History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions Volume I Part 2

Mr. Fisk had a good const.i.tution, and would probably have endured the climate of Syria for many years, with no more strain upon it in the way of travel, than subsequent experience warranted. The reader of the preceding pages will be prepared to apprehend special danger from his return to Beirt in a season, that was sickly beyond the recollection of the oldest of the Franks. He first spoke of being ill on Tuesday, October 11, having had a restless night. His experience was similar on several succeeding nights, but during the day he seemed tolerably comfortable, enjoyed conversation, and frequently desired the Scriptures to be read, remarking on the importance of the subjects, and the preciousness of the promises.

His devotional feelings were awakened and his spirits revived by the reading or singing of hymns, such as he suggested. On the 19th his mind was somewhat affected, and he fainted while preparations were being made for removing him to his bed. The next day, according to a request he had made some time before, he was informed of the probable issue of his sickness. He heard it with composure; remarking that he believed the commanding object of his life, for the seventeen years past, had been the glory of Christ and the good of the Church. During the day he dictated letters to his father, and to his missionary brethren King and Temple. On Thursday he asked for the reading of that portion of Mrs. Graham's "Provision for Pa.s.sing over Jordan," where it is said, "To be where Thou art, to see Thee as Thou art, to be made like Thee, the last sinful motion forever past,"--he antic.i.p.ated the conclusion, and said, with an expressive emphasis, "That's Heaven." As the evening approached, he was very peaceful, and in the midst he spoke out, saying: "I know not what this is, but it seems to me like the silence that precedes the dissolution of nature." Becoming conscious that the fever was returning, he said, "What the Lord intends to do with me, I cannot tell, but my impression is, that this is my last night." The fever, however, was lighter than usual, and the next forenoon there was some hope that it might be overcome. Yet it returned in the afternoon, with all its alarming symptoms. At six o'clock he had greatly altered, and the hand of death seemed really upon him. At eight a physician, who had been sent for, arrived from Sidon, but Mr. Fisk was insensible. Though the physician expressed little hope of saving him, he ordered appliances which arrested the paroxysm of fever, and restored him temporarily to consciousness. He was quiet during Sat.u.r.day, the 22d, and there were no alarming appearances at sunset. But before midnight all hope had fled. "We hastened to his bedside," say his brethren, "found him panting for breath, and evidently sinking into the arms of death. The physician immediately left him, and retired to rest. We sat down, conversed, prayed, wept, and watched the progress of his dissolution, until, at precisely three o'clock on the Lord's day morning, October 23, 1825, the soul, which had been so long waiting for deliverance, was quietly released. It rose, like its great Deliverer, very early on the first day of the week, triumphant over death, and entered, as we believe, on that Sabbath, of eternal rest, which remaineth for the people of G.o.d."

His age was thirty-three. As soon as the fact of his death became known, all the flags of the different consuls were seen at half-mast. The funeral was attended at four P. M., in the presence of a more numerous and orderly concourse of people, than had been witnessed there on a similar occasion.

Mr. Fisk had a strong affinity, in the const.i.tution of his mind and the character of his piety, to the late Miss Fidelia Fiske, of the Nestorian mission, who was his cousin, and whose praise is in all the churches. He was an uncommon man. With a vigorous const.i.tution, and great capacity for labor, he possessed a discriminating judgment, an ardent spirit of enterprise, intrepidity, decision, perseverance, entire devotion to the service of his Master, facility in the acquisition of languages, and an equipoise of his faculties, which made it easy to accommodate himself to times, places, and companies. He was highly esteemed as a preacher before leaving home.

"And who," said a weeping Arab, on hearing of his death, smiting on his breast, "who will now present the Gospel to us? I have heard no one explain G.o.d's word like him!" Aptness to teach was the prominent trait in his ministerial character, and in a land of strangers, he was esteemed, reverenced, and lamented.

