In the previous post in this series, we saw that "salvation" has often narrowly been understood in terms of "justification" (Reformed theology), or "saving souls" (Evangelical theology). Over the past decades, this narrow understanding has increasingly been criticized, both by Western and non-Western theologians.
God's salvation, it has been argued, must be understood to comprise social justice, healing, and/or ecology.
[Part 6 in a series on New Wine and systematic theology, drawn from my research master thesis Life to the Full. From Creation to Re-Creation, VU University 2014]
Criticism from Global Christianity
Over the
past decades, the traditional Protestant concepts of salvation have
increasingly come under criticism from theologians from the Global South. These
non-Western theologians are approaching soteriology from different perspectives
and divergent worldviews, asking different questions and emphasising other
strands in the Biblical witness of the salvation of God.[1]
And for the record, these are not merely liberation theologians and
Pentecostals, but Reformed theologians too.
They are
joined by theologians from the West, who as a consequence of a renewal of
biblical studies with its revitalized understanding of soteriology, agree that
the traditional Protestant dealing with issues of salvation often has been too
narrow. Some of these Western theologians can be associated with the
charismatic renewal within the Protestant churches, that was ignited in the
1950s - decades before any significant influence of charismatic non-Western
theology was noticeable in these churches (see the previous chapter). But quite
apart from charismatic renewal, many Western theologians have come to
reconceive their soteriologies and their understanding of the nature of
salvation as a consequence of either ecumenical dialogue - enriching
denominational perspectives on soteriology - or new insights coming from a
renewal of biblical studies, or most likely a combination of both.
The
typologies give above, then, are no more than typologies, indeed, since each
strand has more or less been influenced by these debates over the last few
decades. Bottom line of the contemporary criticism, then, has been that if we
want to be true to the Bible, the scope of salvation must be broadened to
comprise wholeness in various aspects of creaturely reality. Three broad
categories can be distinguished:
●
Social justice and peace
●
Healing and deliverance
●
Ecology.
Let’s have a
brief look at each of these categories.
1. Salvation and Social Justice
Missionary
Christianity has an ambiguous heritage in Africa, as often has been stated over
the past decades by both African theologians and Western missiologists like
David Bosch and Andrew Walls.[2] This
is not merely of matter of politics and cultural dominance, but also of
theology. Moreover, not merely Western mission has needed revision, but also a revision of theological content might be
called for, as many Western theologians have argued.
One of these
voices comes from South African Reformed theologian Gerrit Brand. As a white
South African who studied theology at the University of Pretoria and did his
PhD-research at the Theological Faculty of Utrecht University (The
Netherlands), he must on the one hand be considered a Western theologian, but
on the other hand “an African who shares many of the concerns [of African
theology]”, as he states in the preface of his PhD-dissertation.[3] This bridging-position makes him an
interesting representative. His dissertation is also interesting for our
present study because it focuses on the concept of salvation.
One aspect
of this ambiguous heritage of Western mission in Africa, has to do with social
justice - not merely as a political category (the wrongdoings of colonialism),
but in direct relation to the theological
understanding of salvation. Brand refers to the old adage: “When the
missionaries came to Africa, we had the land and they had the Bible. They said,
‘Let us pray’, and we closed our eyes… and when we opened our eyes, we saw that
they had the land, and we were holding the Bible.” Is it not true, that “very
often, the missionaries either prepared the way for the colonizing power or
missionary work was used for political purposes”?[4]
After the political decolonization of Africa, African Christianity has needed
decades to also decolonize the Christian faith and emancipate. Christianity had
to be allowed to root in African soil, and to be recognized as a religion that
is not Western and foreign, but global and true to Africa. This included a
re-thinking of the concept of salvation.[5] It is unavoidable, Brand asserts, to acknowledge that something is wrong with
the traditional Western understanding of salvation.
“What will be clear, is that, if Africans are to speak authentically and with integrity about salvation in Christ, they will have to do so in ways that differ considerably from traditional Western (missionary) precedents. At least part of an adequate African Christian soteriology will have to consist of an attempt to expose the characteristic weaknesses of traditional Western accounts of salvation. It is not sufficient to assume that ‘something’ must be wrong with Western Christian talk of salvation if such talk did not prevent, and even contributed to the enslavement, oppression, exploitation and humiliation of Africans.”[6]
It is not
surprising therefore, says Brand, that much of the African literature on
salvation is engaged in a “deconstruction” of traditional Western soteriologies
- a “hermeneutic of suspicion” applied to the concept of salvation that was
introduced to Africa by Western missionaries.[7]
And as a matter of fact, Brand stresses, Western theology should do the very
same.
