Quote:
Originally Posted by aron
Well I don't perceive a common understanding looming, but what I simply tried to point out is that there is this thing called culture. And while I cannot say how much it drove WL's thinking, it is kind of naive to think it had no effect on his ministry at all. And I'd add that the people who study society don't perhaps say "How much was individual 'x' driven by his native culture" as they say, "If you try to sell a McDonald's hamburger in Country X what factors do you have to take into consideration?" Or, "If Politician Y wants to get votes, what demographic is key here?" Or, "If you want a good opening night for this movie, what sort of title and billboard poster will bring in the crowds? What separates a mediocre showing from a blockbuster?"
All of that stuff is under the "common understanding" of the people that study it. And in evaluating the Local Church experience in its successes and failures, we might profit by considering the effect of culture. Because human culture does exist, and even though we insisted as Christians that we were the "one new man", if you step back and look carefully you might still see traces of the old man's culture(s), even in the framework of the religious collective. I think WL successfully blinded us to this, to some degree, and it may have been a big part of his survival.
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I agree. In fact, if culture is defined as a system of learned behavior patterns which are characteristic of the members of a society, then what I was suggesting is that describing cultural differences is going to be more productive than talking about minds or mind-sets. Witness Lee claimed to have transcended culture when he said he preached the "pure Word of God." It isn't clear to me that anyone can do that. When I was sitting listening to Lee, I thought that some of his interpretations sounded like Buddhism or Taoism or Confucianism. He may not have been conscious of that because he was acculturated into that way of thinking as a child. We are all acculturated into some kind of society. If we don't examine our own behavior in terms of culture, we don't become aware of it. He taught that everyone has a blind spot. That might have been his.