A peek into the Christian View of Hindu Dharma and society

How did the missionaries view our religion and society? Are their thoughts still lingering in our discourse today?

Namaste everyone,

Consider the following statements:

1. “Hindu Dharma is full of superstitions”

2. “Its full of meaningless, external rituals”

3. “To be spiritual, one doesn’t have to bow down to Idols”

4. “Hindus are just Brahmins’ slaves”

5. “Brahmins are the most wicked people”

6. “Caste is the most disgusting societal structure that ever exists” and so on.

These are lines which one hears every single day in the Indian discourse on Hindu Dharma and society - someone on the Left or the Right keeps telling something like this. What do these statements tell us about Hindu Dharma and society? It tells us that it is one of those religions which is full of meaningless rituals and superstitions, with possibly nothing to gain from a spiritual standpoint. The Brahmins, who are some of the most evil people are part of this religion and they have created a societal structure, the “Caste System” for their convenience and so on.

Did our ancestors think about society and religion in the same way and still followed it for over 1000 years? Hindus of the last few generations and us, did we get some sort of epiphany through which the “truth” about Hindu Dharma and society were revealed? Were our ancestors dumb and stupid for not finding our that their religion and society are regressive in nature?

To understand these statements and the above questions better, in this post, I will make a small effort towards understanding the Christian missionary view of our religion, practices and society. I will be picking a small piece from a missionary account of the 1700s and will be performing a thorough dissection of those statements. In the end, we give some kind of a verdict to each statement:

1. Does the statement express the true nature of the Hindu society, practices, traditions etc.,? OR

2. Is the statement simply Christian prejudice of the missionary?

I think classifying every word, every statement into these two buckets will be a good exercise in the sense that we will atleast have some kind of answers to the statements we saw in the beginning. In short, if the statement is simply Christian prejudice(biases one develops by believing deeply in the Christian doctrine), that statement can be safely discarded because we know that it is simply bias and hence does not represent the true nature of the society. But if we understand that a statement is indeed talking about the true nature, then we keep it for further discussion.

With that, I hope you understand what we are trying to do. Let us get started.

1. Which missionary account?

The early years of 1700s is when the first set of Protestant Christian missionaries arrived to India to convert us. We will be considering the account “Propagation of the Gospel in the East”[1] which is the account of the first three Protestant Christian missionaries who came to India. It is understood that Bartholomaus Ziegenbalg and Henry Plutschau were the first Protestant Missionaries to come to India who were later joined by John Ernest Grundler. This account[1] has a number of essays, letters etc., written by these missionaries to different people. It is full of their experiences, conversations with Hindus, the obstructions they faced, the success they had and so on. In this post, we will be considering the “Preface” of this account which gives a preview of Hindu Dharma and society in general. As described above, idea is to dissect every statement and understand the account better from a Hindu perspective.

2. Propagation of the Gospel in the East: Preface

2.1 On the Hindus of Malabar

Page (ii of Preface)/12

The Inhabitants are generally good natur'd, ingenious and very industrious; charitable to the Poor, but extremely Superstitious in the Worship of the Pagods.
While he describes the nature of Hindus, the last line few words are interesting: extremely Superstitious in the Worship of the Pagods.

"Pagods" refer to our Devis/Devatas. "Pagodas" are our Devasthanas. What exactly is "Superstitious" about our worship of our Devis/Devas/Moorthys? Let us see.

2.2 On our Temples

Page (ii of Preface)/12

Some of their Temples are very rich, adorned with Galleries and Chapels, where-in are placed the Statues of several Men and Women, who, as they say, have lead Holy Lives, which are adorned with Gold and Silver Apparel, and attended with Lamps and Wax Candles burning Day and Night.

It is interesting to see how the author uses Christian references to describe Hindu temples. No other comments here.

2.3 On the annual Rathothsava in Malabar

Page (ii of Preface)/12

The author writes a short paragraph about the Rathothsava which happens every year("Annual Solemnities"). Let us go through it.

