Āvarna and Adivāsi Christians and Missions: a Paradigm for Understanding Christian Movements in India Robert Eric Frykenberg
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Āvarna and Adivāsi Christians and Missions: A Paradigm for Understanding Christian Movements in India Robert Eric Frykenberg hristian faith, as Lamin Sanneh has commented, tran- upanānayana ceremony are “twice-born” (dvīja). Only males receive Cscends “ethnic, national, and cultural barriers” and sacred and secret knowledge (veda) and skills unique to their birth moves beyond “patterns developed in Europe.” Christian faith or lineage. These skills, taken together, sum up the substance is not bound by or restricted to any one culture. It is bound by of each person’s proper duty, function, or religion (dharma). no single sacred language-in-text, as is Islam within Arabic; nor Peoples not included within categories of varnāshramadharma by any one sacred blood or earth, or language-in-genome, as is are Āvarna and Adivāsi peoples. As such, they are polluted, or Aryan and Brahmanical or Sanskriti and Vedic lore as embodied untouchable. in ideologies of Hindutva. No one culture is sacred. Yet all cul- The highest category, or set of castes, is the white varna. tures can become sacred, to a greater or lesser degree, depending People within such castes are known as Brahmans. The word on how much their essentials are transformed so as to reflect “Brahman,” meaning “cosmic breath or sound,” signifies ultimate everlasting verities that are truly sacred. What happened among reality and sublime, supreme acuity, intellectuality, perspicacity, Āvarna and Adivāsi communities in India can therefore be seen as rationality, and spirituality. Brahmans have inherent power over manifold instances of the “indigenous discovery of Christianity” words, numbers, and rituals. Just below the white varna is the rather than mere instances in the “[Western] Christian discovery red varna. Castes within this varna are known as Kshatriyas. of indigenous societies.”1 Peoples in Kshatriya castes innately possess courage, prowess, What follows is a paradigm for understanding Christian valor, and rulership—power of the “sword.” The third varna is movements in India. Some kinds of communities have been gold/yellow, and its peoples belong to Vaishiya (or Baniya or much more open to the Gospel and to conversion than others. Vaniya) castes. These peoples are makers of wealth, with innate Missionaries from abroad may have brought initial impetus and aptitudes in commerce and industry. Together, peoples in these new technologies for transmitting new knowledge, both scriptural top three categories are the “twice-born.” Their sacred and secret and scientific, but it was local agents who then took ownership of knowledge, passed down from generation to generation as their the Christian message, translating it into indigenously attractive birthright, is for each people a unique religious duty (dharma/ idioms. Only then, and only after a period of incubation and after karma). Each of the three categories of “twice-born” peoples acculturation of the Gospel message, did explosions of spiritual constitutes roughly 5 percent of the population. and social energy turn communities to the new faith. Even so, The fourth and lowest varna, over 40 percent of the popula- such developments were uneven, and wholesale transformations tion, is black. From a Brahmanical perspective, peoples in such occurred among only some Āvarna and Adivāsi peoples. castes are Shudras (Śudras). Neither ritually pure nor “twice- born,” such peoples are thought to be descended from Dasya (lit. Varnāshramadharma and Social Structure “servile”) peoples who had been conquered by Arya (lit. “noble”) peoples in ancient times. Meant to engage in manual labor, they Āvarna and Adivāsi are Sanskritic categories of analysis and till the soil, cultivate crops, and carry out other similar tasks. classification created by Brahmans in ancient times. As tradi- (In South India, where Aryan rule never penetrated as deeply tional and paradigmatic concepts they still define peoples who, and where Brahmanical influences arrived much later, social in terms of ritual pollution, lie outside the bounds of Sanskriti structures reflect a truncated varnāshramadharma. High-born civilization. These are peoples who, in moral, social, and ritual families of the south resisted being relegated to Shudra status. terms, are “untouchable.” They are located outside the metaphoric Thus, while some noble families of South India might claim Ar- spectrum of “proper colors” (savarna); they are beyond the pale yan or Kshatriya lineages, non-Brahman elites consider them- and, in many senses, all but invisible. selves equal, if not superior, to Brahmans.) “Color” (varna) metaphorically defines the caste system. Below the four classical varna categories lies a fifth category. The