Apart from
these matters of colonialism and identity, African theologians have been
pointing to the fact that Western concepts of salvation have been inadequate to
address the contemporary political,
social and economic issues that Africa is faced with: problems of
(neo-)colonialism and economic exploitation, poor government, oppression and
corruption, tribalism, racial violence and refugee crises, illiteracy, disease
and poverty. These are the areas “in which Africa’s need for salvation is most
clearly discernable”, Brand argues.
“A soteriology that has nothing to say to the present-day context in which the Christian church in Africa has to fulfil its mission is simply an unaffordable luxury, and perhaps even a dangerous form of escapism - a kind of ‘fiddling while Rome burns’.”[8]
If salvation is to be of any meaning in the
African context - or in the context of majority Christianity, for that matter -
it will have to deal with these socioeconomic and political dimensions and with
the harsh realities of life. The charge of many African theologians against
Western Reformed and Evangelical theology has been that its “crucicentrism”
meant a one-sided focus on the atonement for sin at the cross (often understood
as penal substitution), that has led to a spiritualized concept of salvation,
ignoring these harsh realities of life.
Kenyan theologian Jesse N.K. Mugambi
insists that both in the African context and in the Bible, “salvation cannot be
complete without liberation” - salvation and liberation are theologically
complementary, and by commencing his salvific ministry through his reading of
Isaiah 61, Jesus acknowledged that the one cannot go without the other.[9]
Jean-Marc Ela, eminent among Africa’s contemporary theologians, opposes any
presentation of Jesus via a theology of the “salvation of souls”, and
repeatedly insists that “salvation in Jesus Christ is liberation from every
form of slavery.”[10]
Western voices: Integral mission
The call to
reconceive salvation to comprise these aspects of social justice often is
associated with the Liberation Theology that began as a movement within the
Catholic Church in Latin America in the 1950s and 1960s, and then spread to
other churches and continents, including Africa. Many Western theologians -
like Jürgen Moltmann - have listened and learned from it.
But many others -
mostly so among Evangelical and Reformed theologians - rejected Liberation
Theologies for both their political, Marxist thrust, and their theological
method (understanding human reality from praxis).
As an unfortunate side effect, the entire theme of social justice often was
treated suspiciously.
It must be
acknowledged that despite this suspicion an awareness arose within the Western
Evangelical movement that mission must comprise issues of social justice,
leading to a movement of “integral” or “holistic” mission, as was noted in our
paragraph on the perception of salvation in Modern Evangelical theology.
However, we also noted the general refusal to consider social justice as part
of God’s salvation. We will get back to this in the next chapter. At this point
it suffices to note that this is exactly what many non-Western theologians are
pleading for: reconceiving the theological understanding of salvation, in order
to comprise issues of social justice.
Michael Welker: Realistic Theology
German
Reformed theologian Michael Welker wholeheartedly agrees. Welker - who received
his first PhD-degree in 1973 for research with Moltmann in Tübingen - is
well-aware of the pluralistic, global context for contemporary theology, and
engages frequently in exchanges with theologians from the Global South. Drawing
from these academic experiences, he pleads for a so-called “realistic theology”
that is grounded in the experiences within the Global Church. This realistic
theology is
“a theology that is related to various structural patterns of experience and that cultivates a sensitivity to the differences of this various patterns. It is precisely in this diverse and complex relation to God’s reality and to creaturely reality as intended by God that realistic theology seeks to perform its task.”[11]
This does
not imply that Welker’s theology is a theology “from below”, grounded only in
human experiences and people’s search for God, he hastens to say. “A realistic
theology mediates this need of theologies grounded in human experiences with
the concern of classical, Reformation, and dialectical theologies ‘from
above’.” In other words, while warranting the concerns of Reformed theology,
Welker aims at taking serious the experiences of believers around the globe.
This leads
him to vindicating the concerns of the liberation theologies from Latin
America, Asia and Africa, and processing this in his own systematic theology.
Without agreeing with everything that is asserted by liberation theologians,
Welker maintains that these theologies take up central biblical concerns.
