Jesus as the dutiful son: Confucian ideals in Asian christology

Simon Cozens
May 28, 2010

The doctrine of filial piety is one of the most obvious demonstrations of Confucian philosophy in Asian society
today, and, according to Ching (1977, p98), the reason why Confucianism is still an integral part of the Asian worldview.
Missionaries have debated the limits of acceptable involvement in filial piety rites since the 17th century; (Luttio, 1994)
Christian firstborn sons are left with little or conflicting guidance about their role with regards to family responsibilities;
and yet Christian teaching about these areas revolves around themes of the sovereignty of God and the prohibition of
idolatry, without dealing directly with the issue of ancestral obligations.
This essay takes as its point of departure the image of Jesus Christ as the ‘firstborn over all creation’ from Colossians
1:15-18, and investigates the possibility of developing a christology of the prototypical Son, Christ the fulfillment of
Confucian filial ideals. We will proceed by investigating the contributions of Confucian theologians to date, highlighting
relevant theological work by authors from Africa, and presenting Biblical exegesis for these ideas. We will assume that
the reader has knowledge of the Confucian worldview and its heritage in the East Asian region today; Rozman (1991)
provides a useful primer.

1 Contextual christology
The discipline of christology, in the words of Phan (2003, p123), is “nothing but attempts to answer Jesus’ question
“Who do you say that I am?””. Whereas O’Collins (1995) claims to present a universal “christology” based on first-
century evidence and the historic debates of the church, Greene (2004) envisages a plurality of christologies, drawing on
the categorizations of christology from below (starting with Jesus the man) and from above (starting with Jesus’ divine
status), and Moltmann’s categories of “therapeutic” and “theoretical” christologies. (pp. 18–26) These categorizations are
a step forward, but the answer to the question “who do you say that I am?” will need to be adequately contextualized to
the cultural, historical and sociological location of the respondent.
Similarly, Parratt (1995, p81), writing about African theology, makes an interesting point in regard the development
of christologies in context: much of Western christology has revolved around the titles of Christ—Messiah, Christ, Son
of Man, Son of David, and so on—whereas such titular approaches have “not provided a promising basis for an African
christology.” Instead, Third World theologians focus more on “functional” or existential approaches: what Christ has
done, and how his deeds relate to the individual believer.
Parratt cites Pobee’s (1979, p81) question “Why should an Akan [a member of his tribe] relate to Jesus of Nazareth, who
does not belong to his clan, family, tribe or nation?” There is an echo here of the words of the Gaderene demoniac in Mark
5:7: τί ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί, Ἰησοῦ;—“what is there between me and you?” The key question in this form of christology is the
nature of the relationship between Jesus and the individual believer. We might go further and suggest that for christology
to “work” in Africa, it must be profoundly relational. Latin theology, developed in the imperial tradition of Rome and
the feudal setting of Europe, traditionally relies on positional and titular authority to communicate the person of Christ;
Eastern theology in the Greek philosophical tradition is motivated by ontological considerations; but in African—and, we
would argue, Asian—contexts, the primary relationship is the clan, the family, the ancestors. To answer the question of
how Jesus relates to us in these contexts, we must, Parratt argues, look to the acts and experience of Jesus, and, significantly
for this present study, examine how Jesus has brought us into a fuller community beyond and transcending the old clans
and communities. (p. 82)

1
 From an Asian perspective, Phan (2003) also remarks that attempts at christological investigation must be made “in
the context and in terms of their own cultures and socio-political conditions.” (p. 98) The transplanted “pot” of Western
theology must be broken for the living plant within to take root in new soil. After reviewing three contemporary Asian
christologies, he posits that an “adequate” theology must use “the resources of the Asian people, both their philosophies
and their stories.” (p. 119)
We will return to Peter Phan later as we explore his christology of Jesus as the elder brother and ancestor.

