Research Paper
Christology
Inculturated:
Is Jesus, the Ancestor of Africa, the same
Jesus of the Bible?
A
Paper
Submitted
to Dr. Dave Pederson
In
Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Course
THEO
675
Contextualization
and Global Theology
(LBTS-LUO)
Ghali,
HebatAllah
August
2015
TABLE OF CONTENTS
THE ANCESTOR OF
AFRICA
A.
Thesis Statement
II.
African Theology
A.
Historical Genesis
B.
African Christology
III.
The Ancestor Motif
A.
African Traditional Religion and Culture
1.
Definition of Ancestor
a.
Ancestral Cult
b.
Ancestor’s Characteristics and Functions
B.
Ancestor in African Christology
1.
Arguments advocating Christ as Ancestor
2.
Counter-Arguments rejecting Christ as Ancestor
IV.
Theological Assessment
V.
Personal Reflections
VI.
Conclusion
INTRODUCTION
Jesus, the Ancestor of Africa, is a
feature of African Christology from below inculturated. African religions pay homage to ancestors
who have powers and authority as mediators between the living and the Supreme
Being. To be qualified as ancestor,
certain conditions must be fulfilled.
When western missionaries came to Africa, they presented the Jesus of
the Bible with His divine titles and works as a stranger to the African
culture. Recently, African Theologians
shaped and formulated the African Theology and Christology from below that
Africans could relate to. Among so many
titles given to Jesus are: Ancestor, Liberator, Healer, Master of Initiation,
and Mediator; the most prominent was the “Ancestor.” Africans drew many comparisons between the
ancestor’s theme and role in African Traditional Religion and Jesus as the
Ancestor of Africa. My contention is
that Jesus, the Ancestor of Africa, is an inculturated Christology from below
that enabled Africans to identify the role of Christ as the Mediator, despite
the incompleteness and exclusivity of the ancestor-motif.
This paper does not compare between
Western and African theology or critiques Western theology or discusses
Majority World Countries; it is mired in African Christology that can produce
Christological reflections. It overviews
the historical genesis of African Theology; examines the concept of ancestor in
African religion; draws analogy between similarities and differences to Jesus
as Ancestor; and investigates whether the title of Jesus as ancestor fulfills
all aspects of His role and work or it is only an additional feature of
Christology from below, specific to Africa?
In other words, is this ancestor-motif exclusive or inclusive? Would this ancestor-motif speak to non-Africans
of the other Majority World Cultures?
Does this title relegate the person and work of Jesus? Is Jesus, the
Ancestor of Africa, different from the Jesus of the Bible? Is He just a Mediator between the Supreme
Being and human or is He the Supreme Being incarnated as their ancestor to
reach out for them with salvation? All
such questions are investigated in this paper, not necessarily providing
answers; some are left for assessment by practical theology in due time.
AFRICAN THEOLOGY
Historical Genesis
Africa is among the Majority World
Countries where the center of gravity of Christianity shifted from the North
(Europe and North America) to the South (Africa, Asia, Latin America, and
Southeast Asia). When the Western missionaries brought the gospel to Africa, it
was from a Western perspective that lacked translatability—“the lifeblood of
Christianity”—the ability to penetrate and cross over cultural and geographical
barriers.[1] The Jesus of the Bible
preached to them differed from the Jesus of the Bible who was a miracle-worker,
a healer, an exorcist, had authority over nature, created new organs, walked on
water, and gave sight to the blind; the Western Jesus was a stranger to them.
Western Christianity was disconnected from the needs and real life issues
Africans faced; theology was theoretical, stripped off the power of life.
African theology was not developed
until much later, when Africans could not relate to Western theology of a
descending Christology from above.
Bishops, pastors, and priests travailed and struggled with understanding;
they needed a theology that speaks to their daily lives. They started to sense
that “the Lord Jesus is turning to Africans as African and asking, ‘Who
do you say that I am?’” and not “who do the missionaries say the Son of
Man is?”[2] That inner unrest led them
to formulate their own contextualized theology and inculturated Christology by
relating the gospel to their own local cultural context and to become a
self-theologizing indigenous African Church with an African Jesus.
