SUNDA ISLANDS 



5627 



SUNDAY SCHOOLS 



1916 (Federal estimate). The area is about 

 two square miles. 



SUN 'DA ISLANDS, two groups of islands 

 in the Malay Archipelago, extending from the 

 Malay Peninsula to the Moluccas. The Great 

 Sunda Islands consist of Sumatra, Java, Bor- 

 neo, Celebes, Banka and Belliton; the Little 

 Sunda Islands being Bali, Lombok, Sumbawa', 

 Flores, Sumba and Timor. With the exception 

 of part of Borneo, they are under Dutch rule. 

 The Sunda Strait separates Java and Sumatra, 

 both of which suffered terrible effects from the 

 eruption of Krakatoa in 1883. The Sunda Is- 

 lands are extremely productive and carry on a 

 large commerce in spices, fruits, copra, rice, 

 coffee, cocoa, tobacco and sugar. 



SUN DANCE, a religious ceremony once 

 practiced by the Plains Indian tribes of North 

 America, but now almost unknown. In most 

 places it has been suppressed by the United 

 States government, because of the fearful tor- 

 tures that sometimes accompanied it. The cere- 

 mony was held once a year in summer or early 

 autumn, and usually lasted eight days, the first 

 three or four being devoted to preliminary rites. 

 Each tribe had its special reason for organiz- 

 ing the dance, but it was always believed to 

 benefit the tribe. Sometimes it was held in ful- 

 filment of a vow made to the sun god. The 

 members of the tribe would arrange their te- 

 pees around a central medicine lodge, with an 

 opening toward the rising sun. In the center of 

 the lodge was a pole, toward which the partici- 

 pants, who were stripped and painted, danced. 

 The rites accompanying the ceremony were 

 often very elaborate, and in all cases they had 

 a special meaning. 



SUN 'DAY, among Christian nations the 

 first day of the week, the day set apart for 

 rest and public worship of the Deity. Among 

 the old Teutonic peoples it was originally sa- 

 cred to the sun, and its name has remained 

 unchanged. Among the Latin nations, how- 

 ever, it became known as the Lord's Day, dies 

 dominicus, from which the modern names di- 

 manche (French), domingo (Italian), domenica 

 (Spanish), etc., are derived. 



In the earliest days of the Christian Era, the 

 status of the Christians was such that they had 

 to work every day in the week, and there is 

 no evidence that Sunday was at first regarded 

 as a day of general rest. It was, however, set 

 apart for worship. About the middle of the 

 second century the Church fathers began to 

 discuss the question of forbidding work on Sun- 

 day, but it was not until the fourth century 



that Church and State officially recognized the 

 day as a day of rest. Most of the states of the 

 United States, the provinces of Canada, and 

 Christian nations in all parts of the world now 

 have laws regulating or prohibiting Sunday 

 labor. 



SUNDAY, WILLIAM ASHLEY (1863- ), an 

 evangelist and former baseball player who is 

 known throughout the United States as "Billy" 

 Sunday. He was born in Ames, Iowa. His 

 father was killed in the War of Secession be- 

 fore William was born, and a part of his child- 

 hood was spent in a soldiers' home in Iowa. 

 He went to high school and to Northwestern 

 University for a time, but he never completed 

 his college course. From 1883 until 1890 he 

 played baseball on the Chicago, Pittsburgh and 

 Philadelphia teams of the National League. He 

 was a first-class player, one of the best in the 

 United States in his time, and twenty-four 

 years after leaving the diamond, at the end of 

 an eleven-weeks' religious campaign in Phila- 

 delphia, he could still bat a "homer" and run 

 the bases in sixteen seconds. 



After his conversion Sunday served as assist- 

 ant secretary of the Y. M. C. A. in Chicago 

 (1891-1895). In 1903 he was ordained a Pres- 

 byterian minister, but he had begun his evan- 

 gelistic work in 1896. He preaches the gospel 

 of clean living, and has won followers by the 

 thousands. Billy Sunday's amazing success is 

 difficult to explain, but his methods are easy 

 to criticize. His enemies are many; his lan- 

 guage has been called "billingsgate;" his reli- 

 gious meetings have been termed "vaudeville 

 stunts." But this is unfair. For, although his 

 speech is slangy and crude, it is not vulgar, and 

 there is something so vital, so human, so genu- 

 ine about the man that people are irresistibly 

 drawn to him. The religion he preaches is the 

 sort that would appeal to the average Ameri- 

 can, for it is the simple doctrine of content- 

 ment, of living honestly, paying one's debts, 

 of being faithful to home and family and of 

 standing for community brotherhood and the 

 common good. 



SUNDAY SCHOOLS, or BIBLE SCHOOLS. 

 When the international convention of Sunday 

 Schools met at Zurich, Switzerland, in 1913, 

 statistics for the world were compiled. It was 

 found that there were at that time over 310,- 

 057 Sunday Schools in operation in Europe, 

 Asia, Africa, the Americas and Oceania, and 

 that they had a combined enrolment of over 

 27,000,000 pupils. (These figures do not include 

 the 2,850,000 in Roman Catholic schools.) The 



