The Rev. Dr. Cornelius Van Til of Westminster Theological Seminary and Dr. Gilbert Den Dulk of the Reformed Fellowship visited Formosa for one week from May 28th to June 4th, 1960. Of this visit an observer who has been on the Island for moro than a decade remarked, “God sent Dr. Van Til to Formosa for such a time at this!”
On Sunday morning, May 29th, the Westminster Professor visited tho oldest part of Taipei city where he ministered to the congregation of the Banks Presbyterian Church, the largest and most evangelical of its denomination in north Formosa. His message was the simple Gospel of Justification by Faith. The people were surprised and delighted, for they had been told that their preacher for the occasion was a very learned man. Dr. Van Til’s preaching in Banks came exactly one hundred years after the first missionary in modem times to come to Formosa had. in 1860, visited Banks, long before it had expanded into the city now known as Taipei. What had transpired in this century of time to make Dr. Van Til’s visit so timely?
The first modern missionaries to settle in Ilha Formosa (Island Beautiful), or Taiwan (Terraced Bay) were the English Presbyterians who came to the South in 1865 and the Canadian Presbyterians who came to the North in 1877. For most of the time, from that day to this, the prevailing interpretation of the Christian Faith preached on the Island has been that proclaimed by Presbyterians. It is quite easy to understand, then, how the Church that emerged. was in many respects like its mother churches in the homelands. Its theology was conservative and its preaching the simple Gospel.
But there was another circumstance that has served to influence the character of the Presbyterian Church of Formosa. That was that during most of its existence there have been virtually no other interpretations of the Christian message being proclaimed and there was no conscious pressing necessity to set forth the Truth against faulty and erroneous interpretations of it. This perhaps partially explains why even until now the Presbyterian Church of Formosa has adopted no confessional standards except those of the Apostles’ and Nicene Creeds.
In 1895 Formosa was ceded to Japan, and for half a century until 1945, the people and churches in Formosa were subjected to influences emanating from Japan. Japanese translations of the works of European theologians came into the hands of theological students soon after the originals were published in Europe. In tho period soon after the early 1930’s, theological thinking became a central emphasis in the church’s life. At least two score young mini$ten went to Japan for postgraduate studies. The works of Karl Barth and Emil Brunner became available in Japanese translation. There developed a widespread eagerness to absorb, frequently without discrimination, anything that bore a theological stamp. And this undiscerning assimilation of things theological is a characteristic of the Formosan ministry right until the present day. Neo-orthodoxy is widely considered to be Calvinism come into its own.
When Taiwan was returned to the republic of China at the end of Word War II, new influences began to impinge upon the Church. For our present purpose we shall only mention those that were brought to bear on the young intellectuals. In the Japanese days, although well over 90% of the people were given a primary schooling, there was very little encouragement or opportunity for higher education. Today that is all changed. This Fall, out of a population of ten million, 9,000 young people will become freshmen in the colleges and universities. And since the Chinese Renaissance of 1919, the thoughts disseminated in the universities have been anything but conservative. Dr. Hu Shih, who is known as the father of the Chinese Renaissance and who is now President of the Academia Sinica, Free China’s highest institute of research, has said, “The real problem…is that our old culture is no longer capable of meeting the needs of tho nation and solving the tremendously difficult problems of the age. It is no longer capable of dealing with the problems of poverty, disease, ignorance and corruption—the four cardinal enemies of the nation.”
But lest we be misled into thinking that such leaders as Dr. Hu will easily accept either of the two ideologies of Communism or Christianity, we must listen to him as he spoke this summer before the Sino-American Intellectual Cooperation Conference. He asserted that the bedrock of Chinese culture is humanism and rationalism and said, “The tradition of the humanistic and rationalistic China has not been destroyed and in al1 probability cannot be destroyed.” The views of such men as Hu Shih have tremendous influence among the intelligentsia and among young students. While in Taiwan Dr. Van Til had an opportunity to call on this eminent intellectual leader. Dr. Hu himself volunteered the following: “My friends say that I am an atheist and I do not altogether deny that it is true.” Is it any wonder that not a few young people from Christian homes, not having been well indoctrinated, lose their faith when they go to college?
Another force that the Presbyterian Church of Formosa has encountered in recent years is the influx· of missionaries of other denominations which followed the neutralization of Formosa by President Troman on June 27th, 1950. A certain line of propaganda in the home-lands has described the resulting situation as one of chaotic confusion. The situation has been highly exaggerated since there arc probably less denominations represented on Formosa than on most mission fields and the proportion of Bible-believing missionaries to the whole Protestant missionary force is probably greater than on any other field. There is thus a basic unity which is far more significant than the differences.
