Chapter 4: “Thy Will Be Ever Done”: Ascetic Spirituality

4

“Thy Will Be Ever Done”: Ascetic Spirituality

John N. Murdock (1820–1897), Secretary of the American Baptist Missionary Union (1863–1892), spoke thus at a centennial address (1888) in Adoniram Judson’s honor:

From the day that he accepted Christ as his Saviour, he also accepted the law of service. Having been bought with a price, he belonged henceforth to his Master, and gave himself up to obey His Word and do His will. This sense of loyalty to Christ led to the effort which he made, in company with others, to organize a society for foreign missions . . . This sustained him in the face of difficulties, rendered him superior alike to ridicule and reproach, and held him steadily to the one end he had set before him, as at once the guide and inspiration of his life . . . He stood, as a soldier of Christ, on a forlorn hope, not counting his life dear unto himself, that he might finish the ministry he had received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God to the heathen.410

As Murdock maintained, under the weight of incredible affliction, grief, and despair, Judson’s staying power was sui generis. Judson, in his dying moments, reflected on his long endurance in the hardships of his missionary service, and fittingly cried, “Oh, how few there are who suffer such great torment—who die so hard!”411 This chapter contends for an all-consuming vision of God’s sovereignty in Judson’s piety. In order to understand his uncommon resilience, it is necessary to consider how Judson’s submission to God’s sovereign will formed his view of suffering, his consecration to duty, and the centrality of self-denial and asceticism in his spirituality. His ambition to please the infinitely wise God led him to renounce all things for the duty to which he was devoted.

Submitting to the Sovereign Will of God

Adoniram Judson’s spiritual formation had its roots in the Calvinism of New Divinity theology. His was an evangelical Calvinism, which was manifest in the Edwardsean ethos of Judson’s New Divinity father and in the Hopkinsian pathos of his New Divinity training at Andover Theological Seminary. God-centeredness pervaded Judson’s life, and through it he interpreted every experience, whether in pain or in pleasure, as redounding to the glory of God. Judson humbly submitted to God in risk, affliction, grief, and death. He claimed no rights over God; his chief plea before God was “Thy will be done.”

Judson’s God-Centered God

From early in his spirituality, Judson had an Edwardsean vision of how enjoyment of God would be ever increasing. Because God is effulgent and infinite in himself, his glory is limitless and therefore the Christian’s happiness in God’s glory is limitless.412 In a letter in October of 1810 to Abigail Hasseltine (b. 1788), the sister of his first wife, Ann Hasseltine, Judson sketched his meditations of what it means to be a “lover of Jesus.” He said that “love to Jesus” partakes in the genuine spiritual blessings both now and in eternity, and it describes superlative happiness. There is no greater happiness than in loving Jesus because Jesus has supreme control over everything. He said that Jesus has promised happiness to his friends, and his happiness will fill them to capacity; it will be neither partial, nor temporal. With eager expectation of eternal joy, Judson went on to propose:

Nor does he intend a happiness eternally stationary. It will be eternally increasing . . . As their capacities will be eternally enlarging, the quantity of happiness they enjoy will be eternally increasing; and not merely eternally increasing in the same ratio, but eternally increasing in an eternally accelerated ratio. So that there will unquestionably arrive a moment in the ages of eternity when the additional happiness, that instant superadded to the happiness already enjoyed by each glorified spirit, will almost infinitely outweigh the whole sum of human happiness enjoyed in this world. To all this may he aspire who is a lover of Jesus. Blessed Jesus, thou art no “niggard provider.” When thou givest, thou givest like a God.413

Throughout his life, Judson maintained a prominent God-centered piety. In May 1836, for the ordination of S. M. Osgood, Judson preached from John 10:1–18. His sermon illustrated that God was the all-consuming center of his piety and devotion to ministry. Judson discussed the pastoral duties required in imitation to Christ’s obedience to the Father. He outlined briefly his enthrallment with God’s God-centeredness. He said that it is useless to compare creatures to their Creator, because God is infinite, eternal, perfect, and that God enjoys in every moment more happiness than all creatures can enjoy for all eternity. Judson went on to argue that God is uppermost in his own affections:

God loves himself, and ought to love himself, infinitely more than he can love, or ought to love, all creatures which have existed or will exist forever . . . What luminaries suspended in the eternity that is past will burst upon our vision when we quit the prison house in which we are now confined; and what new glories we shall see kindling up at each stage of our future happy existence—glories beaming from the divine face, the uncreated sun, the eternal source of all light and glory, forever unveiling to the view of holy beings, yet never, never to be completely unveiled! How infinitely happy must God be in himself, all his infinite attributes ever known and ever enjoyed to full perfection! Herein eminently consists the happiness of God. What is the collective happiness of all creatures in comparison with the happiness of God?414

Judson’s first tract, A View of the Christian Religion, makes clear this vision of God. He contextually delineated a basic doctrine of God for Buddhists, defining God as the true and only eternal One who never tires, ails, or dies. He explained God’s Trinitarian nature and divine attributes, and Judson concluded this section expounding on God’s eternal joy. Judson wrote, “He is pure and good, and possessed of everlasting felicity. Before this world was made, God remained happy, surrounded by the pure and incorporeal sons of heaven.”415

Submitting to God in Risk

Appointed as a missionary in 1812, Adoniram Judson prepared to depart for the mission field. Having met Ann in 1810 at the General Association at Bradford when he presented his letter of inquiry for missions,416 he subsequently cultivated a relationship with her through visits and letters. In preparation for his departure, he sought the approval of Deacon John Hasseltine of Bradford, Ann’s father, for his daughter’s hand in marriage. Judson’s letter to John Hasseltine reveals an unwavering submission to God’s providence, even in the face of unknown risk. Judson asked Ann’s father to allow Judson to take her overseas, never to see her again, and to endure great hardships, hazards, disease, poverty, anguish, humiliation, persecution, and even a fierce death. He further asked, “Can you consent to all this, for the sake of Him who left his heavenly home, and died for her and for you; for the sake of perishing immortal souls; for the sake of Zion, and the glory of God?” Then he concluded his appeal to her father by rehearsing the prospects of Ann’s eternal reward in the joy of bringing many heathen to the Savior, saving them from eternal torment.417 Judson and Ann were married at Bradford, on February 5, 1812, and left for the mission field a week later.

One major event in Judson’s ministry thoroughly demonstrates his submission to God in risk; this was when he personally beseeched the despotic king of Burma. The reason that this singular episode is so illustrative is that Judson wrote many journal entries and letters during this time. Unlike other trying cases, the legal longevity of his mission in Burma was at stake. Judson’s anxiety was high. After the transition of monarchs at the end of 1819, the missionaries feared that the newly instated king, a zealous Buddhist, would revive religious persecution for all those non-Buddhists. Burma, already a despotic empire, did not take long to follow the ruthless devotion to Buddhism of its new monarch. It became illegal to promote or adhere to any religion besides Buddhism. Aware of impending persecution and intolerance, Judson wrote to Thomas Baldwin, in December of 1819.418 He was contemplating a visit in the New Year to the monarch to plead for toleration. Judson wrote that he felt like Esther approaching Ahasuerus,419 and if the king were to deny religious toleration, the mission’s hopes would be lost. He said, “O what a trying case! None can know or experience the uncertainties and anxieties of our present situation. But we sometimes rest on the Saviour, and derive sweet consolation from the assurance that our Jesus will do all things well.”420

After the new monarch took power, Judson resolved to go to his throne and plead for favor for the missionaries to continue their work without interruption and trouble. He had not yet experienced persecution, but the Burmans were afraid to listen to Judson’s words because of the possible vengeance of the king. Judson described his trust in God’s sovereign purposes in the risk he was taking:

If the Lord has other purposes, it becomes us meekly to acquiesce, and willingly to sacrifice our dearest hopes to the Divine will. We rest assured that, in either case, the perfections of God will be displayed, and desire to be thankful that we are allowed to be in any way instrumental in contributing to that display.421

In January of 1820, Judson and his missionary companion, James Colman, arrived at the emperor’s palace. The night before approaching the monarch, Judson recorded his quiet trust and humble submission to God’s sovereign will despite his anxiety. He wrote in his journal that he was sleepless throughout the night, and the only comfort he knew was surrendering his missionary labor into his heavenly Father’s hands. With a spirit of disinterested benevolence, Judson conceded:

The work is his, not ours; that the heart of the monarch before whom we are to appear, is under the control of Omnipotence; and that the event will be ordered in the manner most conducive to the divine glory and the greatest good. God may, for the wisest purposes, suffer our hopes to be disappointed; and if so, why should short-sighted, mortal man repine? Thy will, O God, be ever done; for thy will is inevitably the wisest and the best.422

The monarch did not grant them their request, yet Judson still refused to give up his work. In his journal in February of 1820, he wrestled with whether it would be wise to leave their post or to stay and risk persecution, whether to leave the Burmese disciples or to stay and risk them being thrown in prison and tortured or be tortured himself. He stood firm, saying that he knew God would gather his elect, even through the most severe trials. He described his hope in God as “the angry gleam of lightning around, discloses the black magazines of heaven’s artillery, and threatens death to the unwary gazer.”423

Submitting to God in Affliction

Judson viewed his accumulated afflictions with solemnity. Nothing was by coincidence, and there were no accidents. He believed that God was in control of everything, and furthermore, God had purposes for Judson’s usefulness and God’s glory.

No other time in Judson’s life was more physically excruciating than when he was in prison for 21 months (June 8, 1824—December 30, 1825). Surveying this season of imprisonment and torture reveals to what degree he truly trusted in God and surrendered to his sovereign will. Having been bound and tortured in horrific conditions, Judson wrote to the Corresponding Secretary of the American Baptist Board, Lucius Bolles, about how he trusted that his sufferings would work for his good. He said that his sufferings “have been unavailing to answer any valuable missionary purpose, unless so far as they may have been silently blessed to our spiritual improvement and capacity for future usefulness.”424

While in prison, he suffered in the company of an Anglo-Indian merchant, Henry Gouger. In his narrative of their imprisonment, Gouger recorded Judson’s submission to God’s painful providences. He said Judson was mentally distraught for Ann’s situation. Despite her own sickness, Ann cared for Judson, and concurrently little Maria was ill. The gravity of this tribulation pushed the Judson family to despair.425 Gouger also recalled that Judson’s “painful sensitiveness to anything gross or uncleanly . . . made him live a life of constant martyrdom.” He described Judson as deeply religious. For Gouger the evidence of Judson’s profound spirituality was the fact that he constantly “referred every trial and suffering to the will of God, and in exercising a perfect resignation to His dispensations.” Gouger mentioned that Judson greatly admired the “calm and placid spirit” of Madame Guyon. Judson often quoted some of her simple verses, Gouger said, with a deep longing “to attain the spirit of them.” Judson would often repeat these lines:

No bliss I seek, but to fulfil

In life, in death, Thy lovely will;

No succour in my woes I want,

Except what Thou art pleased to grant.

Our days are number’d—let us spare

Our anxious hearts a needless care;

‘Tis Thine to number out our days,

And ours to give them to Thy praise.426

More than anything, Gouger remembered Judson’s self-denying, submissive piety to God’s will. Judson’s words during those tortuous months revealed what was in his heart. In his frequent recitations of Guyon’s writings, the major inspiration of Judson’s ascetic spirituality began to materialize.427

In addition to Judson’s prison narrative, it is revealing to see his perspective on affliction later in life. A couple of years after his imprisonment, Judson had been suffering with severe illnesses. Writing to Thomas Baldwin in February of 1828, Judson recounted these in light of God’s inscrutable ways. While he resided in Ava, he was plagued with fever and ague. He moved, therefore, to Rangoon to get away from the climate of Ava, hoping it would help. He explored every medical solution available, and though he wanted to finish the New Testament and see a church planted in Ava, he conceded, “the ways of God are not as the ways of man. He does all things well. Glory be to his holy name forevermore.”428

After his death, Judson’s widow, Emily, wrote some anecdotes and sketches of his piety and missionary devotion. It is helpful to read her narration of his unscripted, unplanned responses to situations and conversations that he never wrote down. She rehearsed Judson’s consecrated submission to God’s divine right to use a minister at his pleasure and his divine right to end the minister’s labor whenever he saw fit. Judson admitted that some people would think it bizarre that God would not let him live to finish the dictionary. Yet, he retorted that it would be actually peculiar if God were to permit him to finish it. Judson explained that all men leave some work unfinished that they or others consider critically important. He said, God does this in order to show us “what really worthless creatures we are, and how altogether unnecessary, as active agents, in the working out of his plans.”429

Emily also recorded a short story of some women who were talking about the sailors being superstitious about transporting missionaries. They believed that God took extra special care of his clergymen, so they saw the missionaries as good luck. One lady said to Judson that she herself believed that God favorably “exercises peculiar care over his people,” to which Judson remarked,

True; so “though he slay me, yet will I trust in him [Job 13:15];” not because I have wrought myself into an unwarrantable belief that he will carry me over smooth waters. He may cast us in a burning fiery furnace, or precipitate us to the lowest depths of the sea, but his care, his tenderness, his love, are still the same.430

Emily went on to illustrate Judson’s God-centered submissive piety by describing a story of Judson’s response to the loss of some missionaries onboard a ship to their missionary destination. He had recruited them during his time back in the United States, and he felt a warm affection for them. Emily said he wept upon hearing the news. He refused to speak of the sad event as though God were unwise or impotent. Someone said that this tragedy would demotivate many from supporting missions. Though Judson initially rejected such a possibility, after a few moments he acknowledged that such a deflated reaction among supporters were possible. Emily said that Judson turned away and was quiet for a few moments. And then he rejoined with a spirit of disinterested benevolence:

O, when will Christians learn . . . that their puny, polluted offerings of works are not necessary to God? He permits them to work, as a favor, in order to do them good, personally, because he loves them, and desires to honor them, not because he needs them.

