Category Archives: book review

new book!

Posted on by
Reply

While I (Joshua) have had several peer-reviewed articles published, I am very happy that my first book chapter, “Connections and Collaborations among the Nubian, Coptic, and Ethiopian Churches,” has just been published in:

Gitau, Wanjiru M., and Mark A. Lamport, eds. Globalizing Legacies:  The Intermingling Story of Christianity in Africa.  Preface by Gina Zurlo and Mark A. Lamport.  Introduction by Mark Shaw.  The Global Story of Christianity Series:  History, Context, and Communities 3.  Cascade Books, 2023.
The book can be ordered directly from the publisher here, or from wherever you prefer to buy books.

This multi-author text discusses the story of Christianity in Africa from three perspectives:  “Narrated in Historical Context,” “Expressed in a Grand Church Family Mosaic,” and “Encounters Twenty-First Century Issues.”

After the series introduction by Dana L. Robert, the preface co-written by Gina Zurlo and Mark A. Lamport, and Introduction by Mark Shaw, Kyama Mugambi and Rudolf K. Gaisie begin with “Antiquity: Connections among African Church Fathers in North Africa and the Mediterranean.”  Then Stanislau Paulau examines “The Beginnings of Christianity in Sub-Saharan Africa: Kingdom of Aksum and the Christian World of Late Antiquity.”  Next Fohle Lygunda li-M jumps forward several centuries to explore the contributions of “European Pioneers to Tropical Africa” without neglecting the importance of African agency and the many contributions of Africans who are too often “ignored pioneers” in narratives of Christian history on the continent.  Akintunde E. Akinade then explores “Christianity and the Slave Trade” while Uchenna D. Anyanywu covers “The African-Black American Missionary during the Missionary Era.”

Often histories are told from a limited perspective.  Protestant and Roman Catholic and Orthodox and Pentecostal history texts often ignore contributions of the other traditions.  The second section offers four chapters looking at the whole of Christian history on the continent as the stories of an extended family.  My (Joshua’s) chapter starts by exploring “Connections and Collaborations among the Nubian, Coptic, and Ethiopian Churches” in the ancient and medieval periods.  (Nubia was in the area now known as Sudan, and Nubian and Ethiopian Christianity are ancient examples of indigenous African Christianity in sub-Saharan Africa.)  Moving ahead to the modern period, Stan Chu Ilo tells the story of “The Catholic Church and Networks of Evangelism,” Modisa Mzondi explores “Protestants Working Together,” and Joseph Bosco Bangura examines “Salvation in African Pentecostalism.”

The third section brings us to the twenty-first century.  Harvey Kwyani explores “New Kinships: Christianity and the Formation of New Identities among Convert Communities” and Tharcisse Gatwa discusses “Christianity and Nation-State Formation.”  Next, Georges Pirwoth Atido writes on “Christianity, Wars, and Ethnic Challenges.”  Sampson M. Tieku turns to the influence of the prosperity gospel in “Christianity Encounters the Gospel of Health and Wealth: A Ghanian Case Study.”  Finally Wanjiru M. Gitau closes with “Transtemporal Connections: African Christian History as Intellectual History.”  The book also includes a timeline, provided by Brett Knowles, as an appendix.

Along the way in her chapter, Wanjiru observes that “there exists a continuous history of Christian presence on the African continent. Beginning with its foundations in Alexandria, the church flourished in North Africa, as well as Ethiopia, for some six hundred years. When Carthage, the last Christian stronghold [in North Africa], fell to Arabs in 697, King Mecurios of Nubia built up a Christian kingdom that stretched from the Aswan to the Blue Nile” — I will add that there was a Nubian Christian presence as far inland as the shores of Lake Chad. “After that kingdom succumbed to Turkish-Islamic attacks in 1270, the nine-hundred-year-old Ethiopian church was revived in the mountains of Ethiopia under Yikunno Amlak and Takla Haymanot. By the 1520s, Afonso, king of Kongo, in tropical Africa, had embraced Christianity and established a Christian kingdom that sustained links with Rome for three hundred years. By 1792, Moravian Protestants established a mission station in South Africa, while repatriated slaves established a church in Sierra Leone with intent to evangelize the interior. From there the flow of modern missions established Christianity throughout the continent” (244).

…………………….…………………….
…………………….…………………….

There is one notable error that made into print, albeit only in the timeline.  On p. 258 for the year 231, Knowles writes:

«The church of Caesarea ordains Origen as a presbyter, but this ordination is held to be invalid because he had made himself a eunuch (based on his literal interpretation of Matt 19:12); consequently, he is excommunicated by his home church of Alexandria. [Greco-Roman World, Middle East: Egypt]».

