Indian Christianity

This year India celebrates 60 years of independence.

Today is a good day to recall the roots of Christianity in India. They are apostolic roots.

Legends of St. Bartholomew (August 24)

If the legends on St. Bartholomew about India are to be believed, then we have received the Good News not from one but two of our Lord's Apostles.

According to one tradition, the Apostle Bartholomew (Barthemew) came to India in AD 55 and preached the Gospel in the area near Kalyan (now covered by Bombay Archdiocese) and was martyred in AD 62. No mention of St. Bartholomew occurs in ecclesiastical literature before Eusebius, who mentions that Pantaenus, the master of Origen, while evangelizing India, was told that the Apostle had preached there before him and had given to his converts the Gospel of St. Matthew written in Hebrew, which was still treasured by the Church. "India" was a name covering a very wide area, including even Arabia Felix. Other traditions represent St. Bartholomew as preaching in Mesopotamia, Persia, Egypt, Armenia, Lycaonia, Phrygia, and on the shores of the Black Sea and the manner of his death, said to have occurred at Albanopolis in Armenia, is equally uncertain as accounts vary between beheading, flaying alive and crucifixion head downward by order of Astyages, for having converted his brother, Polymius, King of Armenia. His relics are thought by some to be preserved in the church of St. Bartholomew-in-the-Island, at Rome. A second reference of Jerome says: "Pantaenus, on account of the rumor of his excellent learning, was sent by Demetrius into India, that he might preach Christ among the Brahmins and philosophers of that nation". The mention of Brahmins certainly settles the place as India. The area of his work is thought to be in Konkan in Maharastra.

Kalyanpur-Barkur ClaimsKalyanpur (Indian English or 'Calianpur' in British India English) is a village situated in the Tulunad region, presently a part of the state of Karnataka coming under Mangalore Diocese. Measuring along the present roads, the town of Barkur is less than 10kms away, with both Barkur and Kalyanpur falling within a radius of 5kms from Brahmavar, another Town which either of these places may be twinned with. Research Historian Mascarenhas (M.A.,Ph.D.,D.D., Goa) in 'Konkanachem Christaunponn'-1929 - [Apostolic Christianity in Konkan] seems to say that Barkur owes its name to the Apostle:"In Tulunadu, in South Kanara, there is Kallianpur. Here Bartholomew, then popularly known as Bhethal, preached the Gospel... There are many names and places, words and usages in the coastal Konkan region going up to Bombay and beyond which have originated from his name Bhethal and his preaching and that Barkur which is close to Kallianpur sprung after his name Bartholomew i.e. Bar+Thulami+Ooru and so BARKURU"

Wikipedia connects the Bartholomew legends associated with Kalyan in Maharashtra and Kalyanpur in Mangalore another ancient Indian Christian tradition that says that "the Apostle Bartholomeo (or Nathaniel) was reportedly murdered by Hindus in a port city called Kalyan or Kalyanpur in South Asia, just as the Apostle Thomas was murdered by Hindus near Mylapore, near modern Madras or Chennai."In other words, "Both, the city of Kalyan (British India English "Calian") and the village of Kalyanpur, were at one time port cities, and both vie for the honor of being St. Bartholomeo's place of martyrdom."Barkur, allegedly derived from the Apostle's name, is a politically famous historic port-town, located 3 kms from Brahmavar and had one (Rosario Church) of the 27 (29) original churches of Tulunadu, which was razed to the ground by Tipu Sultan in the 1780s when he set out to eradicate Christianity. The town also had one of Tipu's palaces. In their work, "The land called South Kanara" (2000, Image flex Publishers), William Pais and Vincent Mendonca add more background to the Kalyanpur-Barkur claims:"Christianity has been long established in South Kanara and its adherents are more numerous here, than any other district of India. It is certain that, foreign Christian merchants were visiting the coastal town of Kanara and during that period of commerce some priests also might have accompanied them for evangelical work. According to tradition Kanara had its first missionary the Apostle St. Barthelomew, who landed on the shores of river Swarna at Colombianor Colombo village an ancient maritime port adjacent to Kallianpur, stayed there to preach. He was popularly called Bethel and so the origin of the place Barkur..."The 1981 Milagrian Charles E.G.Lewis has this to say:"It can be said that it was the knowledge of that early Christianity in Kallianpur that prompted and urged the Portuguese Hierarchy to establish again the Church in Kallianpur when it did in 1678, or they must have found clues or traces of it when they arrived here. The Church at Kallianpur which was rebuilt in 1806, by the Goan priests and which later was demolished in 1940, had icons of St. Thomas the Apostle and that of St. Bartholomew on its façade on either side of the main entrance evidently because of the tradition of St. Bartholomew in the place's. Msgr. Denis Jeromme D'Souza who built the present Church saw to it that the tradition was carried forward. In the main body of the Church where the twelve Apostles of Christ are honoured with their statues all round the walls that of St. Bartholomew is prominently placed at the head of the apostles, nearest to the sanctuary. Opposite to him is St. Paul the apostle of Gentiles and by his side is placed St.Thomas the Apostle of India. These realities speak volumes of un-written tradition"To help the Barkur claimes, it may be noted that the same Msg. Denis Jeromme D'Souza built the present gothic style Church of Barkur, dedicated to St. Peter where the statue of St. Bartholomew occupies a prominent place among the statues of twelve Apostles placed in the main altar. Since most of these claims are based on oral traditions it may be disputed. However it is the same case with much of India's historical legends. The future work of scholars may throw more light on the matter but even without it, the Apostle whose eyes have seen God's Son, whose ears have heard the Eternal Word speak and whose hands have touched the Bread of Life merits our devotion, and his message our credence.

