CHAPTER IV
TOWARDS A MARA THEOLOGY
OF MISSION
1.
Introduction
The
idea of paradigm changes in theology which has been discussed in the previous
chapter is of importance and relevance for the understanding of Christian
theology of mission in our contemporary world. The primary purpose of this
chapter is to create a relevant contextual theology of mission for the Mara
church out of the interaction between the gospel and the traditional cultural
practices of the Maras. This chapter looks at the traditional concept of
God-human-world relationship and its significance for the construction of a
contextual Mara theology of mission for social transformation. It will be
helpful to discuss briefly the centrality of the God-human-world relationship
in Christian theology and how the gradual shift in the understanding of
God-human-world relationship has been taking place before discussing the actual
Mara concept of God-human-world relationship. This will help us to see the
validity of the Mara understanding of God-human-world relationship for the formation
of a Mara theology of mission. We will also look at the significance of this
model for the eco-theology and the Mara feminist theology of mission for the
transformation of the Mara society. It is quite obvious that unless certain
principles of life or philosophy provide the basis, no society can practise
such a communitarian way of living. The author will look at the underlying
principles of the Mara communitarian society called ‘apiepasaihna’, its meaning, theological validity and its
significance for the transformation of the Mara society towards the fullness
and realization of God-intended life for human community.
2.
God-Human-World
Relationship
It
will be helpful to discuss briefly the centrality of God-human-world
relationship in Christian theology and the gradual shift in the understanding
of the God-human-world relationship which has been taking place before
discussing the actual Mara concept of God-human-world relationship. This will
help us to see the validity of the Mara understanding of God-human-world
relationship for a Mara Christian theology of mission. Since our world view or
understanding of God-human-world relationship affects our attitudes, the way we
understand ourselves, the way we relate to other people, and the way we relate
to the environment, the earth and all other creatures, a proper articulation of
the Christian understanding of the God-human-world relationship is important. A
right understanding of God-human-world will not only give us an appropriate
vision of society, it will also inspire us to struggle to build a new social
order.
Theology
itself may also be defined as a systematic and coherent articulation of how the
community of faith perceives God-human-world relationships, to assist the
community and individual believers to be more effectively engaged in the
mission of Jesus Christ for the realisation of the reign of God here and now.[1]
For David Tracy, ‘God-human-world’ is an analogical imagination of an ordered
relationship, which expresses the inseparable inter-connection of these
realities. It remains possible to distinguish them, to understand them distinctively
in order to unite these mutually reinforcing realities into the
similarities-in-difference, the ordered relationships of a systematic theology.[2]Theology
is concerned to explain how people have perceived and experienced the
interrelationship of these three realities.
2.1.Theological
debate on God-human-world Relationship
In
the history of Christian thought this relationship has been described basically
in two models – the transcendental model and the immanental model. These models
have been used to classify the two types of God-human-world relationship in the
history of religions as indicated below:
Transcendental
model Immanental
Model
Kat
henotheism Animism
Henotheism
Fethism
Deism
Polytheism
Monotheism
Dualism
Absolute
Monotheism Pantheism
Though
this distinction of two types is in some respects superficial, it reflects the
basic trends of religious thought in general and in Christian theology in
particular. The transcendental model insists that God is prior to, distinct
from, and thus beyond the world, not to be confused with anything in the world
but has its being and comes to the world from ‘beyond’. Karl Barth summarises
his early point of view as an emphasis on God as ‘wholly other’ breaking in
upon us perpendicularly from above’, and on the ‘infinitive qualitative
distinction ‘between God and man’.[3]This
concept of God ‘out there’ or ‘up there’ necessitates the ‘creator-creatures’
or ‘master-servant’ or monarchical model of God-human-world relationship.
J.A.T.
Robinson argued that the idea of God ‘out there’ or ‘up there’ and ‘wholly
other’ was overturned by the Copernican view, the spatial view of transcendence
was interpreted by Christians in a symbolic sense. The idea of God ‘out there’
for Robinson lost its significance. It is ‘a projection, an idol that can and
should be torn down’.[4]
Increasingly theologians have either made the shift from a traditional
transcendental model to an immanental model or are at least having sought to
reconcile the two.
