The Inside Assyria Discussion Forum

=> Egg on Parhad's Face

Posted by Paul Younan (Guest) - Tuesday, September 21 2004, 22:17:17 (CEST)
from 199.67.51.115 - email1.emsphone.com

Commercial -

Windows XP -

Internet Explorer
Website:
Website title:

All serious students of the history of the Church of the East are familiar with the amazing accounts of Church of the East missionary activity which saw monks and merchants, travelers, pastors, traders, and physicians carrying the "pearl of the Gospel" across all the trade routes of ancient and medieval Asia. This included such areas as Russian and Chinese Turkestan, Arabia,
Socotra, Afghanistan, Tibet, Pakistan, India, China, Indo-China and Burma, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, Mongolia, Korea, and Japan (Saeki 1951, Chart I, 349; Vine 1937, 11211).

The history of these countless Christian communities shows some to be nomadic,
some monastic, some largely expatriate at first, many flourishing in cosmopolitan ports, trading centers, some in the households of tribal Khans or imperial rulers, some in remotest valleys or desert oases. It is a long history of surviving, despite hostile state power and countless martyrs; a mission largely by lay people through education, medical care, state service, and trade, and of friendly coexistence – even mutual borrowing.

The story of Christian settlements near the salt lake of Issyk-kul – now in the southern U. S. S. R. – is yet to be told, but its fascinating outlines emerge from the two ancient cemeteries there, containing over 600 cross-engraved tombstones. The oldest date was 858 and the latest 1342. The inscriptions on many were in the Syriac script but the names indicate that these people were native converts. One gravestone (shown in the image above) reads, “This is the grave of Pasak – The aim of life is Jesus, our Redeemer.” Another states, “This is the tomb of Shelicha, the famous Exegete and Preacher who enlightened all the cloisters with Light, being the son of Exegete Peter. He was famous for his wisdom, and when preaching his voice sounded like a trumpet.” Among the names are those of nine archdeacons, eight doctors of ecclesiastical jurisprudence and of biblical interpretation, 22 visitors, three commentators, 46 scholastics, two preachers and an imposing number of priests” (Young, 1984, 17).

Sources:

Abu Salih
1894–95 Description of Churches and Monasteries of Egypt and Some Neighbouring
Countries. B. T. A. Evetts, trans. Oxford: University
Press.
Aprem, Mar
1976 Nestorian Missions. Trichur (India): Mar Nasai Press.
1982 A Nestorian Bibliography. Trichur (India): Mar Nasai Press.
1983 “Syriac Manuscripts in Trichur.” Orientalia Christiana Analecta
221: 355–74.
Atiya, Aziz S.
1968 A History of Eastern Christianity. London: Methuen.
Barthold, W.
1977 Turkestan to the Mongol Invasion (4th ed). London, E. J. W.
Gibb Memorial Trust.
Ba Than Win
1982 Christians of the First Burmese Dynasty (1044–1300) (Rangoon:
Ba Than Win).
Braaten, Carl
1963 “Modern Interpretations of Nestorius.” Church History 32 (3):
251–67.
Brock, S. P.
1979 “Jewish Traditions in Syriac Sources.” Journal of Semitic
Sources 30: 212–32.
Brock, S. P. & Harvey, S. A
1987 Holy Women of the Syrian Orient. Berkeley: University of California
Press.
Budge, E. A. W.
1928 The Monks of Kublai Khan, Emperor of China. London: Religious
Tract Society.
Burkitt, F. C.
1899 Early Christianity Outside the Roman Empire. London: John Murray.
1904 Early Eastern Christianity. London: John Murray.
Butler, J. F.
1969 “The Iconography of the Ancient South Indian Incised
Crosses.” Indian Church History Review 3 (2): 83–95.
Cheryan, C. V.
1970 A History of Christianity in Kerala. Kottayam (India): Kerala
Historical Society & C. M. S. Press.
Colless, Brian
1968 “Giovanni de Marignolli: An Italian Prelate at the Court of
the South-East Asian Queen of Sheba.” Journal of South-East
Asian History 9 (2): 325–41.
1969 “Persian Markets and Missionaries in Medieval Malaya.”
Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 42 (2):
10–47.
1969–77 “The Traders of the Pearl: The Mercantile and Missionary
Activities of Persian and Armenian Christians in South East
Asia.” Series of articles in Abr–Nahrain, vols. 9–17.
1987 Letter to this writer, November.
Dauvillier, J.
1948 “Les provinces chaldéenes de ‘l’extérieur’ au moyen age,”
in Mélanges offerts au R. P. Ferd. Cavallera . Toulouse: Institut
catholique de Toulouse, 260–316.
1983 Histoire et institutions des Eglises orientales au Moyen Age. Collected
Studies series. London: Variorum Reprints.
Dix, G.
1949 The Shape of the Liturgy. London: Dacre Press.
England, John C.
1988 “The Earliest Christian Communities in South-East and
North-East Asia.” East Asia Pastoral Review, 25 (2); also in
Missiology, April 1991.
Foster, John
1938 The Nestorian Monument and Hymn. London: S. P. C. K.
1939 The Church of the Tang Dynasty. London: S. P. C. K.
1972 The First Advance: Church History I. 29–500 AD. London:
Theological Education Fund & S. P. C. K.
Gibson, J. C. L.
1965 “From Qumran to Edessa.” New College Bulletin, 2 (2): 9–20.
Grierson, G. A
1907 “Modern Hinduism and its debt to the Nestorians.” Journal
of the Royal Asiatic Society, 311–35 (Offprint No. 476).
Grousset, Réné
1970 The Empire of the Steppes: A History of Central Asia. New Brunswick,
N. J.: Rutgers University Press.
Hajjar, Yousef (ed).
1986 Arab Christianity. Geneva: WSCF Journal – Special issue.
Hall, D. G. E.
1985 A History of South-east Asia. 4th ed. London: MacMillan.
Hambye, E. R.
1969 “Some Fresh Documentation on Medieval Christianity in
India & Further India.” Indian Church History Review, Dec. 3
(2): 97–101.
Hickley, D.
1980 The First Christians in China. London: China Study Project.
Holdcroft, J. G.
1972 Into All the World. Philadelphia: Independent Board for Presbyterian
Foreign Missions.
Hopkirk, P.
1980 Foreign Devils in the Silk Road: The Search for Lost Cities and Treasures
of Chinese Central Asia. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Hourani, G. F.
1951 Arab Seafaring in the Indian Ocean in Ancient and Early Medieval
Times. Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press.
Khodr, G.
1971 “Christianity in a Pluralistic World – Economy of the Holy
Spirit,” in Living Faiths and the Ecumenical Movement, S. J. Samartha,
ed., Geneva: W. C. C., 131–42.
Kidd, B. J.
1927 History of the Church to AD 461. London: Faith Press.
Klimkeit, Hans-J.
1985 “Christian-Buddhist Encounter in Medieval Central Asia.”
in The Cross and the Lotus. G.W. Houston, ed. New Delhi (India):
Motilal Banarsidass, 6–24.
Kuriakose, M. K.
1982 History of Christianity in India: Source Materials. Madras (India):
Senate of Serampore College & Christian Literature Society.
