The Faith of Ashish (32 page)

Discussion Questions

1. For most Westerners, India is a country shrouded in mystery. We think of elephants and tigers, beggars and snake charmers and spicy food, dancers in jangling ankle bells and holy men in saffron robes. When you started this book, what were some of the pictures you had of India? Have those pictures changed? In what way? What words would you use to describe the country?
   
2. When Western missionaries came to India, they brought medical treatments and the strange idea that education is appropriate for all, regardless of caste. They also brought the Bible and its message of a God who loves all people. What do the exchanges between Dr. Moore and Abigail Davidson tell us about the dif-ficulty of ministering in a culture one doesn't really understand? What did Abigail do to help her grasp the Indian culture? To what extent do you think she was successful? If you could give her a bit of advice, what would it be?
   
3. How does the abiding Indian belief in karma—that the sum total of a person's actions determines his fate—affect efforts to change one's life? Throughout the book, we see various characters comment about their lives being punishment for sins of the past (Virat, Latha, Ashish, Little One, Anup). How does this differ from the Christian belief in Original Sin?
   
4. Several characters and situations in this book are adapted from real people and actual circumstances. Virat's humiliating trek to the landowner in the first chapters is one of these. Another is the practice of killing baby girls, as Sethu the midwife was paid to do. Yet another is the maiming of children to make them into more pitiful beggars (Latha's blinded eye). What effect might an adherence to karma have on such things? What effect might a Christian belief system have? Would there be a difference? Why?
   
5. The story of Saint Thomas's work in India, while apocryphal, is widely accepted among Indians. The Varghese family takes pride in its deep Christian roots. Why would Dr. Moore downplay the validity of this? Why would that history bring the landlord, Mammen Samuel Varghese, such a level of pride? In what ways does Mammen Samuel compromise his beliefs? Why? Do we Western Christians compromise our own beliefs for the sake of fitting into and benefiting from our culture? In what ways?
   
6. Many people believe the caste system to be the most onerous element of Indian society. How does this strict system of social strata differ from the British class differentiations of the time? How does it differ from the haves and have-nots we see around the world? The caste system (
   varnas)
   is part and parcel of Hinduism, yet the practice deeply impacts Indian Christians and divides churches in that country. Why do you suppose this is so? (HINT: You will see more about this in book 2,
   The Hope of Shridula,
   and book 3,
   The Faith of Divena.)
   
7. Some would compare the plight of Indian Untouchables (called Dalits today) to that of African slaves in the American South in the 18th and 19th centuries. In what ways are such comparisons fair? In what ways do the two kinds of servitude differ? What lessons might Indians take from the place African Americans have achieved in today's society? What hope might they gain?
   
8. The majority of Christians in India come from the Untouchable (Dalit) strata of society. How might adhering to Christian teachings affect their way of life? (HINT: We'll see how they affected Mohandas Gandhi when he walks through the pages of book 2,
   The Hope of Shridula.)
   How might the growth of Christianity among the Outcastes affect the upper castes?
   
9. Many people ask how factual the situation is in which Virat finds himself. The answer: terribly factual. Today, millions of people are enslaved as bonded laborers, most of them in India. The majority belong to the Untouchable Dalit caste. Like Virat, their enslavement comes about because of a loan from a moneylender. Laborers work long hours in fields or factories or rock quarries, seven days a week. They must accept the moneylender's meager shelter and food, and the cost is added to their bills at inflated prices. No matter how hard they work, the debt is never paid off. Some families are enslaved for generations. With this so familiar a plight, why do you suppose people still borrow from moneylenders? What options might they have?
   
10. The title of this book is
    The Faith of Ashish,
    yet we never see the fruition of the child Ashish's faith. Is this a realistic conclusion? (HINT: He comes back in book 2,
    The Hope of Shridula.)
    Why do you think the book has "faith" in its name?
    

The Blessings in India saga continues with
The Hope of Shridula,
which will be published in Spring 2012. Here's a sample of the next book of this enthralling series.

1
May 1946

T
he last of the straggling laborers hefted massive bundles of grain onto their weary heads and started down the path toward the storage shed. Only twelve-year-old Shridula remained in the field. Frantically she raced up and down the rows, searching through the maze of harvested wheat stalks.

Each time a group of women left, the girl tried to go with them, her nervous fear rising. Each time Dinkar stopped her. The first time she had tried to slip in with the old women at the end of the line, the overseer ordered, "Shridula! Search for any water jars left in the fields." Of course, she found none. She knew she wouldn't. What water boy would be fool enough to leave a jar behind?

By the time the girl finished her search, twilight shrouded the empty field in dark shadows. Shridula hurried to grab up the last bundle of grain. Its stalk tie had been knocked undone and wheat spilled out across the ground. Quickly tucking the tie back together, Shridula struggled to balance the bundle up on her head. It shifted . . . and sagged . . . and sank down to her shoulders.

Shridula was not used to managing so unwieldy a head load. In truth, she wasn't used to working in the field at all. Her father made certain of that. This month was an exception, though, for it was the month of the first harvest. That meant everyone spent long days in the sweltering fields— including Shridula.

The girl, slight for her twelve years, possessed a haunting loveliness. Her black hair curled around her face in a most intriguing way that accented her piercing charcoal eyes. Stepping carefully, she picked her way out of the field and onto the path. Far up ahead, she could barely make out the form of the slowest woman. If she hurried, she still might be able to catch up with her. The thought of walking the path alone sent a shudder through the girl.

