After Bosch1 : The Future of Missiology

Princeton Currents in World Christianity Seminar, 2 February 2001

First published in 1991, Boschs Transforming Mission represented a
climax of ecumenical and evangelical debate and a surprising
measure of consensus. Ten years later new frameworks for
discussing mission in relation to multicultural and post-modern
contexts are required. In 1990 Missiology needed a text capable of
proving its academic quality and practical relevance. If David Bosch
succeeded in providing that text, he did so in terms of a worldview
that was already losing its defining polarities. The mission of
Christianity now requires the formulation of the elements of new
emerging paradigms. Tracing missiology after Bosch is a reminder
of the quality and importance of his contribution. If that may also
give us some directions for a new era, it is still necessary for
missiology to articulate what it really offers the church and the
academy.
John Roxborogh
Presbyterian School of Ministry
Knox College, Dunedin, New Zealand
john@schoolofministry.ac.nz
1

Missiology in 1991

Definitions of missiology2 tend to reflect the writers vision of the

mission of the church.3 Missiology is the theology that serves that
1

Bosch, David Jacobus, South African missiologist born near Kuruman, South Africa, 1929, died in a
car accident, 15 April 1992. He studied at the universities of Pretoria and Basel (ThD, 1957) and served
as a Dutch Reformed missionary in the Transkei. He founded the Southern African Missiological
Society (SAMS) in 1968 and was first editor of its journal, Missionalia. He became professor of
missiology at the University of South Africa (UNISA) in 1971. He was known for his gracious pastoral
and spiritual sensitivities, enjoyed the trust of diverse groups of Christians, and in his magisterial
Transforming Mission (1991) produced the summative work of classic 20th century missiology.
2
I understand missiology to refer to reflection, particularly within the Christian community, about
Gods purpose for the church in the context of his purpose for creation. As usuage has developed it may
be possible to understand the closely related term mission studies to be the study of the mission of
the church particularly in terms of its effects, not just its intentions, and as carried out by all interested
parties, including those in the academy whether or not they share a Christian commitment. Both
missiology and mission studies have tended to be associated with people whose perspective relates to
mission outside their own country or culture. In the 1990s both have often come to include a domestic
as well as a global focus. The core academic disciplines of those seeing themselves as missiologists
have often been church history, theology, cultural anthropology and religious studies, though there is no
reason why biblical or pastoral studies should not be more highly represented.
3
For discussion see among other sources in the bibliography, Johannes Aagaard, "Trends in
Missiological Thinking During the Sixties," International Review of Mission 62 (1973)., Arnulf Camps,
Missiology : An Ecumenical Introduction : Texts and Contexts of Global Christianity (Grand Rapids,
Mich.: William B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1995)., David J. Bosch, "Theological Education in Missionary
Perspective," Missiology X, no. 1 (1982)., Karl Mller et al., eds., Dictionary of Mission : Theology,
History, Perspectives, American Society of Missiology Series ; No. 24 (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books,
1997)., Guttorm Myklebust Olav, Missiology in Contemporary Theological Education : A Factual