St. Bartholomew, Pray for us!

India and Pakistan

60 years after independence and partition
14th/15th August

Partition and religion

The growth of Muslim separatism from the late 19th century and the rise of communal violence from the 1920s to the virulent outbreaks of 1946-1947, were major contributory factors in the timing and shape of independence.

However, it was only from the late 1930s that it became inevitable that independence could only be achieved if accompanied by a partition. This partition would take place along the subcontinent's north-western and north-eastern boundaries, creating two sovereign nations of India and Pakistan.

'The Muslim League failed to achieve the confidence of the majority of Muslims in the elections of 1937.'

Muslims, as a religious community, comprised only 20% of the population and represented great diversity in economic, social and political terms.

From the late 19th century, some of its political elites in northern India felt increasingly threatened by British devolution of power, which by the logic of numbers would mean the dominance of the majority Hindu community.

Seeking power and a political voice in the imperial structure, they organised themselves into a party to represent their interests, founding the Muslim League in 1906.

They achieved something of a coup by persuading the British that they needed to safeguard the interests of the minorities, a demand that fed into British strategies of divide and rule. The inclusion of separate electorates along communal lines in the 1909 Act, subsequently enlarged in every successive constitutional act, enshrined a form of constitutional separatism.

While there is no denying that Islam and Hinduism were and are very different faiths, Muslims and Hindus continued to co-exist peaceably. There were, however, occasional violent outbursts which were driven more often than not by economic inequities.

Even politically, the Congress and the League cooperated successfully during the Khilafat and Non Cooperation movements in 1920-1922. And Muhammad Ali Jinnah (the eventual father of the Pakistani nation) was a Congress member till 1920.

Although Congress strove to stress its secular credentials with prominent Muslim members - for example, Maulana Azad served as its president through World War Two - it is criticised for failing to sufficiently recognise the importance of a conciliatory position towards the League in the inter-war years, and for its triumphant response to Congress's 1937 election victory.

The Muslim League advocated the idea of Pakistan in its annual session in 1930, yet the idea did not achieve any political reality at the time. Furthermore, the League failed to achieve the confidence of the majority of the Muslim population in the elections of 1937.

Hasty transfer of power

The lack of confidence in the Muslim League among the Muslim population was to be dramatically reversed in the 1946 elections.

The intervening years saw the rise of Jinnah and the League to political prominence through the successful exploitation of the wartime insecurities of the British, and the political vacuum created when the Congress ministries (which had unanimously come to power in 1937) resigned en masse to protest at the government's unilateral decision to enter India into the war without consultation.

'The creation of Pakistan as a land for Muslims nevertheless left a sizeable number of Muslims in an independent India.'

The rejuvenated League skilfully exploited the communal card. At its Lahore session in 1940, Jinnah made the demand for Pakistan into its rallying cry. The ensuing communal violence, especially after Jinnah declared 'Direct Action Day' in August 1946, put pressure on the British government and Congress to accede to his demands for a separate homeland for Muslims.

The arrival of Lord Louis Mountbatten as India's last viceroy in March 1947, brought with it an agenda to transfer power as quickly and efficiently as possible. The resulting negotiations saw the deadline for British withdrawal brought forward from June 1948 to August 1947.

Contemporaries and subsequent historians have criticised this haste as a major contributory factor in the chaos that accompanied partition. Mass migration occurred across the new boundaries as well as an estimated loss of a million lives in the communal bloodbaths involving Hindus, Muslims and also Sikhs in the Punjab.

The final irony must remain that the creation of Pakistan as a land for Muslims nevertheless left a sizeable number of Muslims in an independent India making it the largest minority in a non-Muslim state.

Troubled Relationships

Ever since the partition of the sub-continent in 1947, when Britain dismantled its Indian empire, India and Pakistan have been arch rivals.

The animosity has its roots in religion and history, and is epitomised by the long-running conflict over the state of Jammu and Kashmir. This has recently escalated into a dangerous nuclear arms race.

India and Pakistan 07 Season

In the lead up to the 60th anniversary of India & Pakistan Independence on 14th &15th August, BBC World will show a season of programmes on the subcontinent.

Radio 4 today: Crossing the Boarder
BBC2 tv today: India with Sanjeev Bhaskar

Plenty more to follow.