The Buried Bible

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Nov 3, 1910

THE pagan forces in Madagascar rose against the Christians in 1835, drove out the missionaries, and sought to destroy every Bible. The cause of Christ seemed doomed to destruction.

“But before the last missionaries left the island, they buried in the earth seventy copies of the whole Bible, and stored in various hiding-places several cases of New Testaments, Psalters, and other portions. These books, which passed stealthily from hand to hand, and were read in secret at the peril of the owners’ lives, became the fuel which kept the sacred fire burning. When the missionaries returned, in 1862, they found that the little band of Malagasy Christians had grown from two hundred to over two thousand. The Malagasy Bible had been its own missionary.”

One of the treasures of the Bible House, London, is one of these buried Bibles. This copy of the Word was hidden in a cave which had served as the village smallpox hospital, fear of the place keeping out the spies of the persecuting officials, while the Christian believers found in it the light and comfort of heaven. The same blessed Word to-day is suited to every age and every condition.