The assumption that Christianity in India is nothing more than a European, western, or colonial imposition is open to challenge. Those who now think and write about India are often not aware that Christianity is a non-western religion, that in India this has always been so, and that there are now more Christians in Africa and Asia than in the West. Recognizing that more understanding of the separate histories and cultures of the many Christian communities in India will be needed before a truly comprehensive history of Christianity in India can be written, this volume addresses particular aspects of cultural contact, with special reference to caste, conversion, and colonialism. Subjects addressed range from Sanskrit grammar to populist Pentecostalism, Urdu polemics and Tamil poetry.

The assumption that Christianity in India is nothing more than a European, western, or colonial imposition is open to challenge. Those who now think and write about India are often not aware that Christianity is a non-western religion, that in India this has always been so, and that there are now more Christians in Africa and Asia than in the West. Recognizing that more understanding of the separate histories and cultures of the many Christian communities in India will be needed before a truly comprehensive history of Christianity in India can be written, this volume addresses particular aspects of cultural contact, with special reference to caste, conversion, and colonialism. Subjects addressed range from Sanskrit grammar to populist Pentecostalism, Urdu polemics and Tamil poetry.

Banner-carrying Salvation Army marchers, stone-silent Quakers, jumpy Midwestern revivalists, closed-fellowship Brethren, and Prayer-book Anglicans all made up the mixed multitude sent to the Middle Kingdom by the China Inland Mission (CIM).

In "China's Millions," the newest volume of the acclaimed Studies in the History of Christian Missions series, veteran historian Alvyn Austin crafts a compelling narrative of the sprawling history of the China Inland Mission. Austin explores two questions: How did British evangelicalism feed into American fundamentalism, eventually becoming global Protestantism, and how did evangelical Christianity become Chinese? Along the way he introduces readers to a remarkable array of sights, from the visionary, charismatic sect-leader Pastor Hsi, to the "wordless book," a missionary teaching device that fit perfectly with Chinese color cosmology, to the opium-soaked aftermath of the North China Famine of 187779.

Clear, readable, and well researched, "China's Millions" digs deeply into the Chinese and Western past to tell a story that no one would think to tell, the strange yet hopeful result of two cultures colliding.

Christianity has long been one of India's religious traditions, but the extent to which the faith has influenced Indian society and culture has never been well documented. This important book is the first to do so. Here a group of historians, missiologists, and religion scholars examines the fascinating but little known history of missionary Christianity in India, showing how it has played a significant role in the development of modern India at every level. Chapters deal with the interaction between Christianity and India's high culture, with aspects of conversion among tribal people and outcasts beneath the hierarchy of Hindu society, and with the development of Indian churches and their relation to the wider culture.

Contributors:

Peter B. Andersen
Michael Bergunder
Judith M. Brown
Susan Billington Harper
Beppe G. Karlsson
Indira Viswanathan Peterson
Avril A. Powell
Gerald Studdert-Kennedy
John C. B. Webster
Richard Fox Young

This interesting volume challenges the long-held assumption thatChristianity in India is nothing but a colonial or Western imposition. Leading experts here chronicle the histories and cultures ofIndia's many Christian communities and show that local Indianleaders were the real agents of religious change in the subcontinent.

These chapters range widely over various facets of Indiansociety and its religious developments. Of crucial importance isthe fact that in exploring their subjects the contributors take painsto avoid the Eurocentric nature of most studies of India and represent Christianity from a genuinely Indocentric perspective. Theresult is an entirely new vista from which to view the history, features, and influence of Indian Christianity.Contributors: Peter B. Andersen
Michael Bergunder
MarineCarrin
Penelope Carson
Gunnel Cederlof
Robert Eric Frykenberg
E. M. Jackson
Heike Liebau
Iwona Milewska
Geoffrey A.Oddie
Indira Viswanathan Peterson
Avril Powell
Paula Richman
Jayeeta Sharma
Harald Tambs-Lyche
Richard Fox Young

Robert Frykenberg's insightful study explores and enhances historical understandings of Christian communities, cultures, and institutions within the Indian world from their beginnings down to the present. As one out of several manifestations of a newly emerging World Christianity, in which Christians of a Post-Christian West are a minority, it has focused upon those trans-cultural interactions within Hindu and Muslim environments which have made Christians in this part of the world distinctive. It seeks to uncover various complexities in the proliferation of Christianity in its many forms and to examine processes by which Christian elements intermingled with indigenous cultures and which resulted in multiple identities, and also left imprints upon various cultures of India.
Thomas Christians believe that the Apostle Thomas came to India in 52 A.D./C.E., and that he left seven congregations to carry on the Mission of bringing the Gospel to India. In our day the impulse of this Mission is more alive than ever. Catholics, in three hierarchies, have become most numerous; and various Evangelicals/Protestant communities constitute the third great tradition. With the rise of Pentecostalism, a fourth great wave of Christian expansion in India has occurred. Starting with movements that began a century ago, there are now ten to fifteen times more missionaries than ever before, virtually all of them Indian. Needless to say, Christianity in India is profoundly Indian and Frykenberg provides a fascinating guide to its unique history and practice.