color code, or varnāshramadharma, ranks all bioethnic com- Known as the Panchamas (lit. “fifths”), such peoples now label munities.2 An abstract device handed down from antiquity for themselves Dalits (lit. “crushed peoples”). Beyond the pale, they measuring inherent moral and ritual qualities, it excludes impure are āvarna (lit. “colorless” and thus socially invisible). Too pol- or polluted beings. The Sanskriti word for “born” or “birth” is luting to be permitted to mingle in respectable society, viewed jāt. Each life form—bird, butterfly, fish, serpent, or mammal—is as innately subhuman, these peoples are seen as dust, excre- a jāti and, as such, has its own biocosmic properties, its own ment, or filth—hence untouchable. Denied the right to dwell in genetic code or ritual DNA. Among peoples, each birth group, a pukka or proper house, to drink from a common well or metal or caste (jāti), possesses its own intrinsic qualities. Within each cup, to receive food service, or to enter a pukka or proper place “color” of the four-color (chaturvarniya) system of humankind of worship, they are lumped with dirt, disease, drugs, and debt. are hundreds of separate castes. Only castes ranking within the Nowhere else on earth are so many people, roughly 15 percent top three categories, or colors, are ritually pure (savarna). of the population, relegated to such perpetual, hereditary, and Within each category, only males who undergo the religiously sanctioned thralldom. All peoples born outside of varnāshramadharma are innately Robert Eric Frykenberg, born and reared in India by missionaries, has specialized polluting. They fall into two subcategories: Āvarna (domesticated, in the history and cultures of India for some sixty years, forty-four of which have or subject, peoples) and Adivāsi (undomesticated, or never- been at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. He has written, most recently, yet-subdued, aboriginal peoples). Āvarnas, in other words, are Oxford History of Christianity in India (Oxford, in press). domesticated Adivāsis—“castes” that were once “tribes.” Āvarna 14 INTERNATIONAL BULLETIN OF MISSIONARY RESEARCH, Vol. 32, No. 1 peoples, like cattle or goats or horses or elephants, know their explosive ideology reached Tranquebar in 1706. Scriptures and lowly place. Taken together, the two categories of peoples, of- scientific texts were translated and printed, schools built, lead- ficially designated as “scheduled castes and tribes,” amount to ers trained, and manuscripts collected. Converts and disciples more than 20 percent of India’s population. of Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg, armed with basic literacy, brought about the first proliferation of Tamil Christian congregations. By Āvarna Christian Movements the 1730s, Tamil pastors Aaron and Rajanayakam (Rajanayakam had previously been captain of the palace guard) obtained royal Since 1529, and especially since 1799, numbers of distinct Chris- patronage for building a model school in Thanjāvur. Forty years tian communities have proliferated. Each came into being under later Christian Friedrich Schwartz laid the foundations for an unique circumstances, and each developed its own character. amazing explosion of Āvarna movements. Fluent in Tamil, Telugu, What began in the south in Tirunelvēli and Travancore was repli- Marathi, Persian, Sanskrit, and Portuguese, and himself a locally cated in other parts of Tamil and Telugu country and, eventually, renowned preacher, teacher, schoolmaster, diplomat, and states- among lowest-caste peoples in the north. man, Schwartz (the Raja-Guru, or Protector-Regent, of Serfoji Maharaja) sent his “Helpers” far and wide across the country. Shoreline Āvarna Christians: Paravar and Mukkavar fisherfolk. In In 1769 Sāvarimuthu Pillai, a Vellalar (a dominant caste of the sixteenth century seafaring peoples of the south turned to agriculturalists of South India and northern Sri Lanka) Chris- Christianity. Paravar fishermen, pearl divers, pirates, smugglers, tian sepoy stationed in Tirunelvēli, begged for a modern Tamil and traders on both sides of the Palk Strait faced perpetual op- pastor-teacher. Soon an affluent Brahman Christian widow ar- pression. Their work was hazardous, requiring courage and rived. Baptized Clarinda, she endowed a pukka chapel-school. resourcefulness, for predatory armies and fleets constantly pil- Sathiyanāthan Pillai, a Thanjāvur Vellalar, the first fully ordained laged or enslaved them. In 1527, after forces of the Samudri Raja Tamil missionary in Tirunelvēli, was commissioned in 1785. In 1797 (Zamorin) of Calicut attacked them, they turned for help to the Sundaranandam David, a Shanar Christian trained by Schwartz Portuguese. A Chettiar Christian merchant, John da Cruz, and and by his brilliant disciple Vedanayakam Pillai (or Vedanayagam fifteen Paravars offered an alliance. A year