W. A. P. Martin And The Presbyterian Message In Mid-Nineteenth Century China

By Ralph R. Covell

Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary, Denver, Colorado.

Scholars have devoted considerable attention to the Western missionary as an interpreter of Western civilization to China. Jessie Lutz has observed that

along with the teachings of Jesus, Chinese converts were often asked to accept other ideals and customs from the West; sanitation practices, concepts about the role of women and relations of the sexes, abstinence from alcoholic drink, individualism, standards of medical care ….[1]

Far less frequently has anyone made an effort to analyze the Christian Gospel preached in China, to trace its roots in the sending culture, and to show the nature of its relationship to the “secular” message. They have apparently assumed that readers are so familiar with this that no elaboration is required. Some examples have been given of missionaries explaining to Christian audiences what they preach to the unconverted. Unfortunately, significant differences may have existed between these explanations and what was actually communicated to the non-Christian Chinese.[2]

A far more satisfactory methodology is to analyze an actual Chinese publication by an American missionary to determine the method and content of its religious communication in China. One of the best extant works to use for this is Evidences of Christianity, written by William A. P. Martin who spent nearly seventy years in China. In his famous work Martin apparently had two goals: (1) to give the Chinese a detailed understanding of the Christian faith as understood in his Presbyterian heritage, and (2) to contextualize his communication to fit the unique situation of his Chinese audience. We shall seek to evaluate how well he achieved these two goals with particular attention being given to the source, development, application, and accommodation of his theological concepts.[3]

William Alexander Parsons Martin, son of a pioneer Presbyterian preacher on the American frontier, received his first training at an academy run by his father in Livonia, Indiana. After studying at Indiana University from 1842 to 1846, he received his theological education at New Albany Theological Seminary. The call of home missions in the expanding West was strong, but Martin rejected this in favor of going to China in 1850 with the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church. His first field of service was the south China city of Ningpo, one of the five treaty ports opened to foreign residence by the Treaty of Nanking in 1842.

Martin had a scholarly bent, and as soon as he had gained a grasp of Ningpoese, he gave a series of evening lectures to the city congregation of the Presbyterian church. His audience was largely “educated men, some of whom were teachers and preachers in the service of other missions.”[4] These lectures were organized into a book entitled Tʾien-tao su-yúan (Evidences of Christianity)[5] and attained more popularity in China than any other missionary publication. It ranks first in importance for an understanding of the Christian message as it was articulated in the Presbyterian garb in nineteenth-century China.

From 1854 to 1912 Tʾien-tao su-yúan went through thirty or forty editions in Chinese as well as many in Japanese and Korean.[6] It was a part of the language study program for new missionaries who came to China, not only with the Presbyterian Board, but with other mission societies as well. Evidences of Christianity was also used in theological schools for the instruction of Christian preachers. In 1907 it received the most votes in a poll conducted by the Christian Literature Society previous to the China Centenary Conference as “the best single book” published in Chinese.[7]

For thousands of high Chinese officials and intellectuals this presentation of the Gospel was the only one to which they were ever significantly exposed. When Martin served as an interpreter on American diplomatic missions to Tientsin and Peking (1858–60), and during his many years (1864–94) teaching in and administering the government-sponsored T’ung Wen Kuan,[8] he took advantage of his many contacts to distribute Evidences of Christianity in the highest government circles. A classical Chinese revision of the book was prepared in 1912 at the request of the North China Tract Society with the aim of putting a copy of the work in the hands of every government official.[9] Mandarin editions were also distributed to the common people in North China. Whenever anyone thought of Martin during his period of sixty-six years of active residence in China, they immediately associated him with his famous publication. Arthur Smith, his colleague of many years, observed, “To have produced a volume with such a history would have been worth the life of any missionary.”[10]

The author has given us a description of how he constructed Tʾien-tao su-yúan

Arranging the topics in my own mind, I made them the subject of my evening discourses—not merely presenting my views, but discussing them with my hearers. Each morning I put into shape the matter which had been rendered warm and malleable by the discussion of the previous evening. I followed no authority, translated no page of any textbook, and rarely, if ever, referred to one in the course of my lectures. Matter and form grew out of the occasion, the result being a live book, adapted to the taste as well as to the wants of the Chinese.[11]

The first of the three parts of Evidences was arranged “much after the plan of Paley’s Natural Theology.”[12] If this is so, why did Martin claim to follow no particular book? Apparently, the original unpublished text which he called Evidences of Christianity was almost immediately augmented by two other works on Natural Theology and Revealed Theology which constituted parts one and three of the published Tʾien-tao su-yúan.[13]

The preface of the first edition, written in 1854 by Fan Yung-tai, a friend of Martin’s, set the tone for the entire work with the observation that the Doctrine of the Mean and the Christian faith do not conflict but are in harmony. Martin continned this key note in his introduction by noting that the ta-tao (great doctrine) was not to be restricted to East or West—its origin was in Heaven with a personal God who may be called shen, t’ien-chu or shang-ti.[14] His willingness to use all of these terms, hotly disputed by missionaries of all persuasions, indicated a flexible attitude unusual among missionaries of this early period. The Christian God could be known by a faith based on understanding. This kind of understanding, he affirmed, came only with the thorough investigation similar to that which the Westerner had used to analyze and harness the properties of water and fire.[15]

Section I—Natural Theology

At the outset Martin explained that, contrary to what the Chinese thought, Westerners were not all merchants and destitute of the knowledge of the too. Shunning the term “missionary,” he pointed out that some were scholars, a role of great prestige for the Chinese, and had labored hard to learn about Chinese life and culture in order to preach about a faith that had its earthly origins in the East.[16]

Martin divided the material in Tʾien-tao su-yúan into three sections which follow the classification already noted of natural theology, evidences of Christianity, and revealed theology. Section I has seven chapters in which the author appealed to heavenly bodies, the five elements, living things, the human body, the principle of life (soul), insects and animals, and all of creation to demonstrate the existence of God. The first appeal, then, was not to revealed truth but to an orderly world and the reliability of man’s rational senses of perception. This was almost exactly the plan used by Paley in Natural Theology.[17]

In Chapter I the author utilized the heavenly bodies—the three lights—to illustrate the orderly nature of the universe and to emphasize that it consisted of matter activated by the principle of life.[18] Martin explained scientifically how the sun, planets, and earth were thought to have originated in the contraction and spinning movements of the original stuff of the universe, but then he pointed to God as the hidden source of the gravitational principle which produced this creative activity.[19]

He commenced Chapter II by observing that ancient Chinese and Greek theories[20] to explain the nature of the universe did not reflect scientific reality, but that he would use a combination of these popular views—metal, wind, water, fire, and earth -to indicate God’s existence.[21] He showed in detail how only the presence of a living Creator produced the marvelous interdependent functioning of these five elements in the universe.[22] Throughout this chapter he used simple scientific illustrations that were unfamiliar to his listeners, but would probably not be difficult to comprehend, at least in face-to-face dialogue.[23] His very use of the concept, if not all the content, of the “five elements” would fit the intellectual context of a Chinese audience.

