Ancestor Christology

The study of the application of the title ancestor to Christ permits the author to delve into the Christological reflection in Africa today through one of the principal ways. At play here is the inculturation of the faith, which cannot be fully achieved without a process of theological assimilation of the fundamental parameters in the African life. The thesis, therefore, is not only limited to a mere description of the contemporary panorama in that respect, but attempts to offer a theological evaluation of the real expressive capacity of the title, as it has been proposed. The criterion used is therefore double: In the first place, the thesis tried to show that the human and the divine natures of Jesus Christ can be maintained in such a way that there is no rupture with the great tradition of the Christological councils. In the second place, if it is capable of responding to demands of Christology from above and from below. In all this, however, the horizon of the debate is not occidental exegetical investigation well known by the author; but from the theological ambient of sub-Saharan world. The conclusion is positive, pondering the terms involved. The work can be of great use in the christoogical endeavors of contemporary Africa, as well for those who desire to delve into it. Don Alfonso Carrasco Rouco (director of the thesis and now Bishop of the Diocese of Lugo Spain) The work of Don Cletus Chukwuemeka contains a clear description of what we may call African traditional religiosity as well as the theological efforts to inject Christianity into this cultural and religious tradition. The central point of these efforts revolves around the understanding of Christ. The most original aspect of this work is in the critical recourse to the figure of the ancestor or proto-ancestor to present the identity of Christ in a way that is faithful to the Church tradition, and at the same time, significant for the religious and cultural tradition of Africa. Dr. Don Gerardo del Pozo Abejn (Censor of the thesis)

In this critical study, Dr Turbi Luka uses historical-theological methodology to engage in detail with Christologies of key African theologians and conventional theological sources for Christology, including the church fathers Tertullian and Athanasius as well as modern theologians. Turbi argues that existing African Christologies, specifically ancestor Christologies, are inadequate in expressing the person of Christ as Messiah and saviour, the fulfilment of Old Testament prophesies. Providing a new approach, Turbi proposes an African Linguistic Affinity Christology that explicitly portrays Jesus as Christ in a contextually relevant way for Africans in everyday life. This crucial study highlights the need for biblically rooted Christology and for sound theological understanding and naming of Jesus at every level. This book also warns the church in Africa, and elsewhere, to avoid repeating the dangerous christological heresies of the ancient church by remaining faithful to a biblical interpretation and orthodox theology of Christ.

This book seeks to demonstrate the significance of Ancestor Christology in African Christianity for christological developments in World Christianity. Ancestor Christology has developed in the process of an African conversion story of appropriating the mystery of Christ (Eph 3:4) in the category of ancestors. Logos Christology in early Christian history developed as an intricate byproduct in the conversion process of turning Hellenistic ideas towards the direction of Christ (A. F. Walls). Hellenistic Christian writers and modern African Christian writers thus share some things in common and when their efforts are examined within the conversion process framework there are discernible modes of engagement. The mode of Logos Christology that one finds in Origen, for example, is an innovative application of the understanding of Jesus Christ as Logos (incarnate); a new key but not discontinuous with the Johannine suggestive mode or the clarificatory mode of Justin Martyr. African Ancestor Christology is at the threshold of an innovative mode and the argument this book makes is that this strand of African Christology should be pursued in the indigenous languages aided by respective translated Bibles; a suggested way is a Logos-Ancestor (Nanasɛm) discourse in Akan Christianity.

Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, Frankfurt/M., New York, Oxford, Wien. There is a plethora of Christological initiatives to creatively and firmly root Christianity in Africa without either Christianity compromising its prophetic vocation or the healthy cultural values of the people being destroyed. From the backdrop of the African religio-cultural scenario and the patrimony of the Church these Christological models seek to address the question, but you, who do you say that I am? (Mt16:15). It is a Christological question which underlines the need for a relevant theology which arises from and is accountable to the people. The African cult of the ancestors epitomizes the African quest for salvation (soteriology), goodness in the society (ethics), relationship with one another (community), union with God (spirituality), and the end of the human person (anthropology and eschatology). These African values are perfectly fulfilled in Christ. This work singles out the African ancestral Christological model with its paschal and ecclesiological dimensions to demonstrate, that even though no human term can exhaust the mystery of Jesus Christ, the ancestorship of Christ as perfect and analogical model opens up a mutually enriching dialogical encounter between Christianity and the African culture. Through the analysis and application of the Christological conciliar definitions of the Church from the council of Nicea to Chalcedon, this African confession of Christ as the ancestor is weighed on the balance of the classical Christological orthodoxy. Contents: Ancestor - Christology - Christianity - Inculturation - African Theology - African Culture - Councils - Religion.

How does the global Christian community understand Jesus Christ? Christology examines historical and contemporary understandings of Jesus from a worldwide perspective.

Noting the relationship between philosophy and the doctrine of the Trinity, this book offers the African pre-Christian understanding of God and the "Ntu"-metaphysics as theoretical gateways for African reflections on the doctrine of the Trinity.

"Who do you say that I am" (Mark 8:29) is the question of Christology. By asking this question, Jesus invites his followers to interpret him from within their own contexts-history, experience, and social location. Therefore, all responses to Jesus's invitation are contextual. But for too long, many theologians particularly in the West have continued to see Christology as a universal endeavor that is devoid of any contextual influences. This understanding of Christology undermines Jesus's expectations from us to imagine and appropriate him from within our own contexts. In Re-imagining African Christologies, Victor I. Ezigbo presents a constructive exposition of the unique ways that many African theologians and lay Christians from various church denominations have interpreted and appropriated Jesus Christ in their own contexts. He also articulates the constructive contributions that these African Christologies can make to the development of Christological discourse in non-African Christian communities.