The progress of this wonderful reformation may be ascribed to a few
causes or agencies.
1. THE BIBLE: The Armenian Church not only encourages, but almost
enforces the reading of the Scriptures among the people. They reverence
the word of God. When the missionaries came into Armenia they found a
common ground on the “Thus saith the Lord” to deal with the people and
the clergymen. The absolute necessity of the Bible as the only standard
was felt by the missionaries, as our forefathers felt it after the
conversion of the nation to Christianity, and the ablest intellects
have been engaged in its translation into the vernacular dialects. Rev.
Dr. Goodell, nearly seventy-five years ago, wrote “Turn now to our
labor among the Armenians, our whole work with them is emphatically a
Bible work. The Bible is our only standard, and our final appeal. It is
even more necessary for us than it was for the reformers in England,
because we are foreigners. Without it we could say one thing and the
priests and bishops could say another; but where would be the umpire?
It would be nowhere, and all our efforts would be like ‘beating the
air.’”[93]
The British and the American Bible Societies greatly aided the
publication and circulation of the Scriptures through their agents
in co-operation with the missionaries among the people and in many a
family, town, and city the Bible itself has proved to be the mightiest
means of the conversion of many. “The entrance of thy word giveth
light.” “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul.”
The writer’s father was engaged in business in Constantinople over
fifty years ago, and when he returned home to Sivas, he brought with
him a copy of the New Testament, which he had bought from a colporteur.
This copy of the New Testament was read by him and his sons, and the
simple reading of the word of God resulted in the conversion of the
writer and several members of the family. His only sister was employed
by the missionaries for over thirty years as a Bible-woman, until her
deportation in 1915.
After his conversion and study a few years in the mission school at
Marsovan, it was the privilege of the writer to spend some time in
teaching in a small town. The Protestant people, whose children he
taught, had no preacher and they urged him to preach for them. Not
ability nor preparedness, but necessity, compelled him to engage in
this double duty. One day he was asked by a man who belonged to the
Armenian church, and whose brother (deceased then) was one of the
first converts to Protestantism, whether he knew how the Protestant
work began there. His reply was “No,” and what the man told him is
something like the following:
The first Protestant brother who came to the town went to a
coffee-house,[94] and took out his Bible and attempted to read it to
the men there; but they refused to listen to him. He was so grieved
that he burst into tears. This attracted the attention of an elderly
man, well-known in the town as “Uncle Toros.” He came to him and asked
what was the matter. He answered that he would like to read the Bible
and speak to them about the wonderful love of God, but they objected to
his so doing. Uncle Toros was much interested in the earnestness of the
man and his plans, and, being very hospitable, on learning that he was
a stranger in the town invited him to his own house. According to the
custom of the country everybody that is able has a guest-chamber for
guests. Uncle Toros also was a very influential man in the town and he
had many friends and relatives, who with the neighbors used to come to
his sitting-room and spend the early part of every night.
Thus our brother had a good audience every evening to whom he could
read and expound the Bible. No one could insult or molest him--he was
Uncle Toros’ guest. This was the beginning of the work at Zara, about
thirty miles northeast of Sivas, and when the writer was there, nearly
fifteen years later, he found about twenty families composing the
Protestant community.
The “two-edged sword” of the Spirit, “the Word of God” on the one hand
and “the young converts, full of faith and of the Holy Ghost” on the
other hand, have been still going about “lighting the torch of truth
and salvation throughout the land” and have thus wrought this marvelous
reformation which until within a short time has been progressing
rapidly. The Turkish government is trying a plan, which the Roman
emperors tried in the early Christian centuries, namely to destroy the
Christians and Christianity in the empire.
The following instance combines three phases in one, to wit: the mighty
power of the word of God, heroism of those who believe in the power of
that Word and the violation of all promises of religious freedom, the
marked cruelty and perversion of justice of the Turkish officials.
Avedis (good news) Zotian was a boy of ten or twelve years of age when
the writer was acquainted with him, over forty years ago. He was quiet,
unassuming, skillful and industrious and was engaged in his father’s
trade, copper-smithing. Through his cousin, who was a constant reader
of the Bible and a friend of the writer, and still better a warm friend
of the reformation, Avedis was brought under the influence of the Word
of God. He finally, about 1885, avowed himself a Protestant and joined
that community. He became very active, and, like the prophet Jeremiah,
felt that “His word was in his heart as a burning fire.” He had a long
distance to go to the services and would not be able to stop on his way
and speak to others on the topic of religion. He, therefore, thought
one Sunday in 1889 to have a verse on a piece of board and to carry it
along so that the people could see and read it. The words from Matt.
