TH E K I N G ’ S B U S I N E S S
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We Are the Dead
By GEORGE M. COWAN
to an end a race, a people—the Cuitla- teco Indians of Guerrero. ‘‘Territoria Inexplorada” We sat and talked together, and as bit by bit she recalled almost for gotten fragments of the past, we pieced together a picture of the Cuit- lateco people as they had once been. How many millenniums must be turned back to find their beginnings? No one knows. The pyramids that dot their land and the stone idols that still lie buried beneath the drifting sand of Southwestern Guerrero—a region which to this day is still largely unexplored—have not yet yielded 'to the archaeologist any story they may contain Qf the puitlateco race. Before the beginning of the six teenth century, however, they were already a sturdy race, numbering in to thousands upon thousands, dwell ing along the Pacific Coast some where in' the general region of Acapulco. With the discovery of the
known past. In April of 1943 ONLY FIFTEEN COULD BE FOUND, AND OF THESE THE YOUNGEST WAS IN HIS SEVENTIES. Once a living race with a living language, now they were gone and their voices spoke no more. Children no longer learned the tongue of their forefathers. To all but two, dona Constancia and hej sister Amada, the Cuitlateeo language was but a strangely familiar yet largely forgotten memory of the days of their .earliest childhood. Dona Constancia, embodying for us somehow a whole race, a once strong and virile race, a race that was no more, seemed more Of the past than of the present. As she talked along, one by one we drew out from her thg words of her mother tongue, those imprinted first on the pages of hef memory, those that still spoke clear est and dearest to her heart. Strange they were and difficult for our tongues, but not for hers. As the days went by, she came and came again until finally we were
"NOW Is the day of salvation" (2 Cor. 6:2). , I DON’T want to be buried in a box. Them boxes are heavy things. I want my own clothes. Thus dona C o n s t a n c i a - voiced perhaps as profound a piece of philo sophy as she ever had uttered during the course of her almost eighty years. As she sat on the low stone ledge of the patio porch at the post office in San Miguel Totolapam, Guerrero, Me x i c o , calloused, disease-blotched feet sticking out from a dirty skirt, puffing vigorously on a crude, smelly,/ corn-husk cigarette, her quick, off hand repartee and her active, restless body;contradicted her great age. Yet her face, so tanned and eroded by the years of exposure to blistering sun and wind-whipped sand, arid her hair; so streaked with gray,, only served to confirm it. She was an interesting and amus ing character in her own right. She was an historic and tragic figure in- what she symbolized. With her came
Sad eyes which said: “ For us is no provision,
Suddenly, before my inward, waking vision
“ Give us your Saviour too.
Millions of faces crowded up to view,
able haltingly, ever so haltingly, yet none the less intelligibly, to read to her ,J6hn 3:16 in her own language. We had told her the gospel story in Spanish, but it seemed somewhat re mote and foreign to her. But when we read it to her in her own mother tongue and asked her whéther now she understood the message of God’s Word more clearly, she quiftkly, and in her own inimitable offhand way replied: “And why not? Walk along with you—of course I da!” Translated— -But Too Late! Oh, the tragedy of it! Born, lived, and died, a whole race of people, and never once did they hear, in their own language, the language that alone could speak directly to their hearts, never once did they hear the story
Western World by Columbus and the consequent conquest of Mexico by the Spanish “conquistadores,” Cuitlateeo culture underwent a radical change. As the conquest spread, they moved northward across the barren, desolate mountains and valleys, u n t i l they came to the banks of the Rio Balsas. Here they came, tumpline on fore head, pack on back, trudging the weary miles. Here they sweated and toiled under the burning sun as they sought to eke from the hot, dry plains their livelihood. Here they practiced their witchcraft and paid their hom age to the only gods they, knew, idols of wood and stone. Here they died, and here they, buried their dead. When their decline began and how long they lingered no one knows. By the nir-^eenth century they were a decadent race. By the twentieth they were but a name, a part of the lin-
THE WYCUFFE BIBLE TRANSLA TORS, INC.: The author is now en gaged in translation work among the 55,000 Mazatecos in Oaxaca, Mexico, under the Wycliiie Bible Translators. This group is a movement raised up by God for the giving of His Word to the unreached tribes in the over looked corners of the globe. Already some 52 tribes in Mexico have trans lators with them, and the organization is penetrating into the unevangelized regions of South America. Each sum mer a linguistic institute is held (Bacone, Okla., and Briercrest, Sasic., Can.) where missionaries of any and all evangelical boards may receive basic instruction }n the' sciences of linguistics. For postwar missionary opportunities, the advantage of this linguistic training is immeasurable. Home office is located at 1305 North Louise St., Glendale 7, California.
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