He went on to uphold that God would have lost nothing if he sovereignly removed one of his workers, even his best worker, from the harvest field. He said Christians are distraught when the absolutely sovereign God, who has innumerable resources for his disposal, removes one tool. Judson said that God deals with his servants for their own spiritual improvement, and his final purpose is to prepare them individually for eternity. God takes his servants home when he has sufficiently fashioned them for the position that he has formed them to fulfill in eternity.431

Emily recalled that Judson never spoke of serving God as a right or something of which he was worthy. Conversely, he spoke tenderly of his unworthiness in Christ’s service and the kindness of Christ having permitted him to do even a small thing for Christ’s name. Judson not only deeply felt his unworthiness of salvation, but he also knew how undeserving he was to bear the gospel to the nations. She said he passionately prayed that he would be faithful to devote his whole life to labor and self-denial.432

Submitting to God in Grief

In order to understand how Judson’s spirituality functioned in his grief, it is very illuminating to survey his reflections on occasions of great disappointment, and seasons of grave sorrow. More than his physical afflictions, the most pernicious trials he experienced were unbearable sorrows and disappointments.

Judson trusted in God’s wisdom and providential hand in every kind of ministry setback and disappointment. Emily noted that he asserted,

Our obedience was not to be yielded grudgingly; that it must be a cheerful acquiescence in all that God had done, and a sincere, careful study of the indications of his providence afterwards, without any suspicion that our ways were hedged by any thing harder or thornier than his love and mercy.433

For instance, during the aforementioned event of beseeching the Burman monarch for religious toleration, in January of 1820, the king looked at Judson’s Bible translation, read his gospel tract,434 and then blatantly rejected Judson’s wishes, dismissing him without any hope of future governmental toleration. The next day as he headed home, Judson recorded his trust in God’s purposes. Though he experienced the grief of disappointment, he still rested in God’s sovereign wisdom. In his journal he rehearsed these lines from the English poet, John Milton (1608–1674):

Some natural tears we dropped, but wiped them soon;

The world was all before us, where to choose

Our place of rest, and Providence our guide.435

After traveling for three days, eight miles each day, in the oppressive heat, in his journal he scribbled out all the things that were grievous and burdensome about taking such a risk and traveling so far. After listing out what was so discouraging to him, he stopped abruptly in the middle of his sentence, and instead of ending with a final complaint, he said the outcome of such toil had been,

—the wisest and best possible; a result which if we could see the end from the beginning, would call forth our highest praise. O, slow of heart to believe and trust in the constant presence and overruling agency of our own almighty Saviour.436

He concluded his litany of laments by yielding to God’s wise and perfect will. In light of this setback, in March of 1820, he concluded a letter explaining the weary situation to Thomas Baldwin:

We are fully confident that the events which have lately happened to us will turn out to the furtherance of the Gospel. The ways of God are not like the ways of man. It becomes us, not only to acquiesce, but to rejoice evermore.437

Having returned to Burma from America, in March of 1847, Judson and Emily were traveling to another city. While they were gone, their house in Maulmain burned down, destroying all of their best clothing, books, letters, journals, gifts from America, and many of his manuscripts; the exception was the New Testament. He wrote a letter to E. A. Stevens, the fellow missionary who helped Judson edit and revise the Burmese Bible. In the letter, Judson did not accuse God of cruelty, callousness, or capriciousness; rather, he surrendered to God’s infinite wisdom and love in the loss of all his earthly belongings, save the clothes on his back and the New Testament manuscripts. He asked the obvious questions of why God would permit Judson’s time to be lost, his property to burn up, and his missionary colleagues who had such a command of the Burmese language to have died beforehand so that now he would not be able to access their learned knowledge. To these questions he swiftly asserted with the pathos of disinterested benevolence:

Because infinite wisdom and love would have it so. Because it is best for us and best for them and best for the cause and best for the interests of eternity that it should be so. And blessed be God—we know it and are thankful and rejoice in it. Glory to God.438

Then, three days later, in a letter to the treasurer of the General Convention, Heman Lincoln (1821–1887), Judson said that “all our best clothes and valuables gone. But it is doubtless for the best.” He affirmed that

God is great. He sitteth on the heavens, he setteth his foot on the earth, and the inhabitants are as grasshoppers before him. He dwelleth also in the humble and contrite soul; and the rays of indwelling glory appear more resplendent, gleaming through the chinks of the humble tenement. O for that humility and contrition, O for that simplicity of faith, which will secure the indwelling glory! . . . God is not only “great,” but good. God is love.439

In addition to his submission to God in the disappointments of ministry, the loss of loved ones, especially his first wife, Ann, uncovered the substance of Judson’s faith. After Ann’s death (on October 24, 1826), Judson visited the physician who attended her in her dying moments. Discovering the pervasiveness of her pain and the quality of her faith in her dying hours, Judson wrote to Ann’s mother, Rebecca Barton Hasseltine (1761–1846). His surrender to the wise providence of God was manifest in this letter. He recounted his wife’s “long-protracted sufferings.” She endured them with “meekness, and patience, and magnanimity, and Christian fortitude.” Then he said he would not have wished her sufferings to be less lest she lose the eternal enjoyment of her rest and reward for her sufferings. He admitted that God took her when she was most useful in Christ’s service and most needed for her husband and her child. However, Judson professed his trust that “infinite wisdom and love have presided, as ever, in this most afflicting dispensation. Faith decides that it is all right, and the decision of faith eternity will soon confirm.”440 Judson’s own experience of trusting God’s sovereignty in his grief helped him counsel others. In 1833, he wrote a letter to comfort the inconsolable Stella Bennett, whose husband and children set sail for America. He composed a short poem:

Sovereign love appoints the measure

And number of our pains,

And is pleased when we take pleasure

In the trials he ordains.441

Almost twenty years after Ann’s death, Judson’s second wife, Sarah Boardman Judson, became terribly ill. He would again know the sorrow of a departed helpmate. Receiving advice to set sail to a northern climate to recover, Judson felt compelled to attend her voyage, nurse her, and be there in her death. Yet, the greater trial came with deciding what to do with their children during the long voyage. He decided to leave his three youngest children in Burma, not knowing if they would ever see each other again this side of eternity,442 and he also decided to bring his three eldest children back to the United States to leave them with family so they could go to school.443 Judson noted that “it was so ordered by divine Providence” that on the voyage back to America the ship docked in the port of St. Helena and Sarah died there in September of 1845. After Sarah’s death at the port in St. Helena, a minister444 boarded the ship to console Judson and his children. He described Judson not as speaking in rough dutiful terms to his children, as though they should compose themselves and feel no emotion in light of God’s severe providence. Rather, the minister described the grieving Judson as sobbing himself and speaking to his distressed children “in the most consoling language a Christian father’s lips could utter.”445

In one of the last letters he ever wrote, in the final year of his life, Judson maintained a strong God-centered piety in loss. Judson wrote to S. M. Osgood in October 1849, regarding a bereavement in Osgood’s life. Judson upheld the meticulous sovereignty of God in that harsh trial, and yet it was the sovereignty of God that gave him hope that such a trial would work for the good of the believer. Judson said that God’s purposes, though dark and blurred, would prove bright and clear. Judson commiserated: “We have both tasted of these bitter cups once and again; we have found them bitter, and we have found them sweet too. Every cup stirred by the finger of God becomes sweet to the humble believer.”446

Submitting to God in Death

Judson’s long life of self-denial and labor ended in a hard death. From the time he set sail in 1812 until his death in 1850, he rarely knew reprieve, recreation, or rest. His dying days reveal the unwavering quality of his God-centered submission. Emily stood by Judson as he suffered during his last days, and when a convalescence voyage proved to be indispensable, Judson, compelled against his wishes, embarked on the voyage. In a letter to the Missionary Union in February of 1850, Judson wrote of his sickness and hopeful recovery. He signed off and entrusted himself to God’s wisdom, saying, “May God direct in the path of duty.”447

During that time, Emily wrote letters and carefully detailed her interaction with him in the few days prior to his final voyage. His hands were too weak to write, so she recorded his words. She noted that he candidly mourned, “This is almost more than I can bear! Was there ever suffering like our suffering?” Judson’s health quickly started to decline. He was anxious to get out to sea before it was too late to reverse his illness. The pain was so great that he hardly talked, but Emily said that in those last days he would look at her with a smile and rejoice aloud in Christ’s love. As she cared for him day and night, one night he turned to her and said, “This will never do. You are killing yourself for me, and I will not permit it. You must have someone to relieve you. If I had not been made selfish by suffering, I should have insisted upon it long ago.” Judson went on to say to her, “I think I know why this illness has been sent upon me; I needed it; I feel that it has done me good; and it is my impression that I shall now recover, and be a better and more useful man.” To which Emily asked if he wished to recover. Judson replied that if God would permit, he would like to finish the dictionary because of how much time he had labored on it. He said that he felt like God had brought him through his whole life and labor to this point just to prepare him to be useful. Though at this juncture he realized that he might not finish the dictionary, which meant he would never get to preach as much as he had wished, yet he still hoped in God. Emily then told him that many thought he would not recover. Judson responded to the plain reality that his life was slipping away; he said in tears that he was ready for whatever God ordered according to his perfect will. Emily recorded his words:

Death will never take me by surprise—do not be afraid of that—I feel so strong in Christ. He has not led me so tenderly thus far to forsake me at the very gate of heaven. No, no; I am willing to live a few years longer if it should be so ordered; and if otherwise, I am willing and glad to die now. I leave myself entirely in the hands of God, to be disposed of according to his holy will.

The next day, when given the option to stay in Burma instead of going to sea, Emily said that Judson did not wish to stay for he would surely die. Not wanting to be a self-made martyr or commit the error of self-murder, he said, that it would be “criminal” to stay back and not try to recover.448 On the voyage in 1850, after leaving Emily behind, Thomas Ranney (1810–1868), recorded Judson’s surrender to the will of God in his dying. Judson said to Ranney that he knew Christ was upholding him. Judson uttered, “It is all right there, I believe he gives me just so much pain and suffering as is necessary to fit me to die—to make me submissive to his will.” After days of fevers, severe vomiting, and fierce coughing, Judson lamented to Ranney that so few died such a terrible death. On the day of his death, April 12, the fever of death had set in, and Judson whispered, “It is done; I am going.”449

The Path of Duty

Grounded in his all-consuming vision of God’s comprehensive sovereignty, Adoniram Judson set out on the path of duty, in obedience to his missionary call. His duty to Christ manifested itself in many ways, most noticeably in his resolve to stand for his convictions and his resilience to stay the course and complete what God had called him to do.450 In his A Digest on Scripture, Judson heavily cited Scripture references to delineate what he believed to be the basic biblical duties that the Christian owed to God and to men. With pages of texts cited, Judson said that the Christian’s duty to God is to love him supremely through reverence, trust, and obedience.451 Also, with pages of biblical citations, he outlined the Christian’s duty to men, which included themes such as brotherly love, indiscriminate kindness, forbearance, honor, purity of speech, and integrity in relationships.452

Standing on the Gospel

During his last year of theological study at Andover Seminary, Adoniram Judson began to sense a call to the mission field. His experience began as many missionary calls do, with a combination of a burden for the unreached peoples, anticipation of the journey, and a sense of duty to God and the Scripture.453 In a letter in December of 1837, to Stephen Chapin (1778–1845), the president of Columbian College, Washington,454 Judson recounted those days when he sensed God’s Spirit calling him to missions. Initially, the romance of the missionary venture excited him, but its thrill soon faded; a strong sense of duty then compelled him. He admitted that his emotions were “extravagant.” Yet, he maintained that God, in his wisdom, needed to grant him such a “state of excitement” in order to enable him initially “to break the strong attachment” to his family and homeland and abandon his worldly ambitions. Nevertheless, he said, “That excitement soon passed away; but it left a strong desire to prosecute my inquiries, and ascertain the path of duty.” In the letter he confessed that God’s sovereignty clearly brought together all his companions from their various backgrounds to Andover.455 He said that they “came to a mutual understanding on the ground of foreign missions and missions for life.” The gravity of this high calling impressed upon their souls with “awful solemnity,” binding them together for that great cause of advancing the kingdom of Christ.456 When Leonard Woods, professor of Christian Theology at Andover Seminary (1808–1846), recalled the early missionary fervor of Judson and his colleagues at Andover, he noted that it was not “extravagant romantic ideas” that motivated him, but “with very sober scriptural views,” Judson and his colleagues “engaged in the enterprise as a serious Christian duty,—a work of benevolence, self-denial, and piety.”457

Later in life, in retrospect, Emily C. Judson sketched some anecdotes of her marriage to Judson. She recorded his dutiful devotion to preaching the gospel as a missionary and his refusal to entertain people with stories of his labors, as if he were some kind of Christian celebrity.458 He devoted himself to preaching the gospel not only on the mission field, but at home in his sending churches too. Emily recalled that when visiting her home church,459 after the sermon, Judson spoke for approximately fifteen minutes “with singular simplicity, and, as I thought, with touching pathos, of the ‘precious Saviour,’ what he has done for us, and what we owe to him.”460 Afterwards, Emily said that it was evident that the congregation was disappointed that he had not shared any captivating stories of a man coming from the antipodes. Speaking to Emily later, Judson retorted that he preached to the best of his ability on the most remarkable subject, and he was glad that the church could say that even an adventurer like himself “had nothing better to tell than the wondrous story of Jesus’ dying love. My business is to preach the gospel of Christ, and when I can speak at all, I dare not trifle with my commission.” He went on to say that his duty compelled him to stand for the truth of Christ and Christ’s love over indulging them with “amusing stories, however decently strung together on a thread of religion.” He said, such ear-tickling “is not what Christ meant by preaching the gospel.” Emily recorded that he feared entertaining them with his own escapades only to stand before Christ on the day of judgment and regret wasting an opportunity to preach Christ crucified. Emily recollected that Judson admitted that spreading awareness of missions and missionary work was important; nonetheless, he argued that “the good of the cause of missions did not require a lowering of the standard of gospel preaching; and that whatever was done for missions at the expense of spirituality in the American churches, was lost on the world.”461

Standing amid the Unknown

Judson’s fresh devotion to this duty would undergo testing not long after he vowed himself to obey the missionary call no matter the cost. In the winter of 1810, Edward Dorr Griffin,462 pastor of the distinguished Park Street Church in Boston, visited Judson and his family, and Griffin proposed that Judson become his assistant pastor. Judson’s family was elated. His ambitions had finally led him to a place of prestige and prominence in the Lord’s service that Judson’s father had never achieved. His mother was so happy that he could be immediately useful for the Lord and so close to home. Nevertheless, knowing he would break the heart of his mother and knowing that he would risk displeasing his ambition-fueling father, he said, “No . . . I shall never live in Boston. I have much further than that to go.”463 Then he unfolded his plans to please Christ by obeying his call, devoting himself to preaching the gospel to the heathen.464

Judson sought approval and consent for the creation of American missions, and he presented a letter in June 1810 to Samuel Spring (1746–1819) of Newburyport465 and Samuel Worcester of Salem.466 In spite of Judson’s impetuousness and duty-mindedness, of which he was cognizant, he was indeed malleable. Knowing that none of the older gentlemen had been foreign missionaries before, in the letter Judson still humbly inquired of any advice that they could give the enthusiastic seminarians. Though he would have to pioneer a foreign mission field, Judson assumed the duty, along with his companions, to be “devoted to this work for life” according to God’s providential guidance.467

The Duty to Stay

Judson constantly faced the temptation to retreat from the fray of missionary service. In order to persevere on the path of duty, he had to make hard choices throughout life that would assist him in his lifelong missionary devotion.