understanding. However the maturity of the discipline really requires

that missiology be conceived in terms that encompass visions of
mission other than ones own. The word mission itself needs to be
defined, not simply in terms of the ingredients which make up what
people believe the church ought to be doing, but in terms of what
questions we are asking by using the word. If we do not know what
we mean by the concept of mission, we cannot know what we mean
by the mission of the church and we cannot ask questions about it,
whatever our sources. While it is common for the mission of the
church to be a question of what the church as a body does outside
of itself, the mission of the church as in a mission statement also
needs to address the responsibilities of the church towards God, and
towards its own life. Fundamentally missiology is about helping the
church know what it ought to be doing.
Ten years ago, the Cold War was all but ended, and the Gulf War had
begun. In June 1991 Boris Yeltsin became the first elected president
of the Russian Republic and in January 1993 Bill Clinton would
become President of the United States of America. Some had heard
of the Internet, and very few of the Worldwide web. Globalization
was a programme for North American theological schools to be more
international in their programme and staffing,4 it was not yet the
catch-all explanation for how multinationals and the electronic flows
of culture and capital were destroying the world.
In 1991 the state of missiology was mixed. It was nearly 20 years
since the American Society for Missiology and the International
Association for Mission Studies had come into existence, and a bit
longer from the founding of the South African Missiological Society
by a 39 year old Afrikaans missionary from the Transkei, David
Johannes Bosch. There was significant scholarship in English in
journals like Missiology, Mission Studies, and the International
Bulletin of Missionary Research. Ripples from Vatican II and
reactions to them were still making a profound difference. Liberation
Survey (1989)., Lalsangkima Pachuau, "Missiology in a Pluralistic World. The Place of Mission Study
in Theological Education," International Review of Mission LXXXIX, no. 355 (2000)., Laurent W.
Ramambason, Missiology : Its Subject-Matter and Method : A Study of Mission-Doers in Madagascar
(Frankfurt am Main ; New York: Peter Lang, 1999)., James A. Scherer, "Missiology as a Discipline and
What It Includes," in New Directions in Mission and Evangelization 2: Theological Foundations, ed.
James A. Scherer and Stephen B. Bevans (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1994)., Theo Sundermeier,
"Missiology Yesterday and Tomorrow," in Mission in Creative Tension. A Dialogue with David Bosch,
ed. J. N. J. Kritzinger and W. A. Saayman (Pretoria: South African Missiological Society, 1990)., and
William David Taylor, ed., Global Missiology in the Twenty-First Century : Reflections from the
Iguassu Dialogue (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000)..
4
Max L. Stackhouse, Apologia : Contextualization, Globalization, and Mission in Theological
Education (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1988).

and feminist theologies were challenging structures and forging new

hermeneutics outside the old frameworks. The vision of Evangelicals
meeting at Lausanne in 1974 had been augmented in 1989 at
Manila. The San Antonio meeting of the WCC CWME that same year
seemed positive and comprehensive. Sharp polarities Bosch had
noted in 1980 after meetings in Melbourne and Pattaya were no
longer reliable guides to Evangelical and Conciliar loyalties.5 Lesslie
Newbigins Gospel in a Pluralist Society6 appeared an attractive
solution to the problem of doing justice to the good in the faith of
others while maintaining a missionary commitment. His challenge to
see the West as a mission field had touched a chord which inspired
Gospel and Culture movements in Great Britain, the United States,
and New Zealand.
Nevertheless there was unease. The balanced commitment to social
justice and evangelism of the 1974 Lausanne Covenant was not
accepted by all of its own constituency. The AD 2000 movement
coincided with a decade of evangelism7 and its focus of planning
for a new millennium showed little interest in a wider agenda for
mission. There was anxiety about the uniqueness of Christ, and the
troubling exclusivist, inclusivist and pluralist typology of Paul
Knitters No other name?8 However the existence of such divisions
at least had the benefit of helping missiology touch felt needs.
2

Teaching Missiology in the 1990s

Teaching missiology in the early 1990s was something of a

challenge - perhaps it always is.9 A common pattern was to look at
Biblical theology of mission guided by Johannes Blauw, Missionary
Nature of the Church, then already nearly 30 years old, clearly a
classic but not readily available.10 There was also Senior and

David J. Bosch, "Behind Melbourne and Pattaya: A Typology of Two Movements," IAMS Newsletter,
no. 16-17 (1980).
6
Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society (Grand Rapids, Mich: and Geneva: W. B.
Eerdmans ; and WCC Publications, 1989).
7
David B. Barrett and Todd M. Johnson, Our Globe and How to Reach It : Seeing the World
Evangelized by AD 2000 & Beyond : A Manual for the Decade of Evangelization, 1990-2000
(Birmingham, Ala.: New Hope, 1990).
8
Paul F. Knitter, No Other Name? : A Critical Survey of Christian Attitudes toward the World
Religions, American Society of Missiology Series ; No. 7 (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1985).
9
Andrew F. Walls, "Missiological Education in Historical Perspective," in Missiological Education for
the 21st Century. The Book, the Circle, and the Sandals. Essays in Honor of Paul E. Pierson., ed. J.
Dudley Woodberry, Charles Van Engen, and Edgar J. Elliston (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1997).
10
Johannes Blauw, The Missionary Nature of the Church; a Survey of the Biblical Theology of Mission
(Grand Rapids, Mich.,: Eerdmans, 1974).. Reprinted by Eerdmans in 1974.

