Christianity has a rather sketchy reputation amongst most Hindus I know. Many of us have heard about the underhanded proselytizing tactics used by zealous missionaries in India, or perhaps we've come across rather explicit declarations made by the Pope and other prominent Christians (read: Pat Robertson) publicly asserting the need to ‘save’ India's Hindu population. Over time it begins to sound like a broken record, but the appalling language and assumptions underlying evangelist propaganda can rattle even the most tolerant among us. Much has been written about the insidious character of such propaganda in India, so I won't reiterate it here. Instead, I want to go out on a limb and bring to light something rarely mentioned in discussions about Hinduism and Christianity: the remarkable similarities between Christ's life and message and Sanātana Dharma.

Many Hindus attribute Christianity's original interactions with Hinduism to British colonialism, but in fact, Christianity has a long history in India. The earliest recorded Christian to arrive on the subcontinent was St. Thomas, who settled in Kerala around 53 A.D., less than a century after Christ's death. St. Thomas was an original disciple of Christ and should be of great interest to Hindus for the same reasons the Vatican and most Christian denominations do not emphasize his life and writings: The Gospel of Thomas, discovered in 1945 and believed to have predated all the other gospels, has created a stir amongst Christian historians and theologians alike as it provides a fascinating re-telling of Christian religion and philosophy – one that is very different from modern conceptions of Christianity, but has strong parallels with Hinduism.

Whereas the contemporary practice of Christianity is established upon the belief that man must surrender to Christ (and none other) in order to achieve salvation - presupposing that God and man are separate but not equal - the Gospel of Thomas focuses on spiritual rebirth through recognition of, and meditation upon the unity of existence. The following verse from the Gospel of Thomas provides a singular example of a Christian belief in Advaita, or non-dualism (the belief that God and man are essentially the same):

Jesus said, “If those who lead you say to you, ‘See, the kingdom [of heaven] is in the sky,’ then the birds of the sky will precede you. Rather, the kingdom is inside of you, and it is outside of you. When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father. But if you will not know yourselves, you dwell in poverty and it is you who are that poverty.” (3)

Not only does this passage refute the notion of heaven as external to the world and limited to a physical space, but also Jesus reveals to his disciples that they too are sons of the Father. This turns an outward notion of salvation inward, akin to the Hindu ideal of recognizing the ultimate oneness of ātma (the eternal, illuminating spirit within us) and Paramātma (God, or the Absolute). Further, the idea that ignorance of our true nature is equivalent to poverty echoes our own Hindu concept of avidyā (ignorance), underscoring the role of jnāna (knowledge) in overcoming our blindness to māyā (the illusory and transitory nature of this world). In this sense, the Gospel of Thomas offers a much more complex, transcendental understanding of reality and ultimately the purpose of life than what is normally interpreted from the Bible.

The esoteric and symbolic nature of the Gospel of Thomas provides a sharp contrast to contemporary interpretations of Christianity. This text does not address eschatology (apocalypticism), the Passion (the sufferings of Christ in the period following the Last Supper and including the Crucifixion), or even resurrection. But one need not look to the Gospel of Thomas to find parallels with Hinduism. Indeed, the Bible itself provides direct testimony of Advaita, though any such passages receive nowhere near the primacy they perhaps deserve. The following is one such example:

“And when [Jesus] was demanded of the Pharisees, ‘When the kingdom of God should come?’ He answered them and said, ‘The kingdom of God cometh not with observation: Neither shall they say, Lo here! or, lo there! for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you.”.

Why do the teachings of Jesus, who lived half a world away from India, reverberate so closely with the truths perceived by our rishis so long ago? To answer this we need look no further than India itself. A growing body of researchers investigating the life and travels of Christ are now confident that he must have spent a considerable amount of time in India. Within the last twenty years, dozens of books have been written by historians who support the view that a roughly twelve-year period in Christ's life, between his childhood and when he began preaching (of which there are no records), were spent traveling through Palestine and Afghanistan, ultimately leading him to India. Several Buddhist and Persian texts provide references to a man resembling Jesus and claiming his title. Significantly, our own Bhavişya Mahā Purāņa, dated to 115 A.D., provides the most credible account of an encounter of a King Shalivāhana with Christ in what is now the region of Kashmir.