In order to stay on the path of duty, Judson sought to set a useful trajectory. After making plain his devotion to foreign missions for life, Edward Griffin expressed concern that Judson’s health was too weak and his constitution too delicate. Judson realized that, if he were to stay his course for a long-term investment, he would have to do his best to improve and sustain a strong constitution. So, he studied physiology, and he created daily habits of exercise and health in order to prolong his life, for he believed that his future usefulness greatly depended on exercising and good health. He walked every morning and evening throughout his life, during which he used the time to pray and meditate.468

In the early years of his missionary preparations, Judson wrote letters to Ann Hasseltine. In a letter in January of 1811, Judson demonstrated his early consecration for missionary duty and how he sought to prepare himself to stay the course and finish it. He said that his prayer was that Ann would grow in the “spirit of Christ” and ascend above worldly desires to “be willing to be disposed of in this world just as God shall please.” He went on to say that he wished that as the year went on that she would grow “nearer to God,” and be ready for whatever the future held, even affliction, anguish, isolation, and death. Considering the great risks of living in the East, Judson presumed that they could be “exceeding [sic] sorrowful, even unto death.” Quoting a stanza from a poem by the English poet, Alexander Pope (1688–1744), about dying in a foreign land,469 Judson summoned Ann to pray earnestly with him for “an overcoming faith” in order to stand firm and stay long.470

Approximately two months before the aforementioned letter to Ann, Judson wrote a letter to Ann’s older sister, Abigail Hasseltine.471 In the letter, Judson illustrated the underlying convictions beneath why he would stay so long and suffer so well. He exclaimed that he wished for Christians, including himself, to realize that one moment of torment in eternity would “almost infinitely outweigh all the pain ever suffered in this world.” He contended that Christians would then not be “agitated by the trifles which daily occur”; they would not be “impatient under their light afflictions”; and they would not “be unwilling to bear all the hardships and sufferings which Jesus lays upon us in this world.”472 Meditating on eternal torment would prove foundational for Judson’s staying power through adversity.

Judson’s ability to stay through difficulty was due to his diligence to improve every moment, whether comfortable or inconvenient, for spiritual usefulness. His time-orientation and desire to invest in every opportunity for personal holiness and for Christ’s service dictated how he would spend life’s dull moments and how proactive he would be at all times. For instance, not long after Judson and Ann departed for Calcutta, they fell hard to seasickness, and the smells of refuse and waste were particularly nauseating. Yet, even in the initial adversity of travel, Judson sought to make the most of every opportunity that he might endure in usefulness for the Lord. He wrote a letter from the Bay of Bengal in June 1812, to his colleagues from Andover to exhort them not to waste time and convenience, but to improve every moment for the Lord. Even onboard the ship, Judson said that he sought to be useful for the Lord. Because of his earlier commitment to preserving his physical health through exercise, he learned how to jump rope, which he said was the “best kind of exercise” he had ever found. As soon as he stopped exercising for a few days, his health would fail, so he exercised in order to improve every day for spiritual duties. He wrote to his friends saying that it would be foolish for a passenger to relax on his voyage and not spend his passing time well. He said if a missionary were not to be diligent, even in spite of his seasickness, then the missionary might “acquire habits of indolence and disregard of time which will attach to him through life.” No hour on sea, he said, is less valuable for spiritual improvement than an hour in the comforts of land. Judson even recommended that a traveling missionary should start his voyage with “a definite plan of study, for diligent improvement of several months of voyage, as well as for, improvement for several months after his first arrival at his station.” And, he closed his letter by warning his friends not to let their comforts become a distraction as, he claimed with a touch of sarcasm, his comforts on the ship had become a distraction for him.473

In order to remain on the path of duty, Judson allowed no special privileges to distract him. After serving in Burma for a number of years, an external factor threatened Judson’s devotion to his lifelong duty. In 1819, when the war between Britain and Burma was escalating, which led to the banishment of the English missionaries, the American missionaries were also anxious about the looming possibility that they could likewise receive maltreatment and deportation. Facing the reality of inevitable opposition and persecution by the Burmese government, many missionaries were compelled to pull out and commence work in a more tolerant, peaceful environment. Enduring the scrutiny of such a repressive government, Judson’s devotion to his call remained firm. Judson determined to wait until the government actually forced him to forego his missionary work through imprisonment or deportation. Christ’s example of perseverance motivated him. In a letter to William Staughton474 of Philadelphia, he wrote that the king, on a whim, could banish the missionaries, which would include confiscation of all their property and even deadly cruelty. Judson’s conviction to fulfill his duty and stay came from the fact that he surrendered his American religious freedom by becoming a missionary. He said that most people in history have cowered under some form of despotism with very little provisions of life, liberty, and property. He said, in imitation of Christ who became a man and lived under “the most unprincipled and cruel despot that ever reigned,” Christ’s disciples, then should not decline serving Christ under tyranny. Later in his letter, he called himself “the most unsuccessful of all missionaries” and asked prayer “for grace to strengthen faith, to animate hope, to elevate affection, to embolden the soul, to enable us to look danger and death in the face.”475

Moreover, Judson needed not only to withstand the temptation to retreat in the face of adversity, he needed also to stand firm and stay in the face of opportunity. After leaving the prison in Ava, Judson faced many new prospects in different provinces in which to commence a new work, presumably because they were easier and more promising. He was even encouraged to forego his missionary work to become an interpreter for the British government, which would have provided a more stable occupation than the hazards of their previous post. After much prayer, Judson, along with his wife, Ann, concluded it would render them useless in their mission because of how much time it would demand. In a letter to Lucius Bolles in March 1826, Judson’s response to this affable opportunity was single-minded. He said he endeavored to know nothing but Christ crucified. He said that because of the “comparative worthlessness of all earthly things,” his desire was “to avoid every secular occupation, and all literary and scientific pursuits, and devote the remainder of my days to simple declaration of the precious truths of the Gospel.”476 Just as sixteen years earlier when Judson turned down a rare opportunity to preach in Boston with the respected Edward Griffin before departing for India, so at this stage in his life, he was equally resolute.477

Judson knew translation was hard work to which he must apply himself rigorously, but he also knew it was the Holy Spirit’s work, in which he trusted for illumination and help. Such reliance on the Spirit’s empowerment in congruence with his hard work was a key to Judson’s perseverance.478 In a journal entry in June 1832, Judson demonstrated his assiduous resolve to fulfill his duty and finish his course. He said he had calculated that he could finish the whole Bible in two years from that point. But, that was upon the condition that he would restrain himself to that work alone. He could offer no other duties, otherwise the work would drag on for four years. In his journal, he expressed deep yearning for people to pray for him in his isolated state so that he would “enjoy the presence of the Saviour, and that special aid in translating the inspired Word.” He said such prayers would be granted if they were offered with humility and fervency.479

Even though his fellow missionaries were not directly engaged in his translation work alongside him, they felt the seriousness of Judson’s self-denying seclusion. That he was rarely to be seen told them that he was working as hard or harder than anyone else was. The newly married missionary couple, Catherine Sears Webb (b. 1806) and Abner Webb (d. 1891), had just arrived in Burma in 1833, and Catherine Webb witnessed Judson intently studying and translating. She wrote to her parents (Ebenezer [1776–1847] and Frances Pamela Watson [1778–1842]) and highlighted Judson’s dutiful labors. She did not describe him as impatient or severe, but rather that her conversation with him was “of a very pleasing nature,” and she was happy even to slightly assist him by blunting “the edge of his loneliness.” She described him as “uniformly seriously cheerful.” He secluded himself day and night, except for exercise twice a day, two meals a day, and occasional social conversation in the evenings. “His petitions for a long life, to labor among the heathen, mingled as they are with panting aspirations after heaven” all inspired her greatly.480

Serving as a fellow missionary with Judson, L. Ingalls (d. 1856) recorded Judson’s consuming desire to do his duty to finish the dictionary. Ingalls said,

He possessed, in an eminent degree, the missionary spirit. This I ascertained, not from his writings, but personal observation . . . If I wished to see him, I always knew where to find him—in the study . . . It was a great self-denial to be shut up in his study, and he anticipated, with exulting feelings, the completion of the Burmese Bible. He sighed bitterly when he was required to compile a Burmese dictionary.481

Another contemporary of Judson also described his sedulous labor in translation and editing, temporarily putting on hold his desire to preach the gospel: “Mr. Judson has been so engrossed with revising the translation of the whole Old Testament, and proof reading, for several years, as to be wholly prevented from laboring publicly either in the zayat, or from house to house.”482

Having tirelessly toiled for the translation of the Burmese Bible, Judson finally finished it in January of 1834. In a distant echo of what he wrote to please his father upon attaining his high academic ambitions at Brown University,483 Judson wrote joyfully of attaining his God-centered ambition in this postscript of a letter on January 31, 1834:

P.S.—Thanks be to God, I can now say I have attained. I have knelt down before him, with the last leaf in my hand, and imploring his forgiveness for all the sins which have polluted my labors in this department, and his aid in future efforts to remove the errors and imperfections which necessarily cleave to the work, I have commended it to his mercy and grace; I have dedicated it to his glory. May he make his own inspired Word . . . now complete in the Burman tongue, the grand instrument of filling all Burmah with songs of praise to our great God and Saviour, Jesus Christ. Amen.484

After finishing the Bible translation, Judson temporarily recommenced his work of preaching in Burma, which he loved above all other endeavors. However, Judson’s voice started failing, which rendered him useless in preaching. Though saddened by the prospect of never being able to preach again, Judson sought to fulfill his duty by completing a Burmese dictionary.485 He remained committed to ensuring that its words and meaning were intelligible and that future English-speaking missionaries could access the Burmese text. He resumed to stay the course that God had set out for him in submission to God’s will.486

A motivating theme in Judson’s letters and journals, which compelled his staying power, was the brevity of life. He felt such unction to finish strong, and yet Judson admittedly said that his besetting sin was “a lust for finishing.”487 For instance, in a letter in June 1841, he encouraged his missionary coworker, G. S. Comstock,488 to keep active in propagating the Scripture and to not get distracted with “knotty questions in biblical criticism.” Judson said, “Life is short, and every one [sic] ought to contribute all he can to ascertain and promulgate the precious truths of the inspired word.”489

In his journal from June 1832, Judson said that he was urgently working to finish the whole Bible translation because of the “uncertainty of life.”490 Even seventeen years later, his urgency still had not diminished. In a letter to Solomon Peck in August 1849, he said that in light of “the uncertainty of life” and the deteriorating state of the manuscripts, it was his duty to refuse any other opportunities for service or travel “in order to drive forward the heavy work of the dictionary in the most satisfactory manner.”491 Similarly, in another letter two months later in October 1849, to Abram Dunn Gillette,492 Judson wrote that he was still working hard on the dictionary, which would take him at least another year. Then he referred again to his uncertainty of life.493 He went on to explain that working for Christ, the greatest Master, was what made his anxiety of the uncertainty of life, his perpetual loneliness, and his heavy burden to finish his duty so tolerable.494

Judson had much advice for missionary duty. In 1845, Judson visited Brown University, and there he addressed the students about surrendering to and obeying the call of God in their lives. His lecture was manifestly serious in calling young people to seek out the path of duty to which God might call them. He demonstrated many of the convictions beneath his staying power, which were a juxtaposition of discerning one’s unique path of duty, submitting to the Scripture, and seeking a conviction of steady duty to Christ. Judson proposed, “There is one, and only one, right path for every man—for each one of you to follow, in order to insure the full approbation of God, and the greatest success in your efforts to do good and glorify him.” He went on to say that there would certainly be other good paths, but those paths would not be as fruitful as the one path. Judson directed, “Seek that one path.” He said go “straight forward,” turning neither to the right nor to the left. Judson said that in order to discern that one path, they must seek it diligently by bringing “the unerring Word of God” to bear upon their plans. He warned, “Reject, at once, whatever has not a firm basis there” in the Scriptures. In terms contextualized for Burma, he said the Bible was the “golden lamp of heaven” that would guide them “along the pathway of duty.” He further warned them not to turn their backs on the Scriptures. Nevertheless, he said discerning one’s duty requires considering the working of God’s providences in each one’s character and life situation.495 He suggested that they seek the counsel of wise men and that they should pray fervently for wisdom.

