HINDU‑CHRISTIAN INTERRELIGIOUS DIALOGUE IN INDIA
Present-day Trends
Prof. Dr. Anand Nayak
University of Fribourg, Switzerland
The Hindu-Christian interreligious dialogue, in the sense of an interaction and communication between Hindus and Christians in the sphere of religious life and its practice, although of relatively recent origin, seems to be now taking a solid root in India. The social, but particularly the political scene, motivates the religious Indians of all creeds for a dialogue in view of coming to know one another more closely even in the intimate sphere of their religious convictions and practices. I have limited my enquiry to two of the religions to be found on the Indian soil since about 2000 years, Hinduism and Christianity. These two religions evolved through a long history, but the Independence of India in 1947 marks a clear landmark in their relationship: the attitude of ignorance, indifference or domination yielding to a conscious and positive appraisal of each other, which is the heart an interreligious dialogue.
Christianity came to India, more precisely to Kerala, in the very early centuries, long before Europe embraced that religion. The first Christians of Indian origin, who came mostly from the upper Hindu castes, fostered and continued the Eastern tradition of Christianity as was developed in Antioch and its neighbouring regions in the so called Asia Minor. This orthodox tradition did not have the same missionary outthrust was the Latin form of Christianity that came later through colonisation from the 16th century onwards. Because of its colonial power and strength, most of the Indians have identified Christianity in India with the colonial, Latin Christianity and do not have a clear picture of the old Kerala Christians.
Hinduism, as religion, has had a different outlook in life. It is not missionary oriented. Its concept of dharma does not see the purpose and fulfilment of religion in the harmony of the nature outside end inside the human being. Missionary spread is not a postulate issuing from its concept of religion. Tolerance is its basic attitude. It tolerated Christianity throughout the centuries as it did towards other religions. This tolerance however meant often in reality a free expression of a multiplicity of opinions and ideas, without however entering directly into an appreciative interaction. The two religions preferred to live in a blissful mutual ignorance.
The missionary efforts in India, undertaken with the cooperation of the colonial powers, often tended towards an "ecclesiastical conquest" of Hinduism without taking into consideration the spiritual values of Hinduism. It was not a humble service of bringing God to man, but often a haughty overriding with a sense of superiority over the Hindus.
Nevertheless, in such an atmosphere, which unfortunately lasted too long, there were some rare individuals who made an attempt appreciate Hinduism and to to propose the Christian message ina way meaningful to the culture of the people in India. he efforts of Thomas Stephens (who arrived in India in 1579), Roberto de Nobili (1577-1656) and Joseph Constantius Beschi (1680‑1746), all three Jesuits, are examples of this adaptation of Christianity to the Hindu religious terminology. However, it should be noted that the purpose of their adaptation was primarily the presentation of the Gospel in a way meaningful way to the Hindus in view of their conversion to Christianity. It was not one of dialogue. This too was the intention of the early Protestant missionaries like Bartholomeus Ziegenbalg (1682‑1719) and William Carey (1761‑1834), whose extraordinary work of translating the Bible into several Indian languages helped to form an adequate vocabulary for conveying the Christian message to the Indians.
This initial discovery of Hindu religious literature made by the missionaries aroused the curiosity of Western Orientalists, like William Jones (1746‑1794), Friedrich Max Müller
(1823‑1900) and numerous other Indologists, who from the
beginning of the last century, translated a large number of
Hindu texts and thus brought them to the notice of the West.
The contribution made by these Oriental ists to the discovery
of Hinduism by the West is incomparable. If the missionaries
often studied the Hindu texts with a biased opinion, the
scientific study of Orientalists helped people in the West,
and also in India, to appreciate better the nature of the Hindu
religion. Such a discovery led not to a mere adaptation but to
an inculturation , when people began to be aware of the hidden
values of Hinduism, and to appreciate them.
