic, and more engaging than others. Some of collection of essays, missiologists from Anabaptist), were all originally presented the essays seem to do little more than across the globe reflect on pressing issues at events organized by the Chicago Center summarize material already available in contemporary Christian mission. for Global Ministries. They celebrate the elsewhere. Others offer fresh perspectives These essays, written by authors from centenary of the 1910 World Missionary on perennial and emerging concerns. various Christian traditions (including Conference in Edinburgh, as well as All the essays recognize and celebrate

October 2010 233 the changing direction and dynamics provides a succinct summary of the key Nicholas Black Elk: Medicine Man, of global mission—no longer “from the missiological changes in the past century Missionary, Mystic. West to the rest” but “from everywhere in relation to its context, content, means, to everywhere.” Participants at Edin- and attitude. By Michael F. Steltenkamp. Norman: Univ. of burgh 2010 were drawn from the world —Stuart Murray Williams Oklahoma Press, 2009. Pp. xxi, 270. $24.95. church in a way that was inconceivable in 1910. Several essays reflect helpfully Stuart Murray Williams works under the auspices of Nicholas Black Elk makes a significant on the implications of this multidirec- the Anabaptist Network as a trainer and consultant, contribution to the broadly cast genre of tional expression of mission, with its very with particular interest in urban mission, church “Black Elk studies.” Through the use of different power dynamics and ways of planting, and emerging forms of church. He is the published and unpublished material, as operating. The first essay in the collec- founder of Urban Expression, a pioneering urban well as drawing on his children’s personal tion, “From Edinburgh to Edinburgh,” by church planting agency with teams in several cities experience of Black Elk and his context, Stephen Bevans (the 2008 Scherer Lecture), in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands. author Michael Steltenkamp, professor of religious studies at Wheeling Jesuit Uni- versity, Wheeling, West Virginia, attempts to redress a gap in the existing literature. In doing so he provides an interpretive biography that opens a new window on Black Elk as a historical figure. Beyond Search the reach of antecedent biographies, which have focused largely on the pro- Announcing—something new for tagonist’s earlier life and documented the International Bulletin of Mission- disaffections, this work portrays Black Elk ary Research—an easily searchable as a complex figure. Steltenkamp argues for online gateway to all past feature an interpretation of Black Elk as a religious leader who, in the end, lived an integrated articles, book reviews, Noteworthy spirituality woven from his traditional news items, and conference notices. Lakota heritage as it encountered Christian Go to www.internationalbulletin.org/ faith and practice through the broad span search to search or scroll through the of the latter half of the nineteenth century index of more than 1,200 articles in and the first half of the twentieth. To construct this analysis, the author relies the e-journal archives. rather heavily on Black Elk’s daughter, Lucy, as a companion witness to the story he is attempting to tell. Setting the Read trajectory of Black Elk’s becoming against the marker of his progeny is not necessarily an inappropriate hermeneutical tactic. It When you locate an article that captures your interest, click on the PDF allows the character to live for the reader link and download the article. (The most recent articles are also online in in a way that biographies written with less HTML format). If you are not already a subscriber to the IBMR e-journal, direct access to Black Elk’s story cannot simply register at www.internationalbulletin.org/register. It’s FREE. If you do. The author is to be commended for the prefer the print edition, join the thousands of mission-minded scholars, prac- broad reach of his story and his willingness to engage the complex conversation that titioners, and pastors who subscribe for $23 a year including postage world- unfolds between traditional spirituality wide—at www.internationalbulletin.org/subscribe. and Christian theology. —Wendy L. Fletcher Share Wendy Fletcher is Principal and Dean, and Professor of the History of Christianity, at Vancouver School of Theology, Vancouver, British Columbia. She Whether in print or online, you will receive 4 issues per year—January, April, works extensively in the area of cross-cultural July, and October—of the International Bulletin of Missionary Research, an research and education. Associated Church Press award-winning, quarterly publication of the Over- seas Ministries Study Center. Feel free to e-mail articles to others and intro- duce them to the benefits of the IBMR. Thank you for helping us spread the word about the IBMR—your reliable source for Christian mission history and analysis. Alaskan Missionary Spirituality.

“The IBMR is a splendid periodical of tremendous value Edited by Michael J. Oleska. Crestwood, N.Y.: to the academy as well as the church.” St. Vladimir’s Seminary Press, 2010. Pp. 406. —Mark A. Noll, University of Notre Dame Paperback $24.

Alaskan Missionary Spirituality is a collection of primary-source material www.internationalbulletin.org on an epoch of Christian mission rarely dealt with by historians: the Russian Orthodox mission to Alaska during the

234 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The and Islam, not only using the sacred texts differences will affect the manner in which organization, translation, and introductory of the two faiths, but also describing the theological dialogue can take place. notes by editor Michael Oleska allow this economic, social, and political milieus Johnston’s background is trans- material to be read like one continuous that his theology seeks to address. Indeed, cultural, rooted not only in the American story, a story of courageous and highly in keeping with the author’s belief that context but also in those of Europe and effective evangelization of the native any theology needs be constructed with West Asia, which affords him a unique Alaskan population. reference to its larger setting, this work vantage point from which he sees an The editor’s introduction provides is much more wide-ranging than a one- urgency for Christians and Muslims to necessary background, highlights dimensional discussion of some interesting cooperate in programs of social justice: the accomplishments of individual points of contact between the two religions. little short of our temporal salvation is missionaries, and guides the reader into the Johnston, though, allows that between at stake. He does not shy away from collection by describing several significant the two there are important differences showing how intractable problems characteristics of this movement. The that cannot be glossed over, and that such such as the Israeli-Palestinian conflict organized effort began with a group of missionaries from the Valaam Monastery in Finland. Right from the time of their arrival in the fall of 1794, these monks were determined to “establish an American Church, respecting and employing the Miracles, Missions, & languages and artistic culture of Alaska within the community of Orthodox American Pentecostalism churches” (p. 7). As was the case in Siberia, GARY B. McGEE the Alaskan culture was dominated “Historical scholarship at its best....will serve profitably by shamanism. Interestingly, these in undergraduate courses in religion, in seminary courses Russian missionaries preached the Gospel in church history and missions, and in doctoral courses “without directly attacking the traditional in historiography and historical method.” shamanistic world view of the natives” —Grant Wacker, Duke University Divinity School (p. 13). In fact, they sought to present 978-1-57075-854-6 paper $30.00 Christianity as the “fulfillment of what the The American Society of Missiology Series Alaskans already knew” (p. 13). The result was tremendous success, with thousands The Gospel Among the Nations being baptized and gathered into churches A Documentary History of Inculturation that employed their own art and music to ROBERT A. HUNT contextualize the eternal message of Christ. “An invaluable collection of primary and secondary Unfortunately, the sale of Alaska to documents....An extremely useful resource for anyone the United States in 1867 led to a wide- attempting to engage in mission authentically and spread attempt to assimilate the popula- contextually.” — Dr. Catherine Rae Ross tion by imposing English and enrolling International Association for Mission Studies children (sometimes removed from their 978-1-57075-874-4 paper $35.00 homes by force) in boarding schools, thus destroying much of the native culture and social fabric. Such insensitivity notwith- The Gospel Among Religions standing, this valuable book recounts Christian Ministry, Theology, and and documents what must be one of the Spirituality in a Multicultural World most effective missionary efforts in the DAVID R. BROCKMAN and RUBEN L.F. HABITO, Editors history of the church. —Edward Rommen Explores writings from the New Testament through today to show how Christians historically relate to and engage Edward Rommen served as a missionary in Europe. religious “Others” in a constructive way when carrying He is a priest in the Orthodox Church in America out the tasks of mission and ministry. and an adjunct professor at Duke Divinity School, • Coming in October 2010 • 978-1-57075-899-7 paper $34.00 Durham, North Carolina.

A Christian View of Islam Essays on Dialogue by Thomas F. Michel, S.J. Earth, Empire, and Sacred Text: IRFAN A. OMAR, Editor Muslims and Christians as Trustees Foreword by JOHN L. ESPOSITO of Creation. “This book sheds positive light on the demanding path of mutual understanding and in-depth dialogue.” By David L. Johnston. London: Equinox, 2010. —Tariq Ramadan, Oxford University Pp. xiii, 632. £65 / $95. 978-1-57075-860-7 paper $34.00

David Johnston, visiting scholar in the Faith Meets Faith Series Department of Near Eastern Languages www.maryknollmall.org ORBIS BOOKS and Civilizations, University of Penn- 40 Years of Books Maryknoll, NY 10545 sylvania, casts a “common theology of That Matter 1970-2010 1-800-258-5838 humanity and creation” for Christianity

October 2010 235 can benefit from such cooperation and qur’anic commentary serve him well in in the background, seeking to clothe dialogue. Similarly, he unflinchingly this undertaking. itself respectably in theology. Similarly, addresses larger difficulties of ecojustice An evangelical Congregationalist, his objections to globalization or his and planetary sustainability. Johnston quotes from beyond the usual view of postmodernism are not rooted Johnston helpfully shares with the cast of characters that one might expect— ideologically. reader how he, as a committed Christian, for example, the controversial theologian While not the easiest read, this book can read the Qur’an in a manner that John Hick. Johnston’s political and is well worth the effort, especially if it does justice to the Qur’an as a text while socioeconomic analyses draw on sources provokes readers to ask new questions not imposing on it Protestant thought as disparate as Paul Krugman, with the and entertain fresh answers. patterns. Over the centuries, Protestants New York Times, and the late Edward —Steven P. Blackburn have stumbled by reading Christian infer- Said. Similarly, Johnston uses thinkers ences in the text that may not be there, such as Patricia Crone, whom Islamicists Steven P. Blackburn, ordained in the Congregational or missing points of contact between the will recognize as less than mainstream. Christian Churches (NACCC), is Faculty Associate two religions because of dissimilarities in His indictment of George Bush’s policies in Semitic Scriptures at the Macdonald Center for language. Johnston’s facility with Arabic in Iraq cannot be dismissed as merely the Study of Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, and his familiarity with the tradition of due to some political agenda lurking Hartford Seminary, Hartford, Connecticut.