“According to the messianic promises, God establishes justice, mercy and knowledge of God through a ‘Chosen One’ on whom rests the Spirit of God, as well as through the ‘pouring out’ of the Spirit. There is no righteousness without mercy, without integration of the weak, without liberation of the oppressed, without those who have been forces to the margins of society participating in the processes of economic, judicial, social, and cultural life.”[12]
Traditional
“spiritual” accounts of salvation that narrowly focus on justification must be
reconceived, Welker argues, since “material” issues of social justice and peace
belong to what the Bible describes as the core of what messianic salvation is
about. Moreover, he asserts in his extensive study on the Spirit of God in both
the Old and the New Testament, the Spirit of God is primarily the Spirit of justice and peace, acting in, on,
and through fleshly, perishable,
earthly life, establishing liberation and freedom.[13]
2.Salvation and Healing
The second
category that is firmly put on the theological agenda by theologians from the
Global South, is that of healing and deliverance. Ghanaian theologian Mercy
Amba Oduyoye makes the fundamental statement that,
“the cry for salvation/liberation in Africa is primarily a cry for health and wholeness”.[14]
The African
understanding of healing is closely related to that of salvation. While in
Western understanding illness is a bodily matter concerning the individual, the
African perception is holistic. Healing involves more than just the bodily
afflictions and reaches beyond the individual – healing is being understood as
re-creation of wholeness in all aspects of life, including the spiritual
aspects and restoration of social and cosmic relations.[15]
For much of African theology, Christian
salvation has to comprise this holistic notion of healing to be “salvation” at
all.
Within such
African theology, deliverance of evil spirits is perceived as part of healing.
Traditional Protestantism doesn’t pay much attention to this spiritual world,
if any at all. Western missionaries therefore failed to take seriously African
concerns about attacks by spirits, witches and sorcerers. When Western
missionaries denied the existence of spirits rather than claim the power of
Christ over them, they didn’t free their African converts from their ancient
beliefs and fears, Evangelical missiologist Keith Ferdinando points out.
“On the contrary, it suggested to them that the gospel had
little or nothing to say to their deepest concerns and was thus of only partial
relevance to what they saw as the fundamental issues of life. They therefore
continued to deal with these concerns in the old ways(...) Christ might be able
to save from sin, but the redemption announced by the missionaries had
apparently no response to the profoundly felt need for salvation from witches
and evil spirits. A syncretistic amalgam of Christian faith and traditional
religion was the result, a whole area of reality remaining unredeemed by the
gospel”.[16]
In a
thorough article on the growth of charismatic churches in Ghana, Presbyterian
theologian Cephas Omenyo analyses how Western missionaries in Africa assumed
the primacy of Western culture, and failed in contextualizing the Gospel.[17]
Often they accommodated their message at the first three levels of
contextualization – behaviour, values, and convictions – but failed to discern the deepest level, that of world view. Christian theology, and certainly the concept of salvation, must move
beyond its Western perceptions and resonate with non-Western culture too, or it
will fail to be “Gospel” - good news – for non-Westerners. Put shortly,
Omenyo argues,
“The process of contextualization of Christianity […] should
essentially have the reputation of harnessing resources in Christian belief and
theology in providing a holistic salvation.”[18]
Western voices: Charismatic renewal and healing
Traditional
concepts of salvation in Reformed, Modern Evangelical, and Modern Protestant
theology (as previously typified), have thus come under criticism from majority
Christianity for its failure to include issues of healing and deliverance. This
is not to suggest that this critique comes only
from the Global South. Perhaps even stronger than was the case with social
justice, this critique is also to be found within
Western theology. Within Western Protestantism, there are long-standing
traditions that make similar propositions to include healing in our
understanding of salvation. In the twentieth century, these traditions surfaced
vigorously in the charismatic renewal of the 1950s and 1960s (see my
Introductory Chapter).
A prominent
representative of this charismatic renewal in the Netherlands, is Old Catholic
theologian Martien Parmentier, the first theologian to hold the endowed chair
for the theology of charismatic renewal that was constituted at the VU
University (1992 - 2000). A well-known phrase by Parmentier is “Heil maakt heel” – “salvation makes
whole”. This is also the title of his book on healing ministry. The historic
separation between theological “salvation” and medical “healing” is rather
unfortunate, Parmentier holds, since the salvation of God is intrinsically
connected with physical and inner healing.[19]
Parmentier is hesitant when it comes to deliverance ministry, but other
theologians within mainstream Protestantism fully recognize deliverance as an
aspect of Christian healing. [20]
Excursus: Materiality of Salvation
The
charismatic renewal of the 1950s and 1960s (and in later decades) within the
traditional churches called attention to the Pentecostal movement and its
insistence on the “materiality of salvation” - the way salvation impinges on
earthly, material reality. In 1989, Croatian Protestant (non-charismatic)
theologian Miroslav Volf published an much-debated article on this “materiality
of salvation”, arguing that classical Protestant theology could benefit from
listening closely to Liberation and Pentecostal theology - “the most vibrant
expressions of Christian faith in the rapidly growing two-thirds-world church.”