4:17, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” were written
in the Armenian, and Avedis had his friend Sahag, another Protestant
Armenian, to write the same in the Turkish language. Avedis started to
church with the above text. He was arrested on his way by the Turkish
officers and thrown into prison. His friend Sahag also was arrested
for his share of the crime and shared the corner of the prison with
Avedis. The charge against these young men was that they were political
agitators.
After several months’ imprisonment the unrighteous judge declared them
guilty and sentenced them to be exiled for life. They, with tearful
eyes, bade adieu to their friends, relatives, brothers, sisters, aged
parents, and to their newly married wives, who in vain had tried to
wipe away their overflowing tears. They were driven like cattle by the
mounted officers to Smyrna, then sent to Africa. They were so cruelly
ill-treated on their way that, not very long after their exile, Avedis
was taken away by his Heavenly Father to rest from his labors. And
what became of Sahag no one knows. The Turkish government’s early
determination to root out the Christians and Christianity from the
empire lacks no evidences. Only the selfish European powers, the
guardians of the Christian subjects of the Porte, were unwilling to see
them.
2. EDUCATION. Next in importance to the Bible and the activity of
the natives in spreading it, the superiority of the educational
institutions of the mission and the love for the truth in the native
youth will claim our attention, as potent factors in the progress of
this reformation.
Since the entrance of the Turks into Western Asia the ancient centers
of learning have been lying in ruins; the photophobic malady of
Mohammedanism and its fanatic devotees had extinguished the numerous
lights which have been burning for centuries on the altars of learning.
These wild beasts of mankind had broken in upon these countries, once
so glorious and famous for their happy estate of civilization and
culture, who had given religion and laws to the world, but now, through
ignorance, superstition, and vice had become the most deplorable
spectacle of extreme misery. The barbarous tyrants--the sultans of the
Ottoman empire--who gloried in cruelty and aimed only at the height of
greatness through sensuality, had reduced so great and goodly a part
of the world to that lamentable distress and servitude under which it
now faints and groans. “The true religion discountenanced and oppressed
(insulted); no light of learning permitted, nor virtue cherished,
violence and rapine exulting over all and leaving no security, save to
an abject mind and unlooked-on poverty.”
The above description of an eye-witness was uttered two centuries
before the coming of the missionaries, who have found it literally
true when they came into the East. They also found in this unhappy
empire “a noble race”--the Armenians--“the Anglo-Saxons of the East,”
whose “standard of moral purity is also said to be immeasurably above
that of the Turks around them, and they have a conscience which can be
touched and roused.” Their higher standard of moral purity and superior
intelligence are due to their religion--Christianity--and to their
better education. For as far back as the middle of the seventeenth
century, the Armenian press was in full activity in Constantinople.
It was no wonder that the Armenians had welcomed the missionaries and
had they been left alone they would not have attempted to prevent the
work of reformation at all.
“When the missionaries came to Turkey they were kindly received by
the patriarch and clergymen, who showed great hospitality and favor
to them, and encouraged them to build up schools, which they promised
to support by sending their young men and priests to be educated.
But afterwards the Jesuits, who are ever the uncompromising enemies
of Protestantism, secretly stirred up the Armenian and Greek leaders
against the missionaries and their work, whom they now began to
regard with suspicion and envy. Even among the Armenian priests and
college-men were those who, though they at first persecuted the
Protestants, became not only their stanchest friends, but also earnest
workers for the cause of Christ.”
The above quotation from a native writer is well supported by the
following statement of an American writer, a returned missionary of the
American Board:
“In 1834 these schools had two thousand scholars, and though supported
by the people, yet, having been established by the advice and
assistance of the mission, their influence was great in its favor,
till the monks and priests began to preach violently against the
mission and schools, ‘_and even against the patriarch for favoring
them_.’ But it was too late to destroy their influence. The Armenians
had become roused by the spreading light,” and “in 1835 the revival of
learning and piety among the Armenians continued to advance hand in
hand.”[95]
The Seminary at Bebek in 1840 commenced with three scholars. The
following year the number of the students had increased to twenty-four,
and many had been refused for want of funds. A few years later a
female seminary was started at Pera, Constantinople, and this had a
wonderful effect upon the community. Education of the female, neglected
for centuries, began to revive in the East, even the adult women and
matrons attempted to learn to read their Bibles and they generally
succeeded well. “Fifty adult females have begun to learn to read during
the year; more than fifty have already learned to read well, and many
others are in the process of learning.” Wherever the missionaries
went there they started schools, and these schools were not only the
centers from which the light of truth radiated around, but they also
became in many places nuclei for new churches.
