Where Indian Christianity is different from English Christianity

Since the subject of Kerala Christians have propped up, I think I would finish of the various frill things that seem to be popping up in my mind.

Once I was witness to this scene. I was standing with a Christian priest. He was a nice man. We were speaking in English. Suddenly two young men came. They spoke in Malayalam. Immediately I did notice this discrepancy. The priest was using the word Ningal for You to the young man who was addressing him. Usually to such young men from the parish, the priest would be using the word Nee (lowest Indicant) as You. This would signify subordination of the young man under the priest. The young man was requesting for a recommendation or some kind of authentication from the priest. He was getting married with a female in Trichur district. He was from this local parish. Without this authentication letter from this local priest, the church authorities in Trichur wouldn’t allow the marriage over there. In way it was a very powerful containment and subordination of the people how are born in Christian families. Whatever personal freedom they may profess would be within the parameter of these powerful non-tangible temporal walls of spirituality.  

The priest was simply retorting: ‘I have told you this several times. I can’t give you this letter. You do not attend the church and I do not know you. How can I give this letter?’

The young man seemed to be on the verge of tears. I departed from the scene.

Now, attending the church functions regularly, in a feudal language society, is not just an issue of religious belief, but of being part of a social leadership, continuation of that membership, acceptance of the leadership of the religious leaders, compliance with ecclesiastical rules and ultimately acquiescing to the use of pejorative words of address if they are used by the clergy. This is where English Christianity differs severely from feudal-language Christianity. In fact, the truth is that English concept of Christianity is totally different from many other-language Christianity. For in English, allegiance to the Church is strictly on the basis of faith. However, in the case of feudal languages, it is not faith alone that holds the Church, but a very powerful feudal communication system that holds the members in the congregation in a vice-like hold.

A digression to language issues

Again speaking of Christians, I remember this incident.

I had just returned to my house in the village in Malabar in the year around 2003. I had very minimal connection with this place, having rarely lived there or studied in the locality. I was at that time living in the dilapidated house in our household compound. At that period of time, the Christians living in the settler populated mountainous areas were in terrible financial problems. They were all basically rubber plantation owners. However, rubber prices had crashed down and there were all signs that it would never rise up again. The kilogram price was around Rs. 22/kg. Now, it is around Rs. 200/kg.

Other agricultural crop prices were also crashing down. The farmers, mainly Christians were going rapidly into destitution.

One day a man came. He was assuredly younger to me. He was a farmer. He addressed me with a Saar suffixed to my name. He wanted me to translate a huge petition to the Prime Minister written in Malayalam into English. He said that the farmers were in terrible conditions. And that for many of them suicide was the only viable option, unless urgent financial help came from the Central government in the form of writing-off of bank loans which were in most cases overdue. The banks had started taking seizure of pledged properties. He told me that the famers couldn’t pay much for the translation, as they were all financially broken down. He said that he had been sent by a senior-in-age (to him) Christian advocate from a nearby town.

The first thing that I did was to ask to address me as a Ningal and to use my name with a Mr. prefixed. Actually it was quite an idiotic thing to do. For, the language was Malayalam and I was trying to encode English codes into this Malayalam communication, with a more or less un-educated-in-English farmer. Second thing I said was that if the farmers were in such dire situations, I would write the petition freely. I did not want to add to their woes more. The communication went quite nicely.

It was long draft written by pen. Not typewritten. I worked on it and gave it to that man in a day or two. No payment was taken.

However, in a few weeks time I happened to meet the aforementioned advocate in another business premises, and he invited me over to his office. However, when I went to his office, the other man was there. It was here that my egalitarian pose caused a problem. The other man had forgotten the exact codes that I had mentioned. He simply came and called me by name without the Mr. prefix, and introduced me as the writer to the advocate, at the same time, he himself positioning himself in a deep pose of servitude to the advocate. Now in this scene, the advocate stood high on the pedestal. The other man stood much below him as a sort of servant, and he positioned me at his level by means of indicant words and using my name with no prefix or suffix. This scene cannot be visualised exactly in English, for the powerful positioning done by indicant words is not there in English.

The advocate immediately took cognizance of the situation. He suddenly shifted his pose into that of a superior dealing with an inferior.

Now the other frill issue was that I did not accept money in the understanding that the persons who wanted the help were in acute shortage of cash. However, it soon transpired that this advocate was on the verge of starting a teacher’s training college, with huge buildings and other infrastructure.

Now, continuing in the same vein, there is this thing to be mentioned. The Christian farmers got a lot of financial help from the government, including that of a Support Price for rubber which kept the prices from submerging totally. However, in a few years time, the rubber prices again bounced back to normal and then went to astronomical heights. The question that should come up is: If the farmers got financial help in times of distress, wouldn’t it be a legitimate claim that they should pay it back in times of prosperity? 

The exact codes in the volition to teach

Now, this issue is connected to a more finer issue. What is the exact motivation for becoming a ‘teacher’ in ‘India’? Well, the exact motivation is the ‘respect’ that it brings in. In fact, it is the easiest method to reach out to social leadership. Somehow earn a suffix to one’s name with such words as Mahatma, Saar, Mash, Teacher etc. and the language codes will do the rest. This was the real worry that sprang out in the minds of the ‘Indian’ leaders.

If the Englishmen were to teach the ‘Indians’, then they become the Mash, Saar, Ji, Mahatma, Teacher etc. Once this is established, they become the natural leaders of the population. Then what would be their own stature in a society wherein people who should naturally remain subordinate and low calibre, rise up above their traditional levels of articulation and calibre? They would go into dismal oblivion.

However, the finer understanding that Englishmen would not become Mash, Saar, Ji, Mahatma, Teacher etc. was not clearly understood by the ‘Indian’ leaders. For, even though an immensity of Englishmen have done a fabulous levels of work in ‘India’ for the development of this place, it is impossible to find even one person with a name having a Saar, Mash, Ji, Mahatma or Teacher suffixed. Even Robert Clive, who captured a major part of the Sub Continent with the support of a very loyal and affectionate section of the native population is never seen described in any ‘Indian’ history book as Mahatma Clive or Clive Ji. At the same time, a person of quite insignificant achievements has been donned with the term of Mahatma and Ji. That is how the sly ‘Indian’ indoctrination techniques work.

It is true that many Englishmen were treated with great adoration by the natives here. In fact, many of them did get suffixes of ‘respect’ and adoration. That is the only way that the natives here could codify their adoration in words.

In my own endeavours to spread English also, I had faced this aspect. Local social leaders and others who are in the education field take it as a personal or business competition that I am spreading English. They view it with very grave consternation. Once, I had this very intriguing question to face. A man who was reasonably good in English came and asked me, when I had taught English to some youngsters many years ago: ‘What is it that you are doing?’ When I answered that I was teaching English, he took a very rude attitude and told me, ‘You need not teach them so correctly. Then they will very easily master English’.

Well, the truth was that youngsters in a remote village who have to consistently put on an expression of grateful attention to the ‘intelligent’ teacher are being made intelligent themselves. There was another English teacher who very frankly told me, ‘If you teach everyone English, then what value would we have?’

The fact was that the English were doing a grave misdemeanour by teaching everyone English. For, what they were doing was removing social leaders from positions of ‘respect’ and reverence, and also erasing the perplexed expression from the faces of the common man. It was a prospect that no ‘Indian’ leader was going to allow. The way to block it was to tell the common persons that they were going to be spoiled by this English education. However, the objectives of British East India Company and Macaulay prevailed. 

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