Judson began a long conclusion by warning not to follow enthusiasm, impressions, and emotions, for Satan often counterfeits truth with such feelings. However, he instructed them to seek to follow “a deep and abiding conviction of duty” that essentially cries, “Woe is me if I preach not the Gospel to the heathen.” Judson said this sense of duty alone would “sustain a man under the severe trials and labors of the missionary life,” and no man would stay the course without such a settled conviction of duty that is “constrained by the love of Christ,” in order to “lead many more, to love him.” He concluded by saying,

But with the assurance that, having humbly submitted himself to the Divine teaching, he has the approval of Christ, he is prepared for any event. With this he can labor; by this he can die. If brought into difficulties, from which there seems no escape, he feels that he has gone thus far in obedience to his Lord’s command; that he is doing his Master’s work; and that, whatever befalls him, all is well: it is the will of Christ.496

With similar solemnity, Judson wrote years earlier, in June of 1832, to the Foreign Missionary Association of the Hamilton Literary and Theological Institution of New York. He wrote to advise missionary candidates to count the cost in order to fulfill their duty. His first few points of advice discussed his conviction that the missionary calling is for life. In order to fulfill one’s duty for life, a man should choose a capable companion. Judson cautioned the would-be missionaries to come with realistic expectations of the natives and other Christians. He said that a large reason for missionary repatriation was the missionaries’ disappointments with the native customs, language-learning challenges, and frustrations with other Christians. He advised them to count the cost of all these things for the sake of their duty. He observed that most missionaries died within their first five years in the East, so he soberly warned, “Walk softly, therefore; death is narrowly watching your steps.”497 Six months later Judson wrote to the American Baptist Board expressing frustrations about missionaries who would come with short-term commitments.498 “They are all good for nothing,” he noted. They might be “brilliant” preachers in America, but they are “incompetent to any real missionary work.” He complained that they come only for a few years in order to acquire “a stock of credit on which they may vegetate the rest of their days” in the ease of America. Instead of making it easier for missionaries when they first arrive to the field, Judson argued that “missionaries need more trials on their first setting out, instead of less. The motto of every missionary, whether preacher, printer, or schoolmaster, ought to be, ‘Devoted for life.’” Judson unilaterally condemned short-term missions, saying that if they were to become increasingly popular, “it will be the death blow of missions, and retard the conversion of the world a hundred years.”499

During his furlough, after his visit to Philadelphia in late December 1845, Judson traveled south and stopped in Washington. In a short message, G. W. Samson (1819–1896),500 the pastor of E. Street Baptist Church in Washington, D. C., honored Judson for his service; and Judson spoke afterward. An anonymous person recorded the piety expressed in Judson’s response. Judson advised that missionaries, in order to stay through affliction and grief, needed the missions-minded support and sacrifice of the American churches. This account of Judson shows that he believed partnerships of churches with missionaries were essential for long-term sustainability. Without this partnership, fulfillment of the missionary’s duty would become rare. This anonymous person recorded Judson saying that though the average missionary only lives for five years on the field, despite such a sacrifice, the churches should still partner with the missionaries in executing their duty to lay their lives down as servants of the Cross.501

Self-Denial

The role of self-denial is fundamental for understanding Judson’s ascetic spirituality in light of the providence of God. In a letter to the missionaries in Maulmain, Judson discouraged practicing self-denial through “self-inflicted austerities,” but in contrast, he commended “evangelical self-denial,” which he said “eminently consists in bearing patiently and gratefully all the inconveniences and pain which God in his providence brings upon us.” He went on to say that the missionaries should not “attempt to remove them, unless destructive of life or health, or, in one word, capacity for usefulness.”502 In Hopkinsian fashion, Adoniram Judson saw self-love as the essence of sin, and self-denial in the path of love to God and people as the essence of virtue. The passion and methods of the mystics inspired him, yet their teachings were not the foundation of his self-denial. Judson suffered immense darkness and confusion for a season; and, his theological influences, his sufferings, and his writings all need consideration in order to understand the dominance of self-denial in his spirituality.503

At Judson’s ordination in 1812, Leonard Woods promoted the cost of self-denial as essential to disinterested benevolence. Woods’s opening charge is illustrative of the self-sacrificing spirituality that affected Judson during his days at Andover. Woods said that out of “holy affection reigning” in the heart of the devoted Christian, he “counts it a privilege to do and suffer any thing for the advancement of his cause.” Woods said that nothing ultimately could deter such a Christian. The prospects of losing all earthly comforts and even undergoing extreme persecution and torture are more to be desired than any earthly pleasure. Woods said that such a devoted Christian “is as steady to his purpose, as resolute, active, and patient in pursuit, as the restless miser, or the ambitious conqueror.” Woods went on to say that just as such a miser or conqueror lusts for wealth and booty, so the true Christian dreams of spreading the gospel and eternal happiness. With increase in conversions comes increase in desire for more. He said that the benevolence of the true Christian’s heart is ever expanding with the expanding of Christ’s kingdom. There is no neutral option in the kingdom of Christ. Until every tribe, tongue, and nation submits to Christ, “the enlightened, fervent Christian cannot rest.” Woods contended that such is “the true spirit of our holy religion.” He likewise said this holy affection controls and fuels the true church of Christ.504

The Context of Judson’s Dark Night and Self-Denial

In order to understand Judson’s spirituality of self-denial in light of the absolute sovereignty of God, briefly reviewing Samuel Hopkins’s teaching on disinterested benevolence is helpful.505 Considering Judson’s exposure to Madame Guyon’s writings and methods is additionally helpful.506 Admittedly, the following descriptions of Hopkinsianism and Guyonism are very truncated, and the influences of both New Divinity theology and Roman Catholic asceticism in Judson’s piety deserve fuller development. But this is beyond the scope of this book.

Hopkinsian Disinterested Benevolence

In Hopkins’s famous piece, “A Dialogue Between a Calvinist and a Semi-Calvinist,” he suggested that a true Christian should be willing to be damned forever for the glory of God.507 Hopkins argued that the Christian who truly loves his neighbor as himself should be willing to give himself over to pain in order to save others from greater degrees of suffering. According to E. Brooks Holifield, Hopkins “defined holiness as disinterested benevolence . . . One either loved God above self or one loved self above God.”508 In relation to Romans 9:3, Hopkins noted that the truly benevolent Christian could say, like Paul, that he would willing to be damned if it meant that some sinners might be saved.509 Moreover, Hopkins applied this difficult doctrine as a test of truly regenerate Godward affections. In terms strikingly similar to Judson’s self-denying submission to God and desire to please him, Hopkins said it was impossible that a man would love himself more than God and not be damned. Yet, he maintained that the man “who loves God supremely, and desires his glory above all things,” such a man would necessarily be willing to be damned if it were most glorifying to God. Hopkins further said that if a man cannot say, “Let God be glorified, let what will become of me,” then it is because he loves himself more than God’s glory; thus, “he is not a true friend, but an enemy, to God.”510

Madame Guyon’s Devotion

In relation to the developed doctrine of disinterested benevolence, Edwards Amasa Park, in his Memoir of Hopkins, interestingly observed, “There is a striking resemblance between the feelings of Dr. Hopkins and the feelings of Fenelon, Madame Guion, and many other mystics, with regard to the endurance of pain for the divine glory.” Park went on to comment on how “unnatural” it is to ascend to such lofty ideas of “sentiment and reasoning.” Surely, such a man must hold “an ideality far above that of the masses .”511 It is no coincidence that Judson prepared for ministry in a fertile Hopkinsian environment and that he also gravitated to the self-denying devotion of a mystic like Guyon.512 Judson read Guyon’s writings as a means of awakening a greater longing for the knowledge of God and for finding inspiration for pursuing holiness. The combination of his eccentric personality, the demanding New Divinity training at Andover, and his self-imposed Roman Catholic asceticism was a potent mixture.513

The Dark Hour

Judson was released from prison in December 1825, and ten months later, Ann died. His two-year old daughter, Maria, died in April 1827, and he heard of the death of his father, Adoniram Judson Sr. (on November 25, 1826) that July. After hearing of his father’s death, Judson fell into deep despair. News of his father’s death awakened in him many memories of his father inspiring him to greatness. His father’s well-intended ambitions for his son had developed into worldly ambitions in Judson’s mind, to which Judson still felt fettered. Courtney Anderson perceptively interpreted the collision of God’s ways with Judson’s self-made ambition:

[Judson] began to suspect that his real motive in becoming a missionary had been not genuine humility and self-abnegation but ambition—ambition to be the first American foreign missionary; the first missionary to Burma; the first translator of the Bible into Burmese: first in his own eyes and the eyes of men. He had a lust to excel . . . He had always known that his forwardness, self-pride and desire to stand out were serious flaws in his nature. Now he began to suspect that they were more than flaws. They made his entire missionary career up to now a kind of monstrous hypocrisy, a method of securing prominence and praise without admitting it to himself. He had deluded himself. But he had not deluded God. Perhaps here was the intention in all these deaths: to teach him true humility . . . For Adoniram’s mission, God had approval; for Adoniram and his self-love, a harsh lesson.514

Therefore, in desperation to rid himself of his perceived self-love, in May of 1828, he renounced the title of Doctor of Divinity, conferred on him by Brown University a few years earlier. He also gave away all his private property (amounting to approximately six thousand dollars) to the American Baptist Board. He chose to give up one twentieth of his missionary support and opted to reduce his support by one quarter. He also wrote to his sister, Abigail in Plymouth, and requested that she destroy all his old letters and writings. She wrote him to confirm that she had done according to his wishes.515

Still sensing the conviction of his self-love, he moved to a little hut he had made, which he called “the Hermitage.” He moved on the second anniversary of Ann’s death (October 24, 1828), and that night he wrote to Mary Hasseltine and Abigail Hasseltine. He lamented the loss of Ann and the corresponding “loathsome sepulcher of [his] own heart.” He said that he viewed Ann’s grave and the stormy evening in which he wrote the letter as analogies of his sinful heart. The combination of his grief and self-loathing was incalculable.516 While at the Hermitage, he could not free himself of the guilty feelings that much of his suffering corresponded directly to his inner corruption. Consequently, he dug a grave and sat by it for days, imagining his body decaying in the ground. However, this did not last long; he gave up the grave-contemplation and went back to his work. Though he lived in the Hermitage, he still committed himself to writing and translation. During this time, he wrote the Three-fold Cord.517

After extreme efforts of self-denial, it seemed as if his self-denial was not working sufficiently to subdue his sin, so he decided to try solitude. He left the Hermitage with his Bible and spent forty days in an overgrown pagoda in the wild jungle. There he sought after God but could feel no divine nearness. On the third anniversary of Ann’s death, he wrote to her sisters, Mary and Abigail Hasseltine, and inquired, “Have either of you learned the art of real communion with God, and can you teach me the first principles? God is to me the Great Unknown. I believe in him, but I find him not.”518 To express his utter melancholy, Judson wrote a long poem to Ann’s mother, Rebecca Barton Hasseltine, called “The Solitary’s Lament.” These extracted stanzas of the poem reflected his despondency; furthermore, they manifested his trust in Christ:

The vale of death, so dark and drear,

Where all things are forgot;

Where like they whom I loved so dear;

I call—they answer not.

O, bitter cup which God has given!

Where can relief be found?

Anon I lift my eyes to heaven,

Anon in tears they’re drowned.

Yet He who conquered death and hell

Our Friend at last will stand;

And all whom He befriends shall dwell

In Canaan’s happy land—

Such promise throws a rainbow bright

Death’s darkest storm above,

And bids us catch the heaven-born light,

And praise the God of love.519

Judson’s spirituality was such that even though he could not feel the presence of God in his melancholy, that is, in the same terms described in some of Guyon’s writings, he nevertheless trusted in the promise of Christ’s final victory over sin, death, and suffering.

Judson’s Self-Denial in Perspective

In his biography of his father, Edward Judson said, in relation to this dark period, that his asceticism was “the outcome of a transient and superficial mood rather than his real and underlying character,” which was precipitated by twenty-one months of physical torture, the deaths of his loved ones, and his self-imposed solitude.520 Judson’s son further observed that “it was his intense piety that carried him into these extremes of self-denial. His was a great religious nature, wrestling for Christ-likeness.”521 He did not adhere to the Roman Catholic theology of Madame Guyon,522 but he desired to consecrate himself with mystic-like ardor for the sake of attaining the holiness without which no one will see God.523 If Roman Catholics could deny themselves and aggressively pursue holiness with a flawed doctrinal foundation, surely by observing an Edwardsean tradition, he could do the same.

Regarding the influence of Madame Guyon’s writings and monastic solitude, Emily Judson said in retrospect that she did not believe Judson erred in his heart. She said his mental state was “driven by suffering on suffering, by such bereavement . . . and intensity of devotion, to a morbid development. A mind of less strength or a heart of less truthfulness and sincerity would have been wrecked.” She suggested that “his sound judgment and elevated piety always carried him through triumphantly.”524

Even so, Max H. Brown, in his thesis, “The New Divinity: The Theological Context for Adoniram Judson, Jr.,” insightfully suggests that in Judson’s dark period there was more happening than monastic Quietism. He proposes that Hopkinsian disinterested benevolence mainly influenced Judson, whether consciously or not. Brown says, “It seems that Judson was working out a renewed verification of the presence of grace.” He goes on to say that through this raw season of confinement, Judson’s faith remained firm, and Judson proved to himself that he was willing to be damned for God’s glory. Brown observes that during this time of self-inflicted isolation, Judson wrote The Threefold Cord, which promotes prayer, self-denial, and benevolence. He argues that this is not coincidental, and he says the “synergistic effect” of these three strands of ascetic sanctification “does indicate a rare ‘ideality.’” Brown submits, “Judson was just such an enlightened disciple, that he practiced the benevolence that Hopkins described.”525 In addition to Brown’s point, though Quietism promoted inaction, Judson was hardly inactive. His evangelical activism ordered his regular routine. Judson may have slipped away to a place of solitude to pray and lament, but he was nevertheless active in writing, translation, and meeting with inquirers; he spent his evenings visiting and ministering to people.526 Even The Threefold Cord, which he wrote during this period, promotes “doing good” as one of the three cords necessary for spiritual vitality. In light of his unceasing missionary labor, Judson evidently did not retreat into Guyon-like escapism. Though Guyon’s passion for holiness and pursuit of God inspired Judson, Hopkinsian self-denial controlled him.

Doctrines and Descriptions of Self-Denying Piety

In various forms and on numerous occasions, Judson laid out his practical doctrine of self-denial.527 He developed this doctrine in many different ways. He wrote his own rules for living, which he sought to daily follow; he compiled Scripture verses of what he believed to be the biblical teaching on self-denial; and, he wrote instructions of how to employ self-denial in order to grow spiritually.

