Edwin W. Clark

Edward Winter Clark (E. W. Clark) (February 25, 1830 – March 18, 1913) was an American missionary. Clark is known for his pioneering missionary work in Nagaland and for his work on transcribing the spoken Ao language into a written script. Clark created the first bilingual dictionary of the Ao language and along with his wife, Mary Mead Clark, set up the first school in the Naga hills region of North-East India. Clark documented their experience in Assam and the Naga Hills in ''A Corner in India''. The Clarks are buried in the Island Cemetery in the town of Amenia in Dutchess County, New York.

Early life

Clark was born on February 25, 1830, in North East, New York, and baptized into the Baptist faith at age 14. He attended Worcester Academy from 1839 to 1841, earned his master's degree from Brown University in 1857, and was ordained a preacher in 1859. Mary Mead was born in Amenia, New York.

Ministry in Nagaland

On receiving permission, Clark moved to Molungkimong in March 1876 (an Ao Naga village in the Mokokchung district of Nagaland) and lived there until October 24, 1876.

Molung (Molungyimsen) is the first Christian village in Nagaland because this is the first village formed with Christian prayers. It was in Molungyimsen that the first Naga Christian Association was held. Molungyimsen is also known as the Cradle of Education because the first school in Nagaland was established in Molung (Molungyimsen) in 1878. The first book in Nagaland was written and printed in Molungyimsen. In 1894 Clark moved the Naga Mission Center to Impur which is now known as the Ao Baptist Arogo Mungdang (Ao Baptist Arogo Mungdang).

In 1905 Clark saw a record one hundred and ninety baptisms. The work was truly blessed of God but Clark saw that better days were yet ahead. The Nagas were well aware that to accept Christianity would mean drastic changes in their social life. "Adherents of the old, cruel faith were quick to see that the gospel of peace and love would rapidly empty their skull houses and put to rout most of the old customs handed down from forefathers, for whom they held the greatest reverence. The missionaries presence and his teaching had spread like wildfire from mountain peak to peak and everywhere was fostered the suspicious spirit. Clark died on March 18, 1913 at age 83."

Legacy

Christianity brought an end to the practice of headhunting and destroyed most of the traditional culture and oral knowledge of the various Naga tribes. Clark's vision for a Christian Nagaland came true, with the high price of destroying the Naga's indigenous culture though it has advantages like marking end to cruelty like headhuning. By 1980 the Naga population was 572,742 and the Baptist population was 185,987.

Today the Census of India, puts the numbers of Christians to more than 90% of the population of Nagaland thus making it, with Meghalaya and Mizoram, one of the three Christian-majority states in India and the only state where Christians form 90% of the population. Nagaland is known as "the only predominantly Baptist state in the world."

Archives

A biographer of Clark conducting archival research at the American Baptist Historical Society at the Mission Center noted that much of Clark's correspondence was difficult to read, "written on both sides of onion skin paper".

See also

* Ao Baptist Arogo Mungdang
* Nagaland Baptist Church Council
* Angami Baptist Church Council

References

Bibliography

*Kijung L. Ao, Nokinketer Muncgchen (Impur: Nagaland, Ao Baptist Arogo Mungdang, 1972)
*A. C. Bowers, Under Headhunters' Eyes (Philadelphia: Judson Press, 1929)
*F. S. Downs, Christianity in North East India (Delhi, Ispeck: 1976)
*Tegenfelt, A Century of Growth

External links

*
Clark – Missionary to Naga of India

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, Edward Winter
1830 births
1913 deaths
Baptist missionaries from the United States
Baptist missionaries in India
Indian Protestants
American evangelists
Headhunting accounts and studies
Mokokchung
American expatriates in India
19th-century Baptists
Brown University alumni
Worcester Academy alumni