Introduction
During the Age of
Discovery (1492-1773), Europe was driven by ambition for empire as well as the
evangelical zeal to convert the non-Western world into Christianity. In many
cases, a missionary movement used to be accompanied by the political-economic
expansion and invasion from the West. Such a partnership between the church and
state had become one of the major factors that contribute the emergence of
different models of mission, conflicting with one another. Interestingly
enough, the early Jesuit missionaries in Asia in the sixteenth century had
significant mission approaches. Instead of attempting to impose the Western
cultural and religious values on the indigenous people, the Jesuits applied the
accommodation model in order to communicate the gospel to the local culture by
living among them and sharing their ordinary lives in a real context.
Keeping this concept in
mind, this paper focuses on a selected reading of the early Jesuit mission
history in Asia with missional implications of the works of Francis Xavier,
Matteo Ricci, and Robert de Nobili in light of doing mission in Myanmar today.
Divided into four sections, the first section is an overview of the origin of
the early Jesuit mission history. The second section focuses on short
historical sketches of the three famous Jesuit missionaries in Asia: Francis
Xavier in India and Japan, Matteo Ricci in China, and Robert de Nobili in
India. The third section discuses the Jesuit mission approaches, focusing on
three selected areas: translation, accommodation, and contextualization. The
last section touches the missional implications of the Jesuit mission approach in light of
communicating Christ in Asia, focusing particularly on Adoniram Judson and his
mission work in Myanmar.
1: Overview of the Early Jesuit
Mission History
The history of the
Society of Jesus was started when Ignatius of Loyola and six other students,
including Francis Xavier, at the University of Paris on August 15, 1534, met in Montmartre outside Paris.[2]
Later, they called themselves “the Company of Jesus” because they felt they were placed together by Christ.
They bound themselves by a vow of poverty and chastity, devoting most of their
lives to preaching and charitable work. This took several initial steps, which
led to the founding of what would be called the “Society of Jesus” later in
1540.[3]
Their main focus was on the gospel, not on their own living.
Ignatius was
chosen as the first leader of the newly organized Jesuit Order. He wrote simple
rules for the new Order in which there is no specific form of dress, no regular
commitment to attend particular services, but obedience to the pope was central
to their mission.[4]
He laid out his vision for the Order in The
Formula of the Institute, which was approved in 1540 by Pope Paul III and confirmed in 1550 by
Pope Julius III.[5] The opening
statement of the Formula describes:
Whoever desires
to serve as a soldier of God beneath the banner of the cross in our society . .
. is a member of a Society founded chiefly for this purpose: to strive
especially for the defense and propagation of the faith and for the progress of
souls in Christian life and doctrine, by means of public preaching, lectures,
and any other ministration whatsoever of the word of God. . . . Moreover, he
should show himself ready to reconcile the estranged, compassionately assist
and serve those who are in prisons or hospitals and, indeed, to perform any
other works of charity, according to what will seem expedient for the glory of
God and the common good.[6]
This statement clearly describes
the fact that the Jesuits were ready to defend their Christian faith and to
spread the gospel to others through preaching, teaching, and other means of
social work. Hence, the Jesuits have been known for following their interest in
education and commitment to preaching and teaching throughout the history of
the church.
The Order was
approved by Pope Julius III in 1550. Believing that education is a form of
apostolate, which includes preaching and teaching catechism, the Jesuits began
a system of formal education. Hence, by the end of 1544, there were already
seven Jesuits schools in Europe.[7]
Following the second principal, that is, foreign missions, the early Jesuits
were determined to venture abroad for God’s mission, though difficulties and
challenges lay ahead. Centered in Lisbon, the first Jesuit missionaries sailed
away from Europe on the open seas, heading toward the Far East, reaching India,
Japan, and China.[8]
The most famous Jesuit missionaries in Asia were Francis Xavier, Matteo Ricci,
and Robert de Nobili who had enormous impact on the Catholic mission work as
well as on the world’s mission history as a whole.
2: Sketches of the
Early Jesuit Missionaries in Asia
As the Jesuits
expanded their mission horizon throughout the world, they even reached to
Japan, China, and India as early as the sixteenth century. The main emphasis in
this section is to give descriptive biographical sketches of the three Jesuit
missionaries and their mission influence in the regions. They were Francis
Xavier in India and Japan, Matteo Ricci in China, and Robert de Nobili in
India.
2.1: Francis Xavier (1506-1552)
Francis
Xavier was born on April 7, 1506 in Spain. While he was at University in Paris,
he met with Ignatius and began to study theology with him, soon after which
they started a movement called the “Society of Jesus.”[9]
Xavier was chosen as both the king’s representative and the sole missionary to
the East, serving as missionary in India and Japan.[10]
Xavier
first reached in Goa, India in May of 1542, after a voyage of more than a year
from Lisbon. While in Goa, Xavier discovered that the Portugal missionaries had
had no significant impact on the local people.[11]
Thus, he changed his mission approach from a conquest to adaptation model. Accordingly, Xavier chose to stay in a poor
little cottage near the hospital, despite the fact that he was a papal
representative—nuncio—directly
commissioned by both the Pope in Rome and the king of Portugal.[12]
One observer praised him: “You would have thought he had seen Christ with his
own eyes in those poor, sick persons, and employed his labor in serving Him.”[13]
His mission was to teach the very young and illiterate, and to help the poor.
He usually walked along the streets with a bell, inviting children to come with
him to the church, where he taught them the catechism and the moral teachings
of the church. Through the sharing of children with their parents and villagers
what they had learned in the church, Xavier gained respect of the adults who
eventually flocked to hear him preach.[14]
By the time he left India seven years later, there were five thousand native
Christians in Goa.[15]
Xavier
moved to Japan in 1549, but he spent only two years and three months there.