The following tribute to his memory is from the pen of Mr. Bird:--

"The breach his death has made in the mission, is one which years will not probably repair. The length of time which our dear brother had spent in the missionary field, the extensive tours he had taken, the acquaintances and connections he had formed, and the knowledge he had acquired of the state of men and things in all the Levant, had well qualified him to act as our counselor and guide; while his personal endowments gave him a weight of character, sensibly felt by the natives. His knowledge of languages, considering his well-known active habits, has often been to us a subject of surprise and thanksgiving. All men who could comprehend French, Italian, or Greek, were accessible by his powerful admonitions. In the first-mentioned language he conversed with ease, and in the last two, performed with perfect fluency the common public services of a preacher of the Gospel. Even the Arabic he had so far mastered, as to commence in it a regular Sabbath service with a few of the natives. At the time of his death, besides preaching weekly in Arabic, and also in English in his turn, and besides his grammatical studies under an Arabic master, he had just commenced a work, to which, with the advice of us all, he was directing, for the time, his main attention. Having in a manner completed the tour of Palestine and Syria, and having become quite at home in Arabic grammar, he felt more than ever the need of a dictionary to introduce the missionary to the spoken language of the country. The ponderous folios of Richardson are for Persia; Golius, and the smaller work of Willmet, explain only the written language. We were therefore of the unanimous opinion, that a lexicon like the one in contemplation by Mr. Fisk, was needed, not only by ourselves, but by the missionaries who should succeed us. Our dear brother had written the catalogue of English words according to Johnson, and had just finished the catalogue (incomplete of course) of the corresponding Arabic, when disease arrested him. Had he lived, he hoped to visit his native country, and probably publish some account of his Christian researches in the Levant.

"Such were some of the plans and employments of our brother and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, when he was called off from all his labors of love among men. He is gone, but his memory lives. Never till called to sleep by his side, shall we forget the n.o.ble example of patience, faith, and zeal, which he has set us; and the churches at home will not forget him, till they shall have forgotten their duty to spread the Gospel."1

1 _Missionary Herald_ for 1827, pp. 101, 102.

The station at Jerusalem was suspended for nearly nine years, when unsuccessful efforts were made to revive it. The Rev. William M.

Thomson, and Asa Dodge, M. D., were sent for that purpose. Mr.

Thomson was the first to remove his family to Jerusalem, which he did in April, 1834. Mr. and Mrs. Nicholayson, of the London Jews Society, went with them to commence a mission among the Jews.

Everything looked promising for a few weeks, and Mr. Thomson went down to Jaffa to bring up his furniture. During his absence, the Fellahin, roused by an order to draft every fifth man into the army, rose against Mohammed Ali, the then ruler of Syria. Jerusalem was the centre of this sudden rebellion; and Mr. Thomson, for nearly two months, found it impossible even to communicate with his family, so closely was the city besieged by the rebels. The first sense of personal danger to the mission families, arose from an earthquake of unusual severity, which extended to the coast and shook their old stone habitation so roughly that they were compelled to flee into the garden, and sleep there. Here they were exposed to the b.a.l.l.s from the muskets of the Fellahin outside the walls. At length the rebels within the city somehow let in their friends outside, and it was an hour of terror when they took possession of the mission house, which was near the castle, dug loopholes through its walls, and began to fire on the soldiers of the fortress. The fire was of course returned, and the building, already shattered by the earthquake, was torn by the Egyptian cannon; while both it and the garden were filled with a mult.i.tude of lawless and angry rebels. The families found refuge in a lower room of the house, where the walls were thick, and there listened to the cannon b.a.l.l.s as they whistled above them. The arrival of Ibrahim Pasha at length quieted the city.

Able to return to his family on the 11th of July, Mr. Thomson found his wife suffering from ophthalmia, with high inflammatory fever.

Two days afterwards, Mr. Nicholayson was attacked with a fever, and the children were all sick. The case of Mrs. Thomson baffled all their skill. Convinced herself that she would not recover, the thought did not alarm her. For many weeks, she had been in the clearer regions of faith, enjoying greater nearness to G.o.d in prayer than ever before, with greater a.s.surance of her interest in the covenant of grace through the Redeemer. She had indeed cherished the hope of laboring longer to bring some of the degraded daughters of Jerusalem to the Saviour; but the Lord knew best, and to His will she cheerfully submitted. She died peacefully on the 22d of July, 1834. The bereaved husband was apprehensive of difficulty in obtaining a suitable place for her burial; but the Greek bishop gave permission, and took the whole charge of preparing the grave.