The Presbyterian Church of Formosa, however, being unaccustomed to hearing any other voice but its own, was somewhat taken aback. Influential leaders quickly ushered .it into membership in the World Council of Churches. In the 1953 General Assembly, the Pastor of the Banks Presbyterian Church, the Rev. Go Eng-boa, unsuccessfully attempted to bring about adoption of the Westminster Confession and Catechisms as the subordinate standards of the Church. After that, he also tried, without much success, to get the ministers in the Taipei area to study these standards at their monthly meetings. There was good cause therefore that in the Fall of that year the Sunday services of the Reformed Fellowship should be started. The Reformed Fellowship became the first congregation on the Island to hold services with an avowedly Reformed Confession of Faith (The Westminster standards).
It was, therefore, entirely appropriate that, as Dr. Van Til had preached to the Banks congregation in the morning, he preach to the Reformed Fellowship in the evening. The Sunday evening congregation of the Reformed Fellowship is composed almost entirely of students -mostly college students—and on this occasion there were some 40 in attendance. Dr. Van Til’s message struck the key-note for his entire week’s mission. He chose as his text the passage from 1 Corinthians 1:20,21: “Where is the wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For after that in the wisdom of God. the world by wisdom knew not God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe.” The questions asked in the discussion period that followed showed that his message, “The Challenge of the Gospel,” had struck home.
Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday were busy days for Dr. Van Til. On these days he gave addresses and lectures to the three major groups described above: Ecclesiastical, Academic (Philosophical), and Missionary. Monday morning Dr. Van Til addressed the ministers of the Taipei area at their monthly meeting. His subject was “The Church and Modern Theology.” He sought to show by an exposition of the teaching of modem theologians that there could be no syncretism of the wisdom of God and the wisdom of the world.
On Tuesday and Wednesday mornings there were lectures on Karl Barth given to the Faculty and students of Taiwan Theological College. The subjects chosen for these lectures were particularly felicitous since it is often claimed that a man may be orthodox in his views concerning Christ even though he may not believe in the full trustworthiness of the Scriptures. Dr. Van Til’s two lectures entitled “Barth’s View of Christ” and “Barth’s View of Grace” clearly showed the latter’s deviation from Scriptural teaching on both these subjects. Few in his audience had the philosophical orientation necessary to enable them fully to appreciate the lectures, but one who had apparently made some study of Barth rather angrily remarked, “How can he say such things about Barth?” Dr. Van Til showed himself fully capable of answering such questions and we shall be eager to relay his full answer in the book to be published later this year.
On Monday and Tuesday evenings Dr. Van Til lectured under the auspices of the Department of Philosophy of the National Taiwan University. Taiwan University is the ranking institution of higher learning on the Island. Associated in its Department of Philosophy are the top professors who formerly taught in the leading universities on the mainland of China. Among them there is represented a kaleidoscope of the various schools of thought. Existential.ism and Scientific Empiricism are particularly well represented. Taiwan University also takes the cream of all the high school graduates. This is because of the system of competitive matriculation examinations now in effect. The audiences that heard Dr. Van Til at the University were the best qualified intellectually of any that he met on Formosa. Publicity had been given to the lectures in six of the daily newspapers {4 Chinese and 2 English language} and a select group of some 60 or 70 students was the result.
The subjects for the two evenings were “Christianity and Idealism” and “Christianity and Existentialism.” Dr. Van Til began with a brief outline of the Gospel and then, in his own inimitable way, with ample use of the blackboard, he proceeded to survey the history of Philosophy from its beginnings to the present day. Clearly he showed that God had made foolish the wisdom of this world. At “Tai Ta” {Taiwan University} alone of all his lectures on Formosa, Dr. Van Til spoke without an interpreter and there was some apprehension that there might be a considerable falling off of numbers on the second day. But there was no appreciable diminution of numbers and the questions asked at the end of the first lecture showed that the questioners were at home in Philosophy and had followed the lecturer most closely. During the question period Dr. Van Til not only showed a thorough command of his subject but also the effectiveness of his Reformed Apologetic. The students were most favorably impressed with his kindly manner in answering questions. One of them told his professor-father that he had never heard such a masterful presentation of the whole range of Philosophy in one lecture.
The Philosophy majors who had been reading extracts from Dr. Van Til’s writings for more than a year previous to his coming made a special point of attending all the meetings at which he spoke and of seeing him off at the airport when he departed. Dr. Van Til, in turn, was deeply impressed with the courtesy shown by the Chairman of the Philosophy Department in inviting him to the University and by his hospitality in asking him to his office for refreshments at the conclusion of each evening. Only time and eternity will show the full results of the lectures given.
