my purpose is twofold: first to show the american people the kind of work in which the missionaries in turkey are engaged, and second to assure them from personal observation that these missionaries do not encourage revolutionists or the revolutionary spirit. i am surer of nothing than i am of this. if you could see them at their somewhat thankless tasks you would regard them as the most consecrated men and women on the planet, as far removed from fostering rebellion as heaven is from earth, making the sacrifice of life and of all social and even domestic relations, and doing it with a cheerfulness which must command not only our respect but also our admiration.
the price to be paid for the enlightenment of the nation is very heavy, but these noble men and saintly women are willing to pay it, and i, for one, feel that my poor life amounts to nothing in comparison; so with a full heart, a heart with a big ache in it, i cry, “god bless them!”
the missionaries are the sir knights of modern times, their weapons are no longer swords, but ideas. they are to be found in all quarters of the globe, and they are always surrounded by ambushed perils. they are the representatives of a high civilization and of the best religious thought of the age, and are the little “leaven” which in good time is to “leaven the whole lump.” i do not hesitate to say that they are doing more for the turkey of to-day than all the european powers combined.
—george h. hepworth
in “through armenia on horseback.”
[pg 213]
at the beginning of work in turkey all classes were suspicious of the missionaries. experience with the representatives of the roman catholic and greek churches had led the mohammedans and others to fear that their errand was not wholly religious. at the same time, it was impossible for one brought up in the atmosphere of turkey not to confound religion with nationality. the american missionaries had one great advantage, for few even of the educated in turkey ever heard of the united states. so there was not much alarm at the prospects of missionaries from the united states gaining political supremacy in turkey. so far as the turks understood, the country back of them was without strength or repute. this fact allayed the otherwise inevitable suspicion that they were political agents.
it required more than fifty years of residence in that country, accompanied by a life of constant devotion to the interests of the people, to remove the impression that the missionaries were there for what they could make out of it. the following conversation, which actually took place, illustrates fairly well the attitude of inquiry and doubt. the parties to it were a missionary and an intelligent armenian in the interior of the country:
“you must receive a pretty large salary to lead you to leave your home and friends in america and endure here among us the hardships of this country.”
“quite the contrary,” replied the missionary; “i receive what all american missionaries receive and no more, that is my bare living with no surplus.” [pg 214]
“then,” the armenian quickly replied, “you must expect, after you have learned the language, to receive some government appointment at a large salary.”
the missionary answered, “few missionaries have ever given up missionary work for a government appointment, and i have never seen one who would consider such an appointment, or who would remain in the country at all for diplomatic or consular service.”
“there can be little doubt, then,” said the questioner, “that in your country the missionary is held in high honor by all the people, so much so that it is worth all it costs to win it by a period of severe hardship in a land like this.”
“you are wrong again, my friend,” said the missionary, “for most of the people in the united states think a missionary is a fool to throw his life away in a strange and hostile land; and, besides, the missionaries enter upon the work for life; therefore they have no time left to go home and enjoy the honors that an admiring people might wish to thrust upon them.”
“what are you out here for, anyway?” asked the discouraged guesser.
“we missionaries have come out here only to help the people of this country to establish worthy christian institutions and to become better men and women.”
“surely there is some other reason,” said the man as he walked away. “who would ever bring upon himself such hardship and trouble for that?”
the true christian motive that considers others’ needs ahead of self-interest was little understood, and it required generations of missionary labors to bring the people to begin to understand it. [pg 215]
times of great national distress like war, massacres, famine, and plague, had given the missionaries unusual opportunity to prove to the people that they were there, not for their own personal comfort but to bind up the broken heart and give cheer to the downcast and the dying. every added missionary grave, and they dot the country from arabia to the black sea and from persia to salonica, was an added argument which no oriental could answer, that the missionaries were there to minister and not to be ministered unto, and to give even their lives for others.
through many vicissitudes and misunderstandings and misconceptions the missionaries have quietly continued their labors until, without doubt, it would be hard to find an intelligent man of any race or creed in the empire who does not believe them to be earnest, sincere, altruistic in their life and work. all classes have learned that in times of trouble the missionary is their best friend, no matter how much they may have abused him in times of prosperity. they know that he will always do what he believes to be for their best good, even though there may be a difference of judgment as to what is the best good.
in the midst of oriental duplicity, the missionaries have established the reputation for speaking the truth. at first this was one of the severest puzzles to the turks in the dealings of the missionaries with the government. they could conceive of no reason for telling the truth under such circumstances, so they were completely misled. the missionaries applied to the government, in an interior city, for permission to erect a schoolhouse. all school buildings were at that time opposed by the turkish officials. the governor asked, “for what is the building to be used?” “a school,” replied the missionary. “what are [pg 216] you going to keep in it?” asked the governor. “scholars and teachers,” was the reply. “why do you want so large a building?” was the next question. “because we are going to have many teachers and many pupils,” said the missionary. “what are you going to manufacture there when it is done?” was asked. “scholars,” was the answer. the missionary was dismissed and for hours the council discussed the question. not a man present believed that the proposed building was to be a school. they said, “surely if he were building a school he would not have acknowledged it; it must indeed be something else.” it was afterwards learned that they thought the building was to be an armory for manufacturing guns.
when dr. hepworth of the new york herald took his famous journey through armenia in 1896, he was given, by a turkish governor, a letter of introduction to one of the american missionaries, dr. h. n. barnum at harpoot, with the added statement, “he knows more about the conditions of the interior of turkey than any living man, and you can depend absolutely upon what he says.”
there is no class of people so trusted by the armenians in turkey, as well as by all other races, as are the american missionaries. men who have been hostile to missionary work bring their daughters to the missionary boarding-school because, they say, “we know they will be safe here.” all classes take the word of a missionary as absolutely true and without question. money is put into their hands by the people for safe-keeping or for transmission to some other part of the country or out of it, without hesitation and without asking for a receipt.
there is no doubt that the turkish officials, even though for reasons known to themselves they may oppose the erection of buildings for [pg 217] school or hospital purposes and hamper the missionaries in their general evangelistic work, have long since ceased to regard them in any other light than as men and women of unquestioned integrity and purity of life. much testimony might be adduced to show the confidence that officials repose in individual missionaries. they may not like the higher educational institutions the missionaries have established there, which are leading an increasing percentage of the people to think for themselves, yet they do not now attempt to destroy them or their influence by making personal charges against the missionaries themselves.
many turkish officials of high rank have, in times of special stress, sought the counsel of missionaries, who had resided in the country many years, and who were generally reputed to have a wide knowledge of local affairs. it is interesting to note that in many instances the counsel obtained was acted upon, and later sincere gratitude was expressed.
after the armenian massacre in 1895-96 the armenian patriarch at constantinople called the treasurer of the american board at constantinople and asked him to take complete charge of a considerable sum of money collected for relief. “for,” said he, “i have no means of distributing this fund with assurance that it will, in any large part, reach the needy people, but i know that through the missionaries every dollar will go to the suffering poor.”
the absolute integrity of the life and dealing of the missionaries with the people has done perhaps as much in that land of deceit and dishonesty to commend the simple gospel of jesus christ to all classes as any other single phase of the missionary work. it has come to be believed that a christian of the missionary type must be true, honest, [pg 218] upright, and pure. this has great significance in a land like turkey.
while turkey has suffered but little from general famine or from plagues that have been sweeping in their character, still the missionaries have been compelled to devote much time and strength to the distribution of help to the starving and homeless, owing to oft-repeated political disasters amounting occasionally to open massacres. these began in 1822 at the time of the greco-turkish war when in chios it was reported that fully fifty thousand lives were lost. the next great movement of the kind occurred in the nestorian mountains when some ten thousand armenians and nestorians were said to have been put to death. in 1860 in the lebanon and at damascus about the same number of maronites and syrians were destroyed by the turks and druses. in 1876 occurred the well remembered bulgarian massacres where some ten thousand bulgarians were reported to have lost their lives. the last great and concerted movement of this kind occurred, as we all remember, in 1895-96, which extended from persia to constantinople and in which it is impossible to state with accuracy how many thousands of armenians were massacred. the number has been placed at one hundred thousand, though this is undoubtedly too high.
in addition to these marked cases of violence and murder, the same process has gone on upon a much smaller scale for the last thirty years, causing terror, distress, and poverty, and calling for comfort and assistance. in the last three instances of general massacres reported above, the missionaries were upon the ground, facing no little of the peril and hardship with the people, and afterwards acted as agents for the distribution of relief to those who were left in abject [pg 219] destitution. hundreds of thousands of dollars have passed through their hands for this purpose. with this money they have procured and distributed food and clothing to the starving and naked, while many lines of industry were opened to afford means of prolonged self-help.
the missionaries in turkey have taken the lead in the application of principles by which, in the distribution of charity, much more can be accomplished, without impoverishing the recipients, by devising means whereby the aid received can be earned, at least in part. this same principle has been also carried out in the support of the large number of orphans saved from the massacres of 1895.
they have purchased and distributed seed for planting when famine conditions had exhausted the supply. in severer cases when their cattle had died or had been taken from them, missionaries have purchased oxen and loaned them to the farmers for putting in their crops. the policy of aid practised at all times has been to help the people to help themselves.
the missionaries in these and other lines of eleemosynary operations have demonstrated that they are the friends of all without reference to creed or religion. while these disasters have been terrible to contemplate and have brought immeasurable hardship and care upon the missionaries, they have yet opened new opportunities of approach to the people and have revealed the sincere desire to relieve them in their supreme distress. all classes have learned to trust the missionaries, and in times of trouble, all races appeal to them for assistance.
