t w S.W V THE GREEK CHURCH AND Protestant Missions; OR, Missions to the Oriental Churches. THE GREEK CHURCH AND Protestant Missions; OR, Missions to the Oriental Churches. BY REV. HENRY HARRIS JESSUP, D.D., American Presbyterian Missionary , Beirut, SYRIA. 1891. Copyright, 1891, by THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE CO., New York. THE GREEK CHURCH AND PROT- ESTANT MISSIONS ; OR, MISSIONS TO THE ORIENTAL CHURCHES. BY REV. HENRY H. JESSUP, D.D., BEIRUT, SYRIA. The Oriental churches may be divided into six great classes, comprising fourteen different sects : I. The Monophysite, Eutychian, or anti- Chalcedonian sects, who reject the decrees of the Council of Chalcedon held in 451. These are four : the Armenians, Jacobites (or Syrians), Copts, and Abyssinians. They all have their own distinct ritual and calen- dar, are hostile to each other and to all other Christian sects, have a married parish clergy, and reject the primacy of the Pope. II. The anti-Ephesian, who reject the Council of Ephesus in 431. These are the Nestorians or Chaldeans. They have a married clergy, a high reverence for the Scriptures, and but little picture worship. III. The Orthodox Greek, who accept the seven General Councils. The Greek Church is Rome decapitated — a priestly sys- tem without a pontifex, an exclusive tradi- tional Church, which yet allows the Bible 4 THE GREEK CHURCH AND to the people. In the Turkish Empire its patriarchs and the most of its bishops are foreigners, speaking only Greek and igno- rant of the customs and wants of the people, though of late the Syrians of the Greek Church demand bishops of the Arab race. The parish clergy are married and generally most illiterate. The present Anglican bishop of Jerusalem remarked to a traveller recently that “ no one but those who lived in the East could be aware of the gross igno- rance and immorality of the Greek priests.” Ordinarily the practice in appointing priests is that of Jeroboam, who “ made priests of the lowest of the people.” IV. The Maronite, a papal sect, the an- cient Monothelites, who accepted the papacy in 1182 a.d. They are chiefly peasants in Northern Lebanon, an ignorant people, and an educated priesthood sworn to allegiance to Rome, and yet like all the above in hav- ing a married parish clergy. The Maronite patriarch is regarded by his people as hardly inferior to the Pope. V. The six Oriental papal 6ects, who are converts from six of the above sects to the Church of Rome. They are the Papal Greek, Papal Armenian, Papal Syrian, Pa- pal Nestorian, Papal Coptic, and Papal Abyssinian. They maintain their own cal- endars and saint days, the marriage of the clergy, and various ancient prerogatives PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 5 which the papal legates are now striving most assiduously to abolish. VI. The Latins, a small community com- posed chiefly of attaches of the French and Italian monasteries, who have conformed in all respects to the Church of Rome. These sects all agree sufficiently both in the common truth and the common error which they hold, to be classed as one — one in their need of reformation, one in being an obstacle to the Christianization of the Mohammedan world. They all hold the dootrine of transubstan- tiation, of baptismal regeneration, priestly absolution, Mariolatry and saint worship, image and picture worship, auricular con- fession, and prayers for the dead. Their patriarchs and bishops are celibate, but the parish clergy are generally allowed to marry once. Instruction in the Scriptures is vir- tually unknown. The numbers of these sects, not including Russia and Greece, are as follows : Greeks, 1,000,000 ; Maronites, 230,000 ; Nestorian Catholics, 20,000 ; Greek Catholics, 50,000 ; Jacobite Syrians, 30,000 ; other papal sects, 300,000 ; Nestorians, 140,000 ; Nestorians in India, 116,000 ; Armenians, 3,000,000 ; Copts, 200,000 ; Abyssinians, 4,500,000 ; total, 9,586,000. Thus we have about ten millions of nomi- nal Christians scattered throughout the 6 THE GREEK CHURCH AND great centres and seats of Mohammedan population and power. These Christian sects have never felt the impulse of such an awakening as shook all Europe in the days of the Reformation. About thirty years after the death of Luther the German Protestant divines opened cor- respondence with the Patriarch of Constan- tinople, but he rejected their overtures with contempt. The Greek Church “ knew not the day of its visitation.” For three hun- dred years after that time, with the excep- tion of the sending of papal legates, hardly a movement was made in Europe toward modifying the state of the Eastern churches. In the year 1819 the first American mis- sionaries came to Western Asia, bringing the Gospel of Christ to the Mohammedans, but in their explorations they came in con- tact with these various Oriental Christian sects. They found them to be ignorant, illiterate, superstitious, idolatrous, despised, and hated by the Mohammedans. Yet they were instructed “ not to inter- fere with the Oriental churches, but to visit the ecclesiastics and persuade them, if pos- sible, to abandon their errors, which are re- pugnant to the Word of God.” They gave themselves, therefore, to the work of education, Bible distribution, and the press. But in 1832 the Greek bishops in Latakiah, Tripoli, Damascus, and other PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 7 places gathered the Arabic Bibles (printed in London from the version of the Roman propaganda) and burned them in the court- yards of the churches. In 1830 the Maro- nite patriarch put to death Asaad-esh- Shidiak, the martyr of Lebanon, for reading the Bible and rejecting the errors of Rome. In September, 1835, Rev. Drs. Eli Smith and W. M. Thomson and other missionaries, in reply to the request of a papal Greek priest from Acre to profess the Protestant faith, adopted the following minutes : 1. It is not an object with us to draw individuals from other native Christian sects and thereby in- crease our own denomination. 