"Aller Anfang ist schwer "

All the beginning is difficult

 In the year 1705,
Frederick IV King of
Denmark resolved upon
sending some
The coramandal
coast from missionaries to
Nangur to Tranquebar situated on
Nagapattinam.
the Coast of Coramandel
in the East Indies to attempt the conversion of Malabar heathens.
Court preacher Luetkans made application to the professors of divinity in
Halle to supply his Majesty with fit persons to undertake this important
mission.
Mr. Barthalomew Ziegenbalg and
Mr. Henry Plutschau were selected
to go upon so difficult an errand. The 29 th
of November, 1705 both embarked
with great joy in a ship called Princess
Sophia Hedwigh.
Travel ship of Bartholomäus Ziegenbalg
"Princess Sophia Hedwig"
The 27th of December they entered the Spanish seas, whose towering billows
received them very stoutly, the ship seeming as it were carried through a deep
vale between two lofty mountains. The sights they had of the marvelous works
of God cheered up their spirits very much. And the more the storms and the
roarings of the seas broke in upon them the more increased the joy and praise
of God upon their mouths seeing that they have such potent and powerful
Lord for their Father whom they may daily approach, and as confident children,
put up prayers and petitions to Him. While sailing by Turkish Barbary, they
were in danger of pirates; but under God’s protection they happily touched the
Canary Islands.
They had contrary winds for about 8 weeks together, and were driven quite
upon the coasts of America where they were in danger of suffering shipwreck.
But by the help of God they safely got over this difficulty; which caused such an
extraordinary joy in the whole company, that the next day was not only kept as
a day of thanksgiving, but they had also a considerable collection made for the
benefit of the poor.
For the nearer they touched upon the very brink of death, the more they
endeavoured thoroughly to acquaint themselves with the great God, and to
adore Him in spirit and truth; that they might be ready prepared, whenever the
Lord should be pleased to bury them in the merciless waves of the sea.
 Morning, noon and night they usually had some exercises of piety in the
ship discoursing of the word of God, praying and singing and praising the
Lord for all his wonderful mercies vouchsafed to them. And this proved an
excitement to many others that they were about them. Sometimes they
endeavoured to praise God with a concert of music, both vocal and
instrumental, and by some melodious hymns to praise and magnify the
Lord.

They found not a little satisfaction in viewing the wonders of God,

gloriously displayed in the seas. The various sorts of fishes had afforded
them many an innocent sport and diversion. It often seemed, as if a whole
multitude was gathered together in the sea, with intent to storm the ship.
Some marched in great stomp and state, accompanied with a large train of
lesser ones. They caught a great many of those that are called Hayen.
Some of them are six yards long, having six rows of teeth in their mouth,
which is under the belly. Their skin is of the thickness of a finger. Their
strength exceeds that of many men, and they together with their
attendance are very pleasant to look on. They were drawn up by ropes into
the ship. In warm weather they saw everyday flying-fishes hovering about
them in great numbers.
Near the Line, a so called Sea-Devil swimming up to them roved all day long
about their ship. But they could not take him. He had great horns in
thickness and length equally proportioned and as for the rest very ghastly
to look on. They saw birds of many differing sorts

Beyond the Cape of Good Hope, they had almost nothing else but thunder,
lightening and hail with such a violent storm. One time the upper-part of
the main-mast was split into three pieces and in the cabin everything was
broken with prodigious violence which might have proved very fatal to
them if the Lord had not been pleased to prevent it to their no small
astonishment.

When they came to the Maldive Islands, their ship was daily stored with
abundance of birds, of so dull a nature, that they of their own accord flew
into their hands or lighting down near them would play with them. Nay,
they by no means would be turned off , till they by force be driven away.
At one critical juncture of time, the wind blew so violent, that the ship like
an arrow, cut its way through the midst of the waves. And it was, then
when their men cried out all on a sudden, that large sand banks were just
before them. this they should not at all had been sensible of, if the wind
had not been so boisterous and with vehement battering and beating back
of the waves, had not made such a prodigious echoing and roaring noise.

