WHY A HINDU ACCEPTS CHRIST AND REJECTS CHRISTIANITY: CHURCHIANITY VS THE TRUE RELIGION OF CHRIST

WHY A HINDU ACCEPTS CHRIST AND REJECTS CHRISTIANITY: CHURCHIANITY VS THE TRUE RELIGION OF CHRIST

by Swami Abhedananda, 12th ed., 1976, Replicated without permission

A Hindu distinguishes the religion of the Churches from the religion
of Jesus the Christ. Speaking from the Hindu standpoint, the religion which
the Churches uphold and preach today, which has been built around the
personality of Jesus the Christ and which is popularly known as
Christianity, should be called 'Churchianity,' in contradiction to the pure
religion of the heart which was taught by Jesus the Christ and practiced by
his disciples. The religion of Christ, or true Christianity, had no dogma,
no creed, no system, no theology. It was a religion of the heart, a
religion of the heart, a religion without any ceremonial, without ritual,
without priestcraft; it was not based upon any book, but upon the feelings
of the heart, upon direct communion of the individual soul with the Heavenly
Father. On the contrary, the religion of the church is based upon a book,
believes in dogmas, professes a creed, has an organize system for preaching
it, is backed up by theologies, performs rituals, practices ceremonials, and
obeys the commands of a host of priests.

The popular history of Churchianity began from 325 after Christ,
the 20th year of the reign of Constantine the Great, when the famous Council
was convened at the City of Nicea. Those who have read the life of this
august Roman Emperor will remember how remarkable was the character of this, socalled, pious supporter of the Church dogmas. He put to death his own son and his wife Fausta on groundless suspicion, cut off his brother-in-law Licinius and the unoffending son of Licinius and massacred every one of his rivals. Nevertheless, the Greek Church has canonized him, and adores the
memory of St. Constantine.

It was Constantine the Great, who issued a decree in 321 A.D., for
the general observance of Sunday, instead of the Jewish Sabbath. He hated
the Jews and everything connected with the Jews, and said, "This day shall
be regarded as a special occasion for prayer, because it is the Sun's day,
the day of our Lord." Since that time, the Church has accepted that decree,
ignoring the fact that this was the day for the worship of the sun among the
pagans.

It was Constantine the Great, who decided what should be the creed
of the Church, and commanded the assembled bishops to receive the decrees of the Council of Nicea as the dictates of the Holy Spirit. Since that time
the church has given authenticity to that creed, which is repeated almost
every Sunday in all the orthodox Churches in Christendom.

The horrifying accounts of fraud, political wirepulling, theological
jugglery, ecclesiastical scandal mongery, passions breaking forth into
curses and anathemas, bloody massacres and inhuman assassinations in the
ecumenical councils, show that these were the principal instruments in the
building up of the creed of Churchianity. Readers of ecclesiastical history
will remember that in one of the following the great council of Nicea,
maidens were insulted and scourged, the holy temple was profaned, books were thrown into flames, and the church and baptistry were burned and monks were trodden underfoot. Such were the deeds of the pious bishops and founders of Churchianity.

In the Council of Ephesus, which was held in 431 A.D., monks and
bishops screamed, "Whoso speaks of two natures is a Nestorius, and let him
be cut asunder." A bishop was kicked to death by another bishop in the
course of their arguments and 137 corpses were left in a church to attest
the convincing reasons by which the most ruffianly side proved in orthodoxy.

Such were the assemblies of saints who formed the pillars of the
structure of Churchianity. We can easily imagine the nature of the guiding
spirit of those councils which established the creed of the church. From
the beginning of the history of the Churches, down to the present day,
freedom of thought and freedom and speech, which are the most essential
characteristics of true religion, have been suppressed; and fanaticism,
bigotry, curses, anathema, religious persecution, tortures of inquisition
and diabolical crimes have been committed in the name of religion. Hatred,
cruelty and fighting have reigned in the place of love, mercy, kindness,
peace, and good-will. The creed of the church would have vanished away from the world if swords were not drawn and innocent blood were not shed in the name of religion. The deeds of Churchianity are written indelibly upon the pages of the religious history of the world. Shall we wonder, then if the
humane, kind, gently, peace-loving hearts of the Hindus, that are ver ready
to send forth blessings, good-will, benediction, and a current of love
toward humanity, nay, toward all living creatures, reject Churchianity?
Shall we wonder that the Hindus, who recognize Divinity in the souls of all,
should refuse to accept a system which was founded upon the barren soil of
dogmas, fertilized with the vital forces squeezed out of the hearts of
innocent humanity, and nourished by the blood of martyrs?

We do not hear about the four canonical Gospels until the time of
Irenius, Bishop of Lyons in Gaul, who lived 178-200 A.D. He was the real
founder of the Church Canon. It was Irenius who first mentioned four
gospels. His arguments for accepting four Gospels were very remarkable.

By a strange irony of fate, the Hindu sees today that the
followers of Churchianity, ignoring its past history, have come over to
India to tell the socalled "heathen" how Churchianity has civilized the
world, how it has brought peace on earth, and how it has saved the souls of
sinners. But a Hindu is a lover of Truth and Freedom. Freedom of thought
and freedom of speech are his guiding stars. From ancient times, search
after Truth and unswerving love for Truth have forced the minds of the
Hindus to make rational investigation into matters that have been presented
to them. It is very difficult to persuade a Hindu to blindly believe in
anything. Before he accepts a dogma as truth he must trace its source and
with all the arguments, pros and cons, and then compare it with the highest
ideals that are known to his country. Stimulated by this natural tendency
and by his love of truth, when a Hindu studies the facts upon which
Churchianity is founded, he first reads the Bible as critically as possible,
applies logic and reason at every step; and then he looks into all the
available writings of those western scholars and critics who have made an
impartial examination of the Christian Scriptures from the standpoint of
historical researches.

I know many Hindus who read Thomas Paine's _Age_of_Reason_ before
they opened a page of the Bible. A Hindu knows that there has been a great
dispute in the present century among Western scholars regarding the
historical personality of Jesus the Nazareth, as it is described in the
synoptic gospels. Therefore he doubts the historical side of the
personality of Jesus of the gospels. He also knows that he researches of
the higher critics of the Bible have shown that the descriptions of the
canonical Gospels, regarding the events connected with the life and
teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, do not harmonize with the facts of history
which can be gathered form other sources.

A missionary preaches in India that the New Testament is the
revealed scripture, or word of God. The educated Hindus, however, know that
Jesus did not leave any writings of his own, nor did any of his direct
disciples write any of the gospels which were accepted by the church as the
infallible and revealed word of God. They are also familiar with the fact
that there are absolutely no contemporary records or accounts of the life
and teachings of Jesus, either in the Bible itself or outside of it; and
that the earliest of the writings, in the order of their composition, were
the genuine epistles of Paul.

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