The current essay concentrates on the issues regarding Bible translation that engaged the attention of missionary translators connected to the Bible Society in the nineteenth century in the Madras Presidency and Ceylon. The author focuses on discussions and analyses of the production of a standard Tamil version of the Bible that contributed to the formulation of nascent theories of Bible translation in nineteenth-century India. He places in context the Bible Society's push for standardization and uniformity of Bibles that led to an insistence on standardization of translations, of language and religious vocabulary. This brings the author to the question of how far such standardization was successful and why. It is argued that the desire to achieve standard translations is connected to the objective of creating an abstract, standard Christian subject who would transcend differences in pre-existing cultural conditions or religious beliefs.