Singh , Sundar , 1889-1929 , Indian Christian 'sadhu'

Sundar Singh: born in a Punjab village, 1889; of mixed Sikh and Hindu stock; his early dislike of Christianity resulted in a symbolic burning of the Bible; soon after followed a vision of Jesus Christ and he was baptized, 1905; determined to become a Christian sadhu (holy man); associated briefly with a semi-Franciscan brotherhood and attended an Anglican theological college for a few months, but had no formal church affiliations; travelled and preached in mountain regions from his centre at Kotgarh, c1910-c1916; wrote about the many hardships in the Urdu Christian press, his accounts forming the basis of books about him by Alfred Zahir, 1916, and Rebecca J Parker, 1918; began to travel abroad, 1918; visited Burma, Malaysia, Singapore, Japan, and China; travelled to Europe, North America, and Australia, 1920; visited Europe again, 1922; following the publication of B H Streeter and A J Appasamy's The Sadhu (1921), Sundar Singh was identified as a living mystic and several more books were published about him; some people did not accept his accounts of his early adventures and his later years were dogged by controversy and ill health; set off to travel once more, 1929; his fate, and the circumstances of his death, are unknown.

Rebecca Jane Parker: born, 1865; née Perkins; a church member in Bromsgrove, Worcestershire; married Arthur Parker (1858-1935, a London Missionary Society (LMS) missionary in South India) in Calcutta, 1888; adoptive mother to Sundar Singh; working with her husband in the Trivandrum area, she ran a hostel and boarding home for Christian girls and Bible women; established an embroidery industry, employing over 1,000 Christian women; awarded the Kaisar-i-Hind medal by the British government for social service, 1921; retired, 1925; died at Leamington Spa, England, 1946. Publications: Sadhu Sundar Singh, called of God (1918 and subsequent editions); Sundar Singh, At the Master's Feet, translated by the Rev Arthur and Mrs Parker [1922]; Children of the Light in India: biographies of noted Indian Christians [1929]; Father of Twenty-Five Thousand: Arthur Parker, missionary in India [1939]; How They Found Christ: Stories of Indian Christians (1940).