With and Without Christ
Sadhu Sundar Singh · Introduction by the Lord Bishop of Winchester
About this book
With and Without Christ by Sadhu Sundar Singh, full title Being Incidents Taken from the Lives of Christians and of Non-Christians Which Illustrate the Difference in Lives Lived With Christ and Without Christ, was first published in 1929 by Harper & Brothers of New York and London, with an introduction by the Lord Bishop of Winchester. In it, the Indian evangelist Sadhu Sundar Singh sets down true incidents from his evangelistic travels, arranged under four headings — non-Christians without Christ, non-Christians who nonetheless show the marks of a living faith, nominal Christians who have the form of religion without its substance, and Christians whose lives are visibly transformed by Christ — and closes with a fifth, autobiographical chapter recounting his own experience before and after his conversion to Christ.
తెలుగులో సారాంశం కోసం ఇక్కడ నొక్కండి · Telugu-language summaries are included on this page →
- 5 Chapters
- 1 Introduction
- 1 Preface
- 105+ source pages
- 1929
- English & Telugu summaries
Source edition: Harper & Brothers, New York and London, 1929 (copyright 1929 by Harper & Brothers). The digitized copy used as UECF.NET's source is hosted on the Internet Archive and is marked CC0 1.0 Universal by its uploader; the underlying 1929 publication is also in the public domain in the United States. UECF.NET does not host or republish the complete word-for-word text of the book on this page. What follows is a substantially fuller, original, chapter-by-chapter guide — a detailed description of each chapter's actual content in UECF.NET's own words, a short verified quotation from each section, and a Telugu-language summary of each — together with a direct link into the complete free text at Internet Archive for readers who want the full chapter.
Read the complete book (PDF, hosted on UECF.NET) View source at Internet Archive
Front matter (from the source edition)
The title page reads: With and Without Christ — Being Incidents Taken from the Lives of Christians and of Non-Christians Which Illustrate the Difference in Lives Lived With Christ and Without Christ, by Sadhu Sundar Singh, with an introduction by the Lord Bishop of Winchester. Harper & Brothers Publishers, New York and London, MCMXXIX (1929).
The Preface opens:
In this book I have set out to describe some experiences of Christians and non-Christians belonging to various walks of life, whom I have met in different parts of the world during my evangelistic tours.
Chapter One opens:
Though Christians and non-Christians are equally the creation and sons of one God, yet there is a great difference between them. Some men have a true knowledge and realisation of Him, and are transformed into His likeness and become the heirs of life and eternal happiness through living in the presence of His incarnation, Jesus Christ.
These three passages are quoted directly from the source text (verified against the Internet Archive edition) to show the book's own voice. For the complete chapters, use the "Read the full text" link above.
Table of Contents
This listing is taken from the book's own Table of Contents page and cross-checked against the chapter headings actually printed at the start of each section. Each entry below gives a fuller UECF.NET description of that section's content, a short verified quotation, and a Telugu summary — not the original chapter text — with a link to read that section in full at Internet Archive.
Editorial correction: An earlier version of this page labelled the section beginning on page 105 as an "Appendix." Checking the chapter heading actually printed at that page, it is Chapter Five, "My Experience With and Without Christ" — Sundar Singh's own autobiographical account. This page has been corrected accordingly. UECF.NET was not able to independently confirm the presence, title or exact page number of any separate appendix or index beyond that point, so no specific claim is made about one here.
Introduction — by the Lord Bishop of Winchester
The 1929 edition opens with an introduction contributed by the Lord Bishop of Winchester. He commends the book as genuine theology grounded in lived spiritual experience rather than abstract argument, describing it as a refreshing departure from the flood of religious publications of the day. He points to Sundar Singh's own conversion as bearing comparison with that of the Apostle Paul, and presents the incidents that follow as evidence of Christ's continuing, transforming presence in ordinary lives rather than a case built on philosophy or logic.
"It originated in the experience of men who gradually discovered that for them Jesus filled, and far more than filled, the picture of God."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: విన్చెస్టర్ బిషప్ ఈ పుస్తకానికి రాసిన పరిచయంలో, ఇది కేవలం సిద్ధాంత చర్చ కాదని, జీవించిన ఆధ్యాత్మిక అనుభవంపై ఆధారపడిన నిజమైన వేదాంతమని కొనియాడారు. సుందర్ సింగ్ యొక్క మార్పిడిని అపొస్తలుడైన పౌలు అనుభవంతో పోలుస్తూ, ఈ పుస్తకంలోని సంఘటనలు తత్వశాస్త్రం ద్వారా కాక, సాధారణ మనుషుల జీవితాల్లో క్రీస్తు నిరంతర ఉనికికి, మార్పుకు నిదర్శనమని పేర్కొన్నారు.