Stuhlmueller11 and after 1990 Legrands Unity and Plurality,

translated from the French.12
If the history of mission had shifted its focus from the deeds of
Western missionaries to the dynamic of religious change and the
influence of local leadership, it still tended to be the church history
of the parts of the world not covered in a traditional Western
curriculum. There were serviceable surveys, such as Stephen Neill,
and the TEF study guides, but a sense of accompanying theological
development was weak. The assumptions of 19th century missionary
motivation and the hermeneutical centrality of the Great
Commission often guided the interpretation of the periods before
and since. Boschs Witness to the World, 1980, provided a
tantalizing outline of themes that might be explored.
If there was ample material for the committed and the curious,
nevertheless Andrew Walls could describe mission studies as having
Structural problems.13 It appeared that theological education failed
to reflect global realities and it was necessary to argue the
usefulness of mission studies in terms of its relevance to explaining
the changed demography of Christianity. The tools of the trade
were not nonexistent, but they were hardly adequate either. The one
standard dictionary of mission in English, was long out of print,
some 20 years after publication.14 Useful material such as the essay
collections compiled by Gerald Anderson15 and Thomas Stransky,16
were more effective in laying a ground-work, than in convincing the
theological world it should warmly welcome missiology into its fold.
Missiology seemed the answer to somebody elses problems.

11

Donald Senior and Carroll Stuhlmueller, The Biblical Foundations for Mission (Maryknoll, N.Y.:
Orbis Books, 1983).
12
Lucien Legrand, Unity and Plurality. Mission in the Bible (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1990)., Lucien
Legrand, Le Dieu Qui Vient : La Mission Dans La Bible (Paris: Desclee, 1988).
13
Andrew F. Walls, "Structural Problems in Mission Studies," International Bulletin of Missionary
Research 15, no. 4 (1991).
14
Stephen Neill, Gerald H. Anderson, and John Goodwin, Concise Dictionary of the Christian World
Mission (Nashville,: Abingdon Press, 1971).
15
Gerald H. Anderson, ed., The Theology of the Christian Mission (London: SCM Press, 1962).
16
Thomas F. Stransky, Gerald H. Anderson, and Charles W. Forman, Crucial Issues in Mission Today,
Mission Trends ; No. 1 (New York: Paulist Press, 1974)., Gerald H. Anderson and Thomas F. Stransky,
Evangelization, Mission Trends ; No. 2 (New York: Paulist Press, 1975)., Gerald H. Anderson and
Thomas F. Stransky, Third World Theologies, Mission Trends ; No. 3 (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans,
1978)., Gerald H. Anderson and Thomas F. Stransky, Liberation Theologies in North America and
Europe, Mission Trends ; No. 4 (New York: Paulist Press, 1979)., and Gerald H. Anderson and Thomas
F. Stransky, Faith Meets Faith, Mission Trends ; No. 5 (New York, NY. and Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Paulist Press ; and W.B. Eerdmans Pub. Co., 1981).

No single text defined the discipline or covered the historical and

theological background. A compilation of North American course
outlines17 on evangelism is indicative of the difficulties people
taught to their enthusiasms, glossed by the buzzwords of the day.
Ralph Winter and Steven Hawthornes Perspectives on the World
Christian Movement18 grouped readings and parish-level teaching
under the headings of Biblical, Historical, Cultural, and Strategic, but
the readings given too often begged the questions they were
intended to address.
For some, the older polarities of Evangelical, Liberal and Catholic
provided a framework of alternative visions of mission. International
meetings from Edinburgh 1910, and through the history of the
International Missionary Council and the WCC provided a time-line of
events replete with lessons on how things should or should not be
done. Despite differences over what those lessons might be,
teachers of missiology had common cause that mission was not
taken seriously enough either by their colleagues or by the church.
If it was probably nothing new that it was not clear where in the
theological curriculum missiology belonged, it was probably also
nothing new that there did not appear to be many who knew what
they would do if their prayers were answered. Was the goal of
missiology to establish the importance of mission by the creation or
maintenance of chairs and departments, or would missiologists
serve the interests of the Kingdom of God more by converting their
colleagues to missionary theology, the Bible as a missionary text,
church history as the history of mission in all six continents, and
practical theology as reflecting the missionary nature of the church?
Without a quality text to demonstrate that missiology was an
intellectually respectable discipline relevant to the practical needs of
the church, such considerations were liable to be put to one side,
and the position of missiology in the seminary driven by the
commitments of another era or the lack of them, the partisan views
of champions of particular causes, and the career needs of
missiologists.

