This is the day that Hiram Bingham was born in Vermont, USA, in 1789.
He was nearly 20 years of age when Obookiah, a young Hawaiian lad, was found weeping on the steps of Yale College. He had arrived in America on a trading vessel. Led to Christ by a young Christian student, Edwin Dwight, it was hoped that Obookiah would return to his own people with the gospel. But in 1818 the young Hawaiian sickened and died.
It was this tragedy that led the American Board of Missions to call for volunteers for the Sandwich Islands, as they were then called. These islands had been discovered by Captain James Cook just four decades earlier and Cook had given these islands their Sandwich name.
By 23 October, 1819, the SS “Thaddeus” set sail with seven missionary couples. Leader was Hiram Bingham, with his wife, Sybil, whom he had only met for the first time a month previously and married two weeks later! (From Jerusalem to Irian Jaya, by Ruth Tucker, page 204).
Five months later they arrived at Honolulu, where some of the missionary party were shocked by the sight of the naked savages. “Gushing with tears,” wrote Bingham, “they turned away from the spectacle.”
A new king had recently come to power and put an end to human sacrifice. Nevertheless “polygamy, fornication, adultery, incest, infant murder, desertion of husbands and wives, sorcery …” were still prevalent (Company of Heaven, by G. Kent, page 58).
The presence of a doctor among the Americans, however, opened the way to receiving the king’s favour.
The party was initially permitted to settle in Hawaii for one year. However Bingham stayed on for 21 years, to 1840, constantly involved in mission work and Hawaiian affairs. The two endeavours became practically indistinguishable.
Contrary to James Michener’s anti-Christian novel, Hawaii, the missionaries were soon welcomed by the islanders. Opposition came, however, from white traders whose visits to Hawaii had resulted in widespread immorality.
Bingham invented a 12-letter alphabet and translated much of the Scriptures into the native language. In 1835 a missionary named Titus Coan toured the Hawaiian islands. “He crossed 63 ravines” and saw thousands confess Christ.
Bingham is described as “A controversial figure” who “became enmeshed in island politics through his single-minded efforts to impose Christian reforms on Hawaiians.”
By the time Hiram Bingham returned to America, due to his wife’s ill-health, in 1840, the church numbered 20,000. He died in Connecticut, USA, on 11 November, 1869.
His son, Hiram Bingham Jnr. (1831-1908), carried on the work in the Gilbert Isles of the South Seas, translating the Scriptures into their language. Hiram Bingham III became famous for his explorations in South America and discovery of Machu Picchu.
This post is based on the work of my late friend Donald Prout whose love for books and Christian history led him to collate a daily Christian calendar. I continue to work with Don’s wife, Barbara, to share his life work with the world. I have updated some of these historical posts and will hopefully draw from Don’s huge files of clippings to continue this series beyond Don’s original work. More of Don’s work can be found at www.donaldprout.com. I am indebted to Don for awakening in me an interest in Church History, which I previously considered to be a little stuffy and of little practical value. I find in the process of updating Don’s Christian Diary that I am being constantly refreshed, illuminated or challenged by the lives of those who have gone before.