CHAPTER XIII. THE SPIRITUAL ADVANCE OF THE MAORI.
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CHAPTER XIII.
THE SPIRITUAL ADVANCE OF THE MAORI.
ALTHOUGH sunk in cruel savagery the faint recollections of the sublime conceptions of an earlier and better time were still locked in the Maori breast. As in the north of New Zealand occasional conversions took place through the missionaries, and as the Maoris noticed and were astonished at the inward joy and the noble life of those who were converted, this was felt to be in accord with the sentiments of these conceptions. It was, therefore, possible that the whole Maori population from one end of New Zealand to the other should be seized by an unexampled spiritual desire for Christianity, by means of which wars, murders, cannibalism, and, above all, gross cruelty and vice, should be abandoned. It has occasionally
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happened that a great elevation of mind has permeated a people, when there is occasion, for instance, to make great sacrifices; as when the Fatherland is threatened by overwhelming enemies, but the power of God alone, through the gospel of Jesus Christ, can effect such an elevation as will permanently turn a people to better aims. It is then awakened to an inward desire for a higher life and spiritual being. Although this in-dwelling strength of God has only extended the gospel of Christ by means of spiritual weapons wielded by weak men, and thus gained victories over the powers of darkness amongst the peoples of Europe, yet as they inwardly live in the gospel, they have produced civilization, with the astounding discoveries and advances of our age flowing from it as a result. In this strength of God, which gives the longing heart eternal life, the world for all time will be overcome and conquered.
And now, to relate how the savage Maoris here in the south of New Zealand became civilized Christians, we must go back to the time when I found them here and lived amongst them. Raw savagery they had already renounced before my arrival through the means of the already-mentioned spiritual movement, and had adopted an outward form of Christianity, but they did not understand the spiritual part of it. Their sacred services were works without thought, those of the teachers equally as well as those of the learners. In their then condition, more could not be expected from them. In time, I succeeded in arousing more attention, so that they began to think over what was heard and read. They began to get more earnest. They resembled the eunuch from Ethiopia, who sat reading by the lonely way in his chariot, when Philip met him, and said, "Understandest thou what thou readest?" He said, "How can I, except some man should guide me." Thus the Maoris here. When they began to understand, they came with the timid question, "Cannot I be baptized?" Such questions at first did not come from those of high position, who were looked up to, but from old, simple, otherwise quiet women.
The first who was baptized by me was an old sick woman on her deathbed, whose eyes were lighted up with the peace of God in Jesus Christ, through which she had received the seal of eternal life. The second, if I remember rightly--for I have no data, as
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my papers were all burnt,--was the wife of the Irishman whom I have previously named. She was a pious and enlightened woman, and had been married to her husband by the Bishop of New Zealand when still a heathen. I was then unacquainted with the communal customs of the Maoris, according to which all transactions were undertaken with the consent of the whole community. Under these circumstances, as Christianity had not been long introduced here, it (baptism) was an affair of the native teachers. The reason that no objections were raised to these two first baptisms was because the first was looked upon as a baptism of necessity, and that, as the wife of a European, they had no authority over the second.
Not long afterwards a few elderly women sought me out, who had attentively listened to my discourses, and whose hearts God had opened, as that of Lydia, at the place of prayer at the water in Phillipi (Acts xvi.). These wished to be baptized. I gave them every day an hour's instruction. After a few days they stayed away, and when I asked the reason, it was whispered to me that it was forbidden. At the same time, a boat sailed for Waikouaiti, the Wesleyan mission station, the object of the journey being withheld from me. I soon learnt that, at all events in the eyes of the teachers, I had raised a strong feeling of enmity. The applicants for baptism belonged to the Wesleyan party, but they were unimportant old women, whom the teachers would not have recommended for baptism. So far, only a few notable and some easily-taught young persons like the teachers had been admitted to baptism by the Anglican bishop and the Wesleyan missionaries. I kept silence, and continued the instruction leading to baptism. When, in time, the boat came back, nothing of the result was allowed to escape, and I refrained from making inquiry, as I knew that missionary Creed, who was now at Waikouaiti, and with whom I had been in danger of being lost in the wild mountains, would not take sides against me. Matters thus remained for a while.
The teachers then came and commended to me the old women for baptism, as well as their old husbands, also the Christian consecration of their long-existing marriages. After a few weeks baptism was solemnly administered. The teachers themselves
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declared that the ceremony had a sanctifying influence. Soon others, mostly whole families, were recommended for baptism, who also received it after a suitable time spent in instruction.
The teachers were originally instructed to make use of their position to place obstacles in the way of my administering baptism, and to represent to their missionary what my intentions were. They administered their office without advantage to themselves, except that by means of it they were held in greater respect, which was worth something. They did a great deal of good, in so far as they spread the spiritual movement all over New Zealand and kept it alive.
According to our conceptions they were naturally very ignorant, for they had received no instruction worthy of the name. Even their reading was not fluent. If they had to read a chapter with which they were unacquainted before the congregation they had to prepare themselves beforehand--with such labour the sense and meaning of what they read often escaped them. It often happened that they broke a word in two in the middle and made two out of it, or that they joined one syllable of a word on to another, which gave it quite a different meaning. Once a teacher came to me and asked how the sun could be turned round. I could not at first understand what he meant. Then he showed me Matthew v., 39--"Whosoever shall smite thee on thy right cheek, turn to him the other also." Now in Maori tera (compounded of te era) means this or the other (all words are neuter), and te ra means the sun. He had, therefore, divided tera and made sun out of it. According to heathen ideas, for a Maori of rank to allow such an insult as a blow on the cheek to go unrevenged was as impossible as to turn the sun back. This question was an honest one, whereas most of the questions which the presumptuous teachers put to me were to try me. You see what weak tools God uses in his well-ordered economy, "that nothing may be lost," to advance His Kingdom amongst the Maoris. He knew how to draw most of the missionaries out of a class where the talents given them would otherwise be lost. As workers in God's service appointed by the missionaries I honoured the teachers, although their presumption
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was often annoying. Especially presumptuous were travelling teachers, because they considered themselves wise and wished to show themselves wise, and submitted catching questions to me to try me. A few of them once came from Waikouaiti. After they had been a short time seated, one of them asked, "What is the name of the place where the Jews held race-meetings?" I answered the Jews had none. After a few questions to ascertain if that was my real meaning, they thought to catch me in my ignorance, and one after another called out, " Olympia!" "Olympia!" I said they were wrong, that Olympia was the place where the Greeks held their games, and that they were quite a different people to the Jews. Instead of understanding what they read in the New Testament, they only learnt names and places, in order to be able to ask as teachers in the congregation, "What was the name of the sick servant of the centurion at Capernaum?" "What was the name of the man who provided the boards for Christ's coffin?" and such-like stupid questions. When travelling teachers came who brought freshly-learnt names with them (often quite wrong ones), they came to try me with them to see if I knew them, too.
The teachers, and with them many others who considered themselves clever, were presumptuous and ignorant, and catching with useless questions; but one must not, therefore, think that underneath there did not lie an earnest striving after the kingdom of God and His righteousness. They could pray. It was only sometimes difficult to recognise under the rough coating the deep longing for holiness that by means of their spiritual stirring up had more or less taken hold of their hearts. We, of the old Christendom, from childhood up, are so walled in by Christian customs and habits that we know how to conceal the sins of our heart--such as self-sufficiency, spiritual pride, and such presumptions as may be repulsive to others under a polite exterior. But the Maoris, grown up as raw savages and unpolished children of nature, knew of no such concealment. Their presumptions were not repulsive, but easy to their minds, and they came out freely with them. The deeper spiritual impressions, on the other hand, were new and uneasy; these, therefore, came less to the surface.
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In time I gathered the teachers, both Anglican and Wesleyan, for regular hours of instruction. I read the Gospel of Luke along with them, explaining and examining in order, by better knowledge, to lead their minds away from useless speculations. In time they came to value this instruction. They were pleased to understand what they read. They often thus found material for their discourses, which had often consisted of matters that had no connection with one another and were quite meaningless.
No further hindrances were placed in the way of my baptisms. The teachers, however, so managed matters that the applicants had to go to them in order to be recommended to me. In the first instance I had to put up with this, but I allowed no directions to be given to me. For a time the newly baptized people retained the old appellations of Anglicans and Wesleyans, but they were now under my particular charge, like new-born children in need of the proper sustenance of the reasonable pure milk of the gospel.
The desire for baptism, which more and more found expression, really arose from an inward need of the heart. It had its origin in the general spiritual movement of the entire people, by means of which a yearning for an imagined, but not yet known, higher life was awakened in them, and that yearning the new movement caused to burst forth. They knew well that on baptism they must forsake sin, and that before God and man they must live a conscientious, pure, and Christian life; that their words and acts, even their inward thoughts, would be closely watched by those who were not yet baptized; and that their errors would be cast up to them. To many such thoughts were full of terror; with others the inward stress was strong enough to overcome the fear. It was the love of Jesus Christ that moved their hearts; not so much that they loved Jesus, but much more, that Jesus loved them (sinful men), and had by His life and death saved them.