They have their Annual Solemnities, when they carry their Idols in Procession, with the Sound of Horns and Trumpets, accompanied with a great Number of People; much after the fame manner as the Image of the Virgin Mary is carried about in many Countries of Europe; only with this difference, that the Image of a Malabarian Goddess is so hugely bulky, that several hundred Men must labour hard to move the Great Waggon upon which she is placed in great Pomp and State.

This paragraph is packed. Let us deconstruct it. First and foremost is the usage of the word "Idol" or "Idols". You might think that "Idol" and “Idolatry” simply mean "Moorthy" and "Moorthy Pooje" respectively in the Hindu parlance, but it is not. To make it more clear, "Idol" and "Idolatry" are not the English equivalents of "Moorthy" and "Moorthy Pooje" respectively. When missionaries use it(and today if anyone uses it), please be informed that there is a clear Christian backdrop to these words - they have a clear meaning in Christianity. Let us go through a Bible dictionary[2] and checkout what “Idolatry” actually means.

Idolatry

Image-worship or divine honour paid to any created object. Paul describes the origin of idolatry in Romans 1:21-25 : men forsook God, and sank into ignorance and moral corruption ( 1:28 ).

Look at the words carefully:

1. Men forsook "God".

2. Sank into ignorance.

3. Sank into "Moral Corruption".

What all does this "Idolatry" include?

The forms of idolatry are,

1. Fetishism, or the worship of trees, rivers, hills, stones, etc.

2. Nature worship, the worship of the sun, moon, and stars, as the supposed powers of nature.

3. Hero worship, the worship of deceased ancestors, or of heroes.

We pray to the Panchabhootas(Bhoomi, Agni, Vaayu, Jala, Akasha). We bow down to cows, monkeys and many other animals, and ofcourse the Moorthys we pray to. How does a Christian see "Idolatry"?

1. The first and second commandments are directed against idolatry of every form.

2. The individual offender was devoted to destruction ( Exodus 22:20 )

3. To attempt to seduce others to false worship was a crime of equal enormity ( 13:6-10 )

4. An idolatrous nation shared the same fate.

5. "A city guilty of idolatry was looked upon as a cancer in the state; it was considered to be in rebellion, and treated according to the laws of war. Its inhabitants and all their cattle were put to death."

This is what Christianity tells. Christians, especially the missionaries have these statements engrained in them and whenever they see something like "Idolatry", remember that their reactions will have these thoughts, which are purely Christian in Nature.

Based on what Christianity tells, if a missionary writes the following statements after observing the Hindus:

1. "That Hindu is sinking in ignorance and is morally corrupt"

2. "These Hindus are sinking in gravest sins like Idolatry" etc.,

How do we interpret such statements? Is the Hindu really sinking in "Ignorance", is he really "morally corrupt"? Is “Moorthy Pooje” (which the missionary writes off as “Idolatry”) a sin for Hindus? Are these statements made out of Christian prejudice or is there some truth to it? Because if we can’t put a statement into one of the two buckets, it is going to be a problem. In our textbooks, if the same lines are copy-pasted and our Hindus(kids) read it, these lines will be ingested without context - they will start believing in all this - that their ancestors were "ignorant", "morally corrupt", "sinful" etc., But it is clear from the bible dictionary results that these are Christian beliefs and prejudices - because of this, the above statements should ideally be discarded.

That was about "Idolatry". If you actually want to understand the basics of Moorthy Pooje, Temple worship, you may read about the Agama Shastras. There are a number of them, many in each Sampradaya. To get an introduction, you may read about Vaikhaanasa Agama Shastra[3] and Paancharaathra Agama Shastra[4]. You may read this series of articles on Agama Shastras and Temple worship[5].

