Chapter XX: Camps of Refuge, 1915-17 332 (5)

The wisdom, magnanimity, and the piety of those missionaries were unquestionable. They showed their wisdom in the fact that they “steadily pursued the policy of disseminating the truth without making attacks upon the Armenian Church.”

The silent influence of this reformation spread far and wide in the city of Constantinople and its suburbs. The Roman Church, through its Jesuit missionaries, had carried on the work of proselyting the Armenians for centuries, and she had thousands of adherents. As a Church she had had her experience with the Reformation in the West. She was alarmed and made the first attempt to stop its progress in the East. The patriarch of the Roman Catholic Armenians publicly denounced the missionaries and their books in 1836. His evil example was followed four years later by the Greek and Armenian patriarchs of Constantinople.

Thus the spirit of hatred and persecution was instilled by their respective representatives into the minds and hearts of different communities. But this movement being mostly among the Armenians, their patriarch took a more active part in issuing anathemas and sending them to the provinces, and he caused them to be read in all the churches.

The Armenian Church was sorely wounded by the Roman Church and its missionaries. The national church meant and still means to the Armenians a national unity, and a separation from the Church was considered a division in the nation. Ever since the Armenians lost their independence, they were known as a religious community in the Turkish empire and their patriarch as the representative of the whole people. The patriarch, as the head of the nation, and other leaders, therefore, thought the suppression of this evangelical work might be a prevention of such a division as had taken place in the case of the followers of the Roman missionaries in 1830. The patriarch and his advisers, who took violent measures of persecution against those who favored and labored for the reformation of the Church, unhappily were not aware of the fact that the intentions of the missionaries of the American Board, were very different from those of the missionaries of the Roman Church. The following is the statement written at the time by Rev. Dr. Goodell:

“We ourselves, at this place, have nothing to do with the Church, its dogma, ceremonies, and superstitions.... Nor do we make any attempt to establish a new Church, to raise a new party. We disclaim everything of the kind. We tell them frankly, you have sects enough among you already, and we have no design of setting up a new one, or of pulling down your churches, or drawing members from them in order to build ours over.”[86]

And we find this policy adhered to in the case of the brethren in Nicomedia. The bishop, priests, and the leading men of that city formed a council, and this council drew up a new confession of faith.

“Thus all who were suspected of Protestantism were asked to acknowledge by affixing thereunto their signatures. Those who would refuse to do so were to be anathematized and expelled from the Church. As soon as Rev. Dwight and Dr. Goodell were informed of the Council’s proceedings they advised the brethren not to separate themselves from the Armenian communion, saying that, if they did so, the work would not advance so rapidly.”[87]

In 1843 a young Armenian embraced Mohammedanism. But he became a prey to the remorse of his conscience for his apostacy. He, therefore, renounced Mohammedanism and reconfessed Christianity. He was seized upon and beheaded in the streets of Constantinople by the Turkish authorities, and his corpse was exposed to the public gaze for several days, as an insult to Christianity. This event aroused the indignation of the European ambassadors, who, through the English ambassador, Sir Stratford Canning, demanded and extorted from the Sultan the following written pledge: “The sublime Porte engages to take effectual measures to prevent henceforward the execution and putting to death of the Christian who is an apostate.”

The imprudent conduct of the patriarch, Bishop Matteos, by his anathemas and excommunicating those who were favorably disposed, and were endeavoring to reform the Church, exposed them to all manner of maltreatment. They “were stoned in the streets, unjustly imprisoned, ejected from their shops, invaded and plundered in their houses, bastinadoed and abandoned by their friends.” These persecutions were severe and extended into the provinces wherever there were those who loved the cause of reformation. The unwise course pursued by the patriarch to prevent separation by persecution indeed hastened the division in the church. Vartabed M. Muradian’s statement in regard to Bishop Matteos’ conduct is as follows:

“Patriarch Matteos had already begun religious controversies with the Protestant missionaries, these same controversies were travails of a new eruption. Those inclined to Protestantism were about to appear and the anathematizing course taken by Matteos very materially aided the purpose of the Protestant missionaries, because to persecute is to spread. And, behold, thus on the one hand the inconsiderateness of those inclined to Protestantism, and on the other hand the imprudent conduct of Patriarch Matteos, caused a number of our people to depart from the maternal bosom of the church and adhere to Protestantism, which forms a distinct body, choosing for itself a separate civil head.”[88]

The persecutions and the consequent sufferings of the people were severe, unnecessary, and unjustifiable. Yet whether there were sufficient reasons for a separate organizations it is difficult to say. The missionaries, however, yielding to the desire of those who wished to form a separate organization, gathered them together, forty in number, and constituted July 1st, 1846, the first Evangelical Armenian Church of Constantinople. On the following Sabbath Mr. Apisoghom Khachadurian was ordained by the missionaries and installed the pastor of this new church.

On the 20th of July, 1846, another church was organized at Nicomedia and during that summer two more churches were organized, one at Ada-Bazar and the other at Trebizond. These organizations were followed by others in different parts of the country.

The Protestant Armenians, thus organized into separate churches, formed a new community, yet were under the jurisdiction of the patriarch and up to 1847 not quite free from molestation and privation. “In the temporary absence of Sir Stratford Canning, Lord Cawley negotiated the matter with the government, and on the 15th of November, 1847, the grand vizier issued a paper declaring that the ‘Christian subjects of the Ottoman Government professing Protestantism would constitute a separate community, with all the rights and privileges permitted in their temporal or spiritual concern on the part of the patriarch, monks, or priests of other sects.’”. In November, 1850, a decree was issued proclaiming the professors of all religions equal in the eye of the law. The Protestants then were organized as a distinct civil community, having equal religious rights with the older Christian bodies.

