A groundbreaking example of how different cultural contexts can be employed to broaden and enrich our understanding of the gospel, The Crucified Guru places the Christian doctrine of the person and work of Christ in constructi ve dialogue with the Indian concept of guru.

The centre of gravity of contemporary Christianity has shifted to the southern hemisphere where, with the exception of Latin America, almost all Christians are minorities in their home countries. Christians in Asia live amongst Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, Shamanist or Taoist majorities and this context shapes the local Christian theology. The same is true in Africa where traditional religions and beliefs influence African Christians. Central to this change in both Africa and Asia is the creation of a new Jesus, one who accretes local beliefs and concerns and who, in that process, is transformed. 'The Non-Western Jesus' reveals how a new theology - with its own images and concepts - is coming into being. A wide range of embodiments of Jesus is examined: Jesus as 'Avatara' and 'Guru' in the Indian context; as 'Bodhisattva' in the Buddhist context; and Jesus within Asian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, African and Indonesian religious contexts.

The gospel is directed to people in the concreteness of their lives. For this reason the understanding of the gospel is always of a contextual nature, i.e., is at all times related to the situations in which people live and is therefore influenced by various cultures. The one gospel is understood in and shaped by many cultures. In One Gospel—Many Cultures authors from various parts of the world describe examples of such contextual understandings of the gospel message. The volume contains accounts of Jesus as rice in a Korean and as guru in a South-Indian setting; churches in secular and individualistic societies on both sides of the Atlantic struggling to understand the gospel anew; Christians in East Asian megalopolises trying to inculturate faith in their local cultures; poverty stricken people in massive urban areas in Latin America who cannot read eating fragments of the Psalms; women in African countries suffering poverty and threatened by the spread of diseases, raising the question whether the churches should stick to monogamy or make room for polygamy? These examples entail serious questions for the churches. In what does the unity of the worldwide church consist and how strong is its witness if various contexts yield different interpretations of the gospel? Is cross-cultural understanding in the church possible? Is the World's Day of Women's Prayer perhaps a better example of cross-cultural sharing and unity, women listening to women from parts of the world other than their own, praying together, sharing songs and, if needed, money, and thereby demonstrating one faith, one gospel, one God. And to take another completely different case, was apartheid not a cruel form of contextualization, a parody of the gospel of liberation, a negation of the gospel that calls for and makes possible the breaking down of existing walls of separation between people of different races, colours, nations and genders? The contributors to the work in hand do not merely present case studies of attempts to bring the gospel into rapport with diverse cultural and human situations but also discuss the pro's and con's of the examples of contextualization they describe. The papers included in the present work are the fruit of a study project which forms part of the larger long-standing and ongoing program of theological reflection undertaken by the World Alliance of Reformed Churches. With its fascinating cases studies and thorough discussions of the problems and issues involved in contextualization, this volume will be recognized as an important textbook for academic courses in intercultural theology, ecumenical studies and theological hermeneutics. Contributors: Marcella Althaus-Reid, Russell Botman, Heup Young Kim, Christine Lienemann-Perrin, Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Joseph Small, M. Thomas Thangaraj, Hendrik M. Vroom, and Choo-Lak Yeow

With rare exceptions, serious intentional, reflective and sustained interfaith encounter is a novel and recent enterprise. This book looks in detail at one such encounter--the intentional recent Hindu-Christian dialog in India--and asks why and how the practice of dialog came to replace previous attitudes of confrontation and monologue (especially on the part of Christians). Part I sets the encounter in its global context. Part II offers a comprehensive and critical analysis of the actual encounter. Part III draws on aspects of the Christian tradition as it critically examines the ways in which the dialog has been justified in Christological categories. A final chapter discusses the future of the encounter. Unlike many other works in the area of interfaith studies, this work combines both descriptive detail of the actual encounter and critical theological analysis of the strengths and weakness of the dialog model.

Worshipping at the Feet of Our Ancestors revisits the theology of Dutch missiologist Hendrik Kraemer (1888-1965) and traces his impact on Asian theologians like M.M. Thomas, Lynn de Silva, Aloysius Pieris, and Lakshman Wickremesinghe. By turning back to these theological ancestors, the book find clues for a future theology of cultural-religious pluralism. (Series: ContactZone. Explorations in Intercultural Theology - Vol. 12)

This collection in five volumes tries to realize the desideratum of a comprehensive interdisciplinary work on the manifold faces and images of Jesus in China, which unites the Sinological, mission-historical, theological, art-historical, and other aspects. The first three volumes (vols. L/1-3) contain articles and texts which discuss the faces and images of Jesus Christ from the Tang dynasty to the present time. In a separate volume (vol. L/4) follows an annotated bibliography of the Western and Chinese writings on Jesus Christ in China and a general index with glossary. The iconography, i.e., the attempts of the Western missionaries and the Chinese to portray Jesus in an artistic way, will be presented in the fifth volume of this collection (vol. L/5). "This unique ongoing project continues to open a new, vital lens to learn more about China in its intellectual and cultural dimensions." John Witek in Journal of Asian Studies

The title Strangers and Pilgrims on Earth (Hebrews 11:13) captures well the eschatological nature of the christology which has become so central in the theological enterprise of Prof. dr. Abraham van de Beek. At the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday in October 2011, many of his former colleagues and students honour him in this Festschrift with a contribution to one of the themes that have been central to his theology: christology, theology of Israel, eschatology, theology of the church, creation theology, and freedom of religion. The volume opens with an article providing an overview of his theological development, one probing his deepest theological intentions, and with an up to date bibliography. Contributors include: Martien Brinkman, Johan Buitendag, Jaesung Cha, Pieter Coertzen, Ernst Conradie, Gerrit de Kruijf, Bert de Leede, Adelbert Denaux, Gerard den Hertog, Rene de Reuver, Henk de Roest, Andre Drost, Szilveszter Füsti-Molnár, Harm Goris, Botond Gudor, John Hesselink, Jan Hoek, Gerrit Immink, Allan Janssen, Tamás Juhász, Nico Koopman, Daniel Migliore, ChristIan Mostert, István Pásztori-Kupán, Christoff Pauw, Arjan Plaisier, Ad Prosman, Bernhard Reitsma, Riemer Roukema, Frank Sawyer, Alan Sell, Matthias Smalbrugge, Gerrit Singgih, Dirkie Smit, Adrianus Cardinal Simonis, Ferenc Szűcs, Eep Talstra, Wessel ten Boom, Johann Theron, Jacob van Beelen, Henk van den Belt, Gijsbert van den Brink, Leon van den Broeke, Eduardus Van der Borght, Kees van der Kooi, Paul van Geest, Sjaak van 't Kruis, Willem van Vlastuin, Amie van Wyk, Danie Veldsman, Rian Venter, Wim Verboom, Koos Vorster, Nico Vorster, Robert Vosloo, Henk Vroom, Paul Wells.