George Leslie Mackay

Mackay was born in Embro, Zorra Township, Oxford County, Canada West (now Ontario), Canada. He received his theological training at Knox College in Toronto, Princeton Seminary in the United States, and New College, Edinburgh in Scotland, all Presbyterian institutions.

Original building of the Oxford University College founded by Mackay in Tamsui, Taiwan. Now named Aletheia University, the school administers a museum devoted to Mackay artifacts.

In 1871 Mackay became the first foreign missionary to be commissioned by the Canada Presbyterian Church (predecessor of both the Presbyterian Church in Canada and the United Church of Canada), arriving in Taiwan on New Year's Eve, 31 December 1871.

After consulting with Dr. James Laidlaw Maxwell Sr., a medical doctor serving as a Presbyterian Church of England missionary to southern Formosa (1865), Mackay arrived at Tamsui, northern Formosa in 1872, which remained his home until his death in 1901. Starting with an itinerant dentistry practice amongst the lowland aborigines,[1] he later established churches, schools and a hospital practicing Western biomedicine.

Mackay learned to speak vernacular Taiwanese fluently and married "Minnie" Tiu (張聰明; Tiuⁿ Chhang-miâ), a native Taiwanese woman. The marriage produced three children:

• Mary "Tan" Mackay
• Bella "Koa" Mackay
• George William Mackay

Mackay was described by Rev. William Campbell, a contemporary missionary, as

...a little man, firm and active, of few words, unflinching courage, and one whose sound common sense is equalled only by his earnest devotion to the Master. [...] During the first year of his stay at Tamsui, he began an educational and evangelistic training movement among the young men who came about him, and this has been greatly blessed throughout that northern part of the Island.[1]

Mackey evangelised and planted a church in Tamsui. He went on to launch more churches, including what is today the Lanyang Presbyterian Church in Yilan County, Taiwan. Churches planted in north Taiwan by Mackay later became part of the Northern Synod of the present Presbyterian Church in Taiwan.

In 1896, after the 1895 establishment of Japanese colonial rule in Taiwan, Mackay met with the Japanese Governor-General of Formosa, Maresuke Nogi. Some families in Taiwan today, particularly of lowland-aboriginal Kavalan ancestry, trace their surname '偕' ('Kai' or 'Kay') to their family's conversion to Christianity by Mackay.

In Canada Mackay was honoured during his two furloughs home by the Canadian Church. In 1880, Queen's College in Kingston, Ontario awarded him an honorary Doctor of Divinity, presented by Principal George Monro Grant and Chancellor Sandford Fleming. Before departing in 1881, he returned to Oxford County, where monies were raised to start Oxford College in Taiwan, which would be the basis for two later educational institutions, Aletheia University and Taiwan Seminary. A number of young people in the county were inspired to follow Mackay's example and entered into missionary service with a number of Christian denominations.

Mackay monument in Taiwan at Tamsui.

In June 1894, at the General Assembly meeting in St. John, New Brunswick, Mackay was elected Moderator of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, the highest elected position in the church. He spent the following Moderatoral year travelling across Canada, as well as writing From Far Formosa: the island, its people and missions, a missionary ethnography and memoir of his missionary experiences.

In 1894 he spoke out against the head tax imposed on Chinese immigrants to Canada. As moderator of the Presbyterian church, he broke precedent to speak in favor of a resolution opposing this tax, saying it was unjust and racist.[2]

Although Mackay suffered from meningitis and malaria in his lifetime, he would die of throat cancer on 2 June 1901 in Tamsui. He was interred in Tamsui, Taiwan, in a small cemetery in the eastern corner of the Tamkang Middle School campus. His son was interred adjacent to him.[3]

A sculpture at Aletheia University displays the text of Proverbs 9.10 in Mandarin and romanised Taiwanese.

In Taiwan's modern democratic period Mackay's life has been celebrated by advocates of a distinctive Taiwanese identity and historical understanding separate from colonial narratives brought by Japan and China. The system of phonetic romanisation he and his collaborators developed for writing Taiwan's Hokkien language is still in use.