Soon they came into the sight of Ceylon where the elephants were walking
on the shoar. At last their toils and fatigues ended in a happy arrival at
Tranquebar on
the 9th of July 1706.
Neither Ziegenbalg nor
Plutschau then knew
that a totally
unexpected, cold and
inimical reception from
the Danes in
Tranquebar would
await them.
They were not allowed to disembark the ship, which laid anchored a few
miles away from the coast. The Captain of this ship had his own
displeasures and ill-feelings towards Ziegenbalg because, Ziegenbalg saved
a lady, who boarded the ship in Cape of Good Hope, when the Captain was
about to molest her on board the ship. So the captain wreaked his
vengeance by not sending the boats to carry the missionaries to the land.
Only the fisherfolk, the first Tamil people, helped to carry them to the
shore. From then on, it was the turn of Hassius to harass the missionaries.
“To lead one soul from
among the heathen to
God is as much as if, in
Europe, one brought a
hundred, for here the
means and
opportunities abound
and there they have
none.” Dr.
Breithaupt of Halle
University
 Ziegenbalg managed to run
schools and to construct a
church, within a couple of years
of his arrival in Tranquebar. Three
schools started breathing the air
of academic and religious fervour
in Tranquebar.
One Dano-Portuguese school,
under a Danish master, the
second, a German-Portuguese
school, under Plutschau and the
third, a Tamil school under
Ziegenbalg and a native baptized
teacher started to carry out the
This was the oldest school in Tranquebar, dating back to missionary duties. In all these
the arrival of the Lutheran missionaries in the first
schools, the children were given
decade of the eighteenth century. In fact, the building
used as a prayer hall had originally been built and used food drink, clothes and books
as a school by the German missionary, Bartholomäus freely at their expense of
Ziegenbalg missionaries because they were
“We firmly think that the children are the true nursery in which so fond of the children. They
we can raise the seedlings as we wish. We dream that one day hoped that they can easily make
our children will become able teachers and catechists and help children witnesses for Christ.
this work to grow further and further” Ziegenbalg
What an amount of acute paucity of funds did Ziegenbalg suffer from will
become more clear from his own words:
"Though this, like everything else was begun with great want of funds, yet
God has never put our faith and confidence in Him to shame; for we have
never been obliged to give up any of these institutions, though we were
often hard pressed, and many a time knew not in the evening how we
should provide for the next day."

One fateful morning, a Danish ship laid anchored on the shores of

Tranquebar with a money chest containing. 2000 Rix dollars for the
mission. When the local fisherfolk carefully dragged the boat containing the
mission money, the drunken captain of the ship, who, it is inferred, under
direction from Hassius to drown this money chest, sprang on these
fisherfolk with a drawn dagger and purposely let this boat to capsize.“

"Ziegenbalg and Plutschau took counsel together. A glance into the Bible,
opened at random, decided the issue. Their eyes fell upon the verses in the
twelfth chapter of the Epistle to the Romans : 'Dearly beloved, avenge not yourselves, but
rather give place unto wrath ; for it is written, vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord. Therefore if thine
enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink. For in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head.’
Whenever Hassius reproached Ziegenbalg, the latter approached the
former with love and forgiveness. When Hassius approached Ziegenbalg
with anger, authority, force and punishment, Ziegenbalg received him with
stretched hands of love, generosity, forgiveness and kindness.

“ God alone,” wrote Ziegenbalg, “ is here able to do the work by His power,
and make that possible which appears to our eyes altogether impossible.”
In little over two years Ziegenbalg had established in Tranquebar a firm
base of missionary operations. When at times Ziegenbalg took a walk in the
country, he was surrounded with
hundreds of Malabarians to whom
he preached whenever he pleased.