Martin dealt more specifically with the origin of life in Chapter III. The format used in the text became more polemical, reflecting something of the “give and take” of the discussion in which the lectures originated. A hearer argued that li (reason or principle) had given birth to all things and asked, “What is the principle of anything if not its nature? What anything is by nature is Heaven’s mandate; and Heaven is the Lord. Therefore, to say that principle gives birth to anything is no different from the theory that the Lord gives birth to it.”[24] Martin replied that the nature of anything or its principle adheres in matter and can hardly give birth to it. God, the Creator, he explained, has put a distinctive and unique principle in each part of his creation, but he must be distinguished from it.[25] Although Martin used empirical data as a point of contact with the Chinese context, he saw the limitation of this approach to give a concept of the God of the Bible and thus was prepared, when necessary, to communicate his biblical presuppositions directly.

He mentioned the Chinese theory that the t’ai chi (great ultimate) had given birth to the yang (male principle) and yin (female principle) which together produced all the rest of creation.[26] Without condemning this view as superstitious or idolatrous, he observed simply that it had no foundation in fact. Weather, environment, mutations, and survival of the fittest, he stated, were better explanations than the interaction of yin and yang for the many different species of animal and plant life in the world.[27]

In Chapter IV he presented the design of the human body as further evidence of God’s creative ability. He drew a distinction between the popular Chinese proverb, t’ien sheng jen (“Heaven gives birth to man”) and the concept of creation, which implied careful planning. As he described the human body with its complex detail and the interdependent functioning of each part, he may have been tempted to use Paley’s famous example of the watch to reinforce his emphasis on design.[28] Fortunately he appealed rather to what would obviously be far more familiar to his Chinese audience—a well-planned house or a metal tool.[29]

Chapter V is a long, complex investigation of man’s Godgiven psychological nature. Martin’s starting point was that the human body had no life unless in-dwelt by a ling-hun (soul). He taught that each person has only one “soul,” but that its properties were divided into those of “spirit” and “heart.” Spirit properties were five: consciousness, self-consciousness, memory, thought, and imagination. He presented thought as particularly important in separating man from even the highest level of animal, such as the orangutang.[30] Many simple illustrations from the Chinese situation clarified the interdependence among the five properties. For example, he compared memory without thought to undigested food and thought without memory to dysentery.[31] The several stages in the process by which silk is produced were given as an example of the indispensable nature of each of the “spirit properties.”[32]

“Heart properties” were four: desire, emotions, discrimination, and moral judgment. Each of these was further subdivided in great detail to illustrate how God has directed in the working of man’s heart and mind. He emphasized specifically that moral judgment is a result of the Divine law written on the heart.[33]

This chapter of the first section of the Evidences of Christianity closely reflected Dugald Stewart’s Outline of Moral Philosophy. In Part I of his well-known work, Stewart described the intellectual powers of man—including, as does Martin, external perception, memory, imagination, judgment, and reasoning. Part II was entitled “The Active and Moral Powers of Man” and included an analysis of his appetites, desires, affections, self-love; and moral faculty. Although undoubtedly indebted to Stewart in the development of this portion of his work, Martin did not bother his Chinese readers with material in Stewart on philosophic speculations of Western thinkers.[34] Another difference was that Martin made an occasional appeal to Scripture to support his assertions, while Stewart completely separated natural and revealed theology.[35] His illustrations were not taken from Stewart and were well adapted to every-day Chinese life.

Martin’s use of ling and hun, apparently to carry the meaning of Stewart’s “intellectual powers” and “moral powers,” would tend, without much more explanation, to confuse the Chinese who had a wide variety of concepts associated with these terms. Missionaries had united the two words into a combination not used by the Chinese and assigned to it the meaning of “soul.” Martin started his analysis with this expression which had zero meaning and then divided it again into its components as he groped for terms to express common Western psychological concepts seldom used, at least in these combinations, by the Chinese. Further study—he had only been in China four years—might have enabled him to find terms and concepts that would more easily relate to the Chinese understanding of the “inner man.”

In Chapter VI Martin used both Paley and Stewart in analyzing the unique instincts of fish, birds, and beasts.[36] He showed how the mating cycles of fish, for example, cannot be explained by learning, memory, or thought processes but only by natural disposition.[37] The Chinese term for this, t’ien-hsing (heavenly disposition), is not a Christian expression but was useful for Martin’s argument.

Martin ended this chapter by emphasizing that though man and the animal world were different, they stood in a hierarchical relationship one to the other. “Animals are subject to man and man is subject to heaven. Animals use their bodies to serve man, and man uses his heart to serve God.”[38] He perceived this unity among heaven, man, and the animal world, each in its own place and with its own responsibility, as congenial to a Bible world view and also as having deep roots in ancient and contemporary Chinese thought.[39]

Now that he had used multiple arguments to indicate the existence of God, Martin went beyond the usual province of an introduction to natural theology—certainly beyond Paley—to talk about what God is like. Describing his basic method as to “investigate man in order to understand God,”[40] he argued from the world-wide unity of nature and man to the concept of one God over all—self-existent, with no beginning or end, and possessing the attributes of omnipresence, omnipotence, and ommscience.[41] He quoted from many Scripture portions to buttress his statements, only, however, after he had fully appealed to the nature of the universe and the nature of man to deduce the nature of God. Could this God be approached by mortal man? He answered in the affirmative, not by using a direct Scripture quotation but by reminding his readers of Mencius’ statement that evil man could prepare himself by fasting and ablutions to sacrifice to shang-ti.[42]

Throughout Section I Martin’s argument revealed how his studies in Scottish philosophy at Indiana University had influenced his system of apologetics. The Scottish school of philosophic realism, sometimes referred to as the School of Common Sense, was a reaction against what was considered “the germ of skepticism” in the early philosophical systems of Descartes, Hume, Locke, and Berkeley.[43] As enunciated by Thomas Reid and Dugald Stewart, two authors studied by Martin during his senior year at the university, its central affirmation was that objects exist independently of the mind and can be perceived directly as they are. It was not through ideas or images of the real world that knowledge was gained, but from the objects themselves. The truth of these assertions was self-evident through “common sense,” a synonym in this system for reason.[44]

Although developed to meet particular philosophic problems in Europe, this system of thought appealed widely to American religious thinkers.

