Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions

A. SCOTT MOREAU, ED. Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Books. 2000. Pp. 1,068, indices, preface, index. $60.00. Part of Baker Reference Library, this dictionary is edited by A. Scott Moreau, associate professor of missions and international studies at Wheaton Graduate School, Wheaton, Illinois. Associate editors include Harold Netland, associate professor of philosophy of religion and mission, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois, and Charles Van Engen, a professor of biblical theology of mission at Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California. volume contains some 1,400 entries, of which about 700 are content articles, that is, they cover topics and themes dealing with the practice of missions. Of the 330 contributors, the great bulk stem from evangelical institutions or missionary organizations. book contains much material of value to any serious student. It includes some 483 biographical entries, including those on such major Anglican figures as Gilbert A. Cragg, interpreter of Islam; Albert R. Tucker, missionary to Uganda; Lucian Lee Kinsolving, who was sent to Brazil; and Samuel Schereschewsky, the Russian-Jewish bishop and translator in China. It describes a host of organizations and movements as well, including such Anglican ones as the Church Missionary Society and the Claphani sect. There is hardly a nation in the world that does have its own separate article, be it as tiny as Andorra or San Marino or as new as Belarus or Ukraine. There are other strong features, such as a wide range of theological concepts (e.g., sin, holiness) and current modes of analysis (e.g., ethnologies, missiological anthropology). editors are quick to affirm that the volume is not a dictionary of evangelical missions, but a dictionary on world missions from an evangelical perspective (p. 7; emphasis in original). It is genuinely comprehensive, however, in the sense that certain prominent Roman Catholic missionaries (e.g. Ignatius of Loyola, Mother Cabrini, Mother Theresa) receive highly appreciative treatment. So too do figures of early Christianity, the medieval church, and Eastern Orthodoxy. Articles on many topics are non-polemical, including such matters as sacraments, pacifism, postmillenialism, liberation theologies, and the second Vatican Council. There are some surprisingly gaps, however, at times combined with not-so-subtle editorializing. Note in particular the treatment of various regions and countries. In the piece on Latin America, one reads that The spirit of God must renew stagnant evangelical churches (p. 557). article on Canada mentions neither the Anglican Church in Canada nor the United Church, yet is quick to point out that the nation is scarred by overt immorality and radical humanism (p. 159). Similarly, the entry on Iceland finds at work such dechristianizing influences as prosperity, secularism, occultism, and New Age philosophies (p. 467). In South Korea rapid economic growth comes at the expense of sexual revolution, divorce, drugs, and crime (p. 545). Treatment of India neglects altogether the Church of North India and the Church of South India. article on the nation-state of Israel begins in the usual fashion with population figures and square miles, then omits all further description to explore Israel as a theological concept. One would think there was a single Christian among the Palestinians, for the article, indeed the entire volume, neglects them completely. Some material is too oblique, some puzzling. …

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