South Asia’s Christians: Between Hindu and Muslim, by Chandra Mallampalli (IJFM 39:2-4, Fall 2022), pp. xvi + 351
—reviewed by H. L. Richard
South Asian society defies simplistic analysis. Thus, presenting an overview that gets the nuances right is a rare achievement. This book is an impressive example of success in this area, despite its focus being on the somewhat narrow world of Christianity in South Asia. (But the subtitle of “between Hindu and Muslim” makes clear that there can be no valid study of South Asian Christianity that does not deal with the overshadowing Hindu and Muslim presences.)
Mallampalli surveys the historical development of South Asian Christianity with a decided focus on current issues, as is fitting in a book in the series “Oxford Studies in World Christianity.” His introduction provides a number of the careful nuances which make the book so valuable. In the Christian encounter with South Asia, Mallampalli sees three major aspects of interaction: knowledge production, debate, and conversion (6). The latter two are more easily recognizable, but missionary contributions to understanding life and thought in India should not be underestimated, despite Mallampalli’s wise observation that missionary debate and learned engagement with “other religions” (quotation marks as used by Mallampalli) had nothing to do with the conversion of the Dalit and tribal peoples. “The unmanageability of Dalit converts and their identities not only places them between Hindu and Muslim but also at the margins of organized Christianity in South Asia” (12, italics original).
Indian Christianity is vital for understanding India since Christians were “both catalysts of nationalism and the ‘other’ of nationalism” (12). Christian education especially stirred nationalist thought and action, but a Christian “vision that began with universal claims and transformative aspirations triggered anti-colonial nationalisms that portrayed Christians as foreigners” (12). Mallampalli suggests that “as cricket originated in England and eventually became a genuinely South Asian sport, Christianity underwent a similar transformation through which it became a genuinely South Asian religion” (13). Yet Mallampalli also warns not to “overlook instances where Christians have asserted clearer religious boundaries and have developed a distinctive consciousness through revival movements, theology, or exposure to global Christian networks” (11).
The historical survey of Indian Christianity predictably starts with chapters on the St. Thomas churches and then the Jesuit mission to Akbar. Mallampalli provides an excellent overview of the traditions (and texts) related to the Apostle Thomas in India, perhaps the best place to start investigating these stories. Mallampalli grants the possibility that Thomas was in India, and even the possibility that some early converts were Brahmans, but if that was the case “they were Brahmins who lacked the social capital they would enjoy later” (24).
From 1580, Jesuit missionaries began a series of visits to the court of Akbar who welcomed and interacted with them for complex political and spiritual reasons. In the end, Jesuit dreams of converting the emperor (and thus the entire kingdom) were revealed as empty. Mallampalli compares this failure with the four-centuries-later failure of Christians to understand Mahatma Gandhi’s similar surface openness to Christianity, which was also undergirded by an adamantine embrace of pluralistic universalism.
In his third chapter, Mallampalli takes on the complex historical heritages of Francis Xavier and Robert de Nobili under the broader rubric of cultural accommodation. The turmoil surrounding these issues has not yet stilled; Mallampalli insightfully suggests that “In key respects, the Jesuits appear to have made a virtue out of what would be a natural tendency toward cultural accommodation in regions beyond the reach of Goa” (87). It is not possible to prevent all accommodation (or syncretism), so one must beware of being too concerned about these matters. Mallampalli also helpfully highlights a tension between the foreign priest and the local agent:
Priests faced a constant irony: Catechists made the difficult task of cross-cultural evangelism possible while at the same time contributing to the priests’ sense of vulnerability and resentment. (82)
Foreign missionaries have never been as effective as local workers, and the fact that this simple and obvious truth is not yet widely understood reveals missionary insistence on keeping themselves in the center of the story.
