Christology From Below: Methodological Issues,Global Trends,and Contextual Proposals

Introduction

That Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever (Heb.13: 8) is a biblical truth that Christians of all ages affirm. Christians, from Jerusalem to Jakarta and from the 1st to the 21st century, worship the same Jesus. However, the way that Jesus has been depicted throughout history and throughout different cultures has not been monolithic. The depiction has ranged, according to Jaroslav Pelikan, “from the most naïve and unsophisticated to the most profound and complex” (1985: 4). While some of the depictions seemed to have said more about the people than about the Jesus portrayed in the Bible, others have challenged and enriched the Church. In all these representations, there are continuity and discontinuity. The aspect of continuity can be attributed to the fact that the focus of the investigation is the same person, Jesus of Nazareth. The reasons for discontinuity can be varied. One reason beneath the different descriptions of Jesus inhabits the issue of methodology. By methodology, I mean the ways people make sense of Jesus and present him to others.

In the Christological studies, there have been two broad starting points: “from above” and “from below”. ¹ Although “from below” Christology emerged as an organized discipline later in the history and was initially viewed with some suspicion within some circles, today it has become an established way of doing Christology especially in the global context (see the section on Global Trends). Over the years, even the meanings attached to the terms have transmuted. While most theologians no longer see the two methodologies as contradictory, especially as employed today, some have found it beneficial to prioritize one or the other. The majority world Christians’ approach to the Christological study could be categorized as “from below.” Such an approach consequently yields Christological insights that both enrich and challenge the traditional way. Nonetheless, the precise meaning of “from below” is not clearly delineated. As will become evident later, sometimes people have different things in mind by the term. The objective of this article is to explore the concept behind the Christology “from below,” examining its historical development, assessing its theological assumptions, and investigating its contextual applications in the global context to cultivate some biblical principles for an ongoing contextual theological conversation.

I will try to achieve my goal by examining the topic under three sections. First, I explore the historical origin and theological concept of the term “from below.” Second, I investigate how the term is being used in the global context especially in the majority world settings and examine the rationale for it. ² Third, I evaluate the advantages of and challenges associated with employing the concept, highlighting how such awareness can be beneficial for contextual theology. To that end, I propose some theological principles for a more productive employment of the concept and for an ongoing discussion of this topic.

Christology “From Below”: The Historical Development and Theological Presuppositions

The term “from below” concerning Christological inquiry is commonly used to distinguish “from above.” Various other terms with accompanying nuances are also employed to differentiate the two: ascending versus descending Christology (Sobrino, 1985: 337–338) ³ , saving history versus metaphysical Christology (Rahner, 1975: 215), historical Jesus versus kerygmatic Jesus (Erickson, 2005: 682), and so on. Although the precise meaning is dependent on how the terms are employed and by whom they are used, there are a few general distinctions between the two. First, while “from above” and its associate approaches attempt to begin by assuming the confession of the divinity of Jesus as found in the New Testament and expressed by the early Church, “from below” and its companion approaches want to begin by investigating the historical basis for faith in Jesus without first assuming the deity of Jesus (Kärkkäinen, 2016: 4). This seems to have been the initial distinction when the terms “from below” and “from above” emerged. For others, “from below” simply means approaching the Christology study from the existential life experiences of ordinary Christians as opposed to coming to the “puzzle from the upper side, that is, from the divine initiative of God’s perspective in becoming man” (Tennent, 2007: 108). In this approach, the practical and existential encounter with Jesus is emphasized as opposed to starting from the ontological and metaphysical contemplations. While there are more to these two emphases, they are the fundamental distinctions that commonly emerged in the Christological conversation. As will be shown in the following text, whereas some see the two fundamental frameworks as mutually exclusive, others do not. Yet, few do not find the two methodologies particularly helpful, which makes it all the more necessary for us to investigate the reasons.

