The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1933-03-30
The MARYLAND BIBLE SOCIETYS CORNER
''The Word of Our God Shall Stand Forever"

We again turn aside from the regu-
lar series to present to our readers
a brief story of an outstanding mis-
sionary project sponsored by the
Maryland Bible Society. Nineteen
hundred and thirty-three marks the
twentieth anniversary of the Mary
land Bible Society's gife of $4,000 to
the American Bible Society for the re-
vision and stereotype plates of the
Arabic Reference Bible. This worthy
enterprise was fostered and carried
through by DR.. Franklin Goucher, the
honored president of the Maryland BIZ
BILE Society in 1913, when this sub
seciption was made. The entire
amount was paid in four years.
The Importance of this missionary
enterprise will be apparent to all
Christians when we consider the vast
population of the several countries of
the world where the religion of Mo-
manned predominates, and Arabic is
the spoken or written language.
While it was first spoken in northern
Arabia, and does not appear as writ
ten language four or five centuries
after Christ, it is now the spoken
or sacred language of population
of not less than 200 millions in Africa
and in western and part of southern
Asia, large sections of the trans-Cas-
plan region, and very important eth
mic groups in the PHILIPPINES and in
the East Indies.
The distribution of the Mohamme-
dan religion, shown by world CEN
sus of 1882, reveals 10000 Mohamme-
dams in North America, most of whom
may be expected to have reading
knowledge of Arabic, 100000 in
Europe, 16O,OOO,OOO in Asia, 44,OOO,-
900 in Africa, making a grand total
of 2O9,O2O,OOO, to say nothing of the
Arabic island population.
The total number of Christians of
all kinds-Roman Catholics, Greek
Orthodox Catholic, Protestant, num-
Der through the world approximately
682, 100000.
Statistics are never altogether re-
liable. However, with a constituency
of 209 millions who may be pre-
sumed to be capable of reading the
Arabic language, one may see how
rich and fertile field is presented for
the American Bible Society's work of
translating and distributing the Holy
Scriptures in that tongue, and how
much Of the spirit of the seer ami
mated DR.. Goucher when he advocated
the gift of the plates for this glorious
work, by the Maryland Bible Society
in 1918.
The religion of the prophet Moham-
med is and always will be the strongest
competitor of Christianity, in Africa
and in Asia, 1t is difficult for west
ern mind to conceive of the Bible as
competing for a place in the religious
world with the Koran. But we must
never lose sight Of the power of racial
backgrounds, or of the prejudice men
of every ethnic group feel toward
what to them is new, or springs from
different roots.
Yet the word of our God shall stand
forever. When men of open mind in
America or Arabia can have the Book
in their own tongue, its appeal
when given an opportunity to speak
its MESSAGES never lost.
We rejoice that after twenty years
the Arabic Bible continues to tell its
story, old, yet ever new, to the follow
ers of Mohammed in east and west
alike. Thus indeed may the Arabic
the richest, the most flexible, the most
difficult, and the most widely diffused
of all the Semitic tongues it's self be
enriched by the message it bears to a
waiting world.
The Book of Ruth is poem in