Africans contextualized their
theology in a broader spectrum to relate to socio-economic, political,
cultural, religious and ecclesial settings such as poverty, illiteracy, HIV,
colonialism, dictatorship, endemic bribery, corruption, secret societies,
sufferings, oppression of women, sorcery, and witchcraft, inter alia.[3] Dean Flemming defines contextualization as
[T]he dynamic and comprehensive process by which the
gospel is incarnated within a concrete historical or cultural situation…[the
gospel] comes to authentic expression in the local context and at the same time
prophetically transforms the context.
Contextualization seeks to enable the people of God to live out the
gospel in obedience to Christ within their own cultures and circumstances.[4]
Africans developed their own inculturated
Christology by relating human experience of their cultural heritage to the salvific
work of Jesus to reach for the person of Christ. They could see God’s imprints in their
culture and identified Jesus Christ as living among them taking various roles
like ancestor-mediator, doctor-healer, exorcist-liberator, and initiator. Such
figures were already present in their culture and played decisive authoritative
roles in people’s lives. These figures
were a preparatio evangelica that set the stage for accepting the gospel
of Jesus Christ when presented to them. Inculturation Christology attempted
"to employ African Traditional religious concepts to image and explain
Jesus Christ and the salvific significance of his cross."[5]
Amongst such cultural features is
the ancestor figure that played a significant role in the life of the Africans.
The next part introduces the African Traditional Religion and investigates the
ancestor-motif in terms of role and characteristics, then draws similarities
and differences to the role and characteristics of Jesus as the Ancestor of
Africa, Nana Yesu, in order to assess the validity of this motif.
African
Christology
Africans could not relate to Western Theology;
they did not know how to be “truly Christian and authentically Africans.”[6] This discontinuity between their original
African identity and the new Christian identity led to the emergence of African
Christology that was characterized by four features. First, it was an ascending
Christology from below that did not focus on Christ’s ontology or on the
central concerns of the ecumenical councils pertaining to the person of Christ
but on the work of Christ, closely connected to soteriology, ecclesiology, and
eschatology.[7] Second, African Christology did not disregard
the Traditional Christological formulations, fidei depositum,[8] but honored them as “valid
reference points,” as John Onaiyekan argues, and “the theological patrimony of
the church;” it was a valuable addition to traditional Christology.[9] Third, Christology from
below connected “Christ to Africa’s pre-Christian past,” unlike the nineteenth
century missionaries that presented Christ as a spiritual “tabula rasa.”[10] Fourth, African Christology focused on the
power and victory of Christ Jesus, as portrayed by Jesus the
Exorcist-Liberator, or Doctor-Healer, or Ancestor-Mediator, or Master of
Initiation. Tennent argues for an African Christology consistent with the
Biblical revelation of Jesus, with parallelism and contrast between older and
newer images, responding to African worldview and connecting to the living
experience of Africans.[11] Bediako, an African Christian theologian,
gave Jesus many African epithets, like “Elder Brother, Great and Greatest
Ancestor, Supreme Ancestor, Chief, Hunter, Great Doctor, Chief of all Chiefs,
The Big Tree, Powerful Chief, Nana Yesu, The Lion of the Grasslands, and
Diviner.”[12]
African
Traditional Religion and Culture
African
Traditional Religion (ATR) is a monotheistic and poly-divinistic religion
without contradiction, shared by most Africans and embraces a three-tiered
religious system.[13] The first tier is the Supreme Being; the
second tier is non-human divinities and divinized ancestors, who derive power
from deity and mediate between the deity and humans—a picture of “diffused
monotheism;” the third tier is human powers exhibited by herbalists, doctors,
chiefs, and priests to maintain harmony, order, and balance.[14] This three-tiered
religious system denotes a holistic approach that does not make distinction
between what is sacred and secular, religious and non-religious, but embraces
all areas of life.[15] It is a hierarchical system where the Supreme
Being is remote, “personified by not normally experienced as a person;” he is
transcendent, belonging in “the sphere of cosmology rather than the sphere of
existential relevance,” and could be related to through intermediaries or
ancestors.[16]
ATR
operates in a patriarchal hierarchical system based on submission to authority
in the ancestral line with rituals that are meant to preserve and strengthen
