Catholic Church protest: Distortion of whose history?
By Janaka Perera
The media reported recently that Sri Lanka’s Roman Catholic clergy is reacting in spontaneous protest against the Education Department’s history text books. It is however not clear which sections and paragraphs in these books the clergy is referring to.
If the books criticize the Catholic religion itself and carry derogatory remarks about Jesus Christ, Virgin Mary and the Bible there is no question that the books should be withdrawn since such criticism would be offensive to Catholics and Christians. But if the Catholic Church is objecting to references on the use of religion by European Colonialists as a Trojan horse to consolidate their power in the conquered territories that is an entirely different issue. It cannot and should not be swept under the carpet in the name of ‘religious harmony’ however unpalatable it may be to some.
We know that although Christianity’s origin was in the Middle-East it came to India, Sri Lanka and the rest of Asia via Europe with all the political and cultural baggage of the invaders. Even those with a basic knowledge of the colonial era know that the white colonialists engaged directly and indirectly to promote Christianity and convert the natives not out of Christian love but to get the latter to serve the colonial agenda. For this purpose natives had to be culturally uprooted by alienating them from their ancestral religions. In doing so the colonialists created a generation of Sinhalas and Tamils who could not identify with Sri Lanka’s pre-colonial history. We see its effects to this day.
Perhaps the National Catholic Centre for Social Communication is concerned more about references to missionary activities during the Portuguese occupation of the Maritime Provinces, rather than during the British rule. In the 19th Century the most active proselytizers were Baptists, Wesleyans, Church Missionaries and American Missionaries. It was also in this period that some descendants of those who had first become Roman Catholics (under the Portuguese) and later Protestants (under the Dutch) finally embraced the Anglican Church for personal gain under the British.
Regarding the Portuguese let me quote British Colonial Secretary Emerson Tennant:
“They appeared in the Indian Seas in the threefold character of merchants, missionaries and pirates. Their ostensible motto was, ‘amity, commerce and religion: But their expeditions consisted of soldiers as well as adventurers, and included friars and a chaplain-major, and their instructions were ‘to begin by preaching, but that failing, to proceed to the decision of the sword’.” (The Betrayal Of Buddhism)
Now let us look at the other side of the coin on the issue of distorting history books. In 2008 concerned Sinhala Buddhists led by Dhamsara Foundation Chairman R.M. Navaratne sent a petition to President Mahinda Rajapaksa, the then Education Minister Susil Premajayantha and leading members of the Maha Sangha on distortions in history books relating to both the pre-colonial and colonial periods.
The petitioners recalled that the subject of history in the 1977 was converted into social studies and history as a subject was bastardized. However, in grades 6 to 11 in the subject of Social Studies, history was incorporated to a certain extent.
Thereafter under the new educational revision this set of books too was withdrawn. Under the Mahinda Chintana programme history was again incorporated as a separate subject in the curriculum. But in the 2006 – 2007 school texts, history was distorted causing students to lose interest in studying the subject.
The petitioners drew attention to the history text on the establishment of Aryan settlements in Sri Lanka. According to them the legend of Vijaya’s arrival is presented in a manner to create a mindset among children that he was a monster who slaughtered the island’s natives and destroyed an advanced civilization that was in this country at the time of his arrival.
These history texts leave great doubts on the origin of the Sinhalas by omitting the fact that King Pandukhabhaya (with consensus of Yakshas, other tribes and communities then in the island) unified the country under him. Referring to Elara and Dutugemunu the interpretation given is that the latter prepared to ‘invade’ Anuradhapura! We have heard of South Indian invasions but never an invasion of Anuradhapura by a Sinhala King.
The books give the impression that since Elara was a popular king the Sinhala people did not mind being ruled by a foreign king. Therefore Dutugemunu had to find an excuse to drive wage war against him and so raised the call to protect the Buddha Sasana!
It is necessary to investigate who advised the writer or writers to present such a distorted history that gives an 11-year-old child a wrong impression on one of Sri Lanka’s most eminent kings.
In the Grade 10 text of eleven items only four lessons deal with Sri Lankan history. The rest are devoted to Indian history, South-east Asia’s history of religions and European history. Formerly, students could select either Indian history or European history for the GCE (A Level) examinations. In the teachers’ guide book items numbering eleven, 10 items are devoted to history of foreign lands. How could a child bear in mind such an ocean of history? The ultimate outcome is students fail the examination and get sick of the subject.