Mr. Thomson now visited Beirt to confer with his brethren, and was advised to remove to that place. The Rev. George B. Whiting and wife and Dr. and Mrs. Dodge, were to occupy the station thus vacated, aided by Miss Betsey Tilden. Dr. Dodge accompanied Mr. Thomson on his return, and a.s.sisted him in removing his babe and his effects to Beirt; and on the 22d of October he and Mr. Whiting were on their way with their families to Jerusalem.

Early in the winter, Dr. Dodge was called to Beirt to prescribe for Mrs. Bird, who was dangerously sick. Mr. Nicholayson returned with him to Jerusalem, arriving there on the 3d of January, 1835, cold, wet, and exhausted with fatigue, having traveled on horseback nearly seventeen hours the last day. The peril of such an exposure in that climate was not realized at the time. Both were soon taken sick, and Dr. Dodge rapidly sunk, though a physician from one of the western States of America arrived at the critical moment, and remained with him to the last. He died on the 28th of January, and Mrs. Dodge removed to Beirt. The arrival of Rev. John F. Lanneau in the spring of 1836, furnished an a.s.sociate for Mr. Whiting. A school was opened, and numerous books were sold to the pilgrims. Early in the next year, Tanns Kerem of Safet was engaged as a native a.s.sistant.

He was born and educated in the Latin Church, but in thought and feeling was with the mission, and enlarged their personal acquaintance and influence. In the summer the cholera appeared, and swept off four hundred victims in a month. Mr. Homes, of the mission to Turkey, was there at the time, and all devoted themselves to the gratuitous service of the sick, a thing unknown before in that region. They gave medical aid to many, nearly all of whom recovered, and thus gained many friends. Preaching was commenced in September to a small but attentive congregation. Mrs. Whiting and Miss Tilden had an interesting school, composed chiefly of Mohammedan girls.

There was also a school for boys under a Greek teacher, with twenty-four pupils. In 1838, Mr. Whiting was obliged, by the protracted sickness of his wife, to visit the United States, and Mr.

Lanneau was alone at Jerusalem, with Tanns Kerem, and suffering from extreme weakness of the eyes; but was encouraged by the arrival of Rev. Charles S. Sherman and wife in the autumn of 1839. The new missionary expressed his surprise at finding the different cla.s.ses so little affected by the prejudices of sect in their intercourse with members of the mission. The illness of Mr. Lanneau became at length so distressing, as to require his absence from the field for nearly two years. Before his return to the East, which was early in 1843, the Committee had expressed an opinion, that it was expedient to suspend further efforts at Jerusalem. Mr. Lanneau, however, resumed his abode there until the visit of the writer, with Dr.

Hawes, in the spring of 1844, This was after there had been a protracted conference with the mission at Beirt, at which nothing appeared to affect the decision of the Prudential Committee, and Mr.

Lanneau removed with his family to Beirt. Writing of Jerusalem to the Committee, Dr. Hawes says: "In regard to this city, viewed as a field for missionary labor, I saw nothing which should give it a special claim on our attention. It has indeed a considerable population, amounting perhaps to seventeen or eighteen thousand. But it is such a population as seemed to me to bear a near resemblance to the contents of the sheet which Peter saw let down from heaven by the four corners. It is composed of well-nigh all nations and of all religions, who are distinguished for nothing so much as for jealousy and hatred of each other. As to the crowds of pilgrims who annually visit the Holy City,--a gross misnomer, by the way, as it now is,--they are certainly no very hopeful subjects of missionary effort; drawn thither, as they are, chiefly by the spirit of superst.i.tion; and during the brief time they remain there, kept continually under the excitement of lying vanities, which without number are addressed to their eyes, and poured in at their ears."

The burying-ground belonging to the Board, on a central part of Mount Zion, near the so-called "Tomb of David," and not far from the city, inclosed by a stone wall, was reserved for a Protestant burying-place, to be for the use of all sects of Protestant Christians.

CHAPTER III.

SYRIA.

1823-1828.

The civil and social condition of Jerusalem and Palestine was such, on the arrival of Messrs. Bird and Goodell in 1823, that their brethren advised them to make Beirt the centre of their operations.

The advice was followed; and this was the commencement of what took the name of the Syria Mission.

