India-Pakistan Mission Study Glossary: Q-Z
Definitions are from the India and Pakistan Mission Study Guide unless otherwise noted.
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Reincarnation - An endless cycle of existence and rebirths.
Sikhism - Founded in the fifteenth century by Guru Nanak, Sikhism believes in one God and rejects idol worship and caste. Guru Nanak started free community kitchens where his followers could eat together, regardless of their caste affiliations
In the Sikh concept of God, the sovereign God makes his will known to human beings, even though he does not appear in person. Through Karma, the law of the consequence of human actions, is at work, one can align oneself with God's will and with God's help can attain salvation.
Worshiping the True Name or God is the quest of the religion. The Golden Temple in Amritsar is the holiest shrine of Sikhism.
For more information see the Sikhism page on the Creating Interfaith Community mission study web site.
Clara Swain (1834-1910) - A medical doctor, Dr. Swain graduated from Woman's Medical College of Pennsylvania in 1869. She became one of the first single female missionaries to India from the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the U.S.
She arrived in India on January 7, 1870 and began medical work in Bareilly, India. In 1874, the Clara Swain Hospital opened, the first hospital for women in all of Asia.
Swedeshi (swe DAI shi) - A movement in India at the turn of the twentieth century to boycott British goods and resist British rule. People vowed not to buy British-produced cloth, salt, sugar, and manufactured goods. This Swedeshi movement, the struggle for "one's own country," went beyond industry to include other arenas such as art, culture, literature, and so forth.
In his later life, Gandhi took up spinning yarn on a spinning wheel, a major symbol of his statement against the exploitation of the colonial economy.
People in India began wearing clothes of cotton spun on native wheels and woven in native factories. Wearing Khadi (KAA di), homespun cotton, became a symbol of resistance.
Photo of Mahatma Gandhi spinning at a public meeting in Calcutta from The Official Mahatma Gandhi eArchive and Reference Library.
Isabella Thoburn (1840-1901) - An educator. One of the first single female missionaries to India from the Woman's Foreign Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church in the U.S., she arrived in India on January 7, 1870.
Thoburn championed higher education for women in Asia. She was born in 1840 to a Methodist farm family living in Saint Clairsville in eastern Ohio. She went to India in 1870 to begin a boarding school at the invitation of her brother James, a Methodist missionary. The school, at Lucknow in North India, began with six young girls and quickly gained a reputation for excellence. Undaunted by the then-prevalent bias against the formal education of women, Thoburn labored for 30 years to counter that bias and its effects.
In 1896, she founded the Lucknow Woman's College, the first Christian institution of higher education for women in Asia. Thoburn died of cholera in 1901 at the age of 61. In 1903, Lucknow Women's College was renamed Isabella Thoburn College. The school continues to be active today.
- Portions of the text are from India: A Country Profile from the General Board of Global Ministries, The United Methodist Church, by Franklin Fisher.
Tika - the mark worn by Hindu women on their forehead.
Sometimes the mark is in the shape of three horizontal lines (followers of Shiva), and vertical lines (followers of Vishnu). On a man, the mark is known as a "Tilak."
The tika mark in the shape of a dot is known as a "bindi" (from the Sanskrit word bindu, which means a "dot") and is traditionally worn to signify that a woman is married. In some areas, the symbolism of the bindi is no longer strictly followed and they have become a fashion worn by unmarried women and even young girls.
To learn more, see the article Bindis: Great Indian Forehead Decoration at About.com.
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Upanishads - Hindu mystical writings, dating from 1500-500 B.C.E.
Vedas (VE daas) - An extensive body of religious and philosophical texts in Sanskrit produced by the Aryans.