2 Existing Confucian Christologies

While many theologians have embarked on the search for a christology engaging with Confucian worldview, very few
have dealt with the concept of filial piety and the dutiful son. To examine some of these theologians in historical order:
Wu Lei-ch’uan first sought to engage Confucianism in the 1920s in China, developing a Messianic christology around
the Chung Yung’s idea of the “coming saint”; (see Lam 1983, p63ff.) Ching (1977) mentions the Five Relationships of
Confucianism but does not apply them to Christianity; Lee (1993) explores Christ as the Way and the Light; Kim (1994)
contrasts jen and agape; Yeo (2005) examines the “cruciform ren” of Christ putting an end to the law, and in Yeo 2008
develops parallels between the Jewish law and Confucian li; Tan (2006) focuses on Jesus as the Confucian sage.
Only two theologians, however, Danjo Ebina and Peter C. Phan, have directly considered the question of filial piety
and the Sonship of Christ, and we will examine and critique their thought here.

2.1 Danjo Ebina

The first Japanese Protestant theologian, Danjo Ebina, sought to integrate his Confucian worldview with Christian faith.
The locus of his faith was a personal experience of God, and he “came to discover his deep desire to seek God the Father
as his child,” (Dohi, 1997, p14). He referred to his relationship with God as a fushi ushin, ‘father-son ethics’ and saw
Christianity as “the fulfillment of Confucianism from the standpoint of his own self-identity or self-realization.” (Ishida,
1992) Japanese theology therefore began as an encounter with Confucianism and specifically with filial piety. We see some
elements in Ebina’s writing which point to Christ as the prototypical dutiful son:

The reason why Christ was aware that his relation with God was an ethical father-child relation, was that
there was an ontological father-child relationship in his person. The reason why there was an ethical father-
child sustance in Christ was that there was in his person something equal to the ousia of God. (cited in Dohi
1997, p26)

Ebina’s views were attacked at the time by Masahisa Uemura who, while happy to describe Christianity as “the way of
filial piety” (cited in Dohi 1997, p29), sought more of a break from his Confucian past than Ebina. He considered Ebina’s
christology to suffer from the heresy of adoptionism, he argued that Ebina denied the divinity of Christ, (a charge which
Ebina himself vigorously denied) he stated that if Christ is our elder brother then he is not distinctly different from us
and cannot function as our saviour, and appealed for a return to the historical creeds of the Church.
Ebina, for his part, argued that the historical creeds are the result of contextualised debates and discussions and need to
be re-evaluated in new historical circumstances. (Ishida, 1992) In a sense, Ebina’s christology is a Confucian development
of Abelard’s moral influence theory of atonement. For Ebina, Christ is able to be our saviour because he represents the
highest form of man and “the difference between Christ and us is not one of substance, but in the degree of development.”
(cited in Dohi 1997, p26) Because Christ realized the father-child relationship with God, he is able to draw out the latent
divine nature within ourselves. Similarly, for Abelard, Christ’s obedience to his Father ignites a “supreme love in us, which
not only frees us from slavery to sin, but also acquires for us the true liberty of sons of God.” (Commentary on Romans,
cited in Hill 2003, p139)
Hill goes on to point out two objections to subjective understandings of the atonement, both of which apply to Ebina’s
christology. First, merely having Christ as an example does not help us to attain that “degree of development” of which
Ebina speaks—if all we are to do is to follow Christ’s example of love then we are essentially saving ourselves; second,

2
that there is nothing necessarily salvific about Christ’s obedience, and if there is something about that obedience which is
objectively salvific, then the subjective theory is superfluous:

This, then, is a serious problem with many subjective accounts of the atonement. Either they seek too weak,
failing to explain why Christ’s death should change us so much as to save us; or they seem superfluous, riding
on the coat tails of another theory of the atonement. (Hill, 2003, p140)

To this we can add a third objection specifically for Ebina’s theology: whereas Abelard wrote from detailed personal
and cultural understanding of sin and its relationship to salvation, Ebina was always dogged by charges that he never
understood the nature of sin. (Germany, 1965, p25) In a sense, he never subjectively needed a saviour; what he needed, as
a young samurai after the Meiji Restoration had dissolved the feudal system, was a lord to serve, (Dohi, 1997, p13) and it
was his individual charismatic experience of adoption, acceptance and commitment that engendered his whole theology.
The problem which Christ solved for him was not spiritual; it was historical.
These objections should be borne in mind when developing a christology of filial piety. To overcome them, such a
christology must demonstrate that Christ’s status as proto-firstborn must provide real salvific and not merely exemplary
“value” to the individual believer, and that it is firmly rooted both in the cultural context but also in the common experience
and heritage of the Christian community.

