Dr. Jai Maharaj
2014-08-09 01:11:12 UTC
CHRISTIANS DESTROYED HINDU TEMPLES
Forwarded post:
In article <6trmqu$***@winter.news.erols.com>,
***@hotmail.com posted:
In the Name of Religion what Christian Missionaries did in Goa.
Paul Williams Robert says in his book "Empire of the Soul":
The Spread of Christianity in Goa:
"In the wake of the warriors came the priests.
First, the Franciscans, then the Jesuits, then the Dominicans, and
lastly the Augustinians. It must have made their holy blood boil to
find their old foes, the Muslims and Jews openly and brazenly
practicing their religions.
The men of God set about clearing what the Dominican termed this
"jungle of unbelief" with the ardor of Amazon lumber barons.
Just like the mullahs who had marched into Goa two hundred years
before with the Bahamani sultans, these Catholic clergy were prepared
to go to any lenghts to spread their faiths. Initially they pestered
the Portugese king for special powers, then they pestered the Pope to
pester the king on their behalf.
The first of these special powers arrived in 1540 when the viceroy
received authority to "destroy all Hindu temples, not leaving a
single one in any islands, and to confiscate the estates of these
temples for the maintenance of the churches which are to be erected
in their places. Five years later, the Italian cleric Father Nicolau
Lancilotto reported that "not a single temple to be seen on the
island."
The island in question was Teeswadi, the main field of operations for
the two priestly orders then on the scene. A glance at the absurd
profusion of churches standing cheek by jowl in Old Goa still conveys
some idea of the spiritiual excesses indulged in by these competing
orders of the day.
This Olympiad of Christianization scared the hell out of the locals,
and thousands of family fled across the river. To them, the harshness
of the Moghuls still governing the adjacent territories must have
been preferable to the rabid monomania of papist clerics.
A saying still exist in Konkani, the language of Goa:
"Hanv polthandi vaitam" ( I'm leaving for the other bank ), one
half of its double meaning implying to this day that a person is
rejecting Christianity.
Although their temples had been razed.
The Hindus who remained continued to practice their religion in
secret. More extreme methods were therefore instituted to bring the
heathen into the church's loving embrace. Hindu festivities were
forbidden; Hindu priests were forbidden from entering Goa; makers of
idols were severely punished; public jobs were given only to
Christians.
Soon it was announced that anyone practicising in private was
declared a crime. The penalty was confiscation of property. Also
Hindus, dying without a male heir could pass thier estates only to
relative who had embraced Christianity.
Death was no easier than life for Hindus in mid-sixteenth-century
Goa. To them, the cruelest piece of legislation passed by the
Portugese prohibited cremation of the dead - an inviolably sacred
part of Hindu faith. As a result, death had to be kept a secret; the
wailing grief of the women had to be smothered; family members had to
go about their business as if nothing had happened; children were
sent out to play, washing was done, work was performed - all as
usual.
In the dead of the night, a boat would be loaded with firewood down
on the riverbank, then the dead body would be placed on it, covered
by more wood.
The pyre would be set alight and the boat pushed out to drift on the
river's currents as the funeral party ran back into the safety of
shadows.
The missionaries simply could not grasp that another people's faith
could be as dearly cherished as deeply embedded as their own.
The missionaries obviously had no idea how resilient Hinduism could
be, and indeed is. It had survived Islam's scimtar, and it would
survive the sword that so much resembled the cross in whose service
it was now employed.
Total of 200 temples had been demolished.
* * *
Says Andre Corsalli to Giuliano de Medici Jan 6, 1516
"In a small island near this, called Divari, the Portuguese, in
order to build the city, have destroyed an ancient temple ... which
was built with marvelous art and with ancient figures wrought to the
greatest perfection, in a certain black stone, some of which remain
standing, ruined and shattered , because these Portuguese care
nothing about them. If I can come by one of these shattered images, I
will send it to your Lordship, that you may perceive how much in old
times sculpture was esteemed in every part of the world."
Source - Empire of the Soul
By Paul William Roberts
Riverhead Books.
1994.
pages 80-84
End of forwarded post.
Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan.jai-maharaj
Forwarded post:
In article <6trmqu$***@winter.news.erols.com>,
***@hotmail.com posted:
In the Name of Religion what Christian Missionaries did in Goa.
Paul Williams Robert says in his book "Empire of the Soul":
The Spread of Christianity in Goa:
"In the wake of the warriors came the priests.
First, the Franciscans, then the Jesuits, then the Dominicans, and
lastly the Augustinians. It must have made their holy blood boil to
find their old foes, the Muslims and Jews openly and brazenly
practicing their religions.
The men of God set about clearing what the Dominican termed this
"jungle of unbelief" with the ardor of Amazon lumber barons.
Just like the mullahs who had marched into Goa two hundred years
before with the Bahamani sultans, these Catholic clergy were prepared
to go to any lenghts to spread their faiths. Initially they pestered
the Portugese king for special powers, then they pestered the Pope to
pester the king on their behalf.
The first of these special powers arrived in 1540 when the viceroy
received authority to "destroy all Hindu temples, not leaving a
single one in any islands, and to confiscate the estates of these
temples for the maintenance of the churches which are to be erected
in their places. Five years later, the Italian cleric Father Nicolau
Lancilotto reported that "not a single temple to be seen on the
island."
The island in question was Teeswadi, the main field of operations for
the two priestly orders then on the scene. A glance at the absurd
profusion of churches standing cheek by jowl in Old Goa still conveys
some idea of the spiritiual excesses indulged in by these competing
orders of the day.
This Olympiad of Christianization scared the hell out of the locals,
and thousands of family fled across the river. To them, the harshness
of the Moghuls still governing the adjacent territories must have
been preferable to the rabid monomania of papist clerics.
A saying still exist in Konkani, the language of Goa:
"Hanv polthandi vaitam" ( I'm leaving for the other bank ), one
half of its double meaning implying to this day that a person is
rejecting Christianity.
Although their temples had been razed.
The Hindus who remained continued to practice their religion in
secret. More extreme methods were therefore instituted to bring the
heathen into the church's loving embrace. Hindu festivities were
forbidden; Hindu priests were forbidden from entering Goa; makers of
idols were severely punished; public jobs were given only to
Christians.
Soon it was announced that anyone practicising in private was
declared a crime. The penalty was confiscation of property. Also
Hindus, dying without a male heir could pass thier estates only to
relative who had embraced Christianity.
Death was no easier than life for Hindus in mid-sixteenth-century
Goa. To them, the cruelest piece of legislation passed by the
Portugese prohibited cremation of the dead - an inviolably sacred
part of Hindu faith. As a result, death had to be kept a secret; the
wailing grief of the women had to be smothered; family members had to
go about their business as if nothing had happened; children were
sent out to play, washing was done, work was performed - all as
usual.
In the dead of the night, a boat would be loaded with firewood down
on the riverbank, then the dead body would be placed on it, covered
by more wood.
The pyre would be set alight and the boat pushed out to drift on the
river's currents as the funeral party ran back into the safety of
shadows.
The missionaries simply could not grasp that another people's faith
could be as dearly cherished as deeply embedded as their own.
The missionaries obviously had no idea how resilient Hinduism could
be, and indeed is. It had survived Islam's scimtar, and it would
survive the sword that so much resembled the cross in whose service
it was now employed.
Total of 200 temples had been demolished.
* * *
Says Andre Corsalli to Giuliano de Medici Jan 6, 1516
"In a small island near this, called Divari, the Portuguese, in
order to build the city, have destroyed an ancient temple ... which
was built with marvelous art and with ancient figures wrought to the
greatest perfection, in a certain black stone, some of which remain
standing, ruined and shattered , because these Portuguese care
nothing about them. If I can come by one of these shattered images, I
will send it to your Lordship, that you may perceive how much in old
times sculpture was esteemed in every part of the world."
Source - Empire of the Soul
By Paul William Roberts
Riverhead Books.
1994.
pages 80-84
End of forwarded post.
Jai Maharaj, Jyotishi
Om Shanti
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan.jai-maharaj