The point I am trying to make is that we Hindus had/have all the rationales, beliefs, rituals, traditions supporting our worship. Maybe some of us have lost touch, but reading and talking to Archakas at temples should clear up lot of your doubts. This is our way(lets call it one of the ways, there are other ways of worship as well). There are different sects of people following different methods of worship and we have been doing this consistently for centuries now. When an outsider, that too a Christian missionary who is full of prejudice against the kind of worship we do tells something about our worship, without understanding it and without any intention to understand it(because he does not care, he mostly wants to destroy it and convert us), it is only fair to dismiss his words and not take it to our heart or internalize it. But unfortunately, good number of us have internalized this rhetoric, atleast some parts. The Arya Samaj folks outright take the Protestant missionary position and tell that "Idol worship is not Hindu" and that it is a "sin" and such. Some radicals in that group even call for breaking the Moorthys, demolition of temples. This leads us to the question if they have any intention to reclaim or even support to reclaim the thousands of temples we have lost due to invasions but that is a different story.

Let us continue.

They have their Annual Solemnities, when they carry their Idols in Procession, with the Sound of Horns and Trumpets, accompanied with a great Number of People; much after the fame manner as the Image of the Virgin Mary is carried about in many Countries of Europe; only with this difference, that the Image of a Malabarian Goddess is so hugely bulky, that several hundred Men must labour hard to move the Great Waggon upon which she is placed in great Pomp and State.

I think the author witnessed the "Vaarshikotsava" celebrated at a Devasthana. The "Great Waggon" I believe is the "Ratha" in which Ammanavaru sits and large number of men pull it. It is amazing to see this happening in large number of temples even today.

They make great use of Holy Water in their Ceremonious Washings and Purifications.

This is true.

2.4 On Brahmins

Page (iii of Preface)/13

Then he describes some more practices and introduces Brahmins.

Their Temple Worship consists in Sacrifices, Burning of Incence, in Cringings and Bowing of the Priests, Young Womens Singing and Dancing to the Sound of Musical Instruments before the Idols; the Inspection whereof is committed to the Care of the Bramans, who make a separate Tribe among the Malabarians, as the Levites formerly among the Jews.

This is true even today, although it is Moorthy and not an "Idol". He continues,

They marry only in their own Tribe, and are very burthensome to the Publick: For the whole Tribe is maintain'd by the Gifts and Liberalities of the Layity ;

He stresses on the fact that Brahmins are a separate tribe and marry inside the tribe(basically a "Jaati"). Maybe he did or did not notice, the entire Hindu society was/is organized this way - from what I understand, it is the co-existence of several Jaatis(endogamous-tribes), and Jaati was the fundamental unit of the society(not the individual like today). I am going to guess that missionaries/orientalists stressed a lot on Brahmins marrying inside their tribe - when the entire society did the same. Today, if you observe, whenever anyone speaks about Endogamy, in the end it simply comes down to Brahmins practicing endogamy when the reality is that everyone practices endogamy even today. For that matter, the Jaatis inside the "Dalit" fold also strictly follow endogamy and hardly ever inter-marry, but the focus is never on that. Why this special focus on Brahmins practicing endogamy in today's times, and the demonization associated with it, when everyone have been doing the same atleast for the past 1500-2000 years?

The word "burthensome" means "difficult to carry" or "highly restrictive". Brahmins, especially the ones who serve our Devis/Devas follow stringent rules prescribed in the Dharma Shastras and maybe noticed to be "burthensome". As an Archaka, one has to live a fairly restrictive life. But here, he tells why it is "burthensome". He tells,

For the whole Tribe is maintain'd by the Gifts and Liberalities of the Layity ;
The entire set of Brahmins survive on the Gifts and Liberalities of the "Layity".

Before I analyze the statement, let us understand the word "Layity" in detail. The word "Layity" means lay people/laymen, distinct from the "clergy". This word has a definite Christian backgrop to it and he uses it to describes Hindus. Now, whatever was the relationship between the Christian clergy and Christian layity, will that relationship, its nature be imposed on the relationship between the Brahmins and non-Brahmins just by using these Christian words? Is that a possibility? It is good to understand that the missionaries being zealous and high on Christian knowledge/values, always tend to describe/judge others from a Christian point of view - the relationship between the non-Brahmins("Hindu" layity) and Brahmins(Archakas) may not be the same as "Christian" layity and its clergy, but the latter will be taken as a point of reference while describing the former and if we take the words in face-value, we will implicitly be imposing the latter relationship on the former(Hindu) one. We should make sure such an imposition does not happen - because it does not represent the true nature of that relationship.

