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Additional ResourcesCHAPTER 1: EASTER IN HOPEDALEClick on a section:
IntroductionIf you used the time traveller once more and followed me into the Moravian community of Hopedale on Labrador's north coast in 1804, you would witness some exciting religious events. Christian Inuit and Moravian missionaries have lived here together now for 22 years. The Moravian missionaries were European Christians who came to teach the gospel to the Inuit. They first settled in Nain in 1771, but quickly found out that they could not stay in one place. The Inuit moved according to hunting and fishing needs, so the Moravians had to move, too. They established two more communities north and south of Nain: Okak (1776) and Hopedale (1782). Before the establishment of Makkovik in 1896, Hopedale was the southernmost Moravian community, located near an old Inuit whaling site, called Agvituk (or Arvertok), "place of the whales." The map below, published at the beginning of the 20th century by the Moravian missionary organization Society for the Furtherance of the Gospel, shows all Moravian communities established by missionaries in Labrador from 1771 to 1904. At the top is a summer scene, with a seal basking in the sun at the water's edge and, to the right, the Moravian missionary vessel, the Harmony . The bottom shows a winter scene, with snowshoes, harnessed sled dogs and, to the right, snow houses.
Click here to view a larger image. Fig. 1: Moravian Mission Stations in Labrador
Click here to view a larger image.
Fig. 2: 1782 Mission House at Hopedale with meeting hall (front
three centre windows)
Revival at Hopedale, 1804Here at Hopedale a great revival took place in 1804, which spread also to Nain and Okak. A revival is a reawakening, or resurgence of religious belief. On Easter Sunday 1804 people knew that something remarkable had happened in their community. It all began when some women came to believe that their religious commitment had been only a show for others, rather than a changed life of faith. One woman later recalled a moment in church when, listening to the story of Jesus' suffering and death, she realized personally the significance of his death on the cross. She became so aware of Jesus' suffering and death for her that she forgot everything and everyone around her. She found herself all alone in the meeting room in the mission house long after the other churchgoers had left. She then witnessed to other Inuit women. "The saviour is mine too," she declared. "He removed even my sins and received me as his child. This I now feel in my heart, and I am grateful and ashamed."
Literacy as a Factor in the RevivalLiteracy, the ability to read and write, seems to have been important to the revival in Hopedale. Before the missionaries came, the Inuit language, Inuktitut, was only a spoken language. The missionaries gave it a written form and started printing books in that language. Schools for children started in Nain and Hopedale as early as 1780, and children had been taught regularly in Hopedale since 1783, only one year after the Moravians' arrival. The first two Inuktitut books to be printed were a primer, published in 1790, and an extract from a Harmony of the Gospels , published in 1800. A primer is a textbook used to teach children to read, and a Harmony is the story of Jesus' life, woven together from the four Gospel accounts. Figure 3 shows the title page of the Inuktitut Harmony extract. It described the week in the life of Jesus during which he died on the cross. This week is also called Passion Week, because of Christ's suffering. It was that book that young and old read fervently at Hopedale. A missionary wrote back to Germany that in 1801 for the children of Hopedale, "the printed history of the passion week, as extracted from the Harmony of the Four Gospels, is a welcome present to them. This is the first printed Eskimo book that they read, and will no doubt prove a great means of blessing to young and old. Those that have learned to read, are very much delighted to be able to read it to the rest of the people in the house." Also in 1803, prior to the revival, several of the young people reportedly were reading "with fluency in the printed history of our Saviour's sufferings, extracted from the four Evangelists."
Fig. 3: Passion Narrative, published in Inuktitut in 1800
Eventually many women, children, and men were moved as they had never been moved before. Some felt that they could now endure the hardship of their lives much better and stand the meagre food of that winter. "When we feel in our heart the saviour, who has loved us so much and died for our sins and shed his blood and blesses us with his beloved nearness," one Inuit hunter exclaimed, "we can be quite happy and content, even though we may lack in external things, yet we trust him that he will care for us in that regard."
Easter 1804In 1804 people attended the Easter festivities with renewed enthusiasm. For the Hopedale Inuit, Easter was not only the most important date in the Christian calendar, it also marked the time that that many of them would leave the community for their hunting grounds. The Hopedale diaries, in which the missionaries recorded day by day what happened in the community, allow us to look in on events of 1804. The entries for Easter are summarized below.
Reverend Peacock was the Moravian Superintendent in Labrador from 1930s until the1970s. He was deeply moved by the Easter Services that he attended and wrote the following words about them:
Fig. 4: Moravian Choir from Nain, Labrador, ca. 1880s Unity Archives
Fig. 5: Hopedale brass band of 1919 Unity Archives
God's Acre and the Hope of Resurrection
Click here to view a larger image. Fig. 6: Oldest graveyard at Hopedale Hans Rollmann
The cemetery had a special significance tied to the death and resurrection of Jesus. If you follow me into this old cemetery, which today is marked off by a pine fence, past a protruding rock toward the eastern end of the graveyard, you will see, nearly hidden in the grass, a row of stone slabs. Some are clearly readable. The inscription on others has almost been erased by the relentless wind. If you look more closely, you will notice German names and words on most of the stones. On one marker you can clearly read the name Johann Schneider. The German text tells us that he was born in Zauchenthal in Moravia in 1713 and died at Hopedale on 21 October 1785, just three years after the founding of this Moravian settlement. A little to the right, but in a separate section with other women, is the grave of his wife Elisabeth, née Ertel. She survived him by 12 years. She was also born in Moravia, in Bodenwalde, on 21 March 1721. Elisabeth refused to leave Labrador after her husband's death and was buried in the same resting place. In 1771 the two had belonged to the party that established Nain, the first permanent Moravian settlement in Labrador. The couple also pioneered at Okak and finally, at an already advanced age, helped establish Hopedale. Elisabeth made friends with Inuit women and had an especially close relationship with them.
Click here to view a larger image. Fig. 7: Grave of Johann Schneider, Hopedale Hans Rollmann
Johann Schneider was the first person to be buried in the Hopedale graveyard. In the church records, he is listed as "the first seed in hope of a joyous resurrection." The imagery of the body as a seed fits well with the name that Moravians used for their graveyards: God's Acre. The name goes back to imagery used by the Apostle Paul when speaking of the resurrection: The body that is sown is perishable; it is raised imperishable (1 Cor. 15:42). Because of this hope, funerals for Moravians were upbeat and happy occasions, with songs of praise, scripture readings, and singing, and sometimes a band playing. Portions of a person's biography would often be read at the funeral, as a witness to their Christian life.
Click here to view a larger image. Fig. 8: Grave of Elisabeth Schneider, Hopedale Hans Rollmann
Moravian graveyards differed from those of other Christian churches in how the graves were arranged. Families were not buried together, husbands with wives, parents with children. Instead, there were separate sections for the married men and widowers, the married women and widows, the single men and boys, and the single women and girls. While you can still see these groupings in the old Moravian graveyards at Hopedale and Nain, burials today no longer follow this practice. But on Easter morning the Moravians of Labrador do still gather for traditional sunrise services in church and afterwards in their graveyards, where they celebrate Christ's resurrection as the foundation of hope for their own resurrection.
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