The complex relationship between Christianity and European colonialism (chapter four) raises a simple question, which Mallampalli proceeds to answer:
How exactly did a religion that spread within a context of war capitalism become translated into one that was genuinely owned by Indians? Despite the history of European exploitation, violence, and racism, Indians became Christian. They did so not by accepting every cultural or political assumption of their European rulers, but by embracing a faith that was translated into their own language and experience. (110)
“The argumentative Protestant” is a fitting title for the fifth chapter, and Protestant argumentativeness continues to be a stumbling block to this day. An extensive quotation from the pro-Western Muslim reformer Sir Syed Ahmed Khan strikingly makes the point:
The missionaries introduced a new system of preaching. They took to printing and circulating controversial tracts in the shape of questions and answers. Men of a different faith were spoken of in those in a most offensive and irritating way. In Hindustan these things have always been managed very differently. Every man in this country, preaches and explains his views in his own Mosque, or his own house. . . . But the Missionaries’ plan was exactly the opposite. They used to attend places of public resort . . . to begin preaching there. It was only from fear of authorities that no one bids them off . . . And then the missionaries did not confine themselves to explaining the doctrines of their own books. In violent and unmeasured language they attacked the followers and holy places of other creeds. (135, from The Causes of the Indian Revolt, 1873, 18)
This is not merely a historical embarrassment but a crucial factor for understanding current “religious” realities. As Mallampalli states, “Relentless public criticism of the beliefs of others mobilizes opposition funding, counter-propaganda, and new patrons of opposing agendas” (140). Something like a Protestantization of other faith traditions results, and unsympathetic analysis (Mallampalli singles out Samuel Huntington’s The Clash of Civilizations as an example of offense in this area) “de-historicizes difference and presumes uniformity where it does not exist” (143).
Mallampalli appropriately focuses his sixth chapter on “Upper Caste Converts to Protestantism” before shifting the focus (also appropriately) of his concluding four chapters to the establishment of Protestantism as a religion of the poor and oppressed in India. In a book that is remarkably free from error, there are two minor slips in dealing with forward caste converts. On page 148 discussing Narayan Vaman Tilak, Mallampalli references his friendship with missionary Justin Abbott who “had produced” volumes on the Poet-Saints of Maharashtra; but those volumes post-dated Tilak’s life, so the phrase here should be “who would go on to produce.” Similarly, on page 158 Mallampalli quotes Frykenberg on Pandita Ramabai’s shift to a focus on “bhakti, or personal devotion to God expressed with great emotion,” but this is dated too early, tied to “America’s populist Christianity” during Ramabai’s 1880s USA visit, when in fact that emphasis developed later related to crises in India in the 1890s.
Mallampalli goes from south to northeast to northwest India in documenting “Mass Conversion among Dalits and Tribals” in chapter seven. Like the stories in chapter six, this is stimulating reading with many nuances which explode our tendencies to develop simplistic talking points.
On the contrary, missionaries were often overwhelmed by the eagerness and scale with which Dalits and tribals sought baptism. Native evangelists and catechists bore the brunt of the burden as they assisted with Bible translation, propagated the faith, and provided Christian instruction for new converts. (188)
Chapter eight looks at “Nationalist Politics and the Minoritization of Christians,” a topic on which Mallampalli has previously published (Christians and Public Life in Colonial South India, 1863– 1937: Contending with Marginality, New York: RoutledgeCurzon,
2004).1 Western colonial frameworks distorted reality, and “decolonization in South Asia consolidated notions of nationhood that were built around Hindu, Muslim, and Buddhist identities” (204). This dynamic, as quoted above, “de-historicizes difference and presumes uniformity where it does not exist” (143).
Chapter nine gives an insightful and nuanced approach to “Dalits and Social Liberation,” although I feel there may be some measure of special pleading for the missionary approach. In a section on “Multiple Identities,” Mallampalli points out that:
Converts moved constantly between the domains of village life and those of the Church. As they did so, they negotiated their original identities with their new Protestant selves. Missionaries may have aspired to see converts make a clean break from their past, but this would have required them to provide those converts with an entirely new source of livelihood and an alternative social existence, removed from village life. As noted above, they neither aspired to nor were able to achieve such ends among their mass converts, who were compelled to maintain dual participation and dual identities. (228)
This seems to understate missionary commitment to remake Indian society. The consistent critique of caste (a topic only cursorily touched on by Mallampalli) was self-described by missionaries as an attack on the foundation of Hindu society. True, the mass movements made it impossible to extract converts into a new civilizational set-up, but the missionary attack on caste was not lessened and aimed at uprooting traditional Indian society (as also with many Christian attacks on caste today).