He now describes the "Hindu" layity.

who are so stupid, as to believe these Bramans derive their Pedigree from the God Biruma; and that they are therefore very holy Men.

Alright, are they really stupid? The non-Brahmins who believe in Brahmins, are they stupid? If we take it as a fact, it means the non-Brahmins have been stupid for over 1500 years across all regions in India. Is that the case? I don’t think so. Brahmins serve the Devis/Devas, perform the rituals, do worship at temples. The non-Brahmins believe in Hindu Dharma, believe in our Devis/Devas and the Brahmins who are at the service of the Devis/Devas. Coming to his reason, Dharmic Brahmins truly derive their "Pedigree" from Brahma. Dharmic Brahmins even today live by the Shastras, extremely strict life. To do this, truly a different "Pedigree" is needed. And yes, their practices, cleanliness etc., definitely make them holy men.

Why does our missionary friend find it stupid? The pastors, fathers, priests, clerics, bishops, popes and every position and member of the "Clergy" of every Church/denomination are considered "Holy" in Christianity[6]. Not just in Christianity, in Islam, Judaism and large number of extinct non-Abrahamic religions also have a tribe of men like this. Are the people who follow and abide by the Christian clergy stupid? Are the people who go to the Church every Sunday, listen to the Father and abide by whatever he preaches stupid? Let us take a look at the definition of the "priestly class" or let us put it as "priestly tribe".

A priesthood is a body of priests, shamans, or oracles who have special religious authority or function. The term priest is derived from the Greek presbyter (presbyteros, elder or senior), but is often used in the sense of sacerdos in particular, i.e., for clergy performing ritual within the sphere of the sacred or numinous communicating with the gods on behalf of the community.

So were the normal non-priestly Greeks stupid for following the priestly class? For thinking that the priests performs many rituals which were considered sacred and communicated with the gods on behalf the entire community? Ofcourse not. I think it is stupid to consider the normal Greeks stupid.

Again, were the normal Hindus stupid to believe the priestly Hindus/Brahmins/Archakas? Absolutely not. It is their religion and they believed and practiced it. I believe that the "stupid" has roots in the fact that the author is a Christian. First of all, he believes that ours is a "False religion" and we follow "False Gods", that our practices etc., are "superstitious". And when you see a Brahmin, the person who in a way enforces these practices in Devasthanas(the ones which are "superstitious" and which makes the common people "Ignorant" of the "True God"), this point of view recognizes the common people to be "stupid" of believing the Brahmins.

And then comes their "true" description of the Brahmins.

And they are proud and cunning enough to cherish this Ignorance of the People, by holding no Communication with the meaner sort of People, for fear, say they, of being defiled And some of them separate themselves from the rest of their Neighbours (for there are Monks and Anchorets among them, who spend their time in Wilderneiles and Caves of the Earth ; ) and yet there is not, perhaps, a more wicked Race of Men treading upon God's Earth;

Again, the entire thing is made out to be something exclusive for Brahmins - as if just Brahmins live away from everyone else - and everyone else is one homogenous populace that lives together the way we live today in cities. Reality of the day was that streets were separated based on Jaatis - basically people belonging to a particular Jaati stayed close/together. Even today, this exists in many villages. I have witnessed this first hand in Karnataka there are Brahmin street, Kuruba Street(Pasturer Jaati street), Shetty street(A Vaishya Jaati street), Agasa street(Washermen Jaati street) and so on. Again, there is nothing special about Brahmins living separately from non-Brahmins. Every Jaati lived with their own people, separate from other Jaati people. But the focus again is given on just Brahmins and it is projected as if only Brahmins do it. Today, the “defilement” part is blown out of proportion to demonize Brahmins. But the fact is that the Dharmic Brahmins have to observe a lot of rules prescribed by Shastras when they are serving our Devis/Devas. One such rule is the dichotomy of "MaDi/Mylige" or roughly "purity/pollution". Because of this, they made sure not to touch anything or anyone atleast when they are "on duty" of serving our Devis/Devas. Ofcourse, today this is seen as a crime - the unwillingness to "touch" someone is a crime going by today's discourse. In Karnataka, many Anti-Brahmin folks hate Brahmins because we follow "MaDivantike" or the concept of "purity/pollution". But thinking from a Hindu perspective, it should be noted that such a strict life has to be led when serving the Devatas, the rituals and practices demands it. And the last line,