Preface
In his own short preface, Sundar Singh explains why he wrote the book: to set down real experiences of Christians and non-Christians he met on his evangelistic tours, drawn only from incidents told to him first-hand or that he was able to verify himself. Alongside these, he includes something of his own story — what his life was like without Christ, and what Christ's living presence has meant to him since. He states his aim plainly: not to argue by philosophy, but to let readers see, in simple narrative, the evidence of Christ's presence and power in real lives, and so be helped toward that same experience.
"In this book I have set out to describe some experiences of Christians and non-Christians belonging to various walks of life, whom I have met in different parts of the world during my evangelistic tours."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: తన ముందుమాటలో సుందర్ సింగ్, తన సువార్త యాత్రల్లో స్వయంగా తెలుసుకున్న క్రైస్తవుల, అన్యుల నిజ అనుభవాలను మాత్రమే ఈ పుస్తకంలో పొందుపరిచానని చెప్పారు. వాటితోపాటు, క్రీస్తు లేకుండా తన జీవితం ఎలా ఉండేదో, ఇప్పుడు క్రీస్తు సజీవ సన్నిధి తనకు ఏమి అర్థమిస్తుందో కూడా పంచుకుంటారు. తత్వశాస్త్ర వాదనల ద్వారా కాక, సరళమైన కథనాల ద్వారా క్రీస్తు శక్తిని, సన్నిధిని చూపించడమే తన లక్ష్యమని ఆయన స్పష్టం చేశారు.
Chapter One — Non-Christians Without Christ
Sundar Singh opens by contrasting those who know and are transformed by God's presence in Christ with those who, despite being equally God's creation, remain without that living relationship. This chapter recounts sincere but unconverted seekers he met on his travels — including ascetics who pursued relief from sin through severe physical austerities — and reflects on why such efforts, undertaken apart from Christ, did not bring the peace they sought.
"Though Christians and non-Christians are equally the creation and sons of one God, yet there is a great difference between them. Some men have a true knowledge and realisation of Him, and are transformed into His likeness and become the heirs of life and eternal happiness through living in the presence of His incarnation, Jesus Christ."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: క్రైస్తవులు, అన్యులు ఇద్దరూ ఒకే దేవుని సృష్టిగా, పిల్లలుగా ఉన్నప్పటికీ, వారి మధ్య పెద్ద తేడా ఉందని సుందర్ సింగ్ ఈ అధ్యాయాన్ని ప్రారంభిస్తారు. దేవుణ్ణి నిజంగా తెలుసుకుని, యేసుక్రీస్తు సన్నిధిలో జీవించి ఆయన పోలికగా మారినవారికీ, అలా లేనివారికీ మధ్య భేదాన్ని చూపిస్తారు. తీవ్రమైన శారీరక తపస్సుల ద్వారా పాపవిముక్తి పొందాలని ప్రయత్నించిన యోగుల వంటి నిజాయితీగల అన్వేషకులను ఆయన కలిసిన సంఘటనలను వివరిస్తూ, క్రీస్తు లేకుండా చేసిన ఆ ప్రయత్నాలు వారికి కోరుకున్న శాంతిని ఎందుకు తీసుకురాలేదో చర్చిస్తారు.
Chapter Two — Non-Christians With Christ
Sundar Singh turns to people he met who had not formally joined a Christian church but whose lives, in his assessment, already showed Christ's quickening work. Among the incidents he describes: secret believers organised quietly within their own communities and working for Christ without publicity; a pundit and his family who came to faith after meeting Sanskrit-speaking Christian scholars at a religious gathering; an Egyptian Muslim who found peace in Christ while remaining outside church structures; two brothers whose relationship was transformed after one converted and won the other through patient love; and a Sikh landowner whose life changed after reading a copy of the Gospel. He uses these to argue that Christ's work reaches people well beyond the boundaries of organised Christianity.