John
Macquarrie reacted to the idea of the otherness of God and said that some
theologians have made it more difficult because they have assumed a concept of
God which separates him so absolutely from the created order that the gulf
between can never be bridged. If there is no affinity whatever between God and
the human race, if God is ‘wholly other’ and separated from us by an ‘infinite
qualitative’ difference, then it seems to me that the incarnation of Jesus
Christ is not only an absolute paradox but a sheer impossibility.[5]
Between these two extreme poles of immanence and transcendence of God, the Mara
vision of God-human-world relationship can also provide an integrating concept,
and may be used to develop an authentic Christian doctrine of God-human-world
relationship.
2.2.The
Mara Voice in the Debate
In
the Mara traditional religious belief, there was an implicit idea of a Supreme
Being which anthropologists generally called the ‘high God’ or Khazopa, a
God of all humanity and goodness.[6]
Apart
from the Supreme Being, they also believed in the existence of celestial beings
that are more personal and more involved in human affairs than the Supreme
Being, who is remote. They also believe in both benevolent and malevolent
spirits. As they regarded the malevolent spirits to be the cause of their
suffering, they used to offer sacrifice to evil spirits. When the missionaries
saw the Maras offering sacrifice to evil spirits for appeasement, they
generally thought that they were worshipping evil spirits. The idea of
worshipping evil spirits seems to have been developed by the observers, not the
Mara themselves. This observation of anthropologists on tribal religion, which
influenced the missionaries, is what the Native Americans have called the
legacy of Columbus.[7]
Based
on their cosmology or the science of the universe, heaven is above and the
earth below. They believed that the abode of the Supreme Being and all other
celestial beings is heaven, though they frequently visited human beings and
lived with them.[8]
Thus
human beings who lived on earth saw their existence as living in the midst of
spirits and so they offered sacrifices to spirits. One may think that the Maras
in reality worshipped the evil spirits, not the Supreme Being because they
offered sacrifices to the evil spirits. In the light of theodicy, the offering
of sacrifices to evil spirits may be explained as the solution to the problem
of evil. How is the existence of evil and suffering in the world consistent
with the existence of a supreme God who is believed to be both omnipotent and
good? Adherents of all religions faced this question and pondered on the
possible origin of evil.
The
Hindus regarded karma (the deeds of human beings) as the root cause of
evil whereas Christians regarded sin as originating from Satan. The Maras held
malevolent spirits responsible for all evils. For the Hindus it is the human
being who is responsible, whereas the Christians and the Maras found the root
cause not merely as originating from human beings, but from a power beyond
human control known as Satan or evil spirits. The traditional Christian idea of
Satan and the Mara idea of evil spirits have certain affinities. The Maras, who
experienced human limitations in their day-to-day encounter with nature tried
to protect themselves from misfortunes and blamed malevolent spirits instead of
blaming either God or human beings. In this way they removed God from the
picture. Ultimately, the Supreme God was seen as uninvolved in human affairs.
The
seeming transcendence of God in Mara tradition was a product of the problem of
evil. In other respects, however, they believed in the immanence of God. The
Supreme Being was believed to be a compassionate and gracious God who acted not
coercively, but persuasively and lovingly. The Supreme Being was not a silent
spectator. The chant or invocation used by a Mara priest during the sacrificial
offering to the guardian spirit of the clan or family given in chapter one
reflected that the Supreme God is acting through a particular guardian spirit
who is believed to be everywhere.
The
apparent hierarchy in the relationship of beings is sacred order rather than a
social ideal of gradation. The spirits, humans and animals are differentiated
at the existential level, but there is no real distinction in the Mara
cosmology that may convey the ontological separateness between the Supreme
Being, the spirits and human beings. Perhaps the best way to grasp the
differentiation is to think of the functional aspects of interrelatedness of
all existing things and beings in the larger context of the cosmic process.[9]
In
spite of functional differences, God-human-world formed a community in which
they are interrelated, it is therefore, quite legitimate to describe this
relationship as a ‘community model of relationship’.
