A missiological and theological critique of Lamin Sanneh's 'destigmatization' thesis in the context of Burma at the time of Adoniram Judson with special reference to Judson's tracts in Burmese

This dissertation discusses Lamin Sanneh's version of the vernacularity of Christianity and analyzes his arguments for the twofold feature of "cultural pluralism" in the church: "relativization" and "destigmatization." It makes a missiological and theological critique of the adequacy of cultural destigmatization in relation to a world religion such as Burmese Theravada Buddhism, in light of Adoniram Judson's two tracts that he composed in Burmese. When speaking of the principle of destigmatization, Sanneh includes in it culture, language, culture group, and traditional religion but is silent about world religions. This dissertation argues that destigmatization should include more than Sanneh assumes. This is because Burmese Buddhism is fundamentally transcultural and compatible with local cultures, because it proves itself to be indispensable to Judson, and because it cannot be artificially isolated from Burmese culture and language.; Chapter One discusses Sanneh's concept of the vernacularity of Christianity and outlines his grounds for arguments for the two characteristics of "cultural pluralism." Chapter Two gives a sketch of the general socio-political and religio-cultural backgrounds of early 19th-century Burma against which Christian missionaries including Adoniram Judson and his three successive wives were working.; Chapter Three is devoted to a brief discussion of Judson as a pioneer missionary translator and my English translations of his two tracts in Burmese: "A View of the Christian Religion" and "The Golden Balance." Chapter Four deals with a philological study of the two tracts in order to indicate the indispensability of Burmese Buddhism for Judson's translation project.; Chapter Five recapitulates the discussions of some major themes of Chapters One, Two, Three, and Four and argues that Sanneh should include world religions especially Burmese Buddhism in his principle of destigmatization. Since the linguistic ground does not seem to provide a completely satisfactory foundation for developing a relevant interreligious perspective on Burmese Buddhism, this chapter proposes a new ground, on which one might be based.