Eli Stanley Jones

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Eli Stanley Jones (born January 3, 1884 in Baltimore , Maryland , USA , † January 25, 1973 in India ) was an American Methodist theologian, missionary in India, speaker, author and consultant.

Live and act

Eli Stanley Jones grew up in Baltimore and first studied law at City College. He then moved to Asbury Methodist College in Wilmore , Kentucky . In 1905, during a private prayer meeting with three other men, he experienced a special presence of the Holy Spirit . As a result, other students joined them and a revival movement spread across the Asbury campus and in the town of Wilmore. This movement was characterized by confession of sins, prayers and devotion to Jesus Christ . It was also a calling for Jones to serve as a missionary. In 1907 he graduated from Asbury and became a missionary in India under the Missionary Council of the Methodist Episcopal Church. In India he met an American Quaker and missionary colleague by the name of Mabel Lossing, whom he married in 1911.

Jones began his missionary work in the lowest classes of the Indians. He studied Hinduism to understand the people there. He never attacked a dominant religion, but tried to present and preach the gospel of Jesus Christ without Western culture. Soon he was appointed superintendent for Lucknow District, and he also ran the Methodist publishing house. From 1919 he was employed as a freelance evangelist by the Indian Methodists and held large meetings in Indian cities. He also led roundtables in which all participants could contribute their different religious experiences. His conciliatory nature meant that he was invited to many political negotiations in India, Africa and Asia. During World War II, since 1941, he was a close confidante of US President Franklin D. Roosevelt . After the war he was also welcomed as a peacemaker in Japan. He became a close friend of Mahatma Gandhi and wrote a biography about him. This later influenced Martin Luther King , so that he used nonviolent methods in the American civil rights movement. Jones worked with the post-colonial Indian government for freedom of religion and against the spread of communism.

Jones soon discovered in India that he was working too hard and that his spiritual life as an individual was in jeopardy. So he came up with the idea of using the Indian ashram for his cause, because he had been allowed to participate in an ashram under the direction of Mahatma Gandhi and experienced it as very constructive. He himself filled this Hindu form with Christian content. He understood the Christian Ashram as a time out together with God, to listen to God's word together, to pray, to be in silence before God, to exchange ideas and to experience relaxing moments. In 1930 Jones established the first Christian ashram in Sat Tal near Lucknow. When he had to leave India in 1940 because of the Second World War, he brought this rather strange idea with him to the USA and the West.

In 1947 he campaigned for a national association of churches in India. In 1950 he supported the establishment of the first Indian Christian psychiatric clinic in Lucknow, which then took the name Nur Manzil Psychiatric Center and Medical Unit .

When he was running a Christian ashram in Oklahoma in December 1971, he suffered a stroke that left him severely physically impaired. He died in India on January 25, 1973.

Fonts in English

  • The Christ of the Indian Road , Abingdon Press, 1925
  • Christ at the Round Table , 1928
  • The Christ of Every Road , 1930
  • The Christ on the Mount: A Working Philosophy of Life , 1931
  • Christ and Human Suffering , 1933
  • Radio Talks , 1934
  • Christ's Alternative to Communism , 1935
  • Victorious Living , 1936
  • The Choice before us , 1937
  • Along the Indian Road , 1939
  • Is the Kingdom of God Realism? 1940
  • Abundant Living , 1942
  • The Christ of the American Road , 1944
  • When Sorrow Comes , 1944
  • Evangelize! Why? A Discussion of the Motives of Evangelism , 1946
  • The Way , 1946
  • Gandhi: Portrayal of a Friend , 1948
  • The Way to Power and Poise , 1949
  • How to Be a Transformed Person , 1951
  • Growing Spiritually , 1953
  • Mastery: The Art of Mastering Life , 1955
  • Christian Maturity , 1957
  • Conversion , 1959
  • In Christ , 1961
  • The Word Became Flesh , 1963
  • Victory Through Surrender , 1966
  • A Song of Ascents: A Spiritual Autobiography , 1968
  • The Reconstruction of the Church - On What Pattern? 1970
  • The Unshakable Kingdom and the Unchanging Person , 1972
  • Selections from E. Stanley Jones , 1972
  • The Divine Yes , 1975
  • Sayings of E. Stanley Jones , 1994

German translations

  • Christ and human suffering , Gotthelf-Verlag, 1952
  • Change yourself and you change the world , Gotthelf-Verlag, 1953
  • The word became flesh , Anker-Verlag

literature

  • Wesley Deuwel: Revival Fire ,
  • F. Douglas Powe Jr. and Jack Jackson: E. Stanley Jones and Sharing the Good News in a Pluralistic Society , ISBN 978-1-9459-3510-7
  • Hans Hauzenberger: Creative life - dialogue, service and mission as a task today. Words from the life of Eli Stanley Jones (1884–1973) , Brunnen Verlag, Basel 1996
  • D. Dibelius, Ernst Scholz, James A. Ryberg and Günter Gloede: Ecumenical Profiles - Shaping the One Church around the World , Part IV: Neighbors and Young Churches , Volume 1: Dr. Samuel McCrea Cavert, James A. Ryberg, Eli Stanley Jones, Günter Gloede , Heimatdienstverlag, Berlin
  • Katherine Reese Hendershot: E. Stanley Jones had a wife. The Life and Mission of Mabel Lossing Jones, 1878-1978 , Scarecrow Press, 2007
  • 365 Days with E. Stanley Jones, 2000

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Kathryn Reese Hendershot: E. Stanley Jones had a wife. The Life and Mission of Mabel Lossing Jones, 1878–1978 , website cbeinternational.org
  2. ↑ Hans Jakob Reimers: Holidays with God: How the Ashram came to Germany. Can a Hindu ritual be Christian? Yes, American missionary Stanley Jones said, UMC reports, September 14, 2011
  3. ↑ http://www.estanleyjonesfoundation.com/about-esj/esj-biography/
  4. ↑ http://www.christianashram.org/e-stanley-jones.html
  5. ↑ http://www.robinsonlibrary.com/philosophy/practical/missions/jones.htm Eli Stanley Jones, Methodist Episcopal missionary to India , Robinson Library
personal data
SURNAME Jones, Eli Stanley
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American Methodist theologian, missionary, preacher, and author
DATE OF BIRTH January 3, 1884
PLACE OF BIRTH Baltimore , Maryland , USA
DATE OF DEATH January 25, 1973
Place of death India