Title: Contextualization
1Contextualization Dr. M. David Sills
2Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Understanding Contextualization
- Includes ideas inherent in words like
indigenization or enculturation - Indigenization asks, Who owns the program?
- Enculturation asks, Does it fit in the
culture? - Contextualization combines those two thoughts
and asks, How do you transfer what God has said
through holy men of old who lived in an ancient
cultural context, into the language of people who
live in a very different one, through the medium
of translators who live in yet another context
todays space age?
3Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Defining Contextualization
- Meaningful and appropriate cross-cultural
transmission of Biblical truth which is faithful
to its original intent and sensitive to culture. - Presuppositions behind this concept of
contextualization - Biblical truth is absolute and defines the
essence of the gospel and the church. These
truths cannot be compromised in any way. - There are, however, various legitimate ways in
which these same truths can be expressed and
applied in different cultures. These expressions
and applications must be consistent with
principles of Biblical interpretation.
4Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Presuppositions behind this concept of
contextualization - As every culture contextualizes the gospel and
church, missionaries come to new cultures already
biased towards their own home culture. To
transmit this would be theological imperialism.
It leads to confusion of the gospel and the
planting of a foreign church. - A contextualized gospel and church which are
faithful to Scripture and sensitive to culture
must be worked out for each culture being
entered. This insures that the issues which must
be decided for someone to be converted are the
core issues. It allows flexibility in forms of
expression which are meaningful to the new church
within its culture.
5Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Presuppositions behind this concept of
contextualization - A contextualized church will be better able to
maintain its unity, sustain its purity, and
witness to its own community. Having experienced
the process of contextualization, it will be
better equipped to transmit Biblical truth to
other cultures. It may result in increased
receptivity. If the process is not followed,
artificial barriers may be erected and the
converse of all the above may result. - Areas of Application
- Dress, behavior, and lifestyle of the missionary
- Types of development projects, which if
inappropriate, might be interpreted as
inducements by the non-Christian community
6Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Areas of Application
- Language, including the Scripture translation,
used in evangelism and worship - Thought patterns and communication style as found
in the new culture - Initial selection, sequence, and emphasis of
certain aspects of the gospel relevant to any
culture - Worship posture and expression in prayer, music
or formal discourse, allowing for various forms.
We need to be careful, however, that we do not
overlook the delicate relationship between form
and meaning.
7Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Areas of Application
- Discipling and training methods, keeping in mind
the past experiences and future needs of new
converts - Church organization and government, allowing
various forms - The process of contextualization should be
perpetuated not only by example but through
teaching as a discipline among missionaries and
church leaders
8Contextualization SIM Position Paper
- Problems with Contextualization
- In the rush to contextualize some may attempt to
lessen the demands of the gospel or sacrifice
Biblical truth to make the gospel or church more
acceptable. This may lead to syncretism. - Missionaries may not always understand the
meaning behind forms which they either allow or
disallow in the church. Accordingly, the best
ones to decide what is appropriate are
well-taught believers who can speak for their own
culture - Some theologians, arguing that the method of
interpretation used by evangelicals is often
dictated by their cultural mind set, produce new
theologies based on different hermeneutical
systems- all in the name of contextualization.
9Contextualization International Bulletin of
Missionary Research
Translating Challenges The translation and
dubbing must be as close to perfect as possible,
which means that we must redub portions of the
film. For example, in the initial film edition
of Zhuang, a language group in China, our
translation of angels was actually fairies.
We fixed the problem. In Kinyarwanda (Rwanda),
Mary asked, Am I a virgin? instead of stating,
I am a virgin. We changed it. In Illocano
(Philippines), when the translators needed a word
for prostitute they used a term comparable to
hooker. Although it was good contemporary
Illocano, it offended local pastors, and they
refused to show the film. We changed the word.
10Contextualization International Bulletin of
Missionary Research
Translating Challenges Continued Missionaries
and local churches sometimes fight to retain
Christian words, which may lessen the impact of
the film with nonbelievers. One disputed word is
the name for Jesus, which in Muslim countries has
been translated either Yesu (often favored by
Christians) or Isa (the Arabic usage). We
continually push for Isa because we are trying
to reach Muslims. Some Christians have refused
to show the film with this translation.
Finally, wrong voices or accents are sometimes
selected. In many cultures around the world,
Jesus is expected to have the accent of the
highest caste or class. If a voice with a
low-class accent is used, the viewing audience is
limited.
11Contextualization International Bulletin of
Missionary Research
Translating Challenges Continued Sometimes we
have faced the problem of communicating to
warring tribes that speak the same language but
with slightly different accents. Which tribal
voice do you choose for Jesus? Over the past
twenty-one years the Jesus Film Project has spent
more than 2 million to correct translation and
dubbing errors and problems.
12Perceptions of time
- African theologian John Mbiti, insists that the
Swahili words for time, sasa and zamani, cannot
be pressed into the Western temporal categories
of past, present, and future. Sasa time, in
which people currently participate, embraces the
recent past, the present and immediate future.
Yet, for many Africans, time is not pictured as a
movement forward into an eternal future, as in
the Westl instead, events move backwards and sasa
disappears into an ever increasing past
(zamani). Dean Flemming, Contextualization in
the New Testament
13Cultural Words
- Every statement of the gospel in words is
conditioned by the culture of which those words
are a part, and every style of life that claims
to embody the truth of the gospel is a culturally
conditioned style of life. There can never be a
culture-free gospel. - Lesslie Newbigin, Foolishness to Greeks The
Gospel and Western culture, 1986, p.4