17

Kenneth Parker, Richard Peace, and James Singleton, Teaching Evangelism. A Collection of Syllabi
from North American Seminaries (MARC, 1990).
18
Ralph D. Winter and Steven C. Hawthorne, eds., Perspectives on the World Christian Movement. A
Reader (Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 1981).

2.1 Changes in the 1990s

The end of the Cold War, dramatically symbolized and advanced by
the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, meant that things were going to
be different for the world, and also for the church and its mission. In
1991 there appeared a number of publications, many of
significance, and one in particular that took missiology to a new
level.

The Evangelical Alliance (UK) published a statement that

suggested a more open approach to other Faiths was
acceptable among some evangelicals at least.19 This would be
followed up and articulated by people such as John Stott, John
Sanders20 and Clark Pinnock.
Steve Bevans Models of Contextual Theology provided a
framework for exploring the processes and assessing the
value of local theologies, including Western theologies.
The WCC brought out the Dictionary of the Ecumenical
Movement21 which carried articles relevant to missiology and
missiological significant figures.
John Paul II issued Redemptoris Mission22 which sought to
invigorate Catholic commitment to evangelism.
Jon Book published Mission and Money23 which still serves to
provide a compelling, if not also depressing, study of the
unintended messages of affluent missionaries.
And David Bosch published Transforming Mission. 24

All of these proved to be significant, and are still frequently referred

to. But the one publication which did most to define what missiology
was about, which was of a quality that demanded attention from
outside its own field, was Transforming Mission.

19

(U.K.) Evangelical Alliance, "The Salvation of the Gentiles. Implications for Other Faiths,"
Evangelical Review of Theology January (1991).
20
John Sanders, No Other Name: An Investigation into the Destiny of the Unevangelized (Grand
Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Pub., 1992).
21
Nicholas Lossky, ed., Dictionary of the Ecumenical Movement (Geneva, and Grand Rapids, MI:
WCC Publications, and Eerdmans, 1991).
22
William R. Burrows, ed., Redemption and Dialogue. Reading Redemptoris Missio and Dialogue and
Proclamation. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1995)., William R. Burrows, "Redemptoris Missio after Ten
Years. Reflections from an American Perspective," (forthcoming).
23
Jon Bonk, Missions and Money : Affluence as a Western Missionary Problem, American Society of
Missiology Series ; No. 15 (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1991).
24
David Jacobus Bosch, Transforming Mission : Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission, American
Society of Missiology Series ; No. 16 (Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1991).

2.2 Transforming Mission

When it appeared in March 1991, responses to Transforming Mission
were almost totally positive. Bosch lifted the quality of missiological
debate. Here was writing that manifestly sought to be fair, and had
something fresh to say as it took competing concerns seriously. He
packed in detail, and synthesized a sustained argument from a huge
range of sources. It was an intelligent, readable, text, which could
be preached as well as critically studied, which could be applied to
praxis as well as to pedagogy, and which related to the church while
it took the world and its needs seriously. Bosch broadened peoples
vision for mission, rooted it in the church, and provided a framework
for reflecting on differences. It provided the resource serious
missiology had lacked.
By the time of his death a year later, Transforming Mission was on
its way to becoming the classic text of missiology of the decade,
the summa missiologica of the late 20th century. Bosch had
succeeded in providing a comprehensive theoretical framework for
missiology that rose above the polarities of his generation. Ten years
later Transforming Mission has been translated into 11 languages
and continues to sell at a significant rate. Practically everywhere
missiology is taught, Transforming Mission is the standard working
document.
Of course friends and others have prodded and queried and at
points corrected.25 Its implicit rather than its actual claim to
comprehensiveness invited queries whether that
comprehensiveness was indeed complete, though its nearly 600pages were already significantly reduced in number. Weaknesses in
the characterization of some paradigms (such as the Eastern
Orthodox) 26 and gaps in relation to Third World theologians and to
25