The ancient name of Beirt was Berytus. The city is pleasantly situated on the western side of a large bay, and has a fertile soil, with a supply of good water, sufficient in ordinary seasons, from springs flowing out of the adjacent hills. Its population and wealth have greatly increased of late. The anchorage for s.h.i.+ps is at the eastern extremity of the bay, two miles from the city. Lebanon rises at no great distance on the east, stretches far toward the north and the south, and is a healthful and pleasant resort for Franks in summer. There is a large and beautiful plain on the south, abounding in olive, palm, orange, lemon, pine, and mulberry trees. Damascus was then distant three days, but less time is required now, by reason of the new macadamized road. Sidon might be reached in one day, Tyre in two, and Tripoli in three. An additional motive, in those troublous times, for making Beirt a central station, was the protection afforded by Mr. Abbott, a friendly English Consul.

The two brethren landed, with their wives, October 16th. During the nine mouths of their sojourn at Malta, they had made considerable progress in the Italian language, which was spoken extensively in the Levant; and now, without wholly neglecting the Italian, they applied themselves to the languages of Syria.

Mr. Bird made the Arabic--spoken by the Maronites and Syrian Roman Catholics--his chief study; and Mr. Goodell the Armeno-Turkish, --Turkish written with the Armenian alphabet,--which was the language of the Armenians.

Going to Sidon for aid in his linguistic studies, Mr. Goodell formed the acquaintance of Yakob Agha, an Armenian ecclesiastic, who had dared to marry, a privilege not allowed to him as a bishop. That he might be able to defend his course, he began the study of the New Testament, and thus became impressed with the wickedness around him.

He was at that time acting British agent at Sidon. Mr. Goodell also became acquainted with Dionysius, another Armenian bishop, who had committed a similar offense, and engaged him as a teacher; giving him the name of Carabet, the "Forerunner." He was a native of Constantinople, and had lived thirty-six years in the Armenian convent at Jerusalem. During the last nine of these years, he was a bishop. On account of his age, his services and acquirements, he was regarded as having the standing of an archbishop. Though in darkness on many points, and giving no satisfactory evidence of piety, he made himself useful as a teacher and interpreter, and in his intercourse with the people.

Several English missionaries were added to the Protestant force at that time, and the Papal Church became thoroughly alarmed. Letters were addressed from Rome to the Patriarchal Vicar of Mount Lebanon, the Maronite Patriarch, and the Vicar of Syria and Palestine, urging them to render ineffectual, in every possible manner, the impious undertaking of those missionaries. These letters were dated in the first month of 1824, and the firman against the circulation of the Scriptures was issued by the Grand Seignior very soon after. Though feebly enforced by the Turkish authorities this gave weight and influence, for a time, to the "anathemas," of the Maronite and Syrian Patriarchs against the "Bible men." Peter Ignatius Giarve, the Syrian Patriarch, some years before, while Archbishop of Jerusalem, had visited England, and there obtained, under false pretenses, a considerable sum of money from Protestant Christians, to print the Holy Scriptures according to the text of his own Church. He now issued a manifesto, first defending himself from the charge of deception, and then warning his flock "not to receive the Holy Scriptures, nor any other books printed and circulated by the Bible-men, even though given gratis, and according to the edition printed by the Propaganda under ecclesiastical authority."

Notwithstanding all this, the brethren took a hopeful view of their prospects. "To get a firm footing," they say, "among a people of a strange speech and a hard language; to inspire confidence in some, and weaken prejudice in others; to ascertain who are our avowed enemies, and who are such in disguise; to become acquainted with the mode of thinking and feeling, with the springs of action, and with the way of access to the heart; to begin publicly to discuss controversial subjects with the dignitaries of the Church, and to commence giving religious instruction to the common people; to be allowed to have a hand in directing the studies and in controlling the education of the young; and to begin to exert an influence, however circ.u.mscribed at first, yet constantly extending and increasingly salutary,--all this, though it be not 'life from the dead,' nor the song of salvation, yet is to be regarded as truly important in the work of missions."

In the year 1824, the schools were commenced at Beirt, which have since grown into an influential system. The first was a mere cla.s.s of six Arab children, taught daily by the wives of the missionaries.

