Abraham Rogerius or Abraham Roger (1609 – 1649, in

Gouda Gouda may refer to: * Gouda, South Holland, a city in the Netherlands ** Gouda (pottery), style of pottery manufactured in Gouda ** Gouda cheese, type of cheese originally made in and around Gouda ** Gouda railway station * Gouda, Western Cape, a s ...

) was a Dutch clergyman/translator working for the

Dutch East India Company The United East India Company ( nl, Verenigde Oostindische Compagnie, the VOC) was a chartered company established on the 20th March 1602 by the States General of the Netherlands amalgamating existing companies into the first joint-stock ...

, and one of the first Europeans who wrote about

Indian culture Indian culture is the heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, belief systems, political systems, artifacts and technologies that originated in or are associated with the ethno-linguistically diverse India. The term al ...

Life

Pulicat-India-An-Old-Abandoned-Dutch-House-with-Large-Pots-6

It is possible Abraham was born in

Haarlem Haarlem (; predecessor of ''Harlem'' in English) is a city and municipality in the Netherlands. It is the capital of the province of North Holland. Haarlem is situated at the northern edge of the Randstad, one of the most populated metropoli ...

, like his brother Jacobus, also a chaplain, who went to the Indies. The Calvinist Rogerius (anglicized as Roger), studied in Leiden under

Antonius Walaeus Antonius Walaeus (Antoine de Waele, Anton van Wale) (October 1573, Ghent – 3 July 1639, Leiden) was a Dutch Calvinist minister, theologian, and academic. Early life He was born at Ghent, where his father Jacques de Waele had moved from Brussel ...

. His first trip was to Batavia (1631) and then

Surat Surat is a city in the western Indian state of Gujarat. The word Surat literally means ''face'' in Gujarati and Hindi. Located on the banks of the river Tapti near its confluence with the Arabian Sea, it used to be a large seaport. It is now ...

(1632). From 1633 he worked as a chaplain in

Pulicat Pulicat or Pazhaverkadu is a historic seashore town in Chennai Metropolitan Area at Thiruvallur District, of Tamil Nadu state, India. It is about north of Chennai and from Elavur, on the southern periphery of the Pulicat Lake. Pulicat lake i ...

, the capital of

Dutch Coromandel Coromandel was a governorate of the Dutch East India Company on the coasts of the Coromandel region from 1610, until the company's liquidation in 1798. Dutch presence in the region began with the capture of Pulicat from the Portuguese in Goa and ...

. He studied

Hinduism Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...

southern India South India, also known as Dakshina Bharata or Peninsular India, consists of the peninsular southern part of India. It encompasses the States and union territories of India, Indian states of Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, and T ...

and learned Portuguese. Rogerius authored ''Open Door to the Secrets of Heathendom'', which begins with ten years of ministry among the

Tamil people The Tamil people, also known as Tamilar ( ta, தமிழர், Tamiḻar, translit-std=ISO, in the singular or ta, தமிழர்கள், Tamiḻarkaḷ, translit-std=ISO, label=none, in the plural), or simply Tamils (), are a Dravi ...

in the Dutch colony of Pulicat near

Madras Chennai (, ), formerly known as Madras ( the official name until 1996), is the capital city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost Indian state. The largest city of the state in area and population, Chennai is located on the Coromandel Coast of th ...

, India. His knowledge came from three Brahmins whom he met regularly. In 1642 he went back to

Batavia Batavia may refer to: Historical places * Batavia (region), a land inhabited by the Batavian people during the Roman Empire, today part of the Netherlands * Batavia, Dutch East Indies, present-day Jakarta, the former capital of the Dutch East In ...

and became the manager of an orphanage/school and promoted the use of Portuguese during church services. In 1647 he returned to the

Dutch Republic The United Provinces of the Netherlands, also known as the (Seven) United Provinces, officially as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands (Dutch: ''Republiek der Zeven Verenigde Nederlanden''), and commonly referred to in historiography ...

. "De Open-Deure tot het verborgen Heydendom ofte Waerachtigh vertoogh van het leven ende zeden, mitsgaders de Religie ende Gotsdienst der Bramines op de Cust Chormandel ende der landen daar ontrent ("The open door to the hidden paganism or truthful account of life and customs, as well as religion and worship of the Brahmins at Coromandel Coast and surrounding countries "), was published in Leiden in 1651 and since translated into German (1663), French (1670). This book was one of the first European books describing hinduism. The book has two parts. The first deals with the Brahmins life and customs, while the other describes their faith and worship. Rogerius seems to have been the first to publish a translation of aphorisms in

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

by Bhartṛhari, (Hundred aphorisms on the path to heaven by the heathen Bhartṛhari, famous amongst the Brahmins on the Coromandel coast) which forms the third part of the book.

Works

Breviario de religiāo christāo, em maneira de dialogo (1689)

De open-deure tot het verborgen heydendom

Literature

* Biographies in Dutch * Windisch, Ernst: Geschichte der Sanskrit Philologie und Indische Altertumskunde. Bd. 1. Strassburg, 1917.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rogerius, Abraham - Roger, Abraham 1609 births 1649 deaths 17th-century Dutch Calvinist and Reformed ministers 17th-century Dutch explorers Dutch Protestant missionaries Dutch expatriates in India Hindu studies scholars Leiden University alumni Clergy from Haarlem Protestant missionaries in India Dutch East India Company people Missionary linguists