Pandippedi Chenchiah was a Christian theologian from India in the early 20th century. He felt that most forms of Christianity were too western and not relevant to Indian culture. He advocated for an Indian Christianity centered on the direct experience of Christ. He believed Christians should reproduce the life of Jesus and transform themselves through the power of the Holy Spirit. Chenchiah also critiqued Indian Christians for not originating their own institutions and urged openness to Hindu culture to make Christianity more meaningful in India.

1. CHRISTIAN RESPONSES TO FREEDOM MOVEMENT AND NATIONAL BUILDING

2. Pandippedi Chenchiah was born on the 8th of December, 1886, at Nellore.
Chenchiah joined the Madras Christian College.
As a Christian he did not sever his ties with his ancestral faith i.e. Hinduism and
wanted to retain his Hindu cultural heritage, which he felt to be threatened by
the most organized forms of Christianity.
In later years Chenchiah was one of moving spirit in a series of Christian
ventures in Madras, and a leading figure in a group of somewhat unorthodox
but highly stimulating thinkers who came to be known as ‘the Rethinking
Group’ from the title of their best known publication Rethinking Christianity in
India.
Rethinking Christianity was concerned with redefining Christian faith in Indian
terms thereby relating faith to the cultural traditions of India.
He was in opposition to western forms of Christianity manifested in
institutionalized structures and doctrines.
He participated in the 1928 Jerusalem Meeting of the IMC and its Tambaram
Meeting in 1938.
P. Chenchiah (1886-1959)

3. His contributions are in the form of articles published under
the pseudonym Priyasishya. He served as the editor of the
Danish Mission Pilgrim.
He was instrumental in the formation of Rethinking Christianity in India after
the publication of Rethinking Christianity in India in 1938 as response to the
Church-centered Missiology of V. S. Azariah and Hendrik Kramer’s The Christian
Message in a Non-Christian World, a Barthian Theology.
In his article Rethinking Christianity he countered Kraemer’s understanding of
religion.
He had the interest in comparative religion where he considered it as systems
to know the commonalities and differences. This group was concerned about
the development of expression of biblical faith as against the dominant
Christian expression of faith imported for the West.
Re-thinking Christianity

4. For Chenchiah the central fact of Christianity is the direct
experience of Christ. He firmly affirms the historicity and
humanity of Christ. For him Christ is a historical person. He is
the true man - the ideal of what human should be.
“The fact of Christ is the birth of a new order in creation. Through Christ, we have the
emergence of a new life- not bound by Karma; of man, not tainted by sin, not humbled by
death; of man triumphant, glorious, partaking the immortal nature of God; of a new race in
creation-sons of God”
The humanity of Christ is permanent. Christ is not an avatara who comes for a
limited period of time. But he is here in the world as human, rather than as the
second person of Trinity. Chenchiah rejects the classical doctrine of incarnation.
Jesus is not God the absolute, but He is God standing in relation to human.
Jesus is Godman and not that hyphenated God-man. Hence he fully rejects the
Chalcedonian definitions the Christ is ‘fully God and fully man.’ Christ is a new
emergence or mutation.
Jesus is not God or man, he is not God-man, but he is God and man. That is the
new mutation. He is the product of God and man and not God-man. He is the
son of God, because the Spirit of God entered Him. He is son of man because
he was born of female. He is a new creation the Lord and Master of a new
creative branch of order. He transcends us as we transcend animals. Reason is
our differential but the Holy Spirit is Christ’s differential. Christ is the
Adipurusha of a new creation and he is the true man, satpurushauman
Christ the Adipurusha (The New Creation)

5. The good news of Christianity is the
birth of Jesus.
In him is the emergence of a new life,
not bound by karma, not corrupted by
sin, not humiliated by death but
triumphant, partaking the immoral
nature of God.
The saving work of Jesus is the newness
of life and this newness is reflected
through reproducing Jesus in life.
Christ the Adipurusha (The New Creation)

6. True evangelism consists in reproducing
Jesus.
Christ requires others to mirror Christ and this is the
mark of new creation
Reproducing Jesus

7. Chenchiah defines this Christian yoga as
‘the transformation of oneself into the
figure and image of Christ’.
Eternal life, the life of the kingdom, comes only when
our life is invaded by the mighty power of the Spirit,
and it is our task to make sure that we stand at the
right place, the place where the power of the Spirit will
reach us. For this transformation we do not have to
wait till the end, till the coming of the omegapoint, for
eschatology is realized and the kingdom can and does
begin now when any person is in Christ
The Yoga of the Spirit and Eschatology

8. Chenchiah then critiqued the current
situation in Indian Christianity.
Indian Christians have not shown any initiative in originating
and maintaining institutions.
.....Barrenness prevails in social and religious fields.
…..Spiritual power and Holy Spirit do not go with money
A significant point to note related to Chenchiah’s teaching
on Christianity is his critique of the Christian approach to
Hinduism
Chenchiah on Christianity

9. Chenchiah believes that the Christian faith
must be open to receive new insights from
Indian culture, and he urges his Christian
friends to ‘let channels of the great Indian
culture be opened for the inundation of
the Christian mind.
---- ‘to live Christ is to preach Christ’.
Christianity and Hinduism

10. His theological aim was ‘the new creation’ based on direct
experience of Christ.
Theological reflection is exploring experience to gain religious and
social implications.
Experience inaugurates the process of relational value which
provides criteria for shaping our life and actions therefore he
campaigned for Reproducing Jesus. To create a theology that is
relevant for India, Christians should explore the meaning of Jesus
Christ and the Spirit in the context of the political and social
struggles taking place in India: the secular mission of the church is
to participate in the task of nation-building with an attitude of self-
donating love.
He challenged Christianity to reject the institutional set up and
move towards Jesus and he moved in this direction with a call for a
new humanity to emerge in union with Christ through yoga.
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