Soon an Arab teacher was engaged, and before the end of the year the pupils had increased to fifty. In 1826 the average attendance in the free schools of Beirt and vicinity, was more than three hundred; in the following year it was six hundred in thirteen schools, and more than one hundred of these pupils were girls. The Arabs were thought to have less quickness than the Greeks, to be less studious and ambitious, and more trifling, inconstant, and proud of little things; but many of them were lively and promising, and did themselves honor by their punctuality and application. The Romish ecclesiastics were very hostile to all these schools.

It was in the summer of 1825, that Asaad el-s.h.i.+diak became first personally known to the mission, as the instructor of Mr. King in the Syriac language. His case soon acquired an extraordinary interest, and will occupy a separate chapter.

In March, 1826, several Greek vessels entered the port of Beirt, and landed five hundred men. They were unable to scale the walls, but plundered the houses of natives on the outside. The wild Bedawin, whom the Pasha of Acre sent to drive them away, were worse than the Greeks. They plundered without making any distinctions, and among other houses the one occupied by Mr. Goodell, but Consul Abbott obliged the Pasha to pay for what they took from the missionaries. It was afterwards ascertained, that the Maronite bishop, having learned that the leases of the missionaries would soon expire, came to Beirt just before this invasion, with an excommunication for every Maronite who should permit his house to be hired by a missionary; and prepared by bribery and intrigue to bring also the Greek bishop and the Moslem rulers to act in concert with himself, in driving Protestant missionaries from the country. The sudden landing of the Greeks obliged him to flee in the night, leaving his wicked devices unaccomplished, while the Maronites were glad to place their best houses in the hands of the missionaries.

In 1827, the missionaries hoped that about twenty of those among whom they labored, had been created anew in Christ Jesus. Among them were Asaad and Phares s.h.i.+diak, from the Maronite Church; a lady from the Latin Church; Dionysius, Gregory Wortabet, Jacob, and the wife of Dionysius, of the Armenian Church; the wife of Wortabet and Yooseph Leflufy, of the Greek Catholic Church; and Asaad Jacob and Tanns el-Haddad, of the Greek Church. Leflufy was described as a youth of great boldness and decision, and as thoroughly convinced of the errors of his Church. In April of this year, Dionysius revisited Jerusalem, as the interpreter of German missionaries. The Armenian Convent owed him a sum of money, which it refused to pay, and forbade any Armenian in the city to speak to him. The Greeks, on the other hand, treated him with attention, and so did the Moslem governor. He returned to Beirt in company with three hundred of the Armenian pilgrims, who were no sooner out of Jerusalem than they began to treat him with kindness and respect, while they were full of inquiries as to what he and the Protestants believed, what ordinances they had, and how they observed them, with many more such questions. He was engaged in conversation with them day and night, and had full opportunity to explain his religious views, and to show them the difference between the Christianity of the New Testament, and that of the Oriental Churches; and they expressed much astonishment at his statements. Some of them were persons of respectability and influence, and declared their indignation at the treatment he had received from the convent. It is probable that these conversations had some connection with the spirit of reform among the Armenians, which not long after appeared at Constantinople.

The Rev. Eli Smith reached Beirt early in 1827. At the monthly concert in March, kept as a day of fasting and prayer, and closed with the Lord's Supper, sixteen persons were present, who were all regarded as hopefully pious. They were from America, Europe, Asia, and Africa, and were members of nine churches,--Congregational, Episcopal, Lutheran, Reformed Lutheran, Moravian, Latin, Armenian, Greek Catholic, and Abyssinian. Dionysius Carabet, Gregory Wortabet, and their wives were then received into the mission church, as was also the wife of Mr. Abbott, the English Consul, a native of Italy.

This admission of converts into a church, without regard to their previous ecclesiastical relations, was a practical ignoring of the old church organizations in that region. It was so understood, and the spirit of opposition and persecution was roused to the utmost.

In the Maronite and Greek Catholic churches, severe denunciations were uttered against the missionaries, and all who should render them any service.

Messrs. Goodell and Bird gave more or less time, with the help of their native a.s.sistants, to preparing useful works in the native languages. These, with Mr. King's "Farewell Letter," were copied by the pen, and were eagerly sought and gladly transcribed, and the need of a printing-press on the ground began to be felt.

