Saint Joseph in South India

Costanzo Gioseffo Beschi was an Italian Jesuit who worked in South India from 1710 to 1747. A brilliant scholar of Tamil, his works include hymns, instructions for catechists, and a robust defense of the Catholic missionary approach. His most famous work is Tēmpāvaṇi (The Unfading Garland), an epic re-telling of the early life of Jesus, set in the context of the whole Biblical story, and surprisingly focused on St. Joseph, spouse of Mary and foster-father of Jesus. Beschi shows us not only the New Testament’s laconic Joseph, but also his early discernment of vocation, his place as an eye-witness to the Incarnation, his remarkable ministry as an eloquent preacher and teacher in pagan Egypt, and his final illness and death. St. Joseph in South India argues that Beschi’s distinctively Catholic approach draws on methods already familiar in the Jesuit ethical and dramatic literature in post-Reformation Europe. The book includes a fresh translation of about 300 verses from Tēmpāvaṇi.