Final thoughts on Nagaland

If you were coming to Nagaland to see traditional tribe cultures don’t bother to come as there is nothing left. With 98% of the community Baptist the locals all were western clothes and there is nothing much really to see culturally. 

Both Nagaland and Arunachal are recognized as having diverse biospheres which lead to a very high bird and butterfly count not to mention the fauna.  For us the question in Nagaland was why had there been such a high conversion rate to Christianity? We had not seen the missionary be so successful at conversion in the various countries that we have been to where missionaries have been active.

A Doctoral thesis by Vihuli Sema entitled The American Baptist Mission and the Nagas for which there is an abstract available on line has these remarks on that same subject.

“Chapter four is an elaborate discussion of the missionary contribution in the field of education, literature and health care. No doubt these were some of the methods adopted to achieve their one object, the conversion of the Nagas to Christianity, but the missionary contribution in these fields cannot be underestimated. They were the pioneers in the field of education and contributed immensely to its growth and development in the Naga Hills. Spread of secular education as desired by the administration was not the primary object of the American Baptists. They wanted a workable literacy among the hill men and with this end in view the missionaries established primary schools and a few training schools for teachers. Despite such limitations, the mission schools remained the chief agencies for imparting education to the Nagas. The missionaries also contributed immensely to the development of Naga literature. In fact most of the written Naga dialects owe their origin and development to the Christian agencies. Eager to get vernacular translations of the New Testament into circulation as quickly as possible, the missionaries at Impur and Kohima reduced the various Naga dialects to written forms and built up a body of vernacular literature which represented the first literature the Naga had ever possessed.

 Another sphere of missionary’s activity brought hope and new life to the Nagas hitherto steeped in superstitions and ignorance, and that was medical service. This appeared to be one of the important adjuncts to the evangelistic programs of the missionaries from the beginning. It was seen as the necessary embodiment of the spirit of Christianity, whose founder was Himself a great Healer. The missionaries established hospitals, dispensaries, and other kinds

of health centuries . Through the dispensaries the mission could serve the Nagas even in the remotest areas. The service of Rivenburg, Loops, and Bailey as well as the nonprofessional contributions made by Clark and others dispensed medicine for ordinary ailments did help to project the figure of a compassionate missionary "who became more acceptable to the people. It also contributed a great deal to the material progress of the Naga Hills.

Chapter five deals with conversion and attempts to explain it in the historical context. Clearly it can be seen that Christian conversion among the Nagas cannot be explained in terms of the number of distribution of foreign missionaries, as this line of reasoning is contradicted by the lack of consistent correlation between the incidence of conversion and the presence of foreign missionaries. Shifting the focus from the missionaries to the converts, one might interpret the latter as motivated by political, social, or other forms of self-interest. But this confuses the consequence of conversion for its cause. Religious change in Nagaland in other words, cannot be explained in strictly non-religious terms. The key of these changes is to be found in the particular forms of interaction between the Naga religious cosmology and their social relations, each of which influenced the other. The traditional Naga cosmology may be characterized as a two-tiered scheme, consisting at the upper tier of a supreme deity who underpinned the universe. This supreme deity though benevolent was but vaguely understood and seldom approached because of his remoteness from the everyday concerns of Naga communities. The lower tier consisted of a host of minor spirits who were more sharply perceived because they underpinned the immediate reality which Nagas experienced , and therefore needed constant appeasement to keep them from bringing havoc upon individuals, or whole villages . Within this framework on finds a good deal of room for variation and elaboration from one Naga group to another. Secondly Naga religions were not static but dynamic, as we find that particular deities of one Naga group were occasionally incorporated into the cosmology of other groups. An awareness of the variations among Naga religion and of their dynamic fluid quality helps to suggest how Christian conversion took place in the Naga Hills. In using this approach one finds that in fact Christianity was not presented uniformly among Naga groups, that the Christian cosmology was fitted into the Ao religious system very differently then it was into the Sema, Lotha or Angami system. Secondly one finds that the various Naga communities experienced different sorts of social changes before and during their exposure t o Christian influence, and that this affected their different responses to that influence.

