Indian Christianity

HISTORY OF CHRISTIANITY IN INDIA : M. M. NINAN
Apart from Carey and Fabricus there were other famous missionaries who toiled with the Danish
mission. A few are mentioned in literature which include:
• the linguist Benjamin Schultze (1689–1760),
• the Hebrew scholar Christopher T. Walther (1699–1741),
• the great missionary diplomat and royal priest Christian Frederick Schwartz (1726–1798),
• the educator Christopher Samuel John (1747–1813) and
• the lexicographer John Peter Rottler (1749-1836) .
In 1793 an India Bill went before the British Parliament which renewed the royal licence of the East India
Company. The MP William Wilberforce called for an amendment allowing Christian missions and native
schools to be opened in India, but the bid was resisted and not one single bishop supported the
amendment when it went before the House of Lords.
Proposals for the Missionary Society began in 1794 after a Baptist minister, John Ryland, received the
encouraging missionary activities in India from William Carey. As a result several leaders like H.O.
Wills, an anti-slavery campaigner in Bristol, Scottish ministers in the London, David Bogue and James
Steven, and other evangelicals such as John Hey joined in alliance to form the London Mission Society.
The London Missionary Society was the first Protestant mission in Andhra Pradesh which established its
station at Visakhapatnam in 1805.
Rev. David Bogue
Finally a Charter of 1813 passed by the British parliament led to the foundation of the ecclesiastical
establishement and ended up with a thrust in the Christianisation and establishment of Educational
System in Inda. This opened up more free movement of missions into India from varied denominations.
(See The Conversion of India by Dr. George Smith p 109 quoted in the History of Missions. ) On
invitation from Colonel Arthur Cotton, in 1833, Groves visited widely among missionaries in India, and
found open doors for the gospel in many parts of the country.
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