Making Headway: The particularly the southerners among them, Introduction of Western and their way of life never gained a toehold Civilization in Colonial Northern in the North. This initiative failed, causing Nigeria. colonial officials to concentrate on schools as the conduit for cultural transfer. By Andrew E. Barnes. Rochester, N.Y.: Univ. This delightful book makes a strong of Rochester Press, 2009. Pp. vii, 330. $95. case that, instead of a coherent mission imposing Western civilization on northern This book, which is about the competing land apart, suspended in time and space” Nigeria during the colonial era, there were meaning of Western civilization among (p. 91). For the colonial administration, it competing agendas. Rather than Western northern Nigeria’s vast communal was about how governance related to the civilization having the clear upper hand groupings, documents the perspectives institution and sustaining of so-called in the interchange, the peoples of north- of colonial administrators and Christian indirect rule—involving, for example, ern Nigeria had considerable agency in missionaries, as well as the reactions of the appointment and deposition of rulers, determining which variants of Western various peoples and local rulers, especially negotiation with these rulers on how culture they chose to embrace. Overall, emirs, chiefs, and Islamic clerics under to govern and accomplish government this volume makes a valuable contribution British colonial rule in the first half of objectives, taxation, public works, and to interdisciplinary inquiry in education, the twentieth century. What did it mean education. This education involved African studies, and religious studies. to “make headway” in the context of (1) a leadership that followed colonial —Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké Okome the introduction of Western civilization directives; (2) clerical and artisanal to colonial northern Nigeria? In an training; (3) reconciliation of Muslim Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké Okome is Professor of Political interesting presentation of the various and British values; (4) denationalization/ Science at Brooklyn College, City University of New policies, strategies, and ideologies of detribalization; (5) resistance to the York. She is the author of A Sapped Democracy: the bearers of Western civilization to harmonization of the educational systems The Political Economy of the Structural Adjust- Northern Nigeria, Barnes shows us what of the southern and northern protectorates; ment Program and the Political Transition in “making headway” meant in the local (6) cultural transfer; (7) creating and Nigeria, 1983–1993 (Univ. Press of America, 1998) contexts. As he ably demonstrates, for extending northern Muslim autocratic and is coeditor of the online journal Ìrìnkèrindò: the missionaries, making headway was rule over outsiders (southerners); and A Journal of African Migration. a fight against “the sacred North run as a (8) making sure that African Christians,

Quest for Peace: An Ecumenical popular history of peacemaking efforts History of the Church in Lesotho. by church leaders between 1970 and 1985. This, it was hoped, would serve as By Craig W. Hinks. Morija, Lesotho: The a counternarrative to the more sensa- Heads of Churches in Lesotho and the Christian tional stories that so easily capture the Council of Lesotho, 2009. Pp. xx, 1,084. $55. news, co-opt our Christian memories, and spawn mistrust and confusion. The This is an extraordinary book by any of a farseeing project conceived in the result was an impressively comprehen- measure. Comprising nearly eleven mid-1980s, when both the country and its sive volume that references 175 years of hundred double-column pages, to my churches were convulsed by bitter ethnic, Lesotho denominational and nondenom- knowledge nothing quite like it has political, and ecclesiastical confusion, inational history. ever been published in Africa about suspicion, misrepresentation, and outright Researched and published with the Christianity in a particular country—in conflict. The idea was to engage a neutral full cooperation and encouragement of this case, Lesotho. It is one tangible result but informed outsider to write a short church leaders, this volume will do more

236 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 to foster a sense of shared identity and than not organize prayer campaigns to hard work, which open the believer to the common cause among Lesotho’s Chris- fight crime rather than organize their “values of progress: punctuality, respon- tians (75 percent of the total population) communities against the same threat” sibility, and cleanliness” (p. 160). than anything else conceivable. Replete (pp. xvi, 201). O’Neill’s rapport with these From February 2006 to May 2007 with pictures, maps, and tables, each of neo-Pentecostals helps him to convey the O’Neill lived in Guatemala City, where the book’s seventeen chapters includes weight of their perceived burden, even 5,338 people were killed in 2005, or 15 both a study guide and an action guide as he analyzes how it tends to downplay a day (p. 20). His fieldwork focused on tailored for use by individuals, small historical, political, social, and economic Christian citizenship in neo-Pentecostal groups, and entire congregations. Plans factors. Guatemala is the most Protestant megachurches, but all ethnographic data are under way to translate the book into country of Latin America: a nation chosen come from only one church: El Shaddai. Sesotho. Of special interest is Appendix by God (pp. 7–8). Neo-Pentecostals think (O’Neill mentions in note 10 on p. 216 that B, providing a partial directory of 277 it can change only though conversion, he also visited four other megachurches, denominations in Lesotho (pp. 944–49). individual repentance, Bible study, and but these get only one reference each in the The author estimates that there are probably three times as many African Initiated Churches in the country as appear in his registry, which is nevertheless an impressive indication of both the profusion and the vivacity of indigenous EXPLORE NEW EMPHASA IS OPTIONS AT FULLER Christianities in a country whose total population hovers around two million. The book is divided into four major sections: “Context: Tradition and Change (to 1833)”; “Foundations: Invitation and Response (1833–1899)”; “Expansion: Conflict and Community (1899–1933)”; and “Independence: Problems and Promise (1960–2008).” Five helpful appendixes, a glossary, a bibliography, and an index enhance the value of an outstanding resource that should inspire similar efforts elsewhere in Africa and around the world. The easiest way to procure a copy is to order it directly from the author at [email protected]. A copy of the book shipped by surface mail from Lesotho will cost $55; shipped from Toronto, the book will cost $69. —Jonathan J. Bonk

Jonathan J. Bonk, Executive Director of the Overseas Ministries Study Center, New Haven, Connecticut, is Editor of the International Bulletin of Missionary Research and Project Director for Choosing an emphasis is a great way to take advantage of the the Dictionary of African Christian Biography. rich interdisciplinary resources and faculty available at Fuller. Emphases now available to master’s program students include: ■ Children at Risk ■ International Development and Urban Studies ■ Islamic Studies City of God: Christian Citizenship in Postwar Guatemala. Other emphases also available at Fuller include Ancient Near Eastern Studies; Biblical Studies and Theology; Christian By Kevin Lewis O’Neill. Berkeley: Univ. of Ethics; Leadership in the Multicultural Latino Community; California Press, 2010. Pp. xxix, 278. $55 / Recovery Ministry; Theology and the Arts; Worship, Theology, £37.95; paperback $21.95 / £14.95. and the Arts; and Youth, Family, and Culture.

City of God is an ethnographic study of For more information visit fuller.edu/emphasis “neo-Pentecostal formations of Christian citizenship in postwar Guatemala and the kind of responsibilities that such an iden- tity prompts Guatemalans to shoulder” (p. xxii). It concludes that the active mem- bers of the megachurch El Shaddai “are more likely to pray for Guatemala than pay Theology I Psychology I Intercultural Studies their taxes; they tend to speak in tongues for the soul of the nation rather than vote in general elections; and they more often

October 2010 237 8513-10-08-FullerIBMR-emphases.indd8513-10-08-FullerIBMR-emphases.indd 1 8/4/108/8/4/4/4/10 111:10:431:10:4310:43 AMAM index.) El Shaddai is likely the most active fatherhood, charity projects toward rural democracy and develops a new field of church in promoting the unique brand of Indians, and international networks play studies: the religious dimensions of neo-Pentecostal citizenship, thanks to its in El Shaddai. citizenship. It is another worthy contri- founder, Harold Caballeros. Caballeros O’Neill is well-read and has an bution to the University of California’s was excluded from participation in the engaging and original writing style. His “Anthropology of Christianity” series. 2007 elections by a technicality (or by theoretical preferences range from Fou- —Henri Gooren refusing to engage in corrupt practices, cault and Heidegger to Geertz and Har- according to embittered members; p. 203). ding, although earlier key literature on Henri Gooren, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, The sense of disappointment this created Pentecostals, progressive Presbyterians, in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology is vividly described in the book, which and politics is missing. City of God is an at Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, is the does an excellent job of analyzing the absolute joy to read. It rightly criticizes author of two books and various articles on conver- central role church cells, spiritual warfare, limited Western understandings of sion and on religions in Latin America.