The two broad approaches of Christology, “from above” and “from below,” (or simply “the two approaches” henceforth) have garnered some discussions over the past few decades. In the past, favoring one approach over the other, especially in the first sense, produced divergent conclusions. The dominant orientation of Christology of the Church until the modern era was the approach “from above” (Erickson, 2005: 682; Kärkkäinen, 2016: 5; Wellum, 2016: 86). During this time, historical reliability was taken for granted and assumed rather than argued. However, such assumptions began to be challenged beginning from the Enlightenment period wherein also the approach “from below” arose (Kärkkäinen: 5). When the search for Jesus began purely from a historical approach, the Christ of faith was jeopardized. Erickson notes (and Kärkkäinen concurs) that the Jesus who emerged as a result of employing the latter methodology during the 19th century was often “Jesusologies” as opposed to real Christologies (2005: 684; 2016: 5 respectively). By Jesusologies, they mean the resulting Jesus was “a human being and a little more” (Erickson 684).

The Jesus who emerged from a purely critical study is stripped away from any divine distinctive, such as that of Robert Funk and the Jesus Seminar (1996). Funk’s attempt to discover the real Jesus without any prior theological presupposition is mistaken. His predetermination that the Jesus he discovers “will subvert the Jesus we think we know, the Jesus we venerate and cherish” (19) is in itself an a priori theological commitment. Some would argue that Funk’s Jesus, whom he claims to have discovered purely from the historical-critical approach, turns out to be in direct contrast to that of the biblical writers. However, as many have shown and rejected, Funk speaks more for himself and the Jesus Seminar he founded than for the Jesus of the Bible. Oliver D. Crisp rightly asserts that a purely historical-critical inquiry of the life of Christ is not bound to yield the whole truth about the historical Jesus (2007: 162–163).

Understandably, therefore, some evangelicals such as Steven J. Wellum maintain a sharp distinction between “from above” and “from below,” seeing no redeemable element in the latter. For him, prioritizing one over the other is more than a preferred methodology; it is affirming or denying doctrinal commitment a priori. Wellum argues,

While these phrases [“from below” and “from above”] are defined in different ways, from below is best understood as the attempt to do Christology from the vantage point of historical-critical research, independent of a commitment to the full authority of Scripture; from above refers to starting with Scripture as God’s own accurate and authoritative word written in texts, so that we do Christology from the point of view of these texts . . . [Thus] Jesus can be rightly identified only from above, never from below. (2016: 86–87)

Wellum points out and elaborates three main concerns with the approach of Christology “from below.” First, such an approach denies the Scripture the necessary and sufficient conditions to warrant and ground Christology. Second, it fails to achieve the uniqueness and universal significance of Jesus. Third, it cannot sustain Christian faith (87–92).

A few are not satisfied with driving too sharp a wedge between the two approaches, at least theoretically, although they may favor one over the other. While they would not necessarily see the two methods as antithetical, Wolfhart Pannenberg and Jon Sobrino opt for an approach “from below.” For Sobrino, to start “from below” is to “avoid abstractionism and the attendant danger of manipulating the Christ event . . . [because] focusing on the Christ of faith jeopardize[s] the very essence of the Christian faith if it neglects the historical Jesus” (9). It is evident from his emphasis that he is not necessarily eschewing the Christ of faith but rather wants to begin epistemologically from the Jesus of history. In doing so, he was following Wolfhart Pannenberg who also refused to adopt a “from above” approach (1977 [1968]: 34ff). One of Pannenberg’s objections to the “from above” methodology is that it already presupposes that which must be first enquired: instead of inquiring the reasons for the confession of Jesus’ divinity, we have already presupposed it (34). However, he goes on to declare, “In spite of our rejection of a Christology ‘from above,’ we shall later show the relative justification for such a way of approaching the question.” (35). Later he affirms, “Thus, while Christology must begin with the man Jesus [from below], its first question has to be that about his unity with God” (36). Both Sobrino and Pannenberg take the “from below” approach as the starting point to reach the Jesus of faith. On the other hand, Colin E. Gunton argues that such an approach demonstrated by Pannenberg and others that “attempts to evade, or to postpone consideration of, the explicitly theological content of talk about Jesus, has not shown to be successful” (1983: 30). And yet, Gunton acknowledges, “Nevertheless, there are, in Pannenberg’s theology possibilities for what may be called a purified Christology from below, in which the defects of his over-rationalist approach are avoided” (30). The point is here is that although one approach is favored over the other, they are cautious not to over-dichotomize the two.

