(REVIEW) Many of us might be acquainted with conventional narratives that combine 19th century colonialism and Christianity with cultural suppression and forced conversion in Asian territories where local inhabitants fought back intruders and crushed evangelical missions. 

In the groundbreaking book “Confronting Christianity,” historian Sven Trakulhun challenges this popular belief by tracing back to the exceptional case of Siam (now Thailand). Unlike its Southeast Asian neighbors, Siam escaped the claws of European colonialists and successfully modernized the nation without any violence against Westerners.

How could it happen?

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The secret is in the historic encounter between Christianity and Buddhism. 

Trakulhun is a Hamburg University expert on the early modern history of religious ideas and East-West encounters. He is in a good position to tell us the captivating story of the religious confrontation in a Southeast Asian kingdom at the crossroads of history.     

Trakulhun shows that the Thai elite chose not to be hostile toward Christian missionaries like Vietnam and China but leveraged their ideas to modernize Siam and Thai Buddhism. Nineteenth century Siam consisted of many social groups: Political rulers, nobles, Christian missionaries, Western diplomats, businessmen and, of course, Siamese Buddhists.

Theravada Buddhism, a Buddhist original school, was entrenched and undeniably important in Siamese society. You can imagine plenty of pagodas throughout Siam where Buddhist monks possessed educational and medical knowledge of the kingdom.

They were even advisors to the king. Conversely, Thai kings also claimed themselves as the patron and protectors of Buddhism to build legitimacy and expand power. 

However, Christianity soon became a game changer challenging the status of Buddhism. The interaction between Thai Buddhists and Western Protestants blended with contention and collected reception that would shape the fate of modern Thailand.

This commercial exchange allowed missionaries from America and Europe to realize their mission agenda in Siam. They found their way to win the hearts of the kingdom rulers by introducing knowledge of Western science to gain the interest of the Thai royal court. Royal members were remarkably attracted to medical, engineering, military and technological science.

Interestingly, the book shows that the underlying motivation for missionizing was the superior belief that Christianity was the only road to attain “Western civilization” — which means social progress and economic advancement. American missionaries, like Dan Beach Bradley and John Taylor Jones, accused non-Christian traditions in Siam of being the root of backwardness and superstition, while claiming Christianity represented rationality and progress.

The aggressive actions of missionaries caused the Thai elites to consider Christianity a potential threat to social structure based on the grounds of Theravada Buddhism. The most surprising finding is that Thai elites and Buddhists tolerated Christian missionaries to avoid social turmoil and military conflict with the British and French empires. Siamese kings also utilized the tolerant religious policy to moderate foreign relations with colonial empires while applying Western science and technology to modernize their kingdom and centralize power. 

In other words, Thai elites found another effective tactic to counter Christian opponents. They adapted scientific knowledge from Christian missionaries to appropriate Buddhism with modernity and rational thoughts. They attempted to prove that the modernization and science reception were not necessarily parallel with the acceptance of Christianity.

To do so, they embarked on public debates with Christian missionaries in newspapers and connected to Buddhist supporters in other Asian countries. They even found their Western advocates to build the image of modern Buddhism in the West. 

Through wonderful storytelling and persuasive evidence from archival sources, Trakulhun sets up a compelling story of how Euro-American missionaries and Siamese elites deployed strategies and available resources to achieve their purpose. A strength of the author is to provide analysis of numerous religious tracts, newspaper articles and kings’ edicts in both English and Thai. Many sections of the book are well described with fierce confrontation, thrilling climaxes and amazing plot twists that can immerse readers in a fascinating world of enthusiastic preachers, rational monks and powerful kings.     

As the book is written in the academic style, complicated lexicons appear in some paragraphs that may annoy nonscholastic readers. Some sections should have been written in a shorter manner, especially lengthy paragraphs of doctrinal explanations that may perplex readers who are unfamiliar with Buddhist or Christian beliefs. The voices of local Siamese Christians should be included as active agents in the historical course. 

Despite a few inevitable limits, “Confronting Christianity” is a great choice for anyone who wants to discover the gripping history of the Christianity-Buddhism relationship, which decided the fate of Thai society in decades of the early 20th century and has remained a public concern today.   

Thien Bui is a Vietnamese writer who specializes in the history and religions of Southeast Asia.