The Bebek Seminary, in 1854, reported its number of students as
fifty, and “its former pupils are employed as preachers, teachers,
translators, and helpers in many places.” In the following year the
demand for teachers and preachers from the seminary was so great that
other schools were started--one at Tokat, and another at Aintab. The
number of free schools had increased this year (1855) to thirty-eight,
and the whole number of pupils nine hundred and sixty.
It was in the same year that the American Board sent the Rev. Dr.
Anderson and Thompson to India and Turkey. In the previous year the
Baptist Missionary Society also had sent its deputation to India. “The
result of these delegations was that the character of the education of
nearly all the missionary institutions of the highest grade was wholly
changed. The English language was proscribed and the curriculum of
studies reduced to a vernacular basis. Many schools were closed and
some missionaries came home, and considerable friction was occasioned,
but the new system was rigidly enforced.”[96]
Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, Dr. H. J. Van Lennep, and some other missionaries
advocated the importance of a thorough education and the knowledge
of the English language for the native ministry, believing that “no
country was ever reformed but by its sons, and that for such a great
work a better education IS necessary.” They, however, met not a little
opposition from the Board and some of their associates in the mission.
“The American Board’s change of base on the matter of education”
furnished an occasion--for some trouble in the field--for some
Armenian young men who sought a better education abroad. But their
aspiring and venturing into England and America for a thorough English
education, subjected them to opposition, from some of the missionaries,
and afterwards, when they attempted to secure employment in the
mission-fields, they met discouragement and disappointment. Even as
late as in 1880 Dr. Hamlin, advocating his position, wrote:
“Every young man who started with a good foundation of English, and
of character, has done well. I recall at this moment five such cases:
(1) Alexan Bezjian, now professor in Aintab College; (2) Alexander
Djijisian, who spent one or two years in Edinburgh, now pastor at Ada
Bazar. He is a noble and strong man in judgment and power of argument,
in true insight, in theological training and as a preacher, the
supervisor of many a missionary; (3) The late Broasa pastor, now head
of the High School, who studied at Basle. No one will dare to impugn
his character and ability; (4) Pastor Keropé, like the others, a Bebek
Seminary student. He went to England and Mr. Farnsworth, instead of
opposing him, had the grace to aid him. He made a good impression in
England and obtained aid to build a church; Mr. Farnsworth pronounced
it the best church that has been erected among the Protestants in
Turkey; (5) Pastor Thomas, of Diarbekir. I do not know of a man who
speaks the Armenian language who is his equal for a platform speech.
He carries his audience with him. He is clear and logical. He lifts
his audience to higher planes of principle, thought and feeling.”
The late Rev. Dr. Tracy, a former teacher of the writer and the
ex-president of Anatolia College, Marsavan, wrote in 1904:
“During the prosecution of this [mission] work in the Turkish Empire,
wise attention has been given all along to the education of the young,
both in the common branches with reference to good and intelligent
social and family Christian life; and in the more advanced, with
reference to the Christian leadership so vitally important in the
development of a community. That this principle, discerned by our own
American forefathers, as a corner stone in our national structure,
is just as applicable to and important in the building of Christian
communities in mission lands as at home, has dawned at last upon the
minds of all who seriously prosecute this foreign work. The position
which Christian education has taken in missions is impregnably strong.
Not only does such education improve, inform, enable young men and
young women, but it finds out the able and gathers up the natural
leaders; it not only educates, but makes educators. It is a means
without which no Christian country, community, or enterprise has ever
held permanent leadership, or ever can. The day of light is advancing
in the East with the rise of the Christian colleges.