Up to this time the work of reformation spread and progressed with wonderful rapidity, though through persecutions and privations. The readiness of those who knew the truth to spread it; the eagerness of the people to receive the truth; the unconsciously employed means of those who tried to stop this movement, by trying so to do thus spreading it, are well condensed in the following paragraphs:

“When the patriarch had hurried Bedros, the Vartabed, out of the city for his Protestant tendencies, and Vartabed had gone distributing books and preaching throughout the whole region of Aleppo and Aintab. When he had sent priest Vartanes a prisoner to the monastery of Marash, and then banished him to Cæsarea, Vartanes had first awakened the monks, and then preached the gospel all the way to Cæsarea.

“The missionaries wisely availed themselves of this rising interest in tours for preaching, conversing, and distributing religious treatises. Messrs. Powers, Johnson, Van Lennex, Smith, Peabody, Schneider, Goodell, Everett, and Benjamin, pushed forth to Tintab, Aleppo, Brousa, Harpoot, Sivas, Diarbekir, Cæsarea, and various other places through the empire.

“They soon found that they were in the midst of one of the most extraordinary religious movements of modern times, silent, and sometimes untraceable, but potent and pervasive. In every important town of the empire where there were Armenians, there were found to be as early as 1849, one or more lovers of evangelical truth. But it was no causeless movement. The quiet working of the ‘little leaven’ was traceable almost from its source by indubitable signs. It was a notable sight to see when, in 1838, the Vartabed and the leading men of Orta Keuy, on the Bosphorus, where the missionaries first gained access to the Armenians, went and removed the pictures from the village church. It was another landmark when, in 1842, the fervor of the converts not only filled the city with rumors of the new doctrines, but, after a season of special prayer, held in a neighboring valley, sent forth priest Vartanes on a missionary tour into the heart of Asia Minor. A still more significant fact was when, in that year and the next, the Armenian women were effectually reached and roused, till family worship began in many a household, and a female seminary at Pera became (in 1845) a necessity. The brethren had observed the constant increase of the inquiries, often from a distance, and they had found, even in 1843, such a demand for their books as the press at Smyrna was unable to supply. In many places and at Nicomedia, Adabar and Aintab, books and tracts began the work.

“The preaching services at Constantinople would be occasionally attended by individuals from four or five other towns. At Erzroom one Sabbath (February, 1846), there were attendants from six different places. The seminary for young men at Bebek (a suburb of Constantinople) drew visitors from great distances and from all quarters, as far as Alexandria, St. Petersburg, and the Euphrates. The native brethren also had been engaged in disseminating the truth, and the first awakenings at Killis, Kessab, and Eodosta, for example, were due to their labors.

“From this time forth the enterprise became too broad even to trace in this rapid way. If the whole movement shall ever be suitably recorded the history of this reformation will be second in interest to no other than has ever been written. There are scores and scores of villages, each of which would furnish material for a volume, and multitudes of cases that recall the fervor, faith, and fortitude of apostolic times.”[89]

Although a decree issued in November, 1850, proclaimed the Protestants equal in the eye of the law, and accorded to them protection from persecutions, yet the condition of the brethren was very miserable. Many of the younger brethren were disinherited by their parents, and thrown out of employment by their employers, for their espousal of the cause of reformation. The anathemas of the patriarch upon “the heretics” and those who would have any dealings with them, shut out the Protestants from the society of, and the business intercourses with, the people. Many, therefore, had to sell and sacrifice their properties for the necessities of life, and fell into abject poverty and had almost reached the verge of starvation.

Russia’s desire and demand to establish a protectorate over the Greek Christians in the Turkish empire, and the latter government’s refusal, led these two powers into, what is generally known in history, as the Crimean war. England and France were the allies of the Turk in that war, 1853. This Crimean war also greatly added to the misery of the Protestant community and threatened the existence of the little flock. But the ingenuity of the Rev. Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, the noble missionary, did ameliorate the condition of the Protestants. He established industries, especially the mill and bakery, where he found sufficient work for them to do; he also was able to build a few churches, in which these brethren might worship. These churches were greatly needed, and he had some balance left in hand after building them.[90]

Some good people thought that “the Crimean war was overruled for the furtherance of the Gospel by becoming the occasion, if not the actual means, for securing another concession from the Turkish government on the subject of religious liberty, a new Magna Charter for the Christian subjects of the Porte.” Some regarded this edict (the Hatti Humayaun) as a complete grant of freedom to all Christians or Mohammedans, to follow the dictates of their consciences without any molestation whatever. A few high-sounding sentences from it will show what great contentment it would have given to the subjects of the Porte if it had been meant to be fulfilled:

“Every distinction or designation tending to make any class whatever of the subjects of my empire inferior to another class on account of their religion, language, or race, shall be forever effaced from the administrative protocol.

“As all forms of religion are and shall be freely professed in my dominions, no subject of my empire shall be hindered in the exercise of the religion that he professes, nor shall be in any way annoyed on this account. NO ONE SHALL BE COMPELLED TO CHANGE HIS RELIGION.”