It supported orthodoxy in theology, raised no dangerous questions, invited no intellectual adventures. It was a restatement of Locke [who for Americans was a political idol] against David Hume and contradicted Hume’s skepticism by a blanket assertion that idea and object correspond so faithfully that Americans, intent upon their business, need never give a second thought to so unprofitable a worry.[45]

As the doctrines of Scottish realism entered the minds of American youth through courses in mental philosophy several components were clearly definable.[46] The objective reality of the external world and the doctrine of “cause and effect” led to an argument for God’s existence. The basic premise was that “from certain signs or indications in the effect, we may infer that there must have been intelligence, wisdom, or other intellectual or moral qualities in the cause.” Its corollary was that “the world displays these signs and indications.” Reid concluded that “the man who can see no evidence for God’s existence from final causes ought in consistency to see no evidence for any intelligence other than his own.”[47]

In adopting the world view of Scottish realism Martin was adhering to the dominant philosophical system within early nineteenth-century Presbyterianism. This was orthodoxy for his time. In also asserting that there was some measure of objectivity in the Chinese perception of reality he was laying a theological and philosophical foundation for cross-cultural communication.

Section II—Evidences of Christianity

Section II of Tʾien-tao su-yúan, probably the original Evidences of Christianity, also has seven chapters. Chapter one explained man’s need for revelation, chapter seven resolved doubts hindering an understanding of the faith, and the intervening chapters analyzed five types of evidence for Christianity: prophecy, miracles, the spread of the Christian faith, the transforming power of biblical doctrines, and the wonderful nature of the truth.

Explaining in Chapter I that natural theology did not preclude the need for special revelation, Martin emphasized that God’s disclosure of himself in nature was incomplete and that man has not obeyed what he has learned in this way. He pointed to the Indian custom of temple prostitution and to the Chinese practices of plural marriages and appeasing the spirits by self-sacrifice to substantiate his argument.[48] He compared men to orphans who no longer knew their parents. The religions they had developed—Confucianism, Buddhism, Taoism—gave conflicting answers to such important matters as salvation and the future state. How, he asked, was truth to be found ? What is God’s revelation to man tossed about in the midst of a “sea of bitterness” and trying to find his way to the shore?[49] Although he was directing his remarks to Chinese readers, he asserted that this was the universal plight of all mankind.

In Martin’s view, God’s special revelation could be known only through the Holy Scriptures. He affirmed that although man was related to both heaven and earth,[50] he was ignorant of God, his own nature, sin, and redemption. Nothing in the world’s religions, he declared, could be compared to the Bible and the answers it gave to man’s deepest questions.[51] He pointed out how its unity, its consistency, and the applicability of its truth to all men attested to its divine origin. In contrast with other books, the Bible told both the good and the bad about the men and women whom it described.[52] The God whom it portrayed was not a local deity, constantly changing and being superseded by new objects of worship, but was the unchanging God who controlled the entire earth.[53]

Martin’s phraseology, far from being a wooden translation of an American model, appealed constantly to Chinese concepts. When Jesus was on earth, he was “filial” in relation to his family and to God—lie “honored the king’s law.” In his incarnation he descended to man’s “dust.”[54] Throughout the chapter a strong stress was placed on the fact that the Christian faith was a religion of morality and rectitude.[55] To Chinese readers imbued with the benevolent emphasis of Confucian thought this was an impressive claim.

Continuing to build upon this foundation of the biblical revelation, Martin emphasized the importance of prophecy, showing how the predictions uttered by the “holy saints” of the Old Testament were fulfilled in the New Testament in ways that defied human fabrication.[56]

Miracles were not performed, Martin asserted, in order to astound men but to provide evidence for God’s unity in the Old Testament and for Jesus’ deity in the New Testament.[57] Although admitting that Confucius did not even wish to talk of the miraculous, he affirmed that what Jesus did often seemed strange only because it was new and outside of men’s previous experience.[58]

Martin devoted several pages to the resurrection of Christ as the supreme miraculous testimony to the reliability of the Christian faith.[59] He affirmed that the resurrected Christ himself was the continuing miracle. He had worked only three years, but his influence had changed the world; although no one had served as Jesus’ teacher, he had taught all the world; he never left Palestine to go abroad, and yet the entire world had heard of him.[60]

In common with other apologists in the nineteenth century, Martin gave great importance to the evidential value of the historic triumphs of Christianity as it was propagated throughout the world.[61] The fact that the Christian faith had penetrated over two hundred countries was presented as a sure indication of God’s protection and blessing.[62] Other religions, he claimed, had not spread this extensively and were presently in a state of decline. Whatever measure of success they had attained in some areas of the world he attributed to accommodation—as when Buddhism entered China—or to dependence upon political and military power.[63]

Martin dubiously contended that the Christian faith historically had not relied upon anything but the spiritual zeal of its followers to advance. In his view the removal of religious restrictions in Japan and China was one further indication of this factor.[64] The very privilege of doing missionary work in Ningpo should have reminded Martin that the Opium War with Great Britain, and not the spiritual vigor of the Christian faith, had created this opportunity. Evidences of Christianity had been revised repeatedly over the years from the time of its initial publication in 1854, but the author chose not to remind his readers of his own significant participation in the later “unequal treaties” that opened up all of China to the penetration of Christian missionaries.

He marvelled how God had providentially granted to Christian countries great material resources to send forth missionaries and to build merchant fleets to bring them to their destinations. By contrast, he observed, non-Christian countries were getting progressively weaker and had very few ships.[65] He predicted that under the impetus of this advance, China’s Pu-sa would be no more remembered in a few years than the old deities once worshipped in early European history.[66]

Most of Chapter VI is devoted to an exposition of how the Christian Gospel had changed lives wherever it had gone. Martin noted how God created man with a good nature and commanded him to walk in the true way. Although civilization was primitive, man’s moral state was good. As man improved his physical state he soon deteriorated morally and wandered far from God. Many holy sages appeared to rectify this situation, but their strength and wisdom were insufficient. At this critical juncture, God sent Jesus into the world to enlighten mankind, to change their evil into good, and to save them.[67] As men believed and learned the truth of the Bible, they were restored to God’s will, their governments were reformed, and they developed an interest in science. When science had developed, their countries became strong and able to spread the Christian faith to other countries.[68] America’s drive across the continent to the Pacific Ocean was cited as a prime example of the energy produced by the Christian faith.[69] A product of an expanding America propelled inexorably across the continent and into the far reaches of the Pacific by a concept of “Manifest Destiny,” he was prone in the fashion of that day naively to identify scientific advance, natural resources, material prosperity, a capitalistic economic system, geographic expansion, and most aspects of American culture with the Christian faith. And, with a utopian vision, possibly fed by millenial expectations, he believed firmly that God would not withhold the spiritual conquest of China from his servants.

