Illumination
and Implementation: Decoding Mission through Adaminte Makan Abu
Sajeev
V. Koshy
Adaminte
Makan Abu (Abu, Son of Adam), a Malayalam motion
picture and winner of National and Kerala State Award for Best Picture of 2011
portrays the sorrow and suffering of an elderly Muslim couple living in
Kerala’s Malabar, forsaken and forgotten by their son in the Gulf and
struggling hard to find money to fulfil their dream of going on Hajj[i]. This film also shares a symbolic world which
invites us to re- visit our theological understanding of mission in an
inter-religious society. Since film theology is in a very infant stage in
India, there needs to be attempts to interpret biblical texts and levels of
human existenceby locating film as a text
to be explored and constructed.As Sam Koshy observes, “films can be text
for theological imagination and theology can be a critical partner to the film
making”.[ii]
This study is an attempt to decode some aspects of mission such as mountain
valley experience of mission, sacramental mission, dialogue and mission, eco
mission through the movie Adaminte Makan
Abu as chalanam focuses this year
on the theme Mission: Illumination and
Implementation. I should also note that this is not an attempt to review
the film on strict rules as it requires another methodology.
Abu (Salim Kumar) is a man in his
seventies, who has spent an entire life selling Athar(perfume) and books on the streets. Over the years, Abu along
with his wife Ayeshumma (Zarina Wahab) has learned to get over memories of
Sathar (he never appears on scene), their only son who had deserted them when
life's fortunes beckoned. Old and poor, the couple lives on with hopes of
realizing a single dream that is left; that of going on a Hajj pilgrimage to
Mecca. This movie leads us to ponder on human aspirations and the strenuous
journey of a Muslim couple’s life fulfilment.
Mission:
A mountain-valley experience: We are introduced
into the movie with some curious (could be mythological) characters like Ustad
(Thampi Antony), who prophesies the future and sees the unseen. The saintly man
does not claim to be a God, but maintains that those ridden with grief could
leave their sorrows and tears safe with him. When all this anguish becomes
unbearable, he walks up a hill and stays there until the wind blows it all
away. The hill top where he rests is a spectacle where the sky seems to stoop
down to kiss the earth, where a golden grandeur seems to have thrown open the
doors to paradise. He carries the burden of the community and gives solace to those
who seek his help. He comes to mountain to relax and meditate. Once he is
relaxed and when people seek his help, he goes down the valley.
Mission is an experience from mountain top
to mountain bottom. The transfiguration passage well explains this (Matt
17:1-13). Jesus took Peter, James and John to the mountain; he was transfigured
before them and did not stay there forever. He came down to engage with the
people. The vision they received at the
mountain top enabled them to come down and go for mission beyond the margins. Mountain top experience is essential for
Christian mission to have self reflection, devotion and prayer life. At the
same time, we have to come down the mountain to face the realities of the world
and to be with people who are struggling. Both experiences should go parallel
in mission. Mountain top is required for illumination and mountain bottom is
essential for implementation.Ustad here is a paradigm for mission who
challenges us to be illumined and implementers.
Sacramental
Mission: It is customary in Muslim tradition to
seek pardon and reconcile with people before going on hajj. In a notable scene,
Abu and Ayeshumma pay a visit to the village teacher's (Nedumudi Venu) house to
seek forgiveness for any wrongs that they might have caused him and his family
in the past. They hug before Abu leaves and the teacher requests him to
remember them when he sets foot on the Holy City. Abu had nurtured feelings of guilt over a
squabble that he had with his neighbour Sulaiman (Gopakumar) several years
back. Many years gone by and Sulaiman had moved away to a distant place. Abu
and Ayeshumma, in a bid to seek absolution, call on him with a pack of
biscuits. And they find a frail, bedridden man who is overwhelmed with joy at
seeing them.
Sacramental mission necessitates the
importance of maintaining peace and reconciliation in mission. In Matthew 5:23,
“so when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your
brother or sister has something against you... first be reconciled and then
come and offer your gift”. In the liturgy also, kiss of peace is made before we
partake in Holy Communion as we declare that we stand united and reconciled in
the body and blood of Christ. This sacramentality should enable the worshipping
community to go out in peace and make the whole humanity blessed and
reconciled. We should be illumined through our liturgy for this mission and be
implementing peace and reconciliation in our community.
