Ernest Manges - PT Live
(with thanks to CIT)
Objectives for “Worldview”
• To understand the concept of worldview.
• To understand and accept the need to
understand that culture is layered.
• To practice going deeper by using a tool
Core competency 6I-01 “Culture and worldview”
Worldview Definition
A map of reality that people
use for living
-Paul Hiebert
Transforming Worldviews (Baker 2008), 15.
Worldview Definition
Worldview, the deep level of
culture, is the culturally
structured set of assumptions
(including values and
commitments/allegiances)
underlying how people perceive
and respond to reality.
- Charles H. Kraft
Worldview Definition
A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental
orientation of the heart, that can be expressed
as a story or in a set of presuppositions
(assumptions which may be true, partially true
or entirely false) that we hold (consciously or
subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently)
about the basic constitution of reality, and that
provides the foundation on which we live and
move and have our being. - James Sire,
The Universe Next Door, 5th edn (IVP 2009), 20.
Worldview
Beliefs
Values
Lloyd E. Kwast
Behaviors
8 Basic Worldview Questions
1. What is prime reality – the really real?
2. What is the nature of external reality, that
is, the world around us?
3. What is a human being?
4. What happens to a person at death?
5. Why is it possible to know anything at all?
6. How do we know what is right and wrong?
7. What is the meaning of human history?
8. What personal, life-orienting core
commitments are consistent with this
worldview?
James W. Sire, The universe next door, 5th edn (Downers Grove, IL: IVP
Academic, 2008), 22-23.
Worldview clash
Missionary: I’m here to bring you
wisdom from Jesus.
Tribal elder: You say you have come to
bring us wisdom about this Jesus. Yet
you also just told me that you cannot
give me the names of your greatgrandfathers. How can this be?
Transforming Worldview
Conversion may include a change in
beliefs and behavior, but if the worldview
is not transformed, in the long run the
gospel is subverted and the result is a
syncretistic Christo-paganism, which has
the form of Christianity, but not its
essence. Christianity becomes a new
magic and a new, subtler form of idolatry.
- Hiebert, Transforming Worldviews, 11
8 Basic Worldview Questions
1. What is prime reality – the really real?
2. What is the nature of external reality, that
is, the world around us?
3. What is a human being?
4. What happens to a person at death?
5. Why is it possible to know anything at all?
6. How do we know what is right and wrong?
7. What is the meaning of human history?
8. What personal, life-orienting core
commitments are consistent with this
worldview?
James W. Sire, The universe next door, 5th edn (Downers Grove, IL: IVP
Academic, 2008), 22-23.
The major worldviews of
the world
• Animism
• Monism
• Dualism
• Naturalism
• Judeo-Christian monotheism
• Islamic monotheism
Worldview Definition
A worldview is a commitment, a fundamental
orientation of the heart, that can be expressed
as a story or in a set of presuppositions
(assumptions which may be true, partially true
or entirely false) that we hold (consciously or
subconsciously, consistently or inconsistently)
about the basic constitution of reality, and that
provides the foundation on which we live and
move and have our being. - James Sire,
The Universe Next Door, 5th edn (IVP 2009), 20.
The major worldviews of
the world
• Animism
• Monism
• Dualism
• Naturalism
• Judeo-Christian monotheism
• Islamic monotheism
The Animistic Worldview
The Monistic Worldview
The Dualistic Worldview
The Naturalistic Worldview
Tim Keller, Center Church:
- Danger to think we live in a society
opposite of modernity.
- Modernity promotes autonomy of
the individual & personal
freedom.
- Modernity rejects traditional
authorities (religion, family,
community).
So: we live in late modernity.
The Monotheistic Worldview –
Judeo-Christian
The Monotheistic Worldview –
Islamic
Discuss :
Is there a single
Christian worldview?
Andrew Walls:
Conversion is “the turning towards
Christ of everything that is there
already, so that Christ comes into
places, thoughts, relationships
and world-view in which He has
never lived before.”
Cited in Craig Ott & Harold Netland, eds, Globalizing
theology (Baker 2006), 98.
Andrew Walls:
“Christianity has no culturally fixed
element, as is provided by the
Qur’an fixed in heaven . . .” for
Muslims.
Andrew F. Walls, The cross-cultural process in
Christian History (Orbis 2002), 13.
Worldview
Beliefs
Values
Lloyd E. Kwast
Behaviors
Multilayer analysis of cultural
artifacts and actions
Digging deeper into the
culture
Multilayer analysis of cultural artifacts and actions
Behaviors Values
Wearing a watch
Beliefs
Worldview
Multilayer analysis of cultural artifacts and actions
Behaviors Values
Wearing a watch
Being prompt
Beliefs
Worldview
Multilayer analysis of cultural artifacts and actions
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Wearing a watch
Time is valuable
Being prompt
Worldview
Multilayer analysis of cultural artifacts and actions
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Wearing a watch
Time is valuable
Being prompt
Worldview
Time can be
saved & spent
Behaviors Values
Taking a pill
for pain
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Taking a pill
for pain
Meds are the
best way to
get rid of pain
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Taking a pill
for pain
Beliefs
Meds are the Meds work
best way to
because
get rid of pain based on
science
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Taking a pill
for pain
Beliefs
Meds are the Meds work
best way to
because
get rid of pain based on
science
Worldview
Reality is what
science has
proven
Naturalism
Behaviors Values
After the burial,
walking through
the smoke
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
After the burial,
walking through
the smoke
To be free
from bad
spirits
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
After the burial,
walking through
the smoke
The smoke
washes away
bad spirits
To be free
from bad
spirits
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Worldview
After the burial,
walking through
the smoke
The smoke
washes away
bad spirits
Spirits are all
around and some
will bother us
To be free
from bad
spirits
Animism
Behaviors Values
Avoiding stepping
on ants
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Avoiding stepping Preserving
on ants
all life
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Avoiding stepping Preserving
on ants
all life
All life is
sacred
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Worldview
Avoiding stepping Preserving
on ants
all life
All life is
sacred
All is one
Monism
Behaviors Values
Broccoli and beef
served together
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Broccoli and beef Meals should
served together
be balanced
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Broccoli and beef Meals should
served together
be balanced
Broccoli is ‘cool,’
beef is ‘warm’
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Worldview
Broccoli and beef Meals should
served together
be balanced
Broccoli is cool, We must submit to
beef is warm
the balance of
nature
Dualism
Behaviors Values
When diagnosed,
going home and
doing one’s own
research
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
When diagnosed, Being an
going home and
informed
doing one’s own consumer of
research
medicine
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
When diagnosed, Being an
going home and
informed
doing one’s own consumer of
research
medicine
Doctors can
be wrong
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Worldview
When diagnosed, Being an
going home and
informed
doing one’s own consumer of
research
medicine
Doctors can
be wrong
Human knowledge
is both limited and
biased
Naturalism / late modernism
Behaviors Values
When diagnosed,
going home and
asking the church
to pray
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
When diagnosed, Trusting God
going home and
with my
asking the church illness
to pray
Beliefs
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
When diagnosed, Trusting God Prayer works
going home and
with my
asking the church illness
to pray
Worldview
Behaviors Values
Beliefs
Worldview
When diagnosed, Trusting God
going home and
with my
asking the church illness
to pray
Prayer works
There is a God
who listens and
responds
Judeo-Christian Monotheism
Many thanks to CIT and to
Bob Mackey for some of these
slides. This is Kingdom
partnership at work!