2. Yet ac- cording to the principles of the churches who have sent us hither, when a member of any native sect, giving satisfactory evidence of piety, desires the sacraments of us, we cannot refuse his request, however it may interfere with his previous ecclesiastical re- lations.” On this basis individuals of the various Oriental churches, including bishops, priests, and others, were received to the Lord’s table, together with baptized converts from the Druzes. But the number of enlightened men and women increased in various parts of the land, and they demanded the right to be organized into a distinct Protestant Church of their own. This request was finally acceded to, and 8 THE GREEK CHURCH AND the first Protestant native Syrian church was organized in 1848. Since that time twenty-five other churches have been or- ganized in this mission, with about 1700 communicants from among Moslems, Jews, Druzes, Greeks, Maronites, Nusairiyeh, and Bedawin Arabs. The whole number of Protestant churches in the empire is now about 175, with 20,000 communicants and nearly 100,000 adherents. The majority of these communities are un- doubtedly from the Oriental churches, and we are now met by the high ecclesiastical party in the Anglican Church with the pro- test that this whole movement is a mistake. It is denounced as proselytism, as an at- tempt to build up one Christian Church at the expense of another. It is said that these Greeks and Maronites and others have the creeds of Christendom, and we have no right to receive their followers into our churches. We do not propose to reply to this charge by the “ it tu Brute. ” coun- tercharge that these same high sacerdotal- ists do not hesitate in England and America to receive scores of Methodists and Bap- tists, Presbyterians, Congregationalists and Friends to their own church, without feel- ing that they have committed the heinous sin of proselytism. The work of missions in the East can be justified without such a personal argumentum ad hominem. PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 0 Let us consider the whole question calm- ly, in the light of God’s Word and Provi- dence. The chief and ultimate object of mission- ary work in Western Asia is the conversion of the Mohammedans to the Christian faith. They number 180,000,000 in Asia and Afri- ca, and constitute one of the great influen- tial factors in the future religious history of the race. The Gospel is to be given to them. All the Christian churches which have any missionary zeal admit this. Thus far they are almost unaffected by the great missionary movements of the nineteenth century. They believe in one God and in the divine origin of the Old and New Testaments ; but regard the Scriptures as corrupted, deny the divinity of Christ, ignore the spiritual- ity of religion, and look upon Christians as their hereditary enemies. Having seen only the Oriental type of Christianity, they de- spise its immorality and idolatry, and pro- test against the creature worship and image worship of both the Greek and Latin churches. Images, pictures, and saints are the abomination of the Mohammedan world. The pagans of the second century ob- jected to Christianity that it had neither altars nor images ; the Moslem of the nine- teenth century objects to Christianity that it has only images and altars. 10 THE GREEK CHURCH AND The Christian missionary to-day urges a Mohammedan to accept Christianity. He is met with the derisive reply, “ Thank God we are not idol worshippers as are you Christians, and God willing, we never will he. We have lived among Christians twelve hundred years, and we want none of your creature worship. There is no God but God.” The missionary may protest and ex- plain, but until he can show the Moslem a pure Christianity in life and doctrine, and illustrate by living examples the Bible ideal of a Christian church, his appeals and argu- ments will be in vain. This state of things confronted all Chris- tian missionaries in Oriental lands fifty years ago, and it confronts them to-day. These Oriental churches are among the greatest obstacles to the conversion of their Mohammedan neighbors. Protestants gen- erally will admit this with regard to the Church of Eome, and at the same time there are those who contend that the Greek Church is purer, and hence should be in- trusted with the work of evangelizing the Moslems and Jews in Western Asia. As this question is now a “ burning” one in the Anglican Church, let us ask what is the teaching and practice of the Greek Church in Western Asia to-day ? Our reply will be takeu chiefly from their own ecclesiasti- cal books. The XIXth Article of faith of PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 11 the Church of England declares that “ as the churches of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch have erred, so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of ceremonies, but also in mat- ters of faith.” And in Article XXII., “ The Romish doctrine concerning Purgatory, Par- dons, Worshipping and Adoration as well of Images as of Reliques, and also Invocation of Saints is repugnant to the Word of God.” I. In the Greek Catechism, Jerusalem ed., page 82, we read, “It is one of the presumptuous sins against the Holy Spirit, to hope for salvation