MM Thomas - Life, Legacy and Theology

THEOLOGY OF MADATHILPARAMPIL MAMMEN THOMAS
somewhat turbulent stream of World Council discussions regarding the Christian
attitude toward non-Christian faiths which date back to the Jerusalem conference
in 1928. To understand the attitude and the issues involved one must perceive
the openness to other religions expressed at Jerusalem and by William Hocking
and the members of the Laymen's Inquiry in the early 1930s; the exclusivistic
position taken by Hendrik Kraemer at the World Missionary Conference in
Tambaram, India, in 1938; the inauguration of interreligious dialogues by the
WCC; and, of course, various efforts to contextualize theology during the 1970s
and 1980s. Over the years of his involvement Thomas has responded to the ebb
and flow, the central current and the side eddies, of ecumenical discussion.
Though some observers find indications of a more evangelical posture in his
most recent writings, generally he has taken a position that has broad ecumenical
support.
Like Koyama's, but with a closer affinity to liberation theologians, Thomas's
view of history is central to his way of doing theology. For Thomas God is not
reaching into human history from the outside to effect his purposes. Rather he
is working out his purpose from within history. Inevitably, therefore, all theology
involves an understanding of both a general and a particular history. A Christian
theology for India—or, perhaps better, an Indian Christian theology—must
recognize God's past and present workings in the Hindu renaissance and in the
incursion of secularism in India and work for the realization of his future
purpose.
The Acknowledgment of Christ in the Indian Renaissance
Kraemer felt that Indian religions revolve around a central and unchanging
monistic core. Thomas disagrees with Kraemer. He says that the Hindu renaissance
in modem times "represents an effort to put meaning-content into the term 'personal'
as applied to God, man and society, and to affirm God's purposive work in
world life as directed toward an end." Largely as a result of the impact of
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