and yet there is not, perhaps, a more wicked Race of Men treading upon God's Earth;

This goes well with today’s discourse. Today, Brahmins are infamous for being the most wicked men on Earth. But why is that? What is "wicked" about these Brahmins? Is this just his prejudice or did he see Brahmins actually doing something “wicked”(even this is very subjective)? Let us continue.

For they certainly believe, that all things, how abominable soever, are very lawful, when practis'd by themselves. And the People are so infatuated by them, that they believe they shall become holy, by partaking in their Crimes, or by suffering any Outrage at their Hands.

What are those "abominable things" practiced by these Brahmins? Why are people so "infatuated" by them even when they do "abominable things"? Why are they “infatuated” when Brahmins are the most “wicked” race of people on Earth? What does he call a "Crime"? What do the normal people "suffer" at the hands of Brahmins? Let us see if he describes these things in detail. He continues,

Besides, they are the greatest imposters in the World: Their Talent lies in inventing new Fables every day, and making them pals for incomprehensible mysteries among the Vulgar.

Why are they the "greatest imposters"? What are these "Fables" the author is referring to? What are these "incomprehensible mysteries"? And what is "Vulgar" about them?

As a normal reader, what is your impression on Brahmins after reading the above lines? Criminals, Imposters, Wicked people, they do “abominable things”, common people “suffer” at the Brahmins’ hands and so on. So truly, the Brahmins should be a very bad bunch of people isn’t it. What does the world thing about Brahmins today in general? Literally the above missionary lines. Continuing,

One of their Cheats is to persuade the People, that their Idols Eat like Men: And to the end they may be plentifully provided with good Cheer, they make them of a Gigantick Figure; and to be sure, with a prodigious Paunch.

He has described whatever he saw as a Christian. Let us look at this from a Hindu perspective. If you have observed this ritual, I believe he is talking about “Naivedyam” - we offer the food first to our Devatas we are praying to and once that ritual is done, we complete the Pooje and we have it. During Ganesh Chathurti, we prepare a lot of savories are prepared for Naivedya - Milk, Modaka, Laddu, KaDbu(a delicacy), Idli, Rice, Payasam and so on. First, it is offered to Ganesha during the Pooje. Once the Pooje is done, we consume it as Prasada. It should be noted that this is an extremely common ritual and happens in most Poojes. First, everything is offered to our Gods and only then we consume it. We are not even supposed to smell it. At our home diety’s Devasthana, before the “Vaarshikotsava” starts in the morning, the Gowdas of the village give Goats as sacrifice(Pashubali) to the Ammanavaru(Grama Devate) and it is believed that she consumes that blood - this happens under the supervision of the Archakaru. Only with her blessings and permission, rest of the work related to the “Vaarshikotsava” starts.

He also tells that the Moorthy has a "prodigious Paunch" which means "fat stomach" - He is of the opinion that the Moorthy has a "fat stomach" to indicate/signal that the Swamy eats a "lot" and that lot of offerings are needed to satisfy him. Well, the Moorthy's "belly size" has nothing to do with any of what he told.

Coming back, is the ritual of “Naivedyam” or any such offering to Devis/Devas considered “cheating”? From a Hindu point of view, this is exactly how the ritual works. In this case, the Brahmin performs the ritual. He continues,

If these offerings, with which they maintain their Families, come to fail, they denounce against the People the Anger of the Hungry Gods.

