ABSTRACT
When Ziegenbalg was ordained on November 11, 1705 in Copenhagen as a missionary, he made certain vows and was mindful of them throughout his life.1 Six days later, he received from King Frederick IV further ministerial exhortations.2 The third and fourth exhortations are important to understand Ziegenbalg’s religious research. The third instruction revolves around the complex relationship between the Book of Nature and the Book of Grace,3 and advises Ziegenbalg first to study the (pre-Christian) knowledge of God found among the South Indians, and then find ways of leading the South Indians to the knowledge of God that is revealed in the Bible. The fourth instruction fixes Ziegenbalg’s theological frame of reference4 by requiring him to hold on to the Lutheran doctrines enshrined in the Augsburg Confession. This instruction has also some political and legal implication in Tranquebar because, when Ove Giedde (1594-1660),5 the representative of the Danish King Christian IV (1588-1648), and Rakunāta Nāyak (1600-1634), the King of Tañcāvūr, signed their trade treaty on November 19, 1620, they granted the European inhabitants of Tranquebar the full freedom to practice their “Religion of Augsburg.”6 As a result, Ziegenbalg was asked to be sensitive to this religious provision and make use of it. The basic Lutheran beliefs about the natural law, justification by faith and salvation in Christ7 enabled Ziegenbalg to study the nature of the major South Indian religions and ascertain their usefulness. In this effort he followed several methods, of which the following two are significant.