without works to merit it.” It is plainly taught that justification can only be obtained as a reward of merito- rious actions. In this the Greeks and Latins agree, only that in the Latin theol- ogy “ the merit of good works is acquired only through the atonement of Christ, while the Greek Church puts into a motley confusion Christ, the sacraments, the priest, and good works.” * Rejecting the scrip- tural doctrine of justification by faith, the door is thrown open for endless error and confusion. II. A sacrament is defined to be “a sa- cred performance whereby grace acts in a mysterious manner upon man. In other * “ Researches into the Religions of Syria,” by Rev. John Wortabet, M.D., London, 1860, an admirable book which should he reprinted and widely read. 12 THE GREEK CHURCH AND words, it is the power of God unto salva- tion.” * “ The sacraments are divided inta two classes : first, such as are absolutely necessary in themselves — namely, baptism, holy chrism, and communion. These are indispensably necessary for procuring salva- tion and eternal life ; for it is impossible to be saved without them. The second divi- sion embraces those sacraments, the neces- sity for which proceeds from something else.” III. “ The benefits conferred by baptism are the remission of original sin, the remis- sion of all past actual sins, and grace to sus- tain the believer in his conflict with the world, the flesh, and the devil.” In baptism the first step is exorcising the evil spirit by an elaborate prayer of con- juration. Then the priest breathes into the mouth of the candidate, on his forehead, and on his bosom, each time saying, “ Dis- pel from him every evil and polluted spirit which may lurk in his heart,” etc. Then the candidate or his godfather re- nounces the devil, his works, his angels, his service, and his pomp. The water and oil are then consecrated. In the prayer of consecration for the water is the petition, “ Make it a fountain of im- mortality, granting sanctification, forgiving * Universal Catechism, Part I., sec. 10. PROTKSTANT MISSIONS. 13 6ins, dispelling diseases, destroying devils,” etc. Similar language is used in conse- crating the oil. The person is then immersed three times, in the name of the Father, Son, and lloly Spirit. This trine immersion is regarded as essential, and all converts to the Greek Church must be rebaptized. In this re- spect the Greek Church is far more exclu- sive than the Church of Rome. It does not admit that the Pope or the Archbishop of Canterbury has ever been baptized. Rome admits lay baptism, and baptism by sprink- ling, pouring, or immersion. The Greek Church insists on trine immersion by a Greek priest. An Anglican clergyman once asked permission to “ assist” a Greek priest in his service in Nazareth. The priest politely informed him that as he had never been either baptized or ordained his request must be declined. IV. After baptism the priest administers holy chrism. The oil for this purpose is a mixture of olive oil and aromatic substances made in a decoction by the bishop. The fuel used is the half-rotten and worn-out wood of the holy pictures (eikons), which have been worn off by the constant kissing of devout worshippers or so worm-eaten by age as to be useless. The priest anoints the candidate’s fore- head, eyes, nostrils, mouth, ears, breast, 14 THE GREEK CHURCH AND hands, and feet in the form of a cross, say- ing, “ The seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit. Amen.” The communion is then administered equally to adults and infants. Eucologion, Jerusalem, 1856, (under in- spection of Cyril, Patriarch of Jerusalem.) V. As all sin, original and actual, com- mitted before baptism is washed away by it, subsequent sins are pardoned by the sacra- ment of “ repentance,” “ whereby he who confesses his sins is pardoned by Jesus Christ himself, through the absolution pro- nounced by the priest.” After confession the priest says, “ As to the sins which then hast confessed, go in peace without the least anxiety.” VI. Penances, such as fasting over and above the appointed times, are imposed on the penitent, to “ cleanse the conscience and give peace of mind.” * VII. The Communion is a sacrificial mass, both a eucharistical and propitiatory sacri- fice. In the liturgy of the mass hardly a vestige of the original institution of the Lord's Supper has been preserved. The priest takes a cake of bread in his left hand and the sacred spear in his right, touches the bread with the spear four times in the form of a cross, repeating words from Scrip- ture. Deacon : “ Lift up, 0 Lord.” The * Universal Catechism, Part I., sec. 10. PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 15 priest takes up the sacred bread, saying, “ He was cut oil out of the land of the liv- ing.” He then inverts the bread in the silver plate. Deacon : “ Slay, 0 Lord.” The priest then slays the bread in the form of a cross, etc. Deacon : “ Pierce, 0 Lord.” The priest then pierces the right side of the cake. The priest then takes another cake, and cutting off a part, takes it up on the point of the spear, saying, “In honor and com- memoration of our most blessed lady Mary, the mother of God, whose virginity is per- petual, by whose intercessions accept, 0 God, this sacrifice upon thy heavenly altar.” He then puts it on the light side of the sa- cred bread, saying, “ Upon thy right hand did 6taud the queen in gold of Ophir.” He then cuts nine pieces from the cake, in commemoration of prophets, apostles, fathers, bishops, martyrs, saints, the bishop of the diocese, all the priests and deacons, “ For those who built the temple, even for the forgiveness of their sins, . . . for those who die in hope of the resurrection, for those who present the bread ;” and for all the quick and the dead whom the priest chooses to mention. Then, after various other prayers and ceremonies, the priest says, “ Let both the bread and the mingled wine and water be transmuted and transformed by thy Holy Spirit.” 