BrsiiocRaPHy: John and Henry Venn, The Life and a Selection from the Letters of . . . Henry Venn, London, 1834, new ed., 1870; J. Telford, A Sect that Moved the World, ib. 1907; DNB, lviii. 207-208.
THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
VERBECK, var-bek’ (originally VERBEEK), GUIDO HERMAN FRIDOLIN: Missionary in Japan; b. at Zeist (5 m. e. of Utrecht), Holland, Jan. 23, 1830; d. at Tokyo, Japan, Mar. 10, 1898. He was the fifth of the eight children in a well-todo household, was educated at the Moravian school in Zeist, graduated from it in 1848, and studied then at the Polytechnic Institute in Utrecht and became an engineer. For a short while he worked in the foundry at Zeist. In 1852 he emigrated to America, had a brief experience of foundry and engineering work, but after a serious illness turned definitely to the foreign missionary service, entered Auburn Theological Seminary in 1856, and graduated with the class of 1859. He was ordained by the presbytery of Cayuga Mar. 22, 1859, received as a member of the Reformed (Dutch) classis of Cayuga the next day; married Apr. 18, 1859, and sailed from New York May 7, 1859. He went out as a missionary of the Reformed Dutch church to Japan, and entered the harbor of Nagasaki on Noy. 7, 1859. In his student days he had mastered German, French, and English, and to these he quickly added Japanese, and that not in any halting fashion, but so completely that he spoke it better than most natives. He identified himself with the Japanese, and as he had come before the opening of the country to Western influences he witnessed those changes which have brought Japan into the family of progressive nations, and was himself an important agent in rendering the transition easy and radical. His first work was Bible distribution, as he was not allowed to preach to the Japanese; indeed it was death to a Japanese to become a Christian. In 1860 he was principal of a school for foreign languages and sciences in Nagasaki, attended by samurai, whom he influenced religiously as well as intellectually,fand thus he formed the men who a little later were to play a prominent part in new Japan. The school became famous, and gave him personally such a reputation that in 1869 he was summoned by the government to Tokyo to help it solve its educational problems. When the Imperial University at Tokyo was established he naturally was made the head of it. From 1863-78 he was attached to the Japanese senate. Under the pressure of his multifarious and heavy work, teaching, preaching both in Japanese and English, translating books on law and political economy, on international law, and other topics, consulting with government officials, dealing with foreigners and natives, living in short a full life although never robust, he broke down in 1878 and came to America for recuperation. He returned the next year and resumed work. He taught in the union theological seminary in Tokyo and in the school for nobles, and took part in Bible translation. He could not be restrained; there was so much that he could do that he was perpetually working beyond his strength. On May 16, 1889, he had a slight attack of paralysis on his right side. He kept on and died in the harness.
He was commonly spoken of as ‘“‘ Verbeck of Japan,” and thus his devotion to that people was set forth, but also the curious fact that having left Holland a minor and haying failed to obtain naturalization in the United States while a resident
163 RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Veni, Sancte Verbesserungspunkte
of that country, he could not be naturalized there later, whereas in Japan there was no way in which a foreigner could be naturalized. Consequently he was in a sense a man without a country. In 1891 he applied to the Japanese government to be made a citizen, and in reply the government in view of his services took him and his family under its protection and gave him the right to travel freely throughout the empire in the same manner as the subjects of the same, and to sojourn and reside in any locality.
Verbeck with Samuel Robbins Brown (q.v.) and James Curtis Hepburn (q.v.) formed the triumvirate who are held in grateful memory by the Japanese people. They spent their lives in the service of that people, and brought to them the knowledge of Western science and above all of Christianity. Bisuiocrapuy: W. E. Griffis, Verbeck of Japan, New York,
1900; C. C. Creegan, Pioneer Missionaries of the Church,
pp. 90-101, ib. 1903; R. E. Speer, Servants of the King, pp. 75-87, ib. 1909.
