CHAPTER V
CHAPTER V
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
THE conversion of caste people to faith in Christ is no new thing. Members of various castes have for many centuries been converted to faith in Christ in large numbers.
The Syrian Christian community on the south-west coast, numbering at present about 800,000, were originally drawn from the caste people in Travancore and Cochin.
Large numbers of caste people were also converted first by the Jesuit missionaries from A.D. 1600 onwards, and then by Protestant missionaries in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
So that the total number of Christians gathered from the Hindu castes is at present considerably over a million.
One disappointing feature, however, in these movements among the caste people in the past has been their tendency to stagnation.
They have started with great spiritual power and then after a time have ceased to progress.
That has been the case with the old Syrian church in Travancore and Cochin, and with the caste converts both of the Roman Catholic church and of the Protestant churches in other parts of India. The main reason for this stagnation is the fact that the deep-rooted
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caste feeling of Hindu society has persisted after conversion and has ultimately prevailed over the spirit of Christian brotherhood.
In many parts of South India the Christian community has not only failed to evangelize the depressed classes but has actively opposed their admission to the Christian
Church.
The same spirit is manifested among many of the more highly educated Christians, drawn from various castes in North India.
For social reasons they are definitely opposed to the gathering of the poor and depressed into the Church and regard the mass movements of the outcastes not as an opportunity for service but as a grievous hindrance to the fulfilment of their ambitions.1
The inevitable result of this unchristian spirit is a loss of spiritual power. A very learned Brahman convert, Father Nehemiah Goreh, once said that " Christianity with caste is no Christianity at all."
Unhappily Christian missionaries in the past have not been sufficiently alive to this deadly peril.
The Jesuit missionaries in the seventeenth century made terms with caste and admitted it into the Church and many of the Protestant missionaries followed their example.
It seemed the line of least resistance, but it was a fatal blunder.
A Roman Catholic missionary in South India recently remarked that they had admitted caste into the Church three centuries ago and bitterly regretted it.
"But," he added, "it is now too late, we cannot get rid of it."
* See The Christian Task in India, pp. 244 ff.; The Making of Modern India, pp. 199 ff. Macnicol.
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
The new movement among the caste people in the villages of the Telugu country towards Christianity that has been in progress during the last ten or fifteen years is all the more hopeful because it promises to deal effectively from the start with the caste feeling. The movement has been mainly due to the witness of the changed lives of the outcaste Christians and the personal influence of individual teachers and ministers drawn from the outcastes.
Previous chapters have described the effect that this witness and influence have had in conciliating prejudice and creating a friendly feeling among the caste people towards Christianity.
But within the last ten years this has begun to bear fruit in definite conversions to faith in Christ.
Considerably over 10,000 caste people in the Telugu country have already been baptized, and they have joined a church in which more than 800,000
Christians have been drawn from the outcastes.
So that in nearly every village where these caste converts exist, they worship with outcaste Christians and are ministered to by outcaste clergy, catechists and teachers! This strikes from the beginning a powerful blow at the caste feeling. And it is noticeable that the higher the caste from which the converts come, the more completely they abandon caste prejudices, when once they have crossed the Rubicon at baptism.
It often seems easier for a Brahman convert to eat with an outcaste than for different sections of the outcastes to eat together.
This movement among the caste people is taking place over a very wide area in the Telugu country.
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GUNTUR In the area where the American Lutheran Church is working with its head-quarters at Guntur it began about twenty years ago in a district where there were already a large number of Roman
Catholics, drawn from different castes during the last sixty or seventy years.
The beginning of this movement in the Lutheran church was due to the strong personal influence of a Lutheran missionary and his wife working in that district.
Many hundreds became Christians, but at first, owing to the influence of the Roman Catholics who had been allowed to keep their caste, there was a serious danger of the caste spirit becoming permanent among them. Caste boarding-schools were established exclusively for caste children and in other ways caste prejudices were respected. Happily this policy was reversed, the schools were thrown open to outcaste and caste alike and the caste
Christians learned to accept the ministrations of outcaste ministers and teachers.
Later on the movement started in other districts within the area.
It was mainly due to the personal influence of outcaste teachers and their wives, backed by the changed lives of the outcaste congregations; but in a few cases it began with an individual man who was a true seeker after God.
In one village the munsiff (magistrate) was a student of different religions. He studied carefully
Hinduism, Buddhism and Mahommedanism and could find no peace or satisfaction.
Then he
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
turned to Christianity and the study of the Bible, and after many talks with Lutheran missionaries was convinced of the truth of Christianity.
He was finally baptized with about sixty of his friends and relations.
