The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1925, Page 162

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162

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

Just a Moment, Please!

Kindly tell a few of your friends and fellow-
members why you read the “Lutheran Pioneer”
and why they, too, should be enjoying it every
month. When you explain to them that it
comes a whole year for only fifty cents, it
ought not to be a very difficult matter for you
to find several who will be glad to get our
neatly printed and richly illustrated mis-
sionary monthly with its interesting news
from the Foreign and Home Mission fields.

Will you not do your friends and fellow-
members this favor? Will you not in this
way help the great cause of missions?

SURELY YOU WILL!

Your pastor or teacher will be glad to take
your orders, or you may send them direct to
Concordia .Publishing House, St. Louis, Mo.

Reclaiming Christ’s Heritage.

XI.

MALAYSIA.

Malaysia is a vast archipelago of many large
and small islands lying between the southeastern
part of Asia and New Guinea and Australia. Most
of these islands belong to the little European coun-
try of Holland and are known as the Dutch Hast
Indies. This, Malay Archipelago has a territory
greater than the combined areas of all the States
east of the Mississippi River. Its population is
about half that of the whole United States. The
population of Malaysia is probably more diversified
than is any other part of the world. We find here
native Bataks, Dyaks, Malays, Sundanese, Javanese,
and a host of other native races. Then there are

more than a million Chinese, thousands of Tamils -

and Telugus from India, a great number of Arabs,
many Europeans, and not a few Americans. It is

said that no less than 150 languages are spoken :

throughout Malaysia.

Most of this vast territory, with the exception

of Java, is wild and unexplored territory. The
roads are few, the forests of the interior are largely
inhabited by savages and s0 filled with tropical
vegetation as to be practically impenetrable. Illit-
‘eracy, ignorance, and superstition abound in an
extraordinary degree among the heathen of these

_year 1200 A. D.

islands, and not a few of the tribes are notorious
cannibals. The head-hunting Dyaks of Borneo are
among-the most degraded members of the human
family. It is claimed that the women often incite
the men to go on head-hunting expeditions, and
the courage and manhood of a Dyak is largely
judged by the number of heads he has to his credit.
The heads are handed down from generation to
generation and are regarded as ornaments in their
homes by these human monsters.

Probably about two-thirds of the people of
Malaysia are Mohammedans, and all in all they
number more than 35,000,000. The first repre-
sentatives of Islam came to the islands about the
It is advancing rapidly, and if
Christian missions do not act promptly and ener-
getically, Mohammedanism will soon have absorbed
the remaining heathen of these islands. It is said
that no less than 20,000 Mohammedan missionaries
are carrying on Moslem propaganda with zeal and
ever-increasing success and are thus binding Ma-
laysia more and more closely to the religion of the
False Prophet.

Chinese immigration is very great, it being esti-
mated that Chinese are coming to these islands at
the rate of 250,000 a year. They are very indus-

Dwelling of Natives in Sumatra.

trious and form the commercial backbone of the-
Malay Archipelago. In many respects they present.
a hopeful field for mission endeayor, and many
have already been won for Christ.