Background
Thoburn was born on March 7, 1836 in St. Clairsville, Ohio. He was the seventh child of Matthew Thoburn (originally Thorburn) and Jane Lyle (Crawford), Irish immigrants (1825) from counties Down and Antrim.
(India and Malaysia. 580 Pages)
India and Malaysia. 580 Pages
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(Excerpt from Light in the East Class Hindus - have in re...)
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Thoburn was born on March 7, 1836 in St. Clairsville, Ohio. He was the seventh child of Matthew Thoburn (originally Thorburn) and Jane Lyle (Crawford), Irish immigrants (1825) from counties Down and Antrim.
James entered Allegheny College at Meadville in 1851; for two years he taught school at Loydsville, Ohio; then returned to graduate in 1857.
While he was teaching, religious difficulties by which he had been disturbed became clarified, and he entered the ministry of the Methodist Episcopal Church, being admitted on trial to the Pittsburgh Conference in 1858. Feeling called to missionary service, he was sent to India in 1859 by the Missionary Society of his Church, after ordination under the auspices of the New England Conference. His first appointment was Naini Tal, a hill station in the Himalayas (Kumaon Division, United Provinces). Preaching each Sunday to British troops in a formal "parade-service, " he made a discovery: "I found, " he said, "I could give the people God's message a great deal more effectively in thirty minutes than in sixty". In time he became known as the best preacher of his church in India.
Thoburn returned to America in October 1863, and was tempted strongly to remain and organize a school for preparing missionaries, but the frank questioning of his sister Isabella as to the nature of his "call" sent him back to India in 1865. The North India Conference appointed him to Pauri (Garhwal), a remote station in the Himalayas, where for over two years he had few returns for his labors but much time to brood over big ideas. He was sent next to the thickly populated plains of the upper Ganges Valley, serving at Moradabad (1868), Sambhal (1869), Rae Bareilly (1870), and Lucknow (1871 - 73). During these years he matured rapidly and became intimately associated with the problems occasioned by the influx of converts from the depressed classes, the opening of work among Indian women by unmarried women missionaries from America, and the expansion of religious activities throughout India in consequence of the evangelistic meetings of William Taylor.
On Taylor's insistence Thoburn left Lucknow in 1874 to shepherd, without salary from the Missionary Society, the little group of Taylor's converts in Calcutta, and until 1888 he was associated with missionary enterprise in that city. On one of the busiest streets he built, and later rebuilt, a church, which was filled twice every Sunday. "It is the strangest church I ever saw, " one person remarked. "It seemed to me that all the bad people in Calcutta were there". Sailors, soldiers, Europeans, and Asiatics were in the congregation.
In religious work among Europeans and Anglo-Indians, Thoburn became the outstanding figure in India. All the time, however, he was dreaming of farther India, and in 1879 he began work in Rangoon; in 1884-85 with William F. Oldham he was in Singapore founding a church; in 1885 he was appointed general evangelist. The General Conference of 1888 elected him missionary bishop for India (later Southern Asia), and until his retirement in 1908 he performed the duties of this office with notable skill and power, being the acknowledged missionary leader in his denomination.
After his retirement he settled in Meadville, Pa. Allegheny College honored him by a jubilee celebration in 1909, which brought fitting recognition to his career.
In spite of his numerous activities, Thoburn was continually busy with his pen. In 1871, with James H. Messmore, he started a small paper to which he contributed and which developed into the Indian Witness, official organ of the Methodist Episcopal Church in India. He was also the author of a number of books, among which may be mentioned: My Missionary Apprenticeship (1887); Missionary Addresses before Theological Schools (1887); India and Malaysia (1892); The Deaconess and Her Vocation (1893); Light in the East (1894); The Christless Nations (1895); Graves Lectures at Syracuse University; The Church of Pentecost (1901); Life of Isabella Thoburn (1903); The Christian Conquest of India (1906); India and Southern Asia (1907). To the Western Christian Advocate he contributed "Wayside Notes: An Autobiography, " published between January 4 and December 27, 1911, and to the Northwestern Christian Advocate, "How Christ Came to India, " published between January 3 and April 24, 1912.
In America he won innumerable friends for his far-flung missions; on the field his "singular blend of the mystical enthusiast and the clear-seeing practically minded man" gave him great effectiveness. The years of his administration witnessed a remarkable growth both in number of converts and in extent of territory occupied. Soon the Methodists were in almost every great city of India, in Baluchistan, in Java, in Sumatra, and in British Borneo.
(Excerpt from Light in the East Class Hindus - have in re...)
( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)
( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)
(India and Malaysia. 580 Pages)
On December 16, 1861, he married Sarah Minerva (Rockwell), widow of J. R. Downey; she died on October 30, 1862, leaving him a son.
His second wife, whom he married in Philadelphia, November 11, 1880, was Dr. Anna Jones of Kingston, Ohio. At the time of their marriage she was preparing for medical missionary work, and in 1882 she joined her husband in India; she died in 1902. Of Thoburn's five children three grew to maturity.