Dialogue
and Mission: It would seem more than a coincidence
that of the two men who come to Abu's aid when he is in dire straits, one is a
Hindu teacher and the other one a Christian business man. They offered money to
the poor man. Abu gratefully declines the money which the village teacher offered
to him when heard of Abu’s plight. His religious laws prevented him from
accepted the money (Zakat[iii]),
saying that alms for the holy journey could be accepted only from those with
close blood relations or within Islam. As for Johnson (Kalabhavan Mani), the
wood dealer, Abu hands him back the money that he had accepted, when he learns
that the tree that he had sold him was hollow. With the intense intent of
portraying the innate benevolence in these men, we can find an interreligious
dialogue taking place through these scenes.
According to Felix Wilfred, dialogue and
mission are not conflictual, rather convergent realities[iv].
We see in Jesus who participated and immersed himself in the life, culture and
history of the people. While Jesus engaged in dialogue, he was pursuing mission.
He did both by discovering the will of God, by responding constantly to his
call in the context. Abu is a very pious man who is very much conscious of his
religious laws and observances. But that does not limit him in engaging with
the Hindu teacher and Christian businessman. His interactions in the community made
ateacher to come to his help in need and also enabled Johnson to take the deal
not in business terms, but out of love and concern. Itis also noteworthy that
though Abu returned the money back to Hindu teacher and Christian businessman
out of his religiosity, they were not hurt; rather their respect towards Abu
would have got stronger as their interactions are portrayed through relationships.
Dialogue is enriched in relationship, not in imposing certain truths any
community posses. If church meaningfully engages in dialogue, by anchoring on
relationships, she can creatively implement mission in an open ended way.
Eco
Mission: Concern for the creation is a pertinent
theme in this movie. In the end without able to make it
for hajj, he makes a retrospection of the journey he made to fulfil his dream.
He finds one of the reasons as that Allah would not have liked his action of
cutting the tree because that is also his creation and human is not allowed to
take the life of any creation. Out of his guilty consciousness, he plants a
jackfruit tree in the end. He wants to reconcile with nature. Though symbolically it points to the life of
their son who deprived them in their old age, this action of planting a
jackfruit tree in the end gives hope to the couple again as a tree holds
immense possibilities in it.
We have a mission towards nature. We are to
keep it safe and secure since it is also part of God’s creation. As participants in God’s mission, this exhorts
us to exercise a creative responsibility with the creator (Is 11: 6-9). To
implement this eco-mission, we should be illumined with what M.J.Joseph calls
as the ‘eco-vision of the earth community’[v].
Eco-vision illumines our minds to guard flora and fauna of this creation and
implement necessary actions in our church and locality. The scene in which
Ayeshumma bids adieu to her cattle is also poignant. “I have never treated them
as mere beasts” she tells her husband with tears welling up in her tears while
they were sold. In the end, Abu
decides to buy his cattle back which show that life becomes meaningful and
colourful when human stays in tune with nature and created beings.
The movie engages with the quest of
following one’s passion where humans meaningfully engage with each other,
plants have life, people converse with animals, grass rustles and listens to
human feelings and so on. The couple were not able to make it on hajjas they
could not arrange the finances needed. But the movie does not end on a sad
note. The planting of jackfruit tree sprouted new hope in the minds of viewers
that Abu would make it for hajj in the near future. But director Salim Ahmed leaves
the text open ended. However he portrays Abu, as a highly illumined character
who lived his religion and implemented it as a reality in his locality.
Mission is directed by God, and we are just
partakers in His mission. Our duty is discover the will of God through
illumination and by responding to His call in our context through implementation.
It is a task entrusted by Jesus on church which needs to be taken seriously.
This theme is said loudly in the movie when plot presents Abu for the first
time: A 70 year old, frail man struggling hard to walk after travelling long
hours and without a wink of sleep, comes home to his wife, and yet cannot take
a nap because his life’s mission calls him for action. He goes to market to
pursue his dream. This challenges us to go ahead in mission, which as Robert
Frost said “miles to go before I sleep”. Shall we?
This article is published in Mar Thoma
Syrian Theological Seminary ,Kottayam –Annual Magazine Chalanam 2010
[i]Hajj is one of the five pillars of Islam which is an obligatory duty
laid down in Quran that a pilgrimage should be made once in life by every
Muslim.
[ii] Koshy, Sam. “The Film Theology-An Invitation”.SCM Vaarthapathrika, 7, (2011).
[iii]Zakat is given only to the poor and the needy and those who are to pay
and collect it should be in Islam.
[iv] Wilfred, Felix. “Dialogue and Mission in Context” CTC Bulletin 3, 3 (1989)5-18.
[v] Joseph, M.J. The Eco-Vision
of the Earth Community. Bangalore: BTESSC, 2008.