RELIGIOUS WORLD

Taranaki Daily News, 21 July 1919, Page 9

RELIGIOUS WORLD

THE INDIA OF TO-DAY. By Ecv. T. E. Riddle, in "The Outlook." THE UNCHANGING EAST. For long it has been the fashion to .take India for granted. She has her iron-bound caste system, her strict purdah rules, her unprogrcssive. conservatism, her illiteracy, and licr mutually antagonistic religions. The 315,000,001} of India's peoples are looked on as a mighty sleeping giant bound by her customs and antipathies, inert and unprogressive, a cypher in the world's influences.

i POLITICAL STIRRINGS. But the giant has stirred. The Swadeshi (Own Country) Movement of ;1&07; the Passive Resistance Movement against an unjus.t tax in South Africa in 1913; the trouble when the Canadian Government refused to admit Panjabi emigrants of the Komagatu Maru into Canada in 1914; and then, later, the return of some 6000 Silclu emigrants from the U.S.A., each' prepared for seditionist propaganda work against the British Raj;—air these had the effect of stirring thte giant in his sleep.

THE SACRIFICE BRINGS THE VISION. But it vras the crash of the world war that awakened India. Her sor.s went from ten thousand villages of India to help in France to hold back the menace to the world's life. In the towns and villages of France and England, and, more especially, in their billets, .they came into intimate contact with a life that they had not dreamed of before. They saw sanitary villages, pleasant houses, good farms, and implements and stock, a high standard of life and a freedom of intercourse, that made them dissatisfied with the condition of things in their villages. Why should not India have these things too? India saw tha,t the war had once for all bought her a place in the Empire. Along with'this realisation came the Montagu Reforms, with the promise of an ever-increasing share in the Government of India; then came for India a place in the War Conference, in the House of Lords, and, finally, in the Leagtie of Nations.

TO CLIP SEDITION'S WINGS. Che 1 birth of nationality in India is being attended by some strange por.tents It is one of the oft-repeated sayings here that "India will never have another Mutiny." She always lies so immense and peaceful that we forget that in the East silence doe 9 not mean consent. Indians have Wquiesced in silence, but in the last few weeks the restriction of a misunderstood law has touched their new-born national consciousness, and a fire of protest has flamed through the land. In Bengal, and in part of the Panjab, there has been a certain** amount of anarchial and revolutionary crime for 15 years past. The Rowlat Committee on Sedition lately presented their report to Government, and its recommendations were, first that a more speedy method of dealing with revolutionary crime than by the ordinary crimindl proceedings should be provided; and, second, that the police should be given more power to arrest and to disperse suspected assemblies. The Government of India accepted these recommendations and embodied them in the Anarchial and Revolutionary Crimes Act, which is popularly known as the Rowlatt Bills. The Act in itself is a simple measure to protect the people from lawlessness; but unscrupulous agitators have so distorted its meaning that the people have been inflamed by its passing, and great offence to Indians has been given. A Passive Resistance movement has been inaugurated against the Act, and as a protest a general stfike was fixed for the whole of India, and a vow taken that all stilling and plying of vehicles for hire should be stopped. A day was appointed as' a day of mourning.

I IDEALISM. . Unfortunately the leader, Mr Gandi, is an idealist who did not take into consideration the fact that ideals are not a strong point with a mob. Designing politicians distorted the meaning of the Bill, and, hiding behind Mr GandiV idealism, laid their plans for a blow at the British Government. The pepple were told the. wildest tales, and India being a credulous country, the tales were believed. A man told me to-day that the Bills allowed the Government to take 40 per cent of their crops a<ld 500 rupees for every marriage, and it was cpmmon report that if two or three men were seen standing in a bazaar the police could imprison without trial.