2.2 Peter Phan

As we noted earlier, (Phan, 2003) describes some of the requirements for an “adequate” christology within an Asian
context, one of which is a serious engagement with issues of filial piety: He tackles the issue head-on by suggesting that

… an Asian Christology must develop the image of Jesus as the elder brother of the family, caring for his
siblings and responsible for the cult of the ancestors (Jesus as firstborn among the living) and after his death
and resurrection, as an ancestor mediating the life of God to the community (Jesus as firstborn among the
dead). (pp. 121)

Phan traces the outlines of a christology in these terms, stressing Jesus’s status as the firstborn son and his obedience
to his parents (p. 136) and the kinsman-redeemer image which places him at the head of his family clan. (p. 137) and
exploring how such a figure would be viewed both in Jewish and in Vietnamese society. He then deals with some of the
objections against identifying Jesus in this way, and considers the role of Jesus as high priest to the cult of worship to his
Father, comparing it with the cultic role of the emperor in Vietnamese society. Finally, he interprets Jesus’s death and
resurrection as “his own enthronement as ancestor. He is no longer dead but alive and dwells among his own family of
spiritual descendants, his adopted brothers and sisters, just as the ancestors are truly alive and present in the memory of
their descendants.” (p. 142)
Phan also makes use of Paul’s treatment of Christ as the new Adam, contrasting Adam’s disobedience to God with
Christ’s filial piety in obedience to his heavenly Father, obedience being one of the primary expressions of piety in the
Confucian worldview.1
For Phan, then, Jesus is both a “model of filial piety in an analogical sense” (p. 143) but also an ancestor who receives
the worship of his spirital descendents. In contrast to Ebina, he does not see Jesus’ firstborn status as obtaining our
salvation, avoiding some of Hill’s criticisms of subjective atonement theories; rather, Christ is the inaugurator and cultic
head of a new spiritual family.
On the other hand, there are a number of critiques we can apply to this concept. First, while Phan argues that
the measure of any christological doctrine should be its praxis, (p. 102) there is little reflection on how believers should
practically apply this theology. Despite a concern for the role of Christians in the ceremonies around the veneration
of ancestors, (p. 135) the pastoral implications are left unsaid: Should Christians no longer take part in ancestral rites?
Should they do so on the understanding that they are actually making sacrifices, in some sense, through Christ? Or is this
christology a basis for developing an separate, Christianized ancestor practice?
1
See Mencius’ Li Lau, ch. 19

3
 Secondly, it is a conjecture based on a counterfactual, portraying Jesus as one who “had he been a Vietnamese firstborn
son, would no doubt have taken upon himself with utmost seriousness the responsibilities of ancestor worship.” (p. 138,
emphasis mine.) This is a shame given that the Biblical texts provide adequate basis in themselves for the development of
a firstborn christology, as we shall see. While reimagining the Christ in a different setting is a valid means of contextual
theology, a more concrete and viable method is to take the first-century theological resources and make them, in Koyama’s
(1974, p120) terms, “amphibious”, able to “walk on the dry land of traditional Japanese cultural value” and also to “swim
in the sacred water where the Christian value is hidden.” ‘Sacred’ concepts such as the “firstborn of many brothers,”
“firstborn from among the dead,” “communion of saints” and so on are sufficiently versatile that fruitful theology can be
done without requiring us to imagine what might have been in an alternative historical universe. Hence, while more than
Ebina’s thought, Phan is rooted within the experience of his community, by being so linked to a conjectured Vietnamese
Christ, his theology still fails to relate to the wider experience of the Christian Church outside of Vietnam.

3 What can we learn from other contextual theologies?

To correct this deficiency, we shall attempt to consciously combine aspects of emerging christologies which have dealt
with similar themes. Hopefully, in so doing we will both learn from the theological experiences of others and appreciate
and celebrate the unity-in-diversity of the Christian witness, and also avoid the trap of a “parochial” theology2 .
Phan acknowledges a debt, in his own christology, to the work of African theologians who have explored similar
themes. Palmer (2004) surveys a range of African theologians who have posited ancestral understandings of christology;
we shall explore the work of two of them, Charles Nyamiti from Tanzania and Bénézet Bujo from the Democratic Republic
of Congo.