A willingness to learn from majority Christianity, could help Western
Protestant theology to come to “a more adequate doctrine of salvation.”[21]
While
Liberation theology emphasizes the immanence of God and God’s activity in
history “from below”, and Pentecostal theology stresses the transcendence of
God and God’s activity as coming down vertically “from above”, they share one crucial
aspect in their soteriologies, namely their emphasis on the “materiality” of
salvation.
“Salvation is not merely a spiritual reality touching only an
individual person’s inner being but also has to do with bodily human existence.
Moreover, for both theologies the materiality of salvation is not a marginal
theme but an essential constituent.”[22]
It is
precisely in this respect, Volf asserted, that they differ most radically from
classical Protestantism. Volf then offers a sophisticated analysis of Luther’s
soteriology, showing how Luther first made an anthropological distinction between the “inner man” and the
“outward man”, and then superimposed on this anthropological distinction a
second, soteriological distinction
between “new man” and “old man”, often imprecisely identifying the two pairs of
expressions. It is then only the “inner man” who may become a “new man”. In the
present life, the “outward man” remains outside the sphere of the salvific
activity of God. Salvation then, is merely spiritual,
concerning only the non-bodily existence of man.
The earthly
realm does matter to Luther, as he stresses the importance of acts of love,
stemming from faith. But these acts have to do with temporal well-being of the
“outward man” only, with law and iustitia
civilis, and should not be understood as an aspect of salvation (and iustitia Dei) itself.
“Classical (and to a large extent modern) Protestant theology
since Luther has retained his radical distinction between salvation and
well-being and denied that salvation can be partly experienced in the realm of
bodily existence in the world. Today, both liberation theology and pentecostal
theology, each in its own way, are calling into question this soteriological
tradition. While they are careful not to identify salvation with the betterment
of the earthly condition, both claim that salvation can be experienced in the
material realm as well.”[23]
After
discussing the understanding of salvation in liberation theology and
Pentecostalism, Volf proposes that
“A responsible contemporary theology of salvation needs to
integrate the distinctive soteriological characteristics of all three
traditions discussed - the personal-spiritual aspect of salvation emphasized in
classical Protestantism, the individual-physical aspect of salvation emphasized
by Pentecostalists, and the socioeconomic aspect emphasized by liberation
theologians.”[24]
3. Salvation and Ecology
Volf also
mentions a fourth aspect of salvation, that is largely disregarded in all three
traditions: the ecological aspect. Since the early 1970s, the so-called “ecotheology”
has emerged, though - slowly gaining influence.[25]
One of its contemporary representatives within Reformed theology, is South African
Reformed theologian Ernst M. Conradie.
Christian
theology would lose its credibility if it failed to address the ecological
challenges of today, Conradie argues in his impressive investigation into views
on creation and salvation within the Reformed tradition.[26]
Moreover, it should be acknowledged that the root causes of the environmental
crisis are related to the impact of Christianity. There are some serious flaws
in the Christian tradition, allowing for the exploitation and destruction of
nature in the history of Christianity, Conradie asserts. He agrees with James Nash
that a reformation of the Christian tradition is needed, induced by the
ecological critique.[27]
Therefore, “ecotheology” should not be a sub-discipline of Christian ethics,
being a hobby for those theologians with a personal interest in nature.
Instead, the entire life and praxis of the church should include an ecological
dimension and vision.