Mackay's From Far Formosa is considered an important early missionary ethnography of Taiwan. It provides a valuable source document for understanding the culture and customs of the people of Taiwan during Mackay's lifetime.

Mackay was as fascinated by the cultures and habitat he found in Taiwan as he was hostile to anything he regarded as idolatry. Mackay spoke approvingly, for example, of his converts' destruction of religious objects they had previously held sacred. Of his rustic apartment in an aboriginal village, Mackay wrote:

To that place the cast-off machinery of idolatry was brought, and more than once I dried my clothes before fires made of idolatrous paper, idols, and ancestral tablets. Three men were employed to carry other paraphernalia of idol-worship to the museum in Tamsui.[4]

Yet beyond matters of religion Mackay proved an enthusiastic collector of artefacts and specimens of flora and fauna. Many items collected by Mackay are today housed at the Royal Ontario Museum (Ontario, Canada) and the Aletheia University Museum (Tamsui, Taiwan). James Rohrer, missionary historian, states that Mackay, "allowed himself to truly encounter and to be transformed by the people he sought to serve."[5]

Visual Art and Media

Mackay monument in Canada at Woodstock, Ontario.

On 30 June 2004, a large bust statue of George Leslie Mackay was dedicated outside the Oxford County offices in Woodstock, Ontario. The delegation from Taiwan in attendance included representatives from the Aletheia University and the Presbyterian Church in Taiwan. The event was also attended by representatives of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, the United Church of Canada, local, regional, and national Canadian dignitaries, and a number of Mackay descendants from across North America. One of his grandchildren is Dr. John Ross Mackay.

In November 2006, a Canadian Television documentary was aired titled The Black Bearded Barbarian of Taiwan. It was broadcast in both Mandarin and English on OMNI 2 as part of their Signature Series.

George William Mackay (born 22 January 1882 – 20 July 1963) was a Canadian missionary in Taiwan, son of George Leslie Mackay, and father of J. Ross Mackay.[6][7] Mackay's Chinese name is 偕叡廉; it is from his father's first name 偕.

He was born in Tamsui, Taiwan and grew up there until 13. He then returned to Toronto with his father. He graduated from Clark University with a Master's degree in Education Management. In 1948 he received an honorary doctorate in theology from Knox College.

Mackay may have died in Canada or possibly in Taiwan, where he may have been buried in Tamsui at the Mackay family's tomb next to Tamkang Junior High.[6] The tomb may have since been removed.[8]

Memorials include:

• Memorial Park[9]
• Memorial Church[10]

• J. Ross Mackay (born 1915), his grandson
• Reverend Thomas Barclay, missionary to Taiwan
• Mackay Memorial Hospital
• Mackay Medical College
• Mackay Medicine, Nursing and Management College
• Aletheia University

• Mackay, George L. (1895). Macdonald, James A. (ed.). From Far Formosa: the island, its people and missions. New York: F. H. Revell Co. (published 1896). OCLC 855518794.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Mackay, George L. (1900) [1895]. Macdonald, James A. (ed.). From Far Formosa: the island, its people and missions. Edinburgh and London: Oliphant, Anderson and Ferrier. hdl:2027/miun.ajl0516.0001.001. OCLC 607730510.

• The First Taiwanese Opera "Mackay: The Black Bearded Bible Man", in the website of National Theater and Concert Hall, Taipei
• Full text of The Black-Bearded Barbarian: the life of George Leslie Mackay of Formosa by Marian Keith, from Project Gutenberg
• "Reverend George Leslie Mackay, 1844-1901" from Ontario Heritage Trust
• Aletheia University official website
• "Aborigines Saved Yet Again: Settler Nationalism and Hero Narratives in a 2001 Exhibition of Taiwan Aboriginal Artefacts" by Mark Munsterhjelm, MA Thesis, Indigenous Governance Program, University of Victoria, Canada.
• "Tourism Oxford, (Oxford County, Ontario, Canada) Colourful Characters; Rev. George Leslie Mackay 1844-1901."
• "Biography at the Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online"
• "To Taiwan With The Gospel - George Leslie Mackay"