16 THE GREEK CHURCH AND The deacon then takes a fan and fans the holy substances and the priest says, “We present unto thee this reasonable sacrifice for the believers who are dead, for the primi- tive parents, for the fathers, patriarchs, prophets, apostles, preachers, martyrs, con- fessors, hermits, and teachers, and for the soul of every just man who died in the faith.” At this juncture persons may be seen en- tering the inner temple where the priest is “ sacrificing,” and laying down pieces of money, at the same time repeating to him the names they wish to have mentioned and to receive a part of the benefit from the sacrifice. For a dead person masses are al- ways performed specially. An ex-Greek priest, now for twenty years a Protestant native preacher in Syria, has informed me that he could never hear the ringing sound of the money brought to him while reading the communion service, as a Greek priest, without a shudder, and this was one of the offensive rites of the Greek Church which drove him into Protestantism. VIII. The Greek Church believes in the existence of a limbus wherein the souls of departed men are received and kept until the Day of Judgment. The Catechism teaches that “ prayers offered in behalf of such as die in the faith without having yielded fruits meet for repentance are effica- PROTEST A NT MISSIONS. 17 cious in helping them to obtain a blessed resurrection ; especially if such prayers are accompanied by the offering of the bloodless sacrifice, the sacrifice of the body and blood of Christ, and by alms offered in faith in behalf of them.” IX. \Ye now come to one of the most re- pulsive and unchristian features of the Greek Church, the worship of images. The Council of Constantinople (a.d. 754), composed of 338 bishops, enacted laws re- pressing the growing idolatry of the Eastern Church, but their triumph was brief. The infamous Irene, having first poisoned her husband in order to obtain the regency of the kingdom during the minority of her son, and then having deposed Paul, one of the iconoclasti, from the patriarchal chair of Constantinople and put Tarasius, her secretary, in his place, assembled in concert with Hadrian, the Roman pontiff, a council (a.d. 786), and through it established the worship of images. In spite of the opposi- tion of Charlemagne and the decrees of the Council of Frankfort (a.d. 894), composed of 300 bishops, forbidding image worship, the Roman pontiff maintained it, and the Greek Church to this day defends it on ac- count of the Seventh General Council at Xice in 786. The only difference between the Greek and Latin image worship is that the Greeks repudiate carved images and 18 THE GREEK CHURCH AND statues, and use pictures painted on wood and canvas, the Greek word eikon meaning both pictures and images. In the Synnaxar for the first Sunday in Lent is the gracious expression, “ As to the impious infidels who are not willing to honor the holy images, we excommunicate and curse them, saying Anathema.” And in the Horologion, Beirut ed., 1849, page 696, the crime of idolatry seems to reach its climax. In the prayers to the Virgin offered during Holy Week the curses of the Church are poured upon the heads of all those who do not worship images. “ May the lips of the impious (hypocrites — el-mu-nafikeeri) become dumb, who worship not thy revered likeness, 0 Mary, which was painted by Luke, the most holy evangelist, and by which we have been led to the faith.” It is a painful and sickening spectacle to enter a Greek church and see the crowds of worshippers burning incense, lighting ta- pers, and bowiug before the filthy, painted boards and then devoutly kissing them and crossing themselves. Bishops, priests, dea- cons, and people vie with each other in hon- oring these creatures of the infamous Irene. In Bishop Blyth’s Second Annual Report, July, 1890, page 23, he speaks of “ the iconostasis in the Greek church in Damas- cus — a marble screen on which, some twelve feet from the ground (to avoid dangers of PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 19 iconolatry), are pictures of our Lord and his saints.” Had the bishop looked farther in the church he would have seen a lower picture-stand, on which pictures are daily placed low enough down to be kissed by the people ; and this is true in every Greek church. In the Synnaxar for the first Sunday in Lent it is stated that Theophilus, the icon- oclastic king (a. d. 830-40), “was smitten with an evil disease on account of his hos- tility to image worship ; his mouth was rent open from ear to ear, and his abdominal viscera appeared ; but on repenting and wor- shipping an image, his mouth was restored to its original state, and soon after he died.” The restoration of image worship by his widow Theodora (a.d. 842) on the first Sunday of Lent has ever since been cele- brated in the Greek Church as the feast of Orthodoxy, TTavrjyvpig t rjg dpdudo^ius. In the consecration of a newly painted picture the following words are used : “ Send the grace of thy Holy Spirit and thy angel upon this holy image, in order that if any one pray by means of it, his request may be granted.” In a picture of the Trinity in a book pub- lished in Jerusalem, the Triune God is pic- tured in a group consisting of an old man, a young man, and a dove, and Anthimus, Patriarch of Jerusalem