BVT 5 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Christianity
The Thakur and Christianity
Judging from the amount of association he had with Christian missionaries and the praise that he reserves for Christianity, it is perhaps surprising that he did not become a Christian. Right across the street from where he lived in Calcutta was the church run by Krishna Bandyopadhyay, one of the most famous Bengali converts to Christianity. [59] Notable among the foreign missionaries were Alexander Duff, the fournder of the Scottish Church School, with whom he mentions he had a disagreement [73] and Charles Dall, with whom he seems to have had a more substantial relationship. [69, 71, 73-74, 82-83, 106, 115]
Throughout the Jīvanī, especially in the early period of Kedarnath Dutt’s professional life, we see that the Brahmo Samaj had a very strong presence among the educated leaders of Bengali society, and debates with traditional Hinduism were fierce and often acrimonious. But even at the age of 23 (1861) when teaching in Midnapore, working as a teacher under the direction of one of the Brahmo Samaj’s most powerful figures, Raj Narayan Bosu, he was taking a stand as a traditional Hindu.
"In those days my thoughts on religion were to the effect that the Brahmos' religion of dry knowledge was not good. I preferred the universal brotherhood taught by Jesus Christ and considered that to be most important. Of all the varieties of worship, I felt that only that of devotion filled with relish was good. While still in Calcutta I had read all the books written by Unitarian scholars like Theodore Parker and others. Because of that, I had a bit of faith in Jesus. I had also had some faith in bhakti from the time of my childhood in Ulagram, where I would become blissful on hearing Hari Kirtan… I recalled going to the house of Jaga Vaishnava, where Nam kirtan would be held with much dancing, and torrents of tears poured from some of the devotees' eyes. All these incidents had created in me a great faith for bhakti." [105]
I came to believe that there was something very good in the Vaishnava religion, a devotional taste, bhakti-rasa. On the other hand, the understanding that the Shakta religion was full of base practices and that the Brahmo religion was bereft of rasa gradually took place in my heart. [106]
In his account of the time spent in Medinipur, Bhaktivinoda mentions that he preferred Christanity to the “dry” Brahmo religion because of its bhakti and philosophy of universal brotherhood. It was this sense of universal brotherhood that also informed his view of the British. Elsewhere, however, at around the same time, in Tattva-viveka (1896), he explains why he could not accept Christianity:
"Thinking about the virtues and faults of this world, some moralist monotheists came to the conclusion that this material world is not a place of unalloyed pleasures. Indeed, its sufferings outweigh its pleasures. They decided that the material world is a prison to punish the living entities. If there is punishment, then there must be a crime. If there were no crime, then why would there be any punishment? What crime did the living entities commit? Unable to properly answer this question, some men of small intelligence gave birth to a very wild idea. God created the first man and placed him in a pleasant garden with his wife. Then God forbade the man to taste the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Following the evil counsel of a wicked being, the first man and woman tasted the fruit of the tree of knowledge, thus disobeying God's command. In this way they fell from that garden into the material world filled with sufferings. Because of their offense, all other living entities are offenders from the moment of their birth. Not seeing any other way to remove this offense, God Himself took birth in a human-like form, took on His own shoulders the sins of His followers, and then died. All who follow Him easily attain liberation, and all who do not follow Him fall into an eternal hell. In this way God assumes a human-like form, punishes Himself, and thereby liberates the living entities. An intelligent person cannot make sense of any of this." (Tattva-viveka, 25)
A few years later Bhaktivinoda became aware of Vaishnava scriptures like Caitanya-caritāmṛta, but it was not until 1868 that he was able to get a hold of a copy and start studying it on his own. By 1869, while stationed in Dinajpur, he had made up his mind about where he stood in terms of his religious path.
"At this time there was quite a bit of quarreling between the Hindus and the Brahmos. The schoolteachers were Brahmos, but almost everyone else was Hindu. The Hindus were trying to eject the Brahmos from society. While this was going on, the Brahmos invited me to come to one of their meetings and I wrote to them saying that I was not a Brahmo, but rather a servant of the followers of Sri Chaitanya. When the Brahmos heard this they gave up any hope [of me taking their side in the dispute]. The Hindus invited me to form a sabha and we held our first meeting in Khajanji Babu's house. I gave a 'Bhagbat Speech' that was published as a book. A few Sahebs heard the lecture and were impressed." [141-142]
It was perhaps the reaction of the Sahebs [British residents] that convinced Kedarnath Dutt that it was possible to communicate the concepts taught by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu to those of differing cultural backgrounds.
