Editing Henry Martin

[[Image:Henry_Martyn.jpg|200px|right|Henry Martin]]
'''Henry Martyn''' (18 February [[1781 AD|1781]] – 16 October [[1812 AD|1812]]) was an [[Anglican]] priest and [[missionary]] to the peoples of [[British Raj|India]] and [[Qajar dynasty|Persia]]. Born in [[Truro, Cornwall|Truro]], [[Cornwall]], he was educated at [[Truro Grammar School]] and [[St John's College, Cambridge]]. A chance encounter with [[Charles Simeon]] led him to become a missionary. He was ordained a priest in the [[Church of England]] and became a chaplain for the [[British East India Company]].

Martyn arrived in India in April [[1806 AD|1806]], where he preached and occupied himself in the study of linguistics. He translated the whole of the [[New Testament]] into [[Urdu]], [[Persian language|Persian]] and Judaeo-Persic. He also translated the [[Psalms]] into Persian and the [[Book of Common Prayer]] into Urdu. From India, he set out for [[Bushire]], [[Shiraz, Iran|Shiraz]], [[Isfahan (city)|Isfahan]], and [[Tabriz]].

Martyn was seized with fever, and, though the plague was raging at [[Tokat]], he was forced to stop there, unable to continue. On 16 October [[1812 AD|1812]] he died. He was remembered for his courage, selflessness and his religious devotion. In parts of the [[Anglican Communion]] he is celebrated with a [[Lesser Festival (Church of England)|Lesser Festival]] on 19 October.

==Early life==
Martyn was born in [[Truro, Cornwall|Truro]], [[Cornwall]]. His father, John Martyn, was a "captain" or mine-agent at [[Gwennap]]. As a boy, he was educated at Truro grammar school under Dr. Cardew and he entered [[St John's College, Cambridge]], in the autumn of 1797, and was [[Senior Wrangler|senior wrangler]] and first Smith's prizeman in 1801. In 1802, he was chosen as a fellow of his college.

He had intended to go to the bar, but in the October term of 1802 he chanced to hear [[Charles Simeon]] speaking of the good done in India by a single [[Mission (Christian)|missionary]], [[William Carey (missionary)|William Carey]], and some time afterwards he read the life of [[David Brainerd]], a missionary to the [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native Americans]]. He resolved, accordingly, to become a missionary himself. On 22 October 1803, he was ordained deacon at [[Ely, Cambridgeshire|Ely]], and afterwards priest, and served as Simeon's curate at the [[Holy Trinity Church, Cambridge|Church of Holy Trinity]], taking charge of the neighbouring parish of [[Lolworth]].

==Missionary work==
Martyn wanted to offer his services to the [[Church Missionary Society]], when a financial disaster in Cornwall deprived him and his unmarried sister of the income  their father had left for them. It was necessary for Martyn to earn an income that would support his sister as well as himself. He accordingly obtained a chaplaincy under the [[British East India Company]] and left for [[British Raj|India]] on 5 July 1805. On his voyage to the East, Martyn happened to be present at the [[British Empire|British]] [[Battle of Blaauwberg|conquest]] of the [[Cape Colony]] on 8 January 1806. He spent that day tending to the dying soldiers and was distressed by seeing the horrors of war. He would come away feeling that it was Britain's destiny to convert, not colonize, the world. He wrote in his diary:

:I prayed that…[[England]] whilst she sent the thunder of her arms to distant regions of the globe, might not remain proud and ungodly at home; but might show herself great indeed, by sending forth the ministers of her church to diffuse the gospel of peace.

===India===
Martyn arrived in India in April 1806, and for some months he was stationed at Aldeen, near [[Serampur]]. In October 1806, he proceeded to [[Danapur|Dinapur]], where he was soon able to conduct worship among the locals in the vernacular, and established schools. In April 1809, he was transferred to [[Cawnpore]], where he preached to British and Indians in his own compound, in spite of interruptions and threats from local non-Christians.

