CHAPTER XXIII. THE ARMENIANS.—1846-1848.
Continued Persecutions.—Interposition of the English Ambassador.
—Designation of "Protestants."—A Vizierial Letter.—The
Patriarch's Hostility to the Seminary.—Its Effect.—Seminary for
Young Ladies.—Perpetual Excommunication of the Protestants.
—Consequent Organization of an Evangelical Church at
Constantinople.—Choice of Officers.—Ordination of a Pastor.
—Public Declaration of Faith.—Other Churches formed.—Early Death
of the Pastor.—The Pastor's Wife.—Der Haritûn.—Reformation at
Aintab.—Visit of Mr. Van Lennep.—Visit of Mr. Johnston.—Arrival
of Dr. Azariah Smith.—Mr. Schneider's Visit.—Trying Situation of
the Protestants.—Power of the Patriarch reduced.—Number of the
Protestants.—The Churches.—Additional Native Pastors.—Revivals of
Religion.
INTRODUCTION.
We may not hope for the conversion of the Mohammedans, unless true Christianity be exemplified before them by the Oriental Churches. To them the native Christians represent the Christian religion, and they see that these are no better than themselves. They think them worse; and therefore the Moslem believes the Koran to be more excellent than the Bible.
It is vain to say, that the native Christians have so far departed from the truth that they do not feel the power of the Gospel, and that therefore the immorality of their lives is not to be attributed to its influence. The Mohammedan has seen no other effect of it, and he cannot be persuaded to read the Bible to correct the evidence of his observation, and perhaps also of his own painful experience.
Hence a wise plan for the conversion of the Mohammedans of Western Asia necessarily involved, first, a mission to the Oriental Churches. It was needful that the lights of the Gospel should once more burn on those candlesticks, that everywhere there should be living examples of the religion of Jesus Christ, that Christianity should no longer be associated in the Moslem mind with all that is sordid and base.
The continued existence of large bodies of nominal Christians among these Mohammedans, is a remarkable fact. They constitute more than a third part of the population of Constantinople, and are found in all the provinces of the empire, as, also, in Persia, and are supposed to number at least twelve millions. Being so numerous and so widely dispersed, should spiritual life be revived among them a flood of light would illumine the Turkish empire, and shine far up into Central Asia. The followers of Mohammed would look on with wonder, and perhaps, at first, with hatred and persecution; but new views of the Gospel would thus be forced upon them, and no longer would they be able to boast of the superiority of their own religion.
It is true of the Oriental Churches, that they have lost nearly all the essential principles of the Gospel; at least that those principles have, in great measure, ceased to have a practical influence.1 Their views of the Trinity, and of the divine and human natures of Christ, are not unscriptural; but their views of the way of salvation through the Son, and of the work of the Holy Spirit, are sadly perverted. The efficacy of Christ's death for the pardon of sin, is secured to the sinner, they suppose, by baptism and penance. The belief is universal, that baptism cancels guilt, and is regeneration. They also believe baptism to be the instrumental cause of justification. Hence faith is practically regarded as no more than a general assent of the understanding to the creeds of their churches. Of the doctrine of a justifying faith of the heart,—the distinguishing doctrine of the Gospel,—the people of the Oriental Churches are believed to have been wholly ignorant, before the arrival of Protestant missionaries among them.
1 This brief description of the religion of the Oriental Churches, is condensed from a statement by that eminent missionary, Dr. Eli Smith, in a sermon published in 1833, but now accessible to very few. I often use his words, as best adapted to convey the true idea. Subsequent observations, so far as I know, have never called for any modification in his statement.
Being thus freed from the condemning power of original sin, and regenerated by baptism, men were expected to work their way to heaven by observing the laws of God and the rites of the church. These rites were fasting, masses, saying of prayers, pilgrimages, and the like, and in practice crowded the moral law out of mind. The race of merit was hindered by daily sins, but not stopped, provided the sins were of a class denominated venial. These could be canceled by the rites of the church, the most important of which was the mass, or the consecration and oblation of the elements of the Lord's Supper. That ordinance is to be observed in remembrance of Christ, but the people of the Oriental Churches are taught to look upon it as a renewal of his death. On the priest's pronouncing the words, "This is my body," the elements are believed to be changed from bread and wine, and thenceforth to contain the body and blood, the soul and divinity, of Christ; so that He is crucified afresh, and made an expiatory sacrifice for sin, every time the consecration is performed; which, in most churches, is almost every morning in the year. Its merit attaches not only to the offerer and the partaker, but to all the faithful, living and dead; especially to those who, by paying the priest, or by some other service, have their names mentioned in the prayers that form a part of the ceremony.