It is, however, nothing uncommon with the sultans and other officials of the Turkish government to promise a good deal, with the full determination not to fulfill the least.

“By the terms of the treaty of 1856 (signed at Paris), Turkey was bound in the face of the world to redress the inveterate evils and abuses of her government, and to extend to all her subjects the blessings of civil and religious freedom. There was accordingly promulgated the Hatt-y-Humayoun of 1856, in which the principles of reform embodied in the Tanzimat were renewed and extended, but the edict, like those which preceded it, remained in effect null and void. The grievances and wrongs endured since that time, especially by the Christian population, the perversion of justice, the gross administrative corruption, furnish a sufficient commentary of the futility of the attempted or promised reform of the Porte.”[91]

Had public opinion in Great Britain not been outraged by the Bulgarian massacre, the Conservative government of Lord Beaconsfield would have given armed support to the Turks even in 1877, in spite of “the perversion of justice, the gross administrative corruption” of the Turkish government, and “the grievances and wrongs endured since that time, especially by the Christian population” of the Porte.[92]

The number of the reformed churches in ten years increased to thirty, organized at different places in the empire. And it was only twenty-one years after the organization of the first Reformed Armenian Church, that the late Rev. Dr. H. J. Van Lennep reported, before the Evangelical Alliance at Amsterdam, Holland:

“There were now (1867) fifty-six churches, with two thousand adherents.” And he adds, “The use of such means [for reformation] soon produced a marked effect not so much upon the volatile Greek as upon the sober-minded Armenian, and evangelical doctrines were soon spreading among the latter with amazing power and rapidity. Providence raised from among the people men of eloquence, power, and influence, whose labors were wonderfully blessed; and great numbers soon rejoiced in the precious doctrine ‘Christ crucified.’ The young converts, full of faith and the Holy Ghost, went about lighting the torch of truth and salvation throughout the land.”

It is impossible, and incompatible with our present purpose, to give a fuller account of the grand work of reformation, which is bound to triumph and reconquer the countries once under the sway of the power of the gospel of our Lord.

Twenty-five years ago, there were one hundred and ten churches and eleven thousand and ninety-five members, seventy-four ordained ministers and one hundred and twenty-nine preachers, and eighty-five other helpers, and two hundred and three places for stated preaching, with thirty-one thousand six hundred and eighteen average attendants to services, twenty thousand six hundred Sabbath school scholars and a community of forty-five thousand Protestants, who had contributed $48,941 for all purposes during the year (1890-1891).

Within the last twenty-five years the missionary work has been steadily growing in spite of hindrances, persecutions, massacres and forced conversions to Mohammedanism by the Turks. The following brief table of statistics for 1914 may give an idea how the work was progressing before the terrible war of 1915:

The number of stations and out stations 370
The total number of missionaries 162
The total native workers 1204
Congregations 272
Organized churches 137
Communicants 13,891
Armenian Protestants 50,900
Sunday Schools 270
Sunday School Membership 29,686
Schools (total) Colleges, 8; Theological
Schools, 3; Boarding, etc. 426
Total students 25,134
Hospitals and Dispensaries 19
Patients 39,503
Treatments 134,357
Native Contributions $192,127

FOOTNOTES:

[83] Bartlett, “Historical Sketch of the Missions of The American Board in Turkey,” p. 3.

[84] The Armeno-Turkish is not a distinct language; it is the Turkish written in Armenian characters.

[85] “The Orientals have an admirable kind of coolness and courage. Give them a leader in whom they have confidence, and they will follow him to the death.”--“Cyrus Hamlin.”

[86] Prime, “Forty Years in the Turkish Empire,” pp. 173-4.

[87] Nergararian, “The History of the Beginnings of Missionary Work in Nicomedia,” pp. 20-21.

[88] Muradian, “The History of the Holy Apostolic Church of Armenia,” pages 607-8. (This work is in the original Armenian.)

[89] Bartlett, “The Historical Sketch of Missions of A.B.C.F.M. in Turkey,” pp. 10-12 and 14.

[90] Hamlin, “Among the Turks,” page 258. “It had been no object of mine to have any balance in hand. It amounted, with what had already been expended for churches mentioned, to $25,000.”

[91] Milner, “The Turkish Empire,” pp. 223-4.

[92] Bryce, “Transcaucasia and Ararat,” pp. 519-20, the 4th edition.

X

CAUSES OF PROGRESS, AND HINDRANCES

The progress of this wonderful reformation may be ascribed to a few causes or agencies.

1. THE BIBLE: The Armenian Church not only encourages, but almost enforces the reading of the Scriptures among the people. They reverence the word of God. When the missionaries came into Armenia they found a common ground on the “Thus saith the Lord” to deal with the people and the clergymen. The absolute necessity of the Bible as the only standard was felt by the missionaries, as our forefathers felt it after the conversion of the nation to Christianity, and the ablest intellects have been engaged in its translation into the vernacular dialects. Rev. Dr. Goodell, nearly seventy-five years ago, wrote “Turn now to our labor among the Armenians, our whole work with them is emphatically a Bible work. The Bible is our only standard, and our final appeal. It is even more necessary for us than it was for the reformers in England, because we are foreigners. Without it we could say one thing and the priests and bishops could say another; but where would be the umpire? It would be nowhere, and all our efforts would be like ‘beating the air.’”[93]

The British and the American Bible Societies greatly aided the publication and circulation of the Scriptures through their agents in co-operation with the missionaries among the people and in many a family, town, and city the Bible itself has proved to be the mightiest means of the conversion of many. “The entrance of thy word giveth light.” “The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul.”

The writer’s father was engaged in business in Constantinople over fifty years ago, and when he returned home to Sivas, he brought with him a copy of the New Testament, which he had bought from a colporteur. This copy of the New Testament was read by him and his sons, and the simple reading of the word of God resulted in the conversion of the writer and several members of the family. His only sister was employed by the missionaries for over thirty years as a Bible-woman, until her deportation in 1915.

After his conversion and study a few years in the mission school at Marsovan, it was the privilege of the writer to spend some time in teaching in a small town. The Protestant people, whose children he taught, had no preacher and they urged him to preach for them. Not ability nor preparedness, but necessity, compelled him to engage in this double duty. One day he was asked by a man who belonged to the Armenian church, and whose brother (deceased then) was one of the first converts to Protestantism, whether he knew how the Protestant work began there. His reply was “No,” and what the man told him is something like the following:

The first Protestant brother who came to the town went to a coffee-house,[94] and took out his Bible and attempted to read it to the men there; but they refused to listen to him. He was so grieved that he burst into tears. This attracted the attention of an elderly man, well-known in the town as “Uncle Toros.” He came to him and asked what was the matter. He answered that he would like to read the Bible and speak to them about the wonderful love of God, but they objected to his so doing. Uncle Toros was much interested in the earnestness of the man and his plans, and, being very hospitable, on learning that he was a stranger in the town invited him to his own house. According to the custom of the country everybody that is able has a guest-chamber for guests. Uncle Toros also was a very influential man in the town and he had many friends and relatives, who with the neighbors used to come to his sitting-room and spend the early part of every night.

Thus our brother had a good audience every evening to whom he could read and expound the Bible. No one could insult or molest him--he was Uncle Toros’ guest. This was the beginning of the work at Zara, about thirty miles northeast of Sivas, and when the writer was there, nearly fifteen years later, he found about twenty families composing the Protestant community.

The “two-edged sword” of the Spirit, “the Word of God” on the one hand and “the young converts, full of faith and of the Holy Ghost” on the other hand, have been still going about “lighting the torch of truth and salvation throughout the land” and have thus wrought this marvelous reformation which until within a short time has been progressing rapidly. The Turkish government is trying a plan, which the Roman emperors tried in the early Christian centuries, namely to destroy the Christians and Christianity in the empire.

The following instance combines three phases in one, to wit: the mighty power of the word of God, heroism of those who believe in the power of that Word and the violation of all promises of religious freedom, the marked cruelty and perversion of justice of the Turkish officials.

Avedis (good news) Zotian was a boy of ten or twelve years of age when the writer was acquainted with him, over forty years ago. He was quiet, unassuming, skillful and industrious and was engaged in his father’s trade, copper-smithing. Through his cousin, who was a constant reader of the Bible and a friend of the writer, and still better a warm friend of the reformation, Avedis was brought under the influence of the Word of God. He finally, about 1885, avowed himself a Protestant and joined that community. He became very active, and, like the prophet Jeremiah, felt that “His word was in his heart as a burning fire.” He had a long distance to go to the services and would not be able to stop on his way and speak to others on the topic of religion. He, therefore, thought one Sunday in 1889 to have a verse on a piece of board and to carry it along so that the people could see and read it. The words from Matt. 4:17, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand,” were written in the Armenian, and Avedis had his friend Sahag, another Protestant Armenian, to write the same in the Turkish language. Avedis started to church with the above text. He was arrested on his way by the Turkish officers and thrown into prison. His friend Sahag also was arrested for his share of the crime and shared the corner of the prison with Avedis. The charge against these young men was that they were political agitators.

After several months’ imprisonment the unrighteous judge declared them guilty and sentenced them to be exiled for life. They, with tearful eyes, bade adieu to their friends, relatives, brothers, sisters, aged parents, and to their newly married wives, who in vain had tried to wipe away their overflowing tears. They were driven like cattle by the mounted officers to Smyrna, then sent to Africa. They were so cruelly ill-treated on their way that, not very long after their exile, Avedis was taken away by his Heavenly Father to rest from his labors. And what became of Sahag no one knows. The Turkish government’s early determination to root out the Christians and Christianity from the empire lacks no evidences. Only the selfish European powers, the guardians of the Christian subjects of the Porte, were unwilling to see them.

2. EDUCATION. Next in importance to the Bible and the activity of the natives in spreading it, the superiority of the educational institutions of the mission and the love for the truth in the native youth will claim our attention, as potent factors in the progress of this reformation.

Since the entrance of the Turks into Western Asia the ancient centers of learning have been lying in ruins; the photophobic malady of Mohammedanism and its fanatic devotees had extinguished the numerous lights which have been burning for centuries on the altars of learning. These wild beasts of mankind had broken in upon these countries, once so glorious and famous for their happy estate of civilization and culture, who had given religion and laws to the world, but now, through ignorance, superstition, and vice had become the most deplorable spectacle of extreme misery. The barbarous tyrants--the sultans of the Ottoman empire--who gloried in cruelty and aimed only at the height of greatness through sensuality, had reduced so great and goodly a part of the world to that lamentable distress and servitude under which it now faints and groans. “The true religion discountenanced and oppressed (insulted); no light of learning permitted, nor virtue cherished, violence and rapine exulting over all and leaving no security, save to an abject mind and unlooked-on poverty.”