Today, however, for many, a neat distinction or exclusive preference of one approach as understood especially in the first sense is no longer desirable. Myk Habets avows that both “methodologies are now considered a starting point, not a single orientation” (2010: 42). A correlation that “from below” produces truncated Christology and “from above” a robust Christology cannot be sustained anymore. Kärkkäinen contends that the preferred adoption of the two approaches should not be seen as a test case that differentiates “conservatives” and “liberals”; rather, it is a preference for methodology (2016: 4). Others like Erickson (2005), Gerald O’Collins (2009), Timothy Tennent (2007), Stanley Grenz (2000), and Roger Haight (1999), with distinctive emphases and nuances, concur that both approaches could be united in theologizing. O’Collins speaks on their behalf when he declares: “A genuine Christology ‘from above’ begins from the divinity of Christ but it will go on to do justice to his humanity. Vice versa, a true Christology ‘from below’ begins from the humanity of Christ but it will go on to do justice to his divinity” (17). For them, Christology “from below” does not necessarily have to imply a quest for Jesus detached from the historic affirmation of the Church.

Thus, Christology “from below” today no longer represents the intentional rejection of the kerygmatic Jesus (Jesus of faith). Today, most evangelicals are united in affirming that the “from below” approach can be used positively. For Tennent, Christology “from below” may “help restore the biblical integration of the person and the work of Christ by shining light on the ‘underside’ of the Christological puzzle” (2007: 131). Erickson contends that in discussing the question of Christology “from above” and “from below,” one must differentiate the ontological and epistemological issues and place a proper emphasis on each. He continues, ontologically one takes the deity of Christ for granted, but epistemologically one does not merely assume the deity of Christ. Rather, one begins the inquiry by considering “the possibility of reliable historical knowledge of Jesus” (1991: 625–626). He believes that the kerygmatic Christ is “the key that unlocks the historical Jesus” (2005: 691). As representatives of the broader evangelical Christians, Tennent and Erickson show us the utility of the approach “from below” while upholding a kerygmatic Christ.

Michael Bird, a New Testament scholar, argues that the kerygmatic Jesus formulated by the New Testament writers was also dependent on their prior historical experience (2006: 306–307). He exhorts that in our search for the historical Jesus, we must maintain the historical otherness of Jesus to avoid making our experience the sole referent that inevitably will lead to subjectivism (309). In Bird’s words, this is a safe way “to marry the spirit of the age without divorcing the historical Jesus” (302). Just like for Tennant and Erickson, then, Christology “from below” would be an approach to the person and works of Christ from the existential and historical space without denying the metaphysical and ontological reality. Understood in this sense, Christology “from below” can enrich the Church. Such an approach leaves room for both the continuity and discontinuity in Christological studies and experiences. It also seems to capture the general panorama of the Christological studies of the majority of Christians.

Christology “From Below”: Global Trends

The desire of the majority world Christians is to make Jesus Christ relevant to their daily lives and experience him as their lord and savior in their contexts. One need only skim through the vast amount of literature on the topic to realize this to be the case. ⁴ As such, Christology “from below” seems to be their favored Christological reflection. This method emphasizes the existential and experiential encounter with Jesus while assuming the ontological reality of Christ. It takes one’s experience of Jesus as an epistemological lens to make sense of the fullness of the Jesus of the Bible. Therefore, such an approach does not automatically fall into the limitations raised by Wellum earlier. Majority world Christians generally operate on the assumption that the Word of God is the infallible truth and the supreme authority for Christian life and theology. The precise application of the Scripture may not be monolithic, and there may be room for dialogue, yet most affirm the preeminence of the Scripture. Therefore, Christology “from below,” an approach the majority world Christians opt for, need not be set in opposition to the high view of the Scripture.