How did Christianity relate to the traditional Chinese religions? He quickly dismissed the challenge of Buddhism and Taoism, because of their crude idolatry and recourse to doctrines of hell and heaven to frighten and seduce men.[70] Confucianism, although correct and beautiful in his view, was not complete, for in its doctrine of the wu-lun, or the five human relationships, it had completely neglected the divine dimension.[71] Man, made in God’s image, was responsible first to Heaven. The Christian faith embraced not five but six relationships.[72] He argued that this firm foundation in God’s will and grace was the prerequisite to a change in human morality.

In the final chapter of Section II, Dr. Martin answered a number of objections that had been raised against the Christian faith. The first question had to do with conflicts between the age of the earth as presented in the Bible and in the Chinese classics. The former, based on deductions from genealogical records, had been thought to be about seven thousand years, while the latter seemed to imply forty or fifty thousand. Martin proposed no definite solution, but he claimed that the Chinese records with respect to t’ai-chi, the yin and yang, P’an Ku, the first man, “whom the Bible calls Adam,” and the ancient kings, Yao, Wu and Shun, were not clear enough to form any reliable comparative judgment.[73]

Some of his Chinese audience had questioned the biblical assertion that humankind with all its diversity of races, language, and location was the result of a single creation. He replied that all of these differences were not as important as the similarities of human nature and of the human body and were probably due to factors of climate and spatial separation.[74] He pointed to China’s many languages to illustrate the world problem and noted that European and Indian languages both came from Sanskrit. He speculated that the biblical Eden was in Asia and therefore very close to the first four centers of civilization in India, China, Babylon, and Egypt.[75]

Martin dealt briefly with the theory of evolution. He acknowledged that many scientists believed that man and animals came from one line. He went on to state, however, that despite widespread consensus with respect to evolution—he called it a gradual “creation” in contrast to a “sudden” one—several things could still be affirmed: the wonder of creation; the origin of human and animal life from the earth; and man’s unique possession of a soul. How, he asked, if God had not given a soul to him, could he be a man? He did not insist that the six days of creation be interpreted as literal, twenty-four hour days. To him the order and meaning of creation were more important questions than the time factor.[76] Martin appears to have espoused some type of theistic evolution as he attempted to accommodate his faith to the impact of the evolutionary thought which had become very popular since the time when Darwin published his Origin of Species in 1858.[77] In common with many of his contemporaries. He had uncritically accepted current scientific theories such as the effect of location and climate on the development of racial differences.[78]

A very important question that must have been raised constantly was, “If I follow this way, must I turn my back on Confucius?” Martin’s basic principle was that “Confucianism and Christianity may be distinguished in terms of breadth and narrowness, but not in terms of truth and error.”[79] “How then,” he asked, “can you talk about turning your back on it?” Without spelling out any details of this relationship, he went on to point out that Jesus was the God-Man-at once both teacher and Lord. He had come to redeem men by his sacrifice and not to wield political power nor to teach men to change their customs.[80] Jesus’ first and last objective was to relate men to God.

In his English works Martin was not always as cordial in his estimate of Confucianism. He pointed to religious errors as well as to the social obstacles that it posed to true morality and progress. In his Chinese writings, however, he was more concerned to develop a “point of contact” with his audience. Nevertheless, in his approach to Confucianism, he probably did not evaluate it sufficiently as a part of an institutionalized religious system within Chinese society. Was this part of what an old friend, Robert Hart, the Inspector General of the Chinese Maritime Customs, once observed of Martin: “It is a pity that [he is] not a more practical man ... he has lots of learning, but with the defects of that quality”?[81]

Section III—Revealed Theology

The final section of the Tʾien-tao su-yúan may have been used for catechetical instruction. Martin quoted Scripture liberally to present the basic doctrines of the Christian faith: text and versions of the Bible; the future life; the effect on man of the sin of Adam and Eve; redemption, regeneration; development of Christian morality; and perseverance in prayer. He prefaced this doctrinal section by a brief chapter explaining inspiration, the nature of the Bible’s reliability, scribal errors, differences between the Old Testament, and the scope and character of the content of Scripture.

First of all, he discussed the doctrine of the future life. Starting with several scriptural quotations, he then immediately appealed to divine justice and human nature to build his case inductively.[82] Good and evil rewards for man’s conduct, he affirmed, indicate a time of future judgment. Otherwise there was no justice in the liniverse, and all attempts at a moral life were worthless.[83] The fact that man was composed of a body and soul, argued Martin, indicated the existence of a future life. He observed that the soul controlled the body and was able to operate independently of it during a man’s lifetime. Was it not reasonable then, he asked, to infer that it continued to exist after the death of the body?[84] Man’s spirit came from heaven’s spirit, which was not con trolled in any way by a body.[85] He denied transmigration, which blurred the distinction between man created with a soul in God’s image and animals which were extinguished at death.[86] He ended this chapter with instruction on the resurrection of the body, the future judgment, and the new heaven and new earth.[87] Martin avoided the use of the term ti-yü for hell and spoke only of the huo (misery) which would come upon the souls of those who had done evil.[88]

Always mindful of the dominant view of Chinese people that mankind was not essentially evil, Martin repeatedly reminded his readers that man’s nature had originally been good.[89] Evil in the world, he asserted, did not originate with man’s strange customs or ignorance, but from his deliberate disobedience to God’s command.[90] This initial rebellion caused man to lose his heavenly nature and resulted in a life controlled by sin.[91] Even though man outwardly appeared good, he was not virtuous and needed to be redeemed and related again to God from whom he had been separated by sin. Even the small child, he observed, revealed his inherited tendency to sin. He made it very clear, however, that man was punished not for Adam’s sin but for his own deliberate transgressions.[92]

As Martin elaborated in Chapter IV on how Jesus, the Second Adam, provided divine redemption,[93] the unnamed reader raised the question, “How can Jesus save if he is the descendant of Adam and implicated in the sin of our ancestors?” Martin replied that, on the one hand, Jesus was fully man and able to face man’s moral dilemma and, on the other hand, that he was God and thus able to save. He explained that the virgin birth was the means God had used to enable Jesus to be born as a man free from the entanglement of the inherited sin of the human race.[94]

Could not God have forgiven man’s sin without the death of Christ? Martin answered that this was an impossibility, since God, unlike man who no longer had a sense of holiness, must satisfy both his mercy and his justice. He illustrated this teaching with a story that Chinese, who emphasize harmonious relationships more than the letter of the law, may have found difficult to comprehend. A Grecian king had ruled that the sin of adultery would be punished by removing the offender’s two eyes. When he found that his own son was guilty, he sought a method that would show mercy and yet meet the requirements of the law. He solved his dilemma by extracting one of his son’s eyes and one of his own. Martin applied this by noting that the “country’s law” permitted a relative to serve as an offender’s “middleman,” and that this was the relationship in which Jesus stood to God and man in satisfying divine mercy and divine justice.[95]

Martin noted that forgiveness of sins was but one aspect of the redemptive work of Christ. Equally important to him was that man’s sense of guilt was removed when the righteousness of Christ-his complete fulfillment of t’ien li (the heavenly principle or justice)[96] —was imputed to the believer.