life, in a culture that seeks “the fullness of life—vitality, fertility,
courage, endurance, healing, ecstasy, abandonment in rhythm, dance and song.”[17] Communal life is central
to African culture and healthy relations lead to the prosperity of the
community; any conflicts, sins, or insubordination would lead to misfortunes
and diseases and is an affront not to God but to others.[18] So the concept of sin is privatized but the
concept of salvation is communal. Forgiveness of sins is not an issue when they
approach the diviner, but healing and success are.[19]
Definition
of Ancestor
African
cultures believe that people should approach deity through a mediator and not
directly; the ancestor plays that role. Charles
Nyamiti defines “ancestor” as "a relative of a person with whom he has a
common parent, and of whom he is mediator to God, archetype of behavior, and
with whom—thanks to his supernatural status acquired through death—he is
entitled to have regular sacred communication."[20]
Ancestral Cult
The ancestral cult is not uniform
throughout Africa but rooted in the African Traditional Worldview that could be
summarized under four main points. First, dynamism and animism are connected to
reality, fertility, power, coexistence, and one’s being that are derived from
God; then the dead of the tribe endowed with special powers; then the living
whose main craving is for power, protection, and life (fecundity) which lead
them to spiritism.[21] Second, God is the
foundation of human and cosmic solidarity, totality, and participation and is behind
all events in the world, a concept manifested in community life and
assimilation of the individual into a group.[22] Third, great value is placed on the sacred as
manifested in initiation rites, ancestors, cultural heroes, founders, and
archetypes; people are in close contact with spirits of the dead who are
mediators to God.[23] They also worship Mother Earth, side-by-side
with God. Fourth, anthropocentrism focuses
on man’s welfare being rooted in society and religion.[24]
In the ancestral cult, reinforcing
coexistence and strengthening of the sacred power or vital force in the human
community is the motivation behind the cult; a person without offspring cannot
become an ancestor, the reason why Africans beget many children.[25] An ancestor procures
benefits for his living family such as health, long life and fertility; the
ancestral cult is related to kinship.[26] There is continuity
between the dead and the living in the sense of transition from the visible to
the invisible; death does not lead to non-existence as in Christianity in the
form of final judgment.[27] When an ancestor passes
away, he is believed to be endowed with “a sacred super-human status with
special magico-religious powers that can be beneficial or even harmful to his
earthly kin;” he has the capacity to be visible, to indwell humans or animals,
to eat or drink, and to exist anywhere, and enjoys a special nearness to the
Supreme Being.[28]
The ancestral spirits could be benevolent or harmful; when angered, they are
appeased by sacrifices and ritual offerings.[29]
Ancestor’s Characteristics and Functions
The ancestor has a parent-child relationship,
enjoys a supernatural power, is inferior to God, and acts as mediator between
the Supreme Being and humans, but not a mediator of salvation.[30] Ancestors up to four or
five generations remain in contact with their kin, until their memory fade away;
they are considered to be good models of behavior and to educate social
behavior.[31]
For a living to be an ancestor, two conditions have to be fulfilled: to reach
adulthood and transmit life by reproduction and to die a natural death.[32] Three distinct functions characterize an
ancestor: companion and protector on the journey of life of the living,
mediator between God and humans, and “guardian of family affairs, traditions,
ethics, and activities,”[33] The concern in this paper
is on the “mediator” function, in order to draw similarities and differences
with the role of Jesus as Mediator, between God and man for salvation. As a mediator, the ancestor is a “pool of
power;” and his spirit resides in the deistic and dynamistic spiritual realm.[34] The ancestor is not a
medium of worship in the sense of offering sacrifices to God and does not act
on behalf of God; they are authoritative advisors and channels of blessings or misfortune,
mediating the power between God and humans.
ANCESTOR IN
AFRICAN CHRISTOLOGY
There were many controversies
regarding the inculturated ancestor Christology. Some have argued that Christ fits into the
understanding of ancestor and have called Him “the Ancestor of Africa;” while,
others rejected this inculturated Christology of Jesus as ancestor. The
following part investigates arguments and counter-arguments regarding this
inculturated ancestor Christology, drawing similarities and differences to assess
them theologically.