3.1 Charles Nyamiti

Nyamiti (1984) distinguishes between two types of ancestor in the traditions of West Africa, the elder ancestor, and the
brother ancestor, defined as “a relative of a person with whom he has a common parent, and of whom he is mediator to
God, archetype of behaviour and with whom—thanks to his supernatural status acquired through death—he is entitled
to have regular sacred communication.” (p. 23)
Nyamiti extends this brother-ancestry to the relationship between Christ and his church. He then explores the pos-
sibility of casting the Trinitarian relationships in an ancestral light: “the Father is the Ancestor of the Son, the Son is
the Descendant of the Father. These two persons live their ancestral kinship through the Spirit whom they mutually
communicate to as their ancestral Oblation and Eucharist.” (Olsen, 1997, p261)
One criticism of Nyamiti comes from the African context but is relevant to our Confucian explorations. Palmer (2004)
surveyed responses of a diverse group of Nigerian theological students to the concept of Christ as ancestor and found
that the overwhelming majority felt it was unsuitable. Their reasons were predominantly that Jesus historically did not fit
the criteria of ancestorship—a long life, a good death and fathering children—that ancestorship would imply a direct clan
lineage which evidently is not present between Palestine and Nigeria, that Jesus is not dead but living and that the title of
ancestor would restrict rather than reflect his divine power.
Reflecting on this study, we see the difficulty of the nature of theological analogy: Palmer’s students evidently found
difficulty in delineating the scope of application of analogy, and when the analogy was ‘stretched’ too far—the title of
‘ancestor’ applied to someone outside of their clan, unrelated, without a long life, good death and children—it ‘broke,’
and became unapplicable.
Similarly, the ideas of elder-brother ancestry may resonate to a certain degree with Confucian Christians: it it normally
the elder brother who is responsible for maintaining the ancestral rituals—although they do not normally acquire super-
natural status after death—and so the image of Christ as the elder brother of humanity, offering rites on our behalf to
his Father, is a natural one. As an explanation of Christ’s activity, this may be useful, but again it falls short as a pastoral,
2
Bevans (2009) speaks of the need for mutual dialogue between contextual theologies.

4
practical theology: where Christians are expected to make offerings to their ancestors, the analogy breaks down, as there
is a distinction between spiritual communion with the Father for Jesus and spiritual communion with human ancestors.
In a sense, however, this is taking Nyamiti’s theology beyond its intended scope. His aim is not—despite the title of his
work!—to provide African Christians with a new self -identity but to reconfigure the relationship between God and Christ
from one of “fatherhood and sonship” to one of “ancestorship and descendancy” (Vähäkangas, 1998) and to provide
contextually sensitive understandings of the agency of Christ. Taking the analogy into a new domain—self-identity for
Palmer’s students, pastoral theology in the Confucian case—will cause it to fail3 . Christology, while it must have a dynamic
relationship with the rest of our theological process, is essentially and primarily a question of the identity of Christ.

3.2 Bénézet Bujo

Writing earlier than Nyamiti, Bujo takes a similar line but implicitly recognises the difficulties involved in calling Christ
an ancestor. Instead, he uses the term “Proto-Ancestor” to make clear the analogical and exemplary nature of Christ’s
relationship to human ancestors:

Jesus manifested those qualities which Africans attribute to their ancestors. Yet the concept as applied to
Jesus is only applied analogically. Jesus is not one ancestor among many, but the ancestor par excellence. The
title of Proto-Ancestor “signifies that Jesus did not only realize the authentic ideal of the God-fearing African
ancestors, but also infinitely transcended that ideal and brought it to new completion.”(Georgen, 2001)