3.
Model
of God-human-world relationship
It
is quite clear from the preceding discussion that the Mara concept of
God-human-world relationship is derived neither from strict ideas of
transcendence nor immanence, nor monotheism nor polytheism. None of these
categories reflects adequately the Mara understanding of God-human-world
relationship. A Community model seems to be the most appropriate model to
express the Mara concept of God-human-world relationship. In the Mara
understanding God is never perceived as wholly other but as the one who participates
in the life of the world. David Hasselgrave rightly notes that the tribal
worldview transcends the sacred-secular dichotomy peculiar to western thinking,
and brings together in a single system, nature and super nature, space and
time, this world and the other world. Thus unity is not that of monism or
pantheism, however, it is rather a unity of continuance in which boundaries
between deities, spirits, animals, humans and natural phenomena are more or
less obscure and shifting.[10]
If
we are going to explain this complex relationship with the help of a model, it
is a community model of God-human-world relationship which would certainly
provide the best explanation. A brief discussion of three different models may
help to further clarify the meaning of a community model of God-human-world
relationship.
3.1.Monarchical
or Transcendental Model
This
model maintains a sharp distinction between God and all other creatures. The
idea of extreme transcendence of God is developed from the monotheistic concept
of God which is a belief that there is but one Supreme Being, who is personal
and moral and who seeks a total and unqualified response from human creatures.[11]
It was a great achievement on the part of the people of Israel to acknowledge
God as distinct and different from all other creatures, over against pantheism
and polytheism which dominated the world of religion. This idea of
transcendence was continued and developed by Christianity to the extent of
making God ‘wholly other’, living ‘out there’. In the portrayal of God’s
relation to the world, the dominant western historical model has been that of
the absolute monarch ruling over his kingdom.[12] In
this model, the relationship of God-human-world is made possible by mediators
such as prophets, priest and finally Jesus Christ. A group of theologians
brought together by WCC to discuss the theme of Justice, Peace and Integrity
of Creation in Canberra Assembly expressed the problem of this model. ‘As
we think about the way to express the relationship of God to the world in our
time, we realise that metaphors such as king and lord limit God’s activity to
the human sphere; moreover, these metaphors suggest that God is external to the
world and distant from it’.[13]
God
was thought to be wordless and accordingly, the world could be conceived as
godless. Since this concept of God is considered partly responsible for the
ecological crisis today, J. Moltmann insisted that ‘the first change we must
make is to our image of God, because the way we think about God is also the way
we think about ourselves and nature’.[14]
3.2.Organic
or Immanental Model
The
organic model of God-human-world relationship emphasises the
inter-connectedness of all else and uses the self-body analogy to explain the
nature of this relationship. The relationship of the body and self is
transposed to the relationship of God as the self of the universe which is his
body. From this perspective, an organic model seems to be the most appropriate
to express both the immanence of God in the entire creation as well as God’s
transcendence of it. An organic model means that humans and other living
creatures live together within the body; they are part of each other and can in
no way exist separately.[15] While the interconnectedness of all
creatures and God is profoundly expressed, the model seems inadequate to
explain the doctrine of sin, human freedom and uniqueness. Does God also become
sinful along with human beings as a part of the body? How do we explain human
responsibility and freedom within the same organ? These are the fundamental
questions which cannot be convincingly explained by the organic model. Some of
these problems can be clearly seen in the WCC’s convention in Seoul (1990). It
sounds to many observers that the relationship of human beings and fellow
creatures is romanticised. Genuine agreement is possible only between partners
who are capable of entering into reciprocal relationship.
