Ancient Christianity in India

The story of Christianity in India is fascinating, and I may have mentioned, my great-grand-dad has also published a book on this topic, which I have a copy of. It is written in a quaint Victorian sort of English, which was how the language was in the early 1900s. My great-grand-dad. K.G. Shesha Aiyer, was Chief Justice of Travancore and was a close associate of C.P. Ramaswamy Iyer, who was Dewan of Travancore.  His house was in a place called Thekkad in Trivananthapuram.

 

There is some debate about the exact time of arrival of Christianity in India. The folklore places it at 52 AD with Saint Thomas. But I was talking to some physicians from the Christian Medical College, Vellore, recently, and they showed me papers that argue that the arrival was a century or two later. Regardless, an original version of early Christianity arrived and existed in India 13-1500 years before the arrival of the Vasco de Gama and subsequent aggressive Catholic proselytization which was largely a tool to assist colonization.

 

What is important is that the early Christians ("Syrian Christians") were welcomed by the Hindu population and were very Christian in faith but very Hindu in their customs and culture, even observing the caste hierarchy, marriage, birth and several death rituals. There was no tension between the Christian and Hindu communities and they peacefully coexisted. Ironically, the arrival of Catholicism from Portugal and later from Ireland, created tensions between the old and new Christians, with the latter forcing India's "Syrian Christians" to shift to Latin and to give up their "pagan ways". 

 

A theology scholar once told me that "If you want to understand the true teachings of the historical Jesus, you need to study the early Christian fellowships in Syria, Egypt, Greece, Russia, India". Another expert said, "Christianity started in the Middle-east as a fellowship, became politics in Europe, and has become marketing in America."

 

Venkat

 

PS: Islam also first arrived in Kerala through peaceful ways, and it was only centuries later when the Islamic invaders (colonizers) started using the faith for political purposes did the aggression and tensions begin. The point cannot be lost that aggressive proselytization and politicization of any faith is dangerous.