It has been a while since I read a book purely for pleasure. Life has been, let's say, eventful recently, and I have been managing multiple things at once—negotiating, compromising, and adapting to the hopefully new normal. This brings us neatly to the theme of the 2024 book by Manu Pillai. Manu has been seeing a tremendous growth in popularity as an engaging writer of Indian history, boosted by his prolific writing.

Gods, Guns and Missionaries (notice the absence of the Oxford comma) presents the historical atmosphere of colonial India and how it shaped the country's religious landscape, especially Hinduism. The theme is far more relevant today; with the rise of Hindu nationalism in India, interest in the country's history—especially the parts where Hindus were persecuted—has greatly increased.

Manu sets the stage in the introductory chapter about the unique ability of Hindusim to negotiate, absorb ideas, and even compromise on their identity to create a new one. The marvellous ability of the Vedic people to adapt to local gods and even to unify different gods across the massive landscape of India into a single entity—be it through familial relationships or through avatars.

The equivalence created by the people between Rudra and Shiva, Vishnu and Vasudeva, Vishnu and Avalotiksvara, the various forms of the same god—like Pandurang Vithala and Krishna, even Buddha being an avatar of Vishnu in some cases—are all some interesting examples. Stotras - containing only the "leela" of Gods and their physical forms - became the predominant form of everyday worship. At times, when the Puranic ideas and Bhakti stotras became more predominant, Acharyas went to great lengths to argue that the Puranic ideas were an encapsulation of the Vedas. Nammalvar's thiruvaimozhi became a "Tamil Veda". Although the Vedic people adapted themselves to local religions, the primacy and superiority of the Vedas needed to be maintained. Even now, tremendous effort is being put into showing that that the Thirukkural is essentially an encapsulation of the Vedas.

The scene changed with the advent of Europeans. In and around the 16th and 17th centuries, Italian, Portuguese, and Dutch missionaries wrote misunderstood, exaggerated, and often maligned accounts of Hinduism. As in everything, these early accounts became the standard for understanding about India for their countrymen back home. While the Vedic people practiced inclusivism and pluralism, incorporating all kinds of local gods and customs, these missionaries saw a land of eerie customs and superstitions and wanted to "cleanse" the land of these "pagan" practices.

As with today's, if I may say, predominantly white, tourists tend to box India into either an esoteric, yogic, mystic land or a land where crazy things happen—be it driving, poverty, or the dirt. For a while, the Portuguese and Dutch accounts were either unintelligible to most Hindus or they could not have cared. Manu continues

Interestingly, not all Europeans were initially prejudiced. Vasco De Gama and his men, reportedly, even presumed that a local Hindu temple in Kerala was a shrine to Mary, imagined differently by the local people. It was only when the trade deals went sour (which didn't take that long) and the arrival of the zealous missionaries that the Europeans began to see the Hindus as devil-worshippers. More and more Portuguese missionaries grew hostile with the ongoing eighty-year war in their homeland.

ranam: Soma Sundaresvara Sukha Sphurti Rupini Syame Sankari Digvija

In fact, even the ancient Christians living in Kerala—the Nasranis—, supposedly converted by St. Thomas the Apostle in 52CE, were not spared by the Portuguese. Although they were indeed Christians, they weren't Catholic. These Nasranis were polluted by being around the Heathens, adopting Heathen customs, and living under a Heathen king. The following quip suggests that the ability to adapt one's faith is unique not to Vedic people but to Indians.

Nasiris, too, resisted, as they had gained a higher caste privilege in Kerala in all these centuries, and the new converts were of lower caste (fishermen), and they did not want to give up their caste privilege. Even among the converted ones, the conversion happened "not because Jesus appeared to the fishermen in boats," but due to political rivalry with another group. Of course, resistance was intense—in Goa and everywhere these missionaries went. For example, the founder of the Society of Jesus, Francis Xavier, notes

Xavier left India in frustration after three years. But as they have more conversations with the Brahmins,

Nobody important believed idols were gods; they only symbolized the divine power. For missionaries, this sophisticated glimpse of Hindu ideas generated a problem, for they could no longer simply traffic in stereotypes. As such, the Brahmins were considered the principal defendants of Hinduism.

As Brahmins had begun to be viewed as equals to the missionaries in religio-philosophical matters, their social status within the colonial rule also improved. They started providing administrative support in Portuguese-controlled areas. While Xavier spewed vitriol against Hindus and their practices to mask his ignorance, other missionaries like Giacomo Fenicio started to engage with Brahmins in a more informed way. Catholic missionaries like Thomas Stephens even wrote the Kritapurana (Story of Christ) in a mix of Marathi and Konkani languages, defying the Catholic practice of keeping all scriptures in Latin. The Catholic missionaries from Portugal and the Protestant Dutch missionaries raced each other, attempting to convert local Rajas to convert them, spy on them, scout the kingdom and note down the locations of temples and treasures for looting, and to defend their faith and country from the other.