While in the traditional Christology, various titles of Christ found directly in the Bible—Messiah, Son of God, Son of man, Son of David, and so on—are taken and reflected from contextual realities, the majority world Christians lean toward titles that have immediate contextual relevance to biblical Christological resonance. Of African Christological approach, Charles Nyamiti distinguishes two types: “from the Bible to African reality” and “from African reality to Christology” (1999 [1989]: 18–19). And he asserts thus, “This second type of theologising . . . is the one which is most frequently used” (18). Although slightly dated, such an observation seems to remain valid as demonstrated by Stinton’s approving reference of the same distinction (2004: 23, 49). Titles such as the Great Ancestor, Ideal Healer, Mediator, Great Chief, and so on, as opposed to the biblical titles like the Messiah, Son of man, Son of David, and so on, are considered to make Jesus more relevant to the worldview of the African communities (Mbuvi, 2014: 148; Moloney, 1987: 506). For instance, one of the roles of an ancestor in African belief is to mediate between God and his or her living relatives (Nyamiti, 1984: 19). The familiarity then is invoked as a bridge to understand Christ more fully.

In Latin America, Christology has a strong pragmatic lenience. There is a general tendency to prioritize doing over knowing. The beginning of Christology is, therefore, no longer the theoretical reflection but the pragmatic appropriation of Jesus’ teaching. Thus, orthopraxis and orthodoxy become reciprocally related. Thus Erickson observes about the Latin Liberation theology (and Christology), “Genuine discipleship is measured not by what one thinks about Christ, but by whether one follows and obeys his teaching” (1991: 159). Sobrino writes, “Pondering the real-life situation only after it has been experienced in concrete terms, Latin Americans have been prompted to see Christ in very new and different terms” (33–34). For Sobrino and others, the subjective starting point of Christology is faith as a lived experience (351). In Africa, the predominant image of Jesus is Ancestor, Chief, or Healer; in Latin America it is Jesus as the Liberator (Küster, 2001: 51).

While African and Latin American Christians are more prone to identify Jesus with specific titles, Asian Christians are more ambivalent in their choice. The very uncertainty, however, is in itself a sign of their contextuality. Whether it is C.S. Song’s “the crucified people,” Stanley Samartha’s “theocentric Christology” (Küster, 2001: 79–132), Yangkahao Vashums’s “Jesus the Rooster” (Vashum, 2017: 113), or the many attempts to reconcile Jesus with the dominant understanding of the Transcendent in Asia, they demonstrate the efforts of Asian Christians to navigate the fine line of religious pluralism and exclusivity of the historical Jesus. It shows how Christians endeavor to makes sense of Jesus within the existential reality of their context while trying to remain faithful to the Christ of faith.

The challenges posed from the socioeconomic angles in Latin America, ethnocultural issues in Africa, and religious standpoint in Asia influence the ways Christians attempt to make sense of their theology (Pachuau, 2018: 118). Christians who are struggling with different questions and challenges forge their understanding of Jesus through the lens of their contextual realities. The logic is that such approaches allow Christians to relate with Christ by synthesizing their familiar image with fundamental Christian values (Moloney, 1987: 507). In order for Christ to take deep root in their lives, their understanding of Christ must be built on the existing mental framework. Not to do so would lead to the same pitfalls of the earlier missionaries who considered the nationals as a tabula rasa on which Christian identity is somehow to be engraved (Bediako, 2011: 391). Focusing on familiar Christological themes gives them a mental framework to understand who Jesus is and how he is relevant to them, allowing Jesus to be engraved in the memory of the community. Such an experience, in turn, enriches the biblical imagery of Christ and benefits the global church (Nyamiti, 1998: 30).

What can we say of such proposals that call for utilizing the known to connect the unknown, the familiar to bridge the unfamiliar? What are the advantages and limitations of such Christology “from below”? We will attempt to address this issue in the following text.