3.3.Communitarian
Model
Like
the organic model, the communitarian model affirms the common origin and
interconnectedness of all creation, but unlike the organic model it maintains
the distinctive identities of all creation and acknowledges the unique position
of humans in the created order. The uniqueness of human beings is certainly not
an ontological discontinuity, but by degrees of development in the evolutionary
process in which humans become more capable, rational, free and powerful. This
unique condition of human beings is expressed by the priestly writers as
endowed with the image of God.[16] It is important for human beings to be
constantly aware of the fact that we were a part of the larger living community
and unable to exist in isolation from other creatures. The concept of human
community, the feeling of oneness, a sense of identity is widened to include
all creatures. In this community, God is seen as the originator and ground of
community. Thus, the act of creation is regarded not as what a potter or an
artist does, but as bringing forth as the mother does. This means that the
universe including our earth with all its creatures lives and moves and has its
being in God. Creation is an event in time, a dynamic of becoming, from which
human beings emerge and in which they find themselves involved. They are
therefore, creatures among other creatures in the community of creation. Many
of these ideas have been helpfully developed in conjunction with feminist
approaches to theology.[17]
3.4.Significance
for Mara Theology of Mission
We
now turn to what positive contributions this model may make as part of the
basis for social transformation. Primarily, the ‘Communitarian model of God’
means for the Mara Christians, returning to their roots or original
understanding of God-human-world relationship. The idea of ‘other worldliness
of god’ and the ‘dichotomistic concept of reality’ were not original Mara
concepts. They were inherited from the western missionaries who were the
product of the evangelical revival in Europe. The theological seeds that they
sowed in Mizoram were of the conservative evangelical theology which emphasized
the transcendency of God, verbal inspiration of the Bible and salvation of
souls for life after death. Eventually this has made Christians other-worldly,
maintaining sharp distinctions between the soul and the body, secular and
religious. It is important to explain these problems briefly before exploring
the theological significance of the community model of the God-human-world
relationship for social transformation.
The
problem of a dichotomistic concept of reality, developed mainly among the
educated or enlightened people, was that their religious conviction and moral
teaching are meant only for the purpose of religion, they had nothing to do
with their day-to-day life. This dualistic concept of reality, separation of
secular and religious, body and soul is partly responsible for the present
rampant corruption and increasing social evils in the Mara society. This
theology, although it was inherited from missionaries gained momentum since
1960’s and penetrated the whole Christian community in Maraland. Since saving
the soul for life after death was the ultimate concern, they stressed the ‘born
again’ experience in order to be saved.
[1] K. Thanzauva, Theology of
Community, 149.
[2] David Tracey, The Analogical
Imagination: Christian Theology and the Culture of Pluralism (London: SCM,
1981), 429-430.
[3] Karl Barth, The Humanity of
God (London: Collins, 1961), 39.
[4] J.A.T. Robinson, Honest to God
(London: SCM, 1963), 17, 41.
[5] John Macquarrie, Jesus Christ
in Modern Thought (London: SCM, 1990), 376.
[6] K. Thanzauva, Theology of
Community, 152.
[7] Bartholomew Mella, ‘Indigenous
Culture and Evangelization: Challenge for Liberating Mission’, International
Review of Mission, Vol. 81, No. 324, October, 1992, 551-561.
[8] Wati A., Longchar, The
Traditional Tribal Worldview Modernity (Jorhat: N. Limala, 1995), 33-34.
[9] B. Saraswati, Tribal Thought
and Culture (New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company, 1991), 17.
[10] David J. Hasselgrave, Communicating
Christ Cross Culturally (Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House, 1978), 149.
[11] John Hick, Philosophy of
Religion (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1963), 3.
[12] Ian G. Barbour, Myths, Models
and Paradigms: The Nature of Scientific and Religious Language (London:
SCM, 1974), 156.
[13] Charles Birch, William Eakin and
Jay B. McDaniel, eds., Liberating Life: Contemporary Approaches to
Ecological Theology (New York: Orbis Books, 1990), 276, quoted in K.
Thanzauva, Theology of Community, 158. Hereafter cited as ‘Charles Birch,
Liberating Life’.
[14] Jurgen Moltmann, ‘Reconciliation
with Nature’ in Pacifica, Vol. 5, 1992, 304, quoted in K. Thanzauva, Theology
of Community, 159.
[15] K. Thanzauva, Theology of
Community, 159.
[16] Ibid, 160.
[17] Sally McFague, Models of God:
Theology for an Ecological Nuclear Age (London: SCM, 1987). Sally McFague
has made significant contribution in this book.
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