Daneel on Bavinck mei 2011, M.L. Daneel

 

Personal Memories of Three Dutch “Saints”: J.H. Bavinck

 

By M.L. Daneel

 

While Kraemer stood tall as an imposing Church statesman, Bavinck, by contrast, was of smaller posture, a quiet man with peaceful, if alert and sensitive, eyes and often pulling on his pipe, lit or unlit.

 

Specialized in Missions and an added doctor's degree in Psychology, Bavinck worked for many years as a theological educator in Java before he returned to Holland to serve as Prof. in Missiology at the Free University. His theology of religions was based on a strong emphasis on missionary witness, focused on Christ's cross and resurrection, yet including dialogue based on a thorough understanding of non-Christian religions and cultures. That he took the latter missionary task seriously was evidenced in his numerous publications on World Religions, Eastern and Javanese mysticism in particular. Himself a mystic in his own right, his publications reveal a deep care, respect and love for people, whatever their religious affiliation. It was this legacy of his which he imparted to me during a final blessing on his deathbed – like an Old Testament patriarch laying hands on his successor-son – that inspired and encouraged me during a rich ministry of many years among the Traditionalists and African Initiated Churches in Zimbabwe.

 

The memory of this Dutch sage among Eastern mystics fueled the perseverance I needed for several years before I was allowed (as the first white) to attend and study from within the oracular ceremonies of the Shona high-God, Mwari, at the Matopo shrines. It also enabled me to endure accusations in Zimbabwe of being a traitor to the white cause and threats of imprisonment by the military for my refusal to be conscripted into Ian Smith's armed forces during the Chimurenga liberation struggle.

 

            Bavinck at times lectured us on similar trends in both the world religions and Christianity. I can still see him talking on fatalism and futility, the close Biblical parallel of which he found in Jeremiah 10:23 – 24, "I know, oh Lord that no one is the master of his own destiny; no person has control over his own life [some Bible translations: 'no one plans and directs his foot-steps']. "Correct your people Lord, but do not be too hard on us or punish us when you are angry; that would be the end of us."

 

In Christianity, he maintained, such recognition of human frailty did not translate into the fatalism of abandonment of human responsibility. Instead, the challenge: 'Strive ye hard to enter God's kingdom!' remained and was fueled by the realization that God's mercy remains the condition and context for Christian endeavour.

Christianity somehow knows no quit!

This truth obtained greater meaning for me when Bavinck once took me down into the basement of his house in Amsterdam. The heavy, dark curtains were still there and the bench on which he had mounted his bicycle in such a way that his children could sit on it and peddle it to generate some light for him. Thus he could write his books by bicycle light during the long hours of imposed black-outs at the time of the German occupation of Holland. During the darkest hour of Europe, imposed by Nazi Germany - while millions of lives were lost - a rich harvest of academic and spiritual books was therefore brought in, to the benefit of many, by a transparent and unpretentious believer, who knew no quit!

 

            Bavinck also had good humor. Once a student found him holding a number of letters half-way into the slot of a public mail-box. "Prof, why don't you drop those letters?" the student asked. "Well," came the laconic reply, "I have accidentally mailed my cigar in there. Now I am waiting a while to see if a fire develops."