Anthropology: Luxury or Necessity for Missions?

by Alan R. Tippett

The beginning of courses in anthropology at the School of World Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary has brought a quantity of correspondence from Bible school and seminary professors of missions asking for information, course outlines and reading lists. The correspondence reflects the feeling on the part of some professors of missions that anthropology ought to be included in their program and an uncertainty of how to go about it.

The beginning of courses in anthropology at the School of World Mission at Fuller Theological Seminary has brought a quantity of correspondence from Bible school and seminary professors of missions asking for information, course outlines and reading lists. The correspondence reflects the feeling on the part of some professors of missions that anthropology ought to be included in their program and an uncertainty of how to go about it.

The following observations are offered in the hope that they will help clarify the situation and thereby give some direction to the planning of courses in missionary anthropology. Such courses cannot be planned by collecting outlines and bibliographies for different levels and purposes. The first requirement in planning a training course is to be aware of the need and to set the goal that meets it. This problem ultimately resolves itself into six basic questions which must be answered.

BASIC QUESTIONS
1. Is the anthropological training given to missionary candidates adequate and relevant? Every institution involved in the training of missionaries has to face up to this. I should have have kept a census of the many missionaries who have told me how they wished they had been trained in anthropology. I myself have often felt I could have reached that point of effectiveness in two years which took me ten as it was. In the end I had to take extended furlough without pay to make up the deficiency. Courses in comparative religion are frequently of little value when one gets to the field. Much of the subject matter has come from the theory of the early armchair anthropologists, or it is related to the philosophical superstructure of the great religions rather than the real encounter at grassroots level where men are open for conversion.

A number of missionaries, it is true, must be trained for this academic encounter, but proportionately these are few in the total complex of world mission. Men need to be trained in the way the animist thinks. They need to be able to reason in the logic and imagery of the medicine-man. They need to be brought to an awareness of the difference between encounter and dialogue in cultural as well as theological dimensions. They need to be able to diagnose the character of acculturation processes at work in their specific situations and recognize readiness for innovation when they see it.

To some extent the adequacy or relevance of the course will depend on the theological outlook of the seminary concerned; but even a sound biblical theology has to be communicated effectively across cultural barriers. We are involved with the problems of cross-cultural advocacy and are confronted with the possibilities of acceptance or rejection-or perhaps modification, which brings us into the area of syncretism. Even if syncretism is dealt with on a sound theological level it may still be academic and theoretical and totally unrelated to the specific forms of, say, Africa and Latin America. A relevant course will introduce missionary candidates to these things.

And there is the problem of meaning. When pagans accept the gospel what do they take it to mean? Does it mean the same thing to the foreign advocate as the indigenous acceptor? There are problems of expressing theological concepts in preChristian terminology-or do you invent new vocabulary? If so, is it a foreign imposition?

What is the function of the social structure? What are the patterns of relationship in the family? Who marries who and why? How do you explain the fatherhood of God in a matrilineal society? Do you demand of a pagan polygamist that he divorce his wives before baptizing him? Are the rites which honor the ancestor matters of reverence or worship? These and thousands of other questions are the stuff of anthropology and, whether we like it or not , they are also the burden of the missionary. Anthropology is certainly no substitute for ethics, but it examines all these things andasks why. What is the function? How do they meet the felt needs of the society? What are we doing when we change them? If we know and understand what is involved, we will be wiser by far in our thinking, our acting and our praying.

If the missionary goes out into his field of service without having been made aware of the type of problem he is to meet, his training can hardly be described as adequate or relevant. Anthropology is a must. More and more this is being realized by seminaries and missionaries alike. The missionary situation itself demands it.

Moreover, the course should be undergirded with sound theology. If such an institution has no care whether there be any real acceptance, how can it teach the techniques of advocacy?

2. What is a missionary candidate entitled to expect in his training?
A missionary candidate is entitled to expect four things of his training:

1. A training in the content and message of the Scriptures and a knowledge of how to explore and use their resources, which presumably he gets in his divinity course.

2. The skill of his particular missionary craft-as preacher, teacher, doctor or nurse, agriculturalist, etc.

3. An appreciation of the significance of the Great Commission to him, with his specialist skills, in this particular missionary situation, in this present hour. This is on a personal level and there may be no specific course. The candidate may be seeking this for himself out of the total complex of his work. Yet he is entitled to expect that somewhere his advisors will bring to bear on him the meaning of his skill, his call, in his time and place of service. He is entitled to be confronted with the personal relevance of God’s demands on him.

