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{{Short description|Indian educator, a lay evangelist, and a prominent writer}}

[[File:Ram Chandra Bose - Harper's Weekly - 1884.jpg|thumb|]]

'''Ram Chandra Bose''' (sometimes spelled '''Ram Chunder Basu''' or '''Ramachandra Vasu'''; May 16, 1836 – May 30, 1892) was an educator, a lay evangelist, and a prominent writer in the region of North India known as the [[North-Western Provinces]] and Oudh in the late 19th century. He converted to Christianity while a student in [[Kolkata|Calcutta]]. Upon completing his education, he was employed by several Christian mission agencies as well as the government to teach in their schools. In the 1870s and 1880s, he was associated with the [[American Methodist Episcopal Mission]] and travelled across India as a [[Methodist local preacher|lay evangelist]]. Many of his lectures were published as journal articles or compiled into books creating a prolific literary legacy. Bose wrote over 100 journal articles on religious, philosophical, and social issues for journals such as ''The Bengal Magazine'' edited by [[Lal Behari Day]] as well as the ''[[Calcutta Review]]'', the ''Indian Evangelical Review'', and others. Shortly before he died in 1892, he left the American Methodist Mission to join the [[Anglicanism|Anglican]] [[Church Missionary Society in India|Church Missionary Society]].<ref>B. C. Ghosh, "Ram Chandra Bose: In Memoriam," ''The Indian Church Quarterly Review'' 5, no. 3 (Jul. 1892): 441.</ref>

== Early life and education ==
Ram Chandra Bose was born into what he described "one of those castes called in India the literary castes," but without providing specific detail.<ref>Bose ''Hinduism and the Hindu People'' 1883, p. 40.</ref> Bose stated that it was for this reason that his parents were anxious to educate him even if it meant sending him to a Christian school. While he was the [[Free Church of Scotland (1843-1900)|Free Church]] Institution started by [[Alexander Duff (missionary)|Alexander Duff]], he was "initiated into the mysteries of the English language" as well as Western approaches to science, geography, history, and philosophy.<ref>Ibid., p. 42-43.</ref> Through his study of the Bible and other Christian books, he and his cousin Bhuban Mohan Bose, embraced Christian belief and were baptized by William Sinclair Mackay (1807–1865) of the [[Free Church of Scotland (1843–1900)|Free Church of Scotland]] on 16 July 1851.<ref>Ibid., p. 44. See also the extract of a letter written by Mackay on 8 Aug. 1851, "Foreign Missions, Correspondence: Calcutta." ''Home and Foreign Record of the Free Church of Scotland'' 2 (Nov. 1851): 119-122.</ref> His cousin, Bhuban Mohan Bose, would later become the father of [[Chandramukhi Basu]], one of the first two female graduates of British India.

== Career ==

=== Teacher ===
After completing his education, Ram Chandra Bose was invited by the [[London Missionary Society]] to teach at the LMS Central School in [[Varanasi]] for about ten years starting in 1854.<ref>Bose, ''Truth of the Christian Religion'', p. iii</ref> Subsequently, he was employed by the [[British Raj|British government in India]] to be the headmaster of a school in [[Sitapur]] where he was lauded for his abilities by several officials including [[Robert Milman]], Bishop of Calcutta.<ref>Proceedings of the Government of India Home Department: Education, January – June, 1871, file no. HOME INDEX_NA_1871_JAN TO JUN_PROCEEDINGS, Archives of India, Delhi, p. 124-125.</ref> He left government employment around 1872 to teach in the Boys' Orphanage run by missionaries of the [[Methodist Episcopal Church]] in [[Shahjahanpur]].<ref>"India: Rohilcund District: The Boys’ Orphanage." ''Fifty-Fifth Annual Report of the Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church for the Year 1873''(New York: Printed for the Society, 1874), p. 114.</ref> He also taught in the Methodist school in [[Moradabad]] and the Centennial School in [[Lucknow]] also run by the Methodists.

