Page 2 of
2 BOOK
REVIEW A new
Jerusalem in sub-Saharan
Africa The New Faces of
Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global
South by Philip Jenkins
Reviewed by
Spengler
American
Christianity more than the mere primitivism of
African life may explain why Africans have so
little trouble with the Old Testament.
Africans' appreciation of the concept of
blood sacrifice is a source
of
wonder for Professor Jenkins. He observes:
Only readers in a culture familiar
with sacrificial tradition are in a position to
appreciate fully the numerous allusions to this
practice throughout the New Testament. A
quick search of the New Testament produces over
90 uses of the word "blood", not counting
cognates or related concepts such as altar and
lamb, so it is scarcely an exaggeration to
describe the text as soaked with blood
...Appropriately, evangelical religion, with its
central notion of being saved in the blood, has
exercised immense appeal in modern Africa.
Recall the impact of hymns like the
"Tukutendereza Yesu", the song of the blood of
the lamb.
This is precisely correct as
far as it goes, but again, it is frustrating
that Jenkins does not take the issue one step
further. The reason that blood is so important
to Christianity (and not just evangelical
Christianity) is that the Christian undergoes a
change of ethnicity. As Africa emerges from
tribalism - if it is to emerge at all - this is
decisive. It is the Gentile flesh that is sinful
by its nature, and to overcome sin and gain the
Kingdom of God, the Christian must be reborn
into a new flesh, the flesh of Israel. The blood
sacrifice of Jesus Christ is what makes that
possible.
Because Jenkins' account is
impressionistic rather than precise, he has
difficulty addressing the issue of syncretism -
that is, the Christian problem of having one's
cake and eating it, too. Christians too often
wish to keep one foot in their Gentile past and
another in the Kingdom of God. This dichotomy, I
have argued on previous occasions, ultimately
doomed European Christianity. The reader is left
wondering whether some African theologians'
hatred for the Book of Joshua reported by
Jenkins reflects a syncretic bias on the part of
some African Christians who see their
ethnicities under pressure from colonialism.
Both Christian and Muslim sources, it
appears, agree that Christianity is winning the
battle for souls in Africa. David Barrett (in
the World Christian Encyclopedia, 2001)
projects that the count of African Christians
will rise to 634 million in 2025 from 360
million in 2000, while the number of African
Muslims will rise to 519 million from 283
million - increases, respectively, of 49%
against 40%. One Muslim cleric asserts that 6
million Muslims convert to Christianity each
year. [2]
Muslims inflict violence on
Christians, Jenkins reports:
Between 2000 and 2005, violence
between Muslims and Christians in just one
Nigerian province killed or expelled over 50,000
people, mainly Christian. Across Africa,
repression by secular states often includes an
incidental religious element because of the
strong Muslim tradition in the armed forces;
this predominance recalls the preference of
colonial powers for Muslim "warrior races".
Soldiers serving dictatorships tend
disproportionately to be Muslim, and their
critics and opponents are often Christian
clergy.
Despite Islam's command of
superior force, it is losing the battle for souls.
Why should this be the case? Here Jenkins is no
help at all. In matters of theology and religious
practice, he calls attention only to similarities
between Islam and Christianity. The premises of
the two religions are diametrically opposed,
however.
"One dies a vicarious death in
order to secure eternal life," I wrote under the
title The blood is the life, Mr
Rumsfeld! (October 12, 2005):
Unlike Christians or Jews, whose
religions are based on vicarious sacrifice,
Islam demands the self-sacrifice of its
adherents, in keeping with its essentially
militant character. Revealed religion puts blood
at a distance; Abraham sacrifices a ram and
spares his son Isaac, and God sacrifices his own
son in order to spare humankind. That is why
blood in Judaism became taboo, to be handled
only by the priest or his surrogate, the ritual
butcher. Usually a Catholic priest administers
the Eucharist. Unlike Christianity or Judaism,
Islam has no ritual of sacrifice, nor does it
need one, for the sacrifice that Islam demands
is that of the Muslim himself.
To
sacrifice one's self for one's kind is the sine
qua non of pagan cultures; revealed religion
(Judaism and Christianity), unlike Islam, exempts
the individual from this terrible requirement.
Islam represents the last defense of traditional
society with its demand for self-sacrifice of
every adherent, uniting the tribes into the
ummah whose definitive sacrament is jihad.
Christianity lifts the mortal decree for those who
repudiate traditional society, that is, abandon
their own ethnicity for a new and universal
ethnicity, namely that of Israel.
The
conclusion suggested by Jenkins' report is that
the people of the Southern Hemisphere increasingly
are willing to substitute a universal Christian
identity for their ethnic or tribal identity,
choosing Christianity over Islam. If that is
correct, we are witness to one of the most
remarkable things to happen in world history.
Despite its flaws and omissions, Philip
Jenkins' new book is a source of astonishment. One
cannot quite make sense of today's world without
it.
Notes [1] See
Marie-Claire Koissi and Goran Hognas, "Using
WinBUGS to Study Family Frailty in Child
Mortality, with an Application to Child Survival
in Ivory Coast", in African Population
Studies/Etude de la Population Africaine, Vol
20, No 1, 2005, pp 1-17. They observe, "Under-five
mortality rate for the world dropped from 193 per
thousand births in 1960 to 86 in 1998, which
corresponds to 55% decrease (UNICEF, 2001). In
Sub-Saharan Africa, the reduction in mortality
rates for children aged five and younger, between
1960 and 1998, was nearly 34% (from 261 to 173 per
thousand births)." [2] Islam in fast
demise, FaithFreedom.org.
The New Faces of Christianity:
Believing the Bible in the Global South by
Philip Jenkins, Oxford University Press, 2006.
ISBN: 0195300653. Price US$25, 272 pages.
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