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The Christian in Kadirgamar
By Carlton Samarajiwa
In his funeral tribute at Independence Square, the Anglican Bishop Rt. Revd. Duleep de Chickera spoke of Lakshman Kadirgamar’s Christian upbringing and education. His last rites were Buddhist in form and tradition must have symbolized Kadirgamar’s liberal outlook. There was also a service of thanksgiving, very Christian in form and tradition, at the Cathedral of the Living Christ in Bauddhaloka Mavatha, not far from his private residence where he was cruelly felled. All of this must have formed an appropriate climactic symbol of an eclectic life that rose above pettiness and division through an upbringing in the Christian tradition and the pursuit of all that is good and beautiful and true.

In ordinary minds accustomed to religious stereotypes, there is some confusion about a Christian by birth and nurture being cremated as a Buddhist and his ashes being committed to the Kaluganga. It must have been that Kadirgamar was of a different mould, of a liberal disposition, way above and beyond not only racial but also religious divisions.

“The Buddha and Jesus are men of the same brotherhood. There cannot be any difference of opinion regarding the view of life and the world of thought, which seem to be common to Buddhism and Christianity. They are the twin expressions of one great spiritual movement,” asserted Kadirgamar in his Celestine Fernando Memorial Lecture, titled “The Social Relevance of the Bible for our Times in a Non-Christian Society” and delivered as the third in the series of memorializations of Rev. Celestine Fernando in October 1992. This lecture that he delivered two years before he began to stride like a colossus as Foreign Minister both in the Sri Lankan political scene and the international diplomatic scene provides a measure of the extraordinary Christian in this hero of our time.Kadirgamar’s thesis was simply this: “The Bible belongs in historical time, in geographical origin, in spiritual content, to that great body of scriptures — the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Mahabaratha and the Puranas of the Hindus, the Tripitakas of the Buddhists and the Quran of the Muslims — that flowered in Asia, the home of all the world religions in the millennium before and the millennium after the birth of Jesus.

From its Asian home the Bible was taken to Rome and from there to the rest of Europe and thence it was brought back to Asia — to a far-flung Asia — but unrecognizable any more as the product of the Asian genius. The Bible came back to Asia as an alien book and so began the long estrangement of the Bible from the peoples of Asia. As Mahatma Gandhi pointed out, is not Jesus an Eastern figure, perhaps more open to an Eastern interpretation? Indeed, physically Jesus would have been as tanned as we are, exposed as he was to the fierce desert sun.”

Kadirgamar emphasized the striking resemblance of the life and teaching of Gautama the Buddha to the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. Both Gautama and Jesus were miraculously conceived and wondrously born. “All joy be to thee, Queen Maya, rejoice and be glad, for this child thou has borne is holy,” said the angels. Asitha, the Brahmin priest, predicted Gautama’s future greatness. So did Simeon in the case of Jesus.

Kadirgamar spoke of the resemblance of the temptation of Gautama to the temptation of Jesus. After a fast of forty-nine days, Gautama was tempted by Mara to abandon his quest for truth, with promises of world dominion: “So, Lord, if the Lord desired, he could turn the Himalayas, the king of mountains, into very gold, and gold would the mountain be.” The Buddha replied, “How could he who hath seen pain and the source of pain bow to lusts?” “Similarly,” said Kadirgamar, “the Spirit made Jesus go into the desert, where he stayed forty days being tempted by Satan, who showed him all the Kingdom of the world. “I will give you all this power and all this wealth if you worship me.” Jesus replied, “Worship the Lord your God and serve only him.”

The Buddha had twelve disciples whom he sent forth to spread his message. Jesus did the same. Both claimed their oneness with humanity. The Buddha said, “Whoever would wait upon me, let him wait upon the sick.” Jesus said, “Whenever you did this for the least important of these brothers of mine, you did it for me.”

Kadirgamar, elegantly and eloquently, drew an abundance of striking parallels between these two teachers. “If religion is the natural outcome of the human mind, it would be strange if we did not find coincidences. The hopes and fears of men, their desires and aspirations, are surely the same on the banks of the Ganges as on the shores of the Lake of Galilee,” he explained. “Do as one would be done by; kill not nor cause to kill,” said the Buddha. “Do for others what you want them to do for you,” said Jesus.

“If the teachings of the Buddha and of Jesus are accepted, all distinctions of caste and status are lost. Both of them bade their disciples to lay up for themselves a treasure, which neither moth nor rust would corrupt, nor thieves break through and steal.

In this lecture thirteen years ago, Kadirgamar — as an ordinary citizen — articulated a vision for our country and our world. He also expressed his fears alongside his hopes. He told his audience that “the attitude within Christianity toward the world religions has become somewhat positive; instead of the former contempt there is now esteem, instead of neglect there is understanding, instead of propaganda there is study and dialogue.

“Several centuries too late the attempt is being made to liberate Christianity from its European-American, Latin-Roman wrappings: now at last we have native clergy and bishops, more appropriate pastoral methods, the vernacular in worship, African masses, services with prayers of the Islamic Sufis, Indian dance forms. From Rome and Paris to Bangalore, Calcutta, Colombo, Tokyo and Canberra individuals and whole working groups are striving to discover and evaluate the true inspiration, the great concerns, the wealth of Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Confucianism and Taoism, and make them meaningful for Christian action and theology.”

If the great religions continue to waste their energies in a fratricidal war instead of looking upon themselves as friendly partners in the supreme task of nourishing the spiritual life of mankind the swift advance of secular humanism and moral materialism is assured, Kadirgamar said at the end of his address.
Thirteen years later, as an extraordinary statesman, Lakshman Kadirgamar was engaged in turning his vision for the country into reality, but that was tragically, by a Tiger’s bullet, not to be.

A paragraph from the middle of his 1992 lecture bears poignant resonance with Kadirgamar’s departure in 2005. He told his Christian audience: “When a merchant who became his disciple proposed to return to his native town and preach to his people, the Buddha said, ‘The people of Sunaparanta are exceedingly violent; if they revile you, what would you do?’ ‘I will make no reply,’ said the disciple. ‘And if they strike you?’ ‘I will not strike in return.’ ‘And if they try to kill you?’ ‘Death,’ said the disciple, ‘is no evil in itself. Many even desire it, to escape from the vanities of this life, but I shall take no step either to hasten or delay the time of my departure.’ The Buddha was satisfied and the merchant departed.”

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