Within such a short period of time, he could lay the foundations for the next
two centuries of Catholic missions in Asia. While in Japan, he discovered that
effective accommodation to a culture requires accurate knowledge of the
culture. Thus, he resolved to change his mission strategy by presenting himself
as an ambassador for the Pope as he approached the emperor.[16]
This change of approach involved “wearing fine silk clothes rather than
ordinary cotton clothing, and presenting the local leaders with Western gifts.”[17]
Gradually,
Xavier gained respect from the Japanese authority of the daimyo, receiving
permission to preach the gospel.[18]
He also spent a great deal of time in discussion with Japanese Buddhist monks,
regarding his Christian religion. One of his Buddhist converts, Lourenco, was
highly regarded as a scholar in Japan, who had the ability to teach the Jesuits
about Buddhism and Japanese culture. One other Japanese convert, Yajiro, also
was very helpful in Xavier’s Japanese translation work, though he had some
language limitation in terms of using new terminologies.[19]
After spending some time in Japan, Xavier decided to leave Japan for China, but
he was never allowed to enter into China. He died in 1552 on Sancian, a small
uninhabited island off the coast of China, on his way to China.[20]
2.2: Matteo Ricci (1552-1610)
Matteo
Ricci, known as Li Ma-dou in Chinese, was born on October 16, 1552 in Macerata,
Italy. Believing that he had a religious vocation, though he was supposed to be
a lawyer, he entered into the Society of Jesus in 1571. Ricci studied
philosophy and mathematics under the great mathematician, Christopher Clavius,
a good friend of Kepler and Galileo.[21]
He went to Goa, India in 1578 and remained there for four years, “acting as professor
of Rhetoric, at Goa and at Cochin, and preparing for greater undertaking.”[22]
From there, then, he was assigned to the China mission and spent the rest of
his life there.
Ricci
firmly believed that if the Church was to succeed in Asia, it would have to
adapt itself, to some degree, to the cultural life of the area. As a matter of
fact, he began to learn the political and religious life of China. Realizing
that missionaries would have to master the Chinese language if they wanted to
see success among the Chinese, Ricci and his colleague, Michele Ruggieri,
emphasized the acquisition of the indigenous language.[23]
Trained in science and mathematics, Ricci was also good in language; and he
began his translation project of the Ten Commandments and the Lord’s Prayer
with the aid of a Chinese convert. Ricci wrote several books in classical
Chinese and his books found a wide circulation among the Chinese educated.[24]
Ricci taught mathematics and astronomy and prepared a famous world map, which
for the first time astounded educated Chinese with the possibility that China
might not be the only center of the world.[25]
Realizing that he would only win firm friends among the educated through his
skills in mathematics and science, he set about finding pupils interested in
such skills.
Ricci
had a clear conviction that “Christianity was not bound by Western culture”[26]
such that missionaries must have the ability to adapt a particular context in
order to preach the gospel effectively. Following his principle of adaptation,
Ricci changed the missionaries’ dress from Buddhist dress to Confucian
scholar’s garb, as it was well accepted by the Chinese intellectual people.
Then, he made friends with local Chinese, and he even proclaimed that he wanted
to become a Chinese.[27]
After this, he quickly won a reputation in the intellectual circles of the
city, and he was given a chance to enter into the emperor’s palace.
Ricci
died in 1610 in Beijing without seeing the emperor whom he had believed he
could persuade to open the empire to the gospel. In so many ways, however,
Ricci had made such an impression on Beijing that upon his death he was buried
by the imperial decree of an emperor who had never been allowed to see him, in
a plot of land officially granted to the Jesuits near the West Wall.[28]
Ricci was genuinely interested in Chinese civilization, and he pleased the
Chinese authorities and scholars by saying constantly that he had come to China
in order to study the teachings of the wise men of China and to share the
blessings of Chinese civilization.
2.3: Robert de Nobili (1577-1656)
Roberto
de Nobili was an Italian aristocrat, born in Montepulciano, Italy, in
1577. He joined the Society of Jesus in 1596 and arrived in India in 1605,
spending most of his life as a missionary in the Tamil city of
Madurai. Like his predecessor in China, Matteo Ricci, de Nobili discovered
that to make any impact on a highly sophisticated culture, he not only had to
learn the language but also to find ways of adapting himself to the way of life
of the people.[29]
As William V. Bangert describes, de Nobili discovered the need to relinquish
Western social concepts and adopt the culture of the regions in order to open
the door of India to Christianity.[30]
In fact, he firmly believed that the Christian faith could be lived in a way
not entirely bound by European cultural values. A talented linguist, he was one
of the first Europeans to learn Tamil and perhaps the first to write
theological treatises in that or any Indian language.[31]
Though critics accused of him as betraying his Christian belief because of his
radical mission approach,[32]
de Nobili is best remembered and admired for his willingness to adopt Indian
customs of dress, food, and manner of living.
