Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 38:1 (Winter 2024)
Article: The Theological Quest Of An Indian Woman: Dogma, Doubts, And Debates In Pandita Ramabai’s Early Christian Life
Author: Chongpongmeren Jamir

PP 38:1 (Winter 2024) p. 10

The Theological Quest Of An Indian Woman: Dogma, Doubts, And Debates In Pandita Ramabai’s Early Christian Life

Chongpongmeren Jamir

Chongpongmeren Jamir is a Postdoctoral Fellow in Church History at the Inez and Julius Polin Institute, Åbo Akademi University, Turku, Finland. He holds a PhD from Middlesex University through the Oxford Centre for Mission Studies, Oxford, UK. His research interest revolves around the cultural history of Christianity in modern India, with a particular focus on the interface of culture and religion and the semiotic value of rituals and artifacts in historiography.

“I have not a faith which is called very often child-like,”1 insisted Mary Rama, as she wrestled with doctrinal difficulties as a novice to the Christian faith. “I wish I had it, but you know I had to give up that which really was child-like—and which had come to me from my childhood, my old faith—entirely, and take a new one, which seemed more rational, purer and nobler.”2

Rechristened Mary Rama, Ramabai Dongre Madhavi (popularly known as Pandita Ramabai) was a Brahmin woman from India. She was baptised into the Christian faith on September 29, 1883 at Wantage, England. (She was at the time residing at the convent of the Anglican Community of Saint Mary the Virgin, hereafter referred to as Wantage sisters.) Though she was convinced of “the truthfulness of Christ’s religion,”3 she struggled with the concepts of the Trinity and the divinity of Christ, which to her seemed to indicate polytheism. Suggestions from her mentors to accept the historic Christian dogmas with childlike faith were not helpful. As a Hindu, she was ascribed the rare title of Pandita (“scholar”) due to her mastery of the Hindu scripture. Though a beginner in the Christian faith, she studied the Bible with the critical eye of a religious scholar. Recognizing this tendency, Dorothy Beale (principal of Cheltenham Ladies’ College, where Ramabai was enrolled for study) observed that Ramabai could not receive Christianity “merely as a historical revelation,” but demanded philosophical evidence showing that “such and such things are metaphysical necessities.”4 Thus, Beale urged for patience in dealing with Ramabai, yet cautioned that if left unattended she could end up a heretic. The question on the orthodoxy of Ramabai’s Christian faith alarmed her mentors in England. Sister Geraldine, her godmother in baptism, and Canon William Butler, who baptised her, were aggrieved by what they saw as a drifting away from the faith. The former accused Ramabai of betraying the faith she...