Arguments
advocating Christ as Ancestor
Some have called Christ Jesus as
the “Great Ancestor,” others “the Ancestor of Africa.” The arguments that
advocated Christ as ancestor related the functions of the ancestor to the role
Jesus plays. The ancestor was a mediator
between God and humans in terms of communication but not of salvation, and so
is Jesus who is the only Way to God the Father for salvation (Jn 6:44, 14:6, 1
Tim 2:5; Acts 4:12). The ancestor enjoys
a supernatural power and so is Jesus as manifested with all His miracles of
healing, exorcism, authority over nature, words of knowledge, and prophecies. Ancestors remain in contact with their kin
for four or five generations, and so is Jesus who remains eternally in contact
with us through the Holy Spirit (Jn 14:26; Jn 16). Ancestors are good models of behavior and
educate social behavior, and so is Jesus who taught, preached, and modeled the
character of God. The ancestor is a respectable, authoritative man and so was
Jesus who taught with authority by the word of His power. The ancestor is near
to God and so is Jesus in the bosom of God the Father (Jn 1:18). The ancestor is inferior to God and so was
Jesus in terms of humanity, however much debated, when He said, “for the Father
is greater than I” (Jn 14:28). The
ancestor is an advisor and so is Jesus whom Isaiah foresaw and spoke about as
the Wonderful Counselor (Is 9:7). The
ancestor is a channel of blessing or misfortune and so is Jesus Christ, who
has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing (Eph 1:3),
and who warned non-believers of their misfortunate fate (Mt 23:38; Lu 13:35).
Tennent assesses
"Ancestor Jesus" on four criteria: biblical, older church,
traditional African view, and living experience of African Christians. The
biblical criterion relates to three "theological anchors" for
ancestor imagery: logos referred to as Nana Yesu, mediator, and
life and death in the Christian community. The biblical criterion focuses on Ancestor
Jesus or Nana Yesu by highlighting John's use of the Hellenistic word logos to relay "an impersonal, all pervading force;" it was John's
way to translate the gospel and to communicate more effectively in their
cultural and linguistic context.[35]
The role of mediator between God and man is crucial to the ancestor's role.
Life and death in the community was likened to the Body of Christ, whose Head
is in heavens and body is on earth; there is a sense of continuity between
Ancestor Jesus the living dead and His descendants (the believers).[36]
The older church criterion is placed in the counter-arguments
(please see below). The Traditional African worldview
focuses on the essential roles of the ancestor that closely relate to Jesus as
mediator, founder of the Christian community, and the risen Lord whose life directs
the Christian community and transmits life.[37] Ancestor Jesus is the "proto-Ancestor of
the human race" for God created with His word—Jesus Christ; so this figure
fills a void to prevent Africans to return to their traditional religions. The new identity in Christ Jesus helped unify
Africans and reconcile them to one another which strengthened the community, a
role the ancestor assumes.[38]
Also, the Second Vatican Council of the
Catholic Church was receptive to contextualized theology and Christology,
vis-à-vis traditional religions.[39]
The renown African
theologians, scholars, bishops, and priests that advocate the inculturated
Christology of Ancestor Jesus are: John Pobee, a Protestant Ghanaian; J. Mutiso
Mubinda, a Catholic theologian; Benezet Bujo, a Catholic priest from Congo;
Marc Ntetem, Catholic priest from Cameroon; Archbishop Milingo; Charles Nyamiti
from East Africa; Kwesi Dickson, a Ghanaian from the Methodist church; Francois
Kabasélé, a Catholic theologian from Congo; Emmanuel Martey, a Ghanaian
Presbyterian; Kwame Bediako, a Ghanaian Protestant theologian; and Harry
Sawyerr, a theologian from Sierra Leone, among others.
