Native Evangelism in Central Mexico

1. Analytical Framework of the Study

CHAPTER ONE Analytical Framework of the Study As there are no ethnographies of native evangelist congregations , the central concern of this book is an ethnographic study of two congregations belonging to two native evangelists sects: one established twenty-four years ago and in the process of expansion ; the other founded eighty years ago, and probably the most successful native sect in the country. The first, Amistad y Vida A.C. (Cristianos), is located in the small city of Fortín, Veracruz ; the second, La Luz del Mundo, is located in the city of Tlaxcala, the capital of the state of the same name. Through the longitudinal study of the Tlaxcala-Pueblan Valley (1958 to the present) and the Córdoba-Orizaba region (1968 to the present), we have a detailed ethnographic knowledge of these areas, including the urban environments that dominate their social, economic, and religious life, and the changes that the areas have undergone during the past four decades . Much of this ethnographic work has been on religion, religious change, and related matters (witchcraft, sorcery, and curing), which we regard as essential for understanding the rapid religious transformation that has been ongoing for more than a generation. Moreover, we are thoroughly acquainted with the social, ethnic, demographic, and economic conditions in the rural and urban milieus in which native congregations are embedded. Before specifying how the in-depth ethnographies will be im- 20 Native Evangelism in Central Mexico plemented, we would like to address several points, to be discussed at some length. What are the justification and raison d’être of ethnography in historical perspective? What are the uses of ethnography and the role it plays in complementing and interpreting quantitative data? What constitutes an in-depth ethnography, and how can it most appropriately be implemented ? The concept of “persona” is a fundamental tool in the study of conversion and religious change. (Parenthetically, the elaboration of these concepts allows us an opportunity to present the general analytical framework that has guided our ethnographic and ethnologic work in Mexico for two generations). The Diachronic and Synchronic Raison d’Être of Ethnography Ethnography, like history, is an end in itself: a deep-rooted proclivity , which in Western civilization goes back to the Greeks, to preserve for the future a testimony of the collective deeds and accomplishments of a social group. This syndrome has multiple variations in cultures and civilizations everywhere, and has been embodied in written and oral traditions. Although the earliest ethnographies, in basically the modern denotation of the term, go back to classical times (e.g., the work of Herodotus [1965] and Tacitus [1948]), in Western civilization ethnographic accounts were essentially written, sung, and told in the context of myth, legend, and epic literature until the sixteenth century. Systematic ethnography begins with the work of Bernardino de Sahagún, the Franciscan friar who completed his investigation of the culture and society of central Mexico in about 1570. It remained the most complete ethnography until the onset of the twentieth century, and by the end of this period “ethnography ” had become exclusively associated with the budding discipline of anthropology. Lest we be misunderstood, ethnography is an activity that has always been practiced exogenously, endogenously, or both at the same time. Let us explain. Herodotus wrote about his Analytical Framework of the Study 21 own culture and also about the practices and customs of several societies of the Mediterranean area, whereas Tacitus wrote only about Germanic peoples. The tradition of doing exogenous ethnography essentially disappeared in Western society until the onset of the Renaissance, and from then on, due mostly to the expansion of Western European peoples throughout the world, it became the only kind of ethnography, as endogenous ethnography crystalized into various forms of literature. The latter did not disappear, but it was exogenous ethnography that became the core of anthropology as a scientific discipline. Thus, if Herodotus is our apical ancestor, and therefore something of a mythical figure, Sahagún is the legitimate father of modern ethnographers. In the Anglo-Saxon world, systematic ethnography begins in Australia shortly after the middle of the nineteenth century (Voget 1975; Honigmann 1976; Harris 1968; Lowie 1959), and more significantly in the United States with the foundation of the Bureau of American Ethnology (BAE) and the work of Major John Powell (1875), Henry Schoolcraft (1951), Lewis Henry Morgan (1851), and several others (Judd 1967; Penniman 1965; Eggan 1968...