A drawing of the Spirit, as if by two silken cords of love, proceeds from Jesus Christ in the drawing by love of the hearts of sinful men. One proceeds from His cross, where suffering and dying He was lifted up; the other one from His lofty throne on the right hand of the Father, from whence He prepares a place for us; and both are united in His loving heart. The
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old death goddess drew the Maori into the world of night; Christ draws us into heavenly light. Where the souls of men, full of yearning, turn with anxious longing to a higher life, and then, with no mixture of self-sufficiency, to Christ, they feel and follow this draught, and find in the holy communion of Jesus Christ a heavenly existence--life and blessedness. And this blessed communion is so mysterious, and yet so comprehensible, so sublime, and yet so simple, that every one may have it, from the king on the throne to his meanest subject in a poor hut; from the cultivated man in his superior culture to the uncultivated one in his plainness; from the learned man with his full treasures of knowledge to the unlearned one with his simple Bible; from the scientific discoverer to the wild heathen. All may find purity of heart, inward peace and joy, comfort in sorrow, and consolation in death.
Instruction for baptism consisted mainly of that of the apostolic belief and the Ten Commandments. Many words of the language had not previously the meaning which they have acquired since the language has become a Christian one. Thus, then the word atua--then meaning the other, standing now for the highest being, meaning God--previously meant everything that was different to ordinary experiences as a ghost; an appearance in the air, an European steam engine, and so on. Sin (hara, nothingness) was then differently understood to what it is now. Cruelty, ignorance, and especially all vices, were then only sin when they disturbed the internal life of the community, but practised against strangers they were deeds worthy of praise. It was no sin to rob and oppress widows and orphans, especially amongst the lower classes. But to burn an old fencing post for firewood on which the clothes of a dead child of noble blood had hung, and cook meals with it, especially when persons of lower caste had eaten of them, this was a deadly sin. Yet in spite of all such errors man is made after the image of God, and however deeply it may be overlaid with a hardened crust, marks of the original image are still to be seen in the deepest thoughts of the heart. Accordingly I found in the depths of my scholars' hearts a leaning towards the everlasting nature of God a desire for a share on our part in His eternal
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love, for moral duties, purity of heart, justice and truthfulness, heartfelt pity, and kindness.
In the second of Romans (verse, 14, &c.) it says: "For when the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these, having not the law, are a law unto themselves: which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another." When this original law is moved by the knowledge of Jesus Christ, the old man is put off and the new one put on, fashioned after the manner of God in righteousness and holiness.
The baptized people were under my particular charge. Every week I met them in separate gatherings, besides the ordinary ones, in little divisions. This soon had this result, that each would speak out freely about the state of his soul. In this manner the already begun, but yet very weak, young life was nourished and strengthened. There are, or there used to be, in Germany people who said that, instead of so much spiritual instruction, the missionaries should lay more stress on enlightenment and civilization. This is a piece of wisdom that appears excellent when sitting in a comfortable room, but is not suitable for practical life. Everything has its proper time, also the civilization of the converted heathen. A civilized life requires many labours which cannot be neglected, such as raw heathens are quite unaccustomed to, and are such as they cannot so suddenly understand. Money must first be earned to buy clothes with (their own weaving is not sufficient for it), then follow daily washing and combing, then washing and mending of clothes, building of better buildings, keeping them clean, and a thousand other daily-occurring troublesome matters, all of which are quite strange to the natural man, and, therefore, impossible. If the missionaries were to begin with this, they would find their labours end in nothing. First, the heathen must be converted by a change of heart--"Turn from darkness to light, from the power of Satan to God, and obtain forgiveness of sins." Then, when their thoughts for a time have moved in higher and purer conceptions, the fruit of the conversion causes the desire for a decent life to arise in them, and with this desire come courage
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and industry and a willingness to work. Now is the time for the missionary to counsel and lead them. These are matters of experience.
Let him who thinks he can entirely, or for the greater part, make the heathen civilized by moral teachings, try it himself on the degraded and sunken poor of Germany, and he will find that all such labours are in vain. The so-called mystics and pietists manage things better. These come to the sunken poor with the love of Jesus Christ in their hearts, which, in common with Him, they bear to the poor sinners. Their hearty sympathy opens the hearts of those who have gone astray, their brothers and sisters, and they let a ray of the light of Jesus Christ on to them. This light falls on the better, scattered feelings of the heart, and awakes a desire for salvation in Jesus Christ. New hope arises in them. After they have been fed for a time with the sincere milk of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and thus strengthened, a newness of life arises in themselves, and new courage to improve their condition. Now, for the first time, they can be helped with moral counsel. It is the same with the converted heathen.
