Possibly the largest influence the British had on the Naga came in the form of Christian missionaries. From 1872 to 1954, the Naga Hills were extensively proselytized by the American Baptists.
In the history of global missions, the Baptists’ mission to the Naga ranks at the very top in regards to its statistical exhaustiveness. By 1954, when all foreign missionaries were expelled from the country by the Indian government, it was estimated that nearly half the 500,000 Nagas were Christians.
More recently, an Indian Census placed the percentage of Nagaland, one of the main three Indian states occupied by the Naga, at 90% Christian. With somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,500,000 to 2,000,000 Nagas residing in the broader area of Nagalim, the result is the densest population of Christians in India. (And the densest population of Baptists in the world.)
It is believed Rev. Miles Bronson was the first to visit the Naga in 1841, but he stayed for only a short while. Edwin W. Clark is thought to be the first missionary to serve his mission in the Naga Hills. He established the first Baptist church at Molungkimong in 1872.
Other missionaries soon followed. While the work sputtered at first, within fifty years the gospel of Jesus the Christ flourished. In 1896, William Pettigrew and his wife, Alice, became the first missionaries to work out of the area currently labeled as the Indian state of Manipur.
While one account claims the Pettigrews spent seven years without a single convert, another story records a great success. As the success story goes, Pettigrew encountered a tribal chief whose great grandfather had passed down stories of a dream about the coming of a white missionary. Due to the dream, the chief allowed the Pettigrew’s to live among them. Eventually the chief converted, bringing the whole Tangkhul tribe of the Naga with him.
During the twenty-first century, traditional animist beliefs have resurged throughout much of Nagalim along with the desire to preserve indigenous culture. At the same time, there has been a flourish of modern Christian revivals driven by indigenous missionaries and pastors. The first of these began in the 1970’s as a generation of Naga pastors rose up to fill the void left by the exit of foreign missionaries.
Many of these indigenous pastors became well known within their circuits as powerful healers and miracle workers and well as evangelists. This was the case with Cosmo’s father, Pastor Mayarbing. During the twenty-first century, unification efforts among the divided Naga tribes and regions (especially the Nagaland Nagas, the Manipur Nagas and the Burmese Nagas) have been spearheaded by local Christian communities.
As is common among oppressed peoples, the Naga have found nominal religious beliefs difficult to maintain. Instead they have turned wholeheartedly to the spiritual realm for strength. In the case of the Naga, the majority belief remains Christianity.
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Empty Hand Revolution
Non-FictionBorn into a tribal war with India, violence his earliest memory, Comso Zimik trained as a black belt and street fighter from the age of nine. His vow: never show weakness. Tortured and left for dead in the jungle at the age of seventeen, Cosmo birth...