Christology “From Below”: Evaluation and Proposal

As indicated earlier, our perception of reality is to a large extent a mediated perception. By mediated perception, I mean we conjure known concepts and images to make sense of those that were previously unknown to us. It is true that we may have a direct experience of God, yet even in that experience, we cannot avoid that we still must employ known categories to communicate it (for a brief and helpful discussion on this topic, see Peterson et al., 2013: 33–58). The point here is that in order to make sense of Jesus of the Bible, we must start with the available categories—cultural, mental, religious, and so on. ⁵

Therefore, there is no debate about the benefits of communicating Christ through familiar categories. In fact, there is no other way to make sense of Jesus Christ other than through our known frameworks. Jesus as the Savior, the Bearer of the sins of humanity, the Lord of the universe, the Alpha and Omega, the Son of Man, and so on, must be conceptualized through and with categories familiar to us. That is precisely what the early Ecumenical Councils did. The high Christology ⁶ of the Bible was conceptualized, communicated, and defended with the available Greek philosophical tools—along with the accompanying strengths and limitations (Bauckham, 2008: 58–59; Vanhoozer, 2014: 14–15). Likewise, today the high Christology of the Bible can be conceptualized, articulated, and communicated with the available resources but without ignoring or undermining the past Creed. Thus, some of the proposed titles of Jesus can possess significance in day-to-day life.

As Christianity transitions into different cultures, it must adapt to suit the new sociopolitical and cultural realities. As various people groups read and interpret the Scripture, our understanding is enriched and the Church is edified. It is befitting that we give more attention to how our brothers and sisters from those regions are theologizing. The majority world Christians’ theologizing is a piece in the formation of a more extensive Christological narrative.

Christology “from below” also has the potential to bring the perspectives of the neglected and marginalized to the forefront. The perspective of those from the margins can enlighten those in the center. Since no one theologizes with a blank slate, our preconceived ideas often impinge on our most honest, objective exegeses. Our preconceived ideas are often hard to notice, much less to eradicate. Generally, the opinions of the more privileged are favored at the expense of those in the margins. How the power structure is set up and distributed also influences the way scientific inquiries are conducted (Frostin, 1985: 127). Hence, our goal is to overcome, in the words of Christian Scharen, the “epistemological obstacles” by “unearthing the personal and social unconsciousness” of thoughts that we embody unreflectively (2015: 37–39). An alternative approach can compensate the dominant Christological narratives, some of which have been construed more through the Hellenistic categories and less through the biblical text (González, 1990: 149).

However, we must also not overemphasize the voice from the margins. As Michael F. Bird aptly puts it, “Presuppositions are fences not dungeons. . . . [W]e peek through them and even tear them down when necessary” (2006: 303). What Bird means is that in our dialogue with the text, we must continually and progressively allow the text to correct our understanding. No doubt we employ our memories, framework, schema, and so on, to conceptualize reality and theologize (Bediako, 1998; William A. Dyrness and Oscar Garcia Johnson, 2015: 32, 43–68), including our understanding of Jesus Christ. However, we need not always employ our past experiences or conceptual frameworks positively (Toren, 1997: 230). We must weigh the cost.

Our experience of Jesus as Healer, Savior, and Master, and so on, must accord with the portrayal that he is indeed the healer, savior, and master in the biblical sense. It is true that our perceptions and experiences of Jesus in many ways are contextual, yet it is also true that the person we experience is the same Jesus. Unless Christians have shared objective criteria to evaluate knowledge and experience of Jesus, it will become difficult to answer others’ radical claims of Christ. If all experiences are of “experience as,” we run the risk of succumbing to the claims of people like John Hick.