In Chapter V Martin discussed the work of the Holy Spirit in applying the objective redemption provided in Christ to the life of the individual believer. Man, as a hsiao-t’ien (small heaven) had the same relationship to God as the earth had to the sun. If the earth should fall from its orbit around the sun, darkness would prevail, living things would die, and all the seasons would be confused. In correcting this state of affairs God would need not only to restore the earth to its proper orbit but to recreate all life. Similarly, Martin observed, man needed not only to be justified and restored to his proper position before God, but he required the work of the Holy Spirit to recreate his fallen nature.[97]

No human reformation could deal with the sin of the human heart—pride, selfishness, jealousy and covetousness.[98] Only the “new birth” could redirect the human conscience, perverted in the same way as a compass might be by the steel on a ship, toward willing obedience to God’s purposes.[99]

Consonant with the Reformed emphasis on the sovereignty of God, Martin believed that the converting work of the Holy Spirit preceded faith and was the means by which it was received.[100] He argued that faith enabled man, in contrast with the animal world, to make provision for the distant future. Care must be exercised, however, to have a true repentance—a complete forsaking of sin and a sincere return to the Lord. Merely to repent as a means of escaping punishment was a wrong motivation.[101] Man’s greatest sin was that he had forsaken God and despised his goodness.[102]

In Chapter VII Martin concentrated on a topic of high priority to his Chinese readers—the development of a moral life. True morality, he argued, could not be produced by man’s unaided efforts, but was the fruit of the Holy Spirit and required understanding of biblical principles, obedience, and discipline. The aim of a moral life, he affirmed, was to be like Jesus, a result encouraged by meditation on him and his virtues.[103]

In contrast with Chinese priority upon interpersonal relationships, Martin emphasized a pietistic type of ethics that concerned itself with individual acts and attitudes rather than with social morality. He did not, however, spell out details of the precise things which he felt a Chinese Christian should or should not do, leaving this apparently to the individual conscience as guided by the Holy Spirit and the Bible.

Adherents to Chinese religions found the Christian use of verbal prayer to be strange. The Emperor visited the Altar of Heaven to beseech heaven’s blessing and to avert disaster. Priests presented the people’s requests to the various deities, and a variety of incantations and chants were utilized by Buddhists to obtain what they needed.[104] Martin, therefore, devoted all of Chapter VIII to the need of Christian believers to persevere in prayer. Prayer, he taught, served several functions: to know God better, to enjoy fellowship with him, to thank him, to praise him, to seek his forgiveness, and to petition for his protection.[105] He placed very little emphasis on prayer as a means of getting things from God, although this aspect was not entirely neglected.

How did prayer fit with predestination? It was the means, he affirmed, by which God accomplished the goals which he had previously determined.[106] Nor did God need men to pray so that he might know their needs -prayer basically was the way in which he related himself to man.[107]

Prayer was of three types: public, family, and private. In contrast to what might have been expected for one living in a family-oriented society, Martin put his major stress on the duty of private prayer.[108] Prayer, he emphasized, was as natural as breathing. It required no special words, clothes, ceremonies, incense, or sacrifices and could be done standing, sitting, or kneeling.[109] He concluded his instruction by analyzing the Lord’s Prayer and appending three sample prayers that could be used for repentance, evening and morning devotions, and for grace at meals.[110]

In Chapter IX of Section III of Tʾien-tao su-yúan, Martin explained the meaning of the “holy sacraments”, baptism and communion. Giving to them the traditional Protestant meanings of seal, sign, and symbol of faith, he explained that these were to be observed in the church, and that they were unrelated to national ceremonies. “Each country has its own national rites and ceremonies .... and Jesus neither adds to nor subtracts from them.”[111] When he finished his discussion, he posed the question, “Can the traditions passed down to us by our ancestors be observed along with the Christian rites?” To this query he replied, “You may observe those that do not contradict the Bible, but you must reject those that do.” He then quoted the Ten Commandments, noting specifically that there was no difference between idolatry and worship before the ancestral tablet and between sacrificing to idols and presenting food to the spirit of dead ancestors.[112]

In very discreet and polite language he empathized with Chinese views that termed failures to bow and to sacrifice as unfilial conduct producing dire consequences. He urged his readers to remember that Lú, one of Confucius’ disciples, had said that “life and death, prosperity, and all things” were under Heaven’s control. If this were so, Martin argued, then our first obligation was to God, the originator of all life and the one responsible for parents and their care for their children.[113]

Although Martin believed there was no need to offer sacrifices of food to the ancestors, he stated that the Chinese Christian should fix and clean the graves, put up the pictures of departed loved ones, and take flowers to the burial site. Above all, God should be worshipped and praised as the truest way of expressing gratitude for life. He closed his argument by affirming that when a person has understood the truth, he will be able himself to discern which of the ancestral rites he should observe and which he should abandon.