=== Evangelist and writer ===
In 1877, Bose was appointed by the Methodist Mission to work as an evangelist preaching to educated Indians.<ref>"North India: Oudh District," ''Fifty-Ninth Annual Report of the Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church for the Year 1877'' (New York: Printed for the Society, 1878), p. 124-125.</ref> He gave lectures on a variety of topics including [[Christian apologetics]] in cities across North India and eventually throughout much of India. He published many of these lectures first as journal articles and then compiled into books such as ''The Truth of the Christian Religion as Established by the Miracles of Christ'' (1881). Bose also lectured and wrote on Hinduism, providing philosophical and Christian analyses of the various expressions of [[Hinduism in India]], particularly of the reformist movement, the [[Brahmo Samaj]], and of one of its breakaway factions led by [[Keshub Chandra Sen]].<ref>C. Mackenzie Brown, "Three Historical Probes: The Western Roots of Avataric Evolutionism in Colonial India," ''Zygon'' 42, no. 2 (June 2007): 436.</ref> He was a regular contributor to the ''Bengal Magazine'', the ''Lucknow Witness'', and the ''Indian Evangelical Review'' on subjects related to the [[Christianity in India|Indian Christian community]] and to the work of foreign [[Christian mission|missionaries]] including an early analysis of the [[Revival meeting|revivalist]] preaching of [[William Taylor (bishop)|William Taylor]]<ref>Babu Ram Chandra Basu, "The Rev. William Taylor’s Work and Policy." ''The Indian Evangelical Review'' 3, no. 10 (Oct. 1875): 181-194.</ref> A criticism of foreign mission work which surfaced regularly in Bose's writings was the "race distinctions" made by missionaries between their communities and the Indian Christian communities.<ref>Anilkumar Belvadi, ''Missionary Calculus: Americans in the Making of Sunday Schools in Victorian India'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019), p. 148</ref> In one of his articles, he argued, "If there is one spot in this world, where race distinctions and race disabilities ought to be most thoroughly obliterated and extinguished, where races should meet on equal terms as castes meet within the sacred confines of the great temple of Jaggannath, that spot is the Mission field."<ref>Ram Chandra Bose, "Our Lieutenant-Governor’s Book," ''The Indian Evangelical Review'' 12, no. 47 (Jan. 1886): 343</ref> Having had a long career as a teacher, Bose also wrote regularly on aspects of [[education in India]].<ref>A Hindustani. "Education in India," ''The Bengal Magazine'' 4 (Oct. 1875): 131-141; "Compliments paid to Government Education," ''The Bengal Magazine'' 4 (Dec. 1875): 227-234; "The First Principle of Education," ''The Bengal Magazine'' 4 (Apr. 1876): 420-429; "Technical Education." ''The National Magazine'' 3, 1 (Jan. 1889): 14-24.</ref>
In his final years, Bose shifted the focus of his writings to the early history of the Christian Church, possibly as a result of his theological investigations into [[episcopal polity]] and his consequent move from [[Methodism]] to [[Anglicanism]].<ref>"Ram Chandra Bose," ''The Net Cast in Many Waters: Sketches from the Life of Missionaries,'' (Nov. 1892): 170-171.</ref> Beginning with an article on the second century Christian apologist [[Justin Martyr]] in which he advocated polemical writings and controversial discourse as a valid means of presenting an intellectual defense of Christianity, Bose wrote a series of a dozen or so articles on [[Early Christianity]] and key [[Church Fathers]].<ref>Ram Chandra Bose, "Justin, The Philosophic Missionary: Our Mission Policy," ''The Indian Evangelical Review'' 16 (Jul. 1889): 74-96.</ref> All his published writings were in the English language, not in his native Bengali or his adopted Urdu.

