Book Notes 3

For the third set of book notes I read the first 5 chapters of Disciples of All Nations. It was a very historical book, but the most important point I can put in here is something the author does in all five chapters. The author commonly looks at what is going on in the margins of Christianity. This is incredibly helpful, especially during the slave trade when Christianity was in full empire mode.

Chapter 1

This chapter details ways early Christianity was directly helpful to the society around them. Rather than seal themselves off from a world that was suspicious and violent towards them, they promoted charity and a dynamic community. The author uses examples of the apostles as well as Tertullian. The author makes a point of saying that this Christian heritage is crucial if one is to understand what it means to be Christian.

Chapter 2

This chapter is unique as it analyzes some of the interactions between Christianity and the Muslim world. The most powerful point that I feel the author makes here is the argument about a revealed language. Christianity not having a revealed language made it a religion for everywhere and a religion for everyone. At the same time, this also led to the rapid creation of Christianities instead of one cohesive religion. This is one of the major points that Islam scoffed at Christians for in the early days. In a certain degree, that notion still exists today. The Quran translated into English is exactly that...the Quran translated into English. The only true Quran texts must be written in Arab. The Bible is considered the Bible no matter what language it is written in, despite the Catholic church foisted the Latin language upon people. Blame Charlemagne. Word.

Chapter 3

This chapter details the slave trade and colonial aspects. It lauds the early success of Catholic missions even though they would eventually deteriorate. In this chapter and in the next, the author makes it a point to show that many good Christian activities took place during these times instead of focusing on the obvious bad ideas. He certainly admits to and includes the negative, but that is not the purpose of the book. The eventual empowerment that Christiainty gives slaves is an ironic event in the face of a religion that was used to oppress them.

Chapter 4

This chapter builds directly on 3 and many of its concepts are hard to separate. The largest idea is that the reason that Christianity led to empowerment, even in the midst of oppression was the advent of vernacular Bibles. The fact that Africans could read the Bible in their own language made it their own. This one simple aspect kept colonial rule from stripping away their identity completely. Governments were using missionaries to subdue the people, but instead it set themselves up for well-organized and passionate revolutions.

Chapter 5

This is a shorter chapter, but I think the author uses it to clarify a few key points. He wants to show that earlier Christian history existed within Africa prior to the African churches claiming their independence. While many negative events occurred under the colonial church, I got the feeling that the author feels like it is not a good thing to throw the whole thing out with the garbage. In fact, it would seem that this book was written by a true historian. The past is important to know where our future is going...that sort of thing. The analyses in this chapter provide a picture of what various forms of Christanity were able to do in Africa prior to the concept of indigenous churches.