CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS
There are two branches of mission-work in Persia that bring the
missionaries into close touch with Persian children: one is the
hospital, the other is the school. You will hear about the medical work
presently; in this chapter we will look at the school work.
There are Europeans in Persia, wanting English-speaking servants and
employés; there are rich Persians wanting secretaries who can write
French and English; there are business firms trading with England
and India who want English-speaking clerks and correspondents; so
naturally many Persians want their sons to learn English; and who
should teach it better than the Englishman?
But this is not all they want. As they get to know the Christians they
see that there is something in English ways and English character that
the Persian lacks. And they bring their boys to the missionary, and
ask him not merely to teach them English, not merely to teach them
book-learning of any sort, but to teach them to be good boys.
They do not so often ask for a girls’ school, for they do not think a
girl needs any book education as a rule, and only a few of the Persian
women can even read. Yet in some of the Mission-stations girls’ schools
have been started with great success, and year by year the demand for
them is growing.
English is less taught in these schools, but some of the girls learn
it, especially those most closely connected with the mission. The
girls, of course, have to give a good deal of time to sewing and
embroidery, which are more necessary for them than foreign languages.
But in all the Mission-stations sooner or later, generally sooner, a
boys’ school is started, and these schools vary very much according to
the needs of the different towns.
In one school Armenians and Muhammadans work side by side, in another
we find Muhammadans and Parsees, while a third contains all three.
In one school only English is taught, in another advanced Persian and
Arabic are added. In yet another, everything is taught from the Persian
alphabet onwards.
One missionary works alone in his own house, another has a full staff
of Armenian and Persian teachers and monitors, and a well-built
convenient school.
But whatever the race of the boys, whatever the subjects taught,
whatever the organisation, there are difficulties to be faced.
It is difficult to get teachers; sometimes none can be got on the spot,
and they have to be fetched from some other town, perhaps several
weeks’ journey away. Sometimes the missionary has to be the only
teacher till he can train some of his own boys to be first monitors and
then masters in the school.
Then there is the school itself. Sometimes the small beginnings of a
school are started in the missionary’s own dining-room; sometimes he is
able to spare a room entirely for school purposes. In one case this was
supplemented by a rough tent or shed made of matting in the compound.
But as the school grows, separate buildings have to be found or built.
Books are another difficulty. All books for teaching English have to
be got from abroad, and many are not suitable. Readers which are very
suitable for the size of boy who reads them in England or India, are
not suitable for the young men who often use them in Persia. If you
give an educated young man, well read in the finest Persian poetry, the
childish stories and rhymes in many of the readers, he thinks English
books are very, very foolish, and his opinion of English intelligence
in both literary and religious matters falls very low.
All these things need money. The boys generally pay a very small fee
and buy their own books, but the fees do not go far towards paying for
the schools and the teachers’ salaries, and the getting together of the
necessary money is another difficulty.
The pupils themselves present three great difficulties. In our country
boys under fourteen generally go to different schools from boys
over fourteen, and those who wish to continue their education after
seventeen or eighteen leave school and go to college, or attend special
lectures. But in Persia the missionary is asked to take them all
together in one school, even middle-aged men wishing to become pupils.
But it is quite impossible to make a satisfactory school of boys and
men together. It is sometimes possible, especially in the larger
schools, to arrange separately for the men, but generally an age limit
has to be set.
The second difficulty arises from the number of boys who want to learn
English and who are never likely to have any use for it. They have an
idea that it is so new and uncommon that any one who knows it is bound
to get work at a good salary, and so they want to waste their time over
it when they ought to be learning the subjects they will really need
for their work. It takes some time and trouble to sort these boys out
from those who are really likely to need English. The third difficulty
is not peculiar to Persia, though it presents some peculiarities there.
It is the problem of managing the boys.
Boys in England, I am sorry to say, sometimes tell lies, but in Persia
it would be more correct to say that they sometimes tell the truth.
Then again the boys are of different ranks; some of them come with
their servants, and a certain amount of tact has to be used to get
them to accept the ordinary rules of discipline. But in a school where
everybody comes to learn most of these difficulties can be overcome.
Persian boys want knowing, like all boys, but when one tries to do
one’s best for them one finds them thoroughly lovable and possessed of
a large number of exceedingly good points.
Lastly, the _Mullās_, or Muhammadan clergy, see in the schools the
greatest danger to their religion, and they oppose them strongly. They
know that such close contact with Christians must open the boys’ eyes
to some extent to the contrast between Muhammadanism and Christianity,
and they know Muhammadanism cannot stand such a comparison.
Many Muhammadans, who believe that Muhammadanism is a true religion
given to them by God through Muhammad, still see that Christianity is
the better religion, and Muhammadans have told me that God had given us
a better religion than He had given them.
So the _Mullās_ try to persuade or frighten the fathers into not
sending their boys to the Mission-school, they try to frighten the boys
out of going, and they try to get the governors to close the schools.
But it is God’s work, and He does not allow them to stop it for long.
The boys themselves show the greatest interest in whatever they are
told about the Bible, and naturally in one way or another Bible reading
is always a prominent feature of every class of Mission-school.
Sometimes there is a regular lesson on the Bible as one of the school
subjects, but in other places there are no Bible lessons, but only
prayers and Bible-reading, with very simple explanations. But however
this may be, the gospel story of Christ Jesus, which is known by name
to every Muhammadan, but by more than name to very, very few, is always
of absorbing interest, and is not likely to be forgotten.