Turkish Government and Religious Liberty Under the Berlin Treaty

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · January 15, 1880

FromThe Advent Review and Sabbath Herald, Vol. 55, No. 3

Turkish Government and Religious Liberty Under the Berlin Treaty

The Turkish government is probably about as detestable as it is easy to imagine a government to be. The pretenses of religious liberty, which were artfully made to appear to be secured by the terms of the Berlin treaty, were never meant, on the part of Turkey, to be anything better than a delusive, evasive sham. It is not at all likely that the astute diplomats of the great powers cherished any “great expectations.” Truth and honor and justice are not qualities which a Turkish statesman knows anything about. A Mussulman priest was lately sentenced to death for assisting a missionary, Dr. Groelle, to translate portions of the Bible and the English prayer-book into the Turkish language. Even one of the most liberal Turkish papers demands that the “miserable creature may receive an overwhelming punishment, so that he may by his example deter others from selling their religion for a few pence.” Sir Austen Layard, the British Ambassador, has interfered on behalf of the Mussulman, even announcing that if his demands were not complied with, diplomatic communications with the Porte would be suspended. Serious rupture in the relations of the two governments was threatened unless the demand was complied with. This, it is reported, has, for the time, brought the Porte to its senses.—Advance.