Converging Ways? Conversion Thankfully, other essays rectify the and Belonging in Buddhism and impression that Buddhism is always Christianity. excruciatingly cognitive and unconcerned with practice. On Catholic Zen, excellent Edited by John D’Arcy May. Sankt Ottilien, essays have been included; theologically, Ger.: EOS Klosterverlag, 2007. Pp. 207. though, they seem conventionally €15.80. inclusivistic, despite a delightfully playful, koan-like testimonial on achieving deep A book like this lays to rest any doubt that Delivered at a conference of the insight into the emptiness of “self” by Buddhism has become a European religion. European Network of Buddhist-Christian Reuben Habito, who experienced kensho So far is this true that a certain Eurocen- Studies, the ten papers of this collection as a Jesuit. tricity, innocuous but ironic, here becomes run the gamut from the anecdotal and From all this, much can be learned, proof of Buddhism’s transculturation. autobiographical to the historical and though less about Buddhism than about Nary a non-European voice represents or social scientific, and finally to the contro- its European appropriation. And for all the interprets Buddhism for Europe; and so, versial. A third of the book is a triangu- stress on interreligiosity, one regrets the as in North America, Buddhism proves lated debate—lively, though civil— absence of sustained discussion of how itself remarkably adaptable and adoptable, between Paul Williams, a former Bud- individuals assimilate religious influ- by the cognitively inclined especially. As dhist; Perry Schmidt-Leukel, a pluralist ences without their being integrated into several authors included in the volume Christian; and José Ignacio Cabazón, a a singular system, cognitive or affective. are themselves advocates of and for pluralist Buddhist. Being contested is Wil- —Richard Fox Young Buddhism’s transculturation and already liams’s reconversion to Catholicism, an consider themselves Christians, a unifying act Schmidt-Leukel scorns and Cabazón Richard Fox Young is Associate Professor of the theme is that of multiple interreligious mourns. The volleys are stratospherically History of Religions, Princeton Theological Semi- affinity and identity, a phenomenon once cerebral, and in the end it is the Christians nary. Earlier, he served with the Presbyterian thought of as un-European. who see each other as the “Other.” Church (USA) in South and East Asia.

Jesus Wars: How Four Patriarchs, Two things, I think, would have been Three Queens, and Two Emperors worth exploring further. First, Jenkins Decided What Christians Would might have pursued the relation between Believe for the Next 1,500 Years. theology and ethics. He quotes Dorothy Sayers, who observed that different By Philip Jenkins. New York: HarperOne, Christologies lead to different approaches 2010. Pp. xix, 328. $26.99. to Christian behavior. As Jenkins makes clear, the Nestorian, Monophysite, and In Jesus Wars Philip Jenkins turns his churchmen’s methods is unsqueamish: Chalcedonian churchmen differed in attention to the doctrinal struggles of the “buffaloing and bludgeoning,” “head- Christology—but not in their readiness fourth to sixth centuries. These issues can breaking,” murder. The Council of to use violence to compel truth. Why? be tedious and abstruse, but in Jenkins’s Chalcedon was a cliff-hanger, and it The second-century Epistle to Diognetus writing they pulsate with drama. Jenkins settled the Christological questions in had said, “Compulsion is not God’s way recounts the story of the church’s attempt ways that have largely satisfied Western of working.” Jenkins does not explore to clarify issues that the Council of Nicaea Christians. But Chalcedon also led to the the theological deviation that enabled the had left vague, especially the nature/ secession of Monophysite churches, the fifth-century power-brokers to repudiate natures of Christ. He elucidates the weakening of Christian unity in the East this early Christian commonplace. theological issues clearly and fairly; but (which enabled the triumph of Islam), Second, Jenkins might have explored he also roots them in the rivalry between and the transfer of Christianity’s heart- the relation between doctrine and mis- historic patriarchates, in which emperors, lands to the global West. sion. The bishops, he observes, were faced empresses, and churchmen all played Jesus Wars is an excellent read, and with dioceses only half Christian. As their parts. Jenkins’s description of the Jenkins as always provokes thought. they concentrated on Christology, were

238 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 they also thinking about this missionary Death in a Church of Life: Moral challenge? Did the bishops think that Passion During Botswana’s Time dogmatic precision was necessary to of AIDS. convert the minds and lifestyles of pagans and syncretists? By Frederick Klaits. Berkeley: Univ. of Cali- —Alan Kreider fornia Press, 2010. Pp. xvi, 352. $60 / £41.95; paperback $24.95 / £16.95. Alan Kreider, for many years a Mennonite missionary in England, is Professor of Church History The eighth in the University of California author, Frederick Klaits, is a cultural and Mission (retired) at Associated Mennonite Press series “The Anthropology of anthropologist who teaches in the Biblical Seminary, Elkhart, Indiana. With his wife, Christianity,” this volume is a microstudy Thompson Writing Program at Duke Eleanor, he published Worship and Mission After of one small Apostolic congregation in a University, Durham, North Carolina. Christendom (Paternoster, 2010). township in Gabarone, Botswana. The Between 1993 and 2006 he spent extended

The Cat and the Toaster: Living IntErnAtIonAl HEAltH System Ministry in a Technological Age. And trAvEl InSUrAncE By Douglas A. Hall, with Judy Hall and Steve Daman. Eugene, Ore.: Wipf & Stock, 2010. for anyone…going anywhere Pp. xix, 365. Paperback $43.

For over forty years Douglas Hall has been a leader of the Emmanuel Gospel Center With 30 years of overseas in Boston. The Cat and the Toaster is the experience and options story of Hall’s journey with his wife, Judy, and what they learned about the theory offered by 12 major and practice of urban ministry. During his international health years in Boston, Hall has seen Christianity insurance carriers, Good grow, not decline. This important book Neighbor Insurance can meet helps answer how this has happened. your health insurance needs. With Boston as case study, ministry is most productive, Hall argues, when operating within the whole story of God We also provide coverage and the organic nature of the city. A for medical and political relational, or living-system, approach, evacuation, terrorism, trip with sensitivity to complexity, is key. cancellation, furlough and Consequently, when programs and ini- tiatives are imposed on the urban fabric, settling back into the USA. the result can be counterproductive to the overall work of the church in the city. Plans for internationals By showing how ministry is related visiting outside their home to the city and how the city relates to min- country – including visits to istry, Hall has made a unique and vital contribution. While Hall looks for revival the USA – are also available. in the city, we can wonder whether it is not already occurring. —Mark R. Gornik n Career and Short-Term Health and Travel Plans for Individuals and Families Mark R. Gornik is Director of City Seminary of New York (www.cityseminaryny.org). n Large and Small Group Coverage n Short-Term Teams n Term Life Please beware of bogus renewal notices. A genuine IBMR renewal n Miscellaneous Plans to suit your needs notice will have a return address of Denville, NJ 07834 on the outer envelope, and the address on the reply envelope will go to PO Box 3000, Denville, NJ 07834-3000. Please e-mail [email protected] Phone in USA 480.813.9100 • Fax 480.813.9930 or call (203) 624-6672, ext. 309, with www.gninsurance.com • Email [email protected] any questions. Thank you. Blog www.gntravelinsurance.com

October 2010 239 periods living in the township, learned illness and death brought about by the style, this analysis will be a rich resource Setswana, and became a member of the pandemic. Using his knowledge of the for all with an interest in faith, ethics, congregation that is the focus of his inquiry. vernacular language and drawing on close and community life in Africa today. The He writes with affection and respect for its involvement in the congregational life, he book has a link to online audio files of the leadership and members, and he is open explores ways in which the worship and people’s preaching and singing. about how his own life was influenced by rituals of the church propound an ethic of —Kenneth R. Ross his participation in its life and worship. love. The caring relationships that obtain The period of Klaits’s residence and within the church community are shown Kenneth R. Ross has served as Professor of Theol- research in Botswana was the time when to be in tune with Batswana values and ogy at the University of Malawi (1988–98) and as the AIDS pandemic became evident. of high value in coping with the effects General Secretary of the Church of Scotland Board His study concerns the efforts made by of HIV and AIDS. Low in jargon, high in of World Mission (1998–2009). He is the author members of the Apostolic congregation human sympathy, carrying its erudition of Following Jesus and Fighting HIV/AIDS to sustain love in the context of the lightly, and largely written in a narrative (Edinburgh: St Andrew Press, 2002).

A History of Chinese Christian hymnology, garnished by biographies of Hymnody: From Its Missionary key foreign and Chinese hymnists and Origins to Contemporary musicians. Indigenous Productions. Hsieh, a musicologist and librarian at Southwestern Baptist Theological By Fang-Lan Hsieh. Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Seminary, Fort Worth, Texas, has done Mellen Press, 2009. Pp. xv, 269. $109.95 / extensive research in key North American £69.95. archives related to Chinese Protestantism but also has obviously obtained other This cross-disciplinary study addresses Protestant hymnology during the last materials and information from a wide cultural history, Chinese poetics, musi- two centuries. Including over fifty illus- range of circles within “cultural China.” cological assessments, hymnologists’ trations in its six chapters, Hsieh pre- Believing that studies in hymnology biographies, and religious influences of sents a historical cornucopia of Chinese can offer an aesthetic gauge for levels of

A Call for Papers for the 13th Assembly of the INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR MISSION STUDIES August 15–20, 2012 Toronto, Canada Migration, Human Dislocation, and the Good News: Margins as the Center in Christian Mission

The IAMS 2012 Toronto Assembly will explore the profound missiological dimensions of human migration and dislocation, past, present, and future. We will attend especially to the many repercussions of widespread contemporary human movement for the theory and practice of Christian mission.

The Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, reflecting the lives of God’s Timeline: (1) Proposed topic, with 150–200-word abstract, is due people who were uprooted, exiled, and scattered, features epic by July 1, 2011. (2) Draft paper is due by January 1, 2012. Papers experiences of human mobility such as the call to a new land, exo- are not to exceed 4,000 words, including notes. Writers will be dus and resettlement, and the scattering of the early Christians. expected to strictly adhere to the style guide for Mission Studies. The last half-millennium has seen the Gospel span the globe, often accompanied by the disenfranchisement and sometimes All proposals with abstracts will be carefully reviewed by the obliteration of other peoples. Dislocation, compelled and volun- IAMS Executive Committee. Writers will be notified of the com- tary, continues to characterize our contemporary human story as mittee’s decision before April 2012. people cross state boundaries or move within their own countries in search of safety and well-being. Christian mission, often a fea- Address all correspondence to: ture of large-scale movements of peoples, must continue to attend THE SECRETARIAT responsibly to these historic global realities. INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR MISSION STUDIES c/o Church Mission Society We welcome papers on mission and diverse aspects of human mo- Watlington Road, Oxford OX4 6BZ, United Kingdom bility from across the disciplines. These can touch upon a range of Tel: +44 1865 787400 themes including ethnicity, race, gender, HIV-AIDS, human rights, Fax: +44 1865 776375 violence, poverty, nationalism, other religions, and ecclesiastical E-mail: [email protected] tradition. In addition, we urge IAMS Study Group members to Toronto Assembly – IAMS prepare papers and share research, especially as these relate to the August 15-20, 2012 (Wednesday – Sunday) Assembly’s migration theme. For more information, go to: www.missionstudies.org

240 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 indigenization and spiritual maturity, she Canaan series, produced by leaders in The Spirit in the World: Emerging assesses these matters within hymnals unauthorized churches in Mainland Pentecostal Theologies in Global produced not only in Mainland China China, even though they are quite famous Contexts. but also in Taiwan, Hong Kong, and other and available publicly in Christian places in Asia where overseas Chinese live bookstores and in CDs. Edited by Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen. Grand and worship. Going beyond her concern Nevertheless, one sincerely delights Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009. Pp. xxiv, 248. for indigenization, she provides details in seeing the relatively lengthy treatments Paperback $20. about “contemporary” and “global” music given to Tzu-chen Chao (1888–1979) and that now appears in recently published John E. Su (1916–2007), two major figures This collection of twelve essays is written hymnals. whose hymns continue to be sung in mostly by those who live and work in Hsieh’s strength is clearly in musi- Chinese Protestant worship. Also, the the United States, but the authors have cology, with specialization in the history history of the multiform influences of considerable experience in various global of Chinese Protestant hymnology pro- Bliss M. Wiant (1895–1975), musicologist Pentecostal contexts, which they bring duced by foreign missionaries and indi- at Yenching University in the years before to bear on the reflections of this book. genous Chinese pastors, intellectuals, and 1950, is helpful for understanding shifts in Although the book concentrates on only hymnists. Her scope includes hymns and liturgy and hymnology during the period a portion of global Pentecostalism—the hymnals produced over the nineteenth when nationalism and indigenization were so-called classical Pentecostal churches and twentieth centuries, not only in major concerns. with roots in the 1906–9 Azusa Street now-standardized forms of Mandarin This award-winning and richly revival in Los Angeles—yet these churches Chinese but also in eight Chinese dialects detailed volume will be much appreciated have influenced global Pentecostalism in or languages used by Han ethnic groups. by those interested in the development ways that belie their numbers. The book One would welcome information about and flourishing of Chinese Protestant is divided thematically into three sections Christian minorities in China and their hymnology. It fills a major void within of four essays each. hymnology as well (the author offers Protestant and secular scholarship in the The first section is introductory and some hints of this in Taiwan). Problems history of Chinese Christianity. theological. Frank Macchia suggests of different systems for transliterating —Lauren Pfister that Pentecostalism has a theologically names and terms are solved primarily by distinctive message in its focus on the using Chinese characters, but for those Lauren Pfister teaches at Hong Kong Baptist Uni- baptism in the Spirit. Margaret Poloma, who do not read Chinese, this is not versity and does research in the areas of comparative who writes from a sociological perspective, adequate. More significant is the author’s philosophy and comparative religious studies, with discusses the relationship between apparent unfamiliarity with the Songs of an emphasis in Chinese traditions. the central Pentecostal doctrines of

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October 2010 241 divine healing and revivalism and their Korean minjung and their implications dhism, and Tony Richie on a Pentecostal interaction with scientific modernity. for Pentecostalism to be seen as a theology of religions. As Jürgen Moltmann Korean Pentecostal mission theologian religion of the oppressed and poor. observes in his preface, Pentecostalism Wonsuk Ma discusses Pentecostalism as African-American anthropologist Deidre was born in revival movements in several a religion of the poor and the significance Crumbley illustrates gender and power parts of the globe; it was not a monolithic of its central message of empowerment issues by fieldwork among Nigerian movement but was founded on experi- for witness. Doug Petersen focuses on Aladura churches and her own inner-city ences of Spirit baptism and healing, a Pentecostalism and social concern, the church in Philadelphia. In the essay by religion of the poor (p. ix). But in light subject he knows best from his vast esteemed Nigerian historian Ogbu Kalu, of some of the more crass expressions of practical experience in Latin America. one of the last before his untimely death Pentecostalism promoting an extravagant The second part of the book is in December 2008, the author describes lifestyle and prosperity by faith, one missiological, dealing with Pentecostalism how Pentecostals have responded in inno- wonders whether an idealistic depiction and cultural diversity. Paulson Pulikottil vative ways to the African worldview. of Pentecostalism as an option for the uses postcolonial theory to look at the The final part deals with ways that poor has passed its sell-by date. dominant influence of the Indian (Syrian Pentecostalism deals with religious —Allan Anderson church) context on the emergence of diversity, with contributions by editor Pentecostalism in Kerala. Koo Dong Yun Veli-Matti Kärkkäinen on the role of Pente- Allan Anderson is Head of the School of Philosophy, considers the multicultural origins of costal pneumatology, Opoku Onyinah on Theology, and Religion and Professor of Global Pentecostalism and the role of Asians, Pentecostal responses to African witch- Pentecostal Studies at the University of Birmingham, in particular the revivals among the craft, Amos Yong on responses to Bud- England.

An Introduction to Theology in manifestation of the divine, and the divine Global Perspective. reaches out to embrace all that is genuine” (p. 192). By Stephen B. Bevans. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Readers may be surprised, however, Books, 2009. Pp. xvi, 384. Paperback $30. at Bevans’s largely uncritical approach to his own Catholic position, though he In our increasingly globalized world, one, contrary to its traditional Western does say that he has tried “to listen to all it is imperative that the global church perception and practice. In thirteen well- the voices” while doing theology from be informed and equipped regarding researched chapters he presents a wealth his own particular yet limited perspective theology in a global perspective. Stephen of information about the content, source, (p. 5). And in some cases his treatment Bevans, a Divine Word missionary and method, and history of global theology. of non-Western theologians can appear professor of theology and culture at While written from a Catholic superficial. Despite these concerns, serious Catholic Theological Union, Chicago, has perspective, this volume provides a students of theology will greatly benefit given us a masterful introduction to just discussion of global theological dimen- from this book. It will be a useful tool, such theology. It well reflects Bevans’s sions that includes both Catholic and resource, and reference for theologians, extensive teaching and pastoral work. non-Catholic thinkers from around the theological teachers, and students of Bevans describes the act of theologiz- world. According to Bevans, as he noted theology. ing as “faith seeking understanding” (p. 1) in an earlier publication,“To be a Catholic —Atul Y. Aghamkar and establishes a strong connection means to be radically open to ‘all truth between one’s faith and one’s theology. He and value.’ Nothing that is truly good Atul Y. Aghamkar is Professor and Head of the shows how theology is a communal exer- and really valuable can be excluded, Department of Missiology at South Asia Institute cise and not necessarily an individualistic for everything that is genuine can be a of Advanced Christian Studies, Bangalore, India.