Shridula tried to hurry, but she could not. With each step, her awkward burden slipped further down toward her shoulders. She could hardly see through the stalks of grain that hung over her eyes.

"Please, allow me to lend you a hand."

Shridula caught her breath. How well she knew that voice! It was Master Landlord, Boban Joseph Varghese.

Afraid to lift her head, Shridula peeked out from under the mass of grain stalks. Master Landlord, fat and puffy-faced, stood on the other side of the thorn fence, ankle-deep in the stubbly remains of the wheat field. His old-man eyes fastened on her.

Shridula reached up with both hands and grabbed at the bundle on her head.

"Do not struggle with the load," Boban Joseph said, his voice as slippery-smooth as melted butter. "The women can retie it tomorrow. Let them carry it to the storehouse on their own worn-out old heads."

A shiver of dread ran through Shridula's thin body. She must be careful. Oh, she must be so very careful!

All day long, as fast as the women could carry bundles of grain from the fields, Ashish had gathered them up. He separated the bundles and propped the sheaves upright side-by-side in the storage shed. Everything must be done just right or the grain wouldn't dry properly. One after another after another after another, Ashish stacked the grain sheaves. By the time the last woman brought in the last bundle, by the time he stood the last of the sheaves upright, by the time he closed the shed door and squeezed the padlock shut, then kicked a rock against the door for good measure and headed back to his hut, the orange shards of sunset had already disappeared from the sky.

A welcoming glow from Zia's cooking fire beckoned to Ashish. He watched as his wife grabbed out a measure of spices and sprinkled them into the boiling rice pot. But this night something wasn't right. This night Zia worked alone.

"Where is Shridula?" Ashish asked his wife.

Zia bent low over the fire and gave the pot such a hard stir it almost tipped over.

"She has not yet returned from the fields," Zia said in a voice soft and even. But after so many years together, Ashish wasn't fooled.

The glow of firelight danced across Zia's features and cast the furrows of her brow into dark shadows. Ashish ran a gnarled hand over the deep crevices of his own aging face. He yanked up his
mundu—
his long, skirt-like garment—and pulled it high under his protruding ribs, untying the ends and retying them more tightly.

"She should not have to walk alone," he said. "I will go back." Ashish spoke with exaggerated nonchalance. He would remain calm for Zia's sake.

"All night!" Ashish said to his daughter when she came in at first light. He spoke in a low voice, but it hung heavy with rebuke. "Gone from your home the entire night!"

Overhead, Ashish's giant
neem
tree reached its branches out to offer welcome shelter from the early morning sun. Twenty-eight years earlier, on the day of his wedding, Ashish had planted that tree. Back then, it was no more than a struggling sprout. Yet even as he placed it in the ground, he had talked to Zia of the refreshing breezes that would one day rustle through its dark green leaves. He promised her showers of sweetly fragrant blossoms to carpet the barren packed dirt around their hut.

But no breeze pushed its way through this morning's sweltering stillness, and the relentless sun had long since scorched away the last of the white blossoms. Still, the tree was true to its promise. Its great leaves sheltered Ashish's distraught daughter from curious eyes.

Zia stared at the disheveled girl:
sari
torn, smudged face, wheat clinging to her untidy hair. Zia stared, but said nothing.

"Master Landlord told me I must go with him." Shridula trembled and her eyes filled with tears. "I said no, but he said I had to obey him because he owns me. Because he owns all of us, so we must all do whatever he says."

"Please, Daughter, stay away from Master Landlord," Ashish pleaded.

"I did,
Appa!"
Shridula struggled to fight back tears. "I dropped the bundle of grain off my head and ran away from him, just as you told me to. He tried to catch me, but I ran into the field and sneaked into the storage shed the way you showed me and hid there. All night, I hid in the wheat shocks."

"That new landlord!" Zia clucked her tongue and shook her head. "He is worse than the old one ever was!"

Zia reached over to brush the grain from her daughter's hair, but Shridula pushed her mother's hand away. Her dark eyes flashed with defiance. "Someday I will leave here!" she announced. "I will not stay a slave to the landlord!"

Boban Joseph was indeed worse than his father. Mammen Samuel Varghese had been an arrogant man, a heartless landowner with little mercy for the hapless Untouchables unfortunate enough to be caught up in his money-lending schemes.

Yet Mammen Samuel took great pride in his family's deep Christian roots—he could trace his ancestry all the way back to the first century and the Apostle Thomas. He also clung tightly to the fringes of Hinduism. The duality served him well. It promoted his status and power, yet it also fattened his purse. Even so, Mammen Samuel Varghese had not been a happy man. He seethed continually over the sea of wrongs committed against him, some real and others conjured up in his mind.

Still, it had always been Mammen Samuel's habit to think matters out thoroughly. In every situation, he first considered the circumstances in which he found himself, then measured each potential action and carefully weighed its consequence. It's what he had done when he lent Ashish's father the handful of rupees that led to his family's enslavement. Only after such consideration would Mammen Samuel make a decision. His son Boban Joseph did no such thing.

Do you have questions or comments? Would you like to learn more about author Kay Marshall Strom?

Visit her at her website www.kaystrom.com and on www.GraceInAfrica.com

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