Bujo sees the current system of African ancestral relationships as a mere shadow of the eternal reality of Christ (Parratt,
1995, p130) and thus by essentially redefining the ancestral relationship points to an analogical understanding of the role
of Christ in prefiguring African society.
Parratt (1995, p135) critiques Bujo for failing to take into account the fact than in most African worldviews, the
ancestors are seen as a negative as well as a positive influence on current events, and that there is a clear distinction
between one’s biological ancestors and the proto-ancestorship of Christ: if the biological ancestors are receiving their life
force from the prototypical ancestor, does that mean that all ancestors, Christian or not, share in the community of Christ?
Additionally, despite Bujo’s insistence that such a christology liberates traditional African social structures, and in
particular, the role of women, ancestor theology has come under criticism from womanist theologians (Dube, 1990) for
upholding the patriachal nature of firstborn male ancestral cults. These criticisms apply equally to our Confucian firstborn
explorations, (Phan, 2003, pp. 143–145) but space prevents us from giving them a full treatment here.
Nevertheless, there is something in here that is of relevance to Confucian worldviews. Primarily an ethicist, Bujo
explores the ethical and practical dimensions of his christology with reference a selected number of church practices such
as marriage, ecclesiological structure and the rights of women, in contrast to Nyamiti’s “African scholasticism” (Parratt,
1995, p129) which is silent on its pastoral outworkings. Moreover, in so doing he presents a methodology of theological
analogy for proto-ancestorship which can be applied in practice. When constructing a firstborn christology, we must be
aware of the pastoral implications both of the christology itself–what does it mean for us now that Christ is seen as our
elder brother?–and of the analogical process underlying the christology—is it valid for me in my context to see Christ as
my elder brother?

4 Biblical exegesis of firstborn christology

Having examined some of the major theological understandings of Christ as firstborn and ancestor, let us now turn to
Biblical exegesis to further our investigation.
Before looking at individual verses, one key point is the consistent use of ἀδελφοί by all the NT writers to refer
to the believing community. The fraternal nature of the believing community is established with dominical authority
in Mt. 23:8 and Lk. 8:21; in contrast, “there is not a single clear-cut example in the Old Testament of the use of the
3
For the limits of analogical thinking, see Hofstadter 1980.

5
word brother to describe the relationship between two individuals based simply upon the unity of the human family as the
creatures of God.” (Witmer, 1969) ἀδελφός is also used as a counterpart to Hebrew ‫( אָח‬see Jer 31:34 LXX) to indicate
the community of Israel, but Balz and Schneider’s (1990, p29) argument extending the meaning to “friend, coworker or
fellow soldier” rests on the idea that Jesus did not use the word to refer to believers; however, both the verses we have
mentioned above provide counterexamples. Nevertheless, the dominant self-understanding of the Early Church was as a
fraternity of brothers4 as denoted by the “distinctly Christian use” (ibid.) of ἀδελφός.
Building this self-definition into a coherent christology, Paul states in Romans 8:29, that “his Son would be the firstborn
among many brothers and sisters”. Unfortunately for our purposes, this text, together with its parallel in Col. 1:15, are
exegetical minefields. Most commentators have rather fixated on the first part of Romans 8:29 (“those whom he foreknew
he also predestined”)—Moo (1996), for instance, writes exclusively on this, without reference to the second half, as, rather
surprisingly given the African focus of his commentary, does Adeyemo (2006)—and Dunn (1989, p189) reminds us that
πρωτότοκος πάσης κτίσεως in Colossians provokes the Arian dispute over Christ’s created or uncreated nature. As
we have seen above, the nature of theological analogy is such that there are dangers in pushing the analogies too far, at
the risk of obscuring their positive qualities.
(Dunn, 1989) links the idea of πρωτότοκος with the personification of Wisdom, suggesting Christ’s continuity with
the divine, but in his earlier commentary on Romans (Dunn, 1988, p484) links Romans 8:29 with Paul’s ‘second Adam’
motif, writing that Christ’s work as the eldest brother begins a “new family of humankind”. Friedrich and Bromiley
(1968, p873ff.) point out that not only does the firstborn takes precedence in inheritance law, receiving a double portion
and overseeing the distribution of the remainder of inheritance to the others of his generation (Keener, 1993) but also
that the firstborn sons are considered holy to the Lord for cultic purposes, (Exodus 22:29; Numbers 18:15) something
which should not be too difficult for Confucian believers to relate to. However, Friedrich considers Rom. 8:29 to refer
to an eschatological future state rather than a present reality. Our exploration of the Christian use of ἀδελφοί, however,
cannot support this understanding—first-century believers self-identified as brothers at the time, without waiting for some
eschatological future event.
Hebrews 12:23 refers to the “ἐκκλησίᾳ of the firstborn,” reflecting the church’s connection to Christ the πρωτότοκος
as designated in 1:6, gathering together for a united act of worship. Lane (1991, p468) presents arguments from Käse-
mann, Spicq and Montefiore that this gathering refers to angelic beings, but points out that the following phrase “enrolled
in heaven” is never used of angels. On the other hand, the designation of πρωτότοκος (in the singular) was applied to
Israel in Exodus 4:22 and the plural term used in apocalyptic literature for the redeemed community. However, in this
case, the writer to the Hebrews is clearly appropriating this title and applying it to his readers, the current brotherhood of
Christians.
This verse, together with Romans 8:9, provides an answer to those who would point to verses like Matthew 8:21-22
and Matthew 10:35-37 to claim that Christ stands against filial piety and seeks to break down family relationships: Christ
came to inaugurate a new family relationship built on a higher value than obedience to parents—obedience to God and the
Law of Love. This is something which Confucius would recognise as true piety: “Therefore when a case of unrighteous
conduct is concerned, a son must by no means keep from remonstrating with his father, nor a minister from remonstrating
with his ruler. Hence, since remonstrance is required in the case of unrighteous conduct, how can simple obedience to
the orders of a father be accounted filial piety?” (Xiao Jing, XV; see also Analects 4:18)
Indeed, as Phan correctly points out, a critical element of the Confucian understanding of filial piety comes from
Christ’s obedience to his heavenly Father. Paul’s contrast in Romans between Adam and Christ points to a prototypical
Son who chose obedience to the righteous commands of his prototypical Father, replacing Adam who showed his lack of
filial piety by disobeying a righteous command. Where human relationships are concerned, this understanding of Christ
may help us to find the true spirit of Confucian filial piety: Christ who respected his Father but also commanded us to
place obedience to God, the source of all righteousness, above that of human parents.
Thus the designation of Christ as the obedient firstborn son has significant Biblical support, and that the early church
understood itself as a fraternity, a gathering of a new generation based on the prototypical elder brother figure of Christ.
In this understanding, Christ, as Hebrew firstborn, receives and distributes his (metaphorical) inheritance to his brethren,
4
And, of course, sisters–c.f. Bauer et al. (1979).