Missionaries in Hawai‘i: The would lead one to believe. He draws on a Lives of Peter and Fanny Gulick, rich trove of personal papers to skillfully 1797–1883. weave a highly readable family history. Putney strives to present a balanced By Clifford Putney. Amherst: Univ. of account—and he mostly succeeds. Massachusetts Press, 2010. Pp. xi, 218. $34.95. Hawai‘ian nationalists might regard the Gulicks as typical of missionaries who Peter and Fanny Gulick led undistin- more missionary work, though it did not “came to do good and stayed to do well,” guished careers as missionaries in prevent Peter from ranching, Fanny from but Putney makes a convincing case that Hawai‘i. Peter’s stern Calvinism and raising the largest family in the mission, they do not really fit that stereotype. Fanny’s anxious timidity suggest that and both of them from living to a ripe The Gulicks’ story thus offers a unique they were temperamentally ill-suited to old age. Although Putney concludes that vantage on the mission’s longest-standing the work, and they were bounced from they were influential, fortunately he does controversy, as well as other issues. Peter’s one station to another by the American not push that claim very far, for the real secular interests are also indicative of the Board of Commissioners for Foreign interest of his book lies in the depth of his subtle ways in which missionaries can Missions. Clifford Putney accepts that portrait of missionaries whose type was get drawn into the promotion of “civili- ill health prevented them from doing surely far more common than the literature zation,” and his fervent antislavery views

242 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 When indigenous offer an interesting slant on the difficulty ultimately was their success in inspiring of putting ideals into practice. Hawai‘i their children to pursue missionary believers are was a stronghold of abolitionism among callings. The children appear in many ways equipped with ABCFM missions, and several mission- to have been more interesting characters aries saw a parallel between slavery and than their parents, and it is to be hoped the tools and the forced labor exacted from commoners that Putney will continue the saga of this by the chiefs. Awkwardly, however, the missionary dynasty. skills to serve their missionaries were dependent on the —Paul Harris chiefs’ influence for the strength of Protes- communities, tantism on the islands. Paul Harris is Professor of History at Minnesota that is mPOWER™ The Gulicks’ main accomplishment State University Moorhead. .

Introduction to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-first Century.

By Timothy C. Tennent. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2010. Pp. 558. $38.99. Leave an impact for Timothy Tennent’s Introduction to World Father, Creator, and source of the provi- Missions joins a growing list of important dence in which mission participates in generations on your evangelical and Pentecostal introductions God’s bringing about a new creation. next short-term trip... to the biblical portrayal of mission and Part 3 is on God the Son, the revealer and to the theology and practice of mission. embodiment of the redemption of the Taken together, they are a body of post- new creation. Part 4 develops the doc- Train national liberal, postfundamentalist literature on trine of God the Spirit as the one who empowers the church mission. The entire believers to implement book is predicated on the reality that community dental only an authentic disciple of this redeem- OMSC’s free online database, compiled in coop- ing God can be a genuine ambassador of care in 6 days or eration with Yale Divinity School Library, lists God’s reconciling mission. over 6,175 doctoral dissertations in English community sight care —William R. Burrows on mission and world Christianity. Search by in just 2 days... author, title, subject, keyword, and institution William R. Burrows is Managing Editor Emeritus at www.internationalbulletin.org/resources. of Orbis Books and Research Professor of Missiology at New York Theological Seminary. All for the cost of adding one more mission that is aware of critical studies and grounded in both anthropological person to your trip. and history-of-religions studies. Were I teaching introduction to mission today, every chapter of my Catholic approach Visit us online to mission would list the corresponding Dissertation mpowerapproach.org page numbers in Tennent that I would require my students to read. Call for information Tennent, a graduate of the University Notices 1-502.365.5540 of Edinburgh, where he imbibed the spirit of Andrew Walls and the Centre for the Thong, Tezenlo. Study of Christianity in the Non-Western “A Clash of Worldviews: The Impact World, is president of Asbury Theological of the Modern Western Notion of Seminary, Wilmore, Kentucky. His book Progress on Indigenous Naga Culture.” breathes awareness that the frontiers Ph.D. Denver: Univ. of Denver and Iliff of mission are no longer geographic School of Theology, Joint Doctoral Program, but intercultural and interreligious. His 2009. approach is up-to-the-minute in timeli- ness and sensitivity to ecumenism and Wamutitu, Joseph Warui. dialogue with world religions, while pre- “Economic Empowerment for senting affirmatively—in the spirit of Missions: Empowering the Church in 1 Peter 3:15—the reasons that propel Kenya for Holistic and Cross-Cultural Christians to proclaim the triune God as Ministry.” the world’s Redeemer. Ph.D. Pasadena, Calif.: Fuller Theological The book is divided into four parts. Seminary, 2009. Part 1 introduces the reader to historical and social megatrends that are the context Tools for Transformation of mission. Part 2 centers on God as

October 2010 243 International Bulletin of Missionary Research Index—Volume 34 January through October 2010

(pp. 1–64 are in the January issue; pp. 65–128 in April; pp. 129–92 in July; pp. 193–248 in October) Articles Adeyemo, Tokunboh [obituary], 34:167 “Mission as Invasion?” [editorial], by Jonathan J. Bonk, 34:65–66 “Asking the Big Questions: A Statistical Analysis of Three Missiological “Mission Is Ministry in the Dimension of Difference: A Definition for Journals,” by Gregory J. Liston, 34:215–21 the Twenty-first Century,” by Titus Presler, 34:195–204 “Beyond Contextualization: Toward a Twenty-first-Century Model for “Missions and the Liberation of Theology” [editorial], by Jonathan J. Enabling Mission,” by R. Daniel Shaw, 34:208–15 Bonk, 34:193–94 Bollier, John A. [obituary], 34:199 “A Monumental Breakthrough in the Missiology of Vatican II and Its “Catholics, Carey’s ‘Means,’ and Twenty-first-Century Mission,” by Reception by Ongoing Leadership in the Church,” by William Fra- William R. Burrows, 34:131–38 zier, 34:139–44 “Celebrating Edinburgh 1910’s Centenary,” 34:28 “Mother-Tongue Translations and Contextualization in Latin America,” “Christianity 2010: A View from the New Atlas of Global Christianity,” by by William E. Bivin, 34:72–76 Todd M. Johnson, David B. Barrett, and Peter F. Crossing, 34:29–36 “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” by Edward L. Cleary, 34:46–49 “Christians in the Age of Islamic Enlightenment: A Review Essay,” by “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” by W. Harold Fuller, 34:37–40 Lamin Sanneh, 34:174–78 “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” by Anthony J. Gittins, 34:165–70 Cooley, Frank L. [obituary], 34:199 “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” by David Harley, 34:108–11 “Evangelization, Visual Technologies, and Indigenous Responses: The Noteworthy, 34:6–7, 106–7, 166–67, 198–99 South American Missionary Society in the Paraguayan Chaco,” by “Not Yet There: Seminaries and the Challenge of Partnership,” by Leon P. Alejandro Martínez, 34:83–86 Spencer, 34:150–54 “From the Editors of the World Religion Database,” by Todd M. Johnson “Religious Conversion in the Americas: Meanings, Measures, and and Brian J. Grim, 34:144 Methods,” by Timothy J. Steigenga, 34:77–82 “From ‘the poor heathen’ to ‘the glory and honour of all nations’: Rosen, Moishe [obituary], 34:199 Vocabularies of Race and Custom in Protestant Missions, 1844– “Sixty Years of International Mission Research: Unchanged Commitment, 1928,” by Brian Stanley, 34:3–10 Updated Delivery,” by Daniel J. Nicholas, 34:92 “Fuller’s School of Intercultural Studies Takes a New Approach to Doc- “The State of Mission Studies in India: An Overview and Assessment of tor of Missiology,” by R. Daniel Shaw, 34:178 Publications and Publishing,” by Siga Arles, 34:156–64 Glasser, Arthur F. [obituary], 34:107 “Taking Wolves Among Lambs: Some Thoughts on Training for Short- Gruchy, Steven de [obituary], 34:167 Term Mission Facilitation,” by Karla Ann Koll, 34:93–96 “Guatemalan Catholics and Mayas: The Future of Dialogue,” by “The Theology of Partnership,” by Cathy Ross, 34:145–48 Michael K. Duffey, 34:87–92 “Thirty Books That Most Influenced My Understanding of Christian “IBMR E-journal—a Helpful Resource for Print Subscribers,” by Daniel Mission,” by Samuel Escobar, 34:112–13 J. Nicholas, 34:154 “U.S. Megachurches and New Patterns of Global Mission,” by Robert J. “In the Absence of Missionaries: Lay Preachers Who Preserved Catholi- Priest, Douglas Wilson, and Adelle Johnson, 34:97–104 cism,” by Edward L. Cleary, 34:67–70 “What About Partnership?” [editorial], by Jonathan J. Bonk, 34:129–30 Jones, Tracey K., Jr. [obituary], 34:107 “Who Cares About Mission History? or, The Elder Who Refused to Let Kurtz, Harold E. [obituary], 34:107 the Word ‘Heathen’ Pass His Lips,” by Paul Jenkins, 34:171–74 “The Latin American Doctoral Program in Theology,” by Charles E. Witek, John W. [obituary], 34:167 Van Engen, 34:104 “World Christian Information: Public Freeway or Private Toll Road?” “The Legacy of George Leslie Mackay,” by James R. Rohrer, 34:221–28 [editorial], by Jonathan J. Bonk, 34:1–2 “The Legacy of Carl Thurman Smith,” by Wong Man Kong, 34:229–32 “The World Missionary Conference, Edinburgh 1910: Challenges for “The Legacy of Thaddeus Yang,” by David J. Endres, 34:23–28 Church and Theology in the Twenty-first Century,” by Peter C. “Lesslie Newbigin’s Missionary Encounter with the Enlightenment, Phan, 34:105–8 1975–98,” by Timothy Yates, 34:42–45 “World Religion Database: Detail Beyond Belief!” by Peter Brierley, 34:18–19 “The Making of the Atlas of Global Christianity,” by Todd M. Johnson and “World Religion Database: Impressive—but Improvable,” by Robert D. Kenneth R. Ross, 34:12–16 Woodberry, 34:21–22 “The Missiology of Old Testament Covenant,” by Stuart J. Foster, 34:205–8 “World Religion Database: Realities and Concerns,” by Siga Arles, 34:20–21 Contributors of Articles Arles, Siga, “The State of Mission Studies in India: An Overview and ———, “World Christian Information: Public Freeway or Private Toll Assessment of Publications and Publishing,” 34:156–64 Road?” [editorial], 34:1–2 ———, “World Religion Database: Realities and Concerns,” 34:20–21 Brierley, Peter, “World Religion Database: Detail Beyond Belief!” 34:18–19 Barrett, David B. See Johnson, Todd M., David B. Barrett, and Peter F. Crossing Burrows, William R., “Catholics, Carey’s ‘Means,’ and Twenty-first- Bivin, William E., “Mother-Tongue Translations and Contextualization Century Mission,” 34:131–38 in Latin America,” 34:72–76 Cleary, Edward L., “In the Absence of Missionaries: Lay Preachers Who Bonk, Jonathan J., “Mission as Invasion?” [editorial], 34:65–66 Preserved Catholicism,” 34:67–70 ———, “Missions and the Liberation of Theology” [editorial], 34:193–94 ———, “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” 34:46–49 ———, “What About Partnership?” [editorial], 34:129–30 Crossing, Peter F. See Johnson, Todd M., David B. Barrett, and Peter F. Crossing