In the English text on history for grade 11 the front cover carries a picture of a tea plantation. One cannot even imagine whether this is a book on history.
The texts omit any references to the negative impact of British importation of indentured labour from South India to work on plantations although in earlier times in GCE (both O-level and A-level) classes the influence of the importation of South Indian indentured labour and the resultant effects were dealt with as a separate subject.
As far as we are aware no action has been taken to rectify these distortions. We only hope that the Education Authorities in dealing with these problems will not suppress historical facts in the name of building ethnic and religious amity.
No sensible nation has committed such blunders.
- Asian Tribune -
Comments
Respect Minority Concerns Sri
Respect Minority Concerns
Sri Lanka suffered for thirty years by disregarding the concerns of the Tamil minority.
The Education Department must pay attention to the concerns of religious and ethnic minorities and help to build a united Sri Lanka. This is also a duty of the media.
It is a good thing that
It is a good thing that Janaka Perera has pointed out the omission & remissions in the history books presented to the students of Lanka. I have long wondered what the content of our history books were. It is time to expose the truth of it all, and we thank Janaka for doing so.
All countries in this world have a right to record their history accurately, without distortion. Look at the bloody history of Britain. The fact that Queen Elizabeth 1 had to remove Queen Mary of the Scots from the Scottish throne is never hidden - in fact, it is recorded as accurately as possible in their history books and now on film as well ! Scots do not protest this, calling themselves a Minority within Britain. It is time Lankans, including people who call themselves Minorities, took a good hard look at reality & truth, and present the facts as they were in our history books. Facts can be presented in a dispassionate and fair manner, and thus presented will and should not offend anyone.
This refers to DeMel's
This refers to DeMel's comments which has been made without knowing the crux of the matter. What the hell is he talking? About minority disregard. This is not a minority disregard or degradation. It is a mistake as has been pointed out by some Catholic clergies that some facts entered in the history text books are quite sensitive enough to create a wrong impression among the students who are Catholic. Therefore, those clergies have requested to amend the facts which the department has already agreed to do so. Apart from that, there is no any racial issue embedded in it. Mr De Mel has just written something that has come to his memory with no cognition. Further, the writer (Janaka Perera) of the above article is also unaware that the educational publications department has already taken measures to rectify the facts. Everybody refers to a source and extract facts mentioned there. No official attached to the publication department wants to distort anything because they are not the writers. Those books were written by a panel of writers represented for all religions, races and ethnic groups.
Catholic Church is trying to
Catholic Church is trying to cover up the trye history of Sri Lanka, and inherited rights of the Sinhala Buddhists, instead they want to establish that the Catholism was also a religion that prevailed in parallel, therby targeting to achieve what the Portuguese could not do in 1505 ce.
By deleting specific references in the History book in the pretext of Ethinic Harmony, they want student to take Catholism also as a religion that prevailed from the far history, and in another 50 years Sri Lanka will be a Catholic land like what they did in South Korea.
This is also much important for the West to train the mentality of the people to obey Western Style Economic, Social and establish Western Capitalism in the target country.
Catholism as it evolved with the needs of the Roman empire, and later became the guradian of the Western imperialism by injecting that the world was created by a omnipotent, mythical God, wants all the people on the earth to accept and obey it and then become slaves of Western Liberal Capitalism as blind faith followers. Budhism different from all other religions, but as a Doctrine and Philosophy does not facilitate to establish greedy, competitive, hagenonic, sin society contrary to the Mono theistic religions.
As long as Budhism and Sinhala true History prevails, the world capitalists and imperialism cannot enshrine in Sri Lanka, which is why the Catholic Church wants to eliminate the True Sinhala History from the education carricula of Sri Lanka. If this is allowed by Athorities, the future generations will better commit suicide when they are to be humiliated by Western powers and Church, and next time the same Church will ask the Authorities to eliminate Buddhism as a subject becuase it contradicts the Creationism of the God!
Sinhala Buddhists, Please come and wake up now or repent later.
Mr. President and Education Minister !
Don't fall victims of the shrwed church. If you do that your days will be outnumbered.
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