Grasping The Global Reality A Review Of Allan Andersons An Introduction To Pentecostalism

Click to join the conversation with over 500,000 Pentecostal believers and scholars

Pneuma 28,2_f9_275-277 9/26/06 4:42 PM Page 275

Pentecostal Theology, Volume 28, No. 2, Fall 2006

Grasping the Global Reality: A Review of Allan Anderson’s An Introduction to Pentecostalism

David D. Daniels III

Allan Anderson’s An Introduction to Pentecostalism is a great feat! The text ranks among the most signiﬁcant texts on global Pentecostalism. While texts by Harvey Cox and others offer solid surveys of Pentecostalism globally, Anderson’s text provides an excellent exploration. He examines the roots, beginnings, and development of global Pentecostalism histo- rically and theologically. He presents the material in a thoughtful and engaging manner. By prodding intentionally through key conceptual and theoretical issues involved in writing about global Pentecostalism, he has produced a solid piece of scholarship.

As a textbook on global Pentecostalism, Anderson’s study ﬁlls a glar- ing gap in Pentecostal history courses as well as history surveys of world Christianity. Even specialists of Pentecostalism in certain countries or regions will learn much about Pentecostalism in the regions outside their expertise. They will, however, probably quibble over the speciﬁcs of Anderson’s portrayal of Pentecostalism related to their specialty.

Anderson lodges global Pentecostalism within the long and the recent history of the charismatic phenomena in Christianity. The long history extends back over two millennia; the recent history encapsulates most of the last two hundred years. Thus he offers to two periodizations: a long and recent version. The long history signals Pentecostalism as a contem- porary manifestation of the charismatic phenomenon known among Christians; the recent history accents a particular form of international revivalism illustrating that Pentecostalism parallels the revivals arising around the world. Whereas earlier scholars had highlighted the Protestant revivalistic roots of Pentecostalism, Anderson isolates speciﬁc “revivals with charismatic phenomena.”

Among the missing charismatic revivals within his recent historical period are those among the Native Baptists in Jamaica during the 1830s, the Philadelphia (Pennsylvania) Revival of 1877, and the 1896–97 Baptist Holiness Revivals of the greater Mississippi Delta (USA). Related to this is the glaring absence, within Anderson’s book, of the black Holiness movement. By following the lead of the “black roots of Pentecostalism” school, Anderson focuses on a generic African American Christianity and

1

Pneuma 28,2_f9_275-277 9/26/06 4:42 PM Page 276

Pentecostal Theology, Volume 28, No. 2, Fall 2006

spirituality and thereby obscures the historical agency exercised by African American leaders in the construction of Pentecostalism as a movement.

Anderson’s long and recent history framework prompts questions about the best way to describe the relationship between early global Pentecostalism and these “revivals with charismatic phenomena.” How are the connec- tions made between those whose origins date back to 1830 and those derived from the Manchurian Revival of 1908? Since Anderson purports a direct connection, is it best characterized psychologically as a gestalt, meteorologically as climate, or ecologically as ﬁeld? The periodization seemingly ﬁts a diachronic rather than chronological focus. Or maybe the focus is more on inﬂuences or convergences rather than on chronology. To advance the discussion the reader needs some guidance into the nature of the relationship between early global Pentecostalism and these partic- ular nineteenth- and early twentieth-century revival movements.

Anderson highlights the role of various charismatic revivals in different countries and on different continents in the construction of Pentecosta- lism as a movement. He provides clues to the construction of Pentecosta- lism in a region or on a continent. What remains is the task of exploring their roles in the construction of early Pentecostalism as a global move- ment, since for Anderson, global consists of various regional/continental movements.

For Anderson the global nature of Pentecostalism is basically captured in terms of regions or continents. He argues that the character of Pentecostalism differs in each region or continent. A counter thesis might be that the character of Pentecostalism differs according to racial cultures or theological families or contexts shaped by particular world religions.

Yet, to conceive of “global” in terms of a collection of regions aids Anderson’s thesis about the multiple origins, sites, and centers of global Pentecostalism. As a scholar, he searches for the origins, sites, and cen- ters of global Pentecostalism on each continent. Consequently, he limits the birthplace debate about Topeka or Los Angeles to just the genesis of North American Pentecostalism, crediting Charles Parham with theolog- ical innovation and William Seymour with being its spiritual father. Somehow his conception of “global” as a collection of regions brackets the question of whether there exists a birthplace of global Pentecostalism. The reader, seemingly, needs to know why this is theoretically either unknowable or unnecessary. Clearly, he adopts this thesis to provide an alternative to the expansionist, missionary, Eurocentric (North America- centric) model of writing global Pentecostal history with its center-to- periphery schema. He supplants the expansionist model with his grid

276

2

Pneuma 28,2_f9_275-277 9/26/06 4:42 PM Page 277

Grasping the Global Reality: A Review of Allan Anderson’s An Introduction to Pentecostalism

model of multiple centers. These various centers from around the world function as the many Jerusalems of global Pentecostalism.

In what ways do these multiple Jerusalems interact, if at all? While Anderson does distinguish between direct and indirect inﬂuences, such as the Mukti Revival and Chilean Pentecostalism, more attention needs to be paid to the interconnections. Distinctions need to be made between direct and indirect inﬂuences. As scholars unravel the maze that consti- tutes global Pentecostalism, they must distinguish between degrees of inﬂuence, alternate or parallel trajectories, intersections, interpenetrations, and convergences.

Anderson’s ﬁne text provides an opportunity for scholars of global Pentecostalism to grapple with the theoretical issues that need to be addressed in order to advance scholarship. This text is important for Pentecostal Theology as well as for the emerging academic discipline of World Christianity. As a text within World Christianity studies, this book models an important approach. It is to be commended for what it resists: an expansionist, missionary-focus, Eurocentric study approach. And this text is to be commended for what it achieves: a ﬁne synthetic study of the global form of Christianity called Pentecostalism.

277

3