He occupied himself in linguistic study, and had already, during his residence at Dinapur, been engaged in revising the sheets of his [[Hindustani language|Hindustani]] version of the [[New Testament]]. He now translated the whole of the New Testament into [[Urdu]] also, and into [[Persian language|Persian]] twice. He translated the [[Psalms]] into Persian, the Gospels into Judaeo-Persic, and the [[Book of Common Prayer]] into Urdu, in spite of ill-health and "the pride, pedantry and fury of his chief munshi Sabat." Ordered by the doctors to take a sea voyage, he obtained leave to go to Persia and correct his Persian New Testament. From there, he wanted to go to [[Arabia]], and there compose an [[Arabic language|Arabic]] version. On 1 October 1810, having seen his work at Cawnpore rewarded on the previous day by the opening of a church, he left for [[Calcutta]], from where he sailed on 7 January 1811 for [[Bombay]]. The ship reached port on his thirtieth birthday.<

==Final voyage and death==
From Bombay he set out for [[Bushire]], bearing letters from [[John Malcolm|Sir John Malcolm]] to men of position there, as also at [[Shiraz, Iran|Shiraz]] and [[Isfahan (city)|Isfahan]]. After an exhausting journey from the coast he reached Shiraz, and was soon plunged into discussion with the disputants of all classes, "Sufi, Muslim, Jew, and Jewish Muslim, even Armenian, all anxious to test their powers of argument with the first English priest who had visited them." He next traveled to [[Tabriz]] to attempt to present the [[Shah]] with his translation of the New Testament, which proved unsuccessful. Sir [[Gore Ouseley]], the British ambassador to the Shah, was unable to bring about a meeting, but did deliver the manuscript. Although Martyn could not present the Bible in person, the Shah later wrote him a letter:

:In truth (said the royal letter of thanks to the ambassador) through the learned and unremitted exertions of the Reverend Henry Martyn it has been translated in a style most befitting sacred books, that is in an easy and simple diction...The whole of the New Testament is completed in a most excellent manner, a source of pleasure to our enlightened and august mind.

At this time, he was seized with fever, and after a temporary recovery, had to seek a change of climate. He set off for [[Istanbul|Constantinople]], where he intended to return on furlough to England to regain his strength and recruit help for the missions in India. On 12 September 1812, he started with two [[Armenia]]n servants and crossed the [[Aras River]]. Urged on from place to place by their  [[Tatar]] guide, they rode from Tabriz to [[Yerevan|Erivan]], from Erivan to [[Kars]], and from Kars to [[Erzurum]]. They departed Erzurum and though the plague was raging at [[Tokat]], he was forced to stop there, unable to continue. He wrote his final journal entry on 6 October. It read, in part:

:Oh! when shall time give place to eternity? When shall appear that new heaven and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness? There, there shall in no wise enter in any thing that defileth: none of that wickedness which has made men worse than wild beasts, none of those corruptions which add still more to the miseries of mortality, shall be seen or heard of any more.

On 16 October 1812 he died and was given a [[Christian burial]] by [[Armenian Apostolic Church|Armenian clergy]].

He was heard to say, "Let me burn out for God".  An indication of his zeal for the things of God.

==Legacy==
His devotion to his tasks won him much admiration in Great Britain and he was the hero of a number of literary publications. [[Thomas Babington Macaulay, 1st Baron Macaulay|Thomas Babington Macaulay]]'s ''Epitaph'', composed early in 1813, testified to the impression made by his career:

::Epitaph on Henry Martyn

:Here Martyn lies. In Manhood's early bloom
:The Christian Hero finds a Pagan tomb.
:Religion, sorrowing o'er her favourite son,
:Points to the glorious trophies that he won.
:Eternal trophies! not with carnage red,
:Not stained with tears by hapless captives shed,
:But trophies of the Cross! for that dear name,
:Through every form of danger, death, and shame,
:Onward he journeyed to a happier shore,
:Where danger, death, and shame assault no more.