A sentiment relatable to many of America's extreme-right Christians of today. The Hindu kings, like the Japanese Shoguns/Daimyos, also leveraged this mindset. They allowed for normal tolerance to Christianity, building a church, and converting certain people, as long as the Portuguese supplied them with firearms and did not hesitate to switch sides between the Portuguese and the Dutch. Terms like "Parangi" (Franks) came to be associated with non-Portuguese Christians, just like how "Tulukan" (Turk) became associated with all Muslims in Tamil.

The missionaries also adapted. People like de Nobili started draping in orange, smeared Sandwood paste on his forehead, became vegetarian, even wore a sacred thread, and even practiced the caste system—all the marks of a Brahmin. While Goa was Europeanized, Madurai (where de Nobili operated) became Christianized, in a way.

In a way, Hinduism has not absorbed Christianity and Islam into its folds, as it has done various other local religions. It created a group of people who were fluid in their beliefs: Christians praying to local Hindu gods, Muslims practicing some Hindu customs or celebrating Hindu festivals, and Hindus going to Muslim shrines to make an offering for the sake of their sickly child. The work of de Nobili was accused of being a scam—him being labeled a "white Brahmin." These, still Catholic ideas, were to be challenged not by Hindus but by a new wave of zealous Protestant missionaries. The missionaries began treating the converts of the other faith as lowly 'neophytes', 'pariah', 'dregs of earth', 'enticed by the low of rupees'. The converted Indians were the victims. This is reflected even in modern day as extreme Hindus slander Christians as 'rice-bag' converts.

Decades later, different missionaries still found it quite hard to convince Hindus about their mission and their God.

Learning more about the Hindu reglion and it's various aspects of it, dismantled the prejudices of (some) missionaries like Bartholomaus Ziegenbalg.

In a fascinating turn of events, as the missionaries converged on the Vedas as the alleged definitive guide of the Hindus and translated them (to their advantage), these same texts were used against the Church back in their home. People of the Age of Enlightenment like Voltaire used (dubious) translations of vedas to argue that the Christian religion was a miserable copy of these ancient Hindu theology. As the Jesuits accussed of the Brahmins keeping their sacred texts and "hidden truths" among themselves, the Catholic church was similarly blamed during the Protestant Reformation and subsequently the age of Enlightenment.

These intellectuals presumed a Christian-style development of Hinduism - every written (Vedas mainly) was to be taken literally and everything else being practiced as a gross corruption or a perversion. We now know that Puranic Hinduism developed through interaction and now representative of Hindus at large. Hinduism was a "hybrid culture of overlapping theological encounters". The vedas themselves reflect this - the older portions (karma-kanda) dealing mainly with the rituals, sacrifices, invocations, while the later portions deal with more philosophical and metaphysical aspects (Upanishads). As much as 200 Upanishads (although only 108 mukhya upanishads are recognized as the core) have been catalogued - some written in as late as "medieval times".

Although the 'pure' Hinduism where every Hindu was a rigit votary of the Vedas never existed, it did find validation in the later rise of Hindu Nationalism. The western lament of the decline of the ancient pure Hinduism even found a place in the Brahmin concept of the "Kali Yuga", the dark age of corruption. Nonetheless, the white man's rule gave white men's ideas the muscle to remake reality.

The late 17th century saw the begining of Brahmin domination in the political and juidicial affairs of the land - across various overlords - be it the Hindu Marathas, Muslim Nawabs, or Christian Governor Generals. The identification of Brahmins as the defenders and upholders of the land's culture and traditions by the missionaries was being used by the British to pose a continuation of the status quo to the Indian people. As such, Governor generals often received paens for their victory or for following the Brahmin shastras or local sampradayas (traditions) in various judicial matters ^[1]. Slowly, Brahmins were exployed by the British in various administrative positions. The puppet states followed suit in employing Brahmins in administrative positions.

The administrative and judicial coersion of the British rule, cajoled the majority population to identitfy overwhelmingly based on religion.

With the influence of western medicine and technological developments, a small renaissance also occurred in some Hindu puppet states. Rajas like Serfoji II Bhonsle of Thanjavur, Jai Singh of Jaipur, and some Travancore Rajas encouraged and promoted western sciences, arts, literature in conjuction with a revival of local arts and sciences. This, to the admiration and surprise of the British, did not go against the notion of being a Hindu. Scientific investigation was part of Hindu way of life argued Serfoji II, for instance. While the missionaries could only view Hindu religion with their Christian blinkers, the British were open to actually studying the religion and culture in a zeal to rule over it.

On the otherside, the white men, from the late 18th and 19th centuries, started discovering Sanskrit texts - initially to understand the Hindu law and religion, but eventually the literature and poetry. Their translation to English (and later German, and French), albeit censored and "purified", gave rise to tremendous interest in Sanskrit. Sanskrit was hailed as a wonderful language, even superior to Greek and Latin. This, coupled with the rising idea that Sanskrit was "mother of all subcontinental languages"^[2], lead to a disdain of other vernacular languages, like Bengali, as a mere corruption due to Islamic and Persian influence. This would, again, in time, be amplified by Hindu nationalists.

