Accommodation in an Iban Church Today

Abstract

The usual attitude of missionaries to accommodation (often decried under the label “syncretism”) is to condemn it. In this paper, the authors explore a sensitive effort at positive accommodation among the animistic Iban in Sarawak. The introduction of the original article, which is not reprinted here, summarizes the experimental conditions and describes the animistic foundation of the Iban world view, on which the Gospel must take root. It is in terms of this animism that the accommodation was made. Both advantages and disadvantages of the experiment are candidly explored.