SV: UNiversity and Church

[V.V. Raman]

Sacred Language

1. Many ancient peoples believed that their languages came from a divine
source. This is/was a perfectly reasonable assumption in a frameork which
regards the Divine as the source of everything, especially the blessings of
culture and civilization.

2. Hinduism, Judaism, and Islam are perhaps the only major religions which (at
least in classical times) did not encourage (sometimes prohibited) the
translation of their primary scriptures from their respective languages
[Sanskrit, Hebrew (language of Canaan, as the Bible says), Arabic] which were
regarded as sacred.

4. Christians, on the other hand, were only too eager to <spread the word> by
translating the New Testament.

5. In this context, ardent missionaries like William Carey unwittingly did
great service to the systematic publication of books in many languages in
India. By 1832 The Serampore Press near Calcutta had printed 212,000 volumes in
40 different languages and dialects.

6. I am not defending or attacking  missionaries, merely recalling some
historical facts.

V. V. Raman
March 16, 2001