Tn another village there was a caste man who belonged to the sect of Lingayets and was a follower of the Hindu reformer Ramanuja.
A tract was given him one day in a railway train by a lady missionary and this started him on the study of the Bible.
He went to Guntur where he was taught by the missionaries and baptized.
Through these various influences the movement spread throughout the area with the result that about Gooo of the caste people have already been
- baptised.
DorNAKAL In the Dornakal diocese the movement has been rapidly growing in strength during the last five years.
Sometimes it has been due to the witness of a single outcaste.
The following story told by one of the C.M.S. missionaries is an illustration of this.
"When I had been at Bezwada about eighteen months a young Sudra man named Ramayya appeared one day on my. verandah with his wife and little boy. He had travelled about eighty miles from his home, a village in the Khammamett
District (C.M.S.) in the Nizam's Dominions.
He told me that he desired to be taught about Jesus Christ, having learnt about him first from a certain
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old Christian named Abraham (a convert from the outcastes) who was employed by his (Ramayya's) father. Abraham had evidently taught the young
Sudra some of the salient facts about our Lord and a few lyrics, and had passed away. But his witness had sown seed in the heart of Ramayya, who, no longer able to learn from his old friend, determined to seek further light from the mission to which Abraham belonged. Fearing to go to the mission station nearest his village, namely Khammamett, lest his relations should discover his intentions and bring him back, he came to Bezwada on the plea of wishing to visit some relatives near there.
I received Ramayya, his wife and child, and gladly arranged for them to be housed and given regular instruction in my compound.
But I advised him to let me send news of him to his relatives.
There proved to be no need for this, however, for the next day a crowd of his relatives turned up, having somehow discovered Ramayya's real object in leaving home. They tried their utmost to dissuade him from his intentions and to persuade me to send him away; his wife also sided with them and cursed her husband in a most distressing way.
However, Ramayya remained firm and all the relatives finally departed.
The wife stayed a few days, but took herself off with the child later.
Ramayya stayed with me for about three months unmolested and showed great earnestness and made good progress in learning the Christian faith. But while I was in camp for a few days a message came from his village that his old mother had had
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
j an accident and was dying, and besought a sight of her son.
Ramayya believing the message to be true went to see his mother, but found that the message had been a ruse to get him back home, and that his mother was well!
"Since then Ramayya has never returned to Bezwada.
His relatives seem to have done him no physical harm, though they succeeded in dissuading him from being baptized for some four years; but in 1921 he made the decisive step and was baptized together with his wife and child.
Later on fifty other caste people from the same village were also baptized."
In many villages the friendly relations between the masters and their Christian servants, have created an atmosphere in which even high caste men and women have found it possible to take the serious step of breaking caste and joining the Christian Church.
The village of Raghavapuram, the home of Venkayya (whose conversion is described in chapter II) is a case in point. When
Venkayya was baptized, the Brahmans of the village refused to allow even caste servants of the missionary to draw water from the only fresh-water well. A well was, therefore, dug in the village to supply the outcastes with water.
Some time afterwards there was a great drought.
The river and all the wells in the village went dry. There was one exception and that was the Christians' well! The Brahmans came to Venkayya for relief.
'" Lend us your well," they pleaded.
" We will draw water for you as well as for ourselves."
With a true E
CHRIST IN THE INDIAN VILLAGES
Christian spirit Venkayya and the other Christians decided to hand over the well to the caste people till the rain should again fall. While the drought lasted there was no lack of water in the Christians' well both for caste and outcaste people. A friendly relationship was thus opened up between the Christians and non-Christians, which for fifty years has never been broken.
This kindly feeling is bearing fruit to-day.
In November 1928 the authors of this book went to Raghavapuram for a baptism.
On Sunday morning there was a celebration of the Holy Communion in the village church.
Among the communicants were the representatives of nine different castes, ranging from Brahmans to outcastes.
In the congregation there was a young woman dressed in a bright-coloured silk Sari, with her husband and a number of his female relations.
She belonged to the highest caste of Sudras in the village and was a Christian. Her husband was not yet a Christian, but she was teaching him herself and hoped soon to bring him to baptism. The female relations were Hindus, but had so far advanced towards Christianity that they had no objection to sitting with outcastes ina Christian church. Twenty years ago a scene like this would have been almost inconceivable.
In the afternoon 175 people were baptized and of these 152 were caste people. A few days after we went on to a neighbouring village where 300 people were baptized, of whom 150 were caste people.
In another area, where during the last seven
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
years the Church membership has doubled, over 400 caste people were enrolled as catechumens in one year and 150 of them have already been baptized.
Recently in a group of four villages, where there has been a large Christian community drawn from the outcastes for many years, a remarkable movement has begun among the caste people as well.