The above description of an eye-witness was uttered two centuries before the coming of the missionaries, who have found it literally true when they came into the East. They also found in this unhappy empire “a noble race”--the Armenians--“the Anglo-Saxons of the East,” whose “standard of moral purity is also said to be immeasurably above that of the Turks around them, and they have a conscience which can be touched and roused.” Their higher standard of moral purity and superior intelligence are due to their religion--Christianity--and to their better education. For as far back as the middle of the seventeenth century, the Armenian press was in full activity in Constantinople.

It was no wonder that the Armenians had welcomed the missionaries and had they been left alone they would not have attempted to prevent the work of reformation at all.

“When the missionaries came to Turkey they were kindly received by the patriarch and clergymen, who showed great hospitality and favor to them, and encouraged them to build up schools, which they promised to support by sending their young men and priests to be educated. But afterwards the Jesuits, who are ever the uncompromising enemies of Protestantism, secretly stirred up the Armenian and Greek leaders against the missionaries and their work, whom they now began to regard with suspicion and envy. Even among the Armenian priests and college-men were those who, though they at first persecuted the Protestants, became not only their stanchest friends, but also earnest workers for the cause of Christ.”

The above quotation from a native writer is well supported by the following statement of an American writer, a returned missionary of the American Board:

“In 1834 these schools had two thousand scholars, and though supported by the people, yet, having been established by the advice and assistance of the mission, their influence was great in its favor, till the monks and priests began to preach violently against the mission and schools, ‘_and even against the patriarch for favoring them_.’ But it was too late to destroy their influence. The Armenians had become roused by the spreading light,” and “in 1835 the revival of learning and piety among the Armenians continued to advance hand in hand.”[95]

The Seminary at Bebek in 1840 commenced with three scholars. The following year the number of the students had increased to twenty-four, and many had been refused for want of funds. A few years later a female seminary was started at Pera, Constantinople, and this had a wonderful effect upon the community. Education of the female, neglected for centuries, began to revive in the East, even the adult women and matrons attempted to learn to read their Bibles and they generally succeeded well. “Fifty adult females have begun to learn to read during the year; more than fifty have already learned to read well, and many others are in the process of learning.” Wherever the missionaries went there they started schools, and these schools were not only the centers from which the light of truth radiated around, but they also became in many places nuclei for new churches.

The Bebek Seminary, in 1854, reported its number of students as fifty, and “its former pupils are employed as preachers, teachers, translators, and helpers in many places.” In the following year the demand for teachers and preachers from the seminary was so great that other schools were started--one at Tokat, and another at Aintab. The number of free schools had increased this year (1855) to thirty-eight, and the whole number of pupils nine hundred and sixty.

It was in the same year that the American Board sent the Rev. Dr. Anderson and Thompson to India and Turkey. In the previous year the Baptist Missionary Society also had sent its deputation to India. “The result of these delegations was that the character of the education of nearly all the missionary institutions of the highest grade was wholly changed. The English language was proscribed and the curriculum of studies reduced to a vernacular basis. Many schools were closed and some missionaries came home, and considerable friction was occasioned, but the new system was rigidly enforced.”[96]

Dr. Cyrus Hamlin, Dr. H. J. Van Lennep, and some other missionaries advocated the importance of a thorough education and the knowledge of the English language for the native ministry, believing that “no country was ever reformed but by its sons, and that for such a great work a better education IS necessary.” They, however, met not a little opposition from the Board and some of their associates in the mission.

“The American Board’s change of base on the matter of education” furnished an occasion--for some trouble in the field--for some Armenian young men who sought a better education abroad. But their aspiring and venturing into England and America for a thorough English education, subjected them to opposition, from some of the missionaries, and afterwards, when they attempted to secure employment in the mission-fields, they met discouragement and disappointment. Even as late as in 1880 Dr. Hamlin, advocating his position, wrote:

“Every young man who started with a good foundation of English, and of character, has done well. I recall at this moment five such cases: (1) Alexan Bezjian, now professor in Aintab College; (2) Alexander Djijisian, who spent one or two years in Edinburgh, now pastor at Ada Bazar. He is a noble and strong man in judgment and power of argument, in true insight, in theological training and as a preacher, the supervisor of many a missionary; (3) The late Broasa pastor, now head of the High School, who studied at Basle. No one will dare to impugn his character and ability; (4) Pastor Keropé, like the others, a Bebek Seminary student. He went to England and Mr. Farnsworth, instead of opposing him, had the grace to aid him. He made a good impression in England and obtained aid to build a church; Mr. Farnsworth pronounced it the best church that has been erected among the Protestants in Turkey; (5) Pastor Thomas, of Diarbekir. I do not know of a man who speaks the Armenian language who is his equal for a platform speech. He carries his audience with him. He is clear and logical. He lifts his audience to higher planes of principle, thought and feeling.”