at the time, at- 20 THE GREEK CHURCH AND tempts to justify the shocking sacrilege in labored argument. No wonder that Mohammedans and Jews look with horror and loathing upon such a travesty of Christianity. No wonder that multitudes of Greek Christians in Russia and Turkey, with the open Bible before them, have made haste to “ come out and be separate and touch not the unclean thing.” Can an orthodox creed and his- toric antiquity justify such a glaring crime against God as this shameless idolatry P X. The Mariolatry of the Greek Church is also a grievous error and a stumbling- block in the way of Mohammedans. The Greek Church believes that saints have not yet entered heaven, being in the limbus until the day of resurrection, and yet addresses prayers to them as mediators and intercessors with God. The sole interces- sion of J esus Christ is repudiated, and Mary and the saints exalted into his place. The following petitions are culled from the Greek Prayer - Book (Horologion) : Page 678 r “We are lost through our many sins, turn us not away disappointed, for thou alone art our only hope.” Page 680 : “ Deliver us from all our distresses, for we take refuge in thee. We offer our souls and minds to thee.” Page 704 : “ Oh, thou who didst bear Jesus Christ, purge me with hyssop by thine intercession, for I am very vile.” PKOTESTANT MISSIONS. 21 ■“ Oh, thou who alone art the hope of Chris- tians.” “ 0 Lady, most holy mother of God, grant that I may praise, bless, and glorify thee all the days of my life.” “ Oh, thou who art worthy of all praise, save from future punishment those who cry unto thee, Alleluia.” The use of this word Alleluia (praise ye Jehovah) shows that the Greek Church in plain terms deifies the Virgin Mary, thus justifying the charge of gross polytheism brought by Mohammed against the Christi- anity of his day, and, as Sir William Muir justly says, “ By the cry, ‘ There is no God but God alone/ to trample under foot the superstitions, picture worship, and Mariola- try that prevailed. For example, see in the Koran, Sura V., v. 125, ‘ And when the Lord shall say, 0 Jesus, son of Mary, didst thou say unto men, Take me and my mother for two Gods beside God ? He shall answer, God forbid ; it is not for me to say that which is not the truth/ ” The Mohammedans everywhere believe that the Trinity is a blasphemous elevation of a woman to a place in the Godhead. Is it strange that the Mariolatry of the Greek and Latin churches has become a “ rock of offence” to the whole Mohammedan world ? Space will not allow our giving details as to the worship of relics, and the prayers offered to the wood of the cross, and the 22 THE GREEK CHURCH AND brutal deception of the holy fire, annually sanctioned and promoted by the patriarch, bishops, and priests of Jerusalem as a proof of the orthodoxy of the Greek Church. The patriarch admits it to be a fraud and an imposture, and yet sanctions it because the revenues need it and the people will have it. The Greek Church stands condemned from its own authorized symbols as poly- theistic, idolatrous, and unscriptural. It deserves all the denunciations hurled by Huss and Luther, Wickliffe and Knox upon the abominations of Rome. What, then, is Reformed Protestant Christendom to do in view of these two great facts, the duty of Christianizing the Mohammedan world and the obstacles in- terposed by the idolatries of nominal Chris- tians living among them ? The Oriental churches need the Gospel in its purity. How shall it be given to them ? I. One view has been to effect an outward ecclesiastical union between these sects and Protestant Christianity, on the basis of ad- mitting the truth they hold, without agi- tating the question of their errors. The fatal objection to this is its absolute imprac- ticability. Union of Protestants with the Greek Church on the basis of intercommunion can never be effected, the Greek Church re- maining as it is, until all Protestants have PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 23 submitted to trine immersion by a Greek priest. The concession must be all on one side. Let this be borne in mind, and the advocates of union with the Greek Church may be saved much needless mortification. The modern attempts at fraternization with the Greek Church by Protestant bish- ops, canons, and clergy have only increased the contempt of the Greek clergy for Prot- estantism and their attachment to the tradi- tions and superstitions of their fathers. After an address bv a zealous Anglican in the Greek school in Beirut, full of laudation of the Greek Church, the young people were heard saying, Why should we not wor- ship the Virgin and the saints and the holy pictures, for the Church of England ap- proves it ? As the venerable translator of the Bible into Arabic, the Rev. Dr. Van Dyck, recently wrote to an Anglican clergy- man : “ Union with the Greek Church is easy enough. Let the archbishops, bishops, and other clergy of the Church of England accept rebaptism and reordination at the hands of a Greek priest, together with the holy chrism ; let the higher clergy put away their wives and live a celibate life, and let the rank and file of the English Church be rebaptized, adopt Mariolatry and picture worship, and all the idolatries of the Greek Church, and union will be easy enough, but on no other terms. ** 24 THE GREEK CHURCH AND II. Another plan proposed is to reform the higher ecclesiastics and through them the people. The twelve labors of Hercules were slight compared with such a task. The patriarchs and bishops of the East are, as a class, wealthy, avaricious, masters of political intrigue, unscrupulous, and trained to hierarchical