AFTER IMPERIALISM
Christian identity in China and The Global
Evangelical Movement
Edited by Richard R. Cook & David W. Pao
The Lutterworth Press. 237 pages. £20.00
ISBN 978 0 718 892 579
This book is a collection of papers delivered at a conference held in 2010 and organised by Evangel Seminary, Hong Kong, and Trinity Evangelical Divinity School.
The contributors are both Chinese and American, but, although all are knowledgeable of the situation there, none are living in mainland China, As an academic book, its chief appeal will be to those specialising in a study of China, but it has some useful discussion for the general reader. Lawson Younger’s chapter on the Old Testament in its cultural setting is a good account of the value of studying the cultural context of the Scriptures and a defence against those who claim that such study is an attack on the perspicuity of Scripture. The articles on war, with reference to the way in which missionaries were able to enter China on the coattails of aggressive Western powers and which is still a hindrance to evangelism, deal well with the war passages in books like Joshua.
Cultural identity in Christ
The discussion by Thelman of collective and individual identities has not only some detailed study of Pauline texts to show when he moves from plural to singular language, but also interacts helpfully with aspects of the New Perspective. Yeung’s discussion of what it means to be ‘in C h r i s t ’ addresses the issue of cultural identity and has some useful conclusions re ancestor w o r s h i p . Priest’s plea for serious anthropological studies has some stimulating discussion of how to translate ‘dragon’ into Chinese. Lee’s comparison of Muslim, Jewish and Christian contextualisation has some useful insights.
The book is good in pointing out the pietistic and dispensational views of many of the unregistered churches and the false Western expectation that the growing church in China has political democracy as part of its vision.
It is the publishers and not the editors who were nodding when they invented the ‘Inland China Mission’ on the back cover, ignoring the ‘China Inland Mission’ on the front!
