Friday, October 07, 2005
Newbigin, L (1986) Foolishness to the Greeks : The gospel and western culture. spck
A bit of slog - easier reads now exist to understand the issues, but I could see the importance of this book on contemporary thought.
Issues of dichotomy explored in what he calls private and public world..
Here we must face frankly the distortion of the gospel that is perpetrated in a great deal that passes for missionary encounter. A preaching of the gospel that calls men and women to accept Jesus as Savior but does not make it clear that discipleship means commitment to a vision of society radically different from that which controls our public life today must be condemned as false. 132
The South African missiologist David Bosch has pointed out how much damage has been done by the usual English translation of dikaiosune as "righteousness" and the consequent insulation of an idea of inward and spiritual righteousness from an outward and manifest justice in social relationships. Spanish-speaking Christians are less tempted to fall into this trap because the one word justiia is universally used to translate dikaiosune. It is easy to see how the use of the two different English words righteous andjust for the single biblical word dikaios, and the consistent translation of dikaiosune in the New Testament as "righteousness" while the Hebrew equivalent tsedeq is translated both as 'Justice" and as "righteousness," has seduced evangelical Christians into a mental separation between righteousness as an inward and spiritual state and justice as an outward and political program. But to accept this dichotomy is to abandon the gospel and surrender to the pressure of our pagan culture. As we have seen over and over again in this study, this dichotomy between the private and the public worlds is the central clue to the ideology that governs our culture. To accept it is to make the surrender the early church refused to make-at the cost of the blood of countless martyrs. 132
To make disciples is to call and equip men and women to be signs and agents of God's justice in all human affairs. An evangelism that invites men and women to accept the name of Christ but fails to call them to this real encounter must be rejected as false. 133
#
Issues of dichotomy explored in what he calls private and public world..
Here we must face frankly the distortion of the gospel that is perpetrated in a great deal that passes for missionary encounter. A preaching of the gospel that calls men and women to accept Jesus as Savior but does not make it clear that discipleship means commitment to a vision of society radically different from that which controls our public life today must be condemned as false. 132
The South African missiologist David Bosch has pointed out how much damage has been done by the usual English translation of dikaiosune as "righteousness" and the consequent insulation of an idea of inward and spiritual righteousness from an outward and manifest justice in social relationships. Spanish-speaking Christians are less tempted to fall into this trap because the one word justiia is universally used to translate dikaiosune. It is easy to see how the use of the two different English words righteous andjust for the single biblical word dikaios, and the consistent translation of dikaiosune in the New Testament as "righteousness" while the Hebrew equivalent tsedeq is translated both as 'Justice" and as "righteousness," has seduced evangelical Christians into a mental separation between righteousness as an inward and spiritual state and justice as an outward and political program. But to accept this dichotomy is to abandon the gospel and surrender to the pressure of our pagan culture. As we have seen over and over again in this study, this dichotomy between the private and the public worlds is the central clue to the ideology that governs our culture. To accept it is to make the surrender the early church refused to make-at the cost of the blood of countless martyrs. 132
To make disciples is to call and equip men and women to be signs and agents of God's justice in all human affairs. An evangelism that invites men and women to accept the name of Christ but fails to call them to this real encounter must be rejected as false. 133
Comments:
Post a Comment
