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150 Roy Stults, Dale F. Walker, Makito Yoshimoto
that it is not a Western institution but is truly a global
movement. The book provides excellent exercises at the end of each
chapter to help the reader, whether in the church or in the
classroom, to fully engage the material presented in each chapter.
These exercises are well-thought-out and probe the subject in a
manner that aids in the instruction and continued discussion of the
material.
The book is obviously the result of many years of serious and
intense missiological thinking and teaching, accompanied by
significant experience in doing hands-on missionary work. That is
the perfect combination for writing a book on missions.
Missiological Models in Ministry to Muslims By Sam Schlorff
Upper Darby, PA: Middle East Resources 2006, 202 pp., paper. $19.95
Reviewed by Dale F. Walker
Sam Schlorff writes from long experience of ministry with
Muslims and a long association with Arab World Ministries (and
predecessor organizations). He is no stranger to readers of
Missiology; three of his previous articles have been in these pages
(1983; 1993; 2000). The third of these is adapted in several parts
of the present book and should be compared with Dean Gilliland's
response in the same issue.
Part I of Schlorff's book is a short historical overview of six
models of ministry to Muslims. These range from polemics in the
19th Century, which developed into the Direct Approach model,
typified by Christy Wilson, Sr., to the Fulfillment Model,
represented by Bevan Jones, the Dialectal model (Hendrik Kraemer),
the Dialogical Model (Kenneth Cragg and the WCC), and the Dynamic
Equivalence/Translational Model, illustrated by various attempts at
"contextualization." This historical review is very compressed, but
valuable; it would be even more valuable if Roman Catholic models
had been included in the survey.
Part II deals mainly with questions concerning the use of
Qur'anic expressions in Bible translation and in teaching. There is
extensive discussion about the use of 'Isa/Jesus, but none on the
use of Allah/God. Some would
use Qur'anic expressions only negatively, in debate; others
would use them positively, trying to fill them with Christian
meanings. This leads into more discussion of an "islamicized
church." Schlorff is very doubtful about ministry at the C4-C5
parts of the familiar scale.
In Part , Schlorff sets out aspects of his own model of
ministry. He focuses die objective of mission to Muslims in terms
of the Kingdom of God; the Bible is the only theological starting
point, rejecting any positive use of Islamic teaching.
Contextualization applies to non-religious language and customs.
The church is planted with what Schlorff calls the "Betrothal
Model," based on 2 Cor. 11:2-3.
An extensive appendix illustrates Schlorff's model with the
ministry and teaching of Church Without Walls, founded by Amees
Zaka, and based around Philadelphia, though evidently there are
branches in other places. This ministry is important in itself,
though to compare like with like, a better illustration contrasting
the "Bethothal" and the "Dynamic Equivalence" models would be from
a movement in the Muslim world.
The bibliography is very extensive, largely from the historical
materials of Parts I and II. It is not annotated as stated; only a
handful of entries have any annotation. (A real annotated
bibliography would be a wonderful project.)
In summary, this book is an extensive exposition of one model of
ministry, along with critique of other models. Whether one agrees
with this stance or not, it is an important statement. Our thanks
to Schlorff for making it available.
Theology in Japan: Takakura Tokutaro (1885-1934) By J. Nelson
Jennings American Society of Missiology Dissertation Series,
University Press of America, Lanham; Boulder; New York; Toronto;
Oxford 2004, xxx + 488 pp., paper. $64.00 Reviewed by Makito
Yoshimoto
This Ph.D. dissertation (1995) was written by J. Nelson
Jennings, who was a former missionary in Japan, first as a
church-planting missionary in Nagoya (1986-1991), secondly as an
assistant professor at Tokyo Christian
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Book Reviews 151
University in Chiba (1996-1999). He tried to analyze and assess
the theology of Takakura Tokutaro from the Western point of
view.
In the middle of the nineteenth century, Japan was forced to
abolish her two-and-half century-long isolation policy by the
Western powers and opened up and began to achieve modernization.
This era of Japanese history is designated in the Japanese calendar
according to the reigns of the emperors, respectively as Meiji 1-46
(1868-1912), Taisho 1-15 (1912-1926), and Showa 1-64 (1926-1989).
The present designation is Heisei according to the reign of Heisei
Emperor (1989-).
The introduction of Christianity into Japan was first done by
the Jesuit missionary Francis Xavier in the middle of the 16th
century. It was accepted by several feudal lords and developed
rapidly to the significant size by the time of the total
destruction of the church by the ban in 1638. The Protestant
mission began after the Meiji Reformation (1868) and in Meiji 5
(1872), before abolishment of the prohibition of Christianity the
next year by the Meiji government, the first Protestant church was
established in Yokohama by 11 Japanese Christians and the American
Dutch Reformed missionary James H. Ballagh. Takakura Tokutaro, the
main figure of the thesis, belonged to the second generation of the
Japanese Protestant church and was the representative theologian
and leader in the late 1920s and the early 1930s.
The author analyzed and evaluated extensively Takakura's life
and theology according to the scheme of: Part I: The Life Context
that Shaped Takakura's Thought: Takakura the Human Being; Part II:
Chapter 1: The Christian Faith Conveyed to Takakura through the
Church in Meiji Japan; Part III: Chapter 2: The Christian Faith
Conveyed to Takakura through the Western Church; Part IV:
Takakura's Articulation of the Christian Faith Within His
contemporary Situation: (especially on his major work, Fukuinteki
Kirisutokyo ("Evangelical Christianity"); Part V: Analysis of
Takakura's Thought. I will cite here briefly the author's
observation.