Counter-Arguments
rejecting Christ as Ancestor
Counter-arguments related the
conditions to become an ancestor to the identity of historical Jesus and
deduced that Jesus cannot be their ancestor. A survey was conducted at the Theological College of Northern
Nigeria (TCNN), through eighty students, on forty-two Nigerian tribes to
investigate whether the ancestor-motif fits into Jesus or not.[40]
The results supported a universal rejection of the inculturated Christology of
Jesus as ancestor because he did not meet the criteria for being an ancestor,
and thus is disqualified. The ethnic tribes expressed this rejection in a
strongly negative way based on the physical conditions centered on blood
relations, physical descendants, the ability to give life, and to have died a
good death, not a shameful one. They
viewed Jesus as a stranger, not their African ancestor with blood ties:
Christ
lived and died without having biological children…he died at 33 years which to
Bura people is a tender age, so that proves that his age is not fit for him to
be qualified as ancestor…he died a shameful death, had no children, is never a
member of any clan in Taroh land, had no compound nor history in Taroh land…a
barren person will never become an ancestor…a good ancestor in the Jukun
tradition has to give birth to first, second, third and even fourth generations
but an ancestor has no successor to the third and fourth generation is regarded
as a wicked ancestor…an ancestor must have offspring, a family, a clan, or a
tribe…ancestor is one who gave birth to other people…he was not born in Abiriba
but in Palestine…Jesus Christ is a Jew; he was neither of my tribe nor my
family.. Jesus is no ancestor of the Lunguda man for he bore no Lunguda
person…Jesus was not Warji by tribe but a Jew…[41]
The following
reasons for disqualifying Jesus as an ancestor are centered on the aspect of
Jesus’ work as mediator of salvation.
Jesus was not seen as a savior from their clan but as a universal Savior
for the whole world; the ancestor had to be a personalized savior from their
clan with blood ties:
Jesus Christ died to save the
whole world while the Mwaghavul ancestor represents only his family lineage;
hence Jesus cannot be limited to ancestor…Jesus’ death is universal, he is not
limited to Kilba people…Christ’s salvation is universal…For me, to say that
Christ is an ancestor is equally reducing Christ to my very culture or clan…If
Christ should be an ancestor in Igbo land, his atoning sacrifice…would be only
for his tribe or clan and descendants…He came for the whole world, but as for
ancestors even though it is believed they can protect their own lineage, they cannot
protect any other lineage…[42]
The following
reasons are related to the functions of ancestor as protector, companion, and
guardian of family affairs, traditions, ethics, and activities:
An ancestor in Kuteb culture is a deceased head father whose major duty
is to revenge on behalf of his children, while Jesus Christ is a reconciler who
reconciles the Kuteb people to God…An ancestor can infect people with sickness,
while Christ is a healer…The spirit of the ancestor was feared; today the Dera
do not have this fear because they believe in Jesus’ death which conquered the
spirit of death…[43]
The following
reasons are more ontological, related to the existence of the risen powerful Christ
as compared to the ancestor who is a powerless dead person or a living dead:
The
longer an ancestor is in a family, the more he fades away, but Christ is God,
hence his kingdom remains forever… Christ resurrected bodily and remains
living, not as living dead… Jesus cannot be compared with dead people because
he is alive…An ancestor is a dead progenitor according to my culture but Christ
is not dead, he is alive…When Jesus resurrected, he was seen by many people,
but an ancestor only reveals himself at night and only men know who he is. But
in the case of Jesus Christ, even women testified to his resurrection and
lordship…An ancestor never resurrected physically…We have God, gods, or
divinities, and the ancestors; Jesus Christ is God…The Dera see Jesus as the
Savior of mankind who will come and judge the world; they did not see him as an
ancestor, whose souls are dangerous to them…Christ is above an ancestor… Jesus
ranks above all human ancestors, so he cannot be degraded as an ancestor…Christ
is above these and he is above God, not like the ancestors that still live in
the world…[44]
The final reason
was related to the cult of ancestors that is deeply rooted in ATR of mediums
and spirits that could be evil and harmful, considered by the Bible as sorcery
and divination warned against and banned:
A candid
Christian who is a Kulere should detach himself from ancestral veneration
because God and the Mosaic law forbid it…The practice of dead or ancestral
things is forbidden in the Old Testament…The Bible forbids consulting the
dead…The Israelites were warned by Moses not to consult spirits nor to practice
divination.[45]
This above survey
confirms Tennent's statistical finding concerning the negative responses to the
ancestor image that ranges between 44% and 63%, depending of the region in Africa.[46] Besides, Tennent's older church criterion of Jesus as fully God and fully man is vulnerable
to Arian tendencies because the ancestor is not pre-existent like Jesus.[47] Beyers and Mphahlele questioned
whether Jesus could be called ancestor.