4. But this is not enough. He needs to learn how he can be effective across cultural barriers, where the Bible is viewed differently; where he is in dialogue with orator, herald, teacher, medicine-man and craftsman; where the logic of reasoning follows a pattern strange to him and where he will use an inadequate technical vocabulary.

The young man subjects himself to training in the belief that the course will prepare him for his new role. He is entitled to this. It is not a mere degree he seeks. He seeks to be prepared for the life role to which God calls him. At this point he relies on the seminary.

3. What is the problem faced by the professor of missions? This problem has two different forms. In the first situation we have a seminary with a strong department of missions carried by several professors, with one of them perhaps assigned to anthropology. It ought to be so, but, in point of f act, I cannot say that it actually is. In any case this is an ideal towards which seminaries should aim. The problem is a personal one. In a seminary for training missionaries the anthropologist selected should himself be a dedicated person with Christian convictions. His faith should be in tune with the missionary cause. Preferably he has served a term himself as a missionary, or at least been closely identified with missionary activity on the field.

It may be argued that an objective anthropologist with no personal commitment to the Christian mission can inject many a critical stimulus into his classes with good effect. This is undoubtedly true, but we should never lose sight of the fact that he teaches in an interdisciplinary area and must be able to appreciate both the disciplines he is trying to bridge. No purely objective scientist can really appreciate the ideals and problems of the missionary without some subjective involvement in mission. Furthermore, anthropologists and journalists have long hammered away at missionary inadequacies through lack of anthropological knowledge. To some extent the criticisms have been valid, but the point is made, and we are aware of it, and the matter has been critically evaluated from within our own ranks. The time has now come where positive guidancemusttakethe place of negative criticism. The negative aspects can be handled in a few classes, but we need whole courses to show what anthropology can do positively for the missionary. This requires a teacher who has been involved in mission and knows what it is about, or at least one who has travelled widely in missionary situations and shared the burdens of missionaries.

The second form of the problem is met in those seminaries where all dimensions of missionary thought and activity are left to a single professor of missions. Many such appointments are based on three areas of knowledge-missionary service, wide reading in the history of missions, familiarity with the philosophy of the great religions, their sacred literature and political movements. Usually men selected for this role have not gone far in anthropology because courses in anthropology were not taught to missionary trainees in their day, and to familiarize oneself with this discipline requires a mighty lot of reading. One is confronted with a time-consuming ground work, that just has to be done and this quite apart from keeping up to date in the new material coming out all the time. The all-inclusive role of professor of missions is an unenviable task.

As this man struggles with anthropology he discovers the discipline has many sub-areas which are of little direct value. He finds also a great deal of opinion critical of missions and manifestly agnostic. Here and there he finds promising items which fit his missionary experience, and builds up something of his own without a proper frame of reference or a scientific methodology. He longs for a suitable text written by a believer. The best text in applied anthropology is written by a Roman Catholic and colored by the missionary orientation of that church; but in any case because it is published by a Roman Catholic press he might well pass it by.

One possible solution is to have the candidates attend a secular university for anthropology courses. This has the advantages of (1) having the courses taught by a specialist in that field, (2) making the missionary candidate take an objective and critical look at the missionary image before be becomes part of it himself, and (3) providing him with a basic anthropological frame of reference on which to build his own experience.

It has the disadvantages of (1) possible distortion due to the philosophical bias of the secular teacher, (2) being unrelated positively to mission, (3) involving the candidate in digesting areas of anthropology of no direct value to his life work. However, in spite of this, where seminaries are close to universities it is preferable to draw on the secular resources at hand than burden the solitary professor of missions with this unwelcome task, which should never be regarded as just an extra course that has to be fitted in somehow. My own relationships with secular university departments of anthropology have been most cordial, yet the fact remains that there is now a new discipline of missionary anthropology not normally supplied by a secular university.

4. What is the indigenous church entitled to expect of men sent to them by the home church for cross-cultural mission? Men sent to the young churches should be only those who can supply those elements and roles that the churches cannot supply for themselves. The young churches are entitled to expect the seminaries at home will bear this in mind as they train their missionaries and fraternal workers. These elements may be analysed briefly under four heads-know ledge, attitudes, emphases and methods.