In the first half of the Meiji Era (until about 1890), Japan had
introduced actively Western science and technologies and had been
eager to
catch up with the Western nations by promoting the policy of
industrialization and militarization. Generally, people were also
receptive towards Christianity and especially representative
leaders of the first generation of the newly developed Japanese
churches were from the Samurai (soldier) class, which had been
demoted from their prestigious ruling status by the Meiji
Reformation. Most of them accepted Christianity in order to realize
their personal and national ideals in the new Japan by dint of
Christian values. In contrast, Takakura's father was originated
from a rising merchant family in a rural village near Kyoto. He
came into contact with Christians when he began to learn silk
industry near the Tokyo area and eventually was baptized. He could
afford to have his eldest son, Tokutaro, take the highest
education. While Tokutaro was in Tokyo to attend the prestigious
Tokyo Imperial University, he came to know intimately Uemura
Masahisa, a leading churchman of the Protestant church, and was
baptized by him in 1906. The next year he quit studying at Tokyo
University and entered the newly founded seminary of Uemura.
In the latter half of the Meiji Era and Taisho Era (1890s
1920s), Japan succeeded in achieving industrial revolution and now
began to struggle with overcoming obedient imitation of the West
and creating her identity as a member of modernized nations.
Especially in the Taisho era, the trend of democracy and
individualism, the so-called Taisho-Democracy, was widely spread
among the middle class urban people. In this age, Takakura was led
to the Christianity of the second generation Japanese church.
Whereas his mentor Uemura's Christianity was characterized with
Confucian morality of the ruling military class, Takakura of the
merchant family sought for Christianity as a way of solving the
"problem of ego." The author pointed out that the underlying
Japanese spiritual heritage of Takakura's theology was a Japanized
sect of Mahayana Buddhism, the Jodo Shinshu, as well as its faith
in the Buddhist Savior, Amida, and also the philosophy of Nishida
Kitaro (1870-1945), one of Takakura's teachers at his higher
school. The latter is a representative philosopher of the Modern
Japan, who got acquainted with the Western philosophy thoroughly
and created
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152 Makito Yoshimoto, Charles C. West, A. H. Mathlas
Zahniser
successfully his original philosophical system on the basis of
the Oriental worldview by applying the Western philosophical
concepts and logics. The author believes that this approach of
Nishida was reflected in theologizing of Takakura. Takakura learned
Evangelical Christianity from his mentor, Uemura, and studied
vastly Western theologies both through theological books in
original languages in Japan and study in Scotland and England. But
he accepted Western theologies only critically and tried to
identify the original form and meanings of Christianity and
articulate it as a truly Japanized theological system. After the
death of Uemura in 1925, he publicized his main work, "Fukuinteki
Kirisutokyo (Evangelical Christianity)," in 1927. It was rather a
small thesis but a very sharply and deeply thought-out theological
work. He assumed the role of Uemura and was expected greatly as the
leading figure of the second generation Japanese church in the new
era. But he fell by a serious disease and died shortly before his
forty-ninth birthday in 1934. Shockingly enough, later it was
reported by his family that his death was actually suicide.
Concerning his death, the author is sympathetic that his death was
not the result of crisis of faith but rather purely the result of
illness. Raised in the age of the search for independence and
identity of Japan and being successful to find the solution of the
problem of ego in Christianity and to create an indige-nized
theological system, he himself could not accomplish his faith unto
the end of his full length of life under the burden of studying the
Christian theology and pasturing the church. It was a tragedy and
regret.
As a conclusion, the author values Takakura highly as a creative
thinker and theologian who tried to accept the Western theologies
critically and to create an original theology of the primitive and
authentic Christianity in the Japanese cultural milieu. Further, he
recognizes the significance that he could gain the new standpoint
to appreciate his own Western Christian heritage through the
heterogeneous non-Western theology. He insists that we, Christians
from various cultures and nations, should learn and share with each
other in order to enrich and complement one another for the full
manifestation of the Body of Jesus Christ. Lastly, it
should be emphasized as his credit to have introduced a highly
recommended example of theologizing by a Japanese theologian to the
wide Christian world in spite of the language barrier, because
otherwise, such an ethnic production could rarely be appreciated by
outside people because of linguistic and cultural limitation.
The Witness of the Student Christian Movement: The Church Ahead
of the Church By Robin Boyd London: SPCK 2007, xii + 212pp., paper.
14.99 Reviewed by Charles C. West
This is a book for everyone concerned with the church in mission
in the last hundred years. It pursues a central strand of this
mission the Student Christian Movement (SCM) its evangelical
formation, its ecumenical spirit and its worldwide influence, down
to the present day. The author tells the story from a British
perspective (he is Northern Irish) but includes much of the history
of the World Student Christian Federation and of the Movement in
India and Australia where he has worked.
It is an inspiring story of "the church ahead of the church," to
use the author's phrase. "The evangelization of the world in this
generation" was a Student Christian Movement goal that challenged
the churches as the 20th century began. It led to the Edinburgh
Conference on World Mission in 1910 where the Ecumenical Movement
was born. The SCM in its student groups educated the leaders of
that movement who later led churches through most of the century:
in Biblical and theological renewal; in mission as it became a
world-wide task of the whole church in every land; in search for
the unity given us in Christ beyond church divisions; in prophetic
witness to God's work of justice and mercy in the world; and in
community of worship and prayer to undergird it all.
All of this Boyd describes event by event. SCM meetings were
places where Christian faith was defined politically in intense
encounter over against Communism, Nazism, imperialism and other
ideologies of the day. They were also where Christian witness in
the
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