Spirit(s) and Chinese Religiosity:Retelling the History of Chinese Christianity from a Pentecost Perspective
Authors: Jacob Chengwei Feng
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan Cham
Hardcover ISBN: 978-3-032-00475-8
Published: 09 December 2025
About this book: This open access book offers a fresh perspective on the history of Chinese Christianity, retelling it through the lens of Pentecost (Acts 2) to illuminate the rise of Pentecostal and charismatic Christianity in China from the 20th century onward.Parting from traditional academic studies of Chinese Pentecostalism, the author departs from beginning with the early 20th-century introduction of the Pentecostal movement to China, and instead examines the deeper historical and theological roots of Chinese Christianity. In identifying this gap, the author argues that China’s rich religious and cultural context—shaped by a pantheon of spirits and ghosts—provided a fertile ground for the acceptance and flourishing of modern Pentecostal thought and practice. Through this innovative analysis, the book connects Pentecostalism’s global emergence with the unique spiritual landscape of China, offering new insights into both Chinese and Pentecostal Christian history. It is an important read for scholars of religious history and theology.
Authors and Affiliations: Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, USA
About the author: Dr. Jacob Chengwei Feng is a Lecturer in Religious Studies at the University of California, Irvine, and a Postdoctoral Scholar at the Center for Missiological Research (CMR) at Fuller Theological Seminary. He holds a Ph.D. degree in Theological Studies from Fuller Theological Seminary. He is the Leader of the Theology Interest Group at the Society for Pentecostal Studies (SPS), a Fellow at Oxford Interfaith Forum, and an Academic Researcher at the Asia Research Center (ARC). He lives in Southern California, with his wife and college-age daughter.
Introduction
Pages 1-17
China’s Spirit World as the ‘Dancing Floor’ for the Holy Spirit
Pages 19-51
The Pentecost and Jingjiao: The Holy Spirit Dancing with Qi
Pages 53-72
The Pentecost and Yelikewen: Lived Experience of the Pentecost and Poetic Dancing with Qi
Pages 73-90
The Pentecost and the Jesuits of the Ming and Qing Dynasties: Reluctant Compromise in Dialogue with Confucianism
Pages 91-115
The Pentecost and the Earliest Protestant Missionaries
Pages 117-145
The Pentecost and the Earliest Pentecostal Missionaries in the 1910s and 1920s
Pages 147-165
The Pentecost and Indigenous Spiritual Gifts Movements in the Republican Era (1912–1949)
Pages 167-195
The Pentecost, Watchman Nee, and The Little Flock
Pages 197-223
Toward a Chinese Pentecost Theology for the Third Millennium
Pages 225-246
Download: https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/978-3-032-00476-5.pdf