The community was still a divided one. The newly baptized people, it is true, felt themselves under my care, but in the same spirit as before, and they were still called Anglicans and Wesleyans, and were addressed as such by their respective teachers. There was no community of spirit, not even that of mere companionship. The inhabitants of each little village would each have a separate divine service for themselves. They had, so far, not the least inclination to go on a Sunday to a village, which was close by, and build up a larger congregation. The best method of producing union of spirit would have been, if I could have done so, to induce them all to assist and build a sacred building--a church in common, but that was impossible. In order to awake unity of spirit, we must have a common church. I resolved, therefore, in the name of God, and relying upon His help, to build a church myself. First I went on to a hill, beneath which our settlement lay, and knelt down there, and under a great bush dedicated the place in prayer to our Father in heaven, who sees in secret, as a house of God. Then I went, as soon as I had time, into the
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nearest wood to look for building timber. In distant woods I found slender young trees which would answer very well for the building, but these were too far away for me to be able to carry them. In the nearest woods there were only short, and mostly crooked, stems, and I had to be content to hew these straight and carry them where desired. It was heavy labour, especially as in the wood and on the road to it all was pathless and overgrown with thick undergrowth. The natives wondered at my labours, of which, although they were intended for them, they could not see the use. None was willing to help me without wages, and I had no more money. I needed some timber which required to be longer and straighter than any that I could obtain here, also a few boards. I then asked a European, of Stewart Island, who was engaged in the timber trade, how much a certain quantity of sawn wood and boards would cost. He told me the price, and I told him that when I received money I would perhaps give him the order to deliver the timber. There the matter rested, as I intended. But after a few weeks the man came in his boat and brought me the timber. I pointed out to him that I had expressly said, when I received money, and so on. He said that I should give him a certificate that I owed him the money (I have forgotten how much it was, but think it was £7). Now, I wanted the wood so badly, and the payment seemed so easy, that I accepted his offer, although in time, when no money came, it caused me much inward trouble. Especially I did not wish that my acknowledgment should circulate in trade amongst the scattered Europeans here.
I now went cheerfully to work to carry the timber to the place, and to cut stalks and rushes for roof and walls. As such labours had to be carried on between my journeyings over the island to the different villages, and only a short time was left to prepare my most needful food in the roughest fashion, I often fell asleep after supper from sheer weariness, and in spite of all exertions, could not undress and go to bed in an orderly fashion. After I had hewn the timber--of course, only in a rough way--into the right shape, I stood the building up. At the same time God so brought it about that I received from a land surveyor in
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Otago (Mr. Tuckett was long absent; a present of tobacco. Now, a few old Maoris were willing to help me at building for tobacco. They thatched the roof and walls inside with flax stalks, and outside with reeds. The building had a really church-like appearance--of course, in a rough way--with a tower at the western and a cross at the eastern end, and a place for a choir in a symmetrical lean-to. Inside there was a chancel and an altar. There were no benches, because the Maoris were accustomed to sit on the ground. Such church-like peculiarities were necessary to distinguish the House of the Lord from other buildings, and give it a superior appearance, in order to awaken a desire for a holy communion and fellowship of saints.
The church was at last finished, and could be dedicated. The year, as far as I can remember, was 1846. I invited all the inhabitants of the island to come in, and many did so. The solemn service, so different from their thoughtless ones in the stuffy community houses of the villages, seemed to impress them; for on the following Sundays the church attendance increased. The teachers wished to retain the assemblies in their own villages intact, but most of the former hearers went away to church; they made short work with those who were left behind, and then came themselves. Of course, in the week days, I visited the different villages as before, and only held the congregational services in the church on Sundays.
Originally it was my custom when I referred to Bible passages in my sermons to name the place where they were to be found. This made a rustling in the New Testament to find them. So far, I had allowed this to happen, although I was obliged to stop for a little; but all at once three or four old women who could not find the place, rushed up to me with outstretched arms, with their Testaments, for me to turn up the places for them. This was too much for me, and I ceased to give out the places.
It was evident that a community of mind was awakened, and in time there was less talk of sectarian differences, although now and then disputes broke out.
The reader may well press the question on me, as it often pressed itself on me, how I could answer it to my conscience to
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build where others had laid the foundation. Now, if five, or even two, talents had been given me (Matt, xxv., 15) I might well have besought the North German Missionary Society to send me to some other country, and to some other heathen people; although that would have been no easy matter, for sometimes years passed by before I could receive an answer to my letters to Germany. But I had only one talent. I do not say this from modesty or mere empty talk, but from conscientious conviction. I have a certain faculty for gathering rough material together; the circumstances were very favourable for it here; but when the congregation is once made I find little ability in myself to build it up internally. I was now sent to New Zealand. The mission field was already possessed by others, who did not belong to our missionary society, but were just as good disciples of Christ as we were. I did now what Christ wished the servant with one talent had done--I put it in the bank, that when He comes He may take His own with interest. I mean by this that the field here was white to harvest; the labourers here had not the knowledge how to reap, just as one who had hitherto had no scythe in his hand would be unable to mow. I was now here, and I could do it. Therefore, I put my talent in the bank, that in the name of Christ I might go contentedly to work, and bring souls to Him, without founding a church of any particular denomination--neither Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican, or Wesleyan--not even a permanent missionary station of the North German Missionary Society. The further development I left to the Head of the Church alone.
