History of the missions of the American board of commissioners for foreign missions to the oriental churches, Volume II

In Short

This volume serves as an official administrative history of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, detailing the expansion of Protestant influence in Turkey, Syria, and among the Nestorian communities during the mid-nineteenth century. It records the establishment of schools, the translation of scriptures, and the complex diplomatic negotiations required to secure legal standing for Protestant converts. Beyond its function as an institutional record, the text provides a granular, eyewitness account of how religious reform intersected with the political upheavals, educational ambitions, and social structures of the crumbling Ottoman state.

The Story

The narrative follows the methodical, often fraught, process of transplanting American Protestantism into regions dominated by ancient ecclesiastical traditions. The arc begins with the struggle for legal recognition. In the 1840s, the "Protestant" movement was merely a fragile collection of dissenters within the Armenian Church, frequently subject to arbitrary taxation, imprisonment, and physical intimidation by their former religious hierarchies. The missionaries, working in tandem with British and American diplomats, navigate the labyrinthine politics of the Ottoman Porte to secure firmans—imperial decrees—that grant these converts civil rights and religious liberty.

As the legal landscape stabilizes, the story shifts toward the practical construction of an institutional framework. The missionaries move beyond mere proselytizing to establish a permanent network of stations in cities like Aintab, Harpoot, and Mosul. The narrative emphasizes the creation of printing presses, the publication of bibles in vernacular languages, and the founding of seminaries. These institutions serve as the engines of the mission, designed to cultivate a self-sustaining class of native pastors and teachers. The story tracks the rapid growth of these communities, noting how religious revivals occasionally break out in the seminaries, leading to waves of new, educated converts who begin to take ownership of their own churches.

The middle section of the book is defined by the Crimean War, which the author frames as a providential event that cleared the path for wider influence. Following the war, the mission enters a phase of expansion and institutional maturity. The focus shifts toward higher education, culminating in the bold proposal for the Syrian Protestant College in Beirut and the development of Robert College in Constantinople. These projects represent the mission’s transition from basic gospel instruction to the promotion of Western-style science, medicine, and law.

The arc concludes with a somber yet determined accounting of the cost. The narrative is punctuated by the deaths of missionaries, whose lives are measured by their years of service and the specific fields they occupied. The final pages shift into a logistical summary, detailing millions of pages of printed scripture and the meticulous census of churches, schools, and pupils. The ending does not offer a sense of finality, but rather a snapshot of a vast, ongoing enterprise. The mission is shown evolving from an experimental, fragile effort into a deeply embedded social force, leaving behind a legacy of schools, hospitals, and churches that fundamentally altered the intellectual and religious fabric of the regions they inhabited.

How It Unfolds

The quest for civil status The missionaries work through British and American diplomatic channels to petition the Sultan for the legal recognition of Protestant converts. This struggle, played out against the backdrop of Armenian and Papal opposition, establishes the legal precedent necessary for the movement to exist without state-sanctioned persecution.

Expansion into the interior The mission establishes stations in geographically disparate regions, from the high plains of Harpoot to the rugged mountain strongholds of the Jacobites. Each city presents unique challenges, involving the navigation of local power structures, the management of climate-related health crises, and the persistent need to train local leadership.

The institutional pivot As the mission gains stability, it shifts its focus toward the intellectual infrastructure of the region. This phase sees the establishment of rigorous school systems and the translation of the Bible into refined, idiomatic Arabic, which earns the respect of local scholars and elevates the mission's status.

The age of the college The story culminates in the ambitious project of building enduring, secular-adjacent institutions like the Syrian Protestant College. These organizations aim to provide a comprehensive education in science, law, and medicine, signaling the mission’s final shift from simple evangelism toward long-term cultural influence.

The People

The book is populated by figures who exist primarily as instruments of the mission. Among the missionaries, Dr. Eli Smith and Dr. C. V. A. Van Dyck emerge as the essential scholar-translators, whose mastery of Arabic philology allows the mission to bridge the gap between foreign theology and local culture. Their work is presented as the primary driver of the mission’s intellectual credibility. Mr. Dunmore acts as the archetype of the pioneer, constantly pushing into the interior and thriving on exploration despite the constant threat of physical violence from hostile crowds.

The native converts are also central, though they are often described in relation to their resistance or submission to ecclesiastical authority. Suleeba, a representative convert at Diarbekir, demonstrates the personal stakes of the mission; he is a witness to the brutal, petty bureaucracy of local governors and hostile bishops who use taxes as a weapon of persecution. Meanwhile, the young Patriarch of the Nestorians represents a more modern, pragmatic style of leadership, maintaining a thin veneer of cordiality toward the missionaries while balancing the internal pressures of his traditional, often suspicious, flock. Finally, the wives of the missionaries are framed as the quiet backbone of the endeavor, often suffering extreme physical hardship and premature death, their individual stories serving as a ledger of the personal sacrifices required to sustain the institution.

In Its Own Voice

"There was an obvious need of more persecution."

This observation, made after a period of spiritual decline in the mission at Marsovan, illustrates the author’s belief that external pressure often galvanized the resolve of the converts.

"The educated Arab finds a book printed in characters modeled after the most approved specimens of Arab caligraphy."

This comment on the new translation of the Bible highlights the mission’s strategic focus on academic quality and linguistic precision to win over local intellectuals.

"The struggle of Protestantism with Rome, since the era of the Reformation, would be in Turkey."

This claim reflects the author's perception of the mission as a historical battleground for global religious influence.

What It's Really About

The book is a study in the mechanics of cultural and religious export. At its core, the text argues that the success of a mission is contingent upon institutionalization—that personal faith must eventually be codified into schools, hospitals, and legal frameworks to survive. It grapples with the question of whether a foreign ideology can truly take root without displacing the native social order, and it concludes that the most effective, enduring method is the development of a local, educated leadership. The underlying anxiety throughout is the tension between the "spiritual" work of the mission and the pragmatic requirements of state politics, taxation, and diplomatic maneuvering.

Why Read It Today

Readers interested in the history of global expansion, the mechanics of nineteenth-century diplomacy, or the development of Western educational institutions in the Middle East will find this book an invaluable, if dense, resource. It provides a rare, bottom-up look at how religious organizations operated as quasi-diplomatic entities, navigating local prejudices and imperial decrees to build infrastructure that exists to this day.

However, the reader should be prepared for the book's limitations. It is an administrative document, not a narrative of character, and the author’s voice is consistently that of a partisan institutionalist. The prose is dry, repetitive, and heavily focused on lists, dates, and fiscal accounts, reflecting the 1872 publication date and its intent to satisfy the board’s donors. The period attitudes—regarding non-Protestant religious sects and the superiority of Western education—are pervasive and unapologetic. It is a slow, methodical read that requires patience, but for those who look past the administrative machinery, it offers a stark, unfiltered view of the fervor and meticulous planning that fueled this massive, century-long global endeavor. It remains a sobering reminder of the complex, often messy ways in which disparate cultures were drawn into the orbit of the nineteenth-century American missionary enterprise.