On Tuesday, shortly after noon, Dr. Van Til addressed the May-June meeting of the Taipei Branch of the Taiwan Evangelical Fellowship. Dr. Van Til was originally to have been the speaker at the regular May meeting but when illness caused a postponement and curtailment of his trip, officers of the organization graciously arranged for the special meeting at the time of the postponed visit. Some 200 missionaries and national leaders attended the meeting, this being the largest audience to hear Dr. Van Til on Formosa.
His subject “Modern Theology and Missions” was particularly appropriate. To those not aware of the true nature of Neo-orthodoxy and of the designs of ecumenical leaders vis-a-vis the foreign mission field, the address was most revealing. Masterfully, Dr. Van Til showed that the philosophy underlying “Re-thinking Missions,” published in 1932; the neo-orthodox theology of Hendrik Kraemer which had great influence in the Madras meeting of the International Missionary Council of 1938; and the theological animus of the Evanston Assembly of the World Council of Churches in 1954, were-all three-basically the same. Thus, quoting from the Laymen’s Report of 1932, “The Christian will therefore consider himself as co-worker with the forces within each such religious system which are making for righteousness,” and from the reports of the Madras Conference of 1938, “In non-Christian faith may we meet with something that is not merely a seeking but in real measure a finding, and a finding by contact with which a Christian may be helped to make fresh discoveries in his own finding of God in Christ?…In conclusion, Dr. Van Til quoted Dr. Hoshino, a leading Buddhist Professor in Japan, “Taking note of the difference in background, the one Christian and the other Buddhist, it must none-the-less be maintained that the theology of Barth and that of the largest Buddhist sect of Japan are wholly identical.” And, as he told some 40 younger missionaries the day before in a chapel address at the Language School, so again, on this occasion, Dr. Van Til concluded by saying, “If any of you have Neo-orthodoxy as your message, you might just as well pack up tonight and go home tomorrow.” His address was well received and it was suggested that it be made available to all protestant missionaries on Taiwan.
Part of the address which was particularly relevant for Taiwan, though Dr. Van Til was not aware of it, was his interpretation of the plans set forth at the Evanston Assembly in relation to the foreign mission field: “The Committee of experts that will screen the candidates for the ecumenical ministry will see to it that those who still believe in prescientific myths will not be allowed to go out to the mission field. On tho other hand, it will then be possible to see to it that only those will be sent out who are humble enough to believe that it is not possible that human language should formulate precisely and completely adequate statements concerning the moral, spiritual and metaphysical verities of our universe.”
The animus of this plan had begun to express itself here in Taiwan only a year before. At that time many in Dr. Van Til’s audience had been deeply shucked when a veteran missionary, highly esteemed for his character and work, had been told by an alien-motivated ecclesiastical star chamber that be was not to return to Formosa after his furlough. Later he was told be could return if he would submit to a detailed direction of his activities, euphemistically called “partnership in obedience.” There is other evidence also, that as from 1959 ecumenical leaders are going to see to it that all their resources in men and money, whether or not the men are conservatives and the money was contributed by conservatives, will be used to promote the program of their leading theologians. A drastic situation requires drastic measures.
On Thursday and Friday Dr. Van Til proceeded to Taichung and Tainan in central and south Formosa. His meetings in those places will be described elsewhere.
In farewell, to a small group of Reformed Fellowship students on Wednesday evening and to the Bible-believing Faculty and students of Christ’s College on Saturday morning, Dr. Van Til spoke words of encouragement from I Corinthians 15:58, “My beloved brethren, be ye stedfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, for as much as ye bow that your labour is not in vain in the Lord.”
Thus ended a week of meetings which God in his good providence permitted his faithful servant to carry out. We are thankful to our sovereign Lord for giving Dr. Van Til such a measure of restored health as to make the visit possible. We are also thankful to the Reformed Fellowship, Inc. for their stewardship in making the trip financially possible and for the coming of Dr. Den Dulk, one of their leading members, to accompany Dr. Van Til on the trip and to watch over his health.
The Fellowship may wish to know how they may follow up what has been done and how they may help meet the need in Formosa. Two projects call for immediate prayer and support; 1. The training of Reformed leadership for the Church on Formosa, and 2. The presenting of an effective Reformed Apologetic to the intellectuals and students on Formosa. Each of these projects may be broken down into several component parts.
If there could be raised up even one qualified national leader, gifted and unafraid, to alert the Church to its danger and to inform it of the Truth, a great deal might be accomplished.
May the Lord give us wisdom and grace to meet this opportunity and challenge.
*Before World War II; Protestant Missionaries 40; R.C. 12 priests and 3 nuns. Now: Protestant Missionaries 400; R.C. 900 priests and nuns.