We Asked Hindu, Muslim, Sikh, Jain, and Bahá’í Leaders to Pick Their Favorite Bible Verses
Indian religious leaders on what they admire about Christianity's scriptures.
India is marked by its “unity in diversity,” a term coined by its first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru. The nation is home to dozens of languages, cultures, traditions, and religions, and the founding leaders of the nation were careful to accentuate the celebration of this diversity. Though certain exclusivist ideologies that stress uniformity have come to the fore of India’s social life—deriving their validity from being politically empowered—Indians, by and large, remain not only tolerant of but revel in their diversity.
Christianity in India is as old as Christianity itself, or at least that is what is believed, and tradition says that the apostle Thomas arrived in India and established the first churches. For nearly 2,000 years, Indian Christians have had a dialogue of life with the adherents of the diverse faiths found in the Indian subcontinent and have largely had a peaceful coexistence. (This is in spite of the fact that colonial rule in India positioned Christianity as a foreign faith to the country, and Western missionaries actually faced opposition from Western leaders.)
Though Christians today only compose 2.3 percent of India’s total population, they have historically cultivated a reputation of service, largely through their work in education and healthcare. Yet increasingly this ministry has been questioned and viewed with suspicion and cynicism by hardliners who believe it is only an attempt to manipulate India’s most marginalized.
To illustrate the close relationship that Indian Christians have cultivated with Indians of a variety of faiths, CT spoke to Sikh, Bahá’í, Buddhist, Jain, and Hindu leaders, asking them to share Bible verses that inspired ...