p. 187 | MISSIONS: THEIR STATE

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jan 22, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 12.

MISSIONS: THEIR STATE.

By Rev. J. Murray Mitchell, M.A., LL.D.

[An address delivered at the Dublin Conference of the Evangelical Alliance, and published in Evangelical Christendom.]

SUPPOSE I could bring the heathen world before you so that you could simply see it as it is—if we could bring it all into a focus—the dreadful spectacle would shake the soul to its foundations and haunt us till we died. We cannot so focus heathenism. We can now only with the mind's eye glance rapidly at its chief forms. But even that hurried look will deeply pain us, if we have any regard either for the honor of God or the well-being of man.

There is a disposition in many quarters at present to speak kindly of heathen religions. They are called "imperfect revelations." We are told there is an "ethnic inspiration," and so on. Now, we all admit that reason and conscience are precious gifts of heaven, and may, in a sense, be called revelations of God; but oftentimes mind and conscience are "defiled;" aye, conscience may be "seared as with a hot iron." No man can rightly judge of heathenism unless he has lived in a heathen country and seen with his own eyes its real fruits.

Let us rapidly glance at the chief heathen systems. The most widely diffused is spirit worship—animism, as it is often called. It underlies every form of paganism, and it continually crops up through superincumbent strata. The spirits worshiped are malignant, with hardly an exception—evil spirits, veritable fiends, acknowledged and worshiped as such. And they are supposed to be all around us—lying in ambush, watching for opportunities to harm us. The worship paid them proceeds from fear—blank terror; it has in it no element of love, but much of hatred.

Is this an exaggerated statement? I wish it were. But no. If in some places—Japan, for example—it has a milder aspect, in others—Dahomey, for instance—it becomes utterly diabolical. The honor paid there to any good of man is measured by the quantity of human blood shed on his account. France has lately conquered the country, and we may trust that these horrible celebrations are now suppressed. This, then, as I have said, is the most extensive of heathen religions.

2. Let me next speak of Islam—Mohammedanism. It is full of life and proselytizing zeal, still spreading, at least in Africa, north of the equator, chiefly, yet not solely, by war and conquest.

The two merits Islam possesses are its rejection of idolatry and its prohibition of intemperance. It has been praised as non-atheistic. But the being it worships is an almighty despot, ruling a universe of slaves. Islam knows nothing of a God of love. It denies that Jesus is the Son of God; it denies also his crucifixion. It poisons society at its fountain-head by sanctioning polygamy, and divorce at pleasure, for example, the pleasure of the man. Woman is robbed of her rights more than in any other faith. Islam is intolerant; only Mohammedans enjoy the rights of citizens. The Mohammedan who changes his creed must be put to death. It sanctions slavery; slave hunts are conducted by Mohammedan Arabs, who believe they have divine permission to turn a smiling land into a wilderness by slaughtering and enslaving. And how many accept this dreadful faith?—Alas, about 170,000,000 of our unhappy fellowmen!

3. We point next to Buddhism. Extravagant estimates of its extent are sometimes given; but we cannot count the Buddhists much under 300,000,000. There are two forms of Buddhism, differing greatly from each other. The southern is likest to the original system. It is professed in Ceylon, Burmah, and Siam, the northern form in Thibet, Mongolia, China, and Japan. Southern Buddhism is atheistic. It denies a future life. Nirvâna, the chief end of man, is the cessation of conscious existence, and generally of existence altogether—utter extinction of being. Existence is misery; the sooner it ceases the better. This is original and proper Buddhism, preëminently the religion of despair. These tremendous dogmas the northern Buddhists have modified; they believe in various fantastic deities and in a future existence. Yet it was Buddhist books generally—but especially the northern ones—that the great Orientalist, Burnouf, declared to be "miserable in form and odious in meaning."

I need hardly speak of what is called "Esoteric Buddhism." It is a pure fiction—an invention of that amazing woman, Madame Blavatsky. The Mahatmas of Thibet were the offspring of her own bewildered brain; and the Lamas know nothing about them. Or, if the lady was no deceiver, she was egregiously deceived. Cunning natives of India have, we know, cheated Europeans, and supplied them with fictitious writings. Did Madame Blavatsky know the language in which her "Esoteric Buddhism" is explained? In what language is it? Sanskrit, Pali, or Thibetan? Let the original text be produced, or else the whole thing must be laughed out of court.

Nor need I speak of Sir Edwin Arnold's "Light of Asia." Sir Edwin is a poet, and makes lavish use of the poet's prerogative of "giving to airy nothing a local habitation and a name." Buddhism has been praised for its moral precepts. Several of these resemble the commandments of the second table of the Decalogue. But, in carrying out these precepts, Buddhism runs into the most irrational asceticism, and all missionaries to the Buddhists have declared that even the good precepts exercise little or no influence on the life.

4. Now glance for a moment at Hinduism. It is confined to India, but professed by more than 200,000,000. For the most part it is the wildest polytheism, reckoning its gods and goddesses by hundreds of millions. But among educated men it becomes the most absolute pantheism, acknowledging only one being in the universe,—spirit; the world around us has no existence. Only say—believing it—Aham Brahma, "I am God," and you have attained the height of human wisdom. Could the force of folly or of impiety go farther?

The most characteristic feature of practical Hinduism is caste—a stupendous system of regulations affecting one's whole life. Violate any of these and you are expelled from society; father and mother cast you off; you suffer social death.

Not a few dreadful institutions—such as suttee, or widow burning, self-murder under the wheels of the car of Jaganath, and infanticide, which in certain classes was fearfully common—such things, you all know, have been suppressed by the strong hand of the British Government; but other deplorable evils, such as the general heartless treatment of widows and of the lower castes, child marriages, and many similar things, still exist, and cannot be easily crushed out, so completely interwoven are they with the whole framework of Hindu society and thought.

5. I must hurry on and speak of the system of Confucius. The religion of China generally is a strange medley; but that of the literati and influential classes is Confucianism. This can hardly be called a religion; it is a system of morality, in which the duties of men toward men are elaborately expounded. But when the great sage was asked about another world, he answered: "I do not rightly understand this world; how can I speak of another? And, as for worship, you should perform the usual rites, but have as little dealing with the gods as possible."

This is but a poor creed, and because of its being so Buddhism and Taoism have had sway in China. Of Buddhism I have already spoken. Taoism, the so-called religion of reason, is eminently a system of unreason, full of absurd magical ceremonies. But Confucianism sways the middle and higher classes to a very large extent, and surely it is a most cheerless, chilling creed.

Thus I have run over the leading heathen religions. All are dark and dreary. How deplorable that 1,000,000,000 of our fellow-creatures—our brothers and sisters—should still be lying in this darkness of death!

Let our spirits be stirred within us with sorrow that God is thus dishonored and that man is thus miserable.

When we look on this awful state of things, we are ready to sink into despondency. The case seems hopeless, and we have great heaviness and continual sorrow of heart because of these, our brothers, ignorant of the Creator, the Redeemer, the Sanctifier, and, as the apostle would say, "without God and without hope in the world." Deep sorrow is right, but despair is wrong. "We serve the God of hope;" we must be men of hope. Yes, our hopes are "bright as the promises of God."

But more than this. Even already we can see—not merely hope for—the salvation of God. For already each one of those great heathen systems has been reached, touched, and, I may say, shaken.