Hwa Yung, "Transforming Mission," review of David J. Bosh, Transforming Mission: Paradigm
Shifts in Theology of Mission, Maryknoll: NY Orbis Books, 1991., International Review of Mission
LXXXI, no. 322 (1992)., Kirsteen Kim, "Post-Modern Mission. A Paradigm Shift in David Bosch's
Theology of Mission?," International Review of Mission LXXXIX, no. 353 (2000)., John Kevin
Livingston, A Missiology of the Road : The Theology of Mission and Evangelism in the Writings of
David J. Bosch (1992)., John Roxborogh, "The History and Scope of BISAM within IAMS: 1972 1992," in To Caste Fire Upon the Earth: Bible and Mission Collaborating in Today's Multicultural
Global Context, ed. Teresa Okure (Pietermaritzburg, South Africa: Cluster Publications, 2000)., Willem
Saayman and Klippies Kritzinger, eds., Mission in Bold Humility. David Bosch's Work Considered.
(Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1996)., Robert J. Schreiter, "Book Review : Transforming Mission: Paradigm
Shifts in the Theology of Mission. By David Bosch, Maryknoll, N.Y.; Orbis, 1991," International
Bulletin of Missionary Research 15, no. 4 (1991)., Philip H. Towner, "Paradigms Lost: Mission to the
Kosmos in John and in David Bosch's Biblical Models of Mission," Evangelical Quarterly 67, no. 2
(1995)..
26
Personal email from Stephen Hayes, 9 March 1999.

women, together with a lack of connection with liberationist

hermeneutics were soon noted.
The appropriateness of the paradigm model in relation to missiology
was queried, highlighting that the very act of periodization derives
from the values and assumptions of a particular era.27 The language
of paradigms has become loose in the hands of others and
sometimes applied in reifying ways that ignored the qualifications
Bosch provided. Bosch was aware he was dealing with generalities.
He was attempting to map processes of continuity and change,
doing justice to unifying factors while giving some reasonable
account of the fact that ideas do change. He also acknowledged that
communities are not always together in the same paradigm. He
would also have been aware that transitions between paradigms are
as missiologically significant as the periods of relative stability in
worldview and assumptions the paradigms attempt to describe.
In his lifetime Bosch had invited colleagues to challenge what he
had to say28 and since 1992 his material has continued to prove
robust enough to withstand critical engagement despite some
telling points.29 Norman Thomas is among those who have pointed
out Transforming Missions lack of reference to women and to Third
World writers,30 and Kirsteen Kim has added ecology and indigenous
spiritualities, and the role of the Holy Spirit31 as well as feminism to
the list of deficiencies. Andrew Kirk, seeking to provide a shorter
text for students, found himself having to acknowledge the
foundation provided by Bosch at the same time as he added to the
components, already 13, of the emerging ecumenical paradigm. 32
Kirk provides a refreshing account of Jesus and his mission, but even
27

See Gerald J. Pillay, "Text, Paradigms and Context: An Examination of David Bosch's Use of
Paradigms in the Reading of Christian History," in Mission in Creative Tension: A Dialogue with David
Bosch, ed. J. N. J. Kritzinger and W. A. Saayman (Menlo Park: South African Missiological Society,
1990)..
28
The South African Missiological Society marked Boschs 60th birthday by making the theme of their
1990 congress A missiology of the road: In dialogue with David Bosch and publishing the papers as
a festschrift in his honour. What was different about these as festschrift papers was that they responded
to the invitation to dialogue by being critical of Bosch and each other Kritzinger and Saayman, eds.,
Mission in Creative Tension: A Dialogue with David Bosch.
29
Including, J. N. J. Kritzinger and W. A. Saayman, eds., Mission in Creative Tension: A Dialogue with
David Bosch (Pretoria, South Africa: South African Missiological Society, 1990)., Saayman and
Kritzinger, eds., Mission in Bold Humility. David Bosch's Work Considered. and Norman E. Thomas,
ed., Classic Texts in Mission and World Christianity, American Society of Missiology Series ; No. 20
(Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1995)., which serves as a critique as well as a supplement to
Transforming Mission.
30
Thomas, ed., Classic Texts in Mission and World Christianity., xv.
31
Kim, "Post-Modern Mission. A Paradigm Shift in David Bosch's Theology of Mission?."
32
J. Andrew Kirk, What Is Mission? Theological Explorations. (London: Darton, Longman and Todd,
1999).

