Munda “Conversions” in Two Missionaries’ Narratives

What is it about?

This article focuses on the conversion narratives of two fathers of the Belgian Jesuit mission in India, Joseph Müllender and Johan-Baptist Hoffmann, among the Munda Adivasi minority. Their letters (1881–1927) offer contrasting accounts of conversion as being motivated by preaching and the theological superiority of Christianity over so-called “spirit worship” versus socio-political and agrarian issues as well as literacy. Published materials by Hoffmann (notably the Encyclopedia Mundarica, 1930–37) complete our perspective on Munda cosmology and politics as on its Jesuit translation. Eventually, an article of 1928 gives us the point of view on the same issue by a young Adivasi instructed as a Jesuit. Keywords: India, Christianity, Munda, land rights, conversion, mission

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