Bible writing ceremony marks missionary Ziegenbalg's 300th

A ceremony to write the Holy Bible was observed Sunday at nearby Tarangambadi, an erstwhile Danish colony, in connection with the 300th death anniversary of BartholomeusZiegenbalg, the first Protestant missionary to India. A total of 1,464 people, including a large number of school students, participated in the event and wrote verses from the Bible, church officials said.

Ziegenbalg, who arrived in Tarangambadi in 1706, passed away in 1719, aged 34. The German-born Danish missionary had set up the first-ever printing press in India at Tarangambadi and published studies on Tamil language and Indian religion and culture.

While Ziegenbalg published the Bible in print format first in India, Sunday's event marked the reverse of it - writing the Bible as a manuscript, said Veerasamydas, organiser of the event. His translation of the New Testament into Tamil and the New Jerusalem church, Asia's first Protestant church he and his associates built in 1718 in Tarangambadi are still in use.

The 300th death anniversary of Ziegenbalg is being observed with year-long ceremonies at the house where he lived at the coastal town of Tarangambadi.