in focusing on cultural, justice, peace-making and environmental

issues, the framework is still that of Transforming Mission.
Kim refers to the 7th Assembly of the WCC at Canberra as evidence
of the failure of Boschs emerging ecumenical consensus in the
very year of the publication of Transforming Mission. I doubt this
constitutes actual failure. New issues were emerging, the point is
that old polarities had dissolved. Many people felt part of what was
going on, whatever their views on feminism, indigenous spirituality
and the work of the Holy Spirit outside the church.33 The old liberal
and evangelical code words of loyalty in the lists34 (alluded to above)
that Bosch drew up in 1980 after the WCC, Council on World Mission
and Evangelism (COWME) meeting in Melbourne, and the Lausanne
Consultation on World Evangelization meeting in Pattaya, no longer
worked. By the early 1990s those who differed over mission
emphases were as likely as not to be people from the same
tradition.
Some of the noted deficiencies of Transforming Mission are
surprising given Boschs comments elsewhere. During the 1988
IAMS conference in Rome Bosch was in debate with the French
missiologist Marc Spindler over a project to approach biblical
foundations of mission through a series of word studies35 Bosch
advocated a both / and approach to doubt and faith,
Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment approaches. It is precisely
as we do Missiology for our particular contexts that we contribute
missiologically to the universal Christian and missionary
fellowship.36 This is not really apparent within Transforming Mission
and Frans Verstraelen considers the basic reason to be that
Bosch has difficulty in giving context a central place in his
way of theologizing. This appears the case when one
considers his methodology (which assumed its basic form in
pre-contextual modes of doing theology in the 1980s).
Bosch, in the final analysis, continued to belong to the

33

Bruce Nicholls and Bong Rin Ro, Beyond Canberra : Evangelical Responses to Contemporary
Ecumenical Issues, 1st ed. (Oxford: Regnum Books, 1993).. See also the statement signed by
Evangelicals at Canberra, including by New Zealanders John Evans, John McKinlay and Bruce
Nicholls.
34
David J Bosch, "Evangelism," Mission Focus 9, no. 4 (1981).. See alsoDavid Bosch, "In Search of
Mission: Reflections on 'Melbourne' and 'Pattaya.'" Missionalia 9, no. 1.
35
Mission Studies 11, 6(1) 61-69.
36
Ibid., 64.

category of theologians who theologize from above rather

than from below following an idealist approach.37
A lack of ease with concrete contexts may be noted, but it also
needs to be appreciated how much this is the nature of the case.
Transforming Mission is a theological history. The question about
context is partly a matter of recognizing the nature, scale and scope
of the history. The paradigms themselves form concrete contexts 38
defined in terms of the characteristic features of thinking about
mission within particular cultural eras.39 Only if contextual
theologizing denies the possibility of generalized discourse is
Transforming Mission seriously at fault here.
Today Transforming Mission remains as a substantial expression of
Boschs considerable legacy, a legacy of attitude (a humble
boldness, a bold humility), of leadership in diverse missiological
communities, of scholarly engagement and openness to critique, of
warm encouragement of others, and of a personal faith not
threatened by peoples religion - We cannot point to any other way
of salvation than Jesus Christ; at the same time we cannot set limits
to the saving power of God40 Bosch provided a framework and a
text for theological education. It was probably inevitable that he was
less successful in setting the agenda for the future than in providing
a powerful summary of the past. At the same time the general
authority of his book remains unsurpassed.
The question however remains, if Transforming Mission also
transformed missiology, where does missiology now go after Bosch?
While Transforming Mission can be expected to have a lasting
impact, the very fact that it succeeded more by mapping
convergence than describing a world whose assumptions and needs
were on the point of radical change means that missiology beyond
Bosch must now be addressed.

37

Ibid., 14.
The contexts were not so much cultural particularities as the large eras of human history defined and
grouped as paradigms.
39
Frans J Verstraelen, "Mission in Bold Humility," in Mission in Bold Humilty. David Bosch's Work
Considered, ed. A. Saayman Willem and Klippies Kritzinger (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1996). makes
astute observations about the character of Boschs writing, but perhaps could make more allowance for
this being the nature of the case for a work of theology of this nature.
40
Bosch, Transforming Mission : Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission. 489. Bosch quotes F. R.
Wilson, ed., The San Antonio Report (Geneva: World Council of Churches, 1990). 33 as the source of
the quote. He was at San Antonio and may himself have been the author of the phrase.
38