De
Nobili was the most controversial missionary in India such that his manner of
living as a Raja-sannyasi (a high-caste holy man) scandalized the established
order of the Church in India. He argued, however, that the adoption of
brahmanical customs in his personal lifestyle was the only way in which
Christian faith could be presented. His method of adaptation was simply
following the practice of the early Church—whatever was not directly contrary
to the Gospel could be employed in its service.[33]
He pointed out to his superiors that the religious
faith should not be confused with civil customs,
arguing that to be Christian does not imply to eat beef, to drink wine, to wear
sandals made of leather, and as such become outcasts in Indian society.[34]
He believed and taught his position on the nature of conversion, saying:
When a man became a
Christian, he need not leave his caste or station in life; for he was persuaded
that caste was a social custom parallel to distinctions of class and rank in
Europe, and an inevitable feature of the Indian way of life, just as the Apostles
treated the institution of slavery as an inevitable feature of life in the
Roman Empire, and did not oppose it.[35]
More
surprisingly, de Nobili also allowed his converts to retain their cultural mode
of living such as marking brows with tilakam, growing a tuft of hair (kudumi),
having the ceremonial ablutions, affirming that these can be “understood in a
civil sense, free of all religious superstition.”[36]
His appreciation of the Hindu life style was so sincere that he took the
trouble of learning Sanskrit, the Vedas and the Vedanta from a
notable Pandit of Madurai, Sivadarma.[37]
Later, he wrote many treatises on the Christian faith in the Indian
philosophical terms. Nobili was highly respected as a Jesuit missionary as well
as a true spiritual guru throughout
India. He became totally blind when he died on January 16, 1656 at Mylapore,
India.[38]
The methods employed by the Jesuit missionaries will always remain challenging
factors to mission scholars and theologians in Asia and around the world.
3: Models of Jesuit Mission:
Translation, Accommodation, and Contextualization
There
are three principles of Jesuit mission methods such as “adaptation, fidelity,
and discipline.”[39]
The principle of adaptation gave the missionaries the flexibility to
accommodate their strategy to different social structures in a culturally
pluralistic world. Fidelity to the Catholic orthodoxy gave them a clear
missionary theology that refused to avoid difficult questions, and their vow of
absolute obedience to the Pope gave them an organizational discipline.[40]
Interestingly, most Jesuit missionaries paid attention to the social and
cultural context in communicating the gospel to a particular people and
context. As such, they employed an
accommodation approach as opposed to the tabula
rasa[41] model and conquest model employed
mostly by the Franciscans and Dominicans.[42]
Based on this basic foundation of the Jesuit mission concept, this section
engages with three main mission approaches and their theological implications
in Asia. The three main approaches are translation, accommodation, and
contextualization.
3.1: Translation and Mission
Not surprisingly, language and
communication are indispensible elements in doing mission. Anthony J. Gittins
rightly puts it this way: “Language is a vehicle and human thinking is its
passenger” in doing mission.[43]
Needless to say, the work of translation is essential in communicating the
gospel to a particular culture and social context. The Jesuit missionaries were
well aware of this matter. Stressing the importance of translation, Lamin
Sanneh points out that “[Since] Jesus did not write or dictate the Gospels, his
followers had little choice but to adopt a translated form of message. The
missionary movement of the early church made translation and the accompanying
interpretation natural and necessary.”[44]
Hence, translation and mission are inseparable and they always go hand-in-hand.
In fact, Christianity is a religion of translation, and “Christian faith,” as
Andrew F. Walls puts it, “rests on a divine act of translation: ‘the Word
became flesh, and dwelt among us’ (John 1:14).”[45]
This cannot be neglected in doing mission.
There are at least two kinds of
translation: gloss and symantic. The former simply refers to the translation of
the Bible and other Christian literatures into particular language, whereas the
latter goes more in depth. Stephen B. Bevans explains that a good translation
is one that captures the spirit of a text, which is embedded in a particular
culture.[46]
Jesuit missionaries applied both methods, focusing on writing and translating
Christian literatures into the local language. As mentioned above, one of the
first things Xavier did in India was to translate the Lord’s Prayer and Ten
Commandments into the local language so that he would be able to communicate to
them effectively. This same method applies to Ricci’s and de Nobili’s mission
in China and India respectively. Their mission literature ranges from
translation to writing theological and philosophical books in local languages.
The challenge, however, is that
the translation method needs to be more serious in engaging with negative
elements in a particular culture. Walls appropriately relates translation to
incarnation, stressing the need to be more serious in engaging with the world.
As such, he argues that “Christian faith is not about a theophany or an avatar,
the appearance of the divinity on the human scene. The Word was made human. . . . Christ was not simply a
loanword adopted into the vocabulary of humanity; he was fully translated. . . .”[47]
To borrow Bevans’ words, “it [translation model] needs to take more seriously
the world and the flesh within which, and not just by means of which, God
became incarnate.”[48]
This implies the idea that one has to engage more seriously with the social
context than just identifying oneself with the existing social and cultural
world without challenging the negative elements in that culture.
3.2: Mission and Accommodation
In
assessing the work of Xavier both in Japan and India, we can see patterns of
accommodation that would characterize Jesuit missionary work for further
generations. In fact, the Jesuits did not consider culture a complete evil to
be eradicated, but rather something to utilize in communicating the Good News
of Jesus Christ.[49]
In other words, they always attempted to accommodate the gospel with the local
context. Recognizing the culture of local people, for example, Alessanandro
Valignano insisted that both Japanese and Chinese culture contained “elements
of truth and morality upon which Christian faith could build.”[50]
In the same way, Xavier also insisted that becoming a Christian was not
becoming a Portuguese or a foreigner.
In
response to the work of Jesuit missionaries in Japan, Lamin Sanneh insists that
Christian mission was vernacular in essence and tolerant of other cultures; it
has respect for them as “bearers of God’s universal aim for human race, not
grounds for elevating out own cultural accomplishments as normative for them.”[51]
Darrell L. Whiteman calls this as contextualization that “forces us to have a
more adequate view of God as the God of
all persons.”[52]
Following Valignano’s work in Japan, Mathiesen also observes that European and
Japanese cultures are totally different not only on the surface, but in their very essence. Thus, it is necessary to
accommodate or adapt the Japanese culture for those who want to do missions
work in Japan.[53]
Sanneh adds, “Christianity should be at home in all cultures”[54]
where genuine respect for every culture can be found. At the same time, it is
important to challenge the local culture within the social and cultural context
itself in order to communicate the gospel more meaningfully and effectively.
