ABSTRACT
Ideas of devotion and devotional practices have been contested at various points in the Protestant Tamil context in South India. From the early 18th century onwards, Protestant missionaries, converts and church congregations in the region have each disputed how far Protestants ought to separate themselves from non-Protestant religious traditions. Since both Protestant missionaries and their converts sought to create a separate and distinct space for Protestant Christianity within the diverse and sophisticated world of Tamil religious culture, it meant that a range of cultural practices — linguistic, literary, ritual, and even lifestyle — were demarcated as ‘Protestant’ and ‘non-Protestant’. When faced with the question — ‘What is Protestant devotion?’ — the diffi culty lay in both the lack of consensus amongst missionaries as to what was acceptable and in the lived experiences of Protestant converts who often blurred the lines between their past religious affi liations and their new ones.