True. This is how large number of Brahmins got their livelihood from before they left their Kula-profession and started doing other jobs for livelihood. But connecting that with the offering failing to come - I will let you decide what it is. There is a very tight tradition around every Devi/Deva, every temple, things have to be done in a certain way, for eg. Pashubali is compulsary for certain Devatas or making Modakas and offering it to Ganesha is compulsory etc., Brahmins enforce this tradition and make sure it happens correctly, and that we don't deviate from it. Can this be called “cheating”?

I will let you decide if that is Christian prejudice or is there some truth to it. Then, he talks about Cows.

They believe, that a Cow has something in her Sacred and Divine; and happy is the Man, who can be sprinkled with the Ashes of a Cow burnt by the Hand of a Braman;

It is true that we consider Cow to be a very sacred animal. We refer to her as "Gomata". In the second part, I believe he is referring to Vibhooti/Bhasma, which is traditionally prepared by burning dried Cow Dung. And yes, it is considered very sacred and large number of people wear it everyday on their foreheads. Continuing,

he, who dying, lays hold of a Cow's Tail, and Expires with it betwixt his hands, thinks himself as happy as he that is to be buried in the Robes of a Capuchin: For thus assisted, the Soul departs out of the Body, purified, and sometimes returns into the Body of a Cow;

He is talking about a belief of ours. Next comes the interesting part.

... which is look'd upon as a great Blessing, and never granted, but to Heroick Souls, who contemn Life, and die generously, either by casting themselves headlong from a Precipice, or leaping into a kindled Pile, or throwing themselves under the holy Chariot, to be crushed to Death by the Idols, while they are carried in Triumph about the Town: For the Souls of wicked Men in their next Nativity must animate the Bodies of Swine, Dogs, or some more hideous Creatures.

Let us quickly analyze the key statements.

1. "casting themselves headlong from a Precipice": I am not sure what he is talking about. I am guessing he has seen a Sanyasi/Yogi doing Sheershaasana in some hill.

2. "Leaping into a kindled Pile": This is a prevalent practice even today. People walk on hot burning coal as part of a tradition or to satisfy a Promise to Swamy(known as "Harake" in Kannada) they made.

3. "Throwing themselves under the holy Chariot, to be crushed to death by the Idols, while they are carried in Triumph about the Town": He is talking about how many large number of laymen(like me, you) would want to pull the Ratha/Utsava forward, irrespective of however heavy is the Ratha/Utsava. What does he see in it? He sees it as just some people being “crushed to death” by the “Idols”. Think about this from a Hindu perspective. The Moorthy for us is literally the living form of the Swamy and carrying our Devaru, the Utsava on our shoulders or pulling the Ratha can be considered only as a privilege and an immense blessing from our Devaru. The missionary does not understand the sentiment behind this and describes what he sees from outside.

4. The last few words confirm that good number of Hindus back then believed in re-birth(Punarjanma) and if they don't do good in this Janma, they might be born as hideous creatures in the next.

Coming back, are these the "wicked", "abominable", "Vulgar", "Criminal" things the missionary talking about when he spoke about Brahmins? These are just normal Hindu traditions which even today are performed by large number of devoted Hindus. If all this was indeed “wicked” and “criminal”, I wonder why the people were “infatuated” towards Brahmins. Were they stupid? I don’t think so. They were simply following their religion. But today, the Left and some on Right have a counter for this as well: That the Brahmins “controlled” these people through these “superstitions” and “ceremonies”. This is simply silly and shows Hindus as a collective in a bad light. I can boldly tell that whatever we read above is just Christian prejudice and nothing more. For a given Hindu practice, any number of (mis)interpretations can be given. But the fact is that a believing Hindu will clearly understand what is going on there and the outsider may not be able to make full sense out of it.

He talks about how Bramins refrain from eating non-veg.

And pursuant to this Doctrine of the Transmigration of souls from one Body into another, they religiously abstain from eating the Flesh of any living Creature whatsoever, whether Fish, Foul or Four-footed Beasts; left by chance they might feed upon a Body, animated with the Soul that lodg'd before in a Father or near Relation.