However, there is no evidence that Origen castrated himself.  There is evidence, however, that this was a slander against him.  It should be well-noted that Origen consistently valued allegorical interpretation over literal interpretation (except in matters of straightforward historical narrative) and in his commentating on Matthew 19:12 he explicitly states that the text should not be taken literally.  Demetrius, the bishop of Alexandria, did excommunicate Origen, but did so on the grounds that as Origen was from Egypt, he could only be ordained by the bishop of Alexandria.  (It should also be noted that Demetrius was jealous of Origen’s popularity, which was the result of Origen’s greater ability as both a preacher and a scholar.)  But though Demetrius excommunicated Origen, no one who was not under Demetrius’s ecclesial authority recognized that excommunication.  The bishop of Caesarea-Maritima certainly did not, nor did the patriarchs of Jerusalem, Antioch, or Rome (this was, of course, before the rise in importance of Constantinople).  Thus when Origen died, he died as a Confessor of the Church — that is, he faithfully endured torture for his faith but was not killed outright, because the Roman authorities were hoping for a recantation on the part of such a universally revered church leader and had thus commanded the torturers to ensure that Origen was not made a martyr.  His body and health were broken, however, and he died some months after his release.

The issue is confused because later “Origenism” was explicitly condemned.  But Origen himself was not an “Origenist” and no Council condemned him or his work.  But of course a pall of suspicion was cast upon Origen and his body of work because of the heresies of the so-called Origenists, but this was well after his own day.  As Origen died several years after the passing of Demetrius, Origen was in full communion with the Church universal at the time of his death.

The interpretation that Knowles has given is very common, and has been repeated in untold numbers of “standard” Church History texts.  An examination of the primary sources, however, does not bear this out.  Other than that, he has done a masterful job on the timeline and I am grateful to whomever proposed including it.

There are a few key dates that Knowles did not include which I would have added:

  • Before 450  King Silko of Nobadia becomes the first Nubian ruler to convert to Christianity.  [Sudan]
  • ca. 530–70  Yared the Melodious (501 – ca. 571–76) develops the music and hymnody that is used to this day in the Ethiopian and Eritrean Orthodox liturgies.  [Aksum:  Ethiopia, Eritrea]
  • ca. 1331–35 Ibn al-Dawādārī writes a text (in Arabic) that provides contemporary evidence of the existence of well-established Christian communities within the (Islamic) empire of Mali during the reign Mansa Musa (reigned c. 1312 – c. 1337).  These are sub-Saharan African Christian communities in West Africa before the age of European exploration.  [Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Guinea, Senegal, The Gambia, Mauritania, Côte d’Ivoire]
  • ca. 1400–50  Abba Estifanos (1380 – c. 1450) led a reformation movement in Ethiopia that in many ways presaged the later Protestant Reformation in Europe.  The Stefanite movement was persecuted by emperor Zara’ Ya’eqob (reigned 1434–1468).  [Ethiopia]
  • 1534 Abba Mika’el [aka Michael the Deacon], an Ethiopian Christian, meets with Martin Luther and his colleagues in Wittenberg.  [Ethiopia, Germany]
  • 1991 On 29 December, President Frederick Chiluba declares Zambia to be a Christian nation.  [Zambia]

book review: Forgiveness and Justice

Posted on by
5
Forgiveness and Justice are incompatible, right?  Forgiving someone means foregoing justice, doesn’t it?  Isn’t it just cognitively impossible to think of pursuing justice and forgiving at the same time?  That’s how the popular thinking goes … but that’s not biblical thinking at all.
 
Lamentation (and even anger) at injustice, the seeking of justice, and the practice of forgiveness are all closely intertwined.  W. E. B. Du Bois (1868-1963) included in his book Souls of Black Folk a chapter entitled “Songs of Sorrow.”  In one place he astutely notes that such songs of sorrow (such as the “Negro Spirituals”) offer hope, “a faith in the ultimate justice of things.”
 
Bryan Maier has written an excellent study that explores this relationship between lament for wrongs suffered and hope for justice.  We can’t over-recommend his Forgiveness and Justice:  A Christian Approach (2017).  At just 160 pages, it’s a fairly quick read.
 