=== Conference delegate in America ===
Ram Chandra Bose was twice elected to be the official lay delegate to the [[General Conference (Methodism)|General Conference]] of the [[Methodist Episcopal Church]] in the United States.<ref>Guenther (2024), p. 97-101</ref> When he arrived for the Conference in Cincinnati in 1880 along with 9 other delegates from foreign countries, it was the first time foreign delegates had attended the General Conference in an official capacity.<ref>Wade Crawford Barclay, ''History of Methodist Missions'', Part 2, ''The Methodist Episcopal Church, 1845-1939'', vol. 3 ''Widening Horizons'' (New York: The Board of Missions of the Methodist Church, 1957), p. 169</ref> Bose attended once again in the next General Conference held in Philadelphia in 1884. One of the discussions in which he participated was on the question of appointing [[missionary bishop|missionary bishops]] for overseas regions such as India.<ref>J. H. Messmore, The Life of Edwin Wallace Parker, D.D., Missionary Bishop of Southern Asia: Forty-one Years a Missionary in India (New York: Eaton & Mains, 1903), p. 198-199.</ref> He received many opportunities to speak in churches, at conferences, and at university ceremonies during his visits to the States. He published his thoughtful and, at times, critical reflections on American society first in a series of articles in ''The Bengal Magazine'' which were then compiled into his book ''Gossip about America and Europe'' (1883). Because of the scholarship demonstrated in his lectures and writings, [[Simpson College]] awarded him a [[Master of Arts]] as an [[honorary degree]] in 1881.<ref>"Personals," ''Christian Advocate'' 56 (1881), p.376. Some later accounts state he received an M.A. from the University of Chicago, but there appears to be no contemporary corroboration of such an award.</ref>

== Political involvement ==
Ram Chandra Bose was one of the Indian Christians who actively participated in the [[History of the Indian National Congress|Indian National Congress]] in its early years. The "Proceedings" of the Fourth Indian National Congress meeting held in Allahabad in 1888 lists him as a delegate from Lucknow who had been elected "at the meeting of the Rafa-i-Am Association and at the meetings of the Bengal Christian Conference and Bengal Christian Alliance."<ref>[https://dspace.gipe.ac.in/xmlui/handle/10973/17942 Proceedings of the Fourth Indian National Congress held at Allahabad on December 1888]</ref> He had also been at the Congress meetings in Madras (1887) and Bombay (1889).<ref>"Missionary Gleanings." ''The Methodist Times'' (28 Feb. 1889): 197; Frederick Sessions, "Indian Gleanings: Letter No. VI." ''Gloucester Journal'' (25 Jan. 1890): 6.</ref> In an article published in the Calcutta journal, ''The National Magazine,'' Bose praised the Congress and its aspirations, particularly for its work in initiating a movement towards national unification and for its efforts to bring about reform through reasonable, moderate, and constitutional resolutions.<ref>R. C. Bose, "The National Congress." ''The National Magazine'' 2, no. 8 (Aug. 1888): 283-298.</ref> In what was perhaps his final published article, he returned to the theme of the unification of India, arguing that it was possible because of the inherent equality of all people.<ref>Ram Chunder Bose, "The Unification of India." ''The Indian Evangelical Review'' 18 (1892): 434-448.</ref> Bose also addressed other political issues of his day such as the [[Ilbert Bill]] and the blatant racism of those who opposed the implementation of the Bill in India.<ref>Ram Chandra Bose, "The New Caste in India," ''The Independent'' 36 (14 Aug. 1884): 1029-1030.</ref>

== Death and legacy ==
Ram Chandra Bose died on May 30, 1892 in the city of Lucknow. While he had been lecturing Calcutta a few months earlier, he had an attack of fever and was unable to complete the course of lectures. He returned to Lucknow to be with his relatives but was unable to regain his health.<ref>"Ram Chandra Bose, M.A.," ''The Harvest Field: A Missionary Magazine'' 4, 3rd series (Jul. 1892): 34.</ref> [[Isabella Thoburn]], who had been instrumental in his spiritual journey during the Lucknow revival in the early 1870s, was with him towards the end of his life. She noted that he had not been well for some years but found the final three months of confinement to his room frustrating because of his desire to continue his preaching.<ref>''Sketches of Indian Christians collected from Different Sources,'' (London: The Christian Literature Society for India, 1896), p. 94</ref>
Despite his passion for preaching, Bose's lasting legacy has been his writings. His two volumes on [[Hindu philosophy]] and his writings on the Brahmo Samaj and on Keshub Chandra Sen comprise an early analysis of diverse expressions of Hinduism from the perspective of an Indian Christian.<ref>Lee Irwin, "Reincarnation in America: A Brief Historical Overview," ''Religions'' 8, 10 (2017): 10.</ref> His apologetic writings provided the Christian communities in South Asia with a reasoned defense of their faith. His insightful critique of Christian missionary policies and practices were a continual challenge to the foreign missionaries who worked in India to not ignore the social implications of the Gospel they preached. But his influence was not limited to that country; his travels to America and Britain resulted him in being an important interpreter of India and its customs to those nations as well as an interpreter of America and Britain to India. His final writings on early Christian history consist of perhaps the first in-depth theological reflections on the history of the Church written by an Indian Protestant.

