Americun Society of Missivlogy Series, No. 16 TRANSFORMING MISSION Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission David J. Bosch th the at hte Vou th Me i Aa nf be~ wo Re ae me & Lé yd hivchow PR tEeN vrs @oooxs Maryknoll, New York 10545SIX Epoces In the frst part of this study {have attempted to introduce the vexder to sre ays in which thier important early Chistian witnescs underswos ihe Tre rg nts Chtst and, Bowing fom this, the chuzch’s responsibilty towed the world, rita ee £0 rte however. ts mocesary (0 write about the meaning SLintsion for our ow time, Keeping in mind tet the present crn henmee Healy diferent from the period in which Matthew, Luke, and Pao) woe, thet Sotpels an leters fw the fst and second generations of Chrieees tne Pafiund dissimilarities between then and now iinply that it will herve oPorel 4 firect manncr tn the words of the biblical authors and apply sina {hey mid on a one-to-one bai 0 our own situation We should: rate ei Gfeztie bur responsible freedom, prolong the logic ofthe misty of leas nat econ church in an imaginative and creative way i ur own tine ond aeen Que wf the basic reasons for having to do thi lcs inthe fact thatthe Chon a Bae torical tah. Gol wommunieaes his revelation to people te, human beings and through exews, not by means of abnirat propoctsonn Teh is shouher way of saying thatthe biblical faith, both Ol and New Teseanery is “incarmational”, ‘o draw the contours in bw strokes, ofa contemynsrary paradigms for saan in which the Chuistian church has, through the (6s Interpreted and carried out its mission, T shall follow the histories tine {paica subdivisions suggested by Hans Kung (1984:25; 1987181), Kune oulmas dignan® ante history if Christianity can be susvided into ake majr “pare Sigs". ‘hese are: 1 The apocelyptic paradigm of primitive Chistian. 2. The Hellenistic mradigm of the patristic period. 3. The medieval Rumman Catholic paradigm, 1stPo 182 Husoncel Paradigms of Mision 4. The Protestant (Reformation) palin. 5. The modern Enlightenment paradigm 6, The emerging ecumenical pataigan Ench of these six periods, King suggests, scwrals « peculiar understanding of the Christian faith. To this T would ald tht exch aso offers a astinetve understanding of Chistian sso [shall in the following cleapers, attempt to cutine what mission meant in cach ofthese perinu, heginning not with primitive Christianity (since the entire first pat ofthis nk was, infact, devoted to an effort a tracing the missionary Juma operative in some major representative ofthis period) but with the Helleniste period In each of these eras Christians, from within their own contents, wrestled withthe question of what the Christan faith and, by implication, the Chistian mission meant for them, Needless to say, all of them believed and argued that their understanding of the faith and of the church's mission was faithful to God's intent, This did not, however, mean that they ll thought alike and came to the same conclusions, There have, of course always been Christians (and theologians!) who believed that their understanding ofthe faith was “objec- tively” accurate and, in effect, the only authentic rendering of Christianity. Such an attitude, however, rests on a dangerous illusion. Our views are always only interretaton of what we consider tobe divine revelation, not divine revelation itself (and these interpretations are profoundly shaped by out selfnilerstnml- ings). Ihave argued in the preceding chapters that not even the ileal hoks Ye have sunoyed arc, as such, records of divine revelation; they ae invenpre- tations of thet revelation. Ite an ison to helio hat we ean penetrate 1 8 pure gospel unaffected by any cultuta aul exer human accretions. Even ia the earliest Jesus tration the sayings of Tau were already sayings about Jesus (Gf Schottoff and Sieyenann 19867). And if this was true of the Christian fait in is pristine phase, it should be ebvis that I would be even more trie uf sulpexguent pericds. Nobody recelves the gospel pasively; each one as a ilter of course reinterprets it. There is, truly, no knowledge in which the subjective dimension does not enter in some way or other (Hiebert 1985a:7) Moreover, as will hopefully become clear in the course of my argument, this circumstance Is not something we should lament; it is an inherent feature of ‘the Christian fit, since it concerns the Word made test Isis therefore spproprate not to talk about “Christin theology” but sbout “Christian theologies". Any individual Chnstian’s understanding of God's rev- lation is conditioned by a great varety of factors. ‘These include the person's clesiatical tradition, personal contest (sex. age. marital status, education), social postion (socal “eoss", protesion, wealth, environment), personality and culture (worldview, language, ete). Treditionally we have recognized the enistence (even i nt the validity) af only the fist factor, that isthe eifferences caused by ecclesiastical traditions. In more recent years we have begun to accep the role of eulture in religion and religious experience. The other factors ae, however, equally (if not more) important. A black migrant worker in Taha nesburg or instance, may have a pereeption of the Chistian faith very liflesent Pen from that of « white civil sere the Dutch Reformed Church, as Ernesto Cardeal’s The Ge may understand the gospel it New York businessman, even te: intividual’s self-understas ‘lion and experience of the t ‘There is yet another impor people interpret and experien evesice™ with whieh they happy uniterstanding of reality and th in which they happen to live a faith, experiences, and though divisions of the history of Ch extent, with differences in the the other, and only to @ lesse differences per se. ‘The “work and subsequent centuries was of primitive Christianity, which of the Hebrew Old Testament the other epochs referred to a Kuing’s subdivision ofthe hi of course, not very original. W visions according to Thomas Ki pochs, Kiing suggests, relecis from any of its predecessins T stood and expetiencetl their the understanding suul experie: Kiing's servation regarait our understancling of how Ch various epochs of the history of look at this entire issue. We do is, just to satisfy our curiosity < imissinnary responsibility. Rath: geting a deeper insight into w! ‘every attempt at interpretine th the present and the future. So explore its relevance tor the pré definitions” to be challenged ts Is in this respect that we may ¢ paradigm changes, THE PARADIGM This isnot the place to ente views of Thomas Kuhn, physic