Moreover,
the ecological critique “requires a reinvestigation of Christian doctrine as well.” This reinvestigation,
“cannot be narrowly focused on a reinterpretation of creation
theology only, but calls for a review of all aspects of the Christian faith,
including (...) salvation.”[28]
There have
been four crucial areas where Christian piety “has often inhibited an
ecological ethos, spirituality and praxis”, Conradie argues, namely,
●
a worldless notion of God’s transcendence
●
a dualist anthropology
●
a personalist reduction of the cosmic scope of
salvation
●
and an escapist eschatology.[29]
The main
issue at hand, may be the “anthropocentric notion of salvation” that has been
characteristic for much of Protestant theology. There has been,
“a long-standing tendency, especially in Protestant theology,
to portray the Christian message of salvation as being narrowly focused on the
redemption of human beings. At worst, it has been described as redemption from the earth.”[30]
Instead it
should be affirmed that creation itself must be saved (redemption of the earth). The cosmic scope of God’s
salvation implies a loving concern for all of creation (see Chapter 4).
In the next post in this series, we will briefly look into the Biblical language on salvation.
Series on New Wine and systematic theology:
Part 1: The First Time I Found Myself Praying in Tongues...Part 2: A New Reality: Challenges from the Global Charismatic Movement
Part 3: The Third Wave of Charismatic Renewal: Characteristics and Theological Roots
Part 4: New Wine and Salvation as Wholeness
Part 5: How to Understand Salvation? A Typological Overview
Part 5: How to Understand Salvation? A Typological Overview
Footnotes
[1] See Gerrit Brand,
‘Salvation in African Christian Theology: A Typology of Existing Approaches’, Exchange 28:3 (1999), 194-223.
[2] For instance, David J.
Bosch, Transforming Mission. Paradigm
Shifts in Theology of Mission (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1991), and Andrew F.
Walls, The Missionary Movement in
Christian History. Studies in the Transmission of Faith (Maryknoll: Orbis
Books, 1996).
[3] Gerrit Brand, Speaking of a Fabulous Ghost. In Search of
Theological Criteria with Special Reference to the Debate on Salvation in
African Christian Theology, Contributions to Philosophical Theology, Volume
7 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Verlag,
2002). Until his untimely decease in 2013, he worked as senior lecturer
in systematic theology at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa.
[4] Victor Wan-Tatah, Emancipation in African Theology: An Enquiry
into the Relevance of Latin American Liberation Theology to Africa,
American University Studies: Series 7, Theology and Religion. Vol. 14
(Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang Verlag, 1989).
[5] See Kwame Bediako, Christianity in Africa: The Renewal of a
Non-Western Religion (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1995) and
Lamin Sanneh, Translating the Message:
The Missionary Impact on Culture, revised and expanded edition (New York:
Orbis Books, 2009).
[6] Brand, Speaking of a Fabulous Ghost, 68.
[7] Brand, Speaking of a Fabulous Ghost, 69.
[8] Brand, Speaking of a Fabulous Ghost, 70.
[9] Diane B. Stinton, Jesus of Africa. Voices of Contemporary
African Christology (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 2004), 222-224. See also
J.N.K. Mugambi, ‘The Future of the Church and the Church of the Future in
Africa’, in: José B. Chipenda (ed.), The
Church of Africa: Towards a Theology of Reconstruction (Nairobi: All Africa
Conference of Churches, 1991) and J.N.K. Mugambi, Christian Theology and Social Reconstruction (Nairobi: Acton
Publishers, 2003).
[10] Diane B. Stinton, Jesus of Africa, 194. See also
Jean-Marc Ela, ‘Christianity and Liberation in Africa’, in: Rosino Gibellini
(ed.), Paths of African Theology
(Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1994), 142.
[11] Michael Welker, God the Spirit (Minneapolis: Fortress
Press, 1994). Translation of Gottes
Geist: Theologie des Heiligen Geistes (Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener
Verlag, 1992), x-xi.
[12] Welker, God the Spirit, 16.
[13] Welker, God the Spirit, 296-7.
[14] Mercy Amba Oduyoye, Hearing and Knowing: Theological Reflections
on Christianity in Africa (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1986), 44.
[15] Kingsley Larbi, ‘Healing’,
in: Tokunboh Adeyemo (ed.), Africa Bible
Commentary (Nairobi: WordAlive Publishers, 2006), 447. See also Diane
Stinton, ‘Jesus – Immanuel, Image of the invisible God: aspects of popular
Christology in Sub-Saharan Africa’, Journal
of Reformed Theology 1 (2007) 6-40. In an illuminating article by Zabon
Nthamburi and Douglas Waruta, they discern the “quest for salvation/healing and
wholeness” as one of the key characteristics of African hermeneutics (‘Biblical
Hermeneutics in African Instituted Churches’, in: Hannah Kinoti and John
Waliggo (eds.), The Bible in African
Christianity (Nairobi: Acton Publishers, 1997). See also Tinyiko Sam Maluleke,
‘African Theology’, in: Ford and Muers (eds.), The Modern Theologians (2007), 485-501.
