Pastures of plenty : tracing religio-scapes of prosperity gospel in Africa and beyond / Andreas Heuser (edition). [print]

"The publication of this volume has been supervised by Professor Dr. Klaus Koschorke. Printed with support of the Bertha Hess-Cohn Foundation, Basel."

Includes bibliographies and index.

Religio-scapes of prosperity gospel: an introduction

PART 1. -- Mapping prosperity gospel in politics and society. -- Political architecture of poverty: on changing patterns of "African identity" / Rainer Tetzlaff -- Pentecostal improvement strategies: a comparative reading on African and South American Pentecostalism / Jens Kohrsen -- An activist-holiness Kenneth Hagin? A case study of prosperity theology in the Philippines / Giovanni Maltese

PART 2. -- Embattled theology of prosperity. -- The prosperity theology of David Oyedepo, founder of Winners' Chapel / Paul Gifford -- "Jesus became poor so that we might become rich." A critical review of the use of biblical reference texts among prosperity preachers in Ghana / Werner Kahl -- "Struggling with Africa": theology of prosperity in and from Brazil / Rudolf von Sinner -- To prosper and to be blessed: prosperity, wealth and "life in abundance" in ecumenical debate / Michael Biehl

PART 3. -- Routing religio-scapes of prosperity. -- Battling spirits of prosperity: the "Pentecostalized" interreligious contest over money rituals in Ghana / Andreas Heuser -- Rhetoric and praxis of Ghanaian Salafi and Sufi Muslims: analogies with prosperity gospel / Seebaway Zakaria -- The ethics of wealth and religious pluralism in Burkina Faso: how prosperity gospel is influencing the current religious field in Africa / Katrin Langewiesche -- Gender dimensions of wealth and health in Ghanaian indigenous religious thinking: narratives of female clients of the Pemsan shrine / Genevieve Nrenzah -- Encountering "prosperity" gospel in nineteenth century Gold Coast: indigenous perceptions of western missionary societies / Abraham Nana Opare Kwakye -- Freemasonry, occult economies and prosperity in Tanzanian Pentecostal discourse / Paivi Hasu

PART 4. -- Enchanted Protestant ethic. -- "Now I dress well. Now I work hard" -- Pentecostalism, prosperity, and economic development in Cameroon / Tomas Sundnes Drnen -- Prosperity gospel of entrepreneurship in Africa and Black America: a pragmatist Christian innovation / David D. Daniels III -- Martin Luther, wealth and labor: the market economy's links to prosperity gospel / Chr. Lucas Zapf.

PART 5. -- Sacred economy of exchange. -- A God trap: seed planting, gift logic, and the prosperity gospel / Yvan Droz and Yonatan N. Gez -- Are blessings for sale? ritual exchange, witchcraft allegations, and the de-alienation of money in Tanzanian prosperity ministries / Martin Lindhardt

PART 6. -- Diasporic (dis)illusions. -- Between gutter and Gucci, boss and Botho: a relocation of "prosperity gospel" by Nigerian Pentecostal Christians in Soweto, South Africa / Drea Frochtling -- Missing prosperity: economies of blessings in Ghana and the diaspora / Jeanne Rey -- "With both feet in the air": prosperity gospel in African migrant churches in Switzerland / Daniel Frei.

"Prosperity Gospel, a controversial strand in global Christianity, relates material wealth to divine blessing. Originating in American Pentecostal milieus, it is most successful in Africa. Authors from four continents present interdisciplinary, multi-sited and comparative analyses of Prosperity Gospel in Africa and beyond. Prosperity theologies adapt to varied political contexts and travel outside Pentecostalism into the wider religious arena. Its components trigger discourses within ecumenical Christianity and are transformed in transnational Christian networks of migrants; they turn up in African shrine religion and African Islam. Pastures of Plenty maps the evolving religio-scapes of Prosperity Gospel."--Publisher's summary.

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