An institution was established in his name in India, called the Henry Martyn Institute: An Interfaith Centre for Reconciliation and Research, Hyderabad, India. [[John McManners]] wrote in his ''Oxford Illustrated History of Christianity'' that Martyn was a man remembered for his courage, selflessness and his religious devotion. In parts of the [[Anglican Communion]] he is celebrated with a [[Lesser Festival (Church of England)|Lesser Festival]] on 19 October.

The [http://www.martynmission.cam.ac.uk Henry Martyn Trust] based in Cambridge, England can trace its history back to 1897, at a time of great enthusiasm in Cambridge for overseas missions, when an appeal was launched for a 'Proposed Missionary Library for Cambridge University', to be housed in the Henry Martyn Hall, erected ten years previously.

The Henry Martyn Library opened in the Hall in 1898, and there it remained as a small collection of missionary biographies and other books until 1995. The evolution of the Henry Martyn Library into the present [http://www.martynmission.cam.ac.uk Henry Martyn Centre] began in 1992, when Canon Graham Kings, now Bishop of Sherborne, was appointed as the first Henry Martyn Lecturer in Missiology in the Cambridge Theological Federation.

In 1999 the Centre became an Associate Institute of the [http://www.theofed.cam.ac.uk/index.html Cambridge Theological Federation], one of the largest providers of theological education in the United Kingdom.

Today, the Centre continues to seek to promote the study of mission and world Christianity, developing strong links with mission study centres around the world and fulfilling the same aim that was stated by the founders of the Library in 1897.

==See also==
*[[Henry Martyn Hall, Cambridge]], built 1887
*[[Saints in Anglicanism]]
*[[List of Protestant missionaries in India|List of missionaries in India]]
*[[John Gilchrist (linguist)]]

==References==

==Further reading==
*Padwick, Constance. ''Henry Martyn: Confessor of the Faith'', Inter-Varsity Fellowship: London (1953).
*Bentley-Taylor, David. ''My Love Must Wait: the Story of Henry Martyn'', Downers Grove: IVP (1975).
*Henry, B. V. ''Forsaking All for Christ: A Biography of Henry Martyn'' London: Chapter Two, 2003.
*[[John Sargent (priest)|Sargent, John]].  ''Memoir of the Rev. Henry Martyn B. D.'', London: Hatchard (1816). Links to editions from [http://books.google.com/books?id=msEEAAAAYAAJ 1820] and [http://books.google.com/books?id=vsAEAAAAYAAJ 1844]
*Kellsye M. Finnie, ''Beyond the Minarets: A Biography of Henry Martyn'' Bromley: STL Books, 1988
*Smith, George. [http://books.google.com/books?id=abirsyBToxQC&printsec=frontcover&dq=%22henry+martyn%22 ''Henry Martyn, Saint and Scholar''], London: Religious Tract Society (1892).
*Isaac, Peter. ''A history of Evangelical Christianity in Cornwall'', Privately published; Polperro, Cornwall (1999) &ndash; contains a chapter about Martyn, who was born in [[Cornwall]].

==External links==
* [http://www.martynmission.cam.ac.uk Henry Martyn Centre]
* [http://www.lcms.org/ca/www/cyclopedia/02/display.asp?t1=m&word=MARTYN.HENRY Martyn, Henry] in the Christian Cyclopedia

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[[Category:1781 births]]
[[Category:1812 deaths]]
[[Category:English Christian missionaries]]
[[Category:Christian missionaries in India]]
[[Category:Christian missionaries in Persia]]
[[Category:Translators of the Bible into Persian]]
[[Category:Translators of the Bible into Urdu]]
[[Category:Anglican missionaries]]
[[Category:English Anglican priests]]
[[Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge]]
[[Category:Fellows of St John's College, Cambridge]]
[[Category:People from Truro]]
[[Category:People educated at Truro Cathedral School]]
[[Category:Anglican saints]]
[[Category:Senior Wranglers]]
[[Category:19th-century Christian saints]]