Already about 70 have been baptized from five different castes, including the highest of the Sudra castes in the Telugu country. Many of them are very well off, owning from Io to 50 acres of land. Their keenness is very striking. They want a good school with eight classes established at once and are prepared to find a good part of the money.
"We would give it all," they said, "if it were not for this persecution."
The persecution started when they decided to become Christians and took the form of an attempt to deprive them of their land.
The lawsuits in which they were involved cost them about £225, a very large sum even for well-to-do people in a village. They are very eager to learn more about Christianity themselves; some of them proposed that they should go to the headquarters of the deanery in which they live or to Dornakal itself for two or three months during the hot weather, when there is no field work to be done, in order to get instruction in the Christian faith.
They will probably learn in three months what it ordinarily takes one or two years to teach the outcastes.
They do not seem to have any difficulty about abandoning caste. A few of them
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came to Dornakal and were baptized.
They eat with outcastes food prepared by outcastes without any hesitation.
The one point about which they were uneasy was the Anglican marriage service.
"Tt is so cold and much too short!"
Their own marriage ceremonies last about a week and are full of significant symbolism. A twenty-minutes service with strange, meaningless ritual was a real stumblingblock. However, it was explained to them that this could easily be altered. A form of marriage service was hastily sketched out which would last at least two hours and which fairly satisfied them.
In this group of villages there are in addition to those already baptized, about 2000 more caste people, many of whom are already attending services, receiving instruction and anxious to join the Church.
Mepak !
The recent conversion of about 3000 caste people in the Wesleyan mission district in the Hyderabad
State is a striking illustration of the strength and wonderful possibilities of this new movement.
It is the more remarkable because the work of the mission among the outcastes only started in earnest at their headquarters in the town of Medak about thirty years ago.
In 1895 there were only about 2800 baptized Christians in that area, nearly all 1 This section is taken entirely from information kindly supplied to us by the Rev. C. W. Posnett, the senior
Wesleyan missionary in charge of the Medak area.
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gathered from the outcastes.
Now they number about 60,000.
The movement among the caste people began five years ago.
It started in the extreme north of the district on the banks of the river Godavery, and was due mainly to the influence of an Indian evangelist and his wife backed by the simple faith and devotion of many of the poor outcaste Chris- . tians.
An outbreak of plague drove the whole population of one of the villages out into the jungle to live in booths.
The Hindu priests deserted their people. The Christian teacher and his wife went with the villagers and ministered with great courage and self-sacrifice to the sick and dying, Christians and non-Christians alike.
That made a profound impression on the caste people of that and other villages.
Later on a small band of Wodders, who are a caste just above the outcastes, came to Mr Posnett begging for baptism and for a teacher, and for many months they paid for one amongst themselves.
The teacher left them, but one of their own number still taught them to pray and sing. They habitually called themselves Christians and regularly subscribed to the Mission |funds.
After about three years Mr Posnett visited that part of the district.
He was greatly struck with their forceful character, their earnestness, good habits and splendid record.
So he baptized about 600 of them during this visit.
"' I never," he wrote, " met any people who were better prepared and more thoroughly fit to be received into the Church.
When we asked them
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to pray, one after another they got up and simply but earnestly put their petitions before God, and the way in which they told the story of the death and resurrection of Christ in some of these villages was a perfect delight to hear.
One young man describing in his own words the story of the resurrection was so vivid and did it so well that the great crowd of caste Hindus who were there to watch listened spell-bound to the story.
I never had a better opportunity of preaching to caste Hindus.
These baptisms were not done in a corner, but all the caste village had gathered to see and to hear."
Mr Posnett gives the following account of the movement in other villages on the banks of the Godavery.
"'T was there more than a week last month and I never saw such earnest seekers after God. We stayed in camp at a small town, called [brahimpatnam with about 4000 inhabitants. Every evening we had a congregation of 2000 caste people who had been under instruction for baptism for about eight months.
They were splendidly prepared, they knew the story of Jesus, and they could sing our hymns one after another.
They had broken away from caste and had accepted three of our outcaste evangelists and received them into their houses.
"During the day I went from house to house to visit them and talk about Jesus with them in their own homes. To my amazement when I came to the house of the chief farmer, who is a very
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high caste man, and looked up at the carved wooden doorway of the house I saw that right in the middle of the top of the door he had actually chiselled away the image of the Hindu guardian goddess of the home, called Vignasvarudu.
To those of us who know the caste people of India and the powerful hold of idolatry, it seemed almost a miracle that these beginners should have cut away this image from their homes before their baptism. None of us knew anything about it and they had done it in every house entirely of their own accord.