The late Rev. Dr. Tracy, a former teacher of the writer and the ex-president of Anatolia College, Marsavan, wrote in 1904:

“During the prosecution of this [mission] work in the Turkish Empire, wise attention has been given all along to the education of the young, both in the common branches with reference to good and intelligent social and family Christian life; and in the more advanced, with reference to the Christian leadership so vitally important in the development of a community. That this principle, discerned by our own American forefathers, as a corner stone in our national structure, is just as applicable to and important in the building of Christian communities in mission lands as at home, has dawned at last upon the minds of all who seriously prosecute this foreign work. The position which Christian education has taken in missions is impregnably strong. Not only does such education improve, inform, enable young men and young women, but it finds out the able and gathers up the natural leaders; it not only educates, but makes educators. It is a means without which no Christian country, community, or enterprise has ever held permanent leadership, or ever can. The day of light is advancing in the East with the rise of the Christian colleges.

“Very great and far-reaching was the influence of that school established in early times by Cyrus Hamlin in the village of Bebek, on the Bosphorus. The first venture, though so small a craft compared with what has followed, made the wake for a whole fleet of mighty vessels coming after--Robert College at Constantinople, the Syrian Protestant College at Beirut, the Central Turkey College at Aintab, Euphrates College at Harpoot, Anadolia College at Marsovan, the American College for Girls at Sculari, the Institute at Samakov in Bulgaria, St. Paul’s Institute at Tarsus, the International College at Smyrna, with leading schools for girls in the interior like those at Marash, Marsovan (Sivas Girls’ High School, and Sivas Teachers’ College, etc.), and elsewhere. Another most important class of institutions took its rise from the same fountain--the theological seminaries at Marash, Marsovan, Harpoot, without which the others would hardly have come into existence. They introduced the gospel widely and educational progress followed. Here we have a dozen or more institutions which are the leaders of thought and makers of character in the empire.”[97]

With one or two exceptions these colleges and high schools are, or were, crowded by the Armenian boys and girls: Sivas Teachers’ College--“This College has occupied a unique position in its training teachers for important positions in the mission and in the government schools. During the last year (1914) there were more pupils than at any time in the past. The exact figures are not obtainable, but the total enrollment for the previous year was over 500.”[2]

St. Paul’s College, Tarsus--“The enrollment was the largest recorded: in the College 118, academy 142; total, 260. Of these, thirty-five were Moslems, the greatest in the history of the school. Nearly two hundred were Armenians, but Greeks, Turks, Arabs, Syrians, were represented in the student body.”[98]

Before the spring of 1915 twenty-five thousand and one hundred and thirty-four pupils were attending and receiving Christian training from the kindergarten schools up to the highest colleges in the land.[99]

3. THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE; another cause of progress of the reformed and evangelical work was and is the necessity of a Christian literature. It has been stated that the Armenian literature is largely of religious and Christian character, but the most and best of it is in the ancient Armenian language. After the translation of the Bible into the modern Armenian a new literature in the same was necessitated. This necessity was gradually being met until the war broke out. “THE AVEDAPER--an Armenian paper, published in weekly and monthly editions. It was the most attractively printed Armenian paper in the empire. It is under efficient Armenian management. There was an encouraging increase in subscriptions until the war conditions interfered with the mails and returns fell off. It was finally decided to discontinue the paper for the present.”[100] Within the last fifty or sixty years a goodly number of useful books have been written and translated into the modern Armenian language; such as school books, commentaries, Sunday School lesson helps, dictionaries, religious treatises, hymn books--“whatever is most necessary for the healthy nourishment of awakening minds in the families, the schools, the communities is published, but with sad insufficiency.”

“The mission press is connected with Central Turkey College (at Aintab). Some of the students are given aid in the printing department and in the book bindery. Besides the regular job work the press prints a monthly religious paper in Armeno-Turkish (Armenian letter in Turkish language) called the New Life. No figures are at hand for the total output, but the usual number of pages printed exceeds 700,000.”[101] If this terrible war had not interfered with the missionary work, the annual output would have been between nine and ten million pages of print.

4. THE MEDICAL WORK. The last but not the least of the causes of the progress of the evangelical work in the East is the medical work or the hospitals. Before the coming of the missionaries into the East, and the medical missionaries following them, there were some native physicians, mostly Armenians, in the country. But their knowledge of the art of healing must naturally have been in a crude state. It is no wonder when we remember the fact, that though the East, especially Western Asia, has been the seat of ancient learning, yet it has been for over five hundred years under the rule of the tyrants, the sultans, who delighted more in injustice, cruelty, and sensuality than in learning. So the reflex light of the Sun of righteousness from the West brought also healings in His wings.

Some churches and missionary organizations have been slow to learn the meaning of Christ when He “sent them (His disciples) to preach the Kingdom of God and heal the sick.” (Luke ix: 2.)

“Regular medical departments, with hospitals, are of late growth. In view of the healing mercy and saving power exerted through them, it now seems strange that their development should have been so belated. When, however, it is remembered that in missions almost everything in the way of means and measures is experimental it is not so strange that among the forces born into life and action the ‘noblest offspring’ should ‘be the last.’”[102]

Before the war there were fifteen missionary stations in Asiatic Turkey. Nine of these stations had medical departments with hospitals connected with them; 39,503 patients have been treated in these hospitals and the total number of treatments during the year of 1914 reached 134,357. This is a tremendous power for good and a marvelous blessing for a country like Turkey, yet the rulers of that unhappy country have been destitute of any sense of justice or gratitude, as the following, a few sentences from Dr. Barton’s letter to the writer, show:

Congregational House, 14 Beacon St.,
Boston, Mass.,
July 20, 1916.

MY DEAR DR. GABRIELIAN:

You ask with reference to the situation in Turkey. We have but very little definite information. Our missionaries of Marsovan have just come out under compulsion by the Turkish Government and all of the mission property in Marsoval is in the hands of the Government; also the same is true of Sivas, except that Miss Graffam and Miss Fowle were allowed to remain, and in Talas they have taken possession of the public buildings, but the missionaries at last reports were there, hoping to be allowed to remain....

Very faithfully yours,
JAMES L. BARTON.

One of the hindrances to the work of still greater progress of reformation was, and is, the poverty of the Protestant community. The condition of the Protestant Armenians was very much like that of a young man falling in love with a pure, virtuous, and noble yet poor girl. The rash youth, disregarding the opposition of his parents, married the woman he loved, and on account of this he has been disinherited. Those who espoused the cause of reformation were driven out, not only from their homes and employments, but also from the use of the churches and school-houses, and even were not allowed to bury their dead in the old cemeteries. It was not very difficult for the American Board to meet some of the needs of the Protestant community, while that community was small and its needs few. But by the increase of the community its needs also multiplied. However, knowing the people as we do, their poverty was not a great hindrance. For the generous poor man is richer than the rich miser.

“Many a poor Armenian in the Koodish mountains, many a tattered villager on the Harpoot plains, used to the suffering of robbery and inured to want, brings for the support and propagation of the gospel his poor pittance, more munificent, measured by the sacrificing devotion of it, than the gifts of princes sounding aloud as they fall into the treasury. In other parts of the country there are those so humble that the dwelling of the family would hardly be valued at $25, who yet bring $25 to help build the house of worship, where they and their poor neighbors may hear the sound of the gospel.”[103]

The most prolific source of all evil influences and hindrances against the progress of reformation in the East is the Mohammedan Government. Prof. Vambery’s words might have been heeded twenty-five or thirty years ago, and many hundred thousands of lives would have been saved:

“The conviction is inevitable that until the power of Islamism is broken the true reformation of this land is an impossibility. At whose door shall we lay the blame of cherishing such a viper? That the solution of the vexed question of the political _status_ of Turkey involves great difficulties cannot be denied. But those [the European powers] that are pleased to preserve the existing state of things, as a barrier for themselves against the encroachments of an already overgrown European power, ought to take into consideration the result of encouraging the continuance of a power at once _so poisonous and so suicidal_ as that of the waning crescent.”

FOOTNOTES:

[93] Primce, “Memoirs of Rev. William Goodell, D.D.,” p. 282.

[94] The coffee-houses in the East are much like the saloons in this country, except that no alcoholic liquors are sold. People go there to smoke and sip coffee in small cups and while the time away.

[95] Wilder, “Mission Schools of the A.B.C.F.M.,” p. 375.

[96] Hamlin, “Among the Turks,” p. 275.

[97] Tracy, “Historical Sketch of Missions in Asiatic Turkey,” pp. 20-21, (A.B.C.F.M.)

[98] The Annual Report of the American Board, pp. 100, 105, for year 1915.

[99] The Armenian common and high schools--beside the Mission institutions--were many, but Abdul Hamid had reduced them. Since his overthrow they were again flourishing before the war.

[100] The Annual Report of the American Board, pp. 103, 107 for year 1915.

[101] The Annual Report of the American Board, pp. 103-107 for the year 1918.

[102] Tracy, “Historical Sketch of the Missions in Asiatic Turkey,” p. 34.

[103] Tracy, “The Historical Sketch of the Missions in Asiatic Turkey,” page 16.

XI

THE ARMENIAN QUESTION

The previous brief history of this people, especially since the introduction of Christianity into Armenia, has furnished the reader with sufficient facts to show him that the real trouble of this nation began from the time of its conversion to Christianity, and has come down to the present time.

What the Armenians have been suffering now is just a little more intensified than what they have suffered in the past by the hands of the fire-worshiping Persians. Had they received Zoroastrianism, forced upon them in the fifth century, they might have changed the entire aspect of the history of Western Asia. Or, had they embraced Mohammedanism in the seventh century, when fanatic missionary soldiers of Mohammed fell upon them, sword in hand, and massacred thousands upon thousands in cold blood, because they refused to accept the sensual religion of a sensual and bloody man, again the history of Western Asia might have been differently written.

When their infant sons were torn away from their parental bosom by the Ottoman rulers, and reared in Islamism and inured to the profession of arms, whose skill, vigor, and courage shook the foundations of the then civilized world, then, we say, had the Armenians renounced their religion and professed the Mohammedan faith and entered the army, they would have brought “to bear on the problems of the battlefield all the subtlety of intellect developed by ages of mental activity,” unquestionably would they have saved the Turkish Empire from the inevitable dissolution into which she has plunged herself. This also would have undoubtedly given a different feature to the Ottoman history.

Why have the Armenians been so cruelly persecuted, oppressed, tortured and butchered? Why were their beautiful daughters abducted, their wives ravished, they themselves massacred by the Kurds, Circassians, and Turks? Not because they belong to a different nationality--though they do--but because they belong to a different religion--they are Christians. So I beg the reader to bear in mind that the real trouble or the Armenian question, at the bottom, is the old conflict, first between Christianity and Paganism, then between Christianity and Mohammedanism, and now with Pagan-Mohammedanism.

