SEBASTIAN KAPPEN (1924-1993)

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Story of a Pioneer of Indian Theology of Liberation

The Person

In our interactions with Kutti Revathi during the Theological Sypomsium, one of the questions subtly surveyed her scholarly foundations. Revathi wittingly responded, I quote from my memory “we are not academicians but activists thinking in the field.” Far from escaping scholarly research, she affirmed that she was not an armchair thinker or academician but an activist-thinker. Somewhat similar to this type is Sebastian Kappan (1924-1993), a Jesuit Indian Priest activist-theologian from Kerala. From what I gather from his close associates, I picture Kappen to be an independent, critical, unsparing, marxist, Christian, social-activist theologian. Quite approvingly, Felix Wilfred phrases him as ‘very much admired at the same time a controverted theologian’. All through his life, Kappen remained engaged in different streams of liberation in our country and with several groups of social activists. Therefore, with his style/method and thought, he became a milestone in the evolution of the Indian Christian theology of liberation. He was a bilingual theologian literarily active in both Malayalam and Tamil. Some of his famous works are Jesus and Freedom (Orbis, NY, 1977), Jesus and Cultural Revolution: An Asian Perspective (Bombay, 1983). Generally, scholars/theologians esteem Kappen for his efforts to translate Christianity relevant to the world of poor and marginalized through writings and social action.

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Thought: Theology of Liberation

In contrast to those who cone human liberation as a secular struggle carefully undoing it from theology, Kappen, founded on the Asian wisdom and Sraminik traditions (Jainism, Buddhism etc.), put liberation as the ultimate concern of theology. Liberation here signifies the total (secular/material and sacred/spiritual) wellbeing of the human person. Hence he envisaged theology as a collaborative project between different traditions (religions and Ideologies) including secular traditions everyone for that matter who worked for the emancipation of the marginalized. He defined it as a critical reflection on the ‘historical self-manifestation of the Divine as gift-call and on the human response to it’.[1] Wilfred mentions that Kappen made a conscious choice of the term divine than god to stay away from prejudices and to incorporate secular atheistic traditions in the project of emancipation – theology.

Kappen held that divine manifested in and through history. In other words, we continually encounter divine in the events that go on in and around us day after day. He proposed two modes of encounter with the mystery: one as a gift and another as a call. It becomes a gift in moments of joy, love, friendship, well being, peace and similar events that enhance the integral growth of individual, society and environment. On the other hand in the face of injustices, distinction, exploitation and abuses we experience the mystery as extending a mandatory invitation, a call, to become agents of transformation. He named this continuous dynamics of divine revelation and human response in the heart of history as theandric praxis. This way everyone’s life would be a fiat, instruments for the establishment of the kingdom of God.

Theology, for Kappen, is the discipline that facilitates these encounters and critically reflects to strip off the prejudices that hinder an authentic divine encounter, a true discernment of the divine will in the daily living. We revise the definition, “Theology is a critical reflection on the ‘historical self-manifestation of the Divine as gift-call and on the human response to it’.” He called this as the foundational theology of liberation. Thus, he evolved an Indian version of the liberation theology. It was comparatively broader that the Latin American sensitive to the religio-cultural dimension and the pluralistic context of India.

Kappen envisioned Christian theology of liberation within the broader framework of the foundational theology and our commitment as one among the others who have undertaken this project. In the Indian context, he noted that such humility was inevitable as we were a minority in the country. With his invitations for collaborations, Kappen stood out as offering a realistic solution to the problem of liberation in India.  He described Christian theology of liberation as theandric process founded on Jesus and his Gospel; but that was one side of the story. According to him, it implied a radical shift from a religion centered on the scripture and tradition of a distant past looking forward to the future reward to one that made the presence of the mystery/divine, tangible in the joys and struggles of the people.

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Christianity in India

Kappen contended the irrelevance of Christianity as a religion similar to Hinduism with all its code, creed, cult and community. I quote,

Further the type of religiosity it (Christianity) represents dovetails, in the main, with that of popular Hinduism. Both religions hold fast the distinction between the pure and impure, cult, priesthood, the veneration of image and pietistic devotions. The figure of Christ who had already taken on features of a hellenistic God, became further assimilated to the gods of Hinduism. He has lost much of his uniqueness and has consequently little now to give to India. [2]

He held that India never needed another god in Jesus Christ, which it possessed in great numbers, instead Jesus the prophet of Nazareth and his teachings. Quite different from the debates of other Indian Christian theologians, he likened Christianity to form part of the ethical religious traditions beginning from Mahavira, Buddha, and Medieval Bhaktas to the contemporary secular humanitarian traditions. He writes, “What I claim therefore is not the superiority of Christianity over the Indian religious traditions, but the superiority of the humanizing religiosity of the Buddha, the radical Bhaktas and Jesus over the magico-ritualistic religiosity of orthodox Hinduism and the depropheticised religiosity of tradition-based Christianity”.[3]

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Marxism

Kappen acknowledged the contribution of Marxism in the development of his interests for the poor and the marginalized and his critical thinking. However, he extended the Marxian social analysis to the religio-cultural dimensions of human being to effect a total liberation of the human person who is more than mere economic being.

Conclusion

In the history of Indian Christian theology Kappen is irresistible as he takes Christianity to the adulthood of its presence in India. He evoked the urgency to initiate and join efforts to work for the well being of the poor and marginalized and to break every structure of injustice in the society. While he apparently sounds irrational in his rejection of Christianity as a religion and Jesus as God, in the context of the full picture of his theology of liberation and the history of religious traditions of India, it is courageous work to explore the possibilities of Christianity’s collaboration with non-theistic religious traditions of India which rose as a revolt to the mainstream Brahminic ritualistic religious traditions. It is in this bargain his choice for the historical Jesus than the mystical Christ would make sense. In his we find a good blending of Marxism, Christianity and Indian religious traditions. Unlike other theologians/activists who belonged to either of these traditions, Wilfred notes that Kappen’s life manifested that he belonged to the marginalized and the downtrodden Indian masses. His life was music of liberation that soothed the ears of the poor, while discomforting the complacent people.

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[1] S. Kappen, Liberation Theology and Marxism (Puntamba: Asha Kendra, 1986) 42 as cited in Felix Wilfred, Beyond Settled Foundations (Chennai: University of Madras, 1993) 140.

[2] S. Kappen, Jesus and Cultural Revolution: An Asian Perspective (Mumbai: Build, 1983) 53 as cited in Wilfred, 143.

[3] Kappen, Jesus and Cultural Revolution: An Asian Perspective, 70-71 as cited in Wilfred, 144.