p ^ >> 0 •H 1 O t ' •H o "o c >^ q r •P* * ti LO •H 'O -c! fs <x ;>j c y-, c a- c\i CT- £., rf o f^ -p t; ^-J -P 4-1 rj O £ c C -p H o C_, ;_• ^ a c: •H -.-i -P f_j O is; o P"H f-i £j -(-' i—1 <<J tc f_, Pi •— I •H t - j^ o O C •H C O C2 o (— • •r-i J> §^ 02 a; C K CH s EH "H 0 D liyr u. I S E il IK I 0 II Y 111T TIIr 2 HI The Missionary Activity of the Ancient Kestorian Church. Tablo of Contents. Page. Chapters. Introduction. I Its Missionary Centre - The Church in Persia. 5 II Contriuutin£ Factors in Kestorian Missionary Activity. Persecution - Monasticism. 17 III Kestorianinm in Arabia 45 IV Expansion in Central and Eastern Asia 66 V Syrian Christians of South V/est India 83 VI Kestorian Missionary Activity in Further Asia 105 VII Kestorian Sino-Syriac Monument at Hsi-an-fu and the spread of Christianity in China and Japan 130 VIII Semiryechensk Cemetry Inscriptions 153 IX Factors in Kestorian Decadence - Persecution - Deception - Compromise. 167 X Additional Factors in Kestorian Decadence Extermination "by Mongols and Tamerlane- Absorption "by Roman Catholicism. 197 XI By-products of Kestorianism. 227 XII Conclusion 237 Appendix A. The Kame. 244 Bibliography. i* 2- Intr o rlvi.c t i on«_ "Their sound went into all the eart?i and their words unto the ends of the world" (Rom.X. 18). '.There can we find a more accurate description of the mipnionary activity of the 'church of the east' - the so called Hestorian Church. It is frequently assumed that until the nineteenth century the gospel had not "been carried to riany parts of Asia, and countries such as Afghpjiistan, Tibet and Hepaul are spoken of as lands still closed to the gospel Message, the assumption "being that this has always "been so. Sometimes it has "been asked what would have happened had St. Paul, instead of turning his attention to Macedonia and Europe, gone to the east, implying that Europe was specially favoured as compared with the continent of Asia. I-Iost people are aware that a strong Christian church existed in 3forth Africa in the early centuries, "but that there WP.S a church in the east in no way inferior to the churches of the west, a church that carried its witness to the furthest confines of Asia, is not so generally known. This may "be due partly to the mistaken impression that the world empire of Rome dominated the whole/and that outside the. range of its operations there was nothing of any importance to record. The territory of the Roman empire lay mainly in Europe and in that part of Asia to the west of the Kuphratus, ?>ut to the east of the Euphratus, at the very time when Rome was at the zenith of its power, there existed an empire, first under the Parthian Arsacids and later under the Persian Sassanians - the sixth and seventh of Rawlinson's great Oriental monarchies - which rivalled that of Rome both in extent and power. It extended to and included a considerable part of modern India 2 and was the, only empire able successfully to withstand Ronan aggression. A second reason why so little is kno;v>,of the 'church of the east 1 is that when the Mohammedan delude swept over Asia., especially in its latest form under Tamerlane, the records of countlesn Christian monasteries throughout the whole continent were ruthlessly destroyed^scarcely a vestige be ing left. The nerve centre of this marvellous church was first in Odessa and then in the Persian province of Adiabene. Y/ith its ecclesiastical headquarters atv^tesiphon-Seleucia on the Tigris it spread west and south to the Red Sea and east and north east tlifoughout the whole of Persia, including, as Persia then did, Afghanistan and the northern part of India. Then stimulated by persecutions surpassing anything ever experienced by the churches of the west, and nourished by its wonderful missionary monastic schools. which poured forth a constant stream of missionary volunteer ascetics, its energies boundaries of empire and reached out to the regions beyond. Through the whole of Central Asia, Turkestan, Mongolia, China and Japan its messengers wended their way. They were checked neither by Siberian snows nor by the trppical heat of Java and the adjoining islands. There is evidence that there were Christians in Japan befo.re the close of the eighth century. That there were not only strong Christian communities, but Christian kings and Christian generals in China and in the countries adjoining, before the middle pr -bjic of the seventh century is equally v/ell rvathenU -cjaltfd, me same is true 01 Kongo J.ia, Liberia