Martin was much more tolerant of the ancestral rites in his English writings. This appears to accord with his basic philosophy that if the missionaries would not be so initially judgmental in their attitude toward the target culture on this issue, the climate would be created in which the Chinese, guided by the Holy Spirit and under the judgment of the Word of God, would be able to reach their own conclusions. When speaking, then, to the Chinese he enunciated principles of action, reminded them of those dimensions of the rite that seemed clearly to contradict Scripture, exhorted them to adhere to the highest teaching of their revered sages, and encouraged them to continue in those practices that were spiritually neutral.[114]

Martin devoted the last chapter of his book to the doctrine of the Trinity. Several of his colleagues at Ningpo believed that he had lapsed from the orthodox Christian doctrine into either tritheism or Sabellianism, a doctrine which affirmed there was only one divine person but three functions. His presentation in this chapter, possibly revised over the years, afforded no clear grounds for these charges. He recognized that the subject was a mystery and that no explanations would fully satisfy. He was convinced, however, that the Bible did teach that the one true God existed eternally in three persons and that, as was the case with many other things in life, it was to be believed even if not fully understood.[115]

In conclusion, several things may be noted about Tʾien-tao su-yúan. Martin, although not consciously following any specific books, had absorbed particular systems of thought which were the vehicles for presenting biblical doctrines to the Chinese. Paley’s Natural Theology, Dugald Stewart’s Outlines of Moral Philosophy, and numerous works on the evidences of Christianity were the most dominant. From one standpoint, this was fortuitous. The apologetic assumption in these works of God’s general revelation naturally predisposed him to seek points of contact within Chinese society for the biblical message. Had he lived in another period of history he might have had to make a more conscious effort to use this methodology. The danger of his approach, then and now, was that he unconsciously identified a particular philosophical systematization of data with biblical truth. In his case this partially helped him to attain one of his goals—the contextualization of the Christian message. More usually it only results in a highly Western packaging of the Gospel message that the target culture perceives as foreign.

Martin’s own Presbyterian Confession of Faith as well as Calvin’s Institutes furnished most of the substance for dogmatic portions of his work, particularly for Section III.[116] The order was not usually the same, and a few doctrines in the Confession were omitted, such as effectual calling, adoption, assurance of grace and salvation, the sabbath, marriage, divorce, and the duties of the civil magistrate. Nothing was said of the second advent of Christ nor of his millennial reign, but these are also noticeably absent from the Confession of Faith and the Institutes.

Although much of his factual information and his intellectual point of departure were Western-oriented, Martin utilized Chinese terminology, illustrations, and concepts to gain a “point of contact” with the Chinese mind. He clearly recognized that there was no “common ground” between his biblical presuppositions and the Confucian system of thought. These two holistic world-views, with all of their interacting elements, could not be totally identified. Points of intersection, however, did exist. The human dilemma—visions of a moral life, inability to attain the perceived ideal, a sense of shame and guilt, attempts by rites, education, and humanistic efforts to find a solution to man’s problem—was similar. Martin spoke to his readers’ real problems in terms of their own existential situation, using examples from and allusions to their own literature to elucidate what he believed. Non-Chinese illustrations, usually either historical or scientific, were of such a nature that the central idea could be easily grasped. Tʾien-tao su-yúan is not a translation, nor does it read like one—it is thoroughly immersed in the Chinese context.

Some Christian concepts—man’s relationship to the universe and to his fellow man, his moral nature, the ethical dimensions of the Christian life—were more easily understood by the Chinese than the being of the Triune God, the nature of sin, the psychology of the human personality, the redemptive work of Christ, and the relationship of the Gospel to Chinese customs. Whether the message he proclaimed was more or less obscure, Martin confidently felt that he was responding to needs within the human heart that reflected the divine influence and were imperfectly met by the three Chinese religions. He had little patience with Buddhism and Taoism, but he admired the moral qualities of Confucian teaching.

The message he proclaimed was modified to some degree in its form but not in its content. The doctrines he taught and the morality he enjoined were those of the historic Christian faith. No essential changes were made, although Martin espoused the principle that a Chinese Christian need give up only such indigenous rites as conflicted with the Gospel. His terminology—such as for heaven, hell, Scriptures, etc.—was Buddhist in origin, but Christian content was put into it.

In many portions of his work he confused imparting information with communication, and the message was undoubtedly overloaded with long Scripture quotations, technical terminology, and vague allusions.[117] Exactly how effective the communication was would be impossible to determine. Chinese scholars admired his ability to “turn a phrase,” and this honor and respect for his obvious knowledge of the language and literature were possibly confused with understanding and acceptance of the mysterious Christian doctrine.

Tʾien-tao su-yúan accentuated the positive and spoke appreciatively of Chinese life and society. Martin condemned idolatry as an accretion brought by Buddhism and Taoism, but he did not denounce other Chinese customs—geomancy, the five elements, the yin-yang duality, opium, infanticide, and polygamy. Some of these were mentioned with disapproval but only in the context of dealing with a larger issue. He wished to emphasize the central core of the Gospel message—mail’s restoration to a right relationship with God through the sacrifice of Christ—and to let the application of this to China be worked out in tile liberty given by the Holy Spirit.

From this notable effort by W.A.P. Martin to communicate the Christian faith to the Chinese several things then are apparent: ( 1) communicating to a target audience requires that the missionary speak meaningfully to its cultural heritage and in symbols with which it is familiar; (2) the missionary must resist the often unconscious introduction of alien systems of thought and emphases along with biblical doctrine; (3) tile missionary must make allowance for tile fact that his presentation of biblical teaching will be selective and partial in accord with his tradition and educational background.

Did Martin achieve his goals? Biblical truth, as understood within his own tradition, was clearly presented in Evidences of Christianity. For the day in which he lived, with all of its limitations of understanding in the fields of anthropology, psychology, and missiology, he was a daring cultural pioneer. Unfortunately, he may still need to serve as a trail-blazer even for our more sophisticated age when it is assumed that the missionary will “contextualize” his message.[118] In most of the world the Christian Gospel is still viewed as an exotic foreign transplant. Would this have been as prevalent had later missionaries built upon and expanded the insights of Martin and other like-minded colleagues? Having ignored the lessons of the past, we are confronted with a future that is not as bright as it could be. Alan Tippett sadly confesses that “our missiological theory [in cultural understanding] is not yet adequate for the missionary task I anticipate our being confronted with in the next twenty-five years.”[119]

At the Chinese Congress on World Evangelization (August 18-25, 1976), Stephen Tong, well-known Chinese evangelist and seminary professor from Indonesia, asked his fellow-Chinese participants: “If God were to open the doors of mainland China to the Gospel would we evangelicals have a theology to speak to her needs?” The answer of the Chinese church to this question may well help to determine the spiritual destiny of China’s millions.