In the beginning of this century, the Christian approach to Hinduism was one of social uplift and conversion more than that of dialogue. Yet, a few Christians, notably among the Protestants, were working towards a meaningful inculturation. This was not yet dialogue in the strict sense, that is, Hindus and Christians seeking to discover the truth of one another, but a necessary preparation for it.
The first step in this direction of dialogue was taken by Jules Monchanin (1895‑1957) and Dom Henri Le Saux (1910‑1973), better known under his Indian monastic name Swami Abishiktananda, who in 1950 set up a small ashram in a grove at Kulitalai, a village on the bank of the sacred river Kaveri, near Tiruchirapalli, and began to live Christian contemplative values in the light of the traditions of the Upanishads. Donning the garb of Hindu sannyasis, they initiated an intense dialogue with Hindus, departing completely from the traditional missionary approach of conversion, and sought to live the true values of the Christian and Hindu religious experiences. Unfortunately, Father Monchanin passed away shortly after the inauguration of this experiment, in 1957. However, Abhishiktananda continued it until his death in 1973. Their remarkable work of dialogue, begun with great courage but in isolation within the Church, has paved the way for the work of dialogue in India today.
In the Protestant churches, dialogue was initiated by P.V. Devanandan (1901‑1962). Unlike Monchain and Abhishiktananda, Devenandan sought dialogue with the contemporary Hinduism, as lived in modern Hindu society. The Institute for the Study of Religion and Society, of which he was the co‑founder and the first director, has provoked rich and original thinking in the field of dialogue.
During the 1960s, the theological climate in the Churches all over the world began to take a new turn. In the Catholic Church, the aggiornamento introduced by Pope John XXIII and the subsequent Vatican Council II, took for the first time a serious note, of the existence and value of non‑Christian religions leading to a better appraisal of the Church's position with regard to the non-Christian religions. This new theology welcomed dialogue, not only with other religions, but with all peoples and cultures. Pope Paul created for this purpose the Vatican Secretariate for the Non‑Christian Religions in 1963.
These major changes in the Catholic Church were adopted quickly in the Church in India. Its reponse was one of dialogue. In 1969an All‑India Seminar on Church in India Today was held in Bangalore which set encouraging guidelines for the pursuit of dialogue with other religions, particularly with Hinduism, the religion of the great majority of people in India.
The Hindu response to this Christian initiative was not enthusiastic. Most of the Hindus approached felt that Hinduism was always for dialogue and if there should be a need for dialogue it was clearly for the Christian to take it up, a religion which was till then interested only in conversions and not in a direct discovery of the Hindu religious values. Many even sensed a danger in this sudden change: was it not a new tactic for conversions? If we read closely the different papal writing issued since this time, one notices a gradual but clear change of attitude in the official policies of the Catholic Church. From a dialogue in view of conversions, the Church has come to declare its wish to enter into dialogue with other religions as an effort towards growth in mutual understanding. During interreligious meeting with persons of different religions held at Assisi (Italy) in 2002the Pope declared:
“ We commit ourselves to frank and patient dialogue, refusing to consider our differences as an insurmountable barrier, but recognizing instead that to encounter the diversity of others can become an opportunity for greater reciprocal understanding”.(Assisi Decalogue for Peace, Feb 24, 2002)
In the following decades more and more Hindus are convinced of the bona fide of the Christians in matters of interreligious dialogue and have not hesitated to join in various concrete forms of meetings apromoting such a dialogue.
1. Dialogue meetings
The dialogue meetings, conducted all over the country, are roughly of three types: dialogue groups, prayer meetings and the third, a combination of the first two, the so called live‑in.
a) Dialogue groups
A dialogue group is constitued of a selected number of Hindu and Christian participants who share with one another, on the experimental level, their religious ideas and experiences. The group is formed around a nucleus of at least two persons, a Hindu and a Christian, who animate it directly or indirectly and on whom the existence of the group depends. Normally, for a good functioning, the group needs an optimum number of about 12 to 20 members, for it is difficult to ensure a variety in a number smaller than 10, and a group of over 20 becomes unwieldly and active communication between its members difficult. The group meets about 4 to 6 times a year.
the success of such groups depends on the initiative of the leaders and on the frank and personal sharing of religious values, the problems encountered, the hindrances and such questions which are at the very root of religious communication. The participants have the tendency and temptation to avoid such vital questions and turn the dialogue into a discussion on impersonal and abstract concepts. The questions proposed for dialogue need to be direct and touching the personal experience:
‑ How do I pray?