244 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 Duffey, Michael K., “Guatemalan Catholics and Mayas: The Future of ———, “Sixty Years of International Mission Research: Unchanged Dialogue,” 34:87–92 Commitment, Updated Delivery,” 34:92 Endres, David J., “The Legacy of Thaddeus Yang,” 34:23–28 Phan, Peter C., “The World Missionary Conference, Edinburgh 1910: Escobar, Samuel, “Thirty Books That Most Influenced My Understanding Challenges for Church and Theology in the Twenty-first Century,” of Christian Mission,” 34:112–13 34:105–8 Foster, Stuart J., “The Missiology of Old Testament Covenant,” 34:205–8 Presler, Titus, “Mission Is Ministry in the Dimension of Difference: Frazier, William, “A Monumental Breakthrough in the Missiology of A Definition for the Twenty-first Century,” 34:195–204 Vatican II and Its Reception by Ongoing Leadership in the Church,” Priest, Robert J., Douglas Wilson, and Adelle Johnson, “U.S. Mega- 34:139–44 churches and New Patterns of Global Mission,” 34:97–104 Fuller, W. Harold, “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” 34:37–40 Rohrer, James R., “The Legacy of George Leslie Mackay,” 34:221–28 Gittins, Anthony J., “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” 34:165–70 Ross, Cathy, “The Theology of Partnership,” 34:145–48 Grim, Brian J. See Johnson, Todd M., and Brian J. Grim Ross, Kenneth R. See Johnson, Todd M., and Kenneth R. Ross Harley, David, “My Pilgrimage in Mission,” 34:108–11 Sanneh, Lamin, “Christians in the Age of Islamic Enlightenment: Jenkins, Paul, “Who Cares About Mission History? or, The Elder Who A Review Essay,” 34:174–78 Refused to Let the Word ‘Heathen’ Pass His Lips,” 34:171–74 Shaw, R. Daniel, “Beyond Contextualization: Toward a Twenty-first- Johnson, Adelle. See Priest, Robert J. Century Model for Enabling Mission,” 34:208–15 Johnson, Todd M., David B. Barrett, and Peter F. Crossing, “Christian- ———, “Fuller’s School of Intercultural Studies Takes a New Approach ity 2010: A View from the New Atlas of Global Christianity,” 34:29–36 to Doctor of Missiology,” 34:178 ———, and Brian J. Grim, “From the Editors of the World Religion Da- Spencer, Leon P., “Not Yet There: Seminaries and the Challenge of Part- tabase,” 34:144 nership,” 34:150–54 ———, and Kenneth R. Ross, “The Making of the Atlas of Global Chris- Stanley, Brian, “From ‘the poor heathen’ to ‘the glory and honour of all tianity,” 34:12–16 nations’: Vocabularies of Race and Custom in Protestant Missions, Koll, Karla Ann, “Taking Wolves Among Lambs: Some Thoughts on 1844–1928,” 34:3–10 Training for Short-Term Mission Facilitation,” 34:93–96 Steigenga, Timothy J., “Religious Conversion in the Americas: Mean- Kong, Wong Man, “The Legacy of Carl Thurman Smith,” 34:229–32 ings, Measures, and Methods,” 34:77–82 Liston, Gregory J., “Asking the Big Questions: A Statistical Analysis of Van Engen, Charles E., “The Latin American Doctoral Program in The- Three Missiological Journals,” 34:215–21 ology,” 34:104 Martínez, Alejandro, “Evangelization, Visual Technologies, and Indig- Wilson, Douglas. See Priest, Robert J. enous Responses: The South American Missionary Society in the Woodberry, Robert D., “World Religion Database: Impressive—but Paraguayan Chaco,” 34:83–86 Improvable,” 34:21–22 Nicholas, Daniel J., “IBMR E-journal—a Helpful Resource for Print Yates, Timothy, “Lesslie Newbigin’s Missionary Encounter with the Subscribers,” 34:154 Enlightenment, 1975–98,” 34:42–45 Books Reviewed Adeney, Miriam, Kingdom Without Borders: The Untold Story of Global Haar, Gerrie ter, How God Became African: African Spirituality and Western Christianity, 34:233 Secular Thought, 34:51–52 Ahn, Katherine H. Lee, Awakening the Hermit Kingdom: Pioneer American Hall, Douglas A., with Judy Hall and Steve Daman, The Cat and the Women Missionaries in Korea, 34:118–19 Toaster: Living System Ministry in a Technological Age, 34:239 Anderson, Gerald H. See Whiteman, Darrell L. Hall, Judy. See Hall, Douglas A. Asamoah-Gyadu, J. Kwabena, ed., Christianity, Mission, and Ecumenism Hanciles, Jehu J., Beyond Christendom: Globalization, African Migration, in Ghana: Essays in Honour of Robert K. Aboagye-Mensah, 34:125–26 and the Transformation of the West, 34:54–55 Balisky, E. Paul, Wolaitta Evangelists: A Study of Religious Innovation in Harvey, Richard, Mapping Messianic Jewish Theology: A Constructive Southern Ethiopia, 1937–1975, 34:115–16 Approach, 34:182–83 Barnes, Andrew E., Making Headway: The Introduction of Western Civiliza- Hinks, Craig W., Quest for Peace: An Ecumenical History of the Church in tion in Colonial Northern Nigeria, 34:236 Lesotho, 34:236–37 Becker, Felicitas, Becoming Muslim in Mainland Tanzania, 1890–2000, Hoff, Marvin D., ed., Chinese Theological Education, 1979–2006, 34:59–60 34:53–54 Howe, Renate, A Century of Influence: The Australian Student Christian Berka, Lauren M. See Nyenhuis, Jacob E. Movement, 1896–1996, 34:57–58 Bevans, Stephen B., An Introduction to Theology in Global Perspective, 34:242 Hsieh, Fang-Lan, A History of Chinese Christian Hymnody: From Its Mis- ———, and Jeffrey Gros, Evangelization and Religious Freedom: Ad gentes, sionary Origins to Contemporary Indigenous Productions, 34:240–41 Dignitatis humanae, 34:188-89 Ion, Hamish, American Missionaries, Christian Oyatoi, and Japan, 1859–73, Björkgren-Thylin, Marika, From Pioneer Mission to Autonomous Church: 34:119–20 Lutheran Mission Cooperation and Church Building in Thailand, 1976– Ipgrave, Michael, ed., Building a Better Bridge: Muslims, Christians, and 1994, 34:181 the Common Good, 34:126 Chia, Edmund Kee-Fook. See Kalu, Ogbu U. Jenkins, Philip, Jesus Wars: How Four Patriarchs, Three Queens, and Two Cleary, Edward L., How Latin America Saved the Soul of the Catholic Emperors Decided What Christians Would Believe for the Next 1,500 Church, 34:190 Years, 34:238–39 Cochrane, Glynn, Festival Elephants and the Myth of Global Poverty, 34:50–51 Johnson, Todd M., and Kenneth R. Ross, eds., Atlas of Global Christian- Congdon, Jim, ed., Jews and the Gospel at the End of History: A Tribute to ity, 34:50 Moishe Rosen, 34:182–83 Johnston, David L, Earth, Empire, and Sacred Text: Muslims and Christians Coote, Robert T. See Jongeneel, Jan A. B., with the assistance of Robert as Trustees of Creation, 34:235–36 T. Coote Jongeneel, Jan A. B., with the assistance of Robert T. Coote, Jesus Christ Cox, Harvey, The Future of Faith, 34:52–53 in World History: His Presence and Representation in Cyclical and Linear Daman, Steve. See Hall, Douglas A. Settings, 34:120 Ebelebe, Charles A., Africa and the New Face of Mission: A Critical Assess- ———, Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chong Ku Paek, Scott W. Sunquist, and ment of the Legacy of the Irish Spiritans Among the Igbo of Southeastern Yuko Watanabe, eds., Christian Mission and Education in Modern Nigeria, 34:59 China, Japan, and Korea: Historical Studies, 34:54 Eshete, Tibebe, The Evangelical Movement in Ethiopia: Resistance and Kalu, Ogbu U., Peter Vethanayagamony, and Edmund Kee-Fook Chia, Resilience, 34:189 eds., Mission After Christendom: Emergent Themes in Contemporary Gaitskell, Deborah, and Wendy Urban-Mead, eds., Transnational Bible- Mission, 34:233–34 women: Asian and African Women in Christian Mission, 34:188 Kärkkäinen, Veli-Matti, The Spirit in the World: Emerging Pentecostal The- Gros, Jeffrey. See Bevans, Stephen B., and Jeffrey Gros ologies in Global Contexts, 34:241–42

