Early Christian Sīrah Writings of Subcontinent: A Comparative Study of their Methods, Impact and Cogitating on New Contemporizing Methodology

Abstract

This article is an attempt to study the methods adopted in the Christian missionary biographies of Prophet Muhammad (SAW) in subcontinent from early nineteenth century to the first half of the twentieth century. These missionaries came into this region with their strong missionary convictions and they set up a new literary apologetic trend in the religious history of subcontinent in order to prove the superiority of Christianity overIslam and to trivialize its norms, values, religious figures and traditions. Though this trend was not novel in the history of Christian-Muslim relation however, a distinguished feature of it, in India, was that it took the shape of direct confrontation and animosity e.g. the great debate between Pfander and Rahmatu-Allah-Kīrānvī held in 1854. This early confrontational contact between Islam and Christianity played a pivotal role in the development of an academic environment and had an impact on the Christian-Muslim relations in the subcontinent in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. This study is an attempt to explore this early intellectual confrontational landscape and its impact upon each other’s communities. Furthermore, it also attempts to investigate how modern Christians and Muslims can develop new ways for mutual understanding in the light of contemporary intellectual traditions. Last but not the least, after highlighting major shortcomings in their methods, this study cogitates on new contextual approach for the study of Christianity and Islam.