Looking at Missions from an Anthropological Point of View

by William J. Kornfield

An anthropological view of missions relates to values, ethnocentricity and missionary ghettos, says William Kornfield. This article, which sets the stage for the next four, shows the practical issues in a missionary’s life and work that care affected by his attitudes toward national culture. He gives five guidelines for cross-cultural missionary situations.

An anthropological view of missions relates to values, ethnocentricity and missionary ghettos, says William Kornfield. This article, which sets the stage for the next four, shows the practical issues in a missionary’s life and work that care affected by his attitudes toward national culture. He gives five guidelines for cross-cultural missionary situations.

"What primitive man seeks above all is not truth but coherence; not the scientific distinction between true and false but a vision of the world that will satisfy his soul."’ These words by Claude Levi-Strauss have an application beyond so-called "primitive" man – in fact, it probably could be said of most of the world’s populations that "what man seeks above all else is not truth but coherence, a vision of the world that will satisfy his soul." What we often fail to realize is that most non-Western cultures see life as far more of an integrated whole than we do, and therefore are more holistic (seeing life as a whole) than dichotomistic (seeing life in separate parts) in their value orientations. In Africa, for instance, "traditional religions permeate all departments of life, there is no formal distinction between the sacred and secular, between the religious and non-religious, between the spiritual and material areas of life."² The failure of Western missions to realize this fact has been one of the major contributing causes for the widespread proliferation of African sects today.

For the Navajos, the largest Indian tribe in North America, their world is still a whole and there is no dichotomy between the natural and the supernatural, or between the material and the spiritual; in fact, their world and life view is so well tied together that one looks in vain for the word "religion" as a separate entity in the Navajo language. 3 Like most non-Western cultures, instead of having a Sunday school or morning worship type gathering that must begin and end "on time" at a specific time on a specific day of the week, they are "event oriented" (rather than time oriented), and their traditional religious beliefs and rituals are interwoven throughout their entire culture.

Thus, for many non-Western societies, Christianity is "locked up in a box" (in a church building? most of the week and therefore has little practical relation to the whole of life. Furthermore, particularly in Africa 4, as well as among the Navajos and certain other cultures, the concept of a distant future time^3,4 is either difficult to conceive or not highly valued and therefore to place an emphasis on "escape from hell" is virtually meaningless. In this specific context of preaching about hell, a Christian anthropology student recently made the following significant observation:

While I was in New Mexico last summer, I did see many dedicated missionaries . . . Unfortunately, however many of these were preaching to the Navajo in exactly the same manner which they would to a white man. The trouble with this is that a Navajo isn’t a white man nor does a Navajo usually think as a white man does. Because of this fact many Navajos do not really understand what Christianity is all about and only a few have sincerely responded to the gospel.⁵

The second key area that should be touched upon is that of ethnocentricity, which erroneously postulates that "my" culture and way of doing things are superior to that of another culture. This is a serious problem in that it not only hinders communication and stifles genuine church growth, but also fosters paternalism – a "father-son" relationship and attitude in which national Christians are not considered sufficiently mature to direct their own church and hence must constantly be supervised by the missionary. Mission programs may be defined as ethnocentric, and consequently paternalistic, to the degree that they superimpose Western cultural patterns on the national church, as manifested so often by a Western type of administration, seminary or Bible institute curriculum (often a carbon copy of the homeland), an Anglo-Saxon order of worship service, liturgy, music, preaching and teaching. As to the latter,

A few moments reflection leads to the unsettling suspicion that most teaching and teachers falls into patterns that increase rather than decrease the barriers to communication across cultural and social lines. The teaching methods used, the content of what is taught . . . the motives of the teacher – often combine to encourage the general and specific separations of knowledge that prevent the real transformation of traditional society and culture. The teacher is caught in the trap of being exactly what he is: a relatively educated, sophisticated, and dedicated outsider, trying to work with people who live and think differently than he does."⁶

Even "extension education," which has been claimed to be more anthropologically oriented, has frequently been an extension of methods even more foreign to the national culture than the previous residence type of training. This is particularly true where the programmed texts have been prepared by Western missionaries from outside the country where the materials are being used. Thus the cultural transplant is still with us.

A third area crucial to the kind of impact Christianity is making in cross-cultural contexts today is that of the missionary ghetto. While the typical mission compound is becoming an anachronism in many parts of the world, most mission organizations still seem to function within this frame of reference. We may not live behind high compound walls, isolated and physically separate from the nationals, but really just how effective is our communication with the non-Christian world round about us? As one mission leader recently said, "If you want to test your effectiveness in the country where God has called you, simply ask yourself the following question, `Can I name ten non-Christian nationals whom I could call my friends and they would consider me theirs?’" Can we name even five? If we can’t, then perhaps God would have us reevaluate our ministry, and take definite measures to correct this situation, thus breaking through the professional missionary stereotype.

As we consider then the relation of anthropology and missions, what practical advice can be given? The following five guidelines should be fully taken into account in all cross-cultural situations

1. Be culturally sensitive to the value orientations of the area where you are residing. The nationals will often be more interested in the "events" of life and in you as a person than in Western efficiency goals and timetabled programs.

2. Learn the cultural cues that will enable you to become not only bilingual but even more important, bicultural [the ability to be comfortable in either culture because you know the role expectations of both]. To be bicultural is to be culturally flexible. In this context the apostle Paul is our best example, "I am made all things to all men that I might by all means save some" (1 Cor. 9: 22 ).

3. Seek to build genuine friendships with non-Christians as well as Christian nationals, thus avoiding the missionary ghetto complex, which has heretofore been so devastating to effective communication. This will enable you not only to establish natural channels of communication for the gospel, but also help you to understand how these channels operate in terms of building the national church.

4. Study the history and culture of the people where you are working, thereby learning to identify positively with what they value from their past as well as their present. If they have a written literature, learn to appreciate it, as the "soul" of a people is often expressed through their literature and poetry, as will as their mythology and religion.

5. Avail yourself of the opportunity to receive some definite training in anthropology if you have not already done so. This is recommended in particular to those who are in leadership or administrative roles. Most missionaries, including mission leaders, have received training heavily weighted in the direction of theology with little or no anthropology, resulting in a serious imbalance which should be corrected as soon as possible.

Endnotes
1 "Man’s New Dialogue With Man." Time, June 30, 1967.
2. Mbiti, John S. African Religions and Philosophy. Heinemann, London, Ibadan and Nairobi, 1969.
3. Kluckhehn, Clyde and Leighton, Dorothea. The Navajo. The Natural History Library, Anchor Books, Revised Edition, Garden City, New York, 1982.
4. Dickson, Kwesi and Ellingworth, Paul. Biblical Revelation and African Beliefs. Lutterworth Press, United Society for Christian Literature, London, 1969.
5. Flieschman, Eric. "Distinguishing Marks of Traditional Navajo Thought and My Observations." Unpublished ms. for an anthropology course, Wheaton College, Wheaton, Ill., 1973. These observations have also been confirmed by Mr. Duane Begay, a Navajo Indian pastor, in a personal interview, Wheaton, 1973.
6. Hickman, John. "Linguistic and Sociocultural Barriers to Communication" in Practical Anthropology, March-April, 1968.

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