The Indian ministers who were with me were amazed to see such a thing and were all convinced that this was a sign of their sincerity that none could doubt.
" All day long whilst we were in camp there were groups of other people, both caste and outcaste, coming from all the surrounding villages.
They had nothing whatever to gain, and they knew that they would have to face persecution, but they had already begun to learn about Jesus
Christ and they simply would not leave me until I promised to try and send them an evangelist.
I should think there must be twenty villages here on the banks of the Godavery where they are already learning from the visits of our outcaste teachers; but they say:
' We cannot read and we cannot remember if we are only taught once a week. We must have an evangelist and his wife to come and live in our midst.' There is no doubt at all that this is true.
Hardly any of these people know how to read; it is absolutely necessary to have a teacher who can teach them, regularly hold
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services for them every evening, and teach the children to read the Bible.
I am not willing to baptize 4000 people this year and then leave them to forget all about Jesus Christ.
If we are to receive these people it is our duty to teach them thoroughly and to give them Pastors and Evangelists who will really build up a great Christian Church in their midst.
" Meanwhile the movement had spread to many other villages round Medak itself and all over the district.
In 1926 a five-days' convention was held in the mission station at Medak for high-caste
Hindus who were anxious to hear more about Jesus Christ.
The missionaries did not expect more than 20 or 30, but altogether 150 assembled, among them three or four Patels (headmen) and one Brahman Karunam (village accountant). Special preparations had to be made for their food and accommodation; but it was a wonderful thing that so many caste Hindus came to spend four or five days in what was practically an outcaste settlement and that everything went off happily without the slightest unpleasantness.
" Day by day during the convention there were songs and stories from the life of Christ, and the visitors listened to the singing and preaching with profound interest.
Many of the converts from different castes gave their testimony to the power of Christ in their own lives.
" At the conclusion of one of the addresses on the third day the speaker asked those who were going to be Christ's disciples to say so, and one
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
after the other got up and said 'I will give up idols from to-day and will pray to Yesu Swami
(the Lord Jesus) henceforth.'
" One dear old man said: 'I have given up my idols and I shall never cease to worship Yesu
Swami though I have to starve, and though the crows eat my flesh I will not deny Him.'
I may add that this man right through the meetings had been determined to be a Christian out and out and begged us to baptize him publicly on Sunday morning. The Friday morning meeting was really wonderful.
It was so spontaneous that you could not but believe that God was in our midst.
'The confessions were so brief and so earnest and simple that it really took my breath away."
Some of them wanted to be baptized at once, but it was thought better that they should go back to their own villages and be publicly baptized there.
The sequel came a few weeks afterwards when fourteen people from different castes were baptized by immersion in the river Godavery.
Six months later, Mr Posnett had the great joy of baptizing in the Godavery another band of converts from the caste people.
They came in procession to the place of baptism led by the Christian outcaste drummers.
When they arrived at the camp, "at once it was clear," writes Mr Posnett, " how keen and brave they were—all so happy and bright—some beautiful little children.
There was one wonderful old lady, who was the leader of them all, with her sons, sons-in-law and relatives to the number of thirty-three altogether.
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Amongst them were two of the men who came to. the Summer School in Medak last May and who had never ceased to witness till to-day when they were to be formally baptized in the name of Jesus.
"The singing was splendid, the old lady and the little children all joining in and beating time with their hands—their faces beaming with joy.
They knew the hymns, the Lord's Prayer and the Life of Christ, and when they were asked whether they were ready for baptism, there was a unanimous answer, even though Brahmans and others were all standing round listening.
I asked them if they were prepared to be turned out of caste, to be troubled about marriage and to be persecuted in a thousand ways; but however I tried to put the difficulties before them they answered that they had already counted the cost and made their decision.
"The old lady who was the leader had made such a bold testimony that all the country round knew about her decision.
She had been a sort of priestess to Shiva and had had the direction of all the great sacrifices, receiving by right a special basket of rice from every threshing floor. She also was the priestess of a special society, but she had been so disgusted with their secret impure rites that she had denounced them.
Some of these rites were particularly revolting and the strange thing was that they broke caste in these secret drunken revels and let themselves go without any regard to decency.
A MOVEMENT AMONG THE CASTES
"When her son-in-law came from Medak Summer School and her own daughter began to speak of becoming a Christian she thrashed her and would not have the evangelist coming to the house, but still she was unhappy and dissatisfied.
At last she got the teacher's wife to come to her secretly and inquired about Christ and gradually learnt the Gospel story.
Then she determined to throw up her post as chief priestess and to stop taking the holy begging basket, which she and her foremothers had used for getting their share of every harvest.
