The Gutzlaff Affair: A Warning from History

by Tony Lambert

Charles Gutzlaff (1803-1851) was a gifted missionary to China whose real achievements included the founding of several European missionary societies. Hudson Taylor even went so far as to call him the “grandfather of the China Inland Mission.” Yet his achievements were marred by a serious error of judgement which has cast a permanent stain on his reputation ever since. Gutzlaff’s error has important lessons for anyone serving the Chinese church today.

Karl Friedrich August Gutzlaff was born in 1803 in Pomerania, then part of Prussia. A precocious youngster, he was converted while still a boy and in 1826 sailed with the Netherlands Missionary Society to Batavia (now Jakarta) in the Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia). He had medical training and quickly mastered Chinese and Malay. He plunged into the work of publishing and distributing Christian scriptures and tracts throughout Southeast Asia. He married a young English girl, Miss Newell, who was working with the London Missionary Society, and from his long association with British missionaries became increasingly anglicized, changing his name to Charles. He became burdened for the vast Chinese mainland, then a closed country. In frustration, he resigned from the NMS. In 1830 he and his wife settled in Bangkok where he prepared scripture portions in Thai, Cambodian and Lao.

However, after a year both his wife and baby son died and Charles was left alone. He wrote: “My love for China is inexpressible. I am burning for their salvation.” He signed on as a crew-member on board a Chinese junk bound for Tianjin, “going Chinese” in name, clothing and diet. He arrived in June 1831 and distributed tracts (illegally) up and down the Chinese coast. He eventually made his base in Macau and from there made seven evangelistic journeys along the Chinese coast. At many places the Chinese received him with curiosity and kindness but usually he was eventually thrown out by the local mandarins.

Gutzlaff published details of his travels in Journal of Three Voyages Along the Coast of China. His adventures aroused intense enthusiasm in Christian circles in Europe, Britain and America. In 1842-44, the unequal treaties, which China was forced to sign with Britain after the infamous Opium Wars, opened the country to missionary work. In 1844 he set up the “Christian Association for Propagating the Gospel” for Chinese Christians only under Chinese management. “China is open—the time has come when we must act.” As a direct result, several German-speaking missionary societies came into being and sent missionaries to work under Gutzlaff’s guidance. He had an unquestionable gift for inspiring others for mission to China.

Gutzlaff became Chinese secretary to the British governor of Hong Kong, then newly-established as a British colony. With the benefit of hindsight we would question the wisdom of mixing politics with the gospel but he seems to have seen no contradiction—nor in using an opium vessel for his third evangelistic foray. Daily, between 7 and 8 am, scores of Chinese came to the government offices to hear him expound the Bible in Hokkien. Then, after a hasty breakfast, he taught in Hakka or another dialect before beginning his day’s work. After office hours he went into the Chinese villages to preach or worked at home on his own translation of the Old Testament.

In 1844 Gutzlaff set up his evangelistic society which came to be known as the Chinese Union. Its motto was Isaiah 49:12-13: “Behold, these shall come from afar; and lo, these from the land of Sinim…” He armed his most attentive Chinese listeners with bags of tracts and New Testaments for distribution into the interior. Publications included booklets on the death and resurrection of Christ, on God the Creator, Who is Jesus? and Savior of the World. He contributed towards their travel expenses and paid them a monthly allowance from his own pocket. He chose these colporteurs carefully and traveled with them when he could to the Guangdong and Fujian coasts, working out an ambitious plan to reach the remotest parts of the Chinese empire with the gospel. Soon he had 600 Chinese working for him, of whom 40 were colporteur-evangelists. By August 1848 the latter had increased to 80. In 1844 262 Chinese were reported to have been baptized as a result of these labors. In 1846 601 baptisms; and in 1847, the peak, a total of 655! These results were spectacular compared to others who were reporting converts in dozens or only single figures. The British and Foreign Bible Society gave a grant of £200 to print more tracts and even the King of Prussia donated $400. The evangelists reported a good reception of the gospel in every province except Gansu in the far northwest. Co-workers from Europe arrived and the work seemed poised to reach still greater heights under the blessing of God.