Rules of Life

He developed his own “Rules of Life,” a Benedictine-like daily liturgy, as it were, to guide his decisions, habits, and actions. His rules demonstrate the degree to which Roman Catholic asceticism influenced his spirituality over and above traditional evangelical spirituality.528 He designed eight rules as daily patterns in order to please Christ in all his actions. He adopted and readopted these eight rules on numerous occasions throughout his life. It was a practice he certainly deemed useful for his spirituality. After language study, he began his public ministry to the Burmans. Upon commencing this new phase of his ministry, he first adopted rules in April of 1819, and then he revised and readopted them five different times in the proceeding eight years. He never explained in his journals or letters the reason why he first started reading Roman Catholic writings, but in his rules that he adopted in 1826, he first mentioned that he was committed to constantly read the Bible and some other devotional book. Moreover, he said he refused to read any books in English that did not have “a devotional tendency,” which were likely Roman Catholic writings.529 By the last reapplication of these rules in 1827, his earnest prayer was, “God grant me grace to keep the above rules, and ever live to His glory, for Jesus Christ’s sake.”530 These were his standard eight rules to which he devoted himself much of his life:

1. Be diligent in secret prayer, every morning and evening.

2. Never spend a moment in mere idleness.

3. Restrain natural appetites within the bounds of temperance and purity. “Keep thyself pure [1 Tim 5:22].”

4. Suppress every emotion of anger and ill will.

5. Undertake nothing from motives of ambition or love of fame.

6. Never do that which, at the moment, appears to be displeasing to God.

7. Seek opportunities of making some sacrifice for the good of others, especially of believers, provided the sacrifice is not inconsistent with some duty.

8. Endeavor to rejoice in every loss and suffering incurred for Christ’s sake and the Gospel’s, remembering that though, like death, they are not to be willfully incurred, yet, like death, they are great gain.531

Later in his life, he still sought to live daily by a self-imposed pattern of rules. Six years after his last revision of his eight rules, he rewrote the eight rules on January 1, 1833, and then he renewed them thrice that year. They reflected similar sentiments to his abovementioned standard eight rules, though they were shortened. One rule that he added in 1833 was unlike previous rules: “Learn to distinguish and obey the internal impulse of the Holy Spirit.”532

Two years later, in September of 1835, Judson wrote four rules to help him focus while he finished the revision of the Old Testament. They were similar to his previous rules; they included observing thrice-daily prayer, not reading useless books, heeding his conscience, and seeking to cultivate a constant awareness of God’s presence.533 In August 1842, he wrote a new set of four rules by which to live. This new set essentially abbreviated the original eight rules from 1827. They emphasized secret prayer, avoiding resentment toward others, benevolence to all, and being kind in mood, expression, and speech in order to please Christ. Judson renewed these four again in December 1842.534 Judson took his spirituality seriously; he was uncertain of how long he would live,535 and he knew death could come at any moment.536

Judson’s extreme rule-keeping was out of sync with classic evangelical spirituality. His ascetic spirituality was unique to him, though inspired by his rigorous training at Andover and by his exposure to Roman Catholic writings. His penchant for order and excellence and his copious self-examination undoubtedly made rule-keeping useful for him. Judson certainly immersed himself regularly in the Bible for the sake of his translation work, and his powerful memory likely aided him in memorizing much of the Scripture that he drew upon during his meditation and prayer times. Yet, it is odd that in all his rule-writing, he never explicitly indicated that Bible intake was supreme and sufficient for sanctification, even though, as previously noted, he regularly promoted the proclamation of Scripture as the necessary means of evangelism and discipleship. Moreover, from his conversion and call to missions at Andover until the end of his life, Judson frequently spoke of the benefit of prayer, especially praying while walking, much more than he ever spoke of the long-standing evangelical practice of Bible meditation.537 This demonstrates that his own uncommon ascetic spirituality went beyond the Puritan and evangelical piety of his forbearers.

Points of self-denial.

Judson also practiced specific methods of self-denial. He called them “Points of Self-Denial.” He sought to deny himself his tidiness, cleanliness, and order, which was a constant struggle for him.538 Judson sought to deny himself his propensity to be irritated with others for inconsequential behaviors and indecorum. He wished to deny himself his avoidance of shame at all cost and his aversion to being wrong. Finally, he tried to deny himself his desire for ease and his disgust for inconvenience.539

Judson’s self-denial largely targeted excess and indulgence. He did not believe a life of disinterested benevolence and the pursuit of temporal comfort and pleasure were compatible. Judson wrote to Christian women in America to persuade them not to spend their lives accumulating and flaunting costly attire. In a portion of his letter, written in October of 1831, he wrote with emphasis: “The severest part of self-denial consists in encountering the disapprobation, the envy, the hatred of one’s dearest friends,”540 and people often misunderstand those who practice self-denial as “concerned about small things.” He went on to say that Christ is the commander in this war and he expects each Christian woman to do her duty in accord with his final command. Judson charged them to “go forward,” not fearing what others might think of them. To both comfort and confront them, he asserted, “The eye of Christ is upon you.” Then he closed with a short jeremiad, admonishing them to fear the One with eyes of fire, “whose irrevocable fiat will fix [them] forever in heaven or hell, and mete out the measure of [their] everlasting pleasures and pains.” In light of such eternal prospects, Judson contrasted the futility of “cherishing self-love” with the wisdom of “self-denial.” He closed by exhorting them not to wait another moment, but “do now” what they will have wished they would have done before that great and awful Day.541 This letter further reveals that Judson’s anticipation of imminent death motivated his self-denial. Moreover, he practiced self-denial because he viewed assurance of salvation and eternal rewards in relation to his disinterested benevolence; and conversely, he viewed eternal condemnation in direct correlation to self-love. His reverence for the supreme Judge drove his self-denial.

Duty to Oneself

Judson’s A Digest of Scripture serves as a succinct snapshot of the biblical evidence for Judson’s doctrine and practice. After the chapters on “Duty to God” and “Duty to Men,” Judson outlined the biblical teaching about “Duty to Oneself.” Citing numerous Scripture references, some examples of what he proposed include themes such as self-examination, self-denial, humility, steadfastness, diligence, contentment, and heavenly-mindedness.542 This chapter in A Digest of Scripture reveals Judson’s foundational biblical proof-texts. He did not merely create a doctrine and practice of self-denial based on abstract and philosophical principles. Many of his aforementioned rules of life are indicative of his compilation of biblical verses for teaching the Burmans their Christian duties.

The Born-Again Man.

In A Digest of Scripture, Judson underscored three overarching evidences of regeneration: (1) renunciation of all for Christ; (2) perseverance in good works; and (3) peculiar traits of Christian faith.543 Yet, he mainly developed his practical doctrine of regeneration in his first and most widely published tract (first published in 1816), A View of the Christian Religion. In this tract Judson compared and contrasted the signs of the renewed and unrenewed man. It was his attempt to promote genuine assurance.

In Hopkinsian language, he said that the unregenerate man “loves himself supremely,” and he loves all the things the world commends as pleasurable and worthy. However, the regenerate man “loves the true God supremely, and desires that the divine glory may be promoted.” The regenerate man longs for heaven’s everlasting happiness. Furthermore, the born-again man loves others as himself and seeks their good. In very gospel-oriented terms, Judson said that the unregenerate man seeks to merit his salvation, whereas the regenerate man trusts alone in the merits of Christ. Judson reasoned that the ground for avoiding sinful works and doing good works is the meritorious, atoning work of Christ. Greater still, the grand motivation for the desire to refuse evil and promote good is a “supreme love to Jesus Christ, and a desire to do His will.” So when the man of God does sin, he quickly repents of offending his “superlatively excellent and lovely Lord,” and he puts his trust in Christ’s death, asking God for forgiveness. For the born-again man, the best is yet to come.544

Judson’s The Threefold Cord.

During his dark time at the Hermitage, in February 1829, Judson penned The Threefold Cord.545 It was a practical treatise on the theme of Ecclesiastes 4:12, which says, “And if one prevail against him, two shall withstand him; and a threefold cord is not quickly broken.” The aim of this piece was to help the unsure believer “to grow in grace and attain the perfect love and enjoyment of God.” Regarding this “short manual of advice,” he urged, “Lay hold of it with the hand of faith, and be assured that it will draw thy soul to God and to heaven.” The three cords are secret prayer, self-denial, and doing good.

Judson went on to say that “Secret Prayer” is what gives strength to the other two cords. This portion of his tract suggests that he heavily drew upon Benedictine and monastic daily prayer practices.546 He upheld, as seen in his rules of life, that prayer should be done morning and evening, and the Christian should arrange his schedule so he can easily pray two to three hours a day in total. Interspersed throughout the day should be approximately seven periods to lift up one’s “soul to God in private retirement.” The first prayer time in the morning should come after midnight in the silent hours, and then the subsequent times should be at dawn, nine o’clock, noon, three o’clock, six o’clock and nine o’clock in the evening. Expected in this prayer time were both personal reflection and communion with God. Judson urged Christians to let nothing distract from these sacred hours. Practically, he said that prayer should be directed first toward the cross, looking up, “trembling and in tears, to thine incarnate God and Saviour dying on the cross.” He instructed prayer for forgiveness of sin, and then supplication for the Holy Spirit to come and guide the ensuing prayer time.

Judson admitted that his second cord, “Self-Denial,” had been abused by the Roman Catholic Church and that Protestants consequently had rejected it. However, he charged that self-denial was the one of the three cords that gave “firmness and consistency” to the others. He essentially compared atrophied muscles to a soul that, being unexercised, becomes worthless with self-love and self-gratification. Equally, self-love grows stronger the more it is employed just as a muscle strengthens through use. “The more it is indulged, the stronger it becomes.” So, in order to kill self-love, he said, treat it like “a vicious animal,” and starve it through self-denial and taking up the cross. In a lengthy discourse calling for renouncing convenience, comfort, entertainment, recreation, and all things pleasant, Judson argued that self-denial was the path on which the true Christian must walk to enter the kingdom of heaven.547 As an example, he maintained that exposing the mind and heart to any book that did not improve communion with God would in fact disrupt it.548

Judson went on to plead for Christians to renounce all things worldly. He called on true Christians to forsake whatever would solicit the contaminations of the lust of the flesh, lust of the eyes, and the pride of life. As he called for renunciation of whatever worldly things gain influence over the soul, he included a footnote that insightfully warned against extreme self-denial. He advised against methods that injure the body and compromise health. He also cautioned against the hypocrisy of dress and appearance that harbors pride. He purposefully sought to lead the reader to despair by suggesting that sin has polluted every good deed, whether done reluctantly or nearly perfectly. He encouraged making the initial sacrifice necessary to enter the hard but rewarding path of self-denial.

Judson said that his third section, “Doing Good,” in The Threefold Cord, made the previous two sections useful. He said that just as Christ went and did good, so should the follower of Christ.549 In very Hopkinsian language, he said, “As a true follower of Christ, seek not thine own profit, but the profit of many, that they may be saved.”550 In a helpful summary, Judson explicated how these three cords wrapped together to make one unbreakable cord:

By practicing self-denial, thou weakenest the debasing principle of inordinate self-love; and by doing good, thou cherishes and strengthenest the heavenly principle of holy benevolence. Let these exercises, then, quickened and sanctified by secret prayer, be the regular work of each day of thy life. Thus I present thee, my brother, with the threefold cold—the three grand means of growing in graces—of gaining the victory over the world, the flesh, and the devil—of drawing the soul from earth to heaven. Means, I say; for I speak not now of faith, the living operative principle within—the hand, with which thou must lay hold of the threefold cord . . . Disappoint not the fond hopes of thy longing Saviour. Renounce the world, renounce thyself, and flee into his loving arms, which are open to receive and embrace thee.

He concluded The Threefold Cord by encouraging the struggling believer to be hopeful and boldly enter the path of self-denial:

Do what thou canst; stretch out what thou hast, however maimed or withered, and try to lay hold. Try to pray in faith, to practice self-denial, and to do good. And be assured, my brother, that thou wilt quickly find the hand of faith where thou thoughtest it was not.551

In the final analysis, this tract illustrates the confusion and darkness that had clouded his mind during that painful period. He offered a cord of three strands as a means for sanctification, and none of them promoted the authoritative and sufficient Scriptures as the chief instrument through which the Holy Spirit sanctifies Christians. Ironically, he was concurrently spending himself to translate and teach the Scriptures. Making a similar observation of the absence of the Bible in The Threefold Cord, one biographer aptly remarked that “this could not have happened in the earlier or the later periods of Judson’s religious life,”552 because his whole life was immersed in the Scriptures.

The Missionary Model of Self-Denial

Like his teachings about self-denial, whether consciously or unconsciously, Judson exemplified how he practiced self-denial through his missionary piety. Revealing his early consecration to the missionary life, Judson wrote a letter to Ann in 1821 as she was returning to America to recover from illness. His expressions of piety epitomize his duty of renouncing all things to please Christ. He said in the letter that he entertained for a moment how pleasant it would be to find a serene place for rest where he and Ann could enjoy the loveliness of religion together. Then with an about-face, he exclaimed, “But I fled to Jesus, and all such thoughts soon passed away. Life is short. Happiness consists not in outward circumstances.” He said that he was burdened by the millions of perishing Burmans who have no other person to tell them the gospel (at that time of writing) than Judson himself. He said he was under obligation “to spend and be spent for Christ.” He said that he considered it a great privilege to walk the path of self-denial and suffer for his Lord. He signed off in the letter by calling Ann to join him in prayer for a spirit that grows in indifference to the world’s pleasures and empty promises. He said he prayed that their trials would cause their hearts to cleave to heaven’s promises and to be enthralled in Jesus, “the uncreated Fountain of all excellence and glory.”553

Approximately a decade after the above-mentioned letter to Ann, Judson’s ascetic spirituality had not decreased. It continued to drive his missionary religion. He wrote in 1832 to the Foreign Missionary Association of the Hamilton Literary and Theological Institution of New York. His words to would-be missionaries and others in American churches are revealing. In his final points of advice to missionaries, Judson contended for the indispensable role of self-denial for the devoted missionary. He warned that recreation and retreat from the grind of missionary labor are indeed a “disease” to one’s “spiritual constitution.” Satan loves to tempt Christ’s missionaries to pursue more comfortable and opportunistic fields of service, which preclude long-term missionary service. He admonished them to be weary of “the pride of humble men—that secret pride” of being esteemed as “great and good.” In order to combat this, he said missionaries should “confess faults” immediately, freely, and publicly. Such self-mortification would aid in subduing pride. He also suggested that the missionaries do not store up money for themselves but to trust in God to provide. As was his habit throughout his life, Judson encouraged bodily exercise for the sake of long-term staying power. And his final point of self-denial was the denial of the “genteel living” of “fashionable European society.” Instead, he promoted living in culture like the natives. In sum, Judson encouraged the would-be missionaries to deny themselves whatever personal, sinful, physical, and cultural factors that would impede their usefulness for the Lord’s work.554

