Total Replacement Partial Replacement Replacement Model

Total Replacement

Partial Replacement

“Replacement Model”

Fulfillment Model: • Christianity is the “true” religion but it does not reject, but

rather “confirms” good elements in others

Mutuality Model: • a “rough parity” between all religions; all ways lead to the

same end goal• Three bridges:

• 1) PHILOSOPHICAL (Hick)• 2) MYSTICAL (Panikkar)• 3) ETHICAL (Knitter)

Acceptance Model: • there are real differences among religions and they are

legitimate (different ends in different religions!)

Replacement Model: • Christianity, the “only way,” replaces other faiths

(either totally or partially)

C) Knitter: TYPOLOGY

Knitter, p. 19

“In the final analysis, Christianity is meant to replace all other religions…It’s the dominant attitude, the one that generally has held sway throughout most of Christian history. Although views differed about the way this replacement was to be carried out and why it was necessary, Christian missionaries throughout the centuries have cast forth into the world with the conviction that it is God’s will to make all peoples Christians.”

Overview

Knitter’s typology: two forms of replacement model: total and partial replacement

a) Total= older Protestantism with Barth as key figure and Evangelicalism/ Fundamentalism;

b) Partial: mainline Protestantism (Pannenberg, Tillich; WCC, etc.)

Overview

Christianity as the True Religion

Taking the New Testament and Jesus Seriously•Acts 4:12; 1 Cor 3:11; 1 Tim 2:5; John 14:6; 1 John 5:12 Jesus only Savior•Rom 1:21; 3:9 All are lost• John 3:36; Rom 10:14,17 Faith needed

“One Way” Makes Sense

Main Features of Total Replacement (Knitter, ch.1)

Majority of Christians prior to the Enlightenment – and a large number even afterwards – has held this view in one way or another

In contemporary scene, Fundamentalists and more conservative Christians subscribe to this view

Representatives of Total Replacement Model

Karl Barth represented many key convictions of this view• He did not call “revelation” any knowledge of God

outside of self-revelation of God in Christ• He did not see any contact point between religions

(religiosity) and faith in God• He didn’t see any connection between the God of the

Bible and God of the Philosophers• Universalist?• Christ as Electing and the Elected

This model helps defend the uncompromising monotheism of the Bible and uniqueness of self-revelation of God

Its weaknesses include• A dismissal of general revelation and the innate (partial)

knowledge of God – in a person having been created in the image of God • A radical discontinuity between nature and grace• Lack of emphasis on the saving Love of God with regard

to all people(s)• The tendency to be pejorative of other religions and

people in other faiths, even though they have been created in the image of God

Reflections of Total Replacement Model

A difference between total and partial models•Partial replacement closer to “Fulfillment” model

Most of the views in ch. 2 (WCC and theologians such as Pannenberg, Newbigin, Tillich, Samartha, etc.) are not supportive of replacement model but rather either inclusivist or Fulfillment model or “soft” pluralism (Samartha)

Total and Partial: Same or different models?

It appears that it is only Fundamentalism and conservative Evangelicalism that fall neatly under Knitter’s Replacement Model (mostly total replacement)

Evangelical theologies of religions fall in to two camps• Evangelicals can be found both in (exclusivistic) total

replacement and (inclusivistic) partial replacement

Evangelical theologies and Replacement Model?

God Present in Other Religions?• Yes

• And No!

Revelation: Yes!

Salvation: No!

Value of Dialogue

Limits of Dialogue!

Main Features of Partial Replacement (KNITTER)

While there are some revelatory elements in other religions, religions are not salvific

There are some contact points between the God of the Bible and the deities of religions

Some good features in other religions can be affirmed

The value of interfaith dialogue is affirmed

Main Features of Partial Replacement (Knitter, ch.2)

World Council of Churches• “Religious plurality and Christian self-understanding”• www.oikoumene.org (

Inter-religious dialogue and cooperation)

Mainline Protestant Churches

•Presbyterian Principles for Interfaith Dialogue

(www.pcusa.org/interfaith/study/principles.htm)

Wolfhart Pannenberg (baptizedLutheran)

Lesslie Newbigin (Anglican)

Clark Pinnock (evangelical)

Examples of Partial Replacement Model