Titus Coan: "Apostle to the Sandwich Islands." by Phil Corr (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Titus Coan: "Apostle to the Sandwich Islands." by Phil Corr Clifford Putney Titus Coan: "Apostle to the Sandwich Islands." By Phil Corr. (Eugene, Oregon: Wipf & Stock. 2021. Pp. 513. $60.00. ISBN: 978-1-6667-1393-0). In the annals of missionary history, few places were evangelized as thoroughly as Hawaii (the Sandwich Islands), where missionaries from the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (Congregational/Presbyterian) converted the bulk of the populace to Christianity in the 1800s. Generally intolerant of native Hawaiian customs and beliefs, ABCFM missionaries on the islands were definitely not broad-minded by the standards of today. They were at the forefront of progressive nineteenth-century movements such as abolitionism, however, and they were exceptionally well educated for their day (the women as well as the men). They also included intellectually curious individuals such as the Reverend Titus Coan (1801–1882), whom Phil Corr writes about in his absorbing new biography, Titus Coan: "Apostle to the Sandwich Islands." That Coan is the worthy subject of a biography cannot be denied. A Presbyterian missionary in Hilo on Hawaii (the big island) for forty-eight years (1835–1882), he was a powerful preacher, and he was a prolific writer, with a gift for describing people and places. He was also an ardent revivalist, and he did more than anyone else to instigate the Great Awakening in Hawaii (1836–1840), a [End Page 433] period during which tens of thousands of Hawaiians converted to Christianity. On a Sunday in 1838, at the height of the Awakening, Coan used a bucket and paintbrush to baptize 1,705 adults, whom he subsequently made members of his church in Hilo. The church had over 7,000 members in 1841, and Coan could boast of it being the largest church in the world at that time. In addition to being a successful evangelist, Coan was a skillful (albeit amateur) scientist, and he made important discoveries in the field of vulcanology. As a resident of Hawaii (one of the most geologically active islands in the world), Coan experienced earthquakes, tsunamis, and volcanic eruptions, and he provided detailed descriptions of them for missionary publications and leading scientific journals. He also made innumerable trips to Mauna Loa and Kilauea (the island's two active volcanos), and he risked death on many of those trips. Most people avoid erupting volcanoes, but Coan (who possessed a strong physique and a fearless nature) liked to climb them, even when plumes of red-hot lava were splashing down around him. For his biography of Coan, Phil Corr spent years doing research, relying on published works (especially Coan's autobiography) and unpublished materials, such as letters. From these materials, Corr provides readers with a richly comprehensive portrait of Coan ("the bishop of Kilauea"), encompassing the missionary's childhood on a farm in Connecticut, his conversion during America's Second Great Awakening, his acquaintance with the famous revivalist Charles Finney, his experimental mission in the wilds of Patagonia (1833–1834), his clashes with conservative members of the ABCFM (who opposed Coan's style of revivalism), his two marriages (the latter to a woman thirty-three years his junior), his successful outreach to white sailors, his participation in the American peace movement, his two-year (1870–1871) tour of America (where he was greeted by crowds that sometimes numbered in the thousands), and his long presidency (1863–1882) of the Hawaiian Evangelical Association, the successor body to the ABCFM in Hawaii. Throughout his biography of Coan, Corr expresses admiration for the man and his work. Corr is an evangelical pastor (just as Coan was), and he rarely provides secular explanations for religious phenomena, preferring instead to take the religious phenomena at face value. Doubtlessly this will frustrate secular readers of his book, but even they might well come away from the volume with a liking for Coan, who was not a toxic missionary of the sort found in novels such as The Poisonwood Bible. Rather than being harshly judgmental and arrogant, Coan was a deeply caring individual, and he won the enduring love of people around him. Clifford Putney Bentley University [End Page 434] Clifford Putney Bentley University Copyright...