Pandita Ramabai Biography

Abridged by Colin Melbourne from 'My Inexhaustible Treasure'

© 03-08 Born-Again-Christian.info

Part 1

Jesus... said... Go home to thy friends, and tell them what great things the Lord has done for you... Holy Bible Mark 5:19 KJV

Come, and hear... what He has done for my soul. Psalm 66:16

England - Drawn to Christ

I began to think that there was a real difference between Hinduism and Christianity. I went to England early in 1883 in order to study and fit myself for my lifework. I asked what it was that made Christians care for, and reclaim 'fallen' women, who are not even worthy of compassion according to Hinduism.

The story of Christ meeting the Samaritan woman, and His wonderful discourse on the nature of true worship, spoke of the infinite love of Christ for sinners. He did not despise them but came to save them. I had never read or heard anything like this in the religious books of the Hindus; I realized, after reading the 4th Chapter of John's Gospel, that Christ was truly the divine Saviour He claimed to be, and no one but He could transform and uplift the downtrodden womanhood of India, and of every land.

Thus my heart was drawn to the religion of Christ. I was intellectually convinced of its truth and was baptized in the Church of England in the latter part of 1883. I was comparatively happy and felt a great joy in finding a new religion, which was better than any other religion I had known before. I knew full well that it would displease my friends and my countrymen very much, but I have never regretted having taken the step. I was hungry for something better than what the Hindu Shastras gave. I found it in the Christian's Bible and was satisfied.

After my baptism and Anglican confirmation, I studied the Christian religion more thoroughly with the help of various books written on its doctrines. I was much confused by finding so many different teachings of different sects: each one giving the authority of the Bible for holding a special doctrine, and for differing from other sects.

For five years after my baptism, I studied these different doctrines and made close observations during my stay in England and in America. Besides meeting people of the most prominent sects, the Anglican High Church, Low Church, Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Friends, Unitarian, Universalist, Roman Catholic, Jews, and others, I met with Spiritualists, Theosophists, Mormons, Christian Scientists, and followers of what they call the occult religion.

No one can have any idea of what my feelings were at finding such a Babel of religions in Christian countries, and at finding how very different the teaching of each sect was from that of the others. I recognized the Nastikas of India in the Theosophists, the Polygamous Hindu in the Mormons, the worshippers of ghosts and demons in the Spiritualists, and the Old Vedantists in the Christian Scientists. Their teachings were not new to me. I had known them in their old eastern nature as they are in India, and when I met them in America I thought they had only changed their Indian dress and put on Western garb.

As for the differences of the Christian sects, I could not account for them, except that I thought it must be in the human nature to have them. Although I was quite content with my newly found religion, so far as I understood it, still I was labouring under great intellectual difficulties, and my heart longed for something better that I had not found. I came to know after eight years from the time of my baptism that I had found the Christian religion, which was good enough for me; but I had not found Christ, Who is the Life, and "... the true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." 1 John 1:9.

Finding Christ

My mind at that time had been too dull to grasp the teaching of the Holy Scriptures. The open Bible had been before me, but I had given much of my time to the study of other books about the Bible, and had not studied the Bible itself, as I should have done. Hence my ignorance of many important doctrines taught in it. I gave up the study of other books about the Bible after my return home from America, and took to reading the Bible regularly. Following this course for about two years, I became very unhappy in my mind. I was dissatisfied with my spiritual condition. Then I began to consider where I stood, and what my actual need was. I took the Bible and read portions of it; meditating on the messages that God gave me. There were so many things I did not understand intellectually. One thing I knew by this time was that I needed Christ and not merely His religion.

There were some of the old ideas stamped on my brain; for instance, I thought that repentance of sin and the determination to give it up was what was necessary for forgiveness of sin: that the rite of baptism was the means of regeneration; that my sins were truly washed away when I was baptized in the name of Christ. These and such other false ideas, which are akin to the Hindu mode of religious thought, stuck to me.

I had failed to understand that we are "... in Christ Jesus, Who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification and redemption." I Co. 1:30. I had failed to see the need of placing my implicit faith in Christ and His atonement in order to become a child of God by being born again of the Holy Spirit, and justified by faith in the Son of God. My thoughts were not very clear on this and other points. I was desperate. I realized that I was not prepared to meet God, that sin had dominion over me, and I was not altogether led by the Spirit of God, and had not therefore received the Spirit of adoption, and had no witness of the Spirit that I was a child of God.

"For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, 'Abba, Father.' The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God." Romans 8:14-16.

From Religion to Salvation

What was to be done? My thoughts could not, and did not help me. I had at last come to an end of myself, and unconditionally surrendered myself to the Saviour, and asked Him to be merciful to me, and to become my righteousness and redemption, and to take away all my sin.

Only those who have been convicted of sin and have seen themselves as God sees them under similar circumstances can understand what one feels when a great and unbearable burden is rolled away from one's heart. I shall not attempt to describe how I felt at the time when I made an unconditional surrender and knew I was accepted to be a branch of the True Vine, a child of God by adoption in Christ Jesus my Saviour.

