Biography
Sundar Singh was born on September 3, 1889, in Rampur, a village in the Patiala state of the Punjab, in a wealthy Sikh family. His father, Sirdar Sher Singh, was a landowner and a man of position. His mother, Sadhu, was a woman of deep piety. She loved her youngest son and told him that he must become a holy man, a sadhu. She taught him the sacred texts of the Sikhs and the Hindus. By the age of seven, he had learned the Bhagavad Gita by heart. She also took him to the mountains, where she showed him the life of those who lived in solitude. She died when he was fourteen, in 1903, and the loss shook him to the core.
He was sent to a mission school run by the American Presbyterians, where the Bible was taught. He hated it. He saw the Christian missionaries as foreigners who wanted to destroy the faith of his people. He took part in the opposition to them. He is said to have thrown stones at the missionaries and mud at the preachers. In a rage, he took a Bible and burned it page by page in front of his friends. He also had a deep hunger. He had lost his mother, and he was in despair. He prayed to God, in the manner of his religion, to show him the way. If not, he said that he would lay himself down on the railway track and end his life.
On the morning of December 18, 1904, at about three o'clock, after three days of this struggle, he rose and bathed and prayed. He said that a light filled his room, and that in the light, he saw the form of Jesus. He had thought that if he saw a vision, it would be of Krishna or Buddha. He heard a voice say to him, in Hindustani, why do you persecute me. I died for you. You were praying to find the right way. Why do you not follow it. He fell on the floor. He said that he was filled with a joy that he had never known. He was convinced that Jesus was alive. He told his father that he was a Christian.
His family tried to turn him back. His father was shocked and said that he had disgraced the family. His relatives offered him wealth if he would give up his new faith. He refused. They treated him with contempt, and he was cast out. It is said that he was given poisoned food and fell ill. He was cared for by a Christian pastor, who took him in and helped him to recover. He was baptized on October 3, 1905, in the Anglican church of St. Thomas, in Simla, on his sixteenth birthday, or very near to it. A few days later, he put on the saffron robe of the sadhu and set out as a wandering preacher. He decided to follow Christ as an Indian holy man, with no money, no home and no possessions.
He traveled across India and beyond. He walked barefoot over the roads of the Punjab and the foothills of the Himalayas. He preached in the villages and the towns. He journeyed to Kashmir, to Afghanistan, to Baluchistan, to Ceylon and to Burma. He made a number of trips to Tibet, where Christianity was forbidden. He was often beaten and driven out. According to stories that he told, he was once thrown into a dry well, with the lid locked, and left to die, and was rescued after three days by an unknown hand. He is also said to have met a hermit in a cave in the Himalayas, a Christian who had lived for hundreds of years, though this and other stories have been questioned.
He was invited to the West in 1920 and 1922. He visited Britain, Europe, Australia and the United States, and drew great crowds. He spoke in simple stories, with a gentle voice, and made a deep impression. He was received as a saint by many. He wrote a number of small books, such as At the Master's Feet and With and Without Christ. His message was the love of Christ and a life of surrender. He also said that Christianity ought to take an Indian form and that the church in India should be free of Western control. He refused to found an organization.
He was a mystic, and some of his stories of visions and miracles were doubted. Investigators questioned certain events, and some thought that he had embellished his accounts. He also lacked a firm doctrinal base and was sometimes loose in his statements on the Bible. He was a man who found it hard to settle in a community. His health was weak, and he was often ill.
In April 1929, he set out for Tibet from the foothills of the Himalayas, though he was in poor health. He was seen at Kalka, and then he disappeared. He was never seen again. Inquiries were made, and no trace of him was found. He was thirty-nine. His fate is unknown. His life shows the effect of an Indian who took up the cross in the form of a holy man. He remains a figure of mystery and of devotion.