These were the days when the portuguese had landed on the sacred shores of the Konkan Kashi or Goa. They were keen to caputire the land for the King of Portugal and capture the souls for their God. Many so called saints and priests came from portuguese shores to convert the Hindus to the new faith of Christianity. To convert Hindus they had to first understand their language and their mythology and literature. It was in their interest to do so.
The Portuguese Jesuits set about writing down the literature of the Konkani Hindus. This book is a modern transliteration by Dr P Naik of the Thomas Stevens Konkani Kendra in Goa. Krishnadas Shama was a konkani saraswat brahmin from Kushasthali, saxti(Salcette), Goa who was well versed with Konkani Hindu folklore. He was proficient in Konkani, Marathi and Sanskrit and perhaps even Kannada. He gave an oration of the Mahabharat Adi Parv in Chaste Saraswat Konkani and this was written down by the Jesuits in Roman script. This happened just before the Hindu Holocaust in Goa in the middle of the 16th century.
The transliterated konkani mahabharat was filed away in the libraries in portugal when some Goans discovered them. Dr Naik, himself a jesuit priest transliterated this in the common devnagri script used by many Konkanis today and the TSKK published the same.
The preface thanks the jesuit priests who saved this piece of literature! Shouldnt they be blamed for the almost complete annhilation of the Hindu Konkani culture, temples, literature from Goa??? Wouldn't this be a living tradition if it were not for the portuguese and Jesuits iconoclasts who destroyed all the Goan temples in the province of Saxti (salcette).
There also a mention of Konkani being only an oral language before the Jesuits began to write it in the roman script . Unfortunately the then konkani literature, temples and culture was almost completely annhilated in the 1540s to 1560s to make sure that the Hindu religion never recovers and all the people were forcibly converted to catholicism.
However the mentioned book is a beautiful read for all the lovers of Konkani and makes one comprehend and lament the insurrmountable loss , the Konkani literature, culture and religion has has to suffer under the portuguese and jesuits.
Hindus and Catholics live peacefully in Goa today with a great deal of understanding. We have learnt our lessons from the past (At least we hope so).
Hindus form a majority in Goa today. Hindu temples are booming. Beautiful churches have also been built (some unfortunately on the graves of previous temples). These portuguese religious fanatics who wanted Goa to be cleansed of the Hindu faith are unfortunately not here to see that the Hindus have built a temple in Lisbon.
Do read the book.
Solavya Shekdantle Konknni Mhabharat Adi Parv
Published by the TSKK
Goa- 1990
By a kind donation of Rs 20,000 by the Kuwait Konkani Kendra.
3 comments:
It is a popular myth that a lot of Konkani religious texts were burnt and destroyed by the Portuguese. It has no basis in history. Fact
is that at the time of the Portuguese (and even now) Marathi served as the liturgical language for Konkanis. This is a fact that most
Konkani patriots do not accept because it gives them an inferiority complex. But diglossia is not uncommon.
Just think about it. It is impossible that the Portuguese could have burnt all the religious books in Goa. Surely some of them would
have survived. At least one copy of one book! Why not even one? Simple? because there weren't any . At least one person may have
been able to sneak a book out of Goa. Given that there were settlements of Konkanis outside Goa, even prior to Portuguese
occupation, wouldn't they have had some copies of Konkani books which would have survived , free of the the threat of Portuguese
missionary zeal.
Take the example of the Christa Purana, written by English Jesuit Thomas Stephens. The Christa Purana formed the basis for modern Konkani Catholic prayers. Today only two copies survive. One copy in Portugal the other in India. The copy that exists in India came from a family in Canara. Considering that all Canara Christians were held captive by Tipu Sultan for 15 years, their houses taken and gifted to Muslims, and all churches destroyed. They were not allowed to practice their religion and any one found doing so was punished with death. Yet this book survived to this day.
Logically at least one Konkani Hindu book should have survived till this day. If it did not , it was because there were none. If the Portuguese destroyed any religious books they were probably in Marathi and Sanskrit not Konkani.
Dear DD,
The Christa Puraan you speak about is also in Marathi.
Most myths come from a historical root.
That the portuguese were ruthless and destoryed as much of the Hindu culture and heritage as they could in Goa cannot be denied.
There is absolutely no shame in the use of Marathi by Konkani people. It was Shahu Maharaj ,, a marathi King who sponsered the rebuilding of the Shantadurga and the Mangeshi temple. They kept the portuguese ambitions at bay.
The rich heritage of Hindu literature in Marathi and Kannada were an absolute lifeline to konkani hindus who were torn from their roots by the horrible 16 th century portuguese christians.
Many christians also freely use the latin mass and even an english mass, both languages being very foreign, whereas marathi is Indian.
Dev boro dees deum Xennai Saib,
I never said that the use of Marathi for religious purposes was shameful or bad. Let anyone use any language he or she pleases for whatever purpose; that is not my concern. Nor did I deny the fanaticism of the Portuguese. All I wanted to point was that there were no Konkani books for the Portuguese to burn!
However I find your comment about Christians using English and Latin both "alien languages" very pointed. Should the use worthiness of a language for religious purposes be based on where they originated; or rather on how understandable they are to the people using them. How much different is the use of Latin among Christians different from the use of Sanskrit by Hindus or Arabic by Muslims? All three languages make no sense to the vast majority of the people. However English is a different issue. In most cities like Mumbai(where I live) the Christian congregations are made up of people from diverse lingusitic backgrounds: Marathis, Konkanis, Malayalis, Tamils, Hindis, North Easterners, tribals from different parts of India. It is not practical to have relegious services in every single language. The only common factor amomg they is that they are educated in English.
So is English really a foreign language, Mr Xennai? If your reply is Yes then then my very next question would be "Why do you blog in an alien language?"
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