HVK Archives: The way of Christ is not un-Indian
The way of Christ is not un-Indian - The Pioneer
Valson Thampu
()
11 May 1997
Title : The way of Christ is not un-Indian
Author : Valson Thampu
Publication : The Pioneer
Date : May 11, 1997
Even those who caricature Christianity as a western religion know that the
biblical faith echoes the spiritual longings of India. From time immemorial, the
people of this sub-continent have been yearning to be led from darkness to light,
from falsehood to truth, from death to immortality. The Bible presents Jesus as
the light of the world and the giver of eternal life; Jesus described himself as
"the way, the truth and the life."
The biblical vision of life may be described as one of God-centred humanism, whose
essence is an exalted sense of human destiny. The Bible begins by revealing that
human beings are created in the Image of God. Jesus ascribed priority to human
needs over the rituals of religious orthodoxy. He asserted that the Sabbath was
made for man, and not vice versa. He protested vehemently against the oppression
of human beings by the religious establishment. The foremost biblical goal is that
all people should have fullness of life. It was against this background that
humanistic thought developed.
Biblical thought is dynamically this-worldly. It does not countenance apathy to
the human predicament. God is in solidarity with those who suffer. The holiness
of God demands justice and compassion, especially for the underprivileged. God's
love urges us to wipe the tears from every face and to bind the wounds of every
human being. True spirituality lies in setting people free from the oppressive
conditions - poverty, disease, illiteracy, etc that stifle human life. This we are
to do as an expression of our love for God and our fellow human beings for, as the
Bible maintains, we cannot love God without loving our fellow human beings. True
spirituality demands an integration of faith and action, theory and practice.
Hence mission is integral to Christianity.
An authentic expression of the biblical goal of fullness of life for all is the
preferential option for the poor and the voiceless in order to empower them. As a
result, Christian missions tend to create a subaltern ferment in the given
context, endangering status quo. His makes Christianity seem anarchic to the
powers that be. But to the oppressed and the down-trodden this is indeed good
news! As Jesus said: the last will be first, and the first will be last.
A faith that is committed to fullness of life will be wary of the pitfalls of
materialism. "Re life of a man," said Jesus, "does not consist in the abundance
of his possessions." Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that
comes from the mouth of God. Exclusive dependence on material resources corrupts
and cripples our humanity. The visible world of ,matter must be complemented by
the invisible world of the Spirit. The natural is incomplete without the
supernatural. "In His will alone is our peace," as Dante said.
Yet another expression of the biblical goal of fullness of life for all is the
spirituality of sacrificial service. Since service must take place in the
inter-personal space, much of the biblical thought deals with the ethics of
relationships. The Commandment to love one's neighbour as oneself obliges us to
cross all divisive barriers. One's neighbour may be rich or poor, high or low,
Christian, Hindu or Muslim. The strength to love even one's enemies marks the
summit of this spiritual culture. Needless to say such a vision, if put to
practice, can have a powerful healing influence on our torn and troubled world.
Fullness of life cannot be facilitated simply by recommending moral ideals to
people. The tragedy in the human context is pot always that our knowledge is
inadequate. It is, rather, that we fail to live by what we know to be good.
Biblical realism recognises the gulf between the good that we want to do and the
evil that we actually do. Sin thwarts the expression of the higher self in us. We
are in a state of ethical and spiritual paralysis. The spiritual goal is to
empower people to live by what affirms and fulfills life. That was why Jesus, who
came to lead people to fullness of life, had to die on the Cross in expiation of
the sins of the world.
Christianity is neither western; nor is it, strictly speaking, a religion. The
message of Jesus Christ reached India long before the West was Christianised.
True, spirituality is universal because it addresses universal and eternal human
needs. Jesus did not come to found a new religion, but to forge a new humanity.
The ultimate goal of biblical spirituality is the redemption of the whole of
creation, to which the key is the transformation of human nature. In the words of
St Paul: "He who is in Christ Jesus is a new creation." Appropriately, the
biblical account concludes on the eager expectation of a 'new heaven and a new
earth'.
(The author is the chairman of the Theological Research and Communication
Institute, New Delhi)
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