It is well-known that in India, more perhaps than in any other country, the effects of Christian work are only partly seen in the numbers of the Christian communities. The Brahmo Samaj, chiefly in Bengal, is a type of reformed Hinduism which owes much of its impetus to contact with Christianity. The Arya Samaj, mainly in North India, is an example of the opposite kind of reaction to contact with Christianity, i.e., a return to an earlier Hinduism as the true Indian heritage. Nationalism has rehabil itated Hinduism in many minds, and nationalism together with the almost ineradicable pantheism of the Indian mind present a strong defence against the Christian evangelistic message. On the other hand there is widespread testimony to the admiration felt by educated Indians everywhere for the person of Jesus Christ.
The Christian community of India is estimated to number 5,939,212, of whom 2,242,798 are Protestant; 791,556 belong to the ancient Syrian churches, and 2,906,858 to the Roman Catholic Church. There are 48,787 Protestant Indian workers and Catholic (1928).
China.—We have already mentioned the great missionary activity of the Nestorians. It was they who were the first mis sionaries to China, but their work and that of the Roman Church, begun as the result of Marco Polo's travels about 1290 faded away under the persecution of the Ming dynasty, which came into power about 1350. The next attempt was that of the French Jesuits following on the visit and death of Xavier. They advanced rapidly, especially after the accession in 1644 of the Manchu dynasty. The Orthodox Eastern Church came to Peking about the same time.
Modern missionary activity begins with Robert Morrison of the London Missionary Society, who reached Canton in 1807, and not being allowed to reside in China entered into the service of the East India Company. In 1829 the American Board sent their first representatives, and in 1836 Peter Parker began his famous medical mission. After the war of 1856 a measure of official toleration was obtained and the task of evangelizing the country was fairly begun. In 1877 the number of Protestant converts in the whole of China was reckoned at no more than 13,00o, though Protestant missionaries had been seventy years in the country. Public feeling against foreigners was accentuated by the territorial aggression of the French, German, British and Japanese. There were anti-foreign outbreaks at different times but the great upheaval came in 1899-1900 when in what was known as the Boxer uprising 135 missionaries, 52 children and probably 16,000 Chinese Christians perished, often after torture and showing constancy and heroism never to be forgotten.
The Boxer rising was put down, and out of the agony of these years was born the new China, of which the history remains still to be written. The reforms of 1901-04, especially the decrees regarding education, contained within themselves a complete reversal of the traditional policy of China. A system of public instruction of the most extensive sort was drafted. Universities, technical schools and lower schools were designed, and young Chinese began to turn their faces towards the West.
Meanwhile the missionary societies had never slackened their efforts. Whereas in 1876 there were 289 mission schools with pupils, in 1910 the numbers had risen to 3,129 schools with 79,823 scholars. American influence became particularly powerful, not least because the American government used part of the indemnity paid after the Boxer rising to provide scholarships to enable Chinese students to pursue their studies in America.
The recent developments in China have had a profound effect on missionary work. The Manchu dynasty was overthrown in 1911 by a revolution led by Sun Yat-sen. In 1925 he died and his book "The Three Principles" became the gospel of Chinese nationalism ; the nationalist party dedicated itself to carrying out the purposes of the dead hero. The nationalist government of the South has made itself the de facto government of China and the whole future relationship of China to the western powers is the subject of international debate.
This entire series of political events has been reflected in the Chinese Church and every mission board in the world conduct ing work in China has been forced to review drastically its whole policy, particularly in regard to the relations between the mis sionaries and the Chinese Church. Already Chinese Christians have shown themselves able to take up work which missionaries were compelled to leave during the fighting, and especially in the work of the colleges and schools have shown both initiative and responsibility.
The growth of Christianity in China may be shown by the fact that in 1925 the total number of the Protestant Christian com munity in China was 795,095, and there were 27,133 Chinese evangelists, pastors, teachers and other workers. The Roman Catholic returns give 27,640 Chinese priests and lay helpers, 556,201 catechumens, the total community being much larger.