She publicly burnt it and told every one who was there that she had determined to become a Christian.
She said:
' Until then I had no peace and I lived asleep in the darkness; but now my life is full of light and I am awake. I have worn out my forehead in the dust before the idols which I had always been the first to worship, and they never did me any good, but Jesus has now come and brought peace to my heart.'
You could see it in her face.
Tt was lit from within by the light of the Saviour's love.
"The headman of the village was there and he had not a word to say.
Appadorai, my Indian colleague, publicly called upon him:
'O Patel (headman), are these people doing right?' and he said, ' Yes, they are.
Yours is the Truth,' and a little later he asked us to come to his house and pray over his sick daughter who he said was possessed by a devil."
Another convention for high-caste Hindus who were seeking Jesus followed in May 1927.
It was 7)
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even more remarkable than the one held in 1926.
The following is Mr Posnett's account of it:— "Once more we have invited to Medak all high-caste Hindus who were seeking Jesus. Twenty years ago they would have considered themselves polluted by eating in our compound, but for three days they have been our happy, friendly guests, not a single grumble has been heard.
Men who used to cover up their hands with a cloth to shake hands threw their arms around me. Women, who are always the last to give up idols and old customs, travelled 100 miles to come in the hot weather.
They had a dreadful journey, but no one complained.
Every hour of the day has been filled with the one subject, ' The Call of Jesus.'
"On Sunday morning we had a Love Feast of broken cocoanuts and sugar (the Hindu sacred symbols of love), which the Hindu leaders first brought up with their thankofferings so that we might bless the trays.
Every man gave a thankoffering, and then they took the trays and distributed with their hands both to the caste people and to the outcastes.
After the service I asked those who were really determined to confess Christ and to follow Him to come and talk it over with us quietly.
Quite fifty people came straight away to my house and for two hours we talked together.
They counted the cost and shirked nothing. Some of them spoke with the greatest determination and courage, others said they would first persuade all their family and call us to their villages. But some
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were very eager to be baptized at once in our Church.
Its perfect, simple beauty has greatly appealed to them, in fact no one can calculate the immense influence that this beautiful Church has had upon all these people.
Their behaviour and reverence were a perfect joy and they wanted to be baptized there.
So we chose out eighteen about whom we felt quite certain and promised the rest to come to their villages when their families were ready.
" The first to be chosen was a Brahman village chief—a man of good position and great influence.
He had already seen others in his village baptized, but I had never dreamt that the day might come when he too would kneel humbly at the feet of the crucified Saviour.
Yet he had travelled 120 miles to be here, and this morning he came forward first of all to give his witness at the Baptism Service.
The whole crowd of 220 visitors were there and they listened spell-bound as he confessed that he had gradually come to know that Jesus Christ was the only Saviour, and, whatever it might cost, he was prepared and determined to delay no longer.
He then knelt down at the steps of the font and I baptized him with the name of John at his own wish, for he had read and loved the Gospel that appeals so much to Indians.
After the baptism he came and asked if he might take ' Prashatham,' the feast of friendship, with me.
He was a Brahman who had never in his life touched water from a Christian hand or drunk from a Christian's glass.
He had been taught from boyhood that this was
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horrible pollution, yet when I poured out the water he begged me to drink first and then he quietly took the glass and drank it to the bottom, pouring the remaining drops upon his head—then kneeling down he asked me to bless him. Anyone who knows India will not wonder at my amazement; to drink after anyone from the same cup is anathema ; but for a Brahman to drink from an outcaste's glass is simply amazing beyond words.
This man had broken away from Hinduism at one stroke and had acknowledged Jesus as his only Master.
"The congregation that had listened and watched this Brahman's testimony and baptism were greatly moved.
Many said to me afterwards they had never seen such a baptism service in their lives.
When he had returned to his place, the remaining seventeen high-caste Hindus, all of them men of solid position and respected in their villages, came up in small groups and our Indian ministers baptized them in turn.
"Twelve months ago this work for which we have waited and prayed for 100 years in South
India began.
Our first confessors are standing firm to-day in the midst of bitter persecution, but this has not hindered the coming of the Kingdom.
The numbers are slowly creeping up and we are looking forward to a great ingathering amongst these privileged leaders of Hinduism.
God has given us the outcastes in tens of thousands and now He has crowned all by this wonderful drawing of the high-caste Hindus to Himself. No one can tell where it will stop, but we all know that if we
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are faithful it will become an immense strength to the Church of God in Hyderabad.
" During the last three years about 3000 of these caste Hindus have been baptized and 3000 more are under instruction for baptism, and this in the face of bitter and relentless persecution."