Yes, I did, and thank you for pulling me up on it. Honestly, I don’t know enough about the history of the Philipines to say why it bucks the trend of south and east Asian countries mostly not adopting the religion of their colonisers.
Probably worth noting that Islam spread pretty effectively in this region with very little political conquest/colonisation by Islamic powers. People in what is now Indonesia were exposed to Islam through trade and other links, evidently liked what they say, and adopted the religion in signficant numbers, leading in time to indigenous Islamic polities, which were then conquered and colonised by the Dutch, but without much consequent penetration of Christianity.
I don’t know a whole lot, either, but it might be because it’s one of the few Asian areas which was colonized by Spain (which was Catholic), in contrast to those which were colonized by the Dutch, British, etc.
SFAIK the Qu’ran does not mandate veiling; just modesty in dress. Different Islamic socieities interpret, and always have interpreted, this diffferently.
Was the reason Spain and Portugal were so aggressive about proselytising because a more militant, intolerant form of christianity was pushed there after conquering the area from muslims?
The same time around 1833 that the Scramble for Africa went into full swing, the British Empire outlawed slavery. . Their navy switched over to combatting the slave trade (despite their dear departed Lord Nelson having been a supporter of West Indian slavery). British missionary societies were founded to bring Christianity into Africa. Of course the missionaries were sincere, but it all served the fiction that the British Empire was a civilizing, Christianizing enterprise.
Possibly Jesuit influence. They found occasional success by accepting some local practices as non-religious tradition. This ran counter to church doctrine though and they were frequently at odds with the Portuguese influence.
Well, there was French colonisation in south-east Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos). There was some embrace of Catholicism in Vietnam, but only up to about 10% of the population, I think, and virtually none in Cambodia or Laos.
Of couse, different times — the Spanish got to the Philipines in the sixteenth century; the French didn’t colonise Vietnam, etc, until well into the nineteenth. But that’s not a total explanation, since the French (and indeed, British, etc) colonisation of Africa in the 19th century was associated with a considerable embrace of Christianity.
In line with that, there is conflict between Muslims and Catholics there. Interesting how often there’s conflicts between Islam and Hindus. But an important point that seems to be forgotten is that Islam coexisted peacefully with Judism and/or Christianity for centuries, until 1947. it was Ottoman Turks that was intolerant.of of Judism
That is definitely not true. There were plenty of progoms and massacres in the Arab world long before 1947.
At times life in the Arab world was better for Jews than life in the Christian world. Again - at times. At other times, it was the other way around.
What is that even supposed to mean? “Muslims had no problems with Jews, the Ottomans did” - but the Ottomans were Muslim as well?
Also, much of the time it was Ottomans trying to control the Arab population they’d conquered, and that conquered population was the one doing the pogroming, while the Ottomans (ineffectively, with very low priority) made half hearted efforts to stop it.
In general, the Catholic Church (until after the Protestant Wars) tended to follow a very maximalist policy. During the time of the early church, they’d murder other groups of Christians who believed that Jesus was a dual partner with God rather than a Trinity. During their expansion period, they generally pushed for conquered nations to be converted.
The Catholic British converted the Irish and Scots; the Catholic Scandinavians converted the non-Christian vikings; it doesn’t seem to be limited to the Spanish/Portuguese.
That said, through history, you often see kings and emperors who are alternately strict and alternately forgiving. Cyrus the Great allowed the people that he took into his empire to maintain their traditional religions and languages. Other emperors would push their language and gods on conquered people and those people traditional cultures disappear from history, pretty quickly.
There’s some chance that leadership of the moment was more religious in Spain during that time. We can’t entirely rule it out.
But I’d probably, personally, say that it’s just the way the Catholics generally were.
It’s worth mentioning that South Korea is exceptionally Christian, but as I understand it this is a relatively recent post-colonial phenomenon.
India has had a Christian minority since the first century, so although it got a boost from colonial powers, it was established long before it was tied to any political or economic power. There were Christian minorities elsewhere in Asia through the medieval period but they largely didn’t last.
This is accurate but perhaps worth stressing that at this time “British” means “not English,” since in modern times “British” generally includes “English,” and the proto-English weren’t Christian at this period.
Intolerant religions like Christianity and Islam defeat tolerant religions like paganism every time. Except for Hinduism, which is a puzzle. (My cite for Christianity being an intolerant religion is Bertrand Russell, who was a philosopher not a scholar of religion.) When Islam meets Christianity it’s a battle or a draw.
Why didn’t Islam defeat Hinduism? For Christianity, the answer is more straightforward - Hinduism had absorbed and repulsed attacks by Buddhism and Islam, so they had some experience that other pagan religions lacked.
Der_Trihs surely captures part of the truth. The British colonized India after the concept of religious tolerance was introduced into Christendom following some 200 years of intra-Christian religious war. So the urge to curb-stomp other religions was reduced. I’m still ignorant about why India isn’t wholly Sikh and Islamic now though.
Most of the conversions seemed to follow the same pattern and was top-down.
Ruler converts to Christianity for whatever reason.
They have absolute control so they mandate all of their subjects are not Christian
It does not spread outside their borders.
A great example of this is King Azana of Axum and why Christianity is so strong in Ethiopia
Hinduism is an agglomeration of regional religions that worship a pantheon of gods. It can absorb other religions since they just characterize newly encountered beliefs as another incarnation of Vishnu. That formula sits uneasily with self-avowed monotheistic faiths. I speculate that Christianity gets a pass partly due to its modern separation of church and state dogma.
Islam? Yes, there’s definitely a boatload of sectarian strife between Hinduism and Islam. I’m ignorant of the details of its history before the partition.