New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South, The

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Sep 2007 by Horrell, J Scott

The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South. By Philip Jenkins. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006, x 252 pp., paper $26.00.

As Distinguished Professor of History and Religious Studies at Pennsylvania State University, Philip Jenkins is renowned especially for his The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Oxford University Press, 2002). His other recent books (all published by Oxford University Press) include The New Anti-Catholicism: The Last Acceptable Prejudice (2004); Hidden Gospels: How the Search for Jesus Lost Its Way (2001); and Mystics and Messiahs: Cults and New Religions in American History (2001).

The New Faces of Christianity is a sequel to Jenkins's The Next Christendom through the lens of biblical interpretation. The current work grows out of a 2004 lecture series at Harvard University's Memorial Church. Jenkins compares the literalist readings of Scripture in the global South (Africa, Asia and Latin America) to the progressive readings of mainline denominations in North Atlantic Christendom. He relies heavily on the global population statistics of David Barrett's World Christian Encyclopedia (2 vols., Oxford University Press, 2001) and the yearly updates published by the Overseas Missionary Study Center (International Bulletin of Missionary Research)-broadly considered the most accurate data available today. Evangelicals may question whether Europe has 530 million Christians or Latin America another 510 million, but the author is faithful to the numbers of national censuses. Exemplary of his content and engaging style, Jenkins writes, "The figures are startling. Between 1900 and 2000, the number of Christians in Africa grew from 10 million to over 360 million, from 10 percent of the population to 46 percent. If that is not, quantitatively, the largest religious change in history in such a short period, I am at a loss to think of a rival" (p. 9).

Jenkins's thesis is that the emerging Christian faith of the global South is centered in the Bible as it brings together fresh and "fundamentalist" interpretations of Scripture with belief in direct revelation through visions and prophecy. He continually contrasts this biblical literalism with Euro-American Christendom's significant focus on post-Enlightenment issues related to theological doubt, biblical skepticism, and pragmatic adaptations to societal norms (such as homosexuality). From a Northern vantage point, the great danger of the South, as Harvard's Peter Gomes puts it, is the unholy trinity of "bibliolatry, culturalism, and literalism" (p. 11). In contrast, African and Asian Christians contend not with contexts of doubt but with competing, often hostile claims of faith by Muslims, Hindus, and Buddhists-and, in some regions, the ideology of communism. Jenkins elaborates the tensions between the North and South in biblical interpretation through such chapters as "Old and New, "Rich and Poor," and "Women and Men." While the author seeks to balance the virtues and ills of Northern and Southern approaches to the Bible, his sympathy is clearly with the emerging Christendom of the South. Remarkably, in a work largely written for the North, Jenkins's concluding appeal is for a return to and renewed perspective of "the real Bible."

The New Faces of Christianity will delight many a reader interested in the demographic and theological shifts in global Christianity. Still, there are weaknesses with his approach. While Jenkins's vast research of indigenous forms of Christianity, especially in Africa, is impressive, at times it is disjointedly presented. Though he notes that the "global South" denotes Africa, Asia, and Latin America, Jenkins admits that his data regarding the later two continents is less extensive (this is particularly true of Latin America). Furthermore, conservative Christians will be uneasy with Jenkins's generous assumptions that virtually any group claiming to be Christian (regardless of its relationship to historical faith) is Christian. This is demonstrated not only by the repeated discussions of radical forms of African Zionism and other indigenous religions, but also by the very jacket of the book that displays a Brazilian festival of the Christian Spiritual Order-unanimously considered a spiritist cult in Brazil itself. Moreover, in his African research, Jenkins tends not to give adequate weight to the influence of major evangelical denominations such as ECWA, the Baptist unions, the Assembly of God, and others.

While The New Faces of Christianity focuses especially on the new expressions of Christian faith, it nevertheless is fascinating, indispensable reading (together with The Next Christendom) for all global-thinking Christians. The religious world is shifting far more rapidly than most North Americans are aware. In both works, Jenkins renders profound encouragement to the worldwide body of Christ, and with this book, the subtle admonition to preach and teach the Word, faithfully and context-creatively, could hardly be more eloquent.