10

3 The ten years since Transforming Mission, March 1991

At first, the main thing to do with Transforming Mission, apart from
reading it, was to use it as framework and content for the biblical,
historical, theological and contemporary elements in the
missiological curriculum. As some of the criticisms and
supplementary elements noted came available, they could be
added. But as the decade progressed some deeper difficulties
became apparent.
The postmodern paradigm that Bosch was beginning to address
became sharper in its features, and Boschs comments less
adequate. Spirituality in the west may have developed strange
features, but it was no longer an unusual phenomenon.
Indigenousness peoples began to find their voices. Postmodernism
within the Western intellectual tradition, and multi-cultural and
multi-religious societies in which religious minorities affirmed their
identity against majorities and networked via the Internet, helped
break the dominance of a desacralized world-view.
The end of the Cold War seemed to symbolize the reduction of
theological as well as political boundaries, and Christianity was not
alone in seeking to know what it meant to affirm local as well as
global identity. The opening of nation-state borders electronically
and politically facilitated massive flows of culture and capital.
Electronic developments from the internet to the world wide web
and the proliferation of computers and cell phones in a wired world
created new cultures of digital inclusion, exclusion and immediacy.
Globalization became primarily an economic term - a ready short
hand for the way in which moving industries and capital made some
richer and many poorer.
These have changed the way in which the world understands itself
and does its business. They have changed and must change - how
churches understand mission. This situation is both radically
different from, yet in important ways similar to, the intellectual
framework out of which Bosch constructed his Transforming Mission.
The decade of the 1990s of course saw the production of a great
many significant works on missiology besides Transforming Mission.
Dictionaries and monographs have added to the tools of the trade
and enriched understanding of the mission of the church and its
theological basis immensely. Postmodernism, globalization and the
impact of technology are being explored by writers and
11

consultations. What they have not done however, is replaced

Transforming Missions role as the disciplines defining document.
4

Beyond 2001

If bickering about social action and evangelism no longer hold

center stage, and broader views on the salvation of those who had
never heard have quietly gained acceptance, some may also sense
a weakening of overseas mission interest among introverted
evangelicals not just those for whom the word mission has tainted
associations with colonialism. The missional church emphasis
which owes a lot to Lesslie Newbigin, as well to Bosch and
something to Barth, is concerned to remind Western churches of
their missionary obligation to their own culture. People who speak
this language are hardly alone and are not confined to followers of
Newbigin. Those who still characterize Western academic theology
by its detachment41 perhaps need to note the plethora of
publications that seek to make Christianity and the ministry of the
church relevant. Debates over the future of missiological chairs
might better be seen as a product of a different kind of missionary
commitment, not just its absence. In defining missiology for the
immediate future, we need to move past Bosch as we address a
situation characterized by glocalization, postmodernism and
electronic technologies. We may also need his help:
1. Bosch will remain significant for some time for the paradigm
framework and methodology.
2. Within the overall period that it covers, Transforming Mission
will continue to be critiqued in points of detail.
3. Missiology must continue to provide a key theological
framework for engaging critically with whatever issues emerge
in the life of the church in relation to its environment. For
some time fresh issues will be dealt with in relation to Bosch
by adding them to the lists as Andrew Kirk has done in What
is mission? and Wilbert Shenk has done in calling for facing
the new frontiers of mission and engaging42 with the clash of
civilization theories of Samuel Huntingdon. 43
4. Those concerned to develop a domestic missiology will
continue to find the mission thrust of Boschs vision for the
41

As J. Andrew Kirk, The Mission of Theology and Theology as Mission, ed. Alan Neely, H. Wayne
Pipkin, and Wilbert Shenk, Christian Mission and Modern Culture (Valley Forge, Pa. and Leominster,
Herefordshire: Trinity Press International ; and Gracewing, 1997).
42
Wilbert Shenk, "Christian Mission and the Coming "Clash of Civilizations"," Missiology XXVIII,
no. 3 (2000).
43
Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash of Civilisations and the Remaking of World Order (New York, NY:
Simon & Schuster, 1996).

12

church a powerful ally. The convergence of domestic and

global missiological agendas can be expected to continue.
5. There will be attempts to close off Boschs last paradigm as a
holistic vision of mission maintains general acceptance, and to
create new paradigms, perhaps around a theology of the Holy
Spirit.44
6. A fresh effort perhaps by an interconfessional, crosscultural
team - will soon be necessary to perform the comprehensive
sort of task that Bosch attempted. A feature of Transforming
Mission is that the whole is written from the perspective of a
modern / early post-modern paradigm. Once that era has
passed into another to the extent that a fresh, self-aware, set
of values, questions and procedures are operating, the
periodization, history and theology of mission will need to be
visited afresh.
7. Missiology may itself be redefined. Dr Lalsangkima Pachuau
has argued that theology of religions should be the integrating
motif for missiology.45 Although he makes a strong case, I
suspect missiology in general will want to address other issues
as well and need a wider base for doing so.
5