[16] Keith Ferdinando, The Triumph of Christ in African
Perspective. A Study of Demonology and Redemption in the African Context
(Carlisle: Paternoster, 1999), 3. Ferdinando quotes Osadolor Imasogie: “The
usual resort of the African Christian in crisis situations is a reversion to
traditional African religious practices” (Imasogie, Guidelines for Christian Theology in Africa, Achimota: Africa
Christian Press, 1993, 52).
[17] Cephas Omenyo, ‘Charismatic
Churches in Ghana’, Exchange Vol.
31:3 (2002), 252-277.
[18] Omenyo, ‘Charismatic
Churches in Ghana’, 257.
[19] Martien Parmentier, Heil maakt heel. De bediening tot genezing (Zoetermeer: Meinema,
1997), 11-13.
[20] Within the Dutch context
the following contemporary Reformed theologians should be mentioned, as
processing notions of healing and/or deliverance in their theologies: C. van
der Kooi, Tegenwoordigheid van Geest.
Verkenningen op het gebied van de Heilige Geest (Kampen: Kok, 2006); K.J.
Kraan, Opdat gij genezing ontvangt.
Handboek voor de dienst der genezing (Hoornaar: Gideon, 1974); K.J. Kraan, Genezing en bevrijding, Vol. 1-3
(Kampen: Kok, 1983-1986); M.J. Paul, Vergeving
en genezing. Ziekenzalving in de christelijke gemeente (Zoetermeer:
Boekencentrum, 1997); M.J. Paul (ed.), Geestelijke
strijd. Demonie en bevrijding in christelijk perspectief (Zoetermeer:
Boekencentrum, 2002); J. Veenhof, ‘Charismata – bovennatuurlijk of
natuurlijk?’, in: Veenhof, Vrij
gereformeerd (Kampen: Kok, 2005); H.U. de Vries, Om heil en genezing te vinden. De dienst der genezing en zijn plaats in
instellingen van gezondheidszorg (Kampen: Kok, 2006).
[21]Miroslav
Volf, ‘Materiality of Salvation: An Investigation in the Soteriologies of
Liberation and Pentecostal Theologies’, Journal
of Ecumenical Studies 26:3 (1989), 447-467.
[22] Volf, ‘Materiality of
Salvation’, 448.
[23] Volf, ‘Materiality of
Salvation’, 453-4.
[24] Volf, ‘Materiality of
Salvation’, 467.
[25]
The emergence of ecotheology is often traced back to the publication of an
article by historian Lynn White in 1967, on the relationship between theology
and the modern ecological crisis; Lynn White, ‘The Historical Roots of Our
Ecological Crisis’, republished in A.E. Lugo & S.C. Snedaker (eds.), Readings
on Ecological Systems: Their Function and Relation to Man (New York: MSS
Educational Publishing, 1971). See also Rogers, J. (1973). ‘Ecological
Theology: The Search for an Appropriate Theological Model’, in: Septuagesimo
anno: Theologische opstellen aangeboden aan prof. dr. G.C. Berkouwer ter
gelegenheid van zijn afscheid als hoogleraar in de Faculteit der Godgeleerdheid
van de Vrije Universiteit te Amsterdam (Kampen: Kok, 1973).
[26] Ernst M.
Conradie, Saving the Earth? The Legacy of
Reformed Views on Re-Creation, Studies in Religion and the Environment Vol.
8 (Vienna: LIT Verlag, 2013), 1. Conradie explores the views of Calvin,
Bavinck, Barth, Noordmans, Van Ruler, and Moltmann. See also Conradie,
‘Creation and Salvation in the Wake of Calvin: Some Reflections from within the
South African Context, Nederduits
Gereformeerde Teologiese Tydskrif, Vol 51 (2010), 357-369. More on
Conradie, including publications, in Chapter 4.
[27] Conradie, Saving the Earth?, 1, referring to James
A. Nash, ‘Toward the Ecological Reformation of Christianity’, Interpretation Vol. 50:1 (1996), 5-15.
[28] Conradie, Saving the Earth?, 3.
[29] Conradie, Saving the Earth?, 3.
[30] Conradie, Saving the Earth?, 4.
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