in tne neigh­ bourhood of Lake Baikal, India north as well as south, Ceylon, Burmah and the straits of Malacca, indeed the difficulty is to find a place in all Asia where Kestorian Christians or J_ missionaries have not been. They occupied positions of influence and importance, and one at leant of the Mongol emperors is known to have beon a Christian while the wives of several were n.lno Christians and exerted a wholesome Christian influence. J?rom about the end of the second century until the beginning of \he fourteenth this church was noted for its missionary zoal^ind then cane the tragedy of its eclipse and practical disappearance from the greater part of the area in which it once held sway. This was due to various causes. In India the so called Asokan rock and pillar inscriptions dating from A.D.200 to A.D. 300 and the invention of the Krishna and other avatars of Vishnu not earlier than A.D.600,were, it is claimed, meant to check the progress that Christianity was then making, but the chief factor in the eclipse and final KscxDtzracixBJi extermination of Christianity from JTorthwfn and Central India and the whole of Central Asia was the rise of r.ohanmeclanism dating from A.D. 622. The last emperor of the Sassanian dynasty was defeated by the Hohanmedans about the middle of the seventh century. Y7ith the fall of the Persian empire the way was opened for the spread of Islwn. --e££±±32= the whole of Persia and although not all -*=» .Hosier! rulers were anti-Christian, most of them were, and and the disqualifications under which Christians were placed^ led, either to wholesale secessions to HoharrFiodanism. on the part of nominal Christians, or to the emigration to other lands: of many of the more genuine followers of Christ. Beyond the borders of Persia the progress of Islam v;a» much slower and it was many years before it secured a footing in Transoxania and further east. The accession of "eljuk r\nd other Turks to Mohamnedariisci at the end of the tenth century not only saved Islam f^om extinction,"but brought new life to the Abbasid Kh&lifate. At the same tine it led to increased persecution of the Christiana - the nev/ converts to Islam provine more antagonistic to Christianity that the Abbasides themselves. This experience was repeated tv.ro centuries later when the 1'on^ol viceroys and II-khans of Persia v/ere won over tk. u to A Kohai:uiedan faith: but of all others the nost "bitter persecutorA was Tamerlane, obsessed as he was by the determination to extirpate Christianity from his dominions. To tfive a connected account of the missionary enterprise of this most missionary of all churches and at the same tine to indicate reasons for its almost total disa.ppea.ran/ie from a. large part of the area where it once flourished is the object of this treatise. Chapter I. 1 1 a K i R.B i o nary ^Geitre^- _ The_ ^Church _in Persi.a The Missionary propaganda of the 'Church of the J^ast 1 is a subject of absorbing interest. It will help us to understand tlie enthusiasm that characterised it and the rapidity with which it spread throughout Asia if we look first at its home base - the church in Persia in the 4th and 5th centuries A.JJ. This was the centre from which the evangel was carried to the furthest limits of China, llongoliayf, Siberia, Japan paid India. During the first two centuries of the present era the Parthians were t}ie dominant race in Persia, but in 22STA.D. the Sassanid Persian dynasty overthrew the Arsacids and succeeded the Parthians in the possession of Iran. The religion of the Persians was dualism or Mazdaeism, another name for Soroastrianisn. They were fire worshippers. Their Modern representatives are the Parsees, one of the most 'ortescue: progressive and enterprising races in India. They had a 'istern hierarchy of priests called I'obeds under a chief called the lurches ;.125. Mobedan Tlobed, and observed very "elaborate principles of ritual cleanness, and defilement". "The Kobed wore a mouth covering when tending the holy fire lest his breath defile it. Especially were death and a dead body unclean. A corpse may not defile earth, fire or water". Hence their method of exposing their dead on "Towers of Silence" to be eaten by vultures. It is not to Persia proper however but to Kdessa,(lvk)dern TJrfa^in northern Kesopotamia^seventy eight miles south -.vest of Diarbek<£r; the capital of the small state of Osrhoene,that we must look for the beginning of that great nis.c ionary movement which had such marvellous results.