Conclusion: Missiology in Academy and Seminary

What do missiologists do when cognate disciplines start getting

missiological? Do missiologists recognize the extent to which this is
going on? Are we grateful that they have seen the light, or
threatened that they are stealing our jobs? What do missiologists
do, when moves are made to close their departments and tenure
becomes a distant dream? Does this mark the failure of missiology,
or possibly its success? Is there something to learn from Bosch in
this?
Of course it is necessary to produce evidence that those claiming to
be missiologists are useful and necessary members of faculty
teams. Bosch provides part of an answer, in that he was able to
demonstrate values of personal faith, integrity, humility,
scholarship, and commitment which helped make him widely
acceptable. Some outside of missiology need to be familiar with
professional groups such as the American Society of Missiology and
the International Association for Mission Studies. Missiologists
44

See Kim, "Post-Modern Mission. A Paradigm Shift in David Bosch's Theology of Mission?.",
Stephen B. Bevans, "God inside Out: Toward a Missionary Theology of the Holy Spirit," International
Bulletin of Missionary Research 22, no. 3 (1998)., and a forthcoming paper by Susan Smith, The
Spirit and Contemporary Christian Mission".
45
Pachuau, "Missiology in a Pluralistic World. The Place of Mission Study in Theological Education."

13

themselves need to take a more considered approach to their

colleagues in other disciplines. Nobodys interests are served by
claiming missiology can do more for the church than it properly can.
A sustainable missiology may be more modest in some of its claims.
Should missiologists feel the need to be evangelists in their own
cause, they might wish to take some of their own advice. Some
suggestions. Missiologists 1. Will be content to see missiology as a dimension of
ecclesiology. Theology of mission is theology of the mission
of the Church, even if the churchs mission is defined by the
mission of God, the missio Dei. The provocative phrase
mission is the mother of theology might more accurately be
stated as mission is a catalyst for theology. Somebody needs
to say that it is acceptable to seek to formulate truths about
God simple for the sake of doing that, quite apart from the
mission value of doing so.
2. Will work to clarify what is meant by mission. The move
from missions to mission in the late 1960s seems to have
been intended to move away from seeing the mission of the
church as only evangelism. That may have been helpful, but
we are still in difficulty. Our use of the word mission needs to
take seriously how the term is used in common language
where, as in mission statement, it refers to the total purpose
of a body, not just the specific missions parts of it may engage
in. For the Christian church part of its total mission is to
worship God. Worship takes place for the glory of God as well
as for the building up of the church and for outreach. A narrow
view of mission has difficulty finding a theological place for
worship.
3. Will seek to serve the theological academy and
seminary by offering its crosscultural experience and
perspective, and by being willing to learn from other
disciplines. Missiology needs to practice what it preaches
about mission as a two way street. Servant leadership
concepts might usefully apply as well. Missiology cannot
expect to be heard if it is not willing to listen.
4. Will be willing to affirm the commitment of those in
other disciplines to exploring Gods purpose for the
church and the world and not regard these
perspectives as its private property. Missiologists have to
stop behaving like politicians who only know how to function
in opposition mode.

14

5. Will be prepared to explore the question of whether

missiology is a special department or a dimension of all
theological disciplines in terms of both and not
either or. It is not the only area where such considerations
apply. Ethics and biblical theology courses have overlap issues
where decisions have to be made in a particular teaching
situation who has the primary responsibility and who has the
secondary.
6. Will see the defining specialties of missiology as its
theological concern for clarifying the purpose of the
church and its global perspective in exploring those
implications. How responsibilities are allocated depends on
the gifts and interests of a particular set of teachers. A matrix
model would allow missiology to be championed by one
person taking a particular focus in theology, history, Biblical,
religious or cultural studies. Missiology itself needs to lose its
own life in order to save it.
7. Integration is not everything. Missiology can have an
integrative function in the curriculum, but it is hardly unique in
that respect. So can most subjects. What missiology can also
bear witness to is the voice of the margins, the learnings from
liminality, the seeking of a proper balance between minorities
and the dominant cultures in history, theology and mission. As
long as it does so it will never be a tidy subject. That may in
fact be part of its genius!
Perhaps the most potent paradigm that Bosch has left us is a very
personal one. With his combination of outstanding scholarship, in
terms of the highest values of his generation, and the exercise of
Christian faith in bold humility, he points to the calling of us all.
6

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