By Steve Bishop

(Disclaimer: The views expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of GodandMath.com. Guest articles are sought after for the purpose of bringing more diverse viewpoints to the topics of mathematics and theology. The point is to foster discussion. To this end respectful and constructive comments are highly encouraged.)

Henry Martyn 1781-1812

 Henry Martyn was first wrangler in mathematics at Cambridge (top scholar of the the year). He was elected as a fellow of St John’s College.

After hearing the Anglican preacher Charles Simeon on William Carey and his sacrifice, Martyn he gave up an academic career and chose to go overseas as a missionary to India and Persia.

Martyn was born in Truro, Cornwall to a mine agent. He was educated first at Truro Grammar school and then at St John’s Cambridge.  After hearing about Carey and reading of David Brainard. He was ordained in 1832 and went on to become Simeon’s curate at Holy Trinity, Cambridge.

He had intended to work as an overseas missionary for the CMS, but for financial reasons he had to take a paid role as chaplain to the British East Indies company. He arrived in India in 1806. One of the first things he did on arriving was to visit William Carey at Serampore. Carey was impressed by Martyn and is alleged to have said that “where Martyn went no other missionary would be needed” (Pouncy 1920). Martyn made his way on to Dinapur and then in 1809 to Cawnpore.

All the while he was in India he utilized his mathematics skills as a linguist and translated the New Testament into Urdu and Persian.

He set sail for Bombay in 1811. He then sailed to Shiraz in Iran. In Iran he became unwell and intended to travel to Constantinople for a more agreeable climate. Sadly, at the age of 31 he died in 1812 at Topkat in Armenia on his way to Constantinople.

Martyn’s life has been an inspiration for many Christians and his name lives on with the work of the Henry Martyn Centre in Cambridge.

 References

Pouncy, A. G. 1920 Henry Martyn 1781-1812: The first modern apostle to the Mohammedan Great Churchmen vol 9. Church Book Room Press

Further resources

There have been a number of biographies including:

Bentley-Taylor, David. 1975. My Love Must Wait: the Story of Henry Martyn, Leicester: IVP.

Henry, B. V. 2003. Forsaking All for Christ: A Biography of Henry Martyn London: Chapter Two Padwick, Constance. 1953. Henry Martyn: Confessor of the Faith, Inter-Varsity Fellowship: London

Page, Jesse 2003. Henry Martyn: Pioneer Missionary to India and Islam Ambassador publications

Pouncy, A. G. 1920 Henry Martyn 1781-1812: The first modern apostle to the Mohammedan Great Churchmen vol 9. Church Book Room Press

Sargent, John 2010 (original 1819) Memoir of the Rev. Henry Martyn, B.D: Late Fellow of St. John’s College, Cambridge, and Chaplain to the Honourable East India Company (Cambridge Library Collection – Religion)

Previous Entries in this Series:

• Stokes
• Salmon
• Venn
• Riemann
• Cauchy
• Babbage
• Hamilton
• Bayes
• Nightingale
• Pascal
• Leibniz
• Euler

By Steve Bishop

(Disclaimer: The views expressed by guest authors do not necessarily reflect those of GodandMath.com. Guest articles are sought after for the purpose of bringing more diverse viewpoints to the topics of mathematics and theology. The point is to foster discussion. To this end respectful and constructive comments are highly encouraged.)

George Stokes (1819-1903)

George Gabriel Stokes (1819-1903) was born in a rectory in Skreen, Ireland. He was the son of an evangelical rector, Revd Gabriel Stokes, and the youngest of six children. All three of his elder brothers became vicars.

Stokes attended schools in Skreen, Dublin and Bristol.  He graduated in mathematics from Pembroke College, Cambridge in 1841 and remained at Cambridge until his death in 1903.

He was appointed Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge in 1849. A position previously held by Isaac Barrow, Isaac Newton and Charles Babbage among others. He did much to restore the tradition of mathematical physics in Cambridge. He helped develop the now highly prestigious Cavendish Laboratory. He held the Lucasian chair for 54 years.

He was secretary (1854-1885) and then president (1885-1890) of the Royal Society.

He was an applied mathematician who worked in the area of fluid dynamics (hydrostatics), but also did work on light.

He gave his name to the following:

• Stokes’ law
• Stokes’ theorem
• Stokes line
• Stokes number
• Stokes relations
• Stokes shift and
• Navier–Stokes equations

Craters on the moon and on Mars have also been named after him.

Stokes was a life long friend and correspondent with physicist and fellow Christian Lord Kelvin (William Thompson).

According to Josipa Petrunic:

“Stokes argued mathematics was, and always would be, secondary to physical experimentation in terms of developing scientific knowledge. While math could help describe and formalize our observations, he claimed, it alone could not prove anything about the various phenomena we observe.” Petrunic (nd)

In 1886 Stokes became the president of the evangelical organization the Victoria Institute (VI) and was vice president of the Evangelical British and Foreign Bible Society and active in the Church Missionary Society. One aim of the VI was:

To investigate fully and impartially the most important questions of Philosophy and Science, but more especially those that bear upon the great truths revealed in Holy Scripture, with the view of defending these truths against the oppositions of Science, falsely so called.

The VI was founded in 1865 and published The Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute from 1867. It is still published under the new title of Faith and Thought. Stokes contributed several articles (see below) to the journal.

He delivered the 1891-93 Gifford lectures on the topic of natural theology. In it he contrasted the idea of divine design with materialism. He maintained that materialism is unable to explain certain phenomena such as the law of gravitation.

References

Petrunic, Josipa (no date) “George Stokes” http://www.giffordlectures.org/Author.asp?AuthorID=160

Articles by Stokes in JTVI

“On the bearings of the Study of Natural Science, etc., on our Religious Ideas,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 14 (1880): 227-248

“On the bearings of the Study of Natural Science, etc., on our Religious Ideas,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 14 (1880): 227-248.

“Annual Address,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 20 (1888):10-15.

“The One Origin of the Books of Revelation and of Nature,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 22 (1890): 11-23.

“The Luminiferous Ether. Annual Meeting,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 28 (1896): 89-103.

“Perception of Light. Annual Address,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 29 (1897): 11-24.

“Rontgen Rays. Annual Address, 1896,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 30 (1898): 13-28.

“Perception of Colour. Annual Address, 1897,” Journal of the Transactions of the Victoria Institute 31 (1899): 254-259.

Further resources

George Gabriel Stokes (1893). Natural theology: The Gifford lectures, delivered before the University of Edinburgh in 1893. Adamant Media Corporation. Available online here: http://www.giffordlectures.org/Browse.asp?PubID=TPNATT&Volume=0&Issue=0&TOC=TRUE

David Wilson, David (1984) A physicist’s alternative to materialism: the religious thought of George Gabriel Stokes. Victorian Studies, 28:69-96, Autumn 1984.

David Wilson, David (1987) Kelvin and Stokes: A Comparative Study in Victorian Physics. Adam Hilger, 1987.

 

Previous Entries in this Series:

• Salmon
• Venn
• Riemann
• Cauchy
• Babbage
• Hamilton
• Bayes
• Nightingale
• Pascal
• Leibniz
• Euler