Hendrik Kraemer

1888-1965. Educator, ecumenist, and writer on missions. After specializing in oriental languages and cultures in his native Netherlands, the Bible Society of that land sent him to serve the Dutch Reformed Church in Indonesia from 1922 to 1937, as a linguistics and Bible translation consultant. His most famous book, The Christian Message in a Non-Christian World, written as a study guide for the third World Missionary Conference at Tambaram* in 1938, emphasized the uniqueness of the biblical message in missions. From 1937 he was professor of religion in the University of Leyden, until in 1948 he became the first director of the Ecumenical Institute of the World Council of Churches at Bossey, near Geneva. He was interned by the Nazis from 1942 to 1943. From 1955 to 1957 he was visiting professor at Union Seminary, New York, and thereafter lived in Holland until his death.