Liang A-Fa

China's First Preacher, 1789–1855

McNeur, Seitz

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781630879532
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Religion

Liang Fa holds a unique place in the history of Christianity in China. Baptized and ordained by the first Protestant missionaries to China, Liang aided the first two generations of missionaries and conducted his own work as an evangelist and writer. Liang alone in the first generation wrote and published under his name, and his most famous tract is believed to have influenced the Taiping Rebellion. While George McNeur's biography of Liang has been republished regularly in Chinese, this is the first republication in English since the 1930s. It remains the best work on an influential but little-studied figure. Annotated and with a critical introduction, this work seeks to revive scholarship on Liang as we approach the two-hundredth anniversary of his baptism.

1

The Light of Sacred Story

“It is one of my deepest convictions that all over the world, and possibly nowhere more than back in the Western countries themselves, we need to institute as never before the study of church history . . . I honestly believe that we are headed into the most difficult time in the history of our religion, and we need to treasure greatly the lessons of the centuries. I have great confidence in the study of Christianity, ecumenical Christianity, and above all vital Christianity.”1

—Dr. J. R. Mott

Much has been written—although not enough—about the missionary pioneers of Protestant Christianity in China. But the story of the expansion of our Christian religion as it has spread over the wide world during the centuries cannot be complete without the record of those sons of the soil—the first fruits of China and other lands unto Christ—who were won by the pioneers, and became in their turn the earliest heralds of Christ to their kinsmen. Here we are in touch with vital Christianity in its most evident, and effective expression Just as in the Acts of the Apostles and its continued narrative through the history of the early Church we find satisfying proof of Christ’s power to redeem and transform mankind, so in every fresh Christian conquest in a new field this faith has fuller confirmation, and evangelistic zeal gathers added inspiration. The life stories of trophies won from the thralldom of ignorant, superstitious, and debasing beliefs, and changed into saintly, self-sacrificing, and loving servants of God and man, bring renewed tribute to the supremacy of our Lord and unite diadems of other rich tints with His many crowns. In these days of fuller historical knowledge, wider charity, and deeper understanding of Christ, we are more ready than our forefathers to admit the values existing in the partial and often misleading conceptions of truth presented in non-Christian religions. Master builders like Robert Morrison found certain materials ready to their hand when they began their task. God had never left Himself without a witness in the hearts of His Chinese children. The ancient classical literature of China contained ideas of God and human duty expressed in terms which such pioneers did not hesitate to use when introducing the more perfect Divine revelation. In the modified form of Buddhism they found in possession of China’s religious instincts, there were certain features which almost seemed to indicate Christian influence in its far past. Along with Taoism it had at least kept faith in the world of spirit alive in the hearts of the common people. And Protestants should never forget that for centuries the Roman Church, often in spite of bitterest persecution, had been teaching throughout China the Gospel of the Cross. Dr. Morrison’s first language teacher after arrival was a Catholic Christian, and he used the earlier work of some unknown Jesuit priest as a help in his translation of the New Testament.2 But while the Protestant pioneers gratefully utilized what the past had provided for the new day of opportunity, they never questioned the unique supremacy of Jesus Christ, nor compromised with anything that contradicted His teaching as they understood it. If they had, they would not have been Protestant pioneers. And it is natural that the characters of the men and women whom they won for Christ—the first generation of disciples—should witness to their spiritual lineage, both near and distant. There could be no better example than Liang A-fa, the subject of this biography. He was a real Chinese and a real Christian.

Robert Morrison died at Canton, China, on the first day of August in 1834, almost a century ago. At such a time it is appropriate that we not only study afresh the character and work of that noble missionary, but that we remember also the Chinese colleague to whom he then bequeathed the care of the infant church gathered under his ministry. That early transference of responsibility should have its lessons for us in these days when varying causes are forcing a somewhat questioning but yet rapid devolution from foreign to Chinese control. It will prove that by every token the Chinese Church has always had her own leaders who were in the true apostolic succession. The combined study should shed light on the contribution that Christianity in China most needs from the older church, as well as what this young church has to share with her sisters elsewhere. A senior Y.M.C.A. secretary from America said to his capable Chinese colleagues at Canton some years ago, “You can do without us now. You know far better how to run a Chinese Y.M.C.A. than we do.” “Yes” replied the Chinese general secretary, “we know how to run the ‘Y’ but we need you for character.” This biography should help us appreciate the fact that we of differing races united in Christ need each other for character.

Interest in China’s church history requires quickening. Data regarding the foreign mission side may be carefully pre­served in the archives of mission boards and research libraries. But the biographer of a Chinese life is heavily handicapped. So little relevant material has withstood the ravages of time. Such an experience makes one grateful that the scene of early church history was in a favorable climate for the preservation of written records, and that the writers used durable material. The rubbish heaps outside old Chinese cities will never reward the historian in the same way as those of Western Asia. In the climate of South China the difficulties of keeping written and printed data are multiplied. If it is true in other lands that once a life of biographical worth has been completed by death the sooner it is written the better, such a maxim has special cogency in Kwangtung. Termites have an abnormal taste for literature, as many a missionary has found to his cost. Borers, bookworms, silver-fish, cockroaches, mould, and other pests take their toll. The humidity of the climate reduces paper to its original pulp, and devastating floods are of frequent occurrence. In the summer of 1915 the Canton delta region suffered such an inundation. At Liang A-fa’s old home on Honam near Canton there was stored a basket of papers and books left there by him when he died sixty years before. A Christian relative, realizing that these might include documents of historic value, took the basket in a boat to a Christian institution in the city. But just then the old building occupied by the institution was being pulled down and a new one erected. Storage accommodation was limited, and there was no one present who sensed the import­ance of the situation. The basket was returned to its former corner, the climbing waters covered its contents, and no one knows how much—or how little—the Chinese church lost of its first evangelist’s life story. A few family portraits—among them one of Liang A-fa, some worm-eaten papers, and a time-worn copy of St. Matthew’s Gospel printed at Canton in 1813, are all that can be found. Even the genealogical record of the family, although the custom of ancestral worship has made the preserva­tion of such data universal in China, is difficult to trace. So far as is known not a single copy of the many tracts written by the evangelist has been discovered.3 The young Chinese church must take timely warning, and make suitable arrangements for the collection and preservation of the facts relating to its history. Much has already been irrevocably lost. Recent visits to China by American specialists in church history have awakened a new interest, and Chinese church leaders are beginning to develop a keener sense of historic values.

