A readable Thread by @HindooHistory
Blue Grass Blade, 1906 “HINDOO DELIVERS HOT ROAST”
For Christian Missionary Work In India– Finds More Caste Exclusion in American Than In His Own Country HITS BACK WITH BITTER AND STINGING WIT
It took the naked savages to literally dine off broiled missionary, but the following from Anaconda (Montana) Standard gives an account of a figurative roast reported from Butte. The report, which explains itself, is follows:
Pundit Dr. N. Krishna of Bombay gave a lecture at the court house last evening on the subject of political and social conditions in India. Rev. Lewis Duncan introduced the gentleman from India as a citizen from a country that was the opposite of our own. Instead of aggressiveness and progress, he stands for the pure in spirit and an arrested civilization– a civilization that was of a high type when our forefathers were struggling an seeking to establish the civilization we now enjoy.
Nearly the entire lecture of Dr. Krishna was devoted to a denunciation of English rule and criticism of the American missionaries in India. The English he called robbers and the American missionaries he termed an army of religious hoboes.
He was bitter in his treatment of England, though he was excused because he is a citizen of an oppressed country speaking against his oppressors. He was as [] in his blunt criticism of things American as he was liberal with his roast on England. He called the late lady Curzon ’the queen of American [] women,’ and said she was the most hated woman in India, as her husband was the worst robber England had ever sent to that country.
He declared there was more caste distinction in the Church of England and in the social life of American than there is in India, and he said he was astonished at the amount of ignorance there is in American concerning things in India… and the freedom with which Indian conditions are discussed by the people. ‘I have spoken to 200,000 people since I have been in this country,’ said he, ‘and in that number I found seven persons who could talk with authority on things political and social in India. … Americans like to talk about things of which they know nothing. That is American freedom.’
The doctor said there was no real freedom or Christianity in America, and he related an experience a few days ago in Butt when he entered the Merchants’ cafe on West Broadway… to get something to eat, and was informed by the one of the waitresses that ’they did not serve his class of people here.’ He spoke of the efforts to make the English language universal,and said that the more people learned to talk English the more they learned to drink whiskey.+++(5)+++ He spoke of the ‘women’ of England because, he said, are very few ladies there.+++(5)+++ The army of religious hoboes in India dare not tell the truth of English rule or they would no longer be permitted to practice their graftology.+++(4)+++
It has been asserted that before the English came into India millions of people died of starvation and hunger, yet in 1895 the annual income of the people of India was $30 per capita. Today their income is less than $3 per capita. Before the English came 60 per cent of the people of India had their own homes and the nation was the greatest manufacturing nation in the world, although in a primitive way… yet the people had enough for themselves and exported a great deal of their manufacturers to Egypt, Persia, China, Japan and other countries.
At present in the native states there is very little starvation. The people are taxed to the extent of 45 to 65 percent of the total income from their land. ‘Robberism,’ said the doctor, ‘is the greatest religion in the world, and it is practiced in the name of Jesus Christ.’
The late archbishop of Caterbury blessed the army as it was marching to war, and told the boys to go forth and kill for the glory of their country and the Lord Jesus. And that is Christianity. If Christ should come back again, as the Christians say He will, He would be ashamed of you Christians, who kill and rob in His name. Five thousand years ago the Aristotle of India said, ‘Deeds first.’ Today, we are taught words first and deeds after. Christ wouldn’t know His own church should He come among you, you have so many different isms.
You have the Northern Methodists, the Southern Methodists and the Anti-Trust Methodists, all in the name of the Lord.
Krishna said that before the English took India 80 percent of the people in that country could read and write, while now only 10 percent can do so. In the old days taxes were used to educate the people, but now they are used to support the English bishops and clergymen. There is but one school in about 15 miles. ‘Under such conditions can our country be prosperous or civilized?’ asked the doctor.
Then gentleman from Bombay declared that there is no more caste in India than there is in America. Therefore, said he, 119,000 ministers of the gospel in this country preach the teaching of love and charity taught by Christ, yet not one of them is married to a negress… but all of them denounce caste in India, which prevent a member from one caste from marrying into another. In the Church of England there are 14 castes from the lowest curate up to the archbishop. Dr. Krishna said that since he had been in America, 16 months, 61 negroes have been lynched. ‘Under no conditions could such a state of things occur in India among the Brahmins or the lower classes,’ said he
Krishna said that he did not want to be understood as scoffing at Christianity or Christ. ‘I revere Christ,’ said he,’ but your religious hoboes are a nuisance. Christ was a good man; St. Paul was a good man; John was a good man. But they lived 2,000 years ago, and we live in the twentieth century. We want your business men to trade with us, we want your philosophers to teach and study with us, and we want your tourists to visit us, but for goodness sake keep your missionaries at home’