"There are many Christians among us who would say of such unrecognised workers that they should be forbidden, because they are not members of the constituted Church."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: సంఘంలో అధికారికంగా చేరకపోయినా, క్రీస్తు పని వారి జీవితాల్లో కనిపిస్తున్న వ్యక్తులను సుందర్ సింగ్ ఈ అధ్యాయంలో పరిచయం చేస్తారు — తమ సొంత సమాజాల్లో రహస్యంగా క్రీస్తు కోసం పనిచేసే విశ్వాసులు, సంస్కృత పండితుల ద్వారా క్రీస్తును తెలుసుకున్న ఒక పండితుని కుటుంబం, సంఘ నిర్మాణాలకు వెలుపలే క్రీస్తులో శాంతి పొందిన ఒక ఈజిప్టు ముస్లిం, సోదరుని ప్రేమ ద్వారా మారిన మరో సోదరుడు, సువార్త చదివి జీవితం మారిన ఒక సిక్కు భూస్వామి. వీటి ద్వారా, క్రీస్తు కార్యం వ్యవస్థీకృత సంఘం హద్దులను దాటి కూడా సాగుతుందని ఆయన చూపిస్తారు.
Chapter Three — Christians Without Christ
Sundar Singh turns to professed Christians he met who, in his assessment, lacked a living relationship with Christ despite carrying the name. He recounts a disillusioned Hindu student at Cambridge who observed that self-described Christian nations showed materialism and moral decline he considered worse than in non-Christian lands, and who met educated people willing to deny Christ's divinity outright. He also describes an American professor questioning why God seems hidden, a wealthy European who travelled widely in search of peace but found none despite material comfort, and an Indian prince who privately believed in Christ but feared losing his throne if he confessed it openly — the prince telling Sundar Singh that time spent in nominally Christian countries had left him spiritually weaker, not stronger.
"There are many so-called Christians who have no desire to walk in the Way, or to know the Truth, or even to live the Life."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: పేరుకు క్రైస్తవులే అయినా క్రీస్తుతో సజీవ సంబంధం లేని వ్యక్తులను ఈ అధ్యాయంలో సుందర్ సింగ్ వివరిస్తారు. కేంబ్రిడ్జిలో కలిసిన ఒక హిందూ విద్యార్థి, క్రైస్తవ దేశాలుగా చెప్పుకునే దేశాల్లో భౌతికవాదం, నైతిక పతనం అన్యదేశాల కంటే ఎక్కువగా ఉందని, కొందరు విద్యావంతులు క్రీస్తు దైవత్వాన్నే కాదనడం చూశానని చెప్పిన సంఘటనను పేర్కొంటారు. దేవుడు తనను దాచుకుంటున్నాడని ప్రశ్నించిన ఒక అమెరికన్ ప్రొఫెసర్, సంపద ఉన్నా శాంతి దొరకక ప్రపంచమంతా తిరిగిన ఒక ఐరోపా ధనవంతుడు, రహస్యంగా క్రీస్తును నమ్మినా సింహాసనం కోల్పోతానని బహిరంగంగా ఒప్పుకోలేని ఒక భారతీయ రాజకుమారుడి గురించి కూడా ఆయన వివరిస్తారు.
Chapter Four — Christians With Christ
This chapter gathers incidents of believers whose faith, in Sundar Singh's telling, visibly bore fruit. He describes a businessman troubled by his own remaining imperfection despite his faith, and a minister wrestling with whether prayer or active work should take priority — using the image of Christians as the moon, which has no light of its own but reflects the sun's. He then turns to fuller narratives: Moti Lal, a converted drunkard who lost everything yet found lasting peace in Christ; a bedridden Christian woman whose sustained joy in suffering converted a skeptical agnostic who witnessed it; and an Armenian pastor's testimony of the strength and comfort he found in Christ amid the massacre of fellow Christians in his community.
"Real Christians are not only with Christ, but they live in Him and He lives in them, and because He lives for ever, they also will live for ever with Him, who through death has conquered death (John xiv. 19)."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: విశ్వాసం నిజంగా ఫలించిన క్రైస్తవుల సంఘటనలను ఈ అధ్యాయం సేకరిస్తుంది. తనలో ఇంకా లోపాలున్నాయని బాధపడే ఒక వ్యాపారి, ప్రార్థనకా పనికా ప్రాధాన్యత అని ఆలోచించే ఒక పాస్టర్ ఉదాహరణలతో మొదలై, అన్నీ కోల్పోయినా క్రీస్తులో శాంతి పొందిన మద్యపాన వ్యసనం నుండి మారిన మోతీ లాల్, తన బాధలోనూ నిలకడైన ఆనందంతో ఒక సందేహవాదిని మార్చిన మంచానికి పరిమితమైన ఒక క్రైస్తవ స్త్రీ, తన సంఘంలో సహచరుల హత్యాకాండ మధ్య కూడా క్రీస్తులో బలాన్ని, ఓదార్పును పొందానని సాక్ష్యమిచ్చిన ఒక ఆర్మేనియన్ పాస్టర్ గురించి వివరిస్తుంది.