The Turkish government found a convenient excuse for persecuting Christian Armenians under the garb of suppressing a revolutionary movement. But this movement was of a very recent origin, and altogether “harmless as to any effective force.” The Turkish misrule in Armenia, and in all parts of the Ottoman empire, persecutions, confiscations of property, forcible conversions to Islam, imprisonments, exiles, and massacres, have begun since the entrance of the Turks into Western Asia; at times they have been intensified; they are now at their height.

“Tears of Armenia” was the title of a little book which contained the report of Vartabed Paul Nathanian, who was appointed in 1878 by Bishop Nerses, the patriarch, and the civic and ecclesiastical councils of Constantinople, to take charge of the diocese of Palu in Armenia. While there, this noble prelate, following the example of the Good Shepherd, traveled through the country, visited his flock, and reported the condition of the people. His report was published. With great propriety he begins the preface in the following manner: “Tears and misery, behold, these two painful words are chosen for the theme of this present work, of which with an aching heart will I speak, and still more painful it is, that the esteemed reader will hear undeniable truths.”

The facts recorded in this pamphlet are too painful to be translated into the English language. The crimes of the Kurds and the injustice and cruelty of the government’s officers perpetrated upon the Christian Armenians run from the simplest forms of robbery and cruelty to the vilest forms of abduction, assault, outrage, torture, and murder.

The report of this venerable Vartabed Nathanian was only the confirmation and verification of the oppressed condition of the Armenians in the interior, more or less known before. For, when, in the autumn of 1876, the European powers sent their representatives to meet at Constantinople to consider the cruelties of the Turkish government, the massacre of the Bulgarians and other disturbances in the empire, Bishop Nerses attempted then to draw attention to the condition of the Armenians. But his efforts were fruitless, as the conference itself was futile; a peaceful adjustment of the differences was not agreed upon. The Russo-Turkish war consequently broke out. Again Armenia had to furnish the battle-field for these two formidable combatant nations in Asia.

Russia was apparently fighting for the oppressed Christians. The Turks were called upon to combat with a Christian nation, which was fighting as the champion of the Christian subjects of the Ottoman government. The officials of the government well may say: what do we care for these wretched Christians who are a constant source of trouble to us? The ignorant Turkish soldiers and the _bashi-bazouks_,[104] Circassians and Kurds were incapable of knowing the difference between an Armenian and a Russian, between a Greek and a Bulgarian, it was enough that all of them went under the name “Christian.” It was their frequent utterance, “_Ghiaurlari kesmeli_, the infidels must be killed.” Even when the government had no war whatever there was no safety for the Christian; how much less could any tranquillity now be expected. The mountains especially were infested by those who deserted the army, and the highway robbers were at the fullest exercise of their predatory powers.

Who suffered the worst, served the most, and received nothing in Asiatic Turkey? The Armenians. The Turkish troops, by all means, would avoid on their way to the battle-field lodging at a Turkish, but always at an Armenian village, where even the most insignificant soldier was a despot. He must have everything he wished for nothing, and not depart in peace, but give some trouble to his Christian host. The writer, who was not very far from the battle-field, being on the main road leading to it, has seen these things with his own eyes. He may, therefore, say with perfect truthfulness, that these soldiers did not leave out from the category of their deeds anything evil, but the good only.

“Turkey bears a striking resemblance to the infernal regions, which good George Herbert said are paved with broken promises; her conduct in this war has been marked by the vilest crimes of which a nation can be guilty. She has not only committed the crime of arming and letting loose bands of undisciplined, fanatic robbers, whose passions, fed by the religious exhortations of their bigoted priest, and strengthened by the proclamation of the Sheikh-ul-Islam, have led, as _the Porte knew full well and firmly intended that they should lead, to the brutal massacre of the survivors of the Bulgarian rebellion and the cold blooded murders of the inoffensive Christians in Armenia_.”[105]

The fearful consequence of this war was the ignominious defeat of Turkey, and her readiness to come to terms with Russia whose armies were almost at the gates of Constantinople. So the representatives of these two combatant powers met at San Stefano, in March, 1878, and drew out the treaty which bears the name of the place. The 16th article of this Treaty was suggested and by the earnest solicitation of the patriarch and the leading Armenians of Constantinople, the Russian representative inserted the article for the express purpose of securing the protection of the Armenians. This article runs: “As the evacuation by the Russian troops of the territory which they occupy in Armenia, and which is to be restored to Turkey, might give rise to conflicts and complications detrimental to the maintenance of good relations between the two countries, the sublime Porte engages to carry into effect, without further delay, the improvements and reforms demanded by local requirements in the provinces inhabited by Armenians, and to guarantee their security from Kurds and Circassians.”

It is the opinion of some of the best Englishmen, that had the conservative government of England let the Treaty of San Stefano stand, Russia would have forced the Turkish government to fulfill her promises of reform in Armenia. But England upset and made it of non-effect by her interference merely for selfish ends. She negotiated with Turkey through the Cyprus convention of June, 1878. The following is the first article of this Anglo-Turkish convention: “His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, promises to England to introduce necessary reforms, to be agreed upon later between the two powers, into the government and for the protection of the Christian and other subjects of the Porte in these territories [Armenia], and in order to enable England to make necessary provision for executing her engagement (keeping Russia out of Armenia), His Imperial Majesty, the Sultan, further consents to assign the Island of Cyprus to be occupied and administered by England.”

The Anglo-Turkish Convention of Cyprus was a dagger thrust by a friend into the heart of Armenia; it may have been done unwittingly, yet Armenia has been bleeding ever since.