Despite all their denunciation against the social dimension of Naga religion, prohibiting this, denying that, some missionaries were not at all reluctant to rely very heavily on its cosmological dimension. Thus we see them tinkering with Naga cosmologies, trying to fit their own system into the Nagas, but doing so in a somewhat inconsistent way. In the long run it appears that those missionaries who found the most success were those who allowed the Nagas to identify the Christian conception of God within their own religious system.  However as long as the Nagas experience of reality remained confined to their immediate locality, the upper tier of their cosmology occupied by their supreme deity who underpinned the entire universe, was accordingly given only slight attention . This was why the early missionary efforts met with relatively little success. The missionaries had been elaborating the upper tier of the Naga cosmology at a time when the Nagas pre-occupied with a concern with more immediate spirits were paying little attention to that tier. But world events like the integration of the Naga Hills with British India and World War II confronted Nagas with a larger reality than their lower tier of local spirits could be seen as controlling. When this occurred, Nagas respond d by paying greater attention to the supreme deity who underpinned the entire universe and who appeared more clearly in charge of things. Amidst this breakdown and ultimately capitalizing on it , were the missionaries who claimed to be tapping a source of power the one God ’Tsungrem ' or ‘ Alhon' , far greater in magnitude and far more actively involved with the entire macrocosm than any of the former spirits of Naga cosmology. The acceptance of this Christian conception of God seem to have been facilitated by (a) his ability to deliver men from fear of their malevolent spirits (b) his identification with new solutions to old problems in the area of physical afflictions, and ( c) His infinite power rendered both timeless and challengeable by his being enshrined in a written text, the Christian scriptures.

Chapter Six deals with the impact of Christianity on Naga culture. Culture here implies the personality of a people or a society. It includes the totality of people’s traditions (what they believe) attitudes (what they desire) customs (what they do) and institutions (how they live). Christianity has struck its roots deep in the Naga soil and brought far reaching changes in every facet of Naga life and thought. For centuries the Nagas had been living in isolation, institutionalized warfare between neighboring villages and tribes had been a way of life, the mainspring of many of the political, social and cultural institutions of the people. Now the Christian emphasis upon love for neighbour and enemy alike provided an ideological basis for the new relationship among villages and tribes that British administration and the prohibition of raiding made necessary.  The new attitudes were seen in the extensive evangelistic activities undertaken by Christians of one tribe among members of other tribes who had traditionally been their enemies.  Another area of culture change stimulated by missionary influence was tile breaking of old barriers within and between linguistic groups. The Mission organized large associations to serve as forums for discussion on social welfare activities as well as church policy. But these Associations also served to integrate Nagas of the same language groups. With their huge annual meetings drawing thousands from distant villages, these Associations not only broke down inter village barriers but raised to a much higher level the forum of discussion on issues formerly decided only at the village level. For the Nagas Christianity came as a liberator from ”spiritual and social demons' . But in the process of 1iberatinq the tribes it is not always easy to tell the difference between the "demons" of oppression and superstition that binds the bodies and mind of the people and valuable elements in the traditional cultures that might best be preserved to enrich the Christian community. Sometimes the missionaries seemed to oppose traditional activity simply because they did not fit in with their own rather solemn notions of Christian propriety. For instance, the missionaries forbade converts to participate in the Feast of Merit, and boys were prohibited from attending their morungs or dormitories since these were associated with their former life. The Feast of Merit discouraged by the missionaries fulfilled an important obligation of the well-to-do for the good of the community irrespective of their economic positions. This said to be the Naga way of distributing Wealth which had a greater social value. Again the morungs around which the social, political, religious, legal and military life of the Nagas revolved sank into insignificance due to missionary propaganda. Morungs were supposed to be the “most imposing and well built” houses in the Naga villages. They were also the centers of art and carving. Mills lamented that in the Christian villages Morungs were no longer built and the old xylophones (long wooden drums) came into disuse. The disappearance of the social and communal institution was followed in it’s train by the emergence of a spirit of new individualism. This in turn led to the erosion of the family and clannish ties which were once very important elements of Naga life. Education, occupational mobility and social intercourse also led to inter tribal marriages.  Marriages with non-Nagas also took place. Such inter-marriages have eroded family and community life to a great extent. The convert being thus cut off from the community and village life became a stranger in his village and began to despise his own tribe and cultural inheritance. Many of the charges against the missionaries of disrupting the Naga way of life are not without foundation. However the latter-day missionaries appreciating some of the valuable elements in the Naga culture switched on to a more realistic policy and tried t o preserve all t that was good in the old tradition and culture of the Naqas.

In conclusion it may be said that the American Baptist Mission came out of European and American cultural backgrounds. When they entered the Naga Hills and began working among them, two cultures came face to face. The when two cultural groups meet they effect each other. Usually the dynamic one makes its headway inside the weaker.  On principle a certain amount of tribal disintegration was unavoidable when it came in direct touch with the agent of western culture. It can be admitted frankly that the missionaries that came from America were the bears of both the good and the bad qualities of their nation.  They could not strip themselves of the cultural characteristics of their land and people and this influenced to some extent their attitude toward the tribal culture. But the allegation that Christianity was responsible for the disintegration of the Naga culture and life are interconnected the more so in tribal life, where they tend to be undifferentiated.  The missionaries made an attempt to change the core, the center of tribal religion, but they had attempted to retain the outer framework as much as possible. But a change of center meant a change of world view, philosophy of life and perspective of spiritual and moral values. Thus some kind of change or alteration was inevitable."