John Hick takes the position that all knowledge is “knowledge as”—for instance, Christians know God as the triune God, but Hindus know it as the Transcendental being—and concludes with a pluralistic religious hypothesis to reconcile the diverging claims (1993: 3–16). Given his presupposition, Hick did not hesitate to deny Chalcedon Christology and settle for the incarnation as a mere metaphor (1977: 167–188). I would argue that Chalcedon Christology is more than a cultural commentary on Jesus’s life. It is a serious Christological reflection of the early Church that still has an abiding biblical significance for the contemporary Church. As such, Hick’s position is problematic. His position, nonetheless, is a reminder for the necessity of christologizing in the biblical, ecumenical, and local context. Crisp, therefore, rightly warns us of the danger of the Hick’s historical-critical methodology that presumes to discover the deity of Jesus in the gospel without any prior theological assumption (2007: 160, 154–184). Crisp is not denying that such an approach will yield some truth; he is skeptical that such an approach will yield the whole truth.

There are both elements of continuity and discontinuity between the gospel and the culture, and overemphasizing the continuity also creates the same problems of ignoring the continuity. Understandably, some have raised concerns about uncritically overemphasizing the continuity in Christology “from below.” For instance, Rodney Reed and Gift Mtukwa, while finding some utility in the use of the term Ancestor, caution us of its potential abuse. They contend that when applied to Jesus, it could reinforce the ethnocentrism associated with the term in traditional belief (2010: 156–161). They assert, “What Africa desperately needs is not a Jesus formed in its (African) image, but Africa shaped in Jesus’ image” (162). Although their fear is not about the use of the term per se but the potential abuse of the term because of its associated understanding within the African context; their apprehension reveals the fine line between contextualization and (negative) syncretism and the need to carefully delineate the two. It will be worthwhile to recognize that the holiest Ancestor or the saintliest local Healer stands on the same ground of human depravity as others. Rather than exalt Christ, they can relegate him to the character and status of an ordinary human.

The substitutions of the non-biblical localized titles for the biblical titles can create unwarranted domestication of Jesus. Although some proposals of Asian Christologies such as those of Peter Phan and C.S. Songs have commendable elements, they seem to go too far in contending that “the Asian reality . . . and not Bible and/or tradition, is the starting point” in Christologizing (Phan, 1996: 403) and “Jesus means crucified people” (Song, 1996: 216). While the Latin American Christology such as that of Leonardo Boff has admirable components, his proposal to maintain “the primacy of orthopraxis over orthodoxy” (Martinez-Olivieri, 2014: 89–90) puts the texts at risk of construing their meanings in the light of our existential challenges before letting them speak in their own words. Victor I. Ezigbo aptly puts it that “it is an error to assume that peoples of Africa [or majority Christians] cannot truly experience Jesus Christ unless he is described with a local metaphor, for example, as an ancestor” (2010: 304). He also rightly states that every contextual Christology must avoid the danger of becoming “irrelevant to the development of the Christologies that exist outside of its context” (301).

The meaning of Ancestor, Healer, Mediator, Liberator, Rooster, and so on, can be a helpful lens through which Christ’s person and work are interpreted and understood; however, I suggest that these titles must not in themselves become the controlling paradigm to replace the revealed titles in the Scripture. In other words, the local titles should not be competing models; instead, they should be helpful imagery to make sense of Jesus who is revealed in the inspired Word of God. While it is true that we must apprehend Christ with and through the available cultural categories, we must also let Christ of the Bible transform our imageries. The texts of the Scripture are not raw data upon which we supply meanings; the texts come with theological meanings. While some biblical forms/categories are not closely tied to the theological meanings (God is our rock), some are (God is a Father). For instance, the title Son of man for Jesus has a broader theological and prophetical reference. Despite the fact there are nuances in the understanding of the concept of “the son of man,” New Testament scholars agree that there are rich theological precedents for the term (for a brief discussion, see Ben Witherington III, 1990: 233–262). Substituting that title with another will silence this rich theological reference and, at worse, misguide the very identity of Jesus. It also undermines the epistemic primacy of the Scripture. Understandably, therefore, others like Wellum are wary of Christology “from below” (2016: 92). Even though we draw insights from general revelations, the Scripture alone comes to us as God’s interpreted redemptive act in creation. Although the meaning of the texts can be more fully discerned as Christians read and listen together, we should let the Scripture drive our interpretations.

