Colonial Pragmatism and Religious Assimilation: Dutch Conversion Strategies and their Social Consequences in Jaffna

Abstract

The seventeenth century marked a decisive transformation in northern Sri Lanka, particularly in Jaffna, where the Dutch East India Company (VOC) consolidated its authority following the defeat of the Portuguese in 1658. Unlike the Portuguese, who had pursued Catholic evangelization with uncompromising zeal destroying temples, prohibiting Hindu rituals, and enforcing mass baptisms the Dutch adopted a more calculated and pragmatic religious policy. As a trading corporation primarily driven by commercial imperatives, the VOC could ill afford to destabilize local society through excessive religious coercion (Arasaratnam, 1996). Nevertheless, the Company recognized religion as an essential instrument of colonial rule: a means of legitimizing governance, consolidating authority, and eroding the entrenched Catholic influence of the Portuguese era (Indrapala, 2005).This study examines the dual character of Dutch religious policy in Jaffna: the promotion of Calvinist Christianity as the official faith, and the pragmatic accommodation of local customs and economic necessities. It argues that the resulting tensions between ideology and expediency shaped the contours of Dutch religious assimilation. While the Dutch succeeded in altering aspects of Jaffna’s socio-religious landscape, their policies ultimately produced only a partial transformation, leaving significant continuities within indigenous and Catholic traditions.A study on Dutch conversion strategies and their social consequences in Jaffna, primary sources are considerably important, as they provide immediate evidence from the period of Dutch rule, 1658–1796. The records available from VOC archives (Dutch Documents), in the form of Memoir, letters, reports, instruction and church documents, indicate how the Dutch used religion as an instrument of administration and control. Missionary records, baptism registers, and school reports show how conversion was interwoven with education and social status. The court records, petitions, and local Tamil documents detail the ways in which the people of Jaffna reacted sometimesresisting, sometimes adapting to the religious policies of the Dutch. These sources are also necessary because they represent both colonial motives and the local experiences that lie behind religious change. The study of the true nature of Dutch pragmatism and its enduring impact on Jaffna society would not have been possible without such original materials.