Samuel Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky

Samuel Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky (May 21 or 6, 1831 – October 15, 1906), Chinese name Shi Yuese (施约瑟), was a nineteenth-century bishop of the American Episcopal Church in China. He translated the Old Testament into Peking Mandarin and the Old and New Testaments into Wenli (Classical Chinese), and he founded St. John's University in Shanghai.

Early life and conversion

Schereschewsky was born on May 21 (or 6), 1831, in Tauragė, a small town in Lithuania under the rule of the Russian Empire. Both his parents were Jewish. He lost both parents in early childhood and was raised by an elder half-brother. In 1848 he attended the rabbinical school in Zhytomyr, and in 1852 he entered the University of Breslau in Prussia, where he came into contact with a group of Jews who believed in Christianity. In 1854 he emigrated to New York, where he worked loading glass. On April 2, 1855, while keeping the Passover meal, he decided to be baptized and put his faith in Christ Jesus.

In 1856 Schereschewsky studied at the Presbyterian Western Theological Seminary in Allegheny, Pennsylvania (now part of Pittsburgh). Because the Northern Presbyterian Church did not approve his request to serve as a missionary overseas, in 1857 he transferred to the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church in New York City. On July 7, 1859, he was ordained a deacon of the Episcopal Church. One week later he set out for Shanghai, China, as an overseas missionary of the American Episcopal Church.

Bible translation in Beijing

Schereschewsky had a remarkable gift for languages. During his three years in Shanghai (1859–1862) he learned Shanghainese, Mandarin (the national language) and Classical Chinese. When the Convention of Peking was signed and Beijing was opened to foreigners, he immediately asked to go to Beijing. He lived there for 12 years (1862–1874). His evangelistic work bore little fruit: in nine years he baptized only three Chinese. In 1864, however, he and several other missionaries (Joseph Edkins, John Shaw Burdon, Henry Blodget and W. A. P. Martin) formed the Peking Translation Committee and began translating the Bible into Peking Mandarin. Because he was proficient in Hebrew, he was chiefly responsible for the Old Testament. The Peking Mandarin New Testament was completed in 1872 and the Peking Mandarin Old Testament in 1874. In 1878 the British and Foreign Bible Society published the Old and New Testaments together as the complete Peking Mandarin Bible. This was the first Bible in Peking Mandarin, forty years earlier than the later Mandarin Union Version. In 1868, in Beijing, he married the English woman missionary Susan M. Waring (1837–1909); they later had a son and a daughter.

Bishop and St. John's College

In 1875 Schereschewsky planned to found a college in China, so he returned to the United States to raise funds. On October 31, 1877, at Grace Church in Manhattan, New York City, he was consecrated Missionary Bishop of Shanghai of the Episcopal Church. Then, as Bishop of Shanghai, he went to London in July 1878 to attend the Lambeth Conference of the worldwide Anglican Communion.

After returning to Shanghai, Schereschewsky merged two existing Episcopal schools, Peiya School (培雅书院) and Du'en School (度恩书院), and began preparations for Saint John's College. In 1879 Bishop Schereschewsky chose a plot of 84 mu of land at a bend of Suzhou Creek in the western suburbs. The land was part of a private garden bought in 1864 by H. Fogg, the British merchant and head (taipan) of H. Fogg & Co.; Jessfield Road had already been built, giving access to Jing'an Temple. On April 14, 1879 (the day after Easter), the foundation-laying ceremony was held. In September of the same year St. John's College opened with ten teachers (half American, half Chinese) and 62 students. Teaching was in Mandarin and Shanghainese, and students studied theology, Western learning and Chinese learning. The college offered a six-year course, divided into preparatory, theological and college divisions.

Illness and the Wenli Bible

The American Episcopal Church later concentrated its missionary work in China in the middle reaches of the Yangtze River. In the summer of 1881 Bishop Schereschewsky went to inspect the church's work in that region. On August 12, because of the extreme heat in Wuchang, he suffered severe heatstroke and convulsions and lay unconscious for several days. On August 23 he returned to Shanghai by boat to recuperate. Afterwards he gradually became paralysed: he had difficulty moving his limbs, and even his speech was affected. In 1882 he went to Switzerland for treatment. In 1883 he resigned as a bishop of the American Episcopal Church. In 1886 he returned to the United States, where he lived for 9 years. F. L. Hawks Pott (卜舫济) took over as head of St. John's College. During this period Schereschewsky translated the Old and New Testaments into Classical Chinese, known as the Schereschewsky Wenli Version. After he became paralysed he could move only two fingers, so the Bible he translated with them is also called the "Two-Finger" Wenli Bible.

In 1895 Schereschewsky and his wife returned to Shanghai once more. Because printing in Japan was more efficient, the couple moved to Tokyo in 1897. His retranslated Mandarin New Testament and Old Testament were printed in Tokyo in 1898–1899, and his Easy Wenli Old and New Testaments in 1902. After that he began preparing an edition with cross-references and notes. On October 15, 1906, Schereschewsky died of diabetes at the age of 75.