There’s nearly a cottage industry of books on forgiveness.  Most contemporary teachings on forgiveness follow one of five models (though there are others) —
  • therapeutic forgiveness (the victim should forgive for the sake of the victim’s well-being, the state of unforgiveness only causes further injury to the victim, and may cause the victim to risk damnation),
  • forensic forgiveness (forgiveness as a transaction — the cancelling of debt, granting clemency from deserved punishment),
  • relational forgiveness (transactional forgiveness plus possible reconciliation of a ruptured relationship),
  • unilateral forgiveness (forgiveness is a one-sided action, all on the side of the victim, and it doesn’t matter whether the perpetrator repents), or
  • dispositional forgiveness (having a forgiving or conciliatory spirit).
All of these have some merit but tend to either try to say too much or too little.
Offering an alternative (and more robustly biblical) course, Maier lays out three boundaries delimiting forgiveness.
  • “Boundary #1: Forgiveness Is a Response to a Moral Violation”
    • “Forgiveness, in order to make sense, must presuppose that an offense has been committed; otherwise there would be nothing to forgive.”  Forgiveness is only required when there has been a moral violation, an offense that is inherently unrighteous/unjust.
  • “Boundary #2: Forgiveness Is Not a Cognitive Reframe”
    • This cognitive behaviorism may have its place, within appropriate limits, to offer a fresh perspective — life has handed me a bunch of lemons?  No problem, I’ll just make lemonade!  Clearly, perception does shape behavior.  Changing our perception can help us not to get stuck in resentment.
    • But forgiveness is something different.  Defining forgiveness in this way can blur the lines of reality, foster gaslighting, and confuse such concepts as
      • condoning, excusing, justifying, and showing mercy.
    •  Often cognitive reframing can ultimately call evil, good — see, God can bring good out of that situation, so what happened to you was really good after all!, and you should praise God for this abuse!  (NB:  We — Joshua and Ruth — have both, separately, heard this type of thing many times over the years.)
    • As a result, this type of focus ultimately makes victims more vulnerable to future acts of injustice and harm.
  • “Boundary #3: Forgiveness Is More Than Empathy”
    • Maier notes that “many forgiveness authors suggest some kind of empathy with the perpetrator as a means of ameliorating the resentment” which a victim feels as a result of the moral violation he or she suffered.  Of course we know that “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.”  But we must also recognize that “that if the victim’s sin cancels out the sin of the perpetrator, then the whole basis for justice collapses. If we are always guilty in some kind of morally equivalent way, then we can never charge our offenders.  If a victim must be totally free of any sinful behaviors or thoughts before the offender can be addressed, justice would never occur.  In the classic passage on confronting a brother (Matt. 18:15–20), the victim’s sin (which we know is present from the rest of Scripture) is never mentioned.”
Maier then outlines “four contours of a Christian approach to forgiveness,” asking a series of questions that we must answer to reach a biblical definition of forgiveness on the foundation of the three boundaries listed above.
  • “How does God forgive?”
  • “How does healing relate to forgiveness?”
  • “Is forgiveness primarily self-centered or other-centered?”
  • “Is forgiveness active or passive?”
After examining (in chapter 3) the relationship between resentment and repentance, he explores each of those four questions.  Reminiscent of Bonhoeffer’s discussion of “cheap grace” in The Cost of Discipleship, Maier explains the hidden costs of the “cheap forgiveness” that many in the Church insist upon.  With cheap forgiveness, because the offender has neither confessed nor repented, “there is no agreement that what was done was wrong” and the victim remains unsafe, and true reconciliation is impossible.  It is appropriate to address ongoing resentment harbored by a victim once the offender has confessed and demonstrated signs of repentance, including where necessary some type of restitution to restore justice.  And so, because “trust is the basis of true unilateral healing for victims,” if such “resentment poses a barrier to genuine forgiveness,” this should be dealt with.  But often “resentment is merely an appropriate emotional reaction to sin yet to be addressed.”  In such circumstances, “healing can only come by means of some assurance that one day justice will be complete and final.”  This is not a desire for revenge and vengeance borne out of bitterness and rancorous resentment, but a godly and natural desire for justice and righteousness.
 
Our scholar friends will recall that both the Old Testament Hebrew root צדק (tz-d-q) and the New Testament Greek root –δικ– (-dik-) are inclusive of our English ideas of “righteousness” and “justice.”  There is no justice in the midst of unrighteousness, and no righteousness in injustice.
 
Of course, it is worth mentioning that it was after Israel named their daughters “Miriam”, or themselves “Mara” — names that mean “bitter” or “bitterness” — that God sent savior-redeemers (Moses, Boaz, and ultimately Jesus).  God in God’s wisdom acted salvifically after God’s people recognized their bitter lot.
 
Maier has chapters on “authentic repentance”, “trusting God for justice”, “results of forgiveness”, and “forgiveness and justice in counseling.”  Here is his exposition of what the simple statement “I forgive you” should mean:
Because of your repentance and the facts that the price for your sin has been paid (by God), the effects of your sin against me have been substantially healed, and your repentance has stopped the previously hostile messages to me, your sin can no longer damage me. Since you are taking responsibility for your sin, I no longer have to make up distorted reasons why it happened, and that is good for both of us. Finally, our relationship is now different and I agree to treat you in light of this new relationship.
 
We (Ruth and Joshua) recommend this book — Forgiveness and Justice: A Christian Approach — to any pastor, preacher, counselor, or missionary in any context.  It’s practical, theologically robust but in everyday language, and firmly grounded in Scripture.
 
For that matter, we recommend it to anyone
  • who struggles with forgiveness,
  • who struggles with justice,
  • who is passionate about justice, or
  • or who is passionate about forgiveness.
We guess that covers most of us.
 
 
 
Note:  We have this book in paper and in Kindle (it’s also available for Nook).  We didn’t include page numbers as I (Joshua) was referring for the quotes to the digital copy, which sadly doesn’t include “real” page numbers.  Bryan Maier’s Forgiveness and Justice is available from Christian Book Distributors, Joseph Beth, BooksAMillion, Barnes & Noble, or wherever fine books are sold.