Upon his return to America in 1845, Judson still employed his self-denying model. One writer commented that he arrived in his “refined native home, . . . where no lessons of Divine Truth meet with acceptance unless they are largely seasoned with diversion and pleasantry.”555 He received invitations to preach on many occasions and tell of his sufferings and triumphs. Even at a time when he could slow down and rest from his translation efforts, he did not wish to allow himself relief and relaxation. He pressed on, knowing that life was uncertain and that the dictionary was still incomplete. In a letter to Solomon Peck, before his arrival, he requested that his hosts and supporters allow him to use a quiet room wherever he was staying for his dictionary work. He knew it would be a great sacrifice to shut himself up in a room while back in the land of plenty that he had not enjoyed in over thirty years. Though he would have numerous opportunities to preach in English around the country, he said he would have to refuse many, not only because of his faltering voice, but because preaching in English distracted his concentration in Burmese. Though he loved preaching more than any other spiritual vocation, he said that he had to make a conscious effort from the beginning of his missionary consecration to make choices that would improve his usefulness for whatever task that he believed God had given him.556 This required him to “abjure” his own native language. Regarding denying himself the joy of preaching in English, Judson explained, “When I crossed the river, I burned my ships . . . The burned ships cannot now be reconstructed.”557

Conclusion

Adoniram Judson, deeply influenced by Hopkinsian disinterested benevolence and inspired by the zeal of Madame Guyon, sought to submit to God’s sovereign will no matter the cost. Such a self-denying life of pleasing Christ in the path of missionary duty was his holy ambition. Judson’s ascetic piety, though mixed with some controversial practices and notions, established his staying power. His ascetic spirituality was a key theme that distinguished his piety from common evangelical piety. In a life and ministry context of pre-modern medicine, ocean travel, and slow communication, and where death was always nearby and the uncertainty of life was an ongoing concern, Judson’s disciplined routine and self-denial seem more reasonable. If he were to die early, the whole Burmese translation project would have disappeared with him. Judson’s ascetic missionary spirituality was useful for him in his particular context because it enabled him to complete the task that he believed was his to fulfill. Indeed, the fusion of his New Divinity training, his Roman Catholic ascetic practices, and his peculiar personality may have proven useful for his own sanctification and endurance in ministry; nevertheless, such uncommon features forced the example of his piety to be unattainable for the common evangelical. Furthermore, his belief that God is uppermost in God’s affections dominated his vision of life, ministry, happiness, and suffering. All things, whether miniscule or magnificent, whether painful or pleasurable, climaxed in praise to God’s infinite wisdom. Judson interpreted all of life through this God-exalted lens. He dutifully submitted to this sovereign God, renouncing all things in risk, affliction, grief, and death. Judson’s definitive prayer was, “Thy will, O God, be ever done; for thy will is inevitably the wisest and the best.”558

410. Murdock, “Memorial Address,” 15. Murdock was famous for a sermon he gave regarding the American Civil War (1861–1865). See Murdock, Our Civil War.

411. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 428. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:352.

412. Judson’s descriptions of heaven and rewards sound reminiscent to Jonathan Edwards’s treatment of heaven and eternal happiness in God. See Edwards, Works, 2:243–46.

413. Wayland, Memoir, 1:35–36.

414. Ibid., 2:486–94. This part of his sermon comprises much of his sermon’s fourth point. The year after this ordination sermon, in a letter to S. M. Osgood after his wife’s three-year battle with a pulmonary illness and eventual death on October 5, 1837, Judson upheld the absolute sovereignty of God in immense pain. See evidence of Judson’s unchanging God-centered theology in Adoniram Judson, “Obituary of Mrs. Osgood, Maulmein, Oct. 6, 1837,” 119; see also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 521. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:228.

415. Adoniram Judson, A View of the Christian Religion, 1. See also McElroy, Adoniram Judson’s Soul Winning Secrets Revealed, 23. Judson’s basic Theology Proper was outlined in A Digest of Scripture. In this tract he cited numerous scriptural proof texts. The sections in his chapter, “The Being and Attributes of God,” are: (1) He is a Spirit; (2) He is Eternal and Unchangeable; (3) He Dwells in Heaven, and is also Omnipresent; (4) He is Omniscient; (5) He is Omnipotent; (6) He is Glorious; (7) He is Ever Blessed; (8) He is Righteous and Holy; (9) He is Benevolent; (10) He is the Creator of All Things; (11) He is the Sovereign Controller of All Things; (12) He is the Just Dispenser of Rewards and Punishment; (13) He is Merciful and Forgiving; (14) He is Incomprehensible. See Adoniram Judson, A Digest of Scripture, 8–21.

416. To read Judson’s letter of inquiry and the minutes of the assembly, see Worcester, “Minutes of the General Association,” 86–90.

417. Clemént, Memoir of Adoniram Judson, 25; Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 20; Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 38. Though not from the journal of Judson himself, Ann’s journal entry indeed represents their common agreement about the reality of pain and their like-minded trust in God’s providence. In a journal entry from April 16, 1815, Ann wrote, “We feel more and more convinced, that the gospel must be introduced into this country, through many trials and difficulties; through much self-denial and earnest prayer . . . But all things are possible with God, and he is our only hope and confidence.” Ann Hasseltine Judson, An Account of the American Baptist Mission, 28; see also Wayland, Memoir, 1:169–70. In the following year, 1816, the Judsons suffered the loss of their young son, Roger. Ann’s reflection on God’s wise providence in suffering reveals the submissive spirituality of the grief-stricken Judsons: “Eight months we enjoyed the precious little gift . . . But God has taught us by afflictions what we would not learn by mercies—that our hearts are his exclusive property, and that whatever rival intrudes, he will tear it away.” Knowles, Memoir of Mrs. Ann H. Judson, 122. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 108–9.

418. Thomas Baldwin of the Second Baptist church in Boston baptized Judson’s colleague, James Colman in 1805. See Collier, Colman and Wheelock, 11. See also Chessman, Memoir of Rev. Thomas Baldwin, 10–12. See Anderson, To the Golden Shore, 202–3; and Hunt, Bless God and Take Courage, 268–69. Judson and Colman subsequently left Rangoon on December 21, 1819 for Ava to see the king; see Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 564.

419. See Esth 4:16.

420. Adoniram Judson to the Rev. Thomas Baldwin, letter, December 9, 1819, Box No. AJ 1, Folder 2 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS; see also Adoniram Judson, “Letter from the Rev. Adoniram Judson, Jun. to Dr. Baldwin, Dated Rangoon, December 9, 1819,” 379–80; Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 134.

421. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 134–37. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:244.

422. Conant, The Earnest Man, 240. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:253.

423. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 145–46. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:264–65.

424. Wayland, Memoir, 2:420; Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 209. For a similar statement he made in a letter to the missionaries in Maulmain on January 25, 1831, see Wayland, Memoir, 1:516.

425. Recording her own submission to the sovereignty of God, Ann wrote, “Had it not been for the consolations of religion, and an assured conviction that every additional trial was ordered by infinite love and mercy, I must have sunk under my accumulated sufferings.” Knowles, The Memoir of Mrs. Ann H. Judson, 250–51. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:361.

426. Guyon, Poems, 50.

427. See Gouger, A Personal Narrative, 174–75.

428. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 178. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:324. Judson still maintained the same trust in God’s meticulous providence nineteen years later. On January 28, 1847, in a letter to his third wife, Emily C. Judson. He said, “God orders all things well—the comforts and the discomforts, the bitter and the sweet, of this short, flitting life . . . If we give up all to God, he will take care of us, and bring light out of darkness, and good out of evil, I do believe; and we shall praise him forever, that he led us through some dark ways in his blessed service.” Wayland, Memoir, 2:275–76.

429. Wayland, Memoir, 2:366.

430. Ibid.

431. Ibid., 2:366–68.

432. Ibid., 2:368.

433. Emily wrote this in a note to Wayland, not intending for him to publish it, though he said that he took responsibility for choosing to do so. See ibid., 2:303.

434. Adoniram Judson, A View of the Christian Religion.

435. These are the closing lines of Book XII in Milton, Paradise Lost, 317.

436. Conant, The Earnest Man, 240–41; Wayland, Memoir, 1:258–59.

437. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 148. In response the monarch’s religious intolerance, Ann likewise well illustrated their mutual submission to God’s will: “We wish to leave it all with God, who has so often appeared for us, when we had given up all hope from every other quarter. If he has a work for us to do here, he will provide ways and means for our continuance . . . We feel it good to trust in him, endeavoring to perform present duty, and leaving it with him to provide for the future. In our present situation we often feel the preciousness of this passage: ‘Commit thy way unto the Lord; trust also in him; and he shall bring it to pass [Ps 37:5].’ We are enabled to commit our ways to him, and claim his promises to direct us. If we know anything of our hearts, we have but one prevailing wish—to live and die among the Burmans, either here or elsewhere; and we feel no affliction in this world could equal that of being denied this privilege.” Ibid., 149. Ten years later the Burmese government began to think Judson was a spy for the British, and those to whom he had long been preaching and teaching kept avoiding him on account of this rumor. Under the great discouragement of so many abandoning his zayat-preaching ministry, he submitted to God’s wise providence in hope that some would still be saved. In July of 1830, he wrote that he felt “extremely dejected” and he said that he had never wanted to enter his heavenly rest more than at that moment. Yet in spite of his melancholy and despondency, he said that he was still willing to spend himself and be spent for “the Lord Jesus Christ, to do and to suffer whatever he shall appoint.” He hoped that through his distress some would find “the way of salvation through a crucified Saviour.” Ibid., 259. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:495. Wayland recorded, “He built a zayat by the wayside, and proclaimed these truths to every passer by [sic]. No one paid any attention to his message; but Christ had commanded him to preach the gospel to every creature, and therefore he continued preaching. The more discouraging his prospects became, the more earnestly he fasted and prayed for the coming of the Holy Spirit.” Wayland, Memoir, 2:387.

438. Adoniram Judson to E. A. Stevens, letter, March 11, 1847, Papers, 1811–1888, Trask Library Special Collections, Newton Centre, Massachusetts. In an earlier letter to E. A. Stevens on March 2, 1847 after hearing of the fire, Judson quoted Job 1:21, which says, “The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.” And then he said, “My heart overflows with gratitude, and my eyes with tears, as I pen these precious inspired words.” He went on to say that the truths of the following poem were more precious than any earthly possession. He said, “Blessed be God for all, For all things here below; For every loss and every cross, To my advantage grow.” Adoniram Judson to E. A. Stevens, letter, March 2, 1847, Papers, 1811–1888, Trask Library Special Collections, Newton Centre, Massachusetts. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:278. For a brief account of this fire and its surrounding events, see Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 502–4. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:277–81. For another account, see Stevens, A Half-Century in Burma, 15–16.

439. Adoniram Judson to Heman Lincoln, letter, March 14, 1847, Papers, 1811–1888, Trask Library Special Collections, Newton Centre, Massachusetts; see also Wayland, Memoir, 2:282–83; emphasis in original.

440. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 227; Wayland, Memoir, 1:422–23.

441. Adoniram Judson to Mrs. Bennett, letter, 1833, Box No. AJ 5, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 2, ABHS; see also Wayland, Memoir, 2:57.

442. Judson’s son, Charles, remained in Burma; he died in August 1845, one month before Sarah died in St. Helena. In a touching letter from Judson to his daughter Abby Ann in November 1848, he addressed his submission to God’s will in Charley’s death; see Adoniram Judson, “Adoniram Judson’s Letter to His Daughter Abby Ann,”14. See Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 567. Judson made similar comments about the death of his son, Henry; see Wayland, Memoir, 2:177. For another account of Henry’s death, see also Adoniram Judson, “Death of His Child, Serampore, June 27, 1841,” 54–55.

443. In light of his grave sorrow in leaving behind small children in Burma, he said he sought to esteem Christ above all others and “to face and welcome all [Christ’s] appointments.” Adoniram Judson to the Rev. Solomon Peck, correspondence, April 13, 1845, Box No. AJ 3, Folder 2 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS; and Adoniram Judson, “Letter of Mr. Judson, Maulmain, April 13, 1845: Sickness of Mrs. Judson,” 247–48. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 341–42; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:197–98. Judson wrote to Peck again that following September 1845, after Sarah’s death (September 1, 1845) in St. Helena. With single-minded devotion to his duty, he did not want to risk his poor health unnecessarily by traveling north in the winter lest he never finish the dictionary. He said, “And though I refuse not to die, I have so much desire, in submission to the will of God, to finish my work in Burmah, that I must confess I am unwilling to expose my poor life, though in other respects of no worth, to any unnecessary hazard.” Adoniram Judson to the Rev. Solomon Peck, correspondence, September 1, 1845, Box No. AJ 3, Folder 2 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:202.

444. The Scot, James M’Gregor Bertram (b.1806), previously a pastor in Bristol and a minister with the Ebenezer Christian Missionary Society, became a missionary to the Cape of Good Hope in 1845. For Bertram’s moving account of meeting Judson in St. Helena during Sarah’s sickness and eventual death, see Hatfield, St. Helena and The Cape of Good Hope, 191–96.

445. Ibid., 192. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 349–50; and see Clemént, Memoir of Adoniram Judson, 260–62. For a heart-warming poem reflecting on Judson’s great endurance amid such loss, see Washburn, “Judson Longing for His Burman Home,” 293–94. Washburn also wrote a poem commemorating Sarah Judson; see Washburn, “The Burial at St. Helena,” 228–29.

446. Wayland, Memoir, 2:328; see also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 521.

447. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 527. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 421–22; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:334.

448. Emily Chubbuck Judson, “Closing Scenes in Dr. Judson’s Life, Maulmain,” 37–39. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:343–46; and see Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 425. Similarly, when on the voyage, Judson did not want to succumb to deterministic fatalism. He wished to try every appropriate prescription in order to make sure that nothing could aid him. After the captain had given Judson several medications to no avail, Judson said to his missionary friend and superintendent of the printing press in Maulmein, Thomas Ranney: “It is of little consequence. I do not wish anyone to think I died because all was not done that could be done for me. Medicine is of no use. The disease will take its course.” Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 544–45.

449. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 427–28. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:350–52. After Judson set sail to get well, Emily continued to write to him without any news in return; her last letter to him was on August 2, 1850. By August 19, 1850, she had heard that he died on April 12, 1850. She became so sick with worry during those summer months of waiting that she could barely pick herself up off the couch. For her many heart-wrenching letters during that long time of silence, see Tooze, The Life and Letters of Emily Chubbuck Judson, 4:322–86. For a biographical sketch of those months in her life, see Kendrick, The Life and Letters of Mrs. Emily C. Judson, 323–41. See also Emily Chubbuck Judson to Solomon Peck, letter, August 21, 1850, Box No. AJ 12, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 2, Judson Letters, ABHS; and Emily Chubbuck Judson to Dr Solomon Peck, letter, September 22, 1850, Box No. AJ 12, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 2, Judson Letters, ABHS.

450. At a centennial (1888) address in Judson’s honor, his son Adoniram Brown Judson wrote a letter to the editor of the Judson Centennial Services, J. Nelson Lewis, to be included in the celebration’s records. His closing lines expressed admiration for his missionary father. He said, “As a son of the missionary whose birth we celebrate, I could say but little, except to express a longing, in common with my Christian brethren, for divine help in renewed efforts to imitate the devotion to duty which marked my father’s life.” Adoniram Brown Judson, “Letter to Rev. J. Nelson Lewis,” 56. At the same centennial celebration, John N. Murdock likewise mentioned the role of duty in Judson’s commitment to God: “He accomplished the great results of his life . . . from an overmastering and all-comprehending sense of Duty. From the day he accepted Christ as his Saviour, he also accepted the law of service. Having been bought with a price, he belonged henceforth to his Master, and gave himself up to obey His Word and do His will.” Murdock, “Memorial Address,” 15; emphasis in original.

451. Adoniram Judson, A Digest of Scripture, 72–78.

452. Ibid., 79–107.

453. Wayland included some letters that reveal Judson’s early piety and missionary devotion. Wayland recorded Mary Hasseltine, sister of Ann, describing Judson as “solemn, impassioned, logical, and highly scriptural, without much of the hortatory, with no far-fetched figure or studied ornament of phrase. [She said] I can see his erect, commanding figure in the sacred desk, his manly countenance glowing with celestial fire, laboring intensely to excite in his hearers an interest in those high and holy themes that so fill his own vision . . . He was then in all the ardor of his first love. It may literally be said, that he was a man of one idea, and that was, love to Jesus, and a desire to manifest it in all its varied forms. Yet he was by nature ardent, impetuous, and ambitious, with the most unshaken confidence in his own judgment, irrespective of the advice of his seniors. Of these propensities he was fully conscious, and against them continually warred.” Wayland, Memoir, 1:30–31. Also, Wayland recorded Ann describing his early spirituality in a letter to her sisters: “She says, ‘I feel that there is not a better man on the globe than my husband; not one who labors more strenuously to overcome every unhallowed emotion of his spirit.’ She further adds, ‘I have known him to spend whole days in fasting and prayer, taking no nourishment but a little fruit in the morning, passing the day at the zayat, and returning in the evening languid and pale.’” Ibid., 1:31–32.

454. See Duncan, A History of Baptists in Missouri, 418.

455. His missions-minded friends were Samuel J. Mills Jr., Ezra Fisk (1785–1833), James Richards, John Seward (1784–1873), Luther Rice, Gordon Hall, Samuel Newell, and Samuel Nott. See Woods, Memoirs of American Missionaries, 14. See also Bendroth, A School of the Church, 49–55; and see McBeth, The Baptist Heritage, 344–55.

456. Conant, The Earnest Man, 42–44, 49–50. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 22–26; and Wayland, Memoir, 1:51–53; emphasis in original.

457. Eddy, A Sketch of Adoniram Judson, v. For examples of Judson’s Christian duty to Scripture, see Knowles, Memoir of Mrs. Ann H. Judson, 62–63; Wayland, Memoir, 1:108, 111–12; and Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 42–43, 52–56.

458. One account of Judson described him as strongly unwilling to talk of himself and his notable experiences. See Stevens, A Half-Century in Burma, 12.

459. This was in Eaton, New York.

460. Wayland, Memoir, 2:369.

461. Ibid., 2:370.

462. See Woods, History of the Andover, 147–50.

463. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 26. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:53; and Conant, The Earnest Man, 46.

464. One biographer said about this incident, “It seems from the foregoing incident, that his talents for the pulpit had already made a strong impression on his instructors. We know that he possessed, to a very uncommon degree, the qualities which form an effective popular preacher. His mind was at once logical and impassioned, his voice powerful, and his delivery full of life and fire. His sister-in-law, Miss Mary Hasseltine, describes ‘his eloquence and oratory’ as ‘a transcript of Dr. Griffin’s.’ Should we not, be very likely, even at this day, to consider such peculiar gifts for usefulness at home, as in a great measure thrown away on a missionary to the heathen? Would not many be ready to exclaim: ‘To what purpose is this waste!’ With such thoughts might vanity and ambition, under the mask of duty, have deluded his own heart, had not a voice—the voice of One whom he loved better than father and mother, yea than his own life or honor—whispered in the depths of his soul: ‘I will send thee far hence unto the Gentiles!’ The event has proved how narrow and short-sighted is the policy, which would withhold such gifts, as too precious, from the missionary cause.” See Conant, The Earnest Man, 46.

465. Samuel Spring, a chaplain in the American Revolutionary War and a Congregationalist minister, studied under Nathan Webb (1705–1772), a Congregationalist minister, and at New Jersey College (Princeton University). His father-in-law, Samuel Hopkins, also mentored him. Spring was one of the founding members of Andover Seminary (1808). See McGinnley, “Samuel Spring,” 15–28; see also Spring, A Sermon; Spring, Moral Disquisitions.

466. Samuel Worcester graduated from Dartmouth College in 1795, and he became pastor at the Tabernacle Church in Salem in 1803. He also became the Corresponding Secretary for the ABCFM in 1810. See Worcester, A Correction of Erroneous Statements. He strongly engaged in controversy with Unitarianism. See Worcester, A Third Letter to the Rev. William E. Channing.

467. Wayland, Memoir, 1:55. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 29–30. Judson, Samuel Nott, Samuel J. Mills, and Samuel Newell all signed this letter.

468. See Wayland, Memoir, 1:39. For a succinct description of Judson’s open-air praying, meditating, and rapid walking, see Warburton, Eastward, 119–20. Wayland’s comments on Judson’s early methods of preparation for long-term service are also appropriate: “From the time of his self-consecration to the missionary service, he became, in the highest sense, a man of one idea. He offered himself up a living sacrifice on the altar, and seemed to look forward with pleasure to suffering and affliction, if it were to be endured in the path of Christian duty.” Wayland, Memoir, 1:39.

469. See Pope, The Works of Alexander Pope, 2:213.

470. Wayland, Memoir, 1:34–35; quoted also in Conant, The Earnest Man, 82–83.

471. Searching for the dates and identities of Ann’s family members was challenging. Having recently researched Ann’s siblings herself, Rosalie Hall Hunt said this about locating their information: “The descendants of Ann Hasseltine Judson’s siblings proved . . . difficult to locate. Biographies of the Judsons gave no clues, and books of genealogy seemed to have lost the trail of Ann’s brothers and sisters after one generation, or two at the most . . . Ann had had three sisters and three brothers. Two brothers had died young, one at six months old, the other at age twenty. Only one of her three sisters had married, Rebecca (Becky) Hasseltine, who married Joseph Emerson. They had two sons, who in turn had children, but those children did not leave descendants, so the line ended there. The other Hasseltine sisters, Polly (always called Mary) and Abigail, never married.” Hunt, Bless God and Take Courage, 307. Hunt reported that, according to the Hasseltine genealogy, which “is probably the most thorough record available, John Hasseltine was born November 8, 1756 in Chester, New Hampshire, and died May 24, 1837. Rebecca Barton Hasseltine was born in 1761 in Bradford (no month or day) and died Jan. 11, 1846. Both are buried in the old cemetery in Bradford. Polly [Mary] was born April 3, 1784. Abigail was born March 15, 1788. Both were born in Bradford. Ann’s brother Joseph Hall Hasseltine was born August 13, 1791, and married Chloe Whipple. Joseph was the only sibling who had children that gave Ann nieces and nephews.” Hunt, email message to author, September 17, 2014.

472. Wayland, Memoir, 1:35–36.

473. Adoniram Judson to Bros. Mills, Richards, Warren, &c., letter, June 12, 1812, Papers, 1811–1888, Trask Library Special Collections, Newton Centre, Massachusetts.

474. Staughton became the first president of Columbian College (1821–1827). For a brief treatment of Staughton’s role in encouraging the missionaries, see Lynd, Memoir of the Rev. William Staughton, 174–91.

475. Conant, The Earnest Man, 184. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 117; and Wayland, Memoir, 1:197–98.

476. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 215. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:421; emphasis in original. In a letter to her sisters, Ann reveals a similar view of their devotion to God’s call: “So you see, my sisters, if we had a wish to accumulate property, what an opportunity we have had . . . There is a much greater call for entire and exclusively devoted missionaries than for money. Our friends, we doubt not, will supply all our necessary wants, while we shall be able to spend our strength and our energies for the spiritual good of the Burmans, and avoid those temptations attached to a public situation in the world.” Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 215.

477. See Wayland, Memoir, 1:53. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 26; and Conant, The Earnest Man, 46. By this point, he knew the harsh realities and dry discouragements of missionary life, and he could have escaped it all for an honorable vocation. Nevertheless, he went straightforward, trusting in God. Emily recorded that Judson would often say, “If God has designed a work for us to do, he will arrange all the little particulars, and we have only to trust in him.” Wayland, Memoir, 2:372.

478. Wayland said, “United with all this that was intellectual, there was, in his case, a mind deeply impressed with its own fallibility, and turning with unutterable longing to the Holy Spirit for guidance and illumination.” Wayland, Memoir, 2:163–67.

479. Adoniram Judson, journal, February 29, 1832 to June 25, 1832, Box No. AJ 4, Folder 8 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 300–301; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:50. To read of Ann’s description of the intensity with which Judson studied in his early years of language acquisition, see Ann Hasseltine Judson, An Account of the American Baptist Mission, 43. For a thorough description of Judson’s rigorous language study habits and his passion to see the Bible translated into an easily understandable script for the end goal of preaching it to the common person, see Warburton, Eastward, 64–66.

480. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 399. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 302. Abner and Mary Webb arrived in Burma in 1833, and six years later, because of her failing health, they returned to America, never to go back to Burma. That year, their firstborn son died one-day old (December 16, 1833). See American Baptist Missionary Union, Seventy-Seventh Annual Report, 13. For Judson’s letter to Abner Webb two weeks after the death of their son, see Adoniram Judson to the Rev. Abner P Webb, letter, January 1, 1834, Box No. AJ 5, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 2, Judson Letters, ABHS.

481. Dated May 18, 1852, L. Ingalls wrote to Francis Wayland; see Wayland, Memoir, 2:355. After his death, Emily recorded conversations she had with Judson about his dutiful work in the dictionary: “I remarked that during this year his literary labor, which he had never liked, and upon which he had entered unwillingly and from a feeling of necessity, was growing daily more irksome to him; and he always spoke of it as his ‘heavy work,’ his ‘tedious work,’ ‘that wearisome dictionary,’ &c., though this feeling led to no relaxation of effort. He longed, however, to find some more spiritual employment, to be engaged in what he considered more legitimate missionary labor, and drew delightful pictures of the future, when his whole business would be but to preach and pray.” Ibid., 2:263. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 403.

482. Malcom, “Journal of Mr. Malcom,” 55.

483. Wayland recorded Judson’s words to his father on April 30, 1807: “When he received the highest appointment in the commencement exercises [at Brown University], his delight knew no bounds. He hurried to his room, and wrote, ‘Dear father, I have got it. Your affectionate son, A. J.’” Wayland, Memoir, 1:22.

484. Adoniram Judson to Bennett, Kincaid & Mason, circular letter, February 3, 1834, Box No. AJ 2, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS; see also Adoniram Judson, “Report of the Board: Missions in Asia,” 236–37. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:75–76; and Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 305; emphasis in original. In describing the momentous occasion of Judson’s completion of the Burmese Bible translation, the pastor of Madison Avenue Baptist Church, William Hague, said the following: “If in a coming age some Allston should wish to employ his pencil in picturing forth a single action that should express at once the great aim, the chosen means, and the true spirit of the modern missionary enterprise, he could scarcely select a more fitting scene than that which heaven witnessed with a smile, when Adoniram Judson was seen kneeling by the side of that table . . . holding in his hand the last leaf of the Burman Bible, with his eyes uplifted, and with a countenance radiant with joy, thanking God that his life had been spared to achieve this work, and imploring the Divine Spirit to make the silent page a messenger of life to many.” Hague, The Life and Character of Adoniram Judson, 30–31; see also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 305–6.

485. Adoniram Judson, A Dictionary. For an astute portrayal of the juxtaposition of Judson’s earnestness, devotion, linguistic expertise, and intellectual abilities, see Adamson, “Address,” 72. For a nearly word-for-word copy of the same address, see also Adamson, “The Baptist Mission and Burma,” 15.

486. Wayland, Memoir, 2:96–97.

487. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 409.

488. See Comstock, “Journal of Mr. Comstock,” 69. See also Warburton, Eastward, 152.

489. Wayland, Memoir, 2:170; emphasis in original.

490. Adoniram Judson, journal, February 29, 1832 to June 25, 1832, Box No. AJ 4, Folder 8 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS; see also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 300–301.

491. Adoniram Judson to Solomon Peck, correspondence, August 20, 1849, Box No. AJ 4, Folder 1 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 418–19; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:326–27.

492. Gillette was the pastor at First Baptist Church in Philadelphia and the manager of the American Baptist publication society. For a famous sermon of Gillette’s, see Gillette, God Seen above All National Calamities. Moreover, he contributed well to the Judson corpus; see Gillette, A Sketch of the Labors.

493. Judson would die six months later in April 1850.

494. See Gillette, A Sketch of the Labors, 156–57; and see Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 419.

495. Compare this counsel with Emily’s description of Judson’s strong trust in God to guide and reveal his will to Judson in his praying and watching; see Wayland Memoir, 2:372.

496. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 362–64. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:227–28.

497. Adoniram Judson “Advice to Missionary Candidates,” 577–79. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:38–41.

498. In a letter on February 8, 1836, to Amariah Joy, in Waterville, Maine, Judson said that a young missionary could master the language well enough within two years in order to labor effectively. A short-term commitment of two years would have been useless. See Wayland, Memoir, 2:108.