MOB IDEALS. In Delhi the procession of nominal passive registers got out of' hand, and was fired on by the police and military. Mr Gandi was forbidden to enter Delhi or the Pan jab; but, seeking arrest as a part of his passive resistance creed, he crossed the border. He was u tested and sent back to Bombay Presidency, and there set free. When the news if hio arrest spread, strikes were begun, and processions began to march through the streets in all the big cities. In Lahore the military had the situation in hand, and drove the mob baclt. 5n Amritsar, where troops are not stationed, the banks were looted, the C.M.S. Church burnt, and live Europeans killed before troops could come. In the street-fighting some hundreds were killed. In Gujaranwala the station was wrecked, and damage done to the civil lines; but bombing and maclime-gunnino from dispersed the mob. In Ahmadabad mills were burnt, and there was much mob violence, and police and military picquets had frequently to fire on the mobs. In Calcutta and in Bombay much minor damage was done, and railway lines and telegraphs were cut in many parts, of the country. The strike is now in hand, and the surface of India is again becoming unruffled; but it has reminded us again that there are possibilities in this land,

DOES CASTE BAB THE WAY? ) I used to think that caste and religion and the purdah system would always prove effective barriers to any united action ; _ I am doubtful of it now. In .the white heat of this blaze we have lieard of Hindus and Mussalmans eating together, and there has beeh a very [general effort to break through the bonds of caste. Some day there will be another flare, and caste will go. JVILL THE NEW WOMAN COME? With the women behind the veil in the Zenanas, it looked as if there was a stronghold of conservatism that nothing sojlg thftkg, bttt Jg £u£k<% vylu& the

Young Turks eft in? to power, the women threw away their veils and came out to mingle in the preserves of men. This week, in the revolutionary trouble in Egypt, the women of the harems have been seen processioning, and even addressing meetings in the streets. And if Turkey and Egypt, why not India? Some day I believe it will come here too.

THE CHURCIi-WILL IT STAND? A new India is upon us. There has been more advance in the past five years than in the previous generation, and India ft not going to stand where she was. In the boiling up of the mobs' anger during this last week there has been a bitter feeling against India Christians as welt as against Europeans, there may be difficult days ahead, I wonder if tlw Church will be big enough and devoted enough to stand the" test. I think she will. And should the time come when in his zeal for political unity the Hindu will be willing to sacrifice his caste, will the Church of Christ have the blood mark of sacrifice so stained on her heart that she will be able to lead a bond-free India back to that cross of sacrifice that is our Life?

TRUE VISION. In the long ages of the past India has scarcely ever been a national unityTorn betwen rival factions, ground as subject peoples beneath the heel of many invaders, having their language and law and .religion thrust upon her, her point of vision had become fixed in the dead past of ancient Vedic times on the one hand or of early Islamic times on the other. This looking back has dwarfed her and for long she has acquiesced patiently in her fate. But the call of a new life has come to her. Her point of vision has moved on into tjie living present. A nation is being bora' in a day, and with all the possibilities the next few years cannot fail to be full of interest for the Christian Church and for the tribes and races of this land.

Jagadhri, April 22, 1910. • * • * SONGS IN THE NIGHT OF DEATH. While the eternal morning is breaking over the battlefields of life, how beautiful to be able to sing of victory, to have song in the heart, even, if the voice be too feeble to express the melody! The Lord Jesus sang on His night of ngony, while walking toward Gethaemane—He knew that the conflict on Calvary would mean the emancipation of mankind. The fallowing tender strains: of poetry were found under the pillow of a dying soldier in' the Union Army of the American Civil war:— I lay me down to sleep With little thought or care Whether my waking find Me here or there. A bowing, burdened heart, That only asks to rest, Unquestioning upon A loving breast. My good right hand forgets Its cunning now; To march the weary march I know not how. I am not eager, bold, Nor strong—all that is past; I'm ready not to do, At last, at last. My half-day's work is done, And this is all my part; I give a patient God My trustful heart— And grasp His banner still, Though all its blue be dim, Tliese stripes no less than stars Lead after Him.