6
making cultic sacrifices on their behalf.

5 Towards a new Confucian christology

We cannot here detail in full a new Confucian christology but may only sketch its contours. From Ebina we learn that it is
possible for Japanese Christians to see themselves as children of God connected to their heavenly Father through Christ
their spiritual elder brother, but at the same this christological definition must be paired with an objective soteriology to
avoid the criticisms of Hill and others; from Phan, we pick up the images of Christ as cultic representative, also an element
of Nyamiti’s thought, obedient son and kinsman-redeemer, although the practical implications of this christology need to
be carefully thought through. African theologians focus more on ancestral relationships, suggesting that Christ can stand
as a prototypical exemplar for human society. Biblically, we have seen that all of these understandings are well supported,
and that the Early Church saw itself as a confraternity of a new generation inaugurated by Christ as firstborn.
A Confucian believer can legitimately see Christ as the obedient son and prototypical elder brother, our priest, redeemer
and example. It is from this basis that a fruitful soteriology can develop, perhaps taking on the idea in Hebrews of the
distributor of inheritance.
One key concern for believers in a patrilineal Confucian environment would be the status of human elder brothers and
their relationship with their ancestors. For them, the image of Christ as the obedient eldest son gives opportunities for the
church to contextualize ancestor rites, but does not necessarily answer the question of how a firstborn Christian should
conduct himself in ancestral obligations; that said, our concern is primarily the identity of Christ and only secondarily the
self-identity of believers.
Finally, it is above all the responsibility of Confucian Christians to interpret Christ within their cultural contexts; our
study has been a theoretical one, but they can make it practical.

References
Adeyemo, T. (2006). Africa Bible Commentary, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan Publishing House.

Balz, H. and Schneider, G. (1990). Exegetical Dictionary of the New Testament: Volume 1, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark.

Bauer, W., Arndt, W. F., Gingrich, F. W. and Danker, F. W. (1979). A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other
Early Christian Literature, Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press.