The
Jesuit accommodation model, according to William Burrows, is known as the
“Catholic inculturation paradigm,”[55]
which is the integration of the Christian experience into the culture of its
people. Peter C. Phan rightly defines inculturation as “the intimate
transformation of authentic cultural values through their integration in
Christianity and the insertion of Christianity in the various human cultures.”[56]
The gospel, in this case, has become a critical element for challenging and
transforming the local culture, rather than just inserting Christianity into
particular social and cultural context as if it has a magic power within itself
to transform the culture. As Shorter puts it, “Christianity comes to a culture
to endorse and to challenge its view of man, and the values which derive from
this view.”[57]
This means that mission should not be just a way of accommodating the gospel
into a particular culture, but it is essential to be critical of the unhelpful
cultural and social values in the context.
3.3: Mission and Contextualization
Contextualization
can be understood as a means of finding points of contact within particular
contexts in order to communicate the Word of God contextually. In fact, there
is always change in the method in the process of contextualization, while the
content is never changed.[58]
Put differently, it is the translation of the unchanging message (the
interpreted message) of the gospel into a simple form to the people in their
own culture and existential situation as the Jesuit missionaries did as early
as sixteenth century. The gospel is never changed, whereas the ways in which
people understand and appropriate the gospel in their daily lives are
conditioned by the socio-cultural context expressed in time, place, and people.
The Jesuits had a clear understanding of this nature, and they were not
hesitant to change their mission approach if the context demanded.
One
of the leading Asian theologians, Kosuke Koyama, defines contextualization as a
form of “critical accommodation,” saying:
Context must not be
viewed as something absolute. . . . Context is rather a dynamic relational
concept. Authentic contextualization is a prophetic mode of living in the given
historical cultural situation. It challenges the context and attempts to make
critical theological observations. . . . It aims at an accommodation prophetism
and prophetic accommodation.[59]
Koyama’s
view on accommodation as contextualization is what he refers to as “the process
of inviting the world into the context of the grace of God.”[60]
What is important to note is that contextualization is a way of critically
integrating text (content) and context (social, cultural, and political) in
relevance to a particular situation. In this case, it is always important to
keep in mind that the context is always changing but the content (of the
message) is never changed.
Aylward
Shorter appropriately put the nature of contextualization and expounded its
importance. He said,
Christ challenges a
culture without destroying it, or altering its essential character. This is
because he challenges it from within and not from outside. Christ was
completely identified with his own culture. He was so identified with it that
he was not even recognized as God. It was because he was a perfect Jew that he
was able to challenge the Jewish culture successfully.[61]
What
Shorter emphatically argues in this paragraph is the importance of Jesus’
incarnation into the world by emptying himself and taking the form of a servant
as Paul clearly depicted in the Philippians 2:4-11. As Walls gives us a hint,
he relates the nature of translation to the act of incarnation. He asserts that
“incarnation is translation. When God in Christ became man, Divinity was
translated into humanity, as though humanity were a receptor language.”[62]
Ross Langmead, an Australian Baptist missiologist, calls this concept as
“incarnational missiology.” He argues, “The whole incarnational direction of
God’s activity is ‘missional’ to the core. The call to discipleship includes
the call to an incarnational style in
mission, following the pattern of Jesus’ own mission.”[63]
Hence, the missional implication of contextualization can be understood as
incarnational, which is to take seriously social and cultural values of
particular context in communicating the gospel appropriately and effectively.
4: Doing Mission in
Asia Today: Communicating the Gospel in Myanmar
Since
the relation between Christianity and other religions has become one of the
most pressing themes today, it is impossible for Christians to just ignore the
existence of other faiths. Our context demands that we need to engage in
dialogue in one way or another. With this concept, this section moves towards a
different direction, focusing on the importance of Christian engagement in
Myanmar, where the majority populations are strong adherents of Buddhism. This
section takes a critical look into the work of the first American Baptist
missionary in Myanmar, Adoniram Judson.
4.1: The Mission Legacy of Adoniram Judson
Judson
arrived in Myanmar as the first American Baptist missionary in July, 1813 to
introduce the gospel of Christ among the Burmans. Like the sixteenth century
Jesuit missionaries in Asia, Judson adopted accommodation model as his mission
approach. His main approaches in mission are: translating and printing the
Scriptures into the native language, preaching in the form of conversation,
circulating religious tracts, and promoting education. Believing that every
missionary should learn the local language in order to communicate the gospel
in native terms and language, Judson studied Burmese and Pali for four years. Only after he had mastered the language, then
he began translating the Bible into the local Burmese language, and writing
tracts and working on dictionaries, etc.
Besides
translating the Bible, Judson also developed his speaking skills so that he
could preach the gospel to the Burmans in their own language. Judson chose a
Burman way of public interaction as his strategy for preaching in such a way
that he built a zayat,[64]
after the Burman fashion. He applied person-to-person preaching in an informal
atmosphere in which the person was perfectly free to express his/her views as
well as to hear his own.[65]
In this way, Judson had conversations with local people as well as Buddhist
monks and educated people. The missionary education, started by Judson,
provided the best knowledge especially to the young people and opened their
worldviews. Judson will always be remembered for his mission accomplishments in
Myanmar in many aspects. However, this paper is rather to engage with his works
from a more critical-analytical aspect.
4.2: Conversation with the King: A Challenge to Christianity?
Judson
met with the Burman king three times: in 1820, in October, 1822, and in
December, 1822. The first meeting was an appeal for tolerance of the Christian
religion. The second meeting happened because the king invited Jonathan Price,
a missionary medical doctor, to the capital, Ava, whom Judson accompanied as an
interpreter.[66]
On his third visit to the king, Judson was asked four challenging and important
questions by King Bagyi Daw, which is worth to critically engage in this
section.
