David Jacobus Bosch - Transforming mission : paradigm shifts in theology of mission

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American Society of Missiology Series, No. 16

TRANSFORMING MISSION

Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission

TWENTIETH ANNIVERSARY EDITION

David J. Bosch

Founded in 1970, Orbis Books endeavors to publish works that enlighten the mind, nourish the spirit, and challenge the conscience. The publishing arm of the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, Orbis seeks to explore the global dimensions of the Christian faith and mission, to invite dialogue with diverse cultures and religious traditions, and to serve the cause of reconciliation and peace. The books published reflect the views of their authors and do not represent the official position of the Maryknoll Society. To learn more about Maryknoll and Orbis Books, please visit our website at www.maryknollsociety.org.

Copyright 1991, 2011 by Orbis Books

New concluding chapter copyright 2011 by Martin Reppenhagen and Darrell L. Guder Published by Orbis Books, Maryknoll, New York 10545
All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Bosch, David Jacobus.

Transforming mission : paradigm shifts in theology of mission / David J. Bosch.

p. cm.(American Society of Missiology series ; no. 16)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 0-88344-744-4; ISBN 0-88344-719-3 (pbk.); ISBN 978-1-57075-948-2 (rev pbk)

1. MissionsTheory. 2. MissionsTheoryHistory of doctrines.

3. Christianity and other religions. I. Title. II. Title:

Paradigm shifts in theology of mission. III. Series.

BV2063.B649 1991

266.001dc20

90-21619
CIP

For Annemie

Contents

Part 1
New Testament Models of Mission

Part 2
Historical Paradigms of Mission

Part 3
Toward a Relevant Missiology

Index of Scriptural References

Index of Subjects

Index of Authors and Personal Names

In Memoriam

David J. Bosch, 1929-1992

On April 15, 1992, just one year after Transforming Mission was published, David J. Bosch died in an automobile accident in South Africa. At the age of 62, a preeminent Protestant missiologist, his contribution and influence in mission studies globally was immense.

After missionary service in Transkei from 1957 to 1971, David was professor of missiology at the University of South Africa from 1971. He served as dean of the faculty of theology in 1974-1977 and again in 1981-1987. He was general secretary of the Southern African Missiological Society from its founding in 1968 and editor of its journal Missionalia from its inception in 1973. He served as national chairman of the South African Christian Leadership Assembly in 1979 and as chairman of the National Initiative for Reconciliation from 1989, as part of his tireless ministry to bring about reconciliation among racial, denominational, and theological groups in South Africa and across the world.

A prolific author and eloquent lecturer, fluent in Xhosa, Afrikaans, Dutch, German, and English, Bosch lectured widely in Europe, Britain, and North America. His doctorate from Basel was in New Testament, and he brought profound biblical insights to his work in missiology. He was a bridge person, respected as much in the World Council of Churches as in the World Evangelical Fellowship and the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization.

When Transforming Mission first appeared, it was received with critical acclaim, recognized as a monumental, magisterial work and a superb teaching tool. It was selected as one of the Fifteen Outstanding Books of 1991 for Mission Studies by the International Bulletin of Missionary Research. But it is more than that. Transforming Mission is in a class by itself. It has become a standard reference in studies of the Christian world mission, perhaps the most widely used textbook in mission courses. David Bosch's magnum opus has become his enduring legacy to all who seek to understand, to serve, and to spread the cause of Christ in the world.

One of my lasting memories of David Bosch is from his visit with me a few years before Transforming Mission was published. He had received an invitation to join the faculty of one of the leading seminaries in the United States as professor of world mission. As we walked along the ocean beach in Ventnor, New Jersey, he discussed the pros and cons of leaving South Africa and coming to this attractive post, where he could devote himself more fully to teaching and writing, removed from the stress and struggle going on in South African society, events in which he was deeply involved. I encouraged him to accept the invitation. But at the end of our long conversation, he said, No, I don't think I can leave my colleagues and the struggle in South Africa. It is a critical moment and that is where God has placed me.

It was this kind of bold humility that characterized David Bosch, and it is what he calls for in Transforming Mission.

Preface to the 20th Anniversary Edition

WILLIAM R. BURROWS

In the years since 1991, when David Bosch's long-awaited masterpiece Transforming Mission was first published, it has achieved such wide recognition thatnot without reasonadjectives such as classic and magisterial have been applied to it. Moreover, in the twenty years between the first printing of the original Orbis edition and this 20th Anniversary Edition, translations have been published in Chinese, Korean, French, Indonesian, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Japanese, and Hungarian, not to mention a South Asian edition published in India. Meanwhile, other translations are currently underway into German, Czech, Turkish, and Polish.

David Bosch did not live to see the fruits of his labor disseminated beyond boundaries no one could have predicted in early 1991. During Holy Week, on April 15, 1992, four days before Easter, David died in a road accident. David and I formed what may have been one of the first international friendships born with new technology as the midwife, before we met each other on a rainy spring day in 1991. In the two years before Transforming Mission was published, before email had become common, we were constantly faxing one another with questions, suggestions for revisions, criticisms of the text, and so forth. In the Orbis files, the record of our growing friendship is five inches thick. We met face-to-face for the first time in April 1991 and talked nearly non-stop for ten hours before my wife and I dropped him off in New Haven at the Overseas Ministries Study Center. I never saw David again, but I knew that I had worked with and had become friends with a man whose great holiness and immense learning expressed what God had accomplished in a great heart.

It is an honor to pay tribute to a saint and doctor of the church and to commend a new edition of his missiological masterwork to a new generation of readers. And it is especially pleasant to point to the splendid final chapter authored by Martin Reppenhagen and Darrell Guder. They place David and Transforming Mission in context. They bring into relief its salient features and make us aware of the main currents of both praise and criticism of the book. Most of all, they bring up-to-date the missionary task of both theology and the church in the third millennium.