While we recognize that we participate in the drama of God’s redemptive story and that we forge our unique story in this rich tapestry, we also should acknowledge the discontinuity between the contemporary communities and the community that was instrumental in bringing the Canon. As Vanhoozer rightly puts it, “The Bible is both the authoritative version of the drama of redemption and the authoritative script for the church’s ongoing life” (2005: 115). He continues, “The canon is the script of the theo-drama, the normative specification of what God was saying and doing in Christ” (141). We must make room for the unique place that God allotted the biblical writers in his redemptive drama. Whereas their writings are inspired, ours are not. So while we are called to model our lives on the way they lived, we are not necessarily called to theologize precisely the way they theologized. ⁷ The Canon is closed, and we must recognize the freedom and limitation that comes with that reality.

I suggest that in employing local titles and images to conceptualize Jesus of the Bible, we must recognize their temporality and maintain the primacy of the revealed titles. While the revealed titles of Jesus such as “Son of God,” “Son of Man,” “Lord,” and the like are also conceptualized and communicated within a cultural, linguistic framework, they have abiding theological significance, some of which I have mentioned earlier. If for nothing else, maintaining the distinction between the revealed titles of Jesus and our contemporary titles for Jesus helps us to differentiate between the human search for truth in a particular context and God’s revelation to humans in a given time and place. Hence, it is more beneficial (and biblical) to use extra-biblical titles to communicate and supplement the biblical portrayals rather than substitute them. At the same time, the majority world Christians’ experience of Jesus must be paid close attention to in theologizing. Therefore, the pre-Christian traditions and experiences are not to be suppressed or baptized completely; they are to be encountered, redeemed, and integrated into theologizing. Such was the case with Western Christianity. We see the residue of the pre-Christian beliefs and practices in the names of the weekdays and in the observation of Christmas and Halloween; we celebrate the bravery and sacrifice of our ancestors and heroes (Veterans Day and Memorial Day) even during corporate worship gathering. Yet, we integrate those practices in Christian life with the awareness that all things are being redeemed through and in Christ. Even those who tend to see it differently are mindful that disagreements in these areas are in-house Christian differences. We could extend the same courtesy and self-criticism to the practices of our brothers and sisters around the globe. This proposal is not a call to adopt a (negative) syncretistic Christology but a suggestion to allow Christology to emerge from the ground up by keeping the inspired, infallible Word of God as the primary source.

Conclusion

Oliver Crisp makes an important observation about our conception of Christology: if non-Christians can affirm the central tenets of our Christology without holding on to any other distinctive Christian doctrine—incarnation, crucifixion, resurrection, and so on—then such a Christ is inadequate (2007: 183). The point is clear: is our Christology bringing us to Jesus of the Bible by exalting him or is it distracting us from the Jesus of the Bible? The question we must wrestle with is not just whether our Christology is false but whether our Christology does justice to the whole portrayal of Jesus of the Bible. Keeping such awareness in mind, Christology “from below” can be redeeming.

In this article, we have looked at how the term Christology “from below” emerged, was understood and used, modified and reified, and adopted and applied in the global context. I argued that the majority world Christians favor the “from below” approach to the Christological puzzle. This method takes the existential encounter with Jesus seriously and attempts to Christologize from the ground up, allowing it to serve as a counteractive force to the approach that starts from the ontological and metaphysical aspect. At the same time, I also emphasized that if unchecked, the approach “from below” may create room for a vulnerability of compromising the priority of the text and the uniqueness of Jesus presented in the Bible. In the end, I suggest that it is best to use the non-biblical titles as complementary, although subordinate, and not competing models. Stated differently, they should supplement rather than substitute the primary titles for Christ. Our Christological formulation should help us see the Jesus of the Bible more clearly and beautifully, the Jesus who is the same yesterday, today, and forever.