He is expected to have knowledge that men need and which he is ready to share. This includes knowledge of the gospel itself and the Scriptures which record it. It also includes knowledge of his area of specialization-medicine, education, preaching, and so forth. He works for that day when his own contribution is no longer necessary because the young church providesitsownspecialists. However, as new areas of specialized knowledge emerge the young church may have occasional roles for fraternal workers with the right kind of knowledge.

The man sent out by the seminary needs a right attitude. He is a foreigner entering another culture. It is not his role to impose supposedly superior Western patterns on the people he serves, but to enter their own realms of thought and make his contribution within not against that culture. The young church that welcomes this man is entitled to expect a certain empathy. I remember the welcome speech of an old Fijian minister to a young Australian appointed to a leadership role. His predecessor had frequently tempered his advice from the chair with the words, "We are here to advise you," after which he pressed his will upon them. Now the time had come for a change. The old pastor said to the young man, "We’re glad to be led by a young man full of strength and vigor, but we want to say one thing as you take over. Your task is not to tell us what you want, but to show us how to get what we want." A new day in Fiji began from that moment. The young church expects this attitude of its fraternal workers.

But the missionary or fraternal worker still has an important emphasis to make. He makes this against the background of acculturation and modern Western theology. He is aware of such things as universalism and syncretism and knows these forces from their theological depths. The young church may not fully understand these, but it feels the drag at the grassroots level. It expects the evangelical fraternal worker to expose the peculiar local manifestations of universalism and syncretism, and show where and why they are a danger. He also keeps the young church aware of the importance of outreach. There is still a major theological contribution here that the foreigner can make to the emerging church. This is an emphasis, not an imposition.

We have learned a great deal in the matter of new methods which can and should be passed on to the young churchesmethods of study, of communication, of counseling. The young churches have to take their place in the modern world. Materialism, commerce, other religions and ideologies are all advocates for their souls. They are entitled to expect of our Christian seminaries that those we send out as their fellow workers have the best methodological know-how.

These four things do not come purely as natural gifts. There is a degree of training involved in each. If each has its theological dimension each also has its anthropological dimension. A right knowledge, a right attitude, a right emphasis and right methods-what a tremendous responsibility this throws on the seminary! This is what a young church is entitled to expect of those the home church sends out as equipped men f or service. The young church accepts these candidates on the assumption that they have been adequately prepared to enter into the life and thought of the world so different from their own.

5. Has anthropology any contribution to make to missionary theology? Anthropology certainly raises questions for theology. Some of these call for a widening of the scope of theological thinking as we know it.

Let me take a simple text that creates no problem whatever to us. "’As a man disciplines his son, the Lord your God disciplines you." (Deut. 8:5). This comes from a nomadic patriarchal community. It also fits our way of life, though it threatens to become less meaningful for each generation. I know a community where a father never disciplines his son. The mother’s brother would be offended if his role were so usurped, and it might well lead to divorce. Note what theology is involved-the concepts of Fatherhood and Sonship, their relationships, the authority and providence of the Father, and so on. When our Christian theology stems from imagery derived from culture forms and patterns, and the missionary hastocommunicatethese in symbols of quite different culture, is there a text book in theology anywhere that will help that missionary?

If we believe the Bible is a sufficient rule for life and practice, then what does Deuteronomy 8:5 mean in a matriarchal society, where many missionaries have to communicate today? Anthropology does not provide the answer but it does clarify the issue so the problem may be clearly stated. The anthropologist will ask, for instance, "Does this say that a woman-dominated society is sinful because its ways are not patriarchal like those of the Jews, and therefore the mission is justified in changing their patterns of descent and inheritance?" "Or does it rather mean," the anthropologist goes on, "that particular truth about God is put this way for the benefit of patriarchal people? Would it not be better restated for a matriarchal group.

He might even suggest a way of putting it: "As a mother’s brother disciplines his nephew, so the Lord your God disciplines you." Has the truth been lost by the change? The meaning is certainly transmitted correctly, but the literal text is lost. Is the missionary entitled to this freedom, say in Scripture translation? The anthropologist exposes the problem. The theologian has to give the answer. But in the final analysis it is the field missionary who faces the problem in the real-life communication situation. It is no theoretical or philosophical matter for him; he knows the: spiritual destiny of men is involved.

That is only one example of many. So much of our theology is based on the imagery of personal relationships within the Graeco-Roman or Hebrew complexes-concepts like reconciliation, redemption, adoption, atonement, sacrifice, fellowship and so on ad infinitum. Even our worship patterns and our ethics are culturally conditioned.

