The first Jesuits arrived in Ethiopia in 1557 and began a mission project which lasted for eighty years. At first they were welcomed enthusiastically by the rulers of a Christian kingdom which had been devastated by an assault from Muslim forces led by the charismatic imam Ahmed Granj from the east of the region, and which needed support in reconstruction. During the mission, fifty priests were sent to the country, two successive Ethiopian kings submitted to the pope, and an ancient Christian Church submitted to the authority of Rome. In 1633 a change of government led to the expulsion of the Jesuits first from the court and then from the country.

The Jesuit period is well documented. Not only are there extensive archives held in Rome and elsewhere, but the first stage of the missionaries’ strategy was to study the society which they had set out to evangelise. Francisco Alvares was the chaplain to an earlier Portuguese mission, from 1520 to 1526, who recorded his experiences in a vivid travel diary, and later missionaries added to this body of literature with a series of descriptions and histories of Ethiopia. These have provided the primary sources on which a growing body of research into the Jesuit missions has been conducted by scholars who have helped us to understand the strategy and procedures of the missions. This volume is a valuable addition to this research and sets out to place the mission to Ethiopia in the context of the wider history of the Jesuit order.

The book is divided into three parts. The first shows how the mission project began. It describes the early contacts between Ethiopia and Europe, and how the Jesuits extended their activities from a base in India into the difficult and often hostile territories in the Horn of Africa.

The second, and longest section, analyses the missionary project. It describes the process of recruitment of personnel and shows the kind of people who took part; the biblical origins and theological thinking behind the message which they brought; and the contribution made to the establishing of a centralised political state.

The third section shows how the mission ended. As the mission progressed, the Jesuits began to require the re-ordination of priests and Roman liturgical practice, so resistance grew. This led to civil war and a reassertion of traditional Orthodox faith and practice. So the early promise was not fulfilled and the Jesuits were forced to withdraw.

The title of the study points to the central argument of the book. The idea of a human God gave coherence and consistency to the activities of the missionaries. They placed the humanity of Jesus at the heart of their message. This was taken from the Epistles of St Paul, which rejected the law and preached personal faith, and from the writing of Pope Leo the Great (440–61) who affirmed the full humanity of Christ, and who also sought to bring the Church under the authority of the Roman pope. In a process which they called ‘reduction’, the Jesuits identified the disorder and confusion of society, and brought it to a new unity and order under the Roman pope. This process took place through a progress from observation, which produced the body of descriptive literature; to deconstruction, which shows itself in debate and writing; to replacement, in which active reforms are carried out. The author here shows how this underlying unity of message works itself out in various ways – ranging from the dedication of churches to Iyasus, to concern to recruit able and impressive clergy who dressed in a smart and disciplined style, to helping kings develop centralised methods of government. These were not accidents or preferences, but were part of a coherent and carefully formulated package of reforms, applying the new humanity of the Jesuit Jesus to all aspects of society. The book describes the methods and thinking behind the mission.

Older accounts had pointed to differences in character between leaders. Pedro Paez gained the confidence of the kings through his personal qualities and respect for his hosts, and felt that the king's public submission to Rome was premature and ill-judged, but his successor Alfonso Mendes was seen as behaving in an arrogant manner by insisting on a package of reforms insensitively administered. This study shows that their practice was not the outcome of differences of personal style but was part of the plan which moved through successive stages. While this insistence helps us to understand the message, it is less helpful in describing its reception. There were only a small number of Jesuits in Ethiopia at any one time, and this small number had a huge influence. Ignatius was well aware of the importance of the personal qualities of his missionaries and he deliberately chose men with strong character and impressive personal qualities. He knew that the audience would react to the messenger as much as to the message. Both the capacity of Paez to evoke trust in his hearers and the insensitivity of Mendes to local religious practice were factors in the success of the former and failure of the latter. The third part of the book, which describes the ending of the mission, would have gained from greater emphasis on why the Ethiopians reacted in different ways to different missionaries.

The introduction to this book contrasts the incarnational faith in the ‘human God’ of the Jesuits, with the ‘majesty of the unapproachable godhead’ of the Orthodox. This short comparison does not do justice to the rich theological traditions expressed in poetry, hymnody and oral memory contained within the Ethiopian Orthodox Church. The encounter between Jesuit Catholicism and Ethiopian Orthodox theology produced a prolonged Christological and anthropological discussion especially concerning the work of the Spirit. Discussion of the wider context in Ethiopia and the responses to the actions of the missionaries would have given a more nuanced account and shown further the reasons for the ultimate failure of the mission.