Notes

1. Jesse G. Lutz (ed.), Christian Missions in China: Evangelists of What? (Boston, 1965), p. vii.
2. Ibid., pp. 11-12. The editor selects portions of a speech given by Griffith John at the General Conference of the Protestant Missionaries of China, May 10-24, 1877, which he retitles “Salvation from Sin, the Great Need of the Chinese.”
3. The only analysis with which I am familiar is one in Japanese by Yoshida Tora entitled Investigation of Evidences of Christianity (Tokyo, 1960).
4. W. A. P. Martin, A Cycle of Cathay (New York, 1900), p. 70.
5. The literal meaning of the Chinese title is “to search out the origins of the heavenly doctrine.”
6. Albert Porter, “An American Mandarin,” Outlook, LXXXVI (September, 1907), 887. In 1910 alone 21,260 copies were sold in Japan. Arthur Smith, “The Life and Work of the late Dr. W. A. P. Martin,” The Chinese Recorder, XLVIII (February, 1917), 118.
7. Arthur Brown, “The Death of the Rev. W. A. P. Martin,” Minutes of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A., XXX1V, 321.
8. Literally—“Interpreters’ School,” although usually referred to as Peking College, or even Peking University.
9. China Letters to the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church of the U.S.A., XI, Peking, Annual Personal Report, 1913, 1. Record Group 82-5–12. China Letters are designated in following footnotes as CL.
10. Smith, “Life and Work of Martin,” p. 118.
11. Martin, A Cycle of Cathay, p. 70.
12. Descriptive Catalogue of the Publications of the Presbyterian Mission Press (Shanghai, 1861), p. 6. Charles Denby, United States Minister to China, had received the impression that Evidences was a translation of Paley. See Charles Denby, China and Her People (2 vols.; N.Y., 1906), I, p. 217.
13. CL, IV, Ningpo, Martin to Board. #17, July 17, 1854 and #72, September, 1855, mentioned three books—Evidences of Christianity, Natural Theology, and Revealed Theology. If these three are not the three parts of the published work, then the other two books have been lost, and Martin’s statement that he depended on no outside sources is unreliable.
14. Evidences. la, 1–2; 1b, 1; 5a, 5–6. (The first number refers to the page, a or b to the side of the double leaf, and the final number to the line.) The first and third names are indigenous terms into which missionaries sought to pour a Christian meaning. T’ien-chu is the distinctive Catholic term, less liable to initial misinterpretation. Throughout Section I Martin also used the word t’ien (heaven) to carry the meaning of a personal God, although its precise denotation in the Chinese Classics is ambiguous. See William Theodore de Bary, Wing-tsit Chan, and Burton Watson (eds.), Sources of Chinese Tradition (New York, 1964), 1, pp. 5-6, 34–5, 44–7, 100–04, 485–87, and 503–09. The name Evidences is not used after this footnote.
15. 3a, 1–9.
16. 3b, 9–5a, 1. Note his emphasis on tao, scholars, study, and propagating an Eastern faith.
17. Frederick Ferre, Natural Theology Selections—William Paley (New York, 1963), pp. xi-xv. “Once then we know by natural theology that there is an intelligent mind behind the intricacies of the universe, then we may well leave to revelation the disclosure of many particulars which our research cannot reach respecting either the nature of this Being ... or his character and design … .” (p. 86). Martin studied Paley in his first year at New Albany Theological Seminary. See Plan of a Theological Seminary for The Presbyterian Church in the Western States located at New Albany, Indiana; as Revised, Amended, and Adopted October 1840 (Louisville, 1847), p. 20. Wilson Smith has observed that Paley’s books on moral philosophy and natural theology “were once as well known in American colleges as were the readers and spellers of William McGuffey or Noah Webster in the elementary schools.” Professors of Public Ethics, Studies of Northern Philosophers before the Civil War (Ithaca, 1956), pp. 215-16.
18. 1a.
19. 3a, 7–4a, 3.
20. The Chinese have talked of the five elements—metal, wood, water, fire, and earth—and the Greeks of water, fire, wind, and earth. De Bary, Chan and Watson, Sources, I, pp. 184, 198-9.
21. 4a-b. He spoke of sixty or more elements very briefly at the end of the chapter, 9a, 8.
22. 5a–9a, 7.
23. For example, if there were no air to conduct sound, everyone would be functionally deaf and dumb, 6a, 4–10. He explained the way in which water is evaporated to form clouds which produce rain, 7a, 1–5.
24. 10a, 5–6.
25. 10a, 6–11a.
26. 11a, 6–1 1b, 9.
27. 12a, 3–12b, 8.
28. Ferre (ed.), Natural Theology, XIV.
29. 14a, 6–14b, 3.
30. 18b, 9–19a, 5.
31. 18a, 7–9.
32. 20a, 4–6.
33. 23b, 4–5.
34. Dugald Stewart, Outlines of Moral Philosophy (Edinburgh, 1793), pp. 28-143.
35. 24a, 4–8.
36. 24a, 9–28a, 3. He claimed that their bodily structures were wonderful but basically similar to the marvels of the human body. Paley tended to emphasize this more than he did the instincts.
37. 26b, 8.
38. 27b, 8–9.
39. De Bary, et al., Sources, I, p. 206. “The idea that Heaven, earth and man, in their nature and in all their workings, form an inseparable trinity is fundamental in Han thought:” C. K. Yang, Religion in Chinese Society (Los Angeles, 1967), p. 250.
40. 30b, 7. T’ui-jen chi-shen.
41. 28a, 6–30a, 10.
42. 31b, 10–32a, 1.
43. “Thomas Reid,” The Encyclopedia Britannica, llth Edition, XXIII (Cambridge, 1911), p. 51.
44. Ibid., p. 51. Reid and others did not intend that the term “common sense” be understood as “the unreasoned beliefs of common life” in opposition to “the reasoned conclusions of philosophers.”
45. Perry Miller, American Thought, Civil War to World War I (San Francisco, 1954), p. x. Woodbridge Riley, American Thought from Puritanism to Pragmatism (New York, 1941), p. 121, observed that Scottish realism “fit the practical bent of the country.”
46. See Sydney E. Ahlstrom, “Scottish Philosophy,” Church History, XXIV (September, 1955), 257-72.
47. S. A. Grove, The Scottish Philosophy of Common, Sense (Oxford, 1960), 1). 147. This type of argument is clearly seen in Dugald Stewart, Outlines of Moral Philosophy (Edinburgh, 1793), pp. 159-69. There is design in the universe, we may indubitably perceive it, and it leads us to understand that there is a God. See also Andrew Seth, Scottish Philosophy (Edinburgh, 1875), pp. 72-105, 112.
