RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Baptists
good. The work was extended to the Bahamas, Trinidad, Honduras, San Domingo, etc. The Jamaica Baptists have at present nearly 200 churches and nearly 34,000 members; in Haiti there are 12 churches with nearly 2,000 members; in Cuba (through American Baptist effort) there are 31 churches with nearly 4,000 members; in the Bahamas nearly 4,000 members; and in Central America 10 churches with nearly 700 members. In Africa, through American, English, and German missionary effort there are 81 Baptist churches with 11,388 members, mostly in British territory, the Kongo, and the Kamerun.
4. India, Ceylon, Burma, and Assam: In these British possessions, through English, American, and Canadian missionary effort 1,244 churches have been organized with a membership of over 126,000. A very large proportion of the converts have been won by missionaries from the United States and Canada.
IV. Baptists in Mission Lands: In China there are about 13,000 Baptist church members almost equally divided among the English, Northern, and Southern Baptist missions. In Japan there are about 2,500 Baptist church members of whom over 2,000 belong to the American Baptist Missionary Union and the rest to the missions of the Southern Baptist Convention. In Mexico missions of the Southern Baptist Convention have nearly 1,400 church members to their credit, while those of the American Baptist Home Mission Society, with twenty-six laborers, have a far smaller number. In Brazil the missions of the Southern Baptist Convention have established sixty-nine churches with a membership of over 4,000, and in Bolivia Canadian Baptist missionaries have organized three churches with 115 members.
V. Baptists on the Continent of Europe. — 1. Germany and German Missions: The first Baptist church of the modern type organized in Germany was formed in Hamburg in 1834 under the leadership of J. G. Oncken (q.v.), who several years before had reached Baptist views from independent study of the New Testament. In his youth Oncken had spent some years in England and had been sent (1823) by an English evangelical society as a missionary to Germany. Oncken and six others availed themselves of the presence of Barnas Sears, of the United States, afterward famous as an educational leader, to receive baptism at his hands. Oncken proved a leader of heroic type and with the aid of American Baptists carried on for many years wide-spread and fruitful missionary labors and raised up like-minded ministers who are still carrying forward the work throughout Germanspeaking Europe and beyond. In 1880 a theological seminary was established near Hamburg that has given educational equipment to hundreds of earnest and self-sacrificing young men. The present membership in Germany is about 34,000. They sustain a mission in the Kamerun with over 2,000 converts. The German Baptist Union for the spread of the gospel in foreign parts includes churches in Austria (648 members), Hungary (10,500 members), Switzerland (796 members), the Netherlands (1,396 members), Rumania (277 mem-
bers), and Bulgaria (74 members). The Russian Baptist churches, which have resulted chiefly from the activity of German Baptists of the Oncken type, have now a membership of about 25,000 and a Union of their own; but they still cooperate with the German Union in the raising and use of missionary funds. Through the missionary labors of German Baptists a few Lithuanians were brought into the Baptist fold (1857 onward). A more successful work was done among the Letts, and about 7,000 of the Russian Baptists are Lettish. From the same source Baptist influence was brought to bear upon the Esthonians, of whom over 1,000 are now Baptist church members. The Finns received Baptist teaching from the Swedish Baptists (1868 onward) and now have over 2,000 Baptist church members.
2. Scandinavia: From Germany Baptist influence also extended into Scandinavian lands. Julius Koebner, one of Oncken's early converts and colaborers, was a Dane and on a visit to his native land won to his faith a company of Christians that had become dissatisfied with Lutheranism. The first church was organized in Copenhagen in 1839. Persecution impeded the progress of the Baptist cause and religious freedom was not gained until 1850. A considerable number of ministers trained in the Scandinavian Department of the Divinity School of the University of Chicago have assisted in carrying forward the work in Denmark as well as in Sweden and Norway. In 1895 the Danish Baptists established a small theological school of their own. They have not made rapid progress and their present membership is only about 4,000. German Baptist influence entered Norway not later than 1840. The first church was organized two years later. At present Norwegian Baptists have over 30 churches with a membership of about 3,000. A Danish Baptist named Foerster labored in Sweden in 1848 and baptized five persons near Gothenburg. The Baptist cause has greatly prospered here, so that at present there are 40,000 members and nearly 600 churches. Since 1866 they have had a theological seminary at Stockholm. They are thoroughly organized for missionary and educational work and have reached a degree of influence and recognition enjoyed by Baptists nowhere else on the Continent of Europe.
3. France and Italy: In France, Belgium, and French Switzerland there are about 40 churches with a membership of 2,272, due in large measure to English Baptist missionary enterprise. In Italy there are 55 churches and about 1,500 members, the result, in almost equal measure, of the missionary endeavors of the English Baptist Missionary Society and of the Southern Baptist Convention. The latter body sustains a theological college.
Two highly significant events, indicating the desire of Baptists everywhere to draw closer together and to cooperate in the world-wide dissemination of their principles, were the formation of the General Baptist Convention (St. Louis, May, 1905) to embrace the entire continent of North America and its islands and to hold triennial meetings, and the Baptist World Congress (London, July, 1905), in
Baptists Barclay