Bevans, S. B. (2009). An Introduction to Theology in global perspective, Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books.

Ching, J. (1977). Confucianism and Christianity: A Comparative Study, Tokyo, Japan: Kodansha International.

Dohi, A. (1997). The first generation, in Y. Furuya (ed.), A history of Japanese theology, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.

Dube, M. W. (1990). Mary as our ancestor: An african search for identity, Master’s thesis, Durham University.

Dunn, J. D. (1988). Romans 1-8, Dallas, Texas: Word Books.

Dunn, J. D. G. (1989). Christology in the Making: A New Testament Inquiry into the Origins of the Doctrine of the Incarnation, London:
SCM Press.

Friedrich, G. and Bromiley, G. W. (1968). Theological Dictionary of the New Testament: Volume 6: Πε–Ρ, Grand Rapids,
Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Georgen, D. (2001). The quest for the christ of africa, African Christian Studies 17(1): 5–51.

Germany, C. H. (1965). Protestant Theologies in Modern Japan: A History of Dominant Theological Currents from 1920-1960, Tokyo:
International Institute for the Study of Religion.

7
Greene, C. J. D. (2004). Christology in cultural perspective, Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing.

Hill, J. (2003). The History of Christian Thought, Oxford: Lion Publishing.

Hofstadter, D. (1980). Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books.

Ishida, Y. (1992). The role of liberal theology in Japan at the turn of this century, Currents in Theology and Mission
19(5): 357—363.

Keener, C. S. (1993). The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, accordance electronic edn, Downers Grove:
InterVarsity Press.

Kim, H. Y. (1994). Jen and Agape: Towards a Confucian Christology, Asia Journal of Theology 8(2): 335 – 364.

Koyama, K. (1974). Waterbuffalo Theology, London: SCM Press.

Lam, W.-H. (1983). Chinese Theology in construction, Pasadena, California: William Carey Library.

Lane, W. L. (1991). Hebrews 9-13, Dallas, Texas: Word Books.

Lee, J. Y. (1993). The Perfect Realization of Change: Jesus Christ, in R. Sugirtharajah (ed.), Asian Faces of Jesus, London:
SCM Press, chapter 4, pp. 62–74.

Luttio, M. D. (1994). The Chinese Rites Controversy (1603-1742) : A Diachronic and Synchronic Approach., Worship
68(4): 290—313.

Moo, D. J. (1996). The Epistle to the Romans, Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.

Nyamiti, C. (1984). Christ as our ancestor: christology from an African perspective, Mambo occasional papers, Gweru: Mambo
Press.

O’Collins, G. (1995). Christology: A Biblical, Historical, and Systematic Study of Jesus Christ, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Olsen, J. H. (1997). Contextualized Christology in tropical Africa?, Svensk missionstidskrift 85(3-4): 247–267.

Palmer, T. (2004). Is Christ our ancestor?, TCNN Research Bulletin 42: 4–17.

Parratt, J. (1995). Reinventing Christianity: African Theology Today, Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company.

Phan, P. C. (2003). Christianity with an Asian Face, Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books.

Pobee, J. (1979). Towards an African Theology, Nashville: Abingdon.

Rozman, G. (1991). The East Asian Region: Confucian Heritage and its Modern Adaptation, Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton
University Press.

Tan, J. (2006). Jesus, the crucified and risen sage: Constructing a contemporary Confucian Christology, in R. Malek (ed.),
The Chinese Face of Jesus Christ, Vol. 3b, Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica and China-Zentrum Sankt Augustin,
pp. 1481–1513.

Vähäkangas, M. (1998). Trinitarian processions as ancestral relationships in charles nyamiti’s theology : A european
lutheran critique., Svensk missionstidskrift 86(2): 251 – 263.

Witmer, J. A. (1969). Who is my brother?, Bibliotheca sacra 126(502): 146–159.

8
Yeo, K.-K. (2005). The law of love according to Confucius and Paul: cruciform love and ren ren (benevolent persons) of
becoming fully human., in S. W. Chung (ed.), Christ the one and only, Carlisle, Cumbria: Paternoster Press, pp. 203—222.

Yeo, K.-K. (2008). Musing with Confucius and Paul: Toward a Chinese Christian Theology, Cambridge: James Clarke.