THE EYE OF THE STORM: BISHOP JOHN WILLIAM COLENSO AND THE CRISIS OF BIBLICAL INSPIRATION

Written by Jonathan A. Draper (ed.) Reviewed By Jonathan More

Until recently, John William Colenso was not generally regarded as an important figure in South African church history. Found guilty of heresy by the Bishop of Cape Town in 1863, Colenso is probably known to many people only in terms of the title of a 1983 biography: ‘The Heretic’. But, as this collection of essays shows, facile epithets of this sort can be misleading.

Jonathan Draper (University of Natal) has drawn together a group of biblical scholars, theologians and historians who re-evaluate Colenso in the light of recent developments in a number of fields, particularly hermeneutics, theology, anthropology and linguistics. The book is published on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Colenso’s consecration as Bishop of Natal, and the essays focus on four areas of Colenso’s life: Bible, theology, Ekukhanyeni (his mission station), and family and society.

In the first part of the book the reader is reminded of Colenso’s lexicographical and orthographical work in Zulu that accompanied his translations of various parts of the Bible. Colenso anticipated many of the discussions that would become central in twentieth-century African theology. His commentary on Romans, for instance, was written ‘from a missionary point of view’ and this led Colenso to read Romans as a condemnation of settler racial pride. His universalism also led him to reject the doctrines of substitutionary atonement and eternal punishment while emphasising the place of nature religion and conscience.

Previous writers have shown how Frances Colenso initiated her husband into Coleridge’s Romanticism and F. D. Maurice’s universalism. The ground is not revisited in the second section of the collection, but a handful of essays do explore reasons for the overwhelmingly negative reaction that Colenso’s writing received in nineteenth-century English society. These include dissatisfaction with the critical methods he employed, his association with certain scientists who were highly critical of orthodox Christianity, and the fact that he wrote from ‘out of Africa’.

The third part of this work focuses on Colenso’s mission station, Ekukhanyeni, and on the school he started there. This proved to be one of the more enduring aspects of Colenso’s work as his students proved to be influential in Natal well into the twentieth century.

The book concludes with a group of essays that focus on Colenso’s wife and daughters, and his interaction with colonial and Zulu society. Draper’s essay on Colenso’s 1863 trial shows that it was procedurally flawed and unjust. It is perhaps for this reason that the Church of the Province of Southern Africa passed a resolution in 2002 to lift the condemnation of heresy that Bishop Gray of Cape Town had passed on Colenso. It is somewhat alarming to note that certain doctrinal points for which Colenso was originally excommunicated are no longer controversial and, in fact, have even become acceptable in certain Christian traditions.

One of the most valuable parts of this book is Bell’s bibliography of works by Colenso and works on Colenso. Bell’s labours will certainly allow interested parties easier access to primary and secondary sources relating to Colenso.

The essays in this book focus on Colenso as a Bible reader, a Christian thinker and an educationalist. Little attention is given to his work in colonial politics, but Guy’s essay on Colenso’s daughters gives the reader an indication of Colenso’s enduring influence on this front.

Although The Eye of the Storm will appeal primarily to readers with a special interest in South African history and theology, the essays touch on a wide range of topics and most readers of this journal will find something of interest in them.


Jonathan More

George Whitefield College, Cape Town