Christian appeals for the Indian government to provide affirmative action programs for Dalit Christians is one of the complex topics addressed. That conversion to Christianity disqualifies a Dalit from government aid is seen by many Indian Christians as blatant injustice. But Mallampalli points out three assumptions behind the 1950 Constitutional Order that established this system: “. . . the casteless-ness of Christianity; its transformative impact on the lives of converts; and its capacity to bring foreign resources to bear upon the plight of India’s untouchables” (235).
What of those points can be denied without bringing shame to Christianity and its teachings and practice? Yet a 2005 government appointed Mishra Commission stated bluntly that
Their [persons of Scheduled Caste origin converted to Christianity] position both in the Church as well as amongst fellow Christians is no better than that suffered by their counterparts in other religious denominations. (237)
A final chapter looks at “Pentecostalism, Conversion and Violence in India.” Pentecostalism is the most dynamic and expansive variety of Christianity in India today, as well as being the branch of Christianity most likely to continue the older missionary tradition of attacking other faiths. Mallampalli suggests that:
It is one thing to say that Pentecostals are attacked in India because they attack other faiths. It is perhaps more accurate to say that Pentecostals are attacked because they attract.(242, italics original)
Mallampalli points out that “Pentecostalism and Hindutva are clearly at odds with each other; and yet they appear to draw from a common set of tools arising from globalization” (243).
The rise of Pentecostalism does not have a simple explanation.
The emergence of Pentecostalism in Kerala and in South Asia as a whole involves many variables, sometimes in tension with each other. These include the role of overseas patrons, the quest for local autonomy, enterprising and visionary leadership by Indians, and interpersonal conflicts and church splits that created new churches. Out of this complex array of factors, Pentecostal and independent churches multiplied throughout South Asia and became the force in World Christianity that they are today. (248)
The Pentecostal vision is strikingly at odds with that of liberation theology, and Mallampalli’s perspective in this matter is insightful:
Some contend that Pentecostalism has had a greater impact on the poor than liberation theology, despite the strong emphasis of the latter in Catholic and Protestant seminaries in South Asia. Although its message is not oriented to matters of social justice, Pentecostalism has had an impact on self-worth, empowerment, and dignity for the poor. In this respect, the aims of Pentecostalism intersect with those of liberation theology. (251)
Mallampalli has some concern with the approach of Chad Bauman to anti-Pentecostal violence in India today.
His [Bauman’s] analysis appears to walk a fine line between portraying Pentecostals as victims of unlawful violence while also identifying them as bringing the violence upon themselves through triumphalist rhetoric and practices. (255)
Mallampalli wisely refrains from projecting the future of India or of South Asian Christianity. But clearly his account sets the stage for many more dynamic chapters ahead in the saga of gospel encounters with the complex peoples of South Asia.
Endnotes
1 See my IJFM review at https://ijfm.org/PDFs_IJFM/27_2_ PDFs 27_2%20Book%20Reviews.pdf.
Pull Out Quote
Protestant argumentativeness continues to be a stumbling block to this day.
- H.L. Richard is an independent researcher focused on the Hindu-Christian encounter. He has published numerous books and articles including studies of key figures like Narayan Vaman Tilak (Following Jesus in the Hindu Context, Pasadena: William Carey Library, 1998), Kalagara Subba Rao (Exploring the Depths of the Mystery of Christ, Bangalore: Centre for Contemporary Christianity, 2005), and R. C. Das (R. C. Das: Evangelical Prophet for Contextual Christianity, Delhi: ISPCK, 1995).