499. Ibid., 2:62–63; emphasis in original.

500. George Whitefield Samson became the fifth president of Columbian College (1859–1871). For one of Samson’s many well-known works, see Samson, The Atonement Viewed as Assumed Divine Responsibility.

501. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 377–78.

502. Wayland, Memoir, 1:516.

503. See Wayland’s synthesis of Judson’s self-denying piety, in ibid., 2:379–80.

504. Woods, A Sermon Delivered at the Tabernacle in Salem, 10–11; emphasis in original.

505. For in-depth explications of New Divinity and Hopkinsian theology, see Conforti, Samuel Hopkins and the New Divinity Movement.

506. For an example of what Judson read, see Guyon, A Short and Easy Method of Prayer.

507. See Hopkins, Works of Samuel Hopkins, 3:143.

508. Holifield, Theology in America, 140.

509. See Hopkins, Works of Samuel Hopkins, 3:145–46. See Rom 9:3.

510. Hopkins, Works of Samuel Hopkins, 3:147.

511. Park, Memoir of the Life and Character of Samuel Hopkins, 211.

512. As in the aforementioned account of Judson’s imprisonment and torture (June 8, 1824 to December 30, 1825), one of his cellmates, Henry Gouger, recorded Judson’s admiration for Madame Guyon’s devotion. See Gouger, A Personal Narrative, 174–75.

513. See Warburton, Eastward, 118–19. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 303–4; and Wayland, Memoir, 1:473–74.

514. Anderson, To the Golden Shore, 382–83; emphasis in original. Also, Wayland helpfully summarized Judson’s natural strengths that God sanctified throughout his life: intense desire for prominence, indomitable perseverance, steadiness, self-confidence, ambition, well ordered, and a strong preference for privacy and anonymity. These qualities were evident in Judson’s early life, and with spiritual maturity, Wayland said, Judson’s piety steered his personality. Wayland described Judson’s piety as heavenly-minded, self-denying, prayerful, and unshaken in his confidence in God and God’s promises. For Wayland’s full synthesis of Judson’s early personality and seasoned piety, see Wayland, Memoir, 2:373–404.

515. See Abigail Judson to the Rev. Adoniram Judson, letter, May 22, 1830, Box No. AJ 8, Folder 2 and Microfilm Roll 2, Judson Letters, ABHS.

516. Anderson, To the Golden Shore, 388.

517. Adoniram Judson, The Threefold Cord.

518. Wayland, Memoir, 1:473.

519. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 307–9.

520. Ibid., 305. Hunt, in her well-researched account of the Judson history and legacy, says this period is “out of character with the whole of who he was.” She warns that Honoré Morrow, in Morrow’s biographical novel, Splendor of God, had so “fictionalized” the account that genuine facts had been smothered in historical inaccuracies to the point of being pagan. Hunt condemns Morrow’s imaginative rendering of this dark season in Judson’s life, and calls it “pure fiction, somewhat like a colony of termites in the timber of Judson history.” Hunt, Bless God and Take Courage, 345. See even more unreserved condemnation of Morrow’s fictional account in Hanna, “What Price Missions?,” 811. See also Morrow, Splendor God, 291–321.

521. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 310.

522. Hulse well observed that “Madame Guyon and the mystics she represented laid great stress upon the inner life and union of the soul with God. They taught that our wills may be completely lost in the divine will, that we should strive after a disinterested love for him, and that entire sanctification is possible in this world. The aim of every believer is to be entirely at rest in God. Roman Catholic theology is destitute of exposition on union with Christ let alone the experimental side of that central truth . . . It is not surprising then that interest has been shown in those who have been prepared to explore the experimental aspect of this truth. This interest in experience arose out of Judson’s genuine spiritual needs . . . Judson regarded Roman Catholicism as a system hopelessly given to idolatry.” Hulse, “Adoniram Judson: Devoted for Life,” 149–50.

523. During his melancholic period of 1829, Judson wrote on March 19, 1829, to his sister and mother, commending the works of Guyon and of the English mystic, William Law (1686–1761); however, he cautioned them to “endeavor to imitate” Guyon’s ardor, “so far as she was right.” Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 303. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:473. Also, during this time in Judson’s life, both Wayland and Edward Judson provided a list of seven spiritual practices Judson sought to employ on May 14, 1829. They do not comprise what Judson called his Rules of Life, but they do reflect how the mystics, especially Guyon, influenced his sanctification methods during this season. See Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 304; and Wayland, Memoir, 1:474.

524. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 305. Another biographer also perceptively discussed the way Judson viewed such mystics’ writing: “In the promotion of piety he used some aids which others condemn. Persons who are alarmed at the least approach to popery, view all writings which Roman Catholics extol with suspicion. Nevertheless, Mr. Judson found in the works of Lady Guion, and kindred writers of that communion, productions which gave an insight into the heart, and an impulse to the desire of a holy life, which he could not discover in the generality of human conceptions . . . Mr. Judson did not despise the illustration such works gave of the spiritual life, but cultivated acquaintance with them, doubtless to the benefit of his own soul. His knowledge of the fact that those whose productions he studied had been involved in such fearful delusions, we believe, caused him to exercise a more holy jealousy for truthfulness and reality in his own religion. What in many might be only asceticism, was in him a work of the heart, and his lofty bearing in the vicissitudes through which he was called to pass, manifests how thoroughly his soul was influenced by the highest principles.” Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 438–39.

525. Brown, “The New Divinity,” 96–97. Some who have read Judson’s biography and tertiary sources might surmise that Judson had possibly succumbed to Burmese Buddhist self-denial because of his exposure to Buddhist literature. However, there is no evidence in the totality of the Judson corpus (letters, journals, tracts, sermons, and records from colleagues, friends, and family) that suggests this was ever the case, even in Judson’s darkest season. For examples of such a supposition, see Roebuck, “Adoniram Judson,” 242; and see Scacewater, “Adoniram Judson’s Understanding and Appropriation of Buddhism,” 210.

526. See Anderson, To the Golden Shore, 390–91. Stacy Warburton helpfully observed that Judson “was never more active in his work . . . While he was engaged in self-mortification for his own spiritual enrichment, he was throwing himself with keen ardor into all the work and fellowship of the mission.” Warburton, Eastward, 120. Edward Judson also explained that, though Judson “spent many of his waking hours alone in a bamboo hermitage,” he was still “directly engaged in missionary work.” Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 304.

527. In one practical way, in a letter on April 17, 1831, two years after his depression abated, Judson advised Cephas Bennett to persevere in language study and to view it as a death to initial ministry enthusiasm and activism, for it would require much work and self-emptying. This self-denying work of language learning would pay off in the long-term, both in holiness and in the ability to communicate the gospel. Regarding the self-denial of language learning, Judson urged him, “Let us die as soon as possible, and by whatever process God shall appoint. And when we are dead to the world, and nature, and self, we shall begin to live to God.” Wayland, Memoir, 1:522.

528. He adopted rules on April 4, 1819, revised and readopted them again on December 9, 1820, April 25, 1821, August 31, 1823, October 29, 1826, and March 11, 1827. Then, fifteen years later on August 9, 1842, he wrote a final set of rules. For five additional rules that he initiated on October 29, 1826, see Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315; Wayland, Memoir, 1:322. He also adopted a temporary set of eight rules in 1833 and then a set of four in 1835. See Wayland, Memoir, 2:61, 103. The common denominator in these temporary sets of rules and in his other rules in general is his devotion to thrice-daily prayer and living in a constant awareness of God’s presence. To read all his Rules of Life, see Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315–16; Wayland, Memoir, 1:322–23; Wayland, Memoir, 2:61, 103, 190. He also created some miscellaneous resolutions of general goals, which were similar to his rules, such as the observance of secret prayer three times a day, seeking to preach the gospel daily, and seeking to practice brotherly love. He wrote resolutions like these on March 22, 1837, and revised and renewed them on August 6, 1837 and July 12, 1838; see Wayland, Memoir, 2:114. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315–16; Wayland, Memoir, 1:322–23.

529. See Wayland, Memoir, 1:322–23.

530. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315–16. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:322–23.

531. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:322. It is significant to note that in this eighth point Judson clearly evidenced that he was neither a self-wrought martyr nor was he fatalistic. He saw how suffering and death, though not self-caused, bring great benefits. Adding to his standard eight rules, in October 1826, he supplemented five more rules: “(1) Rise with the sun. (2) Read a certain portion of Burman every day, Sundays excepted. (3) Have the Scriptures and some devotional book in constant reading. (4) Read no book in English that has not a devotional tendency. (5) Suppress every unclean thought and look.” Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315; and Wayland, Memoir, 1:322.

532. For these eight rules of 1833, see Wayland, Memoir, 2:61.

533. Ibid., 2:103.

534. Ibid., 2:190. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 316.

535. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 418–19.

536. Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 577–79. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:38–41. After he readopted his four condensed rules, he created one final rule that well captured his previous years of zealously pursuing usefulness, and it illustrates the supreme motivation of his dutiful spirituality. This final rule would also be the controlling theme of his piety until his death: “Resolved to make the desire to please Christ the grand motive of all my actions.” Wayland, Memoir, 2:190. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 316.

537. See Wayland, Memoir, 1:39; Warburton, Eastward, 119–20. See also Wayland, Memoir, 2:336–37, 389–91.

538. For example, see Gouger’s observations of Judson’s neatness in A Personal Narrative,174–75.

539. See the list of Judson’s “Points of Self-Denial,” in Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 315.

540. Emphasis in original.

541. Wayland, Memoir, 2:483–85. See also Adoniram Judson, Judson’s Letter on Dress; emphasis in original.

542. Adoniram Judson, A Digest of Scripture, 108–23.

543. Ibid., 56–62.

544. Adoniram Judson, A View of the Christian Religion, 2.1, 2.2. See also Adoniram Judson, “A View of the Christian Religion.” For an easily accessible version, see McElroy, Adoniram Judson’s Soul Winning Secrets Revealed, 26–28.

545. Adoniram Judson, The Threefold Cord, 1–6. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 571–77; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:461–66.

546. For sources on such monastic practices, see Johnson, Benedictine Daily Prayer; and Benedict, RB 1980: The Rule of St. Benedict.

547. Judson expounded the verse, “Strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, that leadeth unto life; and few there be that find it” (Matt 7:14).

548. Judson quoted Archbishop Robert Leighton (1611–1684) of Glasgow: “Choose always, to the best of thy skill, what is most to God’s honor, and most like unto Christ and his example, and most profitable to thy neighbor, and most against thy own proper will, and least serviceable to thy own praise and exaltation.” And again: “Not only be content, but desirous, to be unknown, or, being known, to be contemned [sic] and despised of all men, yet without thy faults or deservings, as much as thou canst.” See Cheever, The Select Works of Archbishop Leighton, 558–63. This book by Leighton was likely required reading at Andover. See Woods, History of the Andover, 169. Also, in an original footnote, Judson said, “[S]ee Rules and Instructions for a Holy Life, a piece which, though not elaborately finished, contains the very marrow of true religion. Study also Law’s Treatise upon Christian Perfection, and Kempis’s Imitation of Christ.” Adoniram Judson, The Threefold Cord, 3; see also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 574; Wayland, Memoir, 2:462. See Law, A Practical Treatise upon Christian Perfection; à Kempis, Imitation of Christ.

549. Compare this quote to Judson’s sermon in Philadelphia on December 24, 1845; he said, “It appears from the inspired writings, that one leading characteristic of Christ was, that ‘he went about doing good [Acts 10:38].’ To be like him we must go about—not merely stay and do good, but go and do good.” Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 375. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 469, 475; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:464. Adoniram Judson, The Threefold Cord, 5; emphasis in original.

550. Compare this statement to the theology expressed in Hopkins, Works of Samuel Hopkins, 3:145–46. See Adoniram Judson, The Threefold Cord, 5. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 576; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:464.

551. Adoniram Judson, Threefold Cord, 1–6. See also Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 571–77; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:461–66; emphasis in original. In a fascinating dissertation about the juxtaposition of Judson’s spirituality of self-denial, his translation of the names of God in Burmese, and his ability to contextualize his theology for a Burmese Buddhist culture, Laisum says, “By believing and loving Jesus supremely, the renewed human beings endeavor to avoid evil deeds and to perform good deeds only according to the divine commands, that is, according to Jesus’ teaching. This “believing and loving” Jesus in the real lives of the Judsons . . . was the internalization of the divine laws or spiritual transformation. Accordingly, instruction for Christians during the Judson era was given in a form known as the “Threefold Cord,” that is, secret prayer, self-denial, and doing good. In sum, Judson’s understanding and naming God as Tavara, or universal principle of existence, enabled Judson to dispute about God rationally . . . It also allowed Judson to value the meaning and beauty of Burmese culture and tradition. Thus, the Judsons lived and ate as the Burmese as much as possible . . . By naming and addressing God as Hpaya, Judson personally preached and practiced self-denial or self-negation as the criterion for true spirituality. However, while refraining from worldly pleasure, fame, self-aggrandizement, etc. for himself, he never failed to envision the well-being of the people. Naming God Tavara Hpaya, therefore, is an accurate and intelligible statement about the Christian concept of God in a Burmese context, an analysis, affirmation, and transformation of culture and spirituality theologically.” Laisum, “Naming God in Burma Today,” 22–24.

552. Conant, The Earnest Man, 354.

553. Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 167.

554. Adoniram Judson, “Advice to Missionary Candidates,” 577–79; Wayland, Memoir, 2:38–41.

555. Balderston, “Adoniram Judson,” 194.

556. For one example of his wrestling with his duty to translate and compile a dictionary instead of preaching the gospel, see Judson’s letter on March 12, 1838, to the American Baptist Board in Wayland, Memoir, 2:122.

557. Adoniram Judson to the Rev. Solomon Peck, correspondence, April 13, 1845, Box No. AJ 3, Folder 2 and Microfilm Roll 1, Judson Letters, ABHS. See also Adoniram Judson, “Letter of Mr. Judson, Maulmain, April 13, 1845: Sickness of Mrs. Judson,” 247–48. See also Middleditch, Burmah’s Great Missionary, 342–44; Edward Judson, The Life of Adoniram Judson, 445–47; and Wayland, Memoir, 2:199–200.

558. Conant, The Earnest Man, 240. See also Wayland, Memoir, 1:253.

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