Author: BB Kumar
Publication: The Pioneer
Date: July 8, 2007
The British colonial regime helped the missionaries
in converting tribals. They thought the Christian hillmen would be a valuable
prop to the state in time of nationalist uprising, writes BB Kumar
Changing Gods: Rethinking Conversion in India
is written by Rudolf C Heredia, "a committed Christian believer and a
professional social scientist", as the author claims to be. Proselytisation
is a part of the Christian's ordained duty and the author, himself a Jesuit
priest, takes a stand as expected.
The book begins with a threatening note about
the existing controversy centred around conversion by comparing it with the
nuclear war situation of the Cold War era, wherein the protagonists achieved
the balance of terror with their nuclear policy of 'mutually assured destruction'
(MAD), thus rejecting saner option of a mutually agreed disarmament under
the then existing realpolitik framework and living in the dangerous possibility
of a 'nuclear winter* due to any mishap or miscalculated brinkmanship.
Drawing a parallel, Heredia notes: "Today
religious extremism and fundamentalism is whipping another wave of terror
that seems unbalanced and uncontrollable." He believes that a "parallel
to the MAD approach is grossly inadequate", and suggests: "Rather,
we need to step back from the brink with a determined religious disarmament,
not to dismiss or negate religion but to disarm and discard the aggression
and violence of those who indulge in, and those who seek to contain this religion-inspired
madness."
Who are the extremists in the-author's' view?
Islamists? No. He even objects the jihadis being labelled as Muslim extremists.
Christian terrorists of the North-East? NSCN militants, who have issued decree
to Hindu, Buddhist and pagan villagers of Changlang and Tirap districts of
Arunachal Pradesh "to convert to . Christianity or face capital punishment"?
Christian terrorists, who are terrorising and forcibly converting Hindu tribals
- Tripuris, Reangs and others? Not at all. Then, who are targeted? They are
those who are opposing conversion to Christianity, even indulging in re conversion,
ghar-wapasi.
Heredia writes about the "central paradox
of Hindu tolerance", "orthodox social practice contradicting it",
"the egalitarian possibilities in the Hindu theory of tolerance"
being overwritten by the "hierarchical realities of caste" and Hindu
tolerance being a "reconstruct of renaissance". On the other hand,
he writes about "liberal Islam" and the "social liberation
theory of Islam". He has a romantic view of Islamic tolerance, countering
what DS Margoliouth and Sir William Muir wrote in Prophet Mohammed's biographies.
The massacre of Bengali Hindus in Tripura
during the TNV movement was a "national uprising" for Rieveh Cunvilleh,
an American Church leader and director of the Bible Society of India. He hoped
that such political upheavals would make the tribals more receptive to the
Gospel. He hailed tribal assertion for rights and freedom in Nagaland, Mizoram,
Meghalaya and elsewhere.
Christianity is accepted as a major factor
by some Naga intellectuals in their struggle for 'sovereignty'. Heredia neither
mentions this aspect of the promotion of terror in the name of conversion,
nor about the Church's asking for-foreign intervention in India. Instead he
prefers to talk about "religious phobia that the hate-mongers have created".
These words and the value-loaded phrases, such as "conversion as -freedom/
conversion is freedom", "conversion as liberation", "conversion
as tolerance" become meaningless as the Church indulges in caging in
by terrorising and luring, rather than allowing freedom.
According to Mills, the reasons behind rapid
conversion of Ao Nagas into Christianity were (i) the expectation of the miraculous
results and (ii) the fear of hell-fire. The missionaries promised miracles,
baser and fear.
A threatened Chang Naga once said: "Who
knows what they (missionaries) say is really true? No one has come back from
the dead to tell them what the next world is like.
Even if their words are true, am I a coward
that I should fear to join my parents and suffer whatever torments they may
be suffering? If they can bear, cannot I?" The threat, however, worked
and people converted even in old age.
Conversion creates acute two world' situation
social divide and tensions among the converts 1 number of traditional religion
is drastically reduced. It destroys social egalitarian ethos, the belief system,
cultural heritage and the traditional wisdom. The missionaries destroyed excellent
tribal institutions and crafts such as Naga Morungs and Phom woodcraft. The
vast diversity of pagan religion and culture perished under the steamroller
of Christianity. And yet Heredia has the temerity to plead for conversion
in the name of "multi-cultural and pluri-religious richness.".
David Scot, Johnstone, Dalton and other British
colonial functionaries helped the Church's conversion work in the North- East,
Jharkhand and elsewhere. The Christian hillmen "would be a valuable prop
to the state" in time of nationalist uprising, they believed.
Heredia pleads for conversion "to relieve
them from the oppression of caste/Brahminic hierarchy and oppression and to
provide them egalitarian alternative to the same". Yet another claim
is "conversion as a gateway to self-respect". These tall claims
should be judged in the light of what the missionaries as collaborators of
colonial powers have done globally, in Asia, Africa, America, and to converted
Dalits in India. Moreover, the recent St Stephen's College controversy relating
to reservations for 'Dalit Christians' exposes the 'egalitarian' claims of
the Church.
While pleading for conversion, Heredia parades
colonial myths and misinterpretations fabricated by the colonialists, missionaries,
Marxists 'liberals' and brain washed Indian intellectuals. Besides, the book
promotes the racist interpretation of Indian society, myths of core-fringe
conflict, isolation, exploitation, oppression and hegemony, thereby promoting
social divide theories. Heredia also writes about Dalit marginalisation and
tribal isolation, ignoring the caste-tribe continuum under the sanatan framework.
The British colonial regime and the missionaries
evolved strategies to win India for Christ. Education was definitely one of
the most important tools. Thankfully, Alexander Duff's prediction - "education
would be the time bomb ticking at the roots of Hinduism and would blow it
to bits" - didn't materialise, and the Indic religion survived the missionary
onslaught. The battle, however, is not yet over.
The reviewer is editor, Dialogue.