Another reason for the lack of worthwhile biographical material in China is that Chinese standards of biographical record have been set in a stereotyped mould which robs them of any human interest. Dr. Robert Morrison wrote “In the larger histories of China biographical notices of eminent persons are introduced, but they are generally mere skeletons. Like a great deal of Chinese history there is nothing but bone, no flesh and skin to beautify the body. The name of a person, when born, where he lived, what offices he held, and when he died, made up a biography.” True we have heard something the same about textbooks on history in English. A medical friend told me that when on a health furlough in Japan and ordered to take a sleep every afternoon he found an unfailing soporific in a well-known but old-fashioned text-book on Church History. That something much more interesting is possible to Chinese writers has abundant proof in the many popular dramas like “The Three Kingdoms,” where imagination has been allowed to play around the scanty historical data until the dead past has lived again for the millions of people who through succeeding generations have never tired of its comedy and tragedy. Some­thing of this art, although more closely related to sober fact, is needed today by the Chinese church historian. His work will then find a wide and interested audience. At a time of accentu­ated racial consciousness things Chinese are worth much just because they are Chinese. The demand for an “indigenous” church turns attention to what makes it “indigenous.” And when one looks on the spreading branches of this tree, the flowers and fruit of which are increasingly beautifying and enriching the new life of this old land, the question as to the seed from which it grew takes us back to this pioneer Chinese evangelist who, through lonely, long, and fiery testing, evidenced the strength and sincerity of his faith.

Fortunately we are not altogether without written Chinese data. In the archives of the London Missionary Society in London there is an original letter, still in its Chinese envelope, written by Liang A-fa in 1827.4 Along with it there is a journal written by the evangelist between March 28 and November 6, 1830.5 These valuable documents were courteously sent to Canton for six months, and the greatest surprise was expressed by the Chinese who saw them so well preserved in spite of the century that had past since they were penned. Surviving relatives have provided a few meager details which have come down to them. For the rest English material has been sought in many directions and found in a few. Original letters by Dr. Morrison and Milne and Dr. Hobson to their Mission Board have been gone through by friends and relevant material copied out. Enough has been gathered to sketch the portrait of one whom the church should place in its hall of fame. He might have been lost to us altogether. Yet in a book published in London during 1846 Liang A-fa is mentioned with the remark “Nothing concerning him need be said here, as his praise is in all the churches.”6 The first Bishop of Victoria, Hong Kong, Rev. George Smith, could write of him as “well-known by name in Europe and America.”7 In 1841 part of his story was told by Dr. Peter Parker before the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States. His name appeared in the report of a commission presented to the British House of Commons in 1847. The Chinese have a proverb “Even the crab in a pond without fish is considered big” and it may be argued that the only Chinese Protestant evangelist would naturally attract attention in Christian countries. This story should effectively answer that argument. Whatever the reasons, his name has been gradually forgotten. A few years ago even the church in China knew nothing of him. A strange coincidence led to his grave being discovered on the outskirts of Canton in 1918. Interest in the pioneer began to revive. A Chinese biography published in 1930 was the result of that awakened interest.8 The story is told again in English in response to many requests, and with the conviction that Liang A-fa should be reinstated to the honored place he once held in the estimation of Christians in Europe and America.

Notes

1. National Christian Council of China, Conference on the Church in China Today (Shanghai: China Press, 1926), 43–44.

2. This is now known to be the Jean Basset manuscript. Copies exist as the British Museum, the Hong Kong Bible Society, and elsewhere. On Basset, see Jost Zetzsche, The Bible in China: The History of the Union Version, or, the Culmination of Protestant Missionary Bible Translation in China (Sankt Augustin: Monumenta Serica Institute, 1999), 37–38.

3. See the introduction (above) for works that have surfaced since George McNeur’s time, including the nine-chapter Good News to Admonish the Ages and several smaller tracts.

4. This is part of the Church World Mission collection which has been microfilmed by the company IDC. The original collection exists in the library of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.

5. Ibid.

6. Evan Davies, Memoir of the Rev. Samuel Dyer, Sixteen Year Missionary to the Chinese (London: John Snow, 1846), 205.

7. George Smith, A Narrative of an Exploratory Visit to Each of the Consular cities of China and to the Islands of Hong Kong and Chusan in Behalf of the Church Missionary Society in the Years 1844, 1845, 1846 (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1857), 11.

8. George Hunter McNeur, Zhonghua zui zao de bu dao zhe Liang Fa (Shanghai: Guang xue hui, 1931).

2

The Making of a Prophet

“The book of life has no preface. Every page is a page of the real story, and it has some essential line in it if only we can find it.”

—Percy Ainsworth1

The district of Koming (Lofty Clearness) is one of the smaller units of the Kwangtung province, and is overshadowed by the importance of its surrounding neighbors. Apart from the walled district city the best-known market town is Samchow (Three Islands) so-called because there are three islands in the river beside it. Within half an hour’s journey from that market you can enter any one of three other distr...