The
four questions of the king to Judson were: Are Judson’s Christians real
Burmans? Do they dress like all the other Burmans? How does Judson preach? And
what does Judson have to say of Gautama Buddha?[67]
These questions are simple, but they bear religious identity, cultural and
political values, and the concept of contextualization. Ling explains the
king’s questions in comparison with Judson’s answers. The first question has to
do with the problem of being a Burman and being a Christian in Myanmar. The
second question points to the necessity for contextualizing the gospel in
Myanmar. The third question reminds the nature of Christian attitudes in
communicating the gospel to the Burman Buddhists; and the fourth question has
to do with the problems of the definition of ‘God’ in Myanmar.[68]
Judson’s answers to the king are worth mentioning for critical analysis in the
following.
4.3: Critical Analysis of Judson’s Answers to the King
Judson
assured the king that the Burman converts remained real Burman, and there is no
change of status, race, or nationality after becoming Christian.[69]
Judson gave a fair answer to the king in a way of trying to remove the western
concept that makes the gospel foreign and suspicious to the Burman Buddhists.
Judson’s second answer directly reveals the essential implementation of
contextualization. As such, he replied to the king, “Christians dressed like
other Burmans; men wore paso or longyi (a long silk cloth for gentle
men) and women hta-mein (a simple
silk or cotton long skirt for ladies).”[70]
Judson never imposed western style of dress upon his converts, but critics
accuse him for not having himself tried the local dress. It might have been
more appealing to the Burmans if Judson could have adopted the local style of dress.
Ling
is quite critical to the missionaries regarding their dress and appearance on
the basis of how far they could accommodate the local culture, as the Jesuit
missionaries did in India, Japan, and China. Ling lamented, “They
[missionaries] often dressed and worked in the western ways, alienating
themselves from the local people.”[71]
Pe Maung Tin, a respected Christian professor in Rangoon University, also was
critical of missionaries and their work. Ling quotes him saying that
“missionaries evidently came to teach, but not to learn nor to make Buddhists
the subject of their missionary love and concern. Rather, the Buddhists are
seen only as the object of their missionary preaching,”[72]
which is the biggest mistake missionaries had ever made in their mission work
in Myanmar.
Judson’s
third answer, “I began with a form of worship, which first ascribes glory to
God, and then describes the commands of the law of the gospel, after which I
stopped”[73]
was simple. But Ling is unsatisfied with Judson’s answer, saying that it was
“over-simplistic and inadequate.”[74]
The king seemed to want to know more about the Christian religion. Rather,
Judson tried to outweigh Christianity over Buddhism. Ling continues to lament
that “these one-sided and exclusive attitudes made the Christian gospel less
attractive to the Buddhists in Myanmar.”[75]
Judson’s
fourth answer was most troubling to the king. Judson said, “[We] all knew he (Gautama) was the son of king Thog-dau-dah-nah; that we regarded him
as a wise man and a great teacher, but did not call him God.”[76]
After hearing Judson’s answer, “The king abruptly arose and left.”[77]
Judson failed to present the gospel to the king’s palace. If Judson had applied
more contextualization or an accommodation approach in his mission work, more Burmans
could have been attracted to the gospel, and the history of Christianity in
Myanmar might be different than today in a positive way. But the past has gone
and there is no way to reverse it except for reshaping the present and future
by taking lessons from past experience. Hence, the question remains how
Christians should prepare themselves to communicate the gospel in Myanmar.
4.4: Communicating the Gospel in Myanmar
If
we critically look at Judson’s mission work, one of his weaknesses (out of his enormous
contribution to the country) would be his theological immaturity in terms of
communicating the gospel. Ling rightly observes that “missionaries were not
ready to discern signs of their time and context . . . especially they were
ignorant of the interwoven nature of religion, culture, and identity of the
ethnic people whom they served.”[78]
They failed to teach the indigenous Christians “how to maintain their faith and
ethnic cultural and religious identities, nor did they instruct them how to
deal with neighbors of other faiths like Buddhists.”[79]
This is a great challenge for Christian mission work in Asia today, especially
in Myanmar, in order to communicate the gospel more effectively and
appropriately.
As
Myanmar is a land of religious pluralism and multi-cultural, and many ethnic
nationalities, dialogue has to be a crucial paradigm for doing mission. In
fact, Christians need to be more acquainted and familiar with Buddhist beliefs
and teachings in order to be able to connect with them in a deeper level. Ling
insists that “the Christians should always search for points of contact where
dialogue between religions can take place peacefully and interactively.”[80]
As such, he argues for a shift in mission paradigm that requires more listening
and acting than telling and teaching. He says:
Mission must be a matter of being
there and caring instead of going there and unloading. If the Church in Myanmar
really wants to be understood, it must seek first to understand others. Only
this type of mission would be able to make the Gospel comprehensive and
intelligible to people of other faiths, especially to the Buddhists in Myanmar,
and such a mission would be better able to bring them to the knowledge of
Christ.[81]
This is exactly what
Peter Phan argues as he says, “The church’s mission must be carried out in the
form of dialogue: dialogue of life lived together, of common action, of shared
religious experience, and of theological exchange.”[82]
Until and unless we do not find points of contact, as Ling suggests, among religious
faiths, it is unlikely to be successful in doing mission in Asia, especially in
Myanmar.
In contemporary
Myanmar, the radical necessity on the Christian stance toward neighbors of
other faiths (especially Buddhism) is both an existential demand and a
theological necessity. It is, therefore, essential to search for new
relationships (or points of contact) not just for, as Samartha suggests, a
matter of “political adjustments or a redistribution of economic resources.”[83]
It is important to focus on a “theological question seeking to relate different
responses to the mystery of Truth.”[84]
This means that to make exclusive claim for one’s particular tradition is not
the best way to love one’s neighbors as ourselves. We live in a new context in
which one needs to have the ability and openness to respect the religious,
social, cultural, and political values of our neighbors.