Chapter Five — My Experience With and Without Christ
The book's closing chapter turns from the experiences of others to Sundar Singh's own life. He describes his upbringing in a devout Sikh household shaped above all by his mother, who taught him from early childhood to seek God in prayer before attending to his own needs each morning, and who arranged for him to be taught by Hindu pandits in the scriptures and spiritual disciplines of his family's tradition. He traces how that early, disciplined search for God through his inherited religious training eventually reached a point of crisis, and how his own encounter with Christ transformed his understanding of salvation and reoriented the rest of his life — his own answer, in the first person, to the question the book's title poses.
"She early impressed on me the rule that my first duty in rising in the morning was that I should pray to God for spiritual food and blessing, and that only after that should I breakfast."
తెలుగులో సారాంశం: ఈ ముగింపు అధ్యాయంలో సుందర్ సింగ్ ఇతరుల అనుభవాల నుండి తన సొంత జీవితానికి మళ్తారు. భక్తిగల సిక్కు కుటుంబంలో, ముఖ్యంగా తన తల్లి ప్రభావంతో పెరిగిన తీరును వివరిస్తారు — ప్రతిరోజూ ఉదయం లేవగానే ముందుగా దేవునికి ప్రార్థన చేయాలని, ఆ తర్వాతే అల్పాహారం తీసుకోవాలని తల్లి తనకు నేర్పిన నియమాన్ని గుర్తుచేసుకుంటారు. హిందూ పండితుల వద్ద తన కుటుంబ సంప్రదాయ శాస్త్రాలను, ఆధ్యాత్మిక సాధనలను నేర్చుకున్న తీరు, అది క్రమంగా ఒక సంక్షోభానికి దారితీసిన విధానం, చివరికి క్రీస్తుతో తనకు కలిగిన అనుభవం తన జీవితాన్నే మార్చిన తీరును ఈ అధ్యాయంలో స్వయంగా వివరిస్తారు.
Closing matter
UECF.NET was able to verify the book's front matter, its five main chapters, and their opening content directly against the source scan. Some editions of this book are known to include a short appendix and/or index following the final chapter; UECF.NET was not able to independently confirm the presence, exact title or page number of any such section in this particular scan closely enough to describe it here. The complete scanned book — including any closing matter — is available to read in full below.
About Sadhu Sundar Singh
Sadhu Sundar Singh (1889 – disappeared 1929) was an Indian Christian evangelist and ascetic. Born into a Sikh family in Punjab, he experienced a vision of Christ as a teenager that led to his conversion, after which he adopted the saffron robe of a Hindu "sadhu" (holy man) as a sign that following Christ did not require abandoning his Indian identity. He travelled widely as an itinerant preacher across India, Tibet, and other parts of Asia and the West, becoming known for his simple, story-based style of teaching and for incidents such as those collected in this book. He set out on a journey into Tibet in 1929 and was never seen again; he is presumed to have died on that journey.
This biography summarises widely documented, publicly available facts about Sundar Singh's life. UECF.NET has not independently verified every detail and welcomes corrections at info@uecf.net.
Related Christian Books
- Sadhu Sundar Singh: A Personal Memoir — C. F. Andrews
- The Apostle of the East and West — James A. Kelso
- The Confessions of Saint Augustine
- The Cost of Discipleship — Dietrich Bonhoeffer
- Absolute Surrender — Andrew Murray
- History of Christianity in India — M. M. Ninan
- The Cross Is Heaven — The Life and Writings of Sadhu Sundar Singh, ed. A. J. Appasamy
Source Edition & Attribution
With and Without Christ, Sadhu Sundar Singh, 1929 (Harper & Brothers, New York and London).
Source: Internet Archive — With and Without Christ by Sadhu Sundar Singh, 1929 (uploaded by Peter-John Parisis), marked CC0 1.0 Universal by the uploader. The 1929 publication is also in the public domain in the United States. UECF.NET hosts a copy of the complete scanned book (PDF) directly on this site so readers do not need to leave uecf.net to read it in full. The chapter-by-chapter summaries, quoted excerpts (each individually verified against the source text) and Telugu-language summaries elsewhere on this page are UECF.NET's own editorial work and do not claim to be the original publisher or copyright holder of the work itself.