Ziegenbalg was made to undergo

rigorous imprisonment in the jail.
Hassius ordered that a small cabin,
very close to the kitchen be made
his prison cell. In this prison cell,
Ziegenbalg's health worsened. Arrest of Ziegenbalg.
"No one among the soldiers could speak one word with him. Through
silence the missionary's spirit was to be broken and the unmerciful solitude
in the terrible heat of his cell was to rob him of the power of resistance and
was to ruin his health. If the prison doors would ever be opened to him, he
would leave as a human wreck“
Hassius provoked compassion in the hearts of the Europeans. Two German
soldiers Johann Georg Mann and Christian Ludwig, secretly met Ziegenbalg
and gave him papers and pencil. 717 closely written pages of the Quarto
size were the result of this imprisonment. Even if Ziegenbalg were to be in
the mission house, he could not have written so much. "The God-pleasing
State of a Christian' and "The God-pleasing Profession of Teaching" were
what Ziegenbalg wrote in those 717 pages. He considered the period of
imprisonment as a heaven of peace and solitude.

Ziegenbalg celebrated the New Year of 1709 in his prison and he also sent
greetings to Hassius. Ziegenbalg invited the Commandant and his wife for a
dinner in the prison and had there a discussion for seven hours and at the
end, Ziegenbalg and Hassius embraced one another. Ziegenbalg was
released from the prison after this historic reconciliation.
After this the Missionaries passed five very anxious months. Their school-
children must be fed, their servants must be paid, and they themselves
must live, and yet they received no money; even their salary was for some
time withheld. Their only resource was to call upon God in prayer. This they
did faithfully and the Lord helped them faithfully.

A person, from whom they had least expected it, brought them 40 Rix-
dollars on the condition that they should repay them as soon as the ship
should arrive from Denmark, and some one else lent them 20 dollars
on the same conditions. In this way they collected 200 dollars from
different quarters, and did not suffer from actual want.

On the 6th of March 1707 a Brahmin who was considered very wise and
learned came to Ziegenbalg to have a talk on religion.

In that talk the Brahman said "Our religion is the oldest of all religions.
Many pious kings have reigned over us, and we have had many holy
prophets and learned men. Would God have allowed our religion to spread
so far and to stand for so long, had it been false?“
Ziegenbalg replied, " The truth of a religion does not depend on its
antiquity or on the number of its adherents. The devil and sin are both old,
and govern a large part of the world: but it would be wrong therefore to
say that the devil is pious and that sin is pleasing to God."

Ziegenbalg then made Christ known to him, spoke with him on the
extension of the kingdom of Christ, showed him that it had been
announced to them before, and that it had now come to him, and exhorted
him to be obedient to the voice of God and to believe in his only begotten.

Finally Ziegenbalg told him, "I have represented the necessity of this faith
to you by my words; but I cannot give you that faith in Christ. Go and
humble yourself before the God of heaven and earth, and pray to him to
enlighten you by the word you have now heard, and then you will believe
in Christ, and recognize him as your Saviour.“

On the 5th of July 1707, a Mohammedan priest with several of his followers
came to see Ziegenbalg. Mohammedan priest said, " You Christians
believe in three Gods, we believe in one.”
Ziegenbalg replied, "We do not distinguish three Gods, but three persons in
one divine Being, namely, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, so that it may be
truly said of each person that he is very God and yet there are not three
Gods but one God.“
Mohammadan: "How can you prove this?“

Ziegenbalg: "I will give you a simile. We see but one sun in heaven, and yet
we are aware of three things in it; —there is the body of the sun, the lustre
which it throws out, and the warmth from the lustre. These three things
are so connected that we could not have the warmth without the light, nor
the light if there were no body of the sun there. Now though these three
things are produced by the sun, no one would say that the sun is threefold;
but all would agree that there is but one sun. So the Divine Being is but
one, yet it consists of three persons, who are so united, that any one who
despises the Holy Ghost, cannot acknowledge the Son, and whoever does
not believe in and acknowledge the Son, cannot believe in or acknowledge
the Father. Therefore though you profess to believe in one God, the Creator
of heaven and earth, you cannot be saved unless you also believe in his Son
Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the world.