Suppose a missionary finds himself in a community where a sacrifical configuration ramifies throughout the whole way of life. He wants to transmit the idea of the sacrifice of Christ. This is not merely a matter of translation. Pagan theology arises at every point. For a start, finding the right word is itself a problem. He is confronted with a highly refined vocabulary of sacrificial forms from which to select, with a whole set of differentiations that do not coincide with the English or Greek meanings. Here is a completely different frame of reference. He has to learn to think sacrificially. He is like a musician, trained only in the chords of the octave who is trying to record something sung in a pentatonic scale. Anthropology helps him recognize that there are two completely different kinds of harmony, or two different sacrificial frames of reference. Theology has to determine whether or not the transposing has been legitimate. But once again it is the field missionary who has to face the desperate question: How can I bring this man to a decision for Christ? If I give him a score in the octave of the West, will it be meaningful to him? Can I transpose it into his own scale? And if I do, is the harmony of the cross valid in the pentatonic scale?

The role of the missionary anthropologist is to bring together the seminary theologian and the field missionary. Where the missionary has clung to these patterns of the West, quite frequently the young church has ultimately split off and become an independent church, perhaps with some quite heretical tendencies. This, in itself, shows the missionary religion did not satisfy the felt needs of the group concerned. This is the day for interdisciplinary understanding between theology and anthropology. In any case, the seminary student preparing for the mission field should at least be made aware of his approaching confrontation with this kind of problem. If we neglect to prepare him f or this he may well try to impose a purely Western theological way of thinking, which is not meaningful but learned by rote, and creates an entirely wrong ideaoftheChristian faith. Many an enclosed, non-growing, foreign-patterned mission church has come from this.

6. What is the missionary role in "directed cultural change"? Not so long ago anthropologists (usually spoken of as "salvage" anthropologists) were highly critical of missions for destroying the cultures of their converts. There was perhaps some justification for the criticism, although the critics themselves never understood either the facts or the dynamics involved. Today there is more emphasis on the fact of change itself. Every culture is subject to change.

It is largely because of this that missionaries can communicate their ideas to other cultural situations. While the anthropologist is interested in how, why and when people innovate, the missionary and social worker, the health officer and agriculturalist, the administrator and educator, are all concerned with the same complex of social and psychological forces. However, while the anthropologist is an objective observer interested in cultural dynamics, per se, these others are all subjectively involved in directing the change to the greatest benefit of the society. They all have their successes and their failures, and often an anthropological analysis can expose the reasons. It follows that so-Lind anthropological training is therefore a valid addition to the course for the preparation of missionaries who are to be engaged in cross-cultural communication of the gospel. And not only evangelism is involved; even service projects can be injurious if they are not anthropologically administered. If the excessive giving of aid leads to a state of dependence, it only builds trouble for the future. Many a community of "rice Christians" has been established this way. They came into being with some relief or aid program and after a century are still the same numerical strength as when they began. Aid itself may be good and right, but it requires administration with anthropological insight, lest it be directed to paternalism rather than to indigenous activity, outreach and initiative.

The process of change needs to be smooth rather than disruptive. Excessive shock has to be avoided. There are three types of component in each situation of culture change: (1) features that ought to be preserved, (2) features that must be discarded, and (8) features that may be preserved with a little modification. I once served this philosophy to a committee of Fijian chiefs and pastors, and found they accepted it with common consent as a basis for discussion of a constructive program of reform. Smooth change is possible but one has to be sensitive to the signs of the group’s readiness for that change. It has to be relevant, it has to meet the felt needs, and it has to be timely. If a missionary is to be aware of these qualities in a situation he is more likely to be able to interpret them if be has been trained in anthropology. He requires common sense and he requires grace and guidance, but a good understanding of why people behave as they do in a cross-cultural situation, viewed negatively is a good safeguard against serious error, and viewed positively is a great aid in knowing how to take command of an opportunity and direct change toward the growth of the church and the glory of God.

Some evangelicals may ask, "Does this not take the emphasis off the divine role in mission and put it on man?" I do not think so. To me, God is always in the pattern, ever constant and ever faithful. Man is the variable. Yet God has accepted men as His fellow-workers (I Cor. 3:9). We are responsible for our pounds (Luke 19:11-28), or talents (Matt. 25:14-30). The vine-dresser (Luke 13:6-9), harvesters (John 4:35), servants (Matt. 22:8-10) and shepherds (I Pet. 5:2) were all human agents responsible to the Lord, knowing their respective crafts, and open for judgment if their service was irresponsible (Matt. 25:26-27).