October 2010 245 Kendall, Calvin B., Oliver Nicholson, William D. Phillips, Jr., and Mar- O’Neill, Kevin Lewis, City of God: Christian Citizenship in Postwar Gua- guerite Ragnow, eds., Conversion to Christianity from Late Antiquity temala, 34:237–38 to the Modern Age: Considering the Process in Europe, Asia, and the Paek, Chong Ku. See Jongeneel, Jan A. B., Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chong Ku Americas, 34:56–57 Paek, Scott W. Sunquist, and Yuko Watanabe Kerr, David A., and Kenneth R. Ross, eds., Edinburgh 2010: Mission Then Phillips, William D., Jr. See Kendall, Calvin B. and Now, 34:122 Putney, Clifford, Missionaries in Hawai‘i: The Lives of Peter and Fanny Kessler, Christl, and Jürgen Rüland, Give Jesus a Hand! Charismatic Chris- Gulick, 1797–1883, 34:242–43 tians: Populist Religion and Politics in the Philippines, 34:52 Ragnow, Marguerite. See Kendall, Calvin B. Kidd, Thomas S., American Christians and Islam: Evangelical Culture and Roberts, R. S., ed., translated by Véronique Wakerley, Journeys Beyond Muslims from the Colonial Period to the Age of Terrorism, 34:58–59 Gubuluwayo to the Gaza, Tonga, and Lozi: Letters of the Jesuits’ Zambesi King, Roberta R., Pathways in Christian Music Communication: The Case Mission, 1880–1883, 34:55–56 of the Senufo of Côte d’Ivoire, 34:114–15 Roggema, Barbara, The Legend of Sergius Baḥīrā: Eastern Christian Apolo- Klaiber, Jeffrey L., The Jesuits in Latin America, 1549–2000: 450 Years of getics and Apocalyptic in Response to Islam, 34:174–78 Inculturation, Defense of Human Rights, and Prophetic Witness, 34:185 Ross, Kenneth R. See Johnson, Todd M.; Kerr, David A. Klaits, Frederick, Death in a Church of Life: Moral Passion During Botswa- Rüland, Jürgen. See Kessler, Christl na’s Time of AIDS, 34:239–40 Shaw, Mark, Global Awakening: How Twentieth-Century Revivals Triggered Knitter, Paul F., Without Buddha I Could Not Be a Christian, 34:118 a Christian Revolution, 34:233 Kraemer, Hendrik, The Christian Message in a Non-Christian World, 34:60–61 Steltenkamp, Michael F., Nicholas Black Elk: Medicine Man, Missionary, Lado, Ludovic, Catholic Pentecostalism and the Paradoxes of Africaniza- Mystic, 34:234 tion: Processes of Localization in a Catholic Charismatic Movement in Sunquist, Scott W. See Jongeneel, Jan A. B., Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chong Cameroon, 34:60 Ku Paek, Scott W. Sunquist, and Yuko Watanabe Langer, Erick D., Expecting Pears from an Elm Tree: Franciscan Missions on the Swierenga, Robert P. See Nyenhuis, Jacob E. Chiriguano Frontier in the Heart of South America, 1830–1949, 34:117–18 Tennent, Timothy C., Introduction to World Missions: A Trinitarian Mis- Larson, Pier M., Ocean of Letters: Language and Creolization in an Indian siology for the Twenty-first Century, 34:243 Ocean Diaspora, 34:187 Thomas, David, Christian Doctrines in Islamic Theology, 34:174–78 Lee, Timothy S., Born Again: Evangelicalism in Korea, 34:181–82 Tiedemann, R. G., Reference Guide to Christian Missionary Societies in Lian Xi, Redeemed by Fire: The Rise of Popular Christianity in Modern China, China: From the Sixteenth to the Twentieth Century, 34:124–25 34:186–87 ———, ed., Handbook of Christianity in China, vol. 2, 1800–Present, 34:179–80 Longman, Timothy, Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda, 34:122–23 Urban-Mead, Wendy. See Gaitskell, Deborah May, John D’Arcy, Converging Ways? Conversion and Belonging in Bud- Vethanayagamony, Peter. See Kalu, Ogbu U. dhism and Christianity, 34:238 Wang, Aiming, Church in China: Faith, Ethics, Structure; The Heritage of the Metzger, John Mackay, The Hand and the Road: The Life and Times of John Reformation for the Future of the Church in China, 34:121 A. Mackay, 34:114 Watanabe, Yuko. See Jongeneel, Jan A. B., Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chong Middleton, Darren J. N., ed., Mother Tongue Theologies: Poets, Novelists, Ku Paek, Scott W. Sunquist, and Yuko Watanabe Non-Western Christianity, 34:186 Whiteman, Darrell L., and Gerald H. Anderson, eds., World Mission in Mobley, Kendal P., Helen Barrett Montgomery: The Global Mission of Do- the Wesleyan Spirit, 34:116 mestic Feminism, 34:182 Wu, Xiaoxin, ed., foreword by Daniel Bays, Christianity in China: A Mudge, Lewis S., The Gift of Responsibility: The Promise of Dialogue Among Scholars’ Guide to Resources in the Libraries and Archives of the United Christians, Jews, and Muslims, 34:126 States, 2d ed., 34:116–17 Nicholson, Oliver. See Kendall, Calvin B. Wuthnow, Robert, Boundless Faith: The Global Outreach of American Ng, Peter Tze Ming. See Jongeneel, Jan A. B., Peter Tze Ming Ng, Chong Churches, 34:61 Ku Paek, Scott W. Sunquist, and Yuko Watanabe Young, Richard Fox, ed., India and the Indianness of Christianity: Essays on Noss, Philip A., ed., A History of Bible Translation, 34:180–81 Understanding—Historical, Theological, and Bibliographical—in Honor of Nyenhuis, Jacob E., Robert P. Swierenga, and Lauren M. Berka, eds., Robert Eric Frykenberg, 34:184–85 Aunt Tena, Called to Serve: Journals and Letters of Tena A. Huizenga, Zocca, Franco, ed., Sanguma in Paradise: Sorcery, Witchcraft, and Christianity Missionary Nurse to Nigeria, 34:190 in Papua New Guinea, 34:123–24 Oleska, Michael J., ed., Alaskan Missionary Spirituality, 34:234–35 Reviewers of Books Adeney, Frances S., 34:182 Hanciles, Jehu J., 34:187 Shorter, Aylward, 34:55–56 Aghamkar, Atul Y., 34:184–85, 242 Harris, Paul, 34:242–43 Sinclair, John H., 34:114 Ahn, Katherine H. Lee, 34:188 Hartch, Todd, 34:185 Skreslet, Stanley H., 34:52–53, 122 Akinade, Akintunde E., 34:59, 126 Hoff, Marvin D., 34:54 Starr, Chloë, 34:179–80 Anderson, Allan, 34:241–42 Howell, Allison M., 34:125–26 Stinton, Diane, 34:233 Anderson, Gerald H., 34:60–61, 182–83 Iheanacho, Maureen, 34:186 Tao, Feiya, 34:116–17 Asamoah-Gyadu, J. Kwabena, 34:60 Krabill, James R., 34:114–15 Van der Watt, Jan G., 34:120 Baker, Don, 34:181–82 Kreider, Alan, 34:56–57, 238–39 Ward, Kevin, 34:122–23 Barnes, Andrew E., 34:190 Matheny, Paul D., 34:52 Wickeri, Philip L., 34:121 Bays, Daniel H., 34:186–87 McNeill, John W., 50–51 Williams, Stuart Murray, 34:233–34 Bekele, Girma, 34:115–16 Mekonnen, Alemayehu, 34:189 Woodberry, Robert D., 34:50 Blackburn, Steven P., 34:235–36 Myers, Bryant L., 34:61 Wright, Jonathan, 34:190 Bonk, Jonathan J., 34:236–37 Nolan, Francis, 34:53–54 Yihua, Xu, 34:124–25 Boyd, Robin, 34:57–58 Okome, Mojúbàolú Olúfúnké, 34:236 Yoder, William J., 34:181 Brett, Edward T., 34:117–18 Oladipo, Caleb O., 34:51–52 Young, Richard Fox, 34:118, 238 Burrows, William R., 34:243 Pang, Samuel Y., 34:118–19 Carbonneau, Robert E., 34:59–60 Pfister, Lauren, 34:240–41 Other Daniel, W. Harrison, 34:116 Putney, Clifford, 34:119–20 Fletcher, Wendy, 34:234 Rommen, Edward, 34:234–35 Book Notes, 34:64, 128, 192, 248 Goldman, Gerard M., 34:188–89 Ross, Kenneth R., 34:54–55, 239–40 Dissertation Notices, 34:62, 190, 243 Gooren, Henri, 34:237–38 Rynkiewich, Michael A., 34:123–24 Fifteen Outstanding Books of 2009 for Gornik, Mark R., 34:239 Sanneh, Lamin, 34:174–78 Mission Studies, 34:115 Guenther, Alan M., 34:58–59 Shaw, R. Daniel, 34:180–81

