dc.description.abstract | In Nigerian Christianity, many theologians and Christians who do not have
any formal theological training perceive Jesus Christ primarily as a solution to the
problems that confront humanity. As a solution, they expect Jesus Christ to inspire
some theological discourses that will deconstruct and overthrow Western theological
hegemony, to rekindle the quest to preserve some indigenous traditions, to liberate
the oppressed, poor and powerless, to expose the oppressors and all evildoers, to
liberate and protect people from the attacks of the malevolent spirits, and to save
people from being eternally separated from God. But what these solution-oriented
Christologies have overlooked is that the Christ-Event is a paradox for it creates
simultaneously a problem and a solution for the Christian community which
confesses that God has revealed God’s self in this event. The contextual Christology
that I develop in this study probes the theological, christological and anthropological
consequences of this claim for interpreting and appropriating Jesus Christ in the
Nigerian contexts. To achieve this task, I will converse with and critique some
selected ‘constructive Christologies’ of some key theologians and some ‘grassroots
Christologies’ that have been informed by social conditions, indigenous worldview,
encounter with some versions of Christianity propagated by the West, and some
existential issues that confront many Christians.
However we choose to interpret and appropriate Jesus the Christ in our
contexts, he remains simultaneously a question and an answer to the theological,
cultural, religious, anthropological, political and socio-economic issues that
challenge us. Viewed from this perspective, I will argue that the Christ-Event upsets,
unsettles, critiques, and reshapes the solution-oriented Christologies of Nigerian
Christianity. I will explore this claim within the circumference of the overarching
thesis of this study; namely, as both a question and an answer, Jesus Christ confronts
us as a ‘revealer’ of divinity and humanity. Thus, he mediates and interprets divinity
and humanity for the purpose of enacting and sustaining a relationship between God
and human beings. | en |