VERBESSERUNGSPUNKTE, far-bes’er-rungzpunk’te: Certain requirements introduced into Hesse by the Landgrave Maurice in 1605 for the amendment of religious conditions and the cessation of sectarian strife, and summarized as follows: (1) dangerous and unedifying controversies on the person of Christ must end, and ubiquity must be
held to mean concretely that Christ is
The everywhere, not abstractly that the Articles. humanity of Christ is everywhere; (2) the Decalogue must be taught
according to the words of Christ, and the images surviving from Roman Catholicism must be removed; and (3) in the Lord’s Supper the bread must be broken after institution. On the death of Landgrave Philip in 1567, Hesse was divided among his four sons, but by his will ecclesiastical organization and doctrine were to remain unchanged. At first this was observed, but in 1575, at the instance of his wife, a Wirttemberg princess, Louis, who had received Upper Hesse and Marburg as his inheritance, called Aigidius Hunnius (q.v.) to a professorial chair; and at the general convention at Treysa (1577) it became evident that a new, ultra- Lutheran tendency was gaining ground. It was here decided, however, that, until final decision, the use of the new phrases concerning the doctrine of the two natures of Christ should be discontinued; that their personal union was to be discussed only in the concrete; that the dogma of the Communicatio Idiomatum (q.v.) should not be set forth; and that all polemics should be prohibited. The general synod held at Marburg in 1578, however, deferred decision, and with the last general synod (1582) ecclesiastical harmony had become impossible. Louis and his brother William, landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, adhered to views diametrically opposed, the latter inclining more and more to Reformed tenets and appointing many of the Philippists expelled from Saxony to high positions in the church. Under Maurice, successor of William in 1592, things took a new turn. Heartily weary of fruitless dogmatic controversies and desirous of a new reform, especially with regard to added emphasis on soteriological and practical preaching, the
new landgrave, a man highly endowed, energetic, eloquent, and well trained even in theology, was led to reactionary measures which caused him to seek to banish Lutheranism. Since the general synods had ceased (1582), important church affairs had been referred to the chancery and thus to the sovereign. The authority of the superintendents, moreover, had lately been considerably reduced, and in 1599 Maurice established at Cassel a consistory combined with the chancery to examine, install, and supervise pastors, this being replaced, in 1610, by an independent consistory at Marburg. Until the death of Louis in 1604, Maurice could proceed but slowly, hindered by the attachment of the ignorant populace to the images and the defense of the patronage on the part of the nobles, though in the mean time he sought to place his sympathizers in places of high ecclesiastical authority. When, however, his uncle Louis died and Maurice received the Marburg half of Upper Hesse, he sought first to reform this stronghold of Lutheranism, and, ordering controversies to cease, forbade (June 16, 1605) the teaching of the doctrine of Ubiquity (q.v.). When the Marburg theologians protested, he not only admonished them to obey the conclusions of the convention at Treysa and succeeding general synods, but also issued for strict observance the Verbesserungspunkte already noted.
The theologians, readily perceiving that these articles were but the entering wedge of a much more comprehensive reformation, again protested, but in vain. After fruitless efforts to win over their four leaders, Johann Winckelmann, Balthasar Mentzer, Heinrich Leuchter, and Konrad Dietrich,
the landgrave deposed them. Open
Enforce- riot was the result, and the citizens
ment in were awed into submission only by
Cassel. force of arms. After an eloquent appeal from Maurice, all pictures were
removed from the churches by his order, and early in August the Lord’s Supper was administered according to Reformed usage. In Dec., 1605, with a view to more sweeping measures, Maurice convened the superintendents and provincial governors at Cassel. This convention proposed, (1) the issuance of a mandate authorizing superintendents and civil officials to introduce the Verbesserungspunkte; (2) the admission to the Lord’s Supper of those also who did not accept the Hessian teaching; (8) the introduction of a new liturgy and a new catechism based on the Lutheran; and (4) the establishment of a consistory in Marburg to consolidate the reforms. Notwithstanding all this, opposition only increased, nor did even the deposition of ten clergy in Upper Hesse act as a deterrent. On Jan. 16, 1607, therefore, the landgrave convened diocesan synods at Cassel, Eschwege, Marburg, and St. Goar, where there was a strong sentiment in favor of the Verbesserungspunkte, and, on Apr. 12, a general synod at Cassel. This busied itself with the reform and the harmonizing of worship and doctrine, resolving upon the universal introduction of the catechism ordered in 1605, and now revised (Kinderlehre fiir christliche Schulen und Kirchen in Hessen, 1607). It also ordered a hymnal, and a creed of six articles was adopted which officially published adhesion to
Verbesserungspunkte Vermigli