Beirt was visited by the plague in the spring of 1827, but the deaths were not numerous. In August Mr. Bird, finding it needful to take his family to the mountains, ascended to Ehden by way of Tripoli, from which Ehden was distant seven hours. He went by special permission of the Emir Bes.h.i.+r, and was received in the most friendly manner by the Sheikh Latoof, and his son Naanui. The "Patriarch of Antioch and all the East," who resided at Cann.o.been, hearing of this, proceeded at once to excommunicate the sheikh and his family, who had dared to a.s.sociate "with that deceived man, and deceiver of men, Bird, the Bible-man." An infernal spirit appears in the excommunications of the Romish Church. This of Latoof and family ran thus: "They are accursed, cut off from all the Christian communion; and let the curse envelope them as a robe, and spread through all their members like oil, and break them in pieces like a potter's vessel, and wither them like the fig tree cursed by the mouth of the Lord himself; and let the evil angel reign over them, to torment them by day and night, asleep and awake, and in whatever circ.u.mstances they may be found. We permit no one to visit them, or employ them, or do them a favor, or give them a salutation, or converse with them in any form; but let them be avoided as a putrid member, and as h.e.l.lish dragons. Beware, yea, beware of the wrath of G.o.d." With regard to Mr. Bird and his family, the Patriarch said: "We grant no permission to any one to receive them; but, on the contrary, we, by the word of the Lord of almighty authority, require and command all, in the firmest manner, that not one visit them, nor do them any sort of service, or furnish them any sort of a.s.sistance whatever, to protract their stay in these parts or any other. Let no one receive them into his house, or into any place whatever that belongs to him, but let all avoid them, in every way, in all things temporal as well as spiritual. And whoever, in his stubbornness, shall dare to act in opposition to this our order with regard to Bird, and his children, and his whole family, shall fall, _ipso facto_, under the great excommunication, whose absolution is reserved to ourself alone."

A copy of this doc.u.ment was furnished to Mr. Bird, by the Bishop of Ehden; who, though feeble in health, was second to no prelate of his sect in knowledge, prudence, and evangelical sentiment. On hearing the Patriarch's proclamation read in church, he is said to have fainted, and did not recover his health for weeks afterwards. As a consequence of this proclamation of the Patriarch, a rival sheikh was encouraged to make a violent a.s.sault upon Latoof, in which the latter received a severe contusion on the head, and his wife's mother had her wrist broken. Being warned of a still more determined effort to drive the missionary away, Mr. Bird thought it due to his friend to leave the place; which he did, accompanied by Naanui, leaving his wife and children, and descending to the Greek convent of Hantra, and from thence to Tripoli. Thither the Patriarch followed him with his maledictions. He however obtained a quiet residence at Bawhyta, under Moslem protection, where he was rejoined by his family, and afterwards in the convent of Belmont. Naanui was his faithful companion through all his wanderings and sojourning on the mountains.

Mr. Bird returned to Beirt on the 22d of December, and was received by his Maronite acquaintances with unwonted cordiality.

The battle of Navarino was not the immediate cause of the suspension of the mission; but, in all the ensuing five months, there was constant apprehension of war between Turkey and the allies engaged in that battle, which was so destructive to the naval power of the Turks. The British Consulate was closed, and Mr. Abbott, their friend and protector, was obliged to withdraw privately. No reliance could be placed on the Pasha; and the Prince of the mountains had sent word, that no Frank refugees would be received in his dominions, in case of war. In the utter stagnation of trade, the missionaries could obtain no money for their bills, and no European or American vessels of war visited the port. Messrs. Goodell, Bird and Smith, in view of all these facts, thought it their duty to avail themselves of the opportunity afforded by an Austrian vessel to remove, for a season, to Malta.

They accordingly embarked on the 2d of May, 1828, taking with them Carabet, Wortabet, and their wives, and arrived at Malta on the 29th. No opposition was made. "The parting scene at our leaving, was more tender and affecting than we could have expected, and afforded a comforting evidence that, whatever may be the impression we have left on the general population, there are _some_ hearts in Syria, which are sincerely attached to us. Many, as we pa.s.sed them, prayed that G.o.d would protect us on our voyage. And others, notwithstanding the plague, came to our houses to bid us farewell. One thoughtful youth, who was with us daily, belonging to one of the first Greek families, was full of grief, and earnestly begged us to take him with us, though contrary to the will of his parents."

CHAPTER IV.

SYRIA.

THE MARTYR OF LEBANON.

1826-1830.