[JSNT 73 (1999) 3-5]

A BRIEF MEMORANDUM ON POSTCOLONIALISM AND

BIBLICAL STUDIES

R.S. Sugirtharajah

Selly Oak CollegesBirmingham, England

Soap and the Bible were the twin engines of Europe’s cultural conquest.Ranajit Guha1

Anti-colonial reading is not new. It has gone on whenever a native putquill pen to paper to contest the production of knowledge by the invad-ing power. Postcoloniality begins when subjects find themselves think-ing and acting in certain ways. What is distinctive about the currententerprise, however, is that it is not locked into the colonial paradigmwhere the colonialists set the ground rules, but, more importantly, itconcedes the complexity of contact between the invader and theinvaded. It goes beyond the binary notions of colonized and colonizerand lays weighty emphasis on critical exchanges and mutual trans-formation between the two.

Postcolonialism does not mean that the colonized are innocent, gen-erous and principled, whereas the former colonizers, and now the neo-colonizers, are all innately culpable, greedy and responsible for allsocial evils. Such a notion is not only an inverted form of colonialismbut it also absolves the Third World elite of their patriarchal and vassal-izing tendencies. What the current postcolonialism tries to do is toemphasize that this relationship between the ruler and the ruled iscomplex, full of cross-trading and mutual appropriation and confronta-tion.

1. ‘The Small Voice of History’, in Shahid Amin and Dipesh Chakrabarty(eds.), Subaltern Studies IX: Writings on South Asian History and Society (Delhi:Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 4.

4 Journal for the Study of the New Testament 73 (1999)

Unlike the other critical categories that are in vogue today, postcolo-nialism’s incarnation was in the form of imaginative literature in thewritings of Indians, Africans and Latin Americans. Theoretical fine-tuning followed later.2

What postcolonial theory does is to offer a space for the once-colo-nized. It is an interpretative act of the descendants of those once subju-gated. In effect it means a resurrection of the marginal, the indigene andthe subaltern. It means engaging with the mass of knowledge that isproduced on their behalf and that is in the domain of Euro-Americaninterpretation. It is an act of reclamation, redemption and reaffirmationagainst the past colonial and current neo-colonizing tendencies thatcontinue to exert influence even after territorial and political indepen-dence has been accomplished. It is a tactic and a practice. It meansfinding ways of operating under a set of arduous and difficult conditionsthat jeopardize and dehumanize people.

Applied to biblical studies,3 postcolonial criticism hopes to do thefollowing:

a. It will reconsider the biblical narratives as emanating from colonialcontacts. It will revalue the colonial ideology, stigmatization and nega-tive portrayals embedded in the content, plot and characterization. Itwill scour the biblical pages for how colonial intentions and assump-tions informed and influenced the production of the texts. It will attemptto resurrect lost voices and causes which are distorted or silenced in thecanonized text.

2. Recently, there have been a number of introductory texts that strive to wres-tle with the aim and ambit of the discourse: Ania Loomba, Colonialism/ Post-colonialism (London: Routledge, 1998); Leela Gandhi, Postcolonial Theory: ACritical Introduction (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1998); Bart Moore-Gilbert, Postcolonial Theory: Contexts, Practices, Politics (London: Verso, 1997);Bill Ashcroft, Gareth Griffiths and Helen Tiffin (eds.), Key Concepts in Post-Colonial Studies (London: Routledge, 1998); Bart Moore-Gilbert, Gareth Stantonand Willy Maley (eds.), Postcolonial Criticism (London: Longman 1997); PeterChilds and Patrick Williams, An Introduction to Post-Colonial Theory (London:Prentice Hall, 1997).

3. For recent attempts, see Laura Donaldson (ed.), Postcolonialism and Scrip-tural Reading (Semeia, 75; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996); R.S. Sugirtharajah,Asian Biblical Hermeneutics and Postcolonialism: Contesting the Interpretations(Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1998); and R.S. Sugirtharajah (ed.) The PostcolonialBible (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998)

SUGIRTHARAJAH  A Brief Memorandum on Postcolonialism 5

b. It will also engage in a reconstructive reading that will reread bib-lical texts from the perspective of postcolonial concerns such as libera-tion struggles of the past and present; it will be sensitive to subalternand feminine elements embedded in the texts; it will interact with andreflect on postcolonial circumstances such as hybridity, fragmentation,deterritorialization, and/or hyphenated, double or multiple identities.

c. It will interrogate both colonial and metropolitan interpretations todraw attention to the inescapable effects of colonization and colonialideals on interpretative works such as commentarial writings and histor-ical and administrative records that helped to (re)inscribe the notion ofa mystical, irrational, stagnant Orient pitched against a progressive,rational and secular Occident. It will also investigate interpretations thatcontested colonial interests and concerns. It will bring to the fore howthe invaded, often caricatured as abused victims or grateful beneficia-ries, transcended these images and wrested interpretation from theinvaders, starting a process of self-discovery, appropriation and subver-sion.

Postcolonialism’s critical procedure is an amalgam of different meth-ods ranging from the now unfashionable form criticism to contempo-rary literary methods. It is an avenue of inquiry rather than a monolithictheory.

The success of postcolonialism depends on its engagement with morethan one constituency. It should be able to move freely in the academyand the world outside. It should involve both intellectual and populardiscourse. Postcolonial theory as it is practised in certain circles hasbeen perceived to be too complex and esoteric to have much influenceoutside the academy.

The task of the postcolonial critic is not only to speak truth to thepowerful, as Edward Said has been urging, but also to speak to the poorabout the powerful, especially about the enormous power wielded bythe media, multinationals and the institutionalized Church.

The essays assembled here resonate in many different ways with theconcerns outlined above.