Hindus too, in their own way, started to take part in and influence this rise of subcontinental Orientalism—just like they did with the incoming of the Islamic empires. The associates to the British (now increasingly Brahmin) say what the British esteemed and pointed out Hindu parallels, prejudiced against Buddhist and Jain thought. Ironically, this orientalism enabled the Indians to view themselves as not inferior to the British and would slowly give rise to the Indian resistance. Even as early as 1857, the British sensed the use of Indian texts that they treasured, like the Gita, was beginning to be used as a motive for resistance.

However, by the 1830s, as the missionaries failed to see significant success in their mission, they turned to influencing the governors to restrict their activities that were done to appease the native Hindus (like participating in festivals, honoring, and protecting pilgrimage sites). New laws such as the "Pilgrim tax" were introduced. The intellectuals (from the higher castes) who eagerly learned English and the western sciences were still not considered for positions of any marginal power. Amidst all these, the conversions of any high-caste Hindus were advertised and praised publicly. The British haughtiness and arrogance were not lost on the Indians. For instance, Bhaskar Pandurang (1816-47) records

Then the 1857 rebellion happened. Although the British narrative was to draw a strawman that the natives were enraged over the use of cow and pig fat in the cartridges, the rebellion was a culmination of decades of resentment against the British rule. There were instances as early as 1809 in Travancore where the Britisher's 'ingratitude and treachery' was noted, and the dewan Velu Thampi even tried to oust the Company out of the Kingdom. Intellectuals like Ram Mohan Roy and Bankin Chandra Chatterjee began standing up against the British.

In fact, this period also saw the rise of Hindu religious reformers. As with earlier reformers like Nanak and Kabir, who tried to bridge or tried to abstract away religious practical differences, now in the early 19th century various intellectuals and even God men attempted to reinterpret Hinduism and Hindu practices in light of the White man's influence and Western knowledge. This development can also be partly attributed to the frenzy in "discovering" and translating the ancient Hindu texts. Hinduism started to reshape itself yet again.

In fact, ideas like the rejection of idolatry and a more egalitarian access to the religious experience for all—the ideas that had precedence over 700 years before Roy^[3]—were now being reinterpreted and reinstated. In a sense, this development also partly reflected the actual inter-religious practice of many Indians. As noted by a Deccan writer in the early 1830s,

With the rise of reformers, interesting ideas began to take shape. Dayanand Saraswati, for instance, claimed

Furthermore, he added that guns were used in ancient India and that all 'sciences and art' in 'the whole world' had 'their original start' in Vedic minds. A precursor to the modern romanticization of ancient India by the Hindu nationalists.

In fact, this Arya Samaj transformed into an organism nobody had seen in India before: a Hindu evangelical movement. And a uniform Hindu identity was no longer an intellectual argument alone; it was acquiring muscle to remake reality. However, this was balanced by sensible intellectuals like Jyotiba and Savitribai Phule. They emphasized the urgent need for social revolution and education for all before attempting to reform religion or to get independence.

Fascinatingly, by the turn of the 20th century, the selective view and romanticization of Hinduism in the style of Ram Mohan Roy and the distorted (or one might say puritan), aggressive, and dismissive views of the Arya Samaj evolved into a dangerous standard for a national Hindu identity in the light of every growing dissatisfaction with the British rule. Pillai doesn't shy away from exposing just how influential Bal Gangadhar (or often called lokmanya) Tilak was in this regard. Tilak's pragmatism and his shrewdness sowed the seeds of the Hindutva rhetoric that we see today. His views that secretly the British favored Muslims and that disaster aid from abroad helped missionaries amass fresh converts have uncanny similarities to the modern-day Hindutva rhetoric. In fact, as Pillai notes, who is a Hindu, began to be based on what he was not—Christian or a Muslim. Tilak 'grafted a new hatred of British rule onto the old hatred of Mohammedan domination.' Tilak and his followers even went to the extent of attacking Gopal Krishna Gokhale (a liberal Brahmin) as 'dirt of the gutter' and a 'eunuch' for his progressive views. Such views, freely expressed in public discourse and in magazines, supported by the privileged castes, coupled with the fact that the majority of the administrative positions (by the turn of the 20th century) were held by Brahmins, caused a divide between the Brahmin nationalists and non-Brahmin nationalists.

Finally it would be Tilak's successor of sorts, V.D. Savarkar, who would be successful in describing the "Hindutva" or the "Hinduness" that was to unite the Hindus and, in a way, come to define a modern view of Hinduism.

Savarkar, through his historical revisionism (Pillai notes "conscripting the past to tell a story") and passionate writings, was able to bolster the view that Indian history was a prolonged battle for Hindu self-determination. Unfortunately, this sort of circlejerking continues today.

The view that Hindus were 'historically too tolerant' and the then activities and demands of the Muslim League made Savarkar and his followers acidic towards Muslims. However, the majority of Hindus then backed Gandhi and his views (thankfully!), and as such, Savarkar's Mahasabha saw little success in wooing Hindus together. But, in the recent decades, his ideas and rhetoric are now well underway, attempting to remake the Indian state in its own image.

All the above excerpts are attributed to their original author(s). Book info -

Manu S. Pillai, Gods, Guns and Missionaries, 2024. Penguin Random House, India. ISBN-13: 9780670093656