“Very great and far-reaching was the influence of that school
established in early times by Cyrus Hamlin in the village of Bebek,
on the Bosphorus. The first venture, though so small a craft compared
with what has followed, made the wake for a whole fleet of mighty
vessels coming after--Robert College at Constantinople, the Syrian
Protestant College at Beirut, the Central Turkey College at Aintab,
Euphrates College at Harpoot, Anadolia College at Marsovan, the
American College for Girls at Sculari, the Institute at Samakov in
Bulgaria, St. Paul’s Institute at Tarsus, the International College
at Smyrna, with leading schools for girls in the interior like those
at Marash, Marsovan (Sivas Girls’ High School, and Sivas Teachers’
College, etc.), and elsewhere. Another most important class of
institutions took its rise from the same fountain--the theological
seminaries at Marash, Marsovan, Harpoot, without which the others
would hardly have come into existence. They introduced the gospel
widely and educational progress followed. Here we have a dozen or more
institutions which are the leaders of thought and makers of character
in the empire.”[97]
With one or two exceptions these colleges and high schools are,
or were, crowded by the Armenian boys and girls: Sivas Teachers’
College--“This College has occupied a unique position in its training
teachers for important positions in the mission and in the government
schools. During the last year (1914) there were more pupils than at any
time in the past. The exact figures are not obtainable, but the total
enrollment for the previous year was over 500.”[2]
St. Paul’s College, Tarsus--“The enrollment was the largest recorded:
in the College 118, academy 142; total, 260. Of these, thirty-five were
Moslems, the greatest in the history of the school. Nearly two hundred
were Armenians, but Greeks, Turks, Arabs, Syrians, were represented in
the student body.”[98]
Before the spring of 1915 twenty-five thousand and one hundred and
thirty-four pupils were attending and receiving Christian training from
the kindergarten schools up to the highest colleges in the land.[99]
3. THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE; another cause of progress of the
reformed and evangelical work was and is the necessity of a Christian
literature. It has been stated that the Armenian literature is largely
of religious and Christian character, but the most and best of it is
in the ancient Armenian language. After the translation of the Bible
into the modern Armenian a new literature in the same was necessitated.
This necessity was gradually being met until the war broke out. “THE
AVEDAPER--an Armenian paper, published in weekly and monthly editions.
It was the most attractively printed Armenian paper in the empire.
It is under efficient Armenian management. There was an encouraging
increase in subscriptions until the war conditions interfered with the
mails and returns fell off. It was finally decided to discontinue the
paper for the present.”[100] Within the last fifty or sixty years a
goodly number of useful books have been written and translated into
the modern Armenian language; such as school books, commentaries,
Sunday School lesson helps, dictionaries, religious treatises, hymn
books--“whatever is most necessary for the healthy nourishment of
awakening minds in the families, the schools, the communities is
published, but with sad insufficiency.”
“The mission press is connected with Central Turkey College (at
Aintab). Some of the students are given aid in the printing department
and in the book bindery. Besides the regular job work the press prints
a monthly religious paper in Armeno-Turkish (Armenian letter in Turkish
language) called the New Life. No figures are at hand for the total
output, but the usual number of pages printed exceeds 700,000.”[101]
If this terrible war had not interfered with the missionary work, the
annual output would have been between nine and ten million pages of
print.
4. THE MEDICAL WORK. The last but not the least of the causes of the
progress of the evangelical work in the East is the medical work or the
hospitals. Before the coming of the missionaries into the East, and the
medical missionaries following them, there were some native physicians,
mostly Armenians, in the country. But their knowledge of the art of
healing must naturally have been in a crude state. It is no wonder when
we remember the fact, that though the East, especially Western Asia,
has been the seat of ancient learning, yet it has been for over five
hundred years under the rule of the tyrants, the sultans, who delighted
more in injustice, cruelty, and sensuality than in learning. So the
reflex light of the Sun of righteousness from the West brought also
healings in His wings.
Some churches and missionary organizations have been slow to learn the
meaning of Christ when He “sent them (His disciples) to preach the
Kingdom of God and heal the sick.” (Luke ix: 2.)
“Regular medical departments, with hospitals, are of late growth. In
view of the healing mercy and saving power exerted through them, it
now seems strange that their development should have been so belated.
When, however, it is remembered that in missions almost everything
in the way of means and measures is experimental it is not so
strange that among the forces born into life and action the ‘noblest
offspring’ should ‘be the last.’”[102]
Before the war there were fifteen missionary stations in Asiatic
Turkey. Nine of these stations had medical departments with hospitals
connected with them; 39,503 patients have been treated in these
hospitals and the total number of treatments during the year of 1914
reached 134,357. This is a tremendous power for good and a marvelous
blessing for a country like Turkey, yet the rulers of that unhappy
country have been destitute of any sense of justice or gratitude, as
the following, a few sentences from Dr. Barton’s letter to the writer,
show:
Congregational House, 14 Beacon St.,
Boston, Mass.,
July 20, 1916.