THEOLOGICAL
ASSESSMENT
Jesus as the Ancestor of Africa is
a highly controversial inculturated Christology that swings between acceptance
and rejection, though it is a great contribution to African Christianity and Inculturation
Christology. African theologians and scholars have embraced
the ancestor-motif establishing many similarities between the ancestor role and
function and Jesus Christ, drawing on His functions. The rejection was voiced by common people and
was mired in the physical characteristics and conditions qualifying a person to
be an ancestor. They advocated for the universality
and supremacy of Jesus as God, who rose from the dead and reconciled between
the tribes, a superlative status to ancestor.
Christology from below led them to
Christology from above; in other words, through the works of Christ as an
ancestor, they could believe who He claimed to be in the gospel as God
incarnate. Christology from above led them to discern the syncretic behavior or
belief of mixing between their former traditional religion and their new faith
and identity in Jesus Christ. Some churches accommodated both traditional
ancestor cult and Ancestor Jesus parallel to each other, arguing that ancestral
veneration does not contradict the Christian faith.”[48]
Is the Ancestor-motif an exclusive
or inclusive inculturated Christology? The ancestor-motif is an exclusive
inculturated Christology that differs from one African country to another. Ontologically,
it relegates the universality and pre-existence of Christ and equality with God
the Father; it reduces Him to the limitations of any human, however endowed
with supernatural powers of a divinity. Jesus is not only a
mediator-communicator between God and man; He is mediator of universal
salvation. An ancestor has the capacity to cause harm and be a venue for
demon-possession.[49] Born again Christians refused to see Jesus as
their ancestor because of the association with evil spirits, which they needed
to be liberated from; thus, Ancestor Jesus who liberated them from evil
ancestors cannot be their ancestor. In other words, if Ancestor Jesus liberated
them from ancestor spirits, how could he be viewed as an ancestor? The
ancestor-motif reinforced Liberation Christology—Jesus, the Liberator with
exorcist powers.
Is He just a Mediator to the
Supreme Being or is He the Supreme Being incarnated as their ancestor to reach
out for them with salvation? The
intersection between Christology from above and Christology from below is
constantly correcting and developing the African Christology. Africans started
with Western Christology from above to which they could not relate; Jesus was a
stranger. However, they had the biblical
doctrines and ecumenical confessions of a proper Christology. When Africans
started to develop their own Christology, it was an ascending Christology
inculturated in their local context for the people to understand who Jesus
is. With growth in the knowledge of
Jesus and in grace, believers were transformed and started to discern the
correct faith and to reject syncretism.
ATR still has a hold on them, especially when the churches accept the
presence of ATR ancestor cult along with their new Christian faith, under the
pretext of "inculturated Christology."
PERSONAL REFLECTIONS
In the Egyptian experience, there
was never a system of ancestor veneration; however, there is respect for
ancestors' memory and name. Venerating
the Saints closely embraces the idea of communion with the Saints as they are
physically dead but spiritually alive with the capacity to be visible in
glorified bodies. They are God's
servants to assist Him in ministering to the Body of Christ; they are invoked
by prayers to perform miracles. The Orthodox Church glorifies them and
considers them as intercessors; it venerates their bodies and celebrates yearly
days to commemorate their death or martyrdom. Dead saints cast out demons and
heal cancers. It is amazing how the fellowship of the Saints have helped many
Egyptians believe in Christ Jesus as the Lord and Savior; after all, Saints
minister in the name and power of their God—Jesus Christ.
CONCLUSION
The goal of contextualized theology
is transformation. The ancestor figure in African Theology is an inculturated
Christology that helped Africans receive Christ as an African, not as a
stranger. The deep division in arguments and counter-arguments around the image
of Ancestor Jesus is due to the incompleteness and exclusivity of the motif. What really matters is not the theologians'
and scholars' advocacy but how the common people assessed and related to the
ancestor motif. Ancestor Jesus is a
distorted picture of the Jesus of the Bible that relegates the work and person
of Jesus Christ; however, it could be considered as preparatio evangelica
for the real Savior, the Christ of Africa, to be received as the Jesus
Christ of the Bible—the full God-Man. The ancestral cult was a venue for
demon-possession but the true Divine Ancestor liberated them from that cult. Does the ancestor-motif speak to non-Africans
of the other Majority World Countries? Further research on the ancestor-motif
in other Majority World Cultures would highly benefit the contextualized
Christological reflections and discourses, as it will open horizons of
understanding and acceptance for other cultures and for God's tremendous work.