PROPOSED COURSE
In the light of the six points above, what should be included in the proposed course of study for missionary candidates who have had no anthropology in a secular university? Obviously, the candidate should be given a sound appreciation of what anthropology is about. He should have mastered enough basic texts to permit him to see the field whole. He should be directed further in social anthropology, culture change and primitive religion (his areas of special concern), together with linguistics or any other units that might apply to his specific missionary appointment. He needs to digest carefully some of the good tribal profiles, enough to show him the variation in human society, and a wide reading of those peoples who inhabit the geographical region of his appointment. Some subjects, like methods in field work, which seem essential to me, are only given to advanced students in most secular universities, Yet the truth remains, a missionary must have this no matter how limited his basic anthropological training. This is the one course that really trains him to meet man f ace to face across cultural barriers. We need a special course, which may never yet have been worked out, for missionary field contacts and rapport, together with a seminar with new and old missionaries to deal with problems stemming from such things as the pagan-Christian encounter, magic, polygamy, cross-cultural ethics, and the problem of meaning.

All this is obviously not possible in a single course. This is why anthropology would be considered a full-time professional burden in a well planned training course for missionaries. One of the main irritants of the present situation is the assumption that the normal course for the training of the ministry at home is adequate also for the missionary. This presupposition I most hotly contest.

From the professor’s point of view I consider this course should be taught by a man who has been trained in the subject himself. It is not fair to ask him to do so merely on the basis of a long and faithful missionary service. His experience may be valuable, but he has no frame of reference on which to organize it and relate it to the reading sources, either for his own or his students’ edification; or to organize his attack on the specific problems of the field, relating to them the critical resources that anthropology can bring to bear on these problems. He has no access to the basic tools that are available, the repositories of sources, the technical journals, and the continual flow of professional testing and counter-testing that is so vital in emerging disciplines, nor is his theologicallyconditioned vocabulary adequate for him to use the anthropologically-conditioned reference material available, unless he takes time off to make himself proficient in this respect.

On the other hand the course requires more than a man whose training has been confined to anthropology. He needs to understand the missionary problem from the inside-the idea of mission, its biblical and historical roots, its motivation, and to have been subjectively involved in specific situations of success and failure. Unless he has shared in this he will never fully appreciate the non-anthropological factors in the missionary situation itself. So he needs some theological training and especially a good working knowledge of the Bible itself. Consciously or unconsciously, every anthropologist brings his own personal faith and philosophy to bear on his science. The range among anthropologists is as wide as among theologians. It is not every anthropologist who is competent to train missionaries, but I believe a good many are.

The young person who believes God has called him to mission has a right to expect adequate training from the seminary into whose hands he entrusts his life. The seminary, like the missionary, is responsible to God for its stewardship. What actually has to be done within the seminary? The following are the pre-requisities for the preparation of an adequate seminary course:

1. The objectives of the course need to be stated.
2. The scope of the course has to be outlined.
3. The basic principles of missionary anthropology have to be hypothesized.
4. The problem areas for special exposure need to be- defined.
5. A teacher with the bilateral qualifications has to be found.
6. The composition of and procedure for the class should be established.
7. The availability of resource material and library should be checked.

This poses a formidable set of problems for any seminary before a suitable course in missionary anthropology can even be begun. Very few seminaries and Bible schools are in a position to do this. Trained anthropologists with missionary experiences are few in number.

However, there may be more of them about than we imagine. Therefore I put forward the following proposal in the hope that this article may bring forth some response. I propose:

1. That a consultation of missionary anthropologists be called for the purpose of establishing some kind of professional corpus that can speak on the subject of missionary anthropology;

2. That the consultation discuss such matters as those mentioned in this article and define the range of missionary anthropology as a discipline. Papers could be presented on the aims and objectives, scope, resources, basic principles, and problem areas; these papers serving as a basis for discussion. Ultimately the papers and discussions might be published and provide a useful guidebook for seminary professors.

3. The consultation would also permit the recording of the whereabouts of trained personnel, establish a fellowship, and create an organization for initiative and action. It might, for instance, subsequently arrange f or seminars for professors of missions, who want to develop their understanding of missionary anthropology, and provide them with guidance in how to use sabbatical leave for working within the discipline of missionary anthropology.

All these details would need to be worked out, together with a scheme for financing the project, if the proposal draws a good response. In any case, the problem is very much with us, and our day is far spent. At least this way is practicable and its possibilities are great.

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