Andrew Murray

1828-1917. South African Dutch Reformed leader. Born at Graaff Reinet, he was educated in Scotland and Holland, then ordained in 1848. He served in Bloemfontein (1850-60), Worcester (1860-64), Cape Town (1864-71), and Wellington (1871-1906), and was six times moderator of the DRC in the Cape Colony. Theologically conservative, he led the opposition to liberalism in the DRC during the 1860s. Mystically inclined, he was greatly influenced by William Law* and led a profound devotional life. He undertook frequent evangelistic tours in South Africa and addressed the Keswick and Northfield conventions in 1895. He wrote much for the spiritual guidance of converts, and initiated the Bible and Prayer Union, the holiness conventions, and the Student Christian Association. His interest in education issued inter alia in the Huguenot Seminary (1874) and the Mission Institute at Wellington (1877). He was the moving spirit in the missionary awakening which led to DRC missions in the Transvaal and Malawi, and he also supported the South Africa General Mission. The most famous of his 250 publications was Abide in Christ, which appeared in numerous translations. Murray was the most influential leader of his own church in the nineteenth century, and an evangelical Christian of international stature.

See J. du Plessis, The Life of Andrew Murray (1919).