There is evidence suggesting that Jesus lived in India during his formative years, and this raises the question as to whether he achieved his spiritual awakening whilst there. This is a likely possibility if one were to take Christ's celebrated declarations - “I am the messenger of God”, “I am the son of God” and “I and my Father are one” – to correspond with spiritual evolution from a belief in Dvaita (dualism), to Vishişţādvaita (qualified non-dualism), and finally Advaita (non-dualism).

Aside from the close philosophical and metaphysical ties between Hinduism and Christ's life and teachings, a number of cultural similarities exist in the literature and practices of Christianity and Hinduism in India today. For one, both religions have a version of a flood story. We're probably familiar with the story of Noah's ark and how he saved all life on Earth by transporting a pair of each and every creature to safety across the flooded oceans. Our own tradition provides an account of a massive flood in which Lord Vishnu descended to Earth in the form of Śri Matsya, an avatāra in the form of a fish, to assist King Manu in rescuing all living creatures from destruction.

From a ritualistic and religious perspective, many Hindus earnestly believe in the power or holiness of Christ, visiting churches and other Christian pilgrimage sites, as well as worshipping his image alongside those of Rama, Krishna, and others. We might not believe that Christians are as open to worshipping Hindu deities, but in fact a number of Indian Christians also make pilgrimages to Hindu holy sites on a regular basis. Moreover, there are several churches in India that closely resemble Hindu temples in their architecture and in the manner in which worship is conducted. For example, there is a church in Nagarjunakonda in Andra Pradesh which may easily be mistaken for a Hindu temple. Inside this church, one may discover a statue of Mother Mary garlanded with flowers and standing on a padma (a lotus) - just as we would expect of Goddess Lakshmi.

Finally, Hinduism has managed to absorb a number of Christian cultural practices into its own fold. One example is the harmonium, originally used as a portable piano to sing Christian prayers as a form of proselytization prior to the advent of colonialism in India. Nowadays, the harmonium is a veritable necessity in the performance of bhajans and kirtans, along with other forms of devotional singing and chanting.

Why is this information relevant to Hindus or even to India? The answer to this mystery came to me the other day I met a young woman who had recently moved to the US from India. When she informed me that she had grown up in Mumbai, I naturally asked whether she was Maharashtrian. Immediately she said no, that her family was Catholic. A bit puzzled, I replied that I was in fact curious to know whether she spoke Marathi at home. She answered that her family only spoke English, but knew enough Hindi to deal with the outside world. This incident reminded of an article by Swami Dayanand Saraswati in Hinduism Today where he suggested that many Christians living in India voluntarily choose to disassociate themselves with any sort of cultural, regional, linguistic, or even national identities, instead identifying themselves exclusively along religious lines.

Such a drastic identity change may not pose a threat to Hindu communities abroad, but it is problematic in India for a host of reasons. There is a saying that the welfare of the world depends on the well-being of its nations, the welfare of a nation depends on the well-being of its communities, and the welfare of a community depends on the wellbeing of its families. Inevitably, the health and prosperity of the family-unit is fundamental to the welfare of the country, but this is also most difficult to monitor and support when groups do not consider themselves part of their own nation, region, or even language group. Any attempt to create national solidarity – across ethnic, caste, linguistic, religious, and class divisions – requires a minimal sense of belonging to something greater, which may not always take precedence to religious affiliation, as demonstrated in the aforementioned case.

This brings me to my final point. What can we as Hindus do, knowing now that Christ's life and teachings are essentially congruent with Hindu philosophy? For this, I direct your attention to an essential and oft-quoted Vedic doctrine: Ekam Sat Vipraha Bahudā Vadanti – “The truth is one; sages call it by many names”. If we truly accept the validity of this statement, we must also accept Christianity to be just as sacred as any other sect of Hinduism. That doesn't mean we should remain silent in the face of injustice, but rather that constructive criticism should be provided whenever appropriate. Most importantly, we need not chastise Indian Christians for embracing Christianity, but instead engage in constructive dialogue about the unity of faith, as evinced by Christ's connection to India and his deep spiritual insights. Instead of further distancing ourselves from Indian Christians, we may all benefit from recognizing our common past and the shared destiny we have the power to construct. May we never forget that parallel streams eventually merge with the same sea.

Bible, Luke 17: 20-21.

See Mason, Mak (1997), Choudhury, P (1996), Hassnain, Fida (1997), Deardorff, James (1994), Chaudhry, Aziz. (1992), Holger, Kersten (1993), Matlock, Gene (1991), Childress, David (1985), etc.

See verses 16-33 of the third khanda of the Pratisarga parvan of the Bhavishya Mahapurana.