He then talks about the "Divine Law" that has been sent down from Heaven:

These Bramans boast of a Divine Law them down from Heaven, but couch'd Language sent in a that the Laity understand not; nor are they allow'd the studying of it but must obey, and believe implicitly all that the Priest shall be pleased to prescribe as Articles of Faith.

What are those laws? Are they as "wicked" and “Vulgar” as the Brahmins are? Here are the Moral part of this law.

I. Thou shalt not kill any living creature whatsoever it be, having life in the same: For thou art a creature of mine and so is it: Thou art endued with soul and it is endued with the same. Thou shalt not therefore spill the blood of anything that is mine.

II. Thou shalt make a covenant with all thy five senses. First, with thy eyes, that they behold not things that be evil. Secondly, with thy ears, that they hear not things that be evil. Thirdly, with thy tongue, that it speaks not things that be evil. Fourthly, with thy palate, that it takes nothing that be evil; as wine, or the flesh of living creatures. Fifthly, with thy hands, that they touch not things defiled.

III. Thou shalt duly observe the times of devotion, thy washings, worshippings and prayers to the Lord thy God, with a pure and upright heart.

IV. Thou shalt not tell false tales, or utter things untrue, by which thou mightest defraud thy brother in dealings, bargains or contracts; by this consenage to work thy own peculiar advantage.

V. Thou shalt be charitable to the poor and administer to his need, meat, drink, and money, as his necessity requires, and thine own ability enableth thee to give.

VI. Thou shalt not oppress, injure or do violence to the poor, using thy power unjustly to the ruin and overthrow of thy brother.

VII. Thou shalt celebrate certain festivals; yet not pampering thy body with excess of anything; but shalt observe certain seasons for fasting, and break off some hours by watching, that thou may’st be fitter for devotion and holiness.

VIII. Thou shalt not steal from thy brother anything, however little it be, of things committed to thy trust in thy profession or calling; but content thyself with that which he shall give thee as thine hire; considering that thou has not right to that which another man calleth his.

These laws of “wicked” Brahmins do not seem wicked to me, even when we see through the 21st century lens. The author also talks about how others did not have access to these texts. This is partially true. It is true that the Shudras were not authorized to read/recite the Vedas. But the trope that they were denied of all education is false. If you read rest of the missionary account, you will find out that normal Hindus had access to religious books, Hindu Law books like “Thirukkural”[7][8] and other books which taught about Hindu Dharma.

That is about Brahmins from the Preface.

He then talks about some customs related to burial of a dead body. Following that, he starts talking about St. Thomas, Syrian Christians and general state of Christianity in Malabar. He then talks a bit about the Spaniards and Portuguese:

one may boldly fay, that these two Honest Gentlemen have done more Service to Christ and his Gospel, than the Spaniards and Portuguese have done for these last two Hundred Years, in both the Indies.

He talks in brief about the Goa Inquisition being a bloody one filled with violence and outrage. But he compares that way of conversion(The Jesuit/Roman Catholic way) to the Protestant Missionary way which according to him is the following:

But our Protestant Missionaries know of no other Method of Converting the Heathens, but that of the Apostles themselves, viz. Persuasions and convincing Reasons, setting forth the Corruptions of the Human Nature, and the Necessity of a Mediator ; as will appear by the following Conferences ;

This one account is enough to tell us the kind of “reasoning” used by these Protestant missionaries, a large part of them being plain Christian prejudice against Hindu Dharma, our society, Brahmins(priestly ones) along with technicalities of the Christian religion.

3. Purpose of this exercise?

There are a lot of uses of doing this exercise.

