Narrative of a Visit to the Syrian (Jacobite) Church of Mesopotamia

Passage to Trebizond.-Credentials.-Unity of the Church.-Translations of the Prayer Book.-Their Utility.-Increase of Steam Navigation. Its Moral Consequences.-The Conservative Influence of Mohammedanism on Christianity.-Increase of Infidelity.-Our Duty. -Trebizond.-Bouyouroultous.- Ecclesiastics.-Turkish Reform.— Mohammedan Bigotry.-The Greeks.-Relations of the Clergy to Improvement. Their proper Position.-Greek and Roman Churches Compared.-Means of a peaceful Reformation.

I LEFT Constantinople on the 7th of May, 1841, in the Austrian steamer Metternich, Capt. Clicien. On account of delay in visiting a steamer which had run upon the rocks near Amastra, a small town on the shore, we did not reach Sinope till the 9th. On the evening of the same day we touched at Samsoun, and arrived at Trebizond on the 10th.

I had supplied myself with proper translations of the credentials which I had received from my own Diocesan, the Right Reverend Benjamin T. Onderdonk, D. D., Bishop of New-York, and from the Presiding Bishop, the Right Reverend Alexander V. Griswold, D. D. By the first I was commended to the Bishops and clergy of the countries in which I was to travel, and by the second was faithfully instructed

as to the rules and principles which should govern me in my intercourse with the Eastern Christians. "In the intercourse or correspondence which may be allowed you with the Bishops and other ecclesiastical authorities, be careful to state explicitly what are our views," &c., "that we would scrupulously avoid all offensive intrusion within the jurisdiction of our Episcopal brethren, nor would we intermeddle in their Church affairs. Our great desire is to commence and to promote a friendly intercourse between the two branches [Eastern and Western] of the one Catholic and Apostolic Church; to impart to our brethren in that country any knowledge of the Scriptures and of the doctrines of Christ, which, through the Lord's goodness, we may have obtained, and gladly to receive any such light from them. We would unite hand in hand with them, in the great and noble work of extending the Redeemer's Kingdom, and saving the souls of men."

Thus wrote the venerable Presiding Bishop, now gone to his rest. May his words of wisdom sink deep into our hearts, and be as a light and beacon to our path! The reader will see, as we advance, that my constant aim has been to act in the spirit of this paternal counsel, which my own humble experience has taught me to be the words of truth and soberness.

Hardly less animating was the language of another, now holding high office in the Church,' with which he cheered the hour of my departure from my native land. "But who realizes this truth [of the Church's unity] in its just magnitude? Isolated in little and often hostile clusters, the Bishops of the one Church Catholic are known only as officers of their distinct communions, many almost as the winds of heaven or the climes they blow upon. Yet they are

land.

1 The Right Reverend W. R. Whittingham, D. D., Bishop of Mary

one as a tree is one with its thousands of leaves of divers magnitudes and colors, and many branches, some crooked and some dead, yet all parts of the same one tree, and all, as parts of it, still one with each other. The original mission, as in the tree the sap vessel from the root, is still propagated in the various branches, and though in some little or no vital juice may flow, connects them with the Fountain and makes them one in Him.

ONE IN HIM! There is the life and power of the truth which I rejoice that we are beginning in some faint degree. to realize. One in Him, our invisible and ascended Head! His word made us one. His word, whether we will or no, still keeps us one... Let us go, then, to seek Him and point Him out to those among the walks concealed. Their loss is ours; for while they make no returns of love and zeal to the common stock, we suffer by its want. Our faith dwindles by their ignorance and deadness. The props of our common home and shelter rot and fall away by their negligence and corruption."

With these animating counsels I took my departure. I had also with me a few copies of the Arabic translation of the Prayer Book, intending thereby, when occasion offered, to make known the doctrines, ritual and worship of my Church. And I may here say that I found it of the greatest service for the purpose, presenting as it does in a single view the order of our Ministry, the administration of the Sacraments, the Fasts and Festivals, and the daily Service of the Church.1

1 This translation was prepared and published at the expense of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, and is one of the many noble monuments of their zeal for the cause of the Church and the truth. Other translations, in most of the Eastern languages, are rapidly following. The good which they are calculated to accomplish, in setting forth the Church in its true character, in correcting the gross misrepresentations and slanders which have been circulated with regard to it, in presenting a branch of the Universal Church Primitive in its Doctrines, its

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Narrative of a Visit to the Syrian (Jacobite) Church of Mesopotamia: With ...