Modern Religious Movements in India

A landmark study of the religious ferment that transformed India during the nineteenth century. John Nicol Farquhar, drawing on sixteen years of residence in India and extensive travels across the subcontinent, documents the emergence of reform movements, revival organizations, and new religious syntheses that arose in response to Western influence and Christian missions.

The book traces movements from Ram Mohan Roy’s founding of the Brahma Samaj in 1828 through to the nationalist religious movements of the early twentieth century. Farquhar personally interviewed adherents of nearly every movement described, visiting their headquarters, collecting their literature, and engaging with their leaders. His accounts of the Brahma Samaj, Arya Samaj, Prarthana Samaj, Theosophy, the Ramakrishna Mission, and dozens of smaller movements remain primary historical sources.

Originally delivered as the Hartford-Lamson Lectures at Hartford Theological Seminary in 1913, this work represents the first systematic attempt to understand modern Indian religious movements as expressions of a single great religious upheaval—a counter-reformation responding to the challenges of modernity while drawing on both traditional Indian spirituality and Western religious ideas.