== References ==
===Citations===
{{Reflist|22em}}

===Bibliography===
*B. C. Ghosh, "Ram Chandra Bose: In Memoriam," ''The Indian Church Quarterly Review'' 5, no. 3 (Jul. 1892): 412-416.
*Alan M. Guenther, “Ram Chandra Bose and North Indian Pietism,” in ''[https://place.asburyseminary.edu/academicbooks/49/ Heirs of Pietism] in World Christianity: The 19th to the 21st Centuries: A Conference Held at United Theological Seminary, Dayton, Ohio, June 1-3, 2022'', eds. Wendy J. Deichmann and Scott T. Kisker, 83-106 (Wilmore, KY: First Fruits Press, 2024).
*"Ram Chandra Bose, M.A.," ''The Harvest Field: A Missionary Magazine'' 4, 3rd series (Jul. 1892): 33-34.
*"Ram Chandra Bose," ''The Net Cast in Many Waters: Sketches from the Life of Missionaries,'' (Nov. 1892): 169-172.
*[https://archive.org/details/sketches-of-indian-christians/page/90 ''Sketches of Indian Christians collected from Different Sources,'' (London: The Christian Literature Society for India, 1896), p. 91-95.]

==Further reading==
* [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.36729/page/n1/mode/2up''The Truth of the Christian Religion as Established by the Miracles of Christ''. London: Religious Tract Society, 1881.]
* [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.121235/page/n1/mode/2up''Gossip about America and Europe''. Lucknow: C. M. C. Press, 1883.]
* [https://archive.org/details/hinduismhindupeo00bose/page/n1/mode/2up''Hinduism and the Hindu People''. Indianola, IW: Advocate-Tribune Printing House, 1883.]
* [https://archive.org/details/brahmoismorhist00bosegoog/page/n6/mode/2up''Brahmoism; or History of Reformed Hinduism from its Origin in 1830, under Rajah Mohun Roy, to the Present Time, with a particular account of Babu Keshub Chunder Sen’s Connection with the Movement''. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1884.]
* [https://archive.org/details/hinduphilosophy01bosegoog/page/n5/mode/2up''Hindu Philosophy Popularly Explained: The Orthodox Systems''. New York: Funk & Wagnalls, 1884.]
* [https://archive.org/details/dli.ernet.236233/page/n1/mode/2up''Hindu Philosophy Popularly Explained: The Heterodox Systems''. Calcutta: Methodist Publishing House, 1887.]
* ''Nature and Revelation: Eight Lectures''. Lucknow: Methodist Publishing House, 1888.

== External links ==
* [https://www.academia.edu/114427586/Bibliography_of_Ram_Chandra_Bose Bibliography of Ram Chandra Bose]
* [https://guavagardens.blogspot.com/2015/11/ram-chandra-bose-1836-1892.html Memorial of Ram Chandra Bose in Nishatganj Cemetery, Lucknow]

[[Category:Indian Christian theologians]]
[[Category:Indian Methodists]]
[[Category:Indian Anglicans]]
[[Category:Converts to Protestantism from Hinduism]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian essayists]]
[[Category:19th-century Indian philosophers]]
[[Category:1836 births]]
[[Category:1892 deaths]]

Ram Chandra Bose - Revision history

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