tyranny over the consciences of men, and will probably be the last class in the East to accept the Gospel in its sim- plicity. There are a few noble exceptions, men who would gladly hail a reformation, but find their hands tied and their efforts thwarted by the iron fetters of ecclesiastical despotism. The Greek Church is bound hand and foot to the Church of Greece and Russia, with whom tradition is supreme. No change in liturgies, prayers, doctrines, and usages would be possible without a council of the four patriarchs of Constanti- nople, Antioch, Jerusalem, and Alexandria and the holy Synod of Russia, and such a council, for such an object, is about as likely as a council at Rome to abolish the papacy, or a council at Mecca to abolish Islam. There is no evidence that the clergy de- sire a reform, and the laity have no voice. Archasolatry, avarice, and political power form a threefold cord which will not be easily broken. The mass of the clergy are ignorant and immoral, utterly indifferent to PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 25 spiritual reform, and the ignorant laity, whose war-cry in their contests with the Latins is the infallibility of the first Seven Councils, would mob their clergy if they proposed to cast out the pictures from the churches. Simony and moral dishonesty are notori- ous among the higher clergy. In August, 1891, an intrigue was carried on by a high Greek ecclesiastic in Jerusalem to purchase the patriarchal chair of Antioch (in Damas- cus and Beirut) by the payment of £10,000, and the endowment of the chair with nearly £90,000 on his death. It is humiliating to see godly men in the Protestant Church of England proposing to fraternize with such Oriental ecclesiastics. III. A third scheme has been suggested and faithfully tried. It proposes to preach the Gospel and give the Bible to the people, leaving them in their own ecclesiastical re- lations, in the hope of reforming the Church from within. This plan has been patiently tried in Syria, Egypt, and Asia Minor without suc- cess. It is still on trial among the Nesto- rians. It has been found in the countries first named that no sooner do men read the Bible and know Christ experimentally, no sooner do they compare the New Testament Church with the rites, ceremonies, and priestly systems of the Oriental churches. 26 THE GREEK CHURCH AND than they make haste to “ come out and be separate.” Enlightened New Testament students will not pray to a creature or wor- ship a painted board. Nor, if they wished it, would their priests allow them to remain in a church whose laws they disobey. The result has been that the people them- selves have demanded and compelled the organization of a new Oriental Evangelical Church. This has been done in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Asia Minor. It has vindicated the claims of Christianity to be 'a pure non-idolatrous religion. Moham- medans can see the Bible acted out in life in the teaching and practice of the Protes- tant churches. They are now beginning to believe that the Bible does not sanction idolatry, and that the Oriental churches have gone astray from the truth. In the agreement in 1850 between Baron Bunsen and Archbishop Sumner with regard to the Jerusalem bishopric it is said : “ Duty requires a calm exposition of scriptural truth and a quiet exhibition of scriptural discipline ; and where it has pleased God to give his blessing to it and the mind has become emancipated from the fetters of a corrupt faith, there we have no right to turn our backs upon the liberated captive and bid him return to his slavery or seek aid elsewhere.” This is a clear, calm, and Christian state- PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 27 ment of the case. The 20,000 communi- cants in the Protestant churches of the Turkish Empire are simply “ liberated cap- tives.” These Protestant churches are the “ Sierra Leone” and the “ Frere Town” in this dark Africa of Oriental sacerdotalism. An open Bible and a free salvation through faith in Christ are the right and the refuge of all these enslaved populations. On the basis of Archbishop Sumner’s no- ble utterance, the Church Missionary Soci- ety has pursued its admirable course of evan- gelization in Palestine for the last fifty years. It has opened schools, organized churches, and sowed the good seed of the Gospel. The sainted Bishops Gobat and Barclay fol- lowed the instructions of their archbishop, and welcomed many a liberated captive to the fold of Christ. A self-denying and conscientious band of missionaries, amid difficulties and obstacles found perhaps nowhere else on earth, amid a population demoralized and pauperized and perverted by the wholesale almshouse system of Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Moslems, and Jews who feed and house their adherents and thus well-nigh extinguish every spark of manli- ness and self-respect, have, in spite of such an environment, ennobled the name of Prot- estant Christianity, testified boldly to Mos- lems, Greeks, and Jews of a higher and 28 THE GREEK CHURCH AND purer faith than any they have known, and, by the assiduous labors of the preacher, the teacher, the physician, the Biblewoman, the faithful nurse, and the colporteur, not a few of whom labor at their own charges, laid the foundations of a spiritual reforma- tion, for which all God’s people should offer hearty thanksgiving. And now these good men and women, some of whom have grown gray in the mis- sionary work, are taken to task for “ prose- lytizing” among the adherents of the Holy Orthodox Church. The public press and missionary periodicals are full of the con- flict