Bhaktivinoda saw the teachings of Chaitanya Vaishnavism as a fulfillment of Christian ideas. He published a short article in English on "Love of God" in 1871 while in Puri, which has been included in this volume as Appendix 2, wherein he elaborates on the "inspired" Jesus's "Love God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and love man as thy brother," describing it as "an absolute truth indeed." But then, in the same spirit of progressive thought that he elucidated in the Bhagbat lecture he elaborates on the concept of love of God in the light of Chaitanyaite thought.
Other articles in the introduction
BVT 1-2 : Invocation and Introduction to the Autobiography
BVT 3 :: Modern Scholarship on Bhaktivinoda Thakur
BVT 4 :: Bhaktivinoda Thaku and his thirst for knowledge.
BVT 5 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Christianity
BVT 6 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur in Jagannath Puri
BVT 7 :: Bhaktivinoda and the Meat-eating issue
BVT 8 :: Initiation from Bipin Bihari Goswami
BVT 9 :: Bipin Bihari Goswami in the Thakur's Writings
BVT 10 :: Lalita Prasad Thakur
BVT 11 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Sampradaya
BVT 12 :: The Authenticity of the Autobiography
Other articles inspired by the Autobiography:
A Bengali Zamindar's education in the 1840's
Bipin Bihari's testimonial to his best disciple Kedarnath Datta
Longfellow and Bhaktivinoda Thakur's poems
And also,
Hari-nama-cintamani related posts
Siddhi-lalasa
Judging from the amount of association he had with Christian missionaries and the praise that he reserves for Christianity, it is perhaps surprising that he did not become a Christian. Right across the street from where he lived in Calcutta was the church run by Krishna Bandyopadhyay, one of the most famous Bengali converts to Christianity. [59] Notable among the foreign missionaries were Alexander Duff, the fournder of the Scottish Church School, with whom he mentions he had a disagreement [73] and Charles Dall, with whom he seems to have had a more substantial relationship. [69, 71, 73-74, 82-83, 106, 115]
Throughout the Jīvanī, especially in the early period of Kedarnath Dutt’s professional life, we see that the Brahmo Samaj had a very strong presence among the educated leaders of Bengali society, and debates with traditional Hinduism were fierce and often acrimonious. But even at the age of 23 (1861) when teaching in Midnapore, working as a teacher under the direction of one of the Brahmo Samaj’s most powerful figures, Raj Narayan Bosu, he was taking a stand as a traditional Hindu.
"In those days my thoughts on religion were to the effect that the Brahmos' religion of dry knowledge was not good. I preferred the universal brotherhood taught by Jesus Christ and considered that to be most important. Of all the varieties of worship, I felt that only that of devotion filled with relish was good. While still in Calcutta I had read all the books written by Unitarian scholars like Theodore Parker and others. Because of that, I had a bit of faith in Jesus. I had also had some faith in bhakti from the time of my childhood in Ulagram, where I would become blissful on hearing Hari Kirtan… I recalled going to the house of Jaga Vaishnava, where Nam kirtan would be held with much dancing, and torrents of tears poured from some of the devotees' eyes. All these incidents had created in me a great faith for bhakti." [105]
I came to believe that there was something very good in the Vaishnava religion, a devotional taste, bhakti-rasa. On the other hand, the understanding that the Shakta religion was full of base practices and that the Brahmo religion was bereft of rasa gradually took place in my heart. [106]
In his account of the time spent in Medinipur, Bhaktivinoda mentions that he preferred Christanity to the “dry” Brahmo religion because of its bhakti and philosophy of universal brotherhood. It was this sense of universal brotherhood that also informed his view of the British. Elsewhere, however, at around the same time, in Tattva-viveka (1896), he explains why he could not accept Christianity:
"Thinking about the virtues and faults of this world, some moralist monotheists came to the conclusion that this material world is not a place of unalloyed pleasures. Indeed, its sufferings outweigh its pleasures. They decided that the material world is a prison to punish the living entities. If there is punishment, then there must be a crime. If there were no crime, then why would there be any punishment? What crime did the living entities commit? Unable to properly answer this question, some men of small intelligence gave birth to a very wild idea. God created the first man and placed him in a pleasant garden with his wife. Then God forbade the man to taste the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Following the evil counsel of a wicked being, the first man and woman tasted the fruit of the tree of knowledge, thus disobeying God's command. In this way they fell from that garden into the material world filled with sufferings. Because of their offense, all other living entities are offenders from the moment of their birth. Not seeing any other way to remove this offense, God Himself took birth in a human-like form, took on His own shoulders the sins of His followers, and then died. All who follow Him easily attain liberation, and all who do not follow Him fall into an eternal hell. In this way God assumes a human-like form, punishes Himself, and thereby liberates the living entities. An intelligent person cannot make sense of any of this." (Tattva-viveka, 25)
A few years later Bhaktivinoda became aware of Vaishnava scriptures like Caitanya-caritāmṛta, but it was not until 1868 that he was able to get a hold of a copy and start studying it on his own. By 1869, while stationed in Dinajpur, he had made up his mind about where he stood in terms of his religious path.