1. Identify general Christian prejudice in today’s Hindu discourse: In the above piece, we could clearly see Christian prejudices against various aspects of the Hindu Dharma and society. This is only a peek into how missionaries viewed our society and the way they described it. When these missionary writings are used to make text-books, public speeches and narratives, today’s Hindus will learn the missionary/colonizer version of our own society, which means kids will be made to hate our history and society. When we see certain statements in today’s discourse, we can quickly tell its origins - is it true or it is colonial. Today, when the Left tells that Hindu Dharma is full of superstitions, they are simply repeating what the Christians wrote about our society. In general, I believe this kind of exercise will help us reduce the prejudices we have against our own societies, because good number of prejudices come from our English/Secular/Colonial/Christian education and hopefully we will become capable of constructing the right image of our past without colonial baggage.

2. Discussing Brahmin hatred: Today, “wicked” Brahmins are demonized to no end. Even though scholarly articles are written on this topic[10], I believe we need more evidence to hit the nail harder into the coffin, to tackle this attack. The Christian prejudice expressed by the missionaries(as we saw above) has gotten translated into pure, direct Brahmin hate. With an academic effort, I believe we can prove that this hate has its origins in these missionary accounts, and that before these folks came, Hindus did not hate Brahmins to this degree atleast. This effort is necessary because calls to erase Brahmins from the face of the Earth is increasing steadily and most of the hate is based on Christian prejudice. This is intended to be an intellectual response to the genocide calls. So, “O Brahmin! Fix the past, secure the future” is what I intend to do with this type of exercise.

3. Re-visiting Varna-Jaati vyavastha: If there is anything in Hindu Dharma(apart from Brahmins) that both Left and Right hates, it has to be the Varna-Jaati vyavastha, popularly known as “Hindu Caste System”. While I can understand the Left’s position, the Right’s position is strange. The Right loves almost everything about Hindu Dharma: The Vedas, Puranas, Itihasa, stunning temples and architecture, Art and sculptures and much more. But they hate the societal structure under which all these achievements happened: Preserving of Vedas and other scriptures, building of temples, art and sculptures etc., happened under this societal setup. I found this strange at first, but I understand that large part of this hate is because of the missionary-colonial writings. Atleast after this exercise, I hope one can better appreciate the Varna-Jaati vyavastha and its role in making Hindu Dharma what it is and its special properties which made the society resist the foreign interference.

What this exercise does not intend to do:

1. Re-establishing Varna-Jaati vyavastha: I believe there is a fear/irritation in Hindus that these exercises are being done in order to re-establish Varna-Jaati vyavastha again and that these exercises are “evil” and “agenda-driven” etc., Personally, I don’t care about any of that. I think our society is beyond repair and only Swamy should help us. So, only goal is to fix the way we look at our own past.

2. Whitewash the actual oppression which has happened on different Jaatis. It is often said that Brahmins oppressed all Jaatis for 5000 years. The problem here is that lot of hate in this statement is simply Christian prejudice induced hate which should be discarded. The true facts and incidents of oppression are here to stay and I have no intention to whitewash it.

4. Conclusion

I hope you got a taste of Christian prejudice against Hindu Dharma and society. And I hope one can imagine the amount of damage done to our religion when this prejudice is used today as “facts” of Hindu Dharma. So, this exercise should help us understand our own society better, our own past better.

I request you to read the rest of the account[1] and perform the above exercise as you read through, you will know what ails today’s Hindu discourse.

I hope you learnt something out of this article. Thank you for reading!

5. References

1. https://archive.org/details/propagationofgos00zieg/

2. https://www.biblestudytools.com/dictionary/idolatry/

3. https://www.sadagopan.org/pdfuploads/Vaikhanasa%20Agamam%20v1.pdf

4. https://ebooks.tirumala.org/downloads/pancharatragama.pdf

5. https://sreenivasaraos.com/2012/09/06/temple-worship-and-rituals-1-of-5/

6. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clergy/

7. https://ia801607.us.archive.org/33/items/in.ernet.dli.2015.203867/2015.203867.The-Kural.pdf

8. https://archive.org/details/THIRUKKURALEnglishTranslationAndCommentaryProjectMadurai

9. https://pragyata.com/christian-missionaries-on-caste/

10. https://pragyata.com/the-colonial-genesis-of-anti-brahminism/