raging between opposing policies of missionary work in Palestine. The Church Missionary Society, whose object is to “ seek and to save that which was lost,” advocates the principles of Archbishop Sumner, the same which have been acted on by all the American missions in Turkey since 1820. The extreme Sacerdotal party, headed by Archdeacon Denison, advocate a policy so extraordinary that one can only explain it on the ground of ignorance of history, an- cient and modern, or a blind infatuation. They sent a memorial, July 5th, 1891, to the Archbishop of Canterbury, represent- ing : “ I. That English clergymen cannot legit- imately labor for the conversion of Jews and Mohammedans in Syria and Palestine PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 29 without due mission and jurisdiction, to be given by the Orthodox Territorial Episco- pate. “ II. We observe with grave apprehension the prevalence of an opinion that English clergymen engaged in this work (whether with or without mission, as aforesaid) may lawfully, so long as they abstain from active proselytizing, receive into their congrega- tions members of the Orthodox Church who are discontented with the ministrations of their lawful pastors. This proceeding seems to us to be a direct encouragement of a schismatical temper. They therefore anx- iously hope “ III. That no English clergyman will be allowed in the future so to receive any Orthodox Christian, whether child or adult, without the express permission of his lawful pastor. “ IV. That all who have been so received in the past will be urged to obtain such per- mission, or, failing this, to return to their allegiance. “ V. That no English clergyman will be allowed to undertake any spiritual work in Palestine without express commission from the Orthodox patriarch or bishop, granted to him either immediately or mediately through the Anglican bishop resident at Jerusalem. “VI. That in order to obviate all appear- 30 THE GREEK CHURCH AND ance of the exercise of independent jurisdic- tion by any English bishop in Syria or Pales- tine, the use of such terms as diocese, or commissary or archdeacon, and the creation of anything approaching to diocesan organi- sation be avoided.” One needs documentary evidence to prove that Protestant clergymen in the nineteenth century would sign such a document as the above ; yet it is signed by 4 archdeacons, 17 canons, and 68 clergymen — 89 in all. A question arises in the outset. Why should such devotees of legitimatism and Episcopal prerogatives ignore, in such an insulting manner, the ancient and historic Armenian and Latin patriarchs of Jerusa- lem ? And why, if the Greek clergy have his- toric right to the territory, and are qualified to do all diocesan, parochial, and missionary work in Western Asia, should an Anglican bishop invade the sacred precincts even as a resident ? And why, if Bishop Blyth must obtain “ due mission and jurisdiction” to labor for Jews and Moslems, should he not carry the matter to its logical conclusion, and ask for “ legitimate” baptism and “ legitimate” ordination at the hands of the Greek bish- op ? This would simplify the whole matter and at least secure the existence of one godly bishop among the Oriental clergy ; and PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 31 then, on his next visit to England, the new Gneco-Anglican b : shop could rebaptize and reordain the whole 89 memorialists, and re- lieve their minds of any doubt as to their orthodoxy. But seriously, this memorial is a logical and consistent view from the sacerdotal standpoint. The Orthodox Episcopate is everything. Simony, immorality, unscriptural teaching, idolatry, and Mariolatry are nothing — mere trifles. The fact that for twelve hundred years this haughty hierarchy has done noth- ing for the conversion of Moslems and Jews, and has cared to do nothing, and that its gross idolatries have made Mohammedans hate and spit upon the name of Christianity — all this is of no account. These hierarchs have the only legitimate right to preach the Gospel to perishing Jews, Moslems, and pagans in all Western Asia and Northern Africa. If they do not preach, no matter. If their preaching would be a scandal and a shame, no matter. If they preached and prayed, asking that “ the lips” of every Anglican clergyman and layman “ be struck dumb” as impious hypo- crites, because they will “ not worship St. Luke’s picture of the Virgin Mary,” no matter. They are legitimate. If they keep Moslems and Jews — yes, and their own de- luded followers — out of eternal life, it is well, 32 THE GREEK CHURCH AND for the great object of a legitimate eccle- siastical system ‘ ‘ is not the saving of im- mortal souls, for whom Christ died, but the maintenance of a machine for its own sake.” * This narrow sacerdotal spirit would have kept Peter and Paul and James out of the “ legitimate” synagogues where they preached Christ and denounced Judaism, and handed over the salvation of the world, or what would be more important, the con- servation of Orthodox Judaism, to the “ legitimate” chief priests. Scribes, and Pharisees. It would denounce Huss and Luther and Wickliffe as pestilent prose- lytizers. Let us thank God that this spirit is not the dominant spirit of the Church of Christ, and that this memorial represents only an insignificant fraction of the clergy of the Church of England. The spread of light and Bible knowledge among the youth of the Greek community in Syria is rapidly bringing them into a critical position. Two tendencies are mani- fest : The first is toward infidelity. They say the Orthodox Greek Church claims to be the only true church, but it is corrupt beyond hope of reform, so we will have done with all religion. Family ties and tradi- » The Record, July 10, 1891. PKOTESTANT MISSIONS. 