Labourt, J.
1904 Le Christianisme dans L’Empire Perse sons Ia Dynastie Sassanide.
Paris.
Latourette, K.
1945–47 History of the Expansion of Christianity (7 vols). London: Eyre
and Spottiswood.
Leslie, D. D.
1981–83 “Persian Temples in Tang China.” Monumenta Serica 35:
276–95.
Lieu, S. N. C.
1985 Manichaeism in the Later Roman Empire and Medieval China: A
Historical Survey. Manchester: University Press.
McCrindle, J. W.
1897 The Christian Topography of Cosmas. An Egyptian Monk. London:
Hakluyt Society.
Mathew, C. P. & Thomas, M. M.
1967 The Indian Churches of Saint Thomas. Delhi (India): I.S.P.C.K.
Mingana, A.
1925 The Early Spread of Christianity in Central Asia and the
Far East. Bulletin of John Rylands (BJRL) 9 (2): 297–371.
1926 The Early Spread of Christianity in India. BJRL 10 (2):
435–95.
Moule, A. C.
1930 Christians in China Before the Year 1550. London: S.P.C.K.
Mundadan, A. M.
1970 Sixteenth Century Traditions of St Thomas Christians. Bangalore
(India): Dharmaram College.
1984 History of Christianity in India (I). From the Beginning up to the
Middle of the Sixteenth Century. Bangalore (India): Theological
Publications.
Murray, R.
1975 Symbols of Church and Kingdom – A Study in Early Syriac Tradition.
London: Cambridge University Press.
Muskens, M. P.
1979 Partner in Nation Building: The Catholic Church in Indonesia.
Aachen: Mission Aktuell Verlag.
Nau, F.
1914 L’Expansion Nestorienne en Asie . London: S. P. C. K.
Neusner, J.
1986 Judaism. Christianity and Zoroastrianism in Talmudic Babylonia.
New York & London: University Press of America.
Outerbridge, L. M.
1952 The Lost Churches of China. Philadelphia: Westminster Press.
Pelliot, P.
1914 “Chrétiens d’Asie Centrale et d’Extréme Orient.” T’oung
Pao 15: 623–44.
1930 “Christianity in Central Asia in the Middle Ages.” Journal of
the Central Asian Society 17 (3) 301–12.
1973 Récherches sur les Chrétiens d’Asie Central et d’Extrême Orient .
Paris:Imprimerie Nationale.
Quere, M.
1987 “Christianity in Sri Lanka Before the Coming of the Portuguese.”
Aquinas Journal (Sri Lanka) 4 (2): 127–53.
Renaudet, E. (tr.)
1733 Ancient Accounts of India and China by Two Mohammedan Travellers.
London: S. Harding.
Saeki, P. Y.
1916 The Nestorian Monument. Tokyo (Japan): Waseda University;
London: S.P.C.K.
1951 The Nestorian Documents and Relics in China. Tokyo (Japan): Maruzen
& Co. Sungshil University
1988 Korean Christian Museum at Sungshil University. Seoul (Korea):
Sungshil University.
Stewart, J.
1928 Nestorian Missionary Enterprise: The Story of a Church on Fire. Edinburgh:
T. & T. Clark; Madras: Christian Literature Society.
Tibbetts, G. R.
1957 “Early Muslim Traders in South-East Asia.” Journal of the
Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 30 (1): 1–45.
1979 A Study of the Arabic Texts Containing Material on South-east Asia.
London: Royal Asiatic Society & Brill.
van der Ploeg, J. P. M.
1983 The Syriac Manuscripts of St Thomas Christians. Bangalore (India):
Dharmaram Publications.
Vine, A. R.
1937 The Nestorian Churches. London: Independent Press.
von le Coq, A.
1985 Buried Treasures of Chinese Turkestan. Hong Kong: Oxford University
Press (first published 1928).
Wensinck, A.
1919 Bar Hebraeus’s Book of the Dove . Leiden.
Whitfield, R. (ed.)
1982 The Arts of Central Asia: The Stein Collection in the British Museum
– Paintings from Dunhuang. 3 vols. London: British Museum;
Tokyo: Kodansha.
Wolters, D. W.
1967 Early Indonesian Commerce: A Study of the Origins of Sriviiaya. Ithaca,
N.Y.: Cornell University Press.
Wright, W.
1894 A Short History of Syriac Literature. London: A. & C. Black.
Young, J. M. L.
1984 By Foot to China: The Mission of the Church of the East to 1400.
Tokyo (Japan): Radio Press.
Young, W. G.
1969 A Handbook of Source Materials for Students of Church History. Madras
(India): C. L. S.; London: Lutterworth.
Yule, H.
1913–16 Cathay and the Way Thither. Revised by H. Cordier. 4 vols.
London: John Murray.
1921 The Book of Ser Marco Polo the Venetian Concerning the Marvels and
the Kingdoms of the East. Revised by H. Cordier. 2 vols. London:
John Murray.

---------------------

- BACK TO INDEX - REPLY - QUOTE - EDIT - DELETE -

The full topic:

Egg on Parhad's Face Paul Younan - Tuesday, September 21 2004, 22:17:17 (CEST)
- Khizmie David Paul Younan - 09/21 22:54
  - Re: Khizmie David parