Indian Culture and the Church
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Christayana, He was able to compose only the first three chapters of' this book.
He died in 1919.
Tilak completely humbled himself before God.
Here is a poem which shows his intense longing for Christ:
The more I attain to Thee, so much the more do I desire thee.
Such is the state of my heart, O Lord.
I have seen Thee with mine eyes, Yet still my eyes hunger for Thee.
I have embraced Thee, and should now unclasp my hands, Yet still I long again to hold Thee fast.
Thou dwellest in my heart, Yet still my soul burns with wild desire for Thee The. Servant says—Ah! dearest Lord Jesus Christ.
Tell me, what can I do?
We have here five men—Temple, Schweitzer, Berdyaev, Kagawa and Tilak.
They are greatly endowed by God with intellectual and spiritual gifts.
Life is far more appealing than theology. We need to see in such men the power of Christ working mightily, though in different ways according to their national genius,
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Culture and National Integration Early in my ministry (1942) the Oxford University Press,
Bombay, invited me to write an article on the Cultural Problem and Christianity for a pamphlet they proposed to issue.
Four other writers also wrote in it about their religions and their impact on the Cultural Problem.
Dr S. Radhakrishnan wrote on Hinduism, Sir Abdul Qadir on Islam, Sir Rustom Masani on Zorastrianism and Sir Joghinder Singh on Sikhism.
There were many points on which we differed but we all realized the importance of the problem and the need for dealing with it effectively.
We proposed diverse solutions to the problem.
My suggestion was this.
In India the different communities have developed their own cultures in close' association with their
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religions.
Each of the religions has its own music, its own sculpture, its own poetry and its own architecture.
There cannot be any fusion of these various cultures.
Each religion stands 'distinctively for certain truths and they are expressed in its Buildings, in its songs and in its dances.
To separate them completely is neither possible nor desirable.
But the different communities should live together and work together in peace.
There must be one nation in India.
There are many dangers threatening this great ideal of national unity.
Communal differences are among the most dangerous menaces in the country.
There are fanatics, both politicians and others, who may be interested in feeding the flames of communal prejudice and hatred, but all reasonable men would desire that there should be peace and harmony among the various peoples of India though we may believe and worship differently.
This is possible only by a readiness to appreciate all that is good and noble in the religion and culture of our neighbours, without in any way surrendering _ our faith in God.
Possibilities of conflicts there are in many matters but we need rather to appreciate the best in each other.
Many years ago I saw a Tamil film called Sakuntala.
It was a modern version of Kalidasa's famous Sanskrit play.
The life of a Rishi in his forest hermitage, the devotion of his disciples to him, the prayers and meditations in which they were engaged daily, the many glimpses of nature in its beautiful aspects, the kindness and love which were shown to animals—in all these we saw Hinduism at its best.
Against this characteristically Hindu background, the love story of Sakuntala and Dushyantha was acted.
This ancient story was brought to life again by the consummate skill of a modern film-maker and large audiences of men and women, educated as well as illiterate, drawn from the different religions of India, saw the picture. I am sure they appreciated in different degrees some of the deepest truths of the play.
Most of those people would never read Kalidasa's play in its original Sanskrit or even in a translation, but they were attracted by a modern :film and assembled in large numbers to enjoy it.
It was only one small way in which the different communities in India came together and appreciated, though in varying measure, the deepest and noblest truths for which India has stood through the centuries.
There are innumerable other ways occurring almost
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daily in which we can come together and live together in peace even though we may be followers of different religions and different cultures.
The Church and our Indian Heritage What should be the attitude of the Church to Indian Culture?
For many years this problem has exercised my mind.
It is quite true that a great deal of our Indian culture is closely associated with Hinduism.
Music has grown in intimate connection with worship.
Some of my relations on my mother's side were engaged in singing devotional hymns in Hindu temples as their profession.
One of them was a fine violinist.
He played beautifully on the violin at my' sister's wedding to a large and appreciative audience.
The stories of India are closely connected with the doctrines of the Hindu religion.
As children we eagerly asked for stories and some Hindu women servants in our house held our attention as they told them.
The architecture of the country has developed in connection with the building of temples, particularly in South
India.
Most missionaries are aware of this close association between the Hindu religion and Indian culture and have taught their converts not to take any interest in Indian culture.
This has led to the unfortunate result that most of our Christians are very Western in their cultural. outlook, more interested in Western music than in Eastern, more at home in English literature than in Tamil.
India is an ancient country.
Its music, literature and art have developed enormously in the course of the centuries and we, as Indians, have a vital share in this heritage.
Dr J. N. Farquhar gave us a clear lead in this matter.
I got to know him well in my Oxford days as he was appointed by the University to direct my post-graduate study.
I often called on him in his home and we had many talks together.
With the strong backing of Dr John R. Mott, that far-sighted missionary statesman, Farqubar planned a series of books on the Heritage of India.
They were published jointly by the National Council of Y.M.C.As in India and the Oxford University Press.
Written by experts, they tell the young men of India what has been achieved in literature, music and art.
Kalachepams have been popular in India through the centuries.
Great classics like Ramayana, Mahabharata and Bhagavata
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Purana have been taught to the people by professional singers chanting the poems with musical instruments and explaining their meaning.
This kind of exposition goes on night after night for some hours daily.
When the singer is an able and devout man, crowds would come and listen for weeks and sometimes for months together.
The Christian poet, H. A. Krishna Pillai, was well versed in the Tamil classics.
He had a great ambition to write a Tamil Christian classic which would be read for generations.
He spent fourteen years writing such a book.
As a young Hindu he had read Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress in Tamil translation.
He had been greatly attracted by it.
This interest steadily increased after his baptism.
He found in Bunyan's immortal allegory a reflection of his own struggles and experiences—the deep conviction of his sin and utter unworthiness, the profound meaning of the Cross of Christ and the wonderful joy which filled him when he committed his life wholly to Christ.
When, therefore, he began to write a Christian classic in Tamil, Rakshanya Yatrikam, he used the story of Pilgrim's Progress as the setting for communicating to others his own profound understanding and experience of the Christian faith.
Speaking to Miss Carmichael he said, 'I have poured my life into that book.
My heart's deepest is in it'.
Rakshanya Yatrikam has now won a permanent place for itself in Tamil literature.
Selections from it are included in the textbooks prescribed in the University of Madras for study in college classes.
Serampore College has also made the study of the book compulsory for all students taking the B.D. and L.Th. courses.
I am convinced that not merely students in Arts and Theological Colleges but the rank and file of our Christian people should come to know its beauty and be helped by it spiritually. My father came to Christ through the personal work of H. A. Krishna Pillai.
So his poetry was quite familiar in our home.
My father constantly chanted his lyrics.
The women in the family, who were well-trained in Indian music, would sing these and other Tamil lyrics, accompanying them beautifully on violins.
In 1955 we invited Mr P. S. Kadambavanam to give some addresses on Rakshanya Yatrikam to the Presbyters and Lay Preachers in the Coimbatore Diocese.
This he did with his usual enthusiasm.
In 1957 Vidwan D. G. Thangaraj, now Head
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Master, C.S.]. High School, Nagapattinam, gave some learned lectures on Rakshanya Yatrikam. On my suggestion he also wrote a Tamil book about the life and writings of H. A. Krishna Pillai and had it published privately.
For four days, December 27 to 30, 1958, Vidwan Sathia Satchy, M.A., B.O.L., gave a course of Kalachepams in the Immanuel Church in Coimbatore on Rakshanya Yatrikam, which were greatly appreciated.
He is now Tamil Lecturerin the Madras Christian College.
| He began his series of Kalachepams two days after Christmas, when our people were still busy with Christmas festivities.
The attendance on the first day was quite disappointing.
Though the church was well-filled-when the speaker began, dozens of people slowly left the church and there was a greatly diminished congregation at the end.
This was partly due to the fact that many of the people who came to the meeting were already tired, having attended Christmas functions in the afternoon and evening.
It was also due to the fact that Krishna Pillai's poetry is indeed very difficult for ordinary Tamil Christians.
Sixty-nine stanzas had been printed and were carefully explained in the addresses.
They were a great help in following the learned discourses.
The most important reason for the smallness of the audience was the fact that, alas, a knowledge of Krishna Pillai's life and poetry is not being kept alive in the Tamil Church.
Vedanayaga Sastriar's poetry is far simpler.
Its influence is continued by his faithful descendants and by the many lyrics included in the lyric book used in churches.
Vidwan Sathia Satchy and his team were seated on a low platform facing the pews.
He was clad in a white dhoti and kurta.
His wife also was clad simply.
They had lovely voices and sang reverently and devoutly.
They were accompanied by two men, one of whom played on a violin and the other on a mruthangam.
A mike carried their voice to the people standing in the church compound and on the road nearby.
There was an average attendance of one hundred and fifty people inside the church, listening attentively to the last three addresses and the music.
I observed, also, that the small boys and girls who sat @@ar the platform listened to him with absorbed attention.
They knew now what to expect.
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The most moving address was that in which the speaker expounded the sufferings of Jesus on the Cross,
His body streaming with blood from the scourging, His head crowned with thorns, Jesus hung on the Cross enduring untold agony.
It was during those moments that He cried to. God, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' The poet H. A. Krishna Pillai well asks, 'Do we need any further evidence to show that Christ is indeed the Saviour of the world?'
In explaining the meaning of such stanzas Vidwan Sathia Satchy showed how clearly he had understood the fundamentals of the Christian faith.
In the Immanuel Chusch, Coimbatore, numerous evangelistic addresses had been given and several people had been converted.
Now also the message was the same, the significance of the Cross, but given with the characteristic beauty which Tamil poetry and music can impart to it.
Krishna Pillai grew steadily in his spiritual stature until his death in his seventy-third year.
He had a passionate desire to see Jesus.
This longing he expressed in many passages of deep feeling.
I invited R. P. Sethu Pillai, a Hindu professor in charge of Tamil studies in Madras University, to give four lectures in the Centenary Hall, Palayamkottai and expound the literary beauty of this great Christian poem.
After my retirement I had an opportunity to write a small book about Krishna Pillai.
When Stephen Neill was Bishop in the Tirunelveli Diocese, he had been greatly attracted by the life and writings of Krishna Pillai.
Neill is a scholar with a rare gift for the study of languages, After his return to England he edited the World Christian Books.
One purpose of the series is to show how the Christian faith is understood and explained in different countries by men with different temperaments and backgrounds.
He invited me to write a book about Krishna Pillai which was published in 1966 in London by the Lutterworth Press with the title Tamil Christian Poet.
'The many passages quoted in it show clearly that Krishna Pillai, though wholly dedicated to Christ, was able to enjoy the cultural treasure of his own language and literature.
Villupattu is a valuable indigenous pattern of preaching the Gospel.
Dr V. Selvaraj, DistrictMedical Officer, and his brother Mr A. S. Ratnam, Government Officer for VilfaBe Development, conducted some Villupattu performances in the Diocese.
The
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leader was in charge of a team of ten men and women all clad in simple Indian costume.
Villupattu is a Tamil word which means 'Song with a bow'.
The leader sat on the floor in front of a large bow, to which were attached a number of small bells.
The choir sat behind him in a group.
He' chanted from a carefully prepared manuscript. and told the story of the Lord Jesus Christ in beautiful Tamil prose.
His choir repeated together the important words of the story and sang in unison when its leading episodes were described.
The leader played on' the bow and rang the bells to maintain rhythm. Another man kept time with a mud pot. The Villupattu lasted for two hours and was listened to with close attention.
A. D. Thomas is an interesting example of how Christian"~ artists are understanding and interpreting Indian art today. Thomas comes of a family which has been Christian for the last three generations.
He is a devout member of the Church of India, Pakistan, Burma and Ceylon.
He received his training first in the Lucknow School of Art.
Then he went to Shantiniketan in Bengal, where he came under the influence of Abanendranath
Tagore and Nandalal Bose.
Abanendranath belonged to the famous Tagore family and was an uncle of Rabindranath Tagore, the poet.
Abanendranath was an eminent artist and one of the leaders in the Bengali School of Painting, in which the old ideals of Indian art took on new forms of grace and beauty to suit the modern taste.
Nandalal Bose was another 'leader in the same school.
The work of these two painters has exerted considerable influence not only in Bengal but all over India.
A. D. Thomas has also spent much time in Italy studying the Old Masters with the keen eye and the alert spirit of the born artist.
His picture of 'Christ of the Indian Road' is very popular and hangs in many Christian homes in India.
His book entitled The Life of Christ was published in London by the Society for the Propagation ot the Gospel.
It contains a foreword in which Bishop Hubback, the Metropolitan of the Church of India, Burma and Ceylon, gives an appreciation of the pictures of Thomas.
An _all-toobrief introduction explains the principles behind his art.
Then follow a number of, pictures of Christ, some in colour and others in black and white.
The colours are all sober and restrained, as in the Bengali paintings.
The pictures secking to depict Christ in an Indian setting are very interesting, and all lovers of art who desire
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to see how Christ appeals to a modern Indian artist with a rich and varied training and a deeply devotional spirit would do, well to study them carefully.
I think we should recognize that there is a great deal in.Indian culture which is quite unconnected with Hinduism and which the Indian Christian can use without any hesitation whatever.
In an exhibition of Indian art in Government House, New Delhi, in 1948, I found, for instance, an excellent photograph of an Indus valley seal depicting a well-developed and spirited bull.
This photograph, published by the Department of Archaeology in New Delhi, is very interesting as showing how extraordinarily ancient our civilization is.
The seal is believed to have been produced between 3,200 and 2,500 B.c.
It shows how in that far-off time an Indian artist with great skill portrayed a bull and brought out its energy and its strength.
'That such a striking and animated picture should have been drawn in India five thousand years ago is clear evidence that our civilization has its roots in the hoary past.
I also found in the exhibition two interesting photographs of sculptured figures which are seen in the Bhubanesvar Temple in Orissa.
They both belonged to the eleventh century of our era.
One is an excellent representation of a mother and child, and another of a woman writing letters. 'They are remarkable examples of vivid portraiture in sand-stone.
The sculptor has chiselled out, with great dexterity, human figures which are at once life-like and graceful.
Photographs of such figures would adorn any Christian home or school.
No objection can be taken to them on the ground that they are mixed up with Hinduism, There are also many Mogul paintings which portray scenes from domestic life or from nature.