246 International Bulletin of Missionary Research, Vol. 34, No. 4 From All Nations, To All Peoples Seminars for International Church Leaders, Missionaries, Mission Executives, Pastors, Educators, Students, and Lay Leaders

January Student Seminars on World Mission March 14–18 January 3–7, 2011 Christian Mission, the Environment, and Culture. Missionaries in the Movies. Dr. Allison M. Howell, Akrofi-Christaller Institute for Dr. Dwight P. Baker, OMSC’s associate director, draws upon Theology, Mission, and Culture, Akropong-Akuapem, Ghana, both video clips and full-length feature films to lead semi- considers Christian responses to climate change—something that nar participants in an examination of the way missionar- is not new in human history—and the catastrophes that often ies have been represented on film over the past century. accompany climate change, so as to provide a framework for Cosponsored by Evangelical Covenant Church (Lafayette, Christian mission in facing new crises. Indiana). April 4–8 January 10–14 Christian-Muslim Relations: A Nigerian Case Study with Kingdom Without Borders: Christianity as a World Global Implications. Religion. Dr. Jan H. Boer, Vancouver, British Columbia, through inten- Dr. Miriam Adeney, Seattle Pacific University, helps par- sive examination of Nigeria draws guidance for parameters ticipants to gain both a larger understanding of what God within which Christians and Muslims can relate to each other is doing today and a more intimate picture of God’s people and both flourish. Cosponsored by Christian Reformed World around the world. Cosponsored by Christar and The Mis- Missions and Mennonite Central Committee. sion Society. April 11–15 January 17–21 Cross-cultural Partnership for the Sake of Discipling Culture, Values, and Worldview: Anthropology for the Nations. Mission Practice. Dr. Paul R. (Bobby) Gupta, president of Hindustan Bible Insti- Dr. Darrell L. Whiteman, The Mission Society, shows how tute, Chennai, India, and a senior mission scholar in residence one’s worldview and theology of culture affect cross- at OMSC, offers lessons from India for formation of partner- cultural mission. Cosponsored by United Methodist Gen- ships to disciple whole nations through church-planting move- eral Board of Global Ministries. ments. Cosponsored by Wycliffe International.

January 24–28 April 25–29 The City in Mission. Transformational Leadership: An Entrepreneurial Dr. Dale T. Irvin, New York Theological Seminary, consid- Approach. ers the city in the mission of God. Cosponsored by United Rev. George Kovoor, Trinity College, Bristol, United Kingdom, Methodist General Board of Global Ministries. brings wide ecclesiastical and international experience to eval- uation of differing models of leadership for mission. Cosponsored February 7–10 by Moravian Church Board of World Mission and Wycliffe Deuteronomy: A Challenge to Mission. International. Dr. Christopher J. H. Wright, Langham Partnership Interna- tional, London, unfolds the relevance of Deuteronomy for con- May 2–6 temporary Christian mission and ethics. Four days. Cospon- Christianity in Asia: Traditions and Challenges. sored by Bay Area Community Church (Annapolis, Maryland). Dr. Daniel Jeyaraj, Liverpool Hope University, United Kingdom, traces the distinctive forms Christianity has taken in Asia and March 7–11 identifies challenges raised by Asian contexts, drawing out im- Christianity in America. plications for missionary practice today. Dr. Edith L. Blumhofer, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Illinois, in- troduces participants to the formative role Christianity has played May 9–13 throughout U.S. history. Cosponsored by Black Rock Congre- Spiritual Renewal in the Missionary Community. gational Church (Fairfield, Connecticut) and First Presbyterian Rev. Stanley W. Green, Mennonite Mission Network, and Dr. Church (New Haven). Christine Sine, Mustard Seed Associates, blend classroom instruction and one-on-one sessions to offer counsel and spiri- All seminars cost $175. Students from cosponsoring tual direction for Christian workers. Cosponsored by Menno- schools pay only $90 per seminar if registering for any nite Mission Network. of the four seminars during the month of January. Register online at www.omsc.org/seminars.html. OVERSEAS MINISTRIES

FREE—International Bulletin of Missionary Research STUDY CENTER e-journal—go to www.InternationalBulletin.org/register 490 Prospect Street, New Haven, Connecticut 06511 Book Notes In Coming Baggio, Fabio, and Agnes M. Brazal, eds. Faith on the Move: Toward a Theology of Migration in Asia. Issues Quezon City: Ateneo de Manila Univ. Press, 2008. Pp. xx, 261. Paperback $42. Christian Mission and Earth Care: Carlton, R. Bruce. Strategy Coordinator: Changing the Course of Southern Baptist Missions. An African Case Study Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2010. Pp. xii, 273. Paperback £24.99 / $33.95. Inus Daneel Can Christianity Authentically D’Orsa, James, and Therese D’Orsa. Take Root in China? Some Lessons Explorers, Guides, and Meaning Makers: Mission Theology for Catholic from Nineteenth- and Twentieth- Educators. Century Missions Mulgrave, Austral.: John Garratt Publishing, 2010. Pp. 207. Paperback AU$52.50. Andrew F. Walls Edwards, Don. Reconfiguring Home: Telugu Bible Is Hearing Enough? Literacy and the Great Commandments. Women, Protestant Missionaries, Pasadena, Calif.: William Carey Library, 2010. Pp. x, 144. Paperback $13.99. and Christian Marriage Essamuah, Casely B. James Elisha Taneti Genuinely Ghanaian: A History of the Methodist Church Ghana, 1961–2000. Orality: The Not-So-Silent Issue in Trenton, N.J., and Asmara, Eritrea: Africa World Press and Red Sea Press, 2010. Mission Theology Pp. xliv, 292. Paperback $29.95. Randall Prior Flett, John G. A “New Breed of Missionaries”: The Witness of God: The Trinity, Missio Dei, Karl Barth, and the Nature of Assessing Attitudes Toward Western Christian Community. Missions at the Nairobi Evangelical Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010. Pp. xv, 328. Paperback $36. Graduate School of Theology F. Lionel Young III Fox, Frampton F., ed. Edinburgh 1910 Revisited: “Give Us Friends!” An Indian Perspective on 100 The Vatican’s Shift of Its Years of Mission. Papers from the 16th Annual Centre for Mission Studies Missionary Policy in the Consultation, Union Biblical Seminary, Pune. Twentieth Century: The Mission Bangalore: Centre for Mission Studies / Asian Trading Corporation, 2010. Pp. x, 348. of the Augustinian Fathers of the Paperback $7. Assumption in Manchuria Pedro Iacobelli Frahm-Arp, Maria. Professional Women in South African Pentecostal Charismatic Churches. Ferment at the Margins: Philippine Leiden: Brill, 2010. Pp. xvii, 302. €104 / $154. Ecclesiology Under Stress Paul D. Matheny Heurtz, Christopher L., and Christine D. Pohl. Friendship at the Margins: Discovering Mutuality in Service and Mission. In our Series on the Legacy of Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2010. Pp. 159. Paperback $15. Outstanding Missionary Figures of the Nineteenth and Twentieth Karsen, Wendell Paul. Centuries, articles about The Church Under the Cross: Mission in Asia in Times of Turmoil; A Thomas Barclay Missionary Memoir. Vol. 1. George Bowen Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010. Pp. xx, 434. Paperback $36. Hélène de Chappotin Lederleitner, Mary T. Ch’eng Ching-Yi Cross-Cultural Partnerships: Navigating the Complexities of Money and Lydia Mary Fay Mission. Carl Fredrik Hallencreutz Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity Press, 2010. Pp. 231. Paperback $17. J. Philip Hogan Arthur Walter Hughes Lewis, Bernard. Thomas Patrick Hughes Faith and Power: Religion and Politics in the Middle East. Hannah Kilham New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 2010. Pp. xxi, 208. $24.95. Lesslie Newbigin Ott, Craig, and Stephen J. Strauss, with Timothy C. Tennent. Constance Padwick Encountering Theology of Mission: Biblical Foundations, Historical Peter Parker Developments, and Contemporary Issues. James Howell Pyke Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010. Pp. xxx, 383. Paperback $29.99. Pandita Ramabai George Augustus Selwyn Paterson, Robert. Bakht Singh Kowhai and Orchid: Life on Two Islands. James Stephen Dunedin, N.Z.: [self-published], 2009. Pp. 232. Paperback NZ$54. James M. Thoburn Rohrer, S. Scott. M. M. Thomas Wandering Souls: Protestant Migrations in America, 1630–1865. Harold W. Turner Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 2010. Pp. x, 312. $39.95. Johannes Verkuyl