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[1]. Timothy C. Tennent, Theology
in the Context of World Christianity, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan, 2007), 6.
[2]. Ibid, 109.
[3]. Dean Flemming Contextualization in the New
Testament: Patterns for Theology and
Mission, (Madison, Wisconsin:
InterVarsity Press, 2005), 308; Tennent, 113.
[4]. Flemming, 19.
[5]. Godwin Akper, “The Person
of Jesus Christ in Contemporary African Christological Discourse, ” Religion
and Theology, Vol. 14, 2007, 225.
[6]. Tennent,
115.
[7].
Ibid, 113.
[8] Fidei Depositum is the
Apostolic Constitution, October 11th 1962, by which Pope John Paul II ordered
the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
[9]. Tennent,
114.
[10]. Ibid,
115. Tabula Rasa, means “( Latin: ‘scraped tablet’—i.e., ‘clean slate’) in epistemology (theory of knowledge) and psychology, a supposed condition that empiricists attribute
to the human mind before
ideas have been imprinted on it by the reaction of the senses to the external world of objects;” see http://www.britannica.com/topic/tabula-rasa
[11].
Ibid, 117.
[12]. Roar G.
Fotland, “The Christology of Kwame Bediako,” Nordsk Tidsskrift For Misjon, Vol.
1, 2006.
[13]. Tennent, 122-123.
[14]. Ibid.
[15]. Charles A. Wanamaker, “Jesus
the Ancestor: Reading the Story of Jesus
from an African Christian Perspective,” Scriptura,
Vol. 63, 1997, 286.
[16]. Klaus Nürnberger,
“Ancestor Veneration in the Church of Christ?” Journal of Theology for Southern Africa, Vol. 129, Nov. 2007,
56.
[17]. Ibid, 60-62.
[18]. Ibid.
[19].
Ibid, 63.
[20]. Tennent,
123.
[21]. Charles Nyamiti, Ancestor
Veneration in Africa, http://www.afrikaworld.net/afrel/nyamiti.htm
[22]. Ibid.
[23]. Ibid.
[24]. Ibid.
[25]. Ibid.
[26]. Ibid.
[27]. Wanamaker, 286.
[28]. Ibid.
[29]. Ibid.
[30]. Jaco Beyers and Dora N. Mphahlele, “Jesus Christ as
Ancestor: An African Christian
Understanding,” HTS Teologiese Studies, Vol. 65, Issue no. 1, 2009, 38-42, 38; see
also Raymond Moloney, “African Christology,” Theological Studies, Vol. 48, Issue no. 3, Sep 1987, 510.
[31]. Beyers, 39.
[32]. Ibid.
[33]. Nyamiti; Wanamaker,
286.
[34]. Beyers, 39.
[35] Tennent, 125-126.
[36]. Tennent, 127.
[37]. Ibid.
[38]. Ibid.
[39]. Alexander Jebadu,
“Ancestral Veneration and the Possibility of its Incorporation into the
Christian Faith,” Exchange, Vol. 36, 2007, 279.
[40]. Timothy Palmer, Is
Jesus Christ our Ancestor?, http://www.tcnn.org/articles/RB42_Palmer.pdf,
accessed August 18, 2015. Please note
that this paper is an unpublished work without normal protocol for research,
but the statistical results of the survey confirm and support my thesis
statement.
[41]. Palmer, Is Jesus
Christ our Ancestor?
[42]. Ibid.
[43]. Ibid.
[44]. Ibid.
[45]. Ibid.
[46]. Tennent, 127.
[47]. Ibid.
[48]. Jebadu, 246.
[49]. Edison Muhindo Kalengyo,
“ 'Cloud of Witness' in Hebrews 12:1 and Ganda Ancestors: An Incarnational Reflection,” Neotestamentica,
Vol. 43, Issue no. 1, 2009, 58.
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