"At this time there was quite a bit of quarreling between the Hindus and the Brahmos. The schoolteachers were Brahmos, but almost everyone else was Hindu. The Hindus were trying to eject the Brahmos from society. While this was going on, the Brahmos invited me to come to one of their meetings and I wrote to them saying that I was not a Brahmo, but rather a servant of the followers of Sri Chaitanya. When the Brahmos heard this they gave up any hope [of me taking their side in the dispute]. The Hindus invited me to form a sabha and we held our first meeting in Khajanji Babu's house. I gave a 'Bhagbat Speech' that was published as a book. A few Sahebs heard the lecture and were impressed." [141-142]
It was perhaps the reaction of the Sahebs [British residents] that convinced Kedarnath Dutt that it was possible to communicate the concepts taught by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu to those of differing cultural backgrounds.
Bhaktivinoda saw the teachings of Chaitanya Vaishnavism as a fulfillment of Christian ideas. He published a short article in English on "Love of God" in 1871 while in Puri, which has been included in this volume as Appendix 2, wherein he elaborates on the "inspired" Jesus's "Love God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and love man as thy brother," describing it as "an absolute truth indeed." But then, in the same spirit of progressive thought that he elucidated in the Bhagbat lecture he elaborates on the concept of love of God in the light of Chaitanyaite thought.
Other articles in the introduction
BVT 1-2 : Invocation and Introduction to the Autobiography
BVT 3 :: Modern Scholarship on Bhaktivinoda Thakur
BVT 4 :: Bhaktivinoda Thaku and his thirst for knowledge.
BVT 5 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Christianity
BVT 6 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur in Jagannath Puri
BVT 7 :: Bhaktivinoda and the Meat-eating issue
BVT 8 :: Initiation from Bipin Bihari Goswami
BVT 9 :: Bipin Bihari Goswami in the Thakur's Writings
BVT 10 :: Lalita Prasad Thakur
BVT 11 :: Bhaktivinoda Thakur and Sampradaya
BVT 12 :: The Authenticity of the Autobiography
Other articles inspired by the Autobiography:
A Bengali Zamindar's education in the 1840's
Bipin Bihari's testimonial to his best disciple Kedarnath Datta
Longfellow and Bhaktivinoda Thakur's poems
And also,
Hari-nama-cintamani related posts
Siddhi-lalasa
Comments
In regard to the real origins of Christianity; please research Emperor Titus Flavius Caesar Vespasianus Augustus (and the sacking of the temple, Jerusalem):
https://www.bitchute.com/video/oI6r4zlf5szk/
I can't help chuckling, reading the quote of his that runs from, "They decided to material world is a prison..." through "An intelligent person cannot make any sense of this." With a small change in theology, we're talking about ISKCON.
Yes, there is little upa-deśa from the pens of Titus Flavius Vespasian’s scholars in their efforts to produce (a benign peace-loving form of Judaism) a translation and reformulation (as Christianity) of the Jews (violent and militaristic) messianic scripture looted from the Temple of Jerusalem.
This informative video is just under an hour and a half, if you are interested in knowing the truth:
https://www.bitchute.com/video/CJQiag4BDoxL/
Titus Flavius Vespasian's scholars used the convenient name Jesus (Ancient Greek Ἰησοῦς [Iēsoûs]) to suit the Semitic tongue as yēšūaʿ and also replace the European Druidic Æsus (symbolised by the Irminsul).
The name Jesus (Iēsoûs) fitted nicely to usurp the native religions of (and control) the minds of the conquered Jews and peoples of Europe.
Notes
Æsa:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%C3%86sa