Although it is impossible for me to tell all that God has done for me, I must yet praise Him and thank Him for His loving kindness to me, the greatest of sinners. The Lord, first of all, showed me the sinfulness of sin, and the awful danger I was in of everlasting Hell fire, and the great love of God with which He "... so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son..." John 3:16. And He gave His Son to be the propitiation for my sin, for does not the inspired Apostle say, "... we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world." 1 John 2:1-2.

The Bible says that God does not wait for me to merit His love, but heaps it upon me without my deserving it. It says also that there is neither male nor female in Christ.

"... the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe; for there is no difference. For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in His blood, to declare His righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God; to declare, I say, at this time His righteousness, that He might be just, and the justifier of him who believes in Jesus." Romans 3:22-26.

I do not know if any one of my readers has ever had the experience of being shut up in a room where there was nothing but thick darkness and then groping in it to find something of which he or she was in dire need. I can think of no one but the blind man, whose story is given in the Gospel of John, chapter nine. He was born blind and remained so for forty years of his life, and then suddenly he found the Mighty One, Who could give him eyesight. Who could have described his joy at seeing the daylight? When there had not been a particle of hope of his ever seeing it? Even the inspired evangelist has not attempted to do it. I can give only a faint idea of what I felt when my mental eyes were opened, and when I, who was "sitting in darkness saw Great Light", and when I felt sure that to me, who but a few moments ago "sat in the region and shadow of death, Light had sprung up." I was like the man who was told, "... in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk... And he leaping up stood, and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking and leaping and praising God." Acts 3: 6,9.

I looked to the blessed Son of God Who was lifted up on the cross and there suffered death, even the death of the cross, in my stead, that I might be made free from the bondage of sin, and from the fear of death, and I received life. O the love, the unspeakable love of the Father for me, a lost sinner, Who gave His only Son to die for me! I had not merited this love, but that was the very reason why He showed it to me.

How very different the truth of God was from the false idea that I had entertained from my earliest childhood. That was that I must have merit to earn present or future happiness, the pleasure of Svarga, or face the utterly inconceivable loss of Moksha or liberation. This I could never hope for, since a woman, as a woman, has no hope of Moksha according to Hindu religion. The Brahman priests have tried to deceive the women, and the Shudras, and other low caste people into the belief that they have some hope. But when we study for ourselves the books of the religious law and enquire from the higher authorities we find that there is nothing, not anything whatever, for us.

They say that women and Shudras, and other low caste people, can gain Svarga by serving the husband and the Brahman. But the happiness of Svarga does not last long. The final blessed state to which the Brahman is entitled is not for women and low caste people. But here this blessed Book, the Christian Bible says, "For when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly. For scarcely for a righteous man will one die; yet perhaps for a good man some would even dare to die. But God commends His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us... For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son..." Romans 5:6-10.

"In this was manifested the love of God toward us, that God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins." I John 4:9, 10.

How good, how indescribably good! What Good News for me a woman, a woman born in India, among Brahmans who hold out no hope for me and the likes of me! The Bible declares that Christ did not reserve this great salvation for a particular caste or sex.

"But as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the children of God, even to them that believe on His name; who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." John 1:12, 13. "For the grace of God that brings salvation hath appeared to all men..." Titus 2:11. "... the kindness and love of God, our Saviour, toward man appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us..." Titus 3:4, 5

No caste, no sex, no work, and no man was to be depended upon to get salvation, this everlasting life, but God gave it freely to any one, and everyone, who believed on His Son Whom He sent to be the propitiation for our sins. And there was not a particle of doubt left as to whether this salvation was a present one or not. I did not to have to wait until after undergoing births and deaths for countless millions of times, when I should become a Brahman man, in order to get to know the Brahma. And then, was there any joy and happiness to be hoped for? No, there is nothing but to be united into Nothingness - Shunya, Brahma.

The Son of God says, "Truly, truly, I say unto you He that hears my word, and believes on Him that sent me has everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation but is passed from death to life." John 5:24.

"If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater; for this is the witness of God which He hath testified of His Son. He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God, has made Him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave of His Son. And this is the record, that GOD HAS GIVEN TO US ETERNAL LIFE, AND THIS LIFE IS IN HIS SON. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. These things have I written unto you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that ye may know that you have eternal life and that you may believe on the name of the Son of God." 1 John 5:9-13.

The Holy Spirit made it clear to me from the Word of God, that the salvation that God gives through Christ is present, and not something future.

I believed it, I received it, and I was filled with joy.

Part III: Mukti Mission and Revival

Pandita starts the Mukti Mission for abandoned women and children, run entirely on faith in Christ. It becomes the source of a genuine Acts 2 Holy Ghost revival, thousands of Hindus are saved from religious bondage.

Treacherous Religion The Traitor in Hindi

Are Catholics Christian? No they are NOT!

Tamil This Was Your Life English

Tract images © Chick Publns. Used by permission