In 1849 Gutzlaff returned to Europe to encourage support for his society, stressing that the work of evangelism must be done by the Chinese Christians themselves. He stated: “All the men employed write their journals which they present to the Society on their return… Their pay on their excursions is from $4-6 (Spanish) per month and a small allowance for traveling expenses… The whole is a work of faith from first to last… they must be engaged as if the work were their own…. Hence the necessity of committees of deep and long enquiry respecting the capacity of the [Chinese] candidate, of earnest entreaties before the throne of grace for the individuals proposed.” Gutzlaff was not unaware of the dangers of being deceived by those with false motives: “We ought to avoid as much as possible every contact with unknown men who might bring disgrace upon the Union… Whoever is clearly proved to have sinned against the Lord and committed crime must be expelled.”

All this seemed very sensible, and in Europe many Christians were ready to organize themselves into associations to support the Chinese Union. He traveled to England, Holland, Belgium, France, Denmark, Norway and even Russia. “Immense crowds and a spirit of devotion,” as he put it, followed him everywhere. The Chinese Missionary Gleaner was founded to publicize news from China and of Gutzlaff’s mission.

But then—catastrophe! As Broomhall puts it, “like an ocean breaker on the shore the whole exciting world of Gutzlaff’s Chinese Union and its European associations collapsed as dramatically as they had been built up.” Other missionaries, including the famous Dr. Legge of the London Missionary Society, began to suspect that all was not well with the Union. But Gutzlaff would not listen to criticism. He consulted his leading Chinese workers and was reassured all was well. He accused his accusers of acting on hearsay—only he had firsthand knowledge. The rapid growth of the Union with its impressive statistics of baptisms was proof of the blessing of God!

However, Dr. Theodore Hamberg of the Basel Evangelical Missionary Society, who knew the Chinese language well, was sure that “the Chinese were deceiving Dr. Gutzlaff to get money.” He made a secret mark on the literature issued to the evangelists and found it repeatedly on “new consignments” from the printer. The false members of the Union were selling it back to the printer. Both he and they were making a profit repeatedly from the same books at Gutzlaff’s expense. At first Gutzlaff indignantly rejected the accusations: “I weep tears at your conduct and still more since you are so infatuated as to throw the blame on the Chinese.”

Other missionaries read through a bundle of reports written by the supposedly godly Chinese workers. They smelled a rat! “They all seemed to be composed on one model”—in other words, they were too good to be true. Gutzlaff merely continued to dazzle his European audiences with information supplied from the now discredited Chinese evangelists. Dr. E. J. Eitel of the Basel Mission later reported that they “came and went with the utmost regularity starting from Gutzlaff’s office with bags full of Bibles, traveling money and directions for the route; returning at the proper time with well-written journals of travels they had never made, skeletons of sermons and lists of converts they had never baptized. Poor Gutzlaff—he believed them all to be inspired with his own holy zeal. The very Bibles he bought from the printers with his hard-earned money were sold by them again to Gutzlaff.” The false evangelists were now under surveillance and were followed to teashops and low dives where they spent their ill-gotten gains.

In January 1851 Gutzlaff returned to Hong Kong to be confronted with the evidence which he could no longer deny. He withdrew from the Union and it was disbanded. On August 9 in the same year he died—some say, of a broken heart.

History never repeats itself exactly, but today even a cursory survey of what is being done overseas in the name of Christ for China reveals some grave concerns.

Some 150 years later we can learn from Gutzlaff.
First, good intentions and zeal for the gospel are not enough.
Second, we should never be carried away by exaggerated statistics and stories of revival and large numbers of converts without careful examination of the facts.
Third, monetary incentives for the work of the gospel in China can be productive of great evil. How wise is it today to raise huge sums overseas, if in so doing the integrity and self-support of the Chinese church are gravely compromised?
Fourth, what sounds like a great work of God at a distance may dissolve into the air close up. Christians should not be carried away by mere excitement.
Fifth, however well structured a mission or project sounds on paper it is only going to succeed if regulations and controls are actually implemented properly. There must be openness and strict accountability.
Sixth, to question and probe the reliability of various China ministries and projects far from being unspiritual is actually essential if the gospel is to be preached effectively in China and the Chinese church built up and equipped so that it can itself reach out effectively.

SOURCES
Barbarians at the Gates (Hudson Taylor & China’s Open Century: Vol. 1), A. J. Broomhall, Hodder & Stoughton & OMF, 1981.
A History of Christian Missions in China, K. S. Latourette, Ch’eng-Wen, Taipei, 1975.
Unfinished Encounter, Bob Whyte, Collins, 1988.

Copyright by OMF International 2004