48. 34a, 9–34b, 10.
49. 37a, 9–37b, 5–8. This concept with its terminology came from Buddhism. See Proverb 920 in Clifford Plopper, Chinese Religion Seen Through the Proverb (Shanghai, 1935), p. 150.
50. A pithy Chinese proverb—“He wears heaven on his head and the earth is beneath his feet.”
51. 38b, 10.
52. 43a, 5–44b, 6.
53. 44b, 6–46b, 5.
54. 42a, 10. This is a Buddhist term.
55. 46b, 4.
56. 52b, 1–3.
57. 53b, 2–7.
58. 53a, 10–53b, 2 and 54a, 7–8.
59. 59a, 9–60b, 9.
60. 60b, 9–6 1 a, 6.
61. This note, for example, is prominent in Ebenezer Dodge, The Evidences of Christianity (New York, 1869), V; Mark Hopkins, Evidences of Christianity (Boston, 1890), pp. 335-45; Albert Barnes, Lectures in the Evidences of Christianity in the Nineteenth Century (New York, 1868), pp. 109-150.
62. 62a, 1–3.
63. 62a, 3–62b, 3.
64. 62b, 10 and 63a, 1–63b, 2.
65. 63b, 2–8.
66. 64a, 2–7.
67. 65a, 3–65b, 6.
68. 65b, 7–66a, 9.
69. 63b, 4–6.
70. 67b, 5–10
71. 67b, 2–3. He called Confucianism cheng, meaning upright, straight, orthodox, correct, etc. The five relationships are ruler-minister, father-son, husband-wife, elder brother-younger brother, friend-friend. Karl Reichelt, Religion in Chinese Garment (New York, 1951), p. 47.
72. 68a, 4–5; 68a, 8–69a, 2.
73. 69a, 4–70a, 1.
74. 70a, 3–4.
75. 70a, 4–70b, 9.
76. 72a, 1–3.
77. 71a, 6–71b, 1. The edition of Tʾien-tao su-yúan used in this study is undoubtedly a reproduction of the last edition of 1912. This would appear from the author’s statement that America had forty-five states, 63b, 5. The forty-fifth and the forty-sixth states (Arizona and New Mexico) were added to the Union in 1912.
78. See, for example, William Stanton, The Leopard’s Spots, Scientific Attitudes Toward Race in America 1815-1859 (Chicago, 1960).
79. 73a, 9.
80. 73b, 1–6.
81. J. K. Fairbank, K. F. Braner, and E. M. Matheson (eds.), The I.G. in Peking (Boston, 1975), Vol. II, Letter 1231, p. 1300.
82. 78a, 1. Divine justice in t’ien-li, a Chinese expression associated with the very nature of things.
83. 78a, 1–80a, 6. This line of reasoning is good natural theology, fits with biblical doctrine, and would not immediately conflict with the Buddhist teaching of karma. Plopper, Chinese Religion, p. 223. Martin quoted the Chinese proverb, yu ch’ien-yin pi yu hou-ko: “If there is a previous cause, there certainly will be a later result.”
84. In this section he came perilously close to Buddhist doctrine which stated that a man’s spirit leaves him when he is sleeping, 80a, 6–80b, 9.
85. 81a, 6.
86. 82b, 9–83a, 8.
87. 83a, 9–86a, 8. judgment, immortality of the soul, and even a new world would not be as strange to the Chinese mind as the resurrection of the body. Reichelt, Religion in Chinese Garment, noted that “resurrection of the body is never mentioned in the thought systems existing from China’s ancient period.”
88. 85b, 5. From this context alone one could possibly conclude that the judgment of which he spoke extended from death to the day of resurrection.
89. 86a, I; 87a, 10; 90b, 1; 92a, 6–7. Chinese sages and philosophers have differed as to the nature of man, but, with the exception of Hsún Tzu, the prevailing view has been that it is good. De Bary, et al. (ed.), Sources, I, pp. 88, 100. Martin only made passing reference to this dispute, but he obviously was thinking about it, 92a, &-92b, 1.
90. 90a, 8–92b, 2.
91. 90a, 6–8. By this Martin did not mean that man no longer had God’s law written on his heart, 92a, 7. The compass was still there, but it needed to be redirected.
92. 90b, 5–9; 89b, 6–8.
93. 93b, 5–94b, 10; 93b, 4.
94. 94b, 10–95a, 1; 96b, 4–97a, 1.
95. 97b, 8–98b, 4.
96. 99a, 3–100b, 4.
97. 101a, 4–102a, 1.
98. Tsui, the common term used for sin, meant “crime” in ordinary conversation.
99. 105b, 4–105b, 10.
100. 107a, 8–107b, 2.
101. 110a, 4–5; 110b, 3–4.
102. A very common Chinese phrase, wang-en fu-i (ungrateful), usually used of human relationships, was utilized to express this concept, 111a, 2.
103. 114b, 2–4; 117a, 2–4; 117a, 5–10; 120b, 7–8; 115b, 8–116a, 5.
104. Yang, Religion in Chinese Society, p. 15. He noted that an analysis of 500 “prayer slips” included the following requests: healing of diseases, marriage, travelling mercies, wealth, lawsuits, progeny family problems, lost articles, moving (household), business affairs, crops, domestic animals, and official position.
105. 121b, 9–122a, 5.
106. 122b, 9–123a, 3.
107. 123a, 4–7.
108. He gave nearly three times as much space to private prayer as he did to family prayer; 124b, 9–125a, 3 and 125a, 3–125b, 4.
109. 125b, 2–8.
110. 125b, 9–127b, 10.
111. 128a, 2.
112. 129b, 7–130a, 6.
113. 130a, 6–131a, 2.
114. 131a, 2–8. See the following English books and articles by him: Hanlin Papers, Second Series (Shanghai, 1894), pp. 327-55; The Lore of Cathay (New York, 1912), pp. 264-78; “How Shall We Deal with the Worship of Ancestors?” The Chinese Recorder, XXXIII (March, 1902), 117–19; “The Worship of Ancestors, How Shall We Deal with It?” CR, XXXV (June, 1904), 301–08; “The Worship of Confucius-Is it Idolatry?” CR, XXXIV (February, 1903), 92–94.
115. 131b, 1–9; 133b, 7–134a, 4.
116. Martin’s favorite teacher at New Albany Theological Seminary had been John Matthews, professor of theology. His only textbook in classroom instruction was the Confession of Faith of the Presbyterian Church. See LeRoy Halsey, A History of McCormick Theological Seminary of the Presbyterian Church (Chicago, 1893), pp. 33, 45-46.
117. One of these was “steadfast anchor ... a hope that enters into the veil … .” Hebrews 6:19 RSV, 108a, 2. He used the term “centurion” in 107b, 2. No biblical references were used for any of his Scripture quotations, making it virtually impossible for Chinese readers to find the proper context.
118. I recognize that “con textualization” as used in missiology today refers to broader dimensions of economic, political, and social life as well as to traditional cultural features more usually associated with the term “indigenous.”
119. Tetsunao Yarnamori and Charles R. Taber (eds.), Christopaganisin or Indigenous Christianity? (South Pasadena, 1975), p. 192.