‑ Have you discovered God? If so, can you tell me how you discovered Him?
‑ Have you suffered in life? Was your religion helpful to you in those moments of suffering?
‑ How do I love my neighbour?
‑What do I consider as values in my life?
‑ A whole village of outcastes was completely slaughtered by a troupe of bandits; how do I see this incident from my religious point of view?
‑Why do I go to the temple, to the church?
‑ What shall I say to God when 1 see Him face to face?
Faced with such questions, one cannot but speak from one's own experience and religious point of view.
This personal sharing is of th utmost importance for dialogue, for otherwise there is no convergence of the religious point of view on a given situation. Dialogue rests on truth, not a mere objective truth, but a reality that has become truth for me and, therefore, it can also become true for my neighbour. Such a sharing is not just on the verbal level, but on the vital, on the level of experience, deep speaking to deep.
b) Dialogue in prayer
Even more so than the dialogue groups, prayer meetings have become very popular in places where dialogue is being initiated between the people of different religions. This has come about mainly from the realization of the treasures of prayer‑traditions of these religions and, at the same time, from the sorry situation that in this most fundamental act of religion, in so much prayer, praise and worship addressed to the same God and the Source of our being, religions should remain one aloof from the other. Man in the presence of God is the same, be he Hindu or Christian.
Dialogue in prayer as it is carried out today is mainly of two types: prayer meetings and satsangas (literally: "meeting the good", a concept and practice prevalent in today's Hinduism). there are also other forms, like common retreats and pilgrimages, but they are very rare. While satsangas are a rather long community gathering in prayer, held mostly in ashrams or religious communities between people known to one another, prayer meetings unite a number of people of a particular region who are in general unknown to one another.
c) "Live‑in's"
The "live‑in's" are encounters of dialogue conducted during two or three days, mostly during a week‑end, where Hindus and Christians live together for dialogue. These are of recent origin and are organised by a few centers only, like Aikiya Alayam in Madras or the C.B.C.I. Commission on Dialogue which has conducted several of them throughout the country in the past two years. The great advantage of these live‑in's is that in a short time people of different religions come to know one another at a level of religious sharing that is almost
non‑existent in daily life.
The live‑in has on its programme a morning and an evening prayer in common, a time set aside for the prayer of the Hindus which Christians may attend, and a eucharistic or biblical celebration open to the Hindus, a common session of study of a religious theme p sharing of participants' personal religious convictions, values and forces.
Much depends for the success of a live‑in on the persons who organize it, their human qualities and gifts to create a favourable mood for dialogue.
2. Dialogue in Ashrams
The Hindu‑Christian dialogue in the setting of ashrams (monasteries) was the first of the dialogue forms to be experimented with. From antiquity till today, ashrams have abounded in Hinduism. Ashram (from the sanskrit asrama) is a place where a guru (spiritual teacher) lives with his disciples. From antiquity till today, ashrams have abounded in Hinduism. They manifest a great variety in their foundation, structure, rule and way of life. Ashrams can be big or small: a large community of over a hundred monks, novices and aspirants living in extensive buildings or a small but where the guru lives with one or two disciples. Whatever may be its exterior form and way of life, an ashram is supposed to be a place of intensive spiritual activity. Under the instruction of the guru, the members of the community study, meditate or practise austerities. Work and other material preoccupations are reduced to a minimum, so that the spiritual quest becomes the highest priority. The inmates ‑ men and women ‑ practise strict celibacy, live in poverty, that is, with the bare essentials in housing, clothing and food, and follow the path shown to them by their guru.