33 tions, pride of name and pecuniary interests keep them in outward connection with the Church, whilo they laugh at its supersti- tions and despise its hierarchy. This class are rapidly lapsing into French infidelity. The second is among the more thoughtful and conscientious, who, in despair of re- forming the errors of the old Church, break away from all connection with it and em- brace Protestantism. Here they find freedom from hierarchical domination, liberty of conscience, an open Bible, and a pure, non-idolatrous doctrinal system. No more priestly absolution, trail- substantiation, picture worship, cross wor- ship, adoration of the Virgin, and invoca- tion of the saints. They accept the doctrine of justification by faith and are at rest. To receive such men into the Protestant communion, however it may be stigmatized by Archdeacon Denison as “ proselytism,” is dignified by a greater than the archdea- con, even Archbishop Sumner, as receiving “ liberated captives.” It is the delightful privilege of the Chris- tian missionary to give such men a hearty and fraternal welcome. Bishop Blyth, in a conversation with Bev. H. E. Fox, of Durham, England, defined “ proselytism to be unfair pressure to per- suade a man to leave one church for an- other.” Where the bishop has met with 34 THE GREEK CHURCH AND that type of proselytizing I am at a loss to conjecture. During a residence of thirty-five years in the East, I have not met it among either English or American missionaries. The Jesuits notoriously practise it, and are making rapid inroads upon the Oriental churches. I have known an Anglican clergyman of sacerdotal tendencies to labor for two hours to persuade a stanch Protes- tant in Beirut, who was born and baptized a Protestant, to enter the Greek Church, but I do not believe that either the Presbyterian or Church of England missionaries in West- ern Asia use “ unfair” means to draw men into the Protestant churches. I was re- cently riding in the French omnibus from Beirut to Aaleili in Mount Lebanon. My fellow-passengers were Greek, Maronite, and Greek Catholic gentlemen from Beirut. A young Greek Effendi of well-known ability entered into a discussion of the comparative systems of instruction in the Protestant and Jesuit schools. Said he, “ Our Greek boys go to the Jesuit College. They are taught daily the Romish doctrines, the Pope, the Church of Rome, and the errors of the Greek schism. It is drilled and beaten into them, and yet, as a fact, hardly one of the Greek boy6 ever becomes a Jesuit. We also send boys to the American College and seminaries. Nothing is 6aid about Protes- tantism or the Greek Church. There is no PROTESTANT MISSIONS. 35 attack on picture worship or the worship of the Virgin. Only the Bible is taught and Bible truth is preached, and the result is that the great part of our young men be- come Protestants.” I believe that the testi- mony of Nejeeb Elfendi will be corroborated by that of every intelligent man in the country. The vast accessions to Protestantism from among the Oriental churches have been oc- casioned by the working of the Gospel leaven in the hearts and minds of men. To bid these men “ return to their sla- very” (to use the language of Archbishop Sumner) would be an outrage upon Chris- tian charity, and treachery to the principles of the Gospel. In the time of St. Paul the Jews had the Old Testament Scriptures — “Who are Israel- ites ; to whom pertainetli the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises : whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came” (Rom. ix. 4, 5) — but they had rejected the Messiah through the traditions of the oral law, and the Gospel was to be preached to them. They were bidden to “ come out and be separate.” The Greeks have the Old and New Testa- ments, but they have buried the living Christ under a mass of traditions and super- 36 THE GREEK CHURCH AND stitions and the idolatrous decrees of that anti-Christian Seventh General Council, caricaturing the divine glories of our Lord’s miraculous resurrection by the lying fraud and imposture of the blasphemous Greek fire, which makes the Moslem and Jewish enemies of Christ to blaspheme ; and it is the duty of every branch of the Reformed Church to lift up its voice in protest, preach to them the pure Gospel, and when they come out and are separate and refuse to touch the unclean thing, to hid them hearty welcome to a purer church and a more or- thodox doctrine. The persecution of the Stundists in Rus- sia, who are being exiled to Siberia with barbarous cruelty for the sole crime of studying the Bible and then refusing to at- tend the Greek Church, shows the under- lying animus of the Greek Church every- where. To place ourselves on a vantage ground with the Mohammedans, we must let it be thoroughly understood that we are distinct and separate from the idolatrous Oriental churches. The Moslems look on these “ Christians” as creature worshippers. They are now beginning to understand that the Protestants hold to a purer faith. Sheikh Mohammed Smair, of the Anazy Arabs, on entering our simple church in Beirut stood by my side in the pulpit. mssiom and Placing hi* i , 37 !? ,bIe ’ 8 aid, “ Tru ? d ° n the open Arabic j d - Th <*e i 8 n * / ilS 18 house 0 f llle > July, 1891 tt rp, -Aden, Arabia hiring ia i h ;, b ? u * °f tl.e i/opT' “!' io^^- follow 0l e thm 6 rr s is ^ ^ ^ ** ** es fMtnue s i„ D3 4““ ed “ ns . We “sled p rot “ ^ one atheiTa °s,n™ Tie ” rshi P' " " 0i>P ° Siti0n *»’ from Islam J e ™ is tie 1st of .•"* 00nd