4.5: Challenges for Doing Mission in Myanmar
There
are three theological challenges, out of many, Christians should be aware of as
they engage in mission in dialogue with Buddhist neighbors in Myanmar. These
challenges are: (1) the problem of God, (2) the problem of Christ, and (3) the
problem of human beings, which are appropriate to add in this last section.
These problems were first brought to public debate by a respected Burmese lay
theologian, U Khin Maung Din,[85]
who tried to interpret the gospel with the aid of some Buddhist and Oriental
concepts. He argued that genuine theology should not only broaden the
boundaries of Christian theology, but it should also discover “new dimensions
for theology with the help of the spiritual experience and concepts of men of
other faiths.”[86]
I find Din’s idea theologically reasonable and contextually appropriate to
include in this paper for further discussion.
There
is no problem for the idea of God with religions such as Judaism, Islam,
Hinduism, and Christianity. But there is a problem with Buddhism such that it
is categorized as an atheistic religion.
Quoting the words of Buddha,[87]
however, Din argues that there is a concept of “Transcendence” or “Ultimate
Reality” in Buddhism, which Christianity should be aware of as it engages with
Buddhists.[88]
Hence, he questions whether the traditional Christian concepts of God as only Person or Personal Being would be appropriate to introduce to Buddhist
neighbors, who perceive of God as both Person
and non-Person, both Being and Becoming.[89]
His former student and now Professor Emeritus at Myanmar Institute of Theology,
Edmund Za Bik concurs with Din, and he says, “We need a paradigm-shift—i.e.,
from the rigid ‘either-or’ way of thinking to ‘both-and’ way of thinking, or
also called ‘The Middle Way’” in engaging with our Buddhist neighbors today.[90]
Though it might be difficult to embrace this whole new concept of God, it is
wise to keep in mind if one is called to communicate the gospel to Buddhist
neighbors.
The
second problem is the problem of Christology, the doctrine of Atonement, Sin,
and Salvation, etc. The traditional Christian belief that Jesus suffered and
died on the Cross for the forgiveness of human sins is unacceptable and
unreasonable to the minds of the Buddhists who strictly prohibit any manner of
killing. Traditional biblical terms like ‘atonement’, ‘sacrifice’, and ‘blood
offering’ may have had religious significance for the Jews within their own
particular culture. But for the Burmese people, these terminologies “belong to
the ancient primitive, animistic and pre-Buddhist period.” Thus, Din warns that
“if conventional Christology insists on using those relative Jewish concepts in
an absolute way, then it will be imposing an unnecessary stumbling block to the ‘Gentile’ of the East, and the
fault will be more with the preacher than the hearers of the Word.”[91]
Ling also affirms and insists that “since there is no idea of bloody imagery,
no crucifixion, no atonement, and no death as agony in Buddhism, these ideas
will never awaken in the Buddhist hearts.”[92]
This is a reminder and also a challenge for Christians in Myanmar who are
engaging in dialogue with Buddhist neighbors. In this case, I am not suggesting
that Christians should change their belief system and way of thinking in terms
of how they perceive of the life and work of Jesus Christ. But it is wise to be
aware of the fact that understanding the cultural norms and religious values is
very important in communicating the gospel to other faiths, especially to the
Buddhists in Myanmar.
The
question ‘who is God’? is always related to the question ‘who is human’? in
Christian theology. Not surprisingly, traditional Christian theology draws the
answer mostly from the Scripture alone. But Din wants to go beyond the biblical
concepts in order to find a reasonable answer. He argues that other normative
and empirical studies should also be used in our attempt to relate God and
human. Hence, he presses the importance of listening and learning from other
religions in order to define who a human being really is.[93]
Directly relating to the problem of human-being is the problem of original sin.
Here, Din brings two terms such as volitional
choice and intellectual decision in explaining the nature of sin. The
former aspect, according to him, is emphasized by Christian theology and the
latter by the Eastern thought, including Buddhism.[94]
Sin, understood as volitional choice,
according to Din, is a result of independent decisions of isolated individuals.
Din concluded that this concept of sin “fails to understand sin in relational context, with the result that
the socio-political nature of evil became almost neglected.”[95]
This is part of a larger issue for mission in Myanmar for which Christians need
to prepare themselves as they engage in religious conversation with people of
other faiths, especially Buddhist neighbors.
Conclusion
Having
descriptively mentioned the early Jesuit mission history in Asia, it is fair to
draw a conclusion that the Jesuit missionaries had an enormous impact on the
mission history in Asia and around the world. They truly deserve credit for
their enormous sacrifices, commitments, willingness to identify themselves with
indigenous people, and openness to the strange cultures, different religions,
and different social and political contexts. This informs us to take a critical
look at the mission history of our own since we now live in a different world,
where all religions and cultures have come closer than before. This requires us
to apply the method of a critical reading of our own mission history. In this
process, one needs to pay careful attention to the social context, cultural and
religious values, and political worldviews of the other in order to make sense of the gospel of Christ. Context
always matters; it constantly changes, though the message never changes.
[2]
Martin P. Harney, S. J., The Jesuits in
History: The Society of Jesus through Four Centuries (Chicago: Loyola
University Press, 1941), 38, 39.
[3]
Ibid., 42, 43.
[4]
Richard W. Thompson, The Footprints of
the Jesuits (New York: Hunt & Eaton, 1894), 39.
[5]
William V. Bangert, S. J., A History of
the Society of Jesus, (St. Louis: The Institute of Jesuit Sources, 1972),
22.
[6]
Theodor Griesinger, The Jesuits: A
Complete History of their Open and Secret Proceedings from the Foundation of
the Order to the Present Time (New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1883), 46.
[7]
William V. Bangert, S. J., A History of
the Society of Jesus, 26.
[8]
Ibid., 29.
[9]
Joseph N. Tylenda, S. J., Jesuit Saints
and Martyrs: Short Biographies of the Saints, Blessed, Venerables, and Servants
of God of the Society of Jesus (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1984),
449.
[10]
Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of
Christianity: The Early Church to the Dawn of the Reformation, vol. 1 (New
York: HarperCollins Publishers, 1984), 404.
[11]
Stephen Neill, A History of Christianity
in India: The Beginnings to AD 1707 (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1984), 139.
[12]
Samuel Hugh Moffett, A History of
Christianity in Asia, vol. 2: 1500-1900 (New York: Orbis Books, 2005), 10.
[13]
Ken Newton, Glimpses of India and Church
History (Bombay: Gospel Literature Service, 1975), 18.
[14]
Justo L. Gonzalez, The Story of
Christianity, vol. 1, 404.
[15]
Moffett, A History of Christianity in
Asia, vol. 2, 10.
[16]
Andrew C. Ross, A Vision Betrayed: The
Jesuits in Japan and China, 1542-1742 (New York: Orbis Books, 1994), 27.
[17]
Stephen B. Bevans and Roger P. Schroeder, Constants
in Context: A Theology of Mission for Today (New York: Orbis Books, 2004),
185.
[18]
Andrew C. Ross, A Vision Betrayed,
25.
[19]
Ibid., 27.
[20]
Ibid., 30-31.
[21]
Matteo Ricci, S. J., The True Meaning of
the Lord of Heaven (T’ien-chu Shih-i), trans. by Douglas Lancashire and
Peter Hu Kuo-chen, and edited by Edward J. Malatesta, S. J. (St. Louis: The
Institute of Jesuit Resources, 1985), 4.
[23]
Matteo Ricci, S. J., The True Meaning of
the Lord of Heaven, 5.
[24]
Ibid., 7.
[25]
Moffett, A History of Christianity in
Asia, vol. 2, 108.
[26]
Ibid., 109.
[27]
Ibid., 110.
[28]
Ibid., 113, 114.
[29]
Cyril Bruce Firth, An Introduction to
Indian Church History (Bangalore: The Christian Literature Society, 1961),
108, 109.
[30]
William V. Bangert, S.J., A History of
Society of Jesus, 152.
[31]
Francis X. Clooney, S. J., “Roberto de Nobili’s Dialogue on Eternal Life and an early Jesuit Evaluation on Religion
in South India,” in John W. O’Malley, S. J., Gauvin Alexander Bailey, Steven J.
Harris, and T. Frank Kenedy, S. J., eds., The
Jesuits Cultures, Sciences, and the Arts (1540-1773) (Toronto: University
of Toronto Press, 1999), 402.
[32] He adopted the saffron dress and
wooden clogs; abstained from meat, fish, eggs and wine; ate only vegetarian
food; marked his brow with sandal paste and wore the sacred thread across the
breast as the Brahmins did. See Stephen Neill, A History of Christianity in India, 281.
[33]
William V. Bangert, S.J., A History of
Society of Jesus, 154.
[34]
Stephen Neill, A History of Christianity
in India, 281.
[35]
Cyril Bruce Firth, An Introduction to
Indian Church History, 111.
[36]
William V. Bangert, S.J., A History of
Society of Jesus, 153.
[37]
Stephen Neill, A History of Christianity
in India, 284.
[38]
Roger, E. Hedlund, ed., Christianity is
Indian: The Emergence of an Indigenous Community (Delhi: ISPCK, 2004), 103.
[39]
Moffett, A History of Christianity in
Asia, vol. 2, 70.
[40]
Ibid., 70.
[41]
In the tabula rasa method, “people
could become Christian only if their cultural-religious beliefs and practices
were first destroyed, sometimes but not always by force.” See Bevans et al., Constants in Context, 178, 184.
[42]
Bevans et al., Constants in Context,
184.
[43]
Anthony J. Gittins, Ministry at the
Margin: Strategy and Spirituality for Mission (New York: Orbis Books,
2003), 82.
[44]
Lamin Sanneh, Whose Religion is
Christianity?: the Gospel beyond the West (Grand Rapids, MI: W. Eerdmans,
2003), 97.
[45]
Andrew F. Walls, The Missionary Movement
in Christian History: Studies in Transmission of Faith (New York: Orbis
Books, 1996), 26.
[46]
Stephen B. Bevans, Models of Contextual
Theology (New York: Orbis Books, 2004), 38.
[47]
Walls, The Missionary Movement in
Christian History, 28. (emphasis original).
[48]
Bevans, Models of Contextual Theology,
44.
[49]
Gaylan Kent Mathiesen, A Theology of
Mission: Challenges and Opportunities in Northeast Asia (Minneapolis:
Lutheran University Press, 2006), 134.
[50]
Andrew C. Ross, A Vision Betrayed,
xiii.
[51]
Lamin Sanneh, Translating the Message:
The Missionary Impact on Culture (New York: Orbis Books, 1989), 94-95.
[52]
Darrell L. Whiteman, “Contextualization: The Theory, the Gap, the Challenge,”
in International Bulletin of Missionary
Research (January, 1997): 4. (emphasis mine).
[53]
Gaylan Kent Mathiesen, A Theology of
Mission, 133. (emphasis original).
[54]
Lamin Sanneh, Translating the Message,
96.
[55]
Bevans et al., Constants in Context,
195. Bevans et al. quote from William Burrows’ “A Seventh Paradigm? Catholic
and Radical Inculturation,” in Willem Saayman and Klippies Kritzinger, eds., Mission in Bold Humility: David Bosch’s Work
Considered (New York: Orbis Books, 1996).
[56]
Peter C. Phan, In Our Own Tongues:
Perspectives from Asia on Mission and Inculturation (New York: Orbis Books,
2003), 6.
[57]
Aylward Shorter, W. F., Theology of
Mission, ed. Edward Yarnold, S. J. (Nortre Dame, IN: Fides Publishers,
Inc., 1972), 55.
[58]
Samuel Ngun Ling, “The Meeting of Christianity and Buddhism in Burma: Its Past,
Present, and Future Perspectives” (Ph.D. diss., International Christian
University, Japan, 1998), 283.
[59] Gerald Anderson, ed., Asian Voices in Christian Theology (New
York: Orbis Books, 1976), 5. Anderson
quotes from Kosuke Koyama, “Reflections on Association of Theological Schools
in South East Asia,” in South East Asia
Journal of Theology, vol. XV, No. 2 (1974): 18-19.
[60]
Kosuke Koyama, Theology in Context (Madras,
India: The Christian Literature Society, 1975), 62.
[61]
Aylward Shorter, W. F., Theology of
Mission, 55.
[62]
Walls, The Missionary Movement in
Christian History, 27.
[63]
Ross Langmead, The Word Made Flesh:
Towards an Incarnational Missiology (New York: University Press of America,
2004), 48. (emphasis original).
[64]
Courtney Anderson, 219. Zayat is a
synagogue-like public building where public gathering used to happen among the
Burmans. It serves primarily as a shelter for travelers, at the same time, is
also an assembly place for religious occasions as well as meeting for the
villagers to discuss the needs and plans of the village. Theravada
Buddhist monks use zayats as their
dwelling place while they are exercising precepts. Buddhist monasteries
may have one or more zayats nearby.
Donors mostly build zayats along main
roads aiming to provide the exhausted travelers with water and shelter.
Beginning with Adoniram Judson’s construction of one in 1818, Christian
missionaries have also adopted their use of zayat
as a means to spreading the gospel.
[65]
Maung Shwe Wa, Burma Baptist Chronicle (Rangoon:
Burma Baptist Convention, 1963), 40.
[66]
Courtney Anderson, To the Golden Shore,
280ff.
[67]
Courtney Anderson, To the Golden Shore:
The Life of Adoniram Judson (Valley Forge: Judson Press, 1987), 280-283.
See also Ling, “The Meeting of Christianity and Buddhism in Burma,” 110.
[68]
Samuel Ngun Ling, Communicating Christ in
Myanmar: Issues, Interactions, and Perspectives (Yangon, Myanmar: ATEM,
2005), 131-140. Ling gives a critical theological discussion on the king’s
questions and Judson’s answers, which I do not intend to follow in detail.
[69]
Ibid., 132.
[70]
Maung Shwe Wa, Burma Baptist Chronicle,
42.
[71]
Ngun Ling, Communicating Christ in
Myanmar, 135.
[72]
Samuel Ngun Ling, “The Encounter of Missionary Christianity with Resurgent
Buddhism in Post-Colonial Myanmar,” in Quest:
An Interdisciplinary Journal for Asian Christian Scholars, vol. 2, no. 2 (November,
2003): 68. (63-74). See also Southeast Asia Journal of Theology, vol. 3, no. 2 (October, 1961): 28.
[73]
“Mr. Judson’s Journal,” in American
Baptist Magazine and Missionary Intelligencer, vol. IV. No. 6 (November,
1823): 216.
[74]
Ngun Ling, Communicating Christ in
Myanmar, 138
[75]
Ibid., 138.
[76]
Courtney Anderson, To the Golden Shore,
281. See also “Mr. Judson’s Journal” in the American
Baptist Magazine and Missionary Intelligencer, vol. IV. No. 6 (November,
1823): 216.
[77]
Ngun Ling, Communicating Christ in
Myanmar, 140.
[78]
Ibid., 63.
[79]
Ibid., 64.
[82]
Peter C. Phan, In Our Own Tongues,
10.
[83]
Stanley J. Samartha, “The Cross and
the Rainbow: Christ in a Multireligious Culture,” in Asian Faces of Jesus, ed. Stanley J. Samartha (New York: Orbis
Books, 1993), 108.
[85]
U Khin Maung Din was a lay Myanmar theologian and a Professor in Philosophy at
Rangoon University, Myanmar. This section mainly engages with his article, Some Problems and Possibilities for Burmese
Christian Theology Today, appeared in Asia
Journal of Theology, vol. 7, no. 1 in 1993.
[86] U Khin Maung Din, “Some Problems and
Possibilities for Burmese Christian Theology Today,” in Asia Journal of Theology, vol. 7, no. 1 (1993): 40.
[87]
In the book of Udana, Buddha is reported to have said: “. . . there is, O
monks, an Unborn, an Unbecome, Unmade, an Unconditioned; for if there were not
this Unborn, Unbecome, Unmade, Unconditioned, no escape from this born, become,
made and conditioned would be apparent.” U Khin Maung Din, “Some Problems and
Possibilities for Burmese Christian Theology Today,” 42.
[88]
U Khin Maung Din, 42.
[89]
Ibid., 43.
[90]
Edmund Za Bik, “Theological Reflections on Professor Khin Maung Din’s Article
on Some Problems and Possibilities for
Burmese Christian Theology Today” (A paper delivered by Edmund Za Bik at
the Annual Lecture Series organized by the Myanmar Institute of Theology,
Yangon, Myanmar, 2004), 8.
[91]
U Khin Maung Din, 46-47.
[92]
Ngun Ling, Communicating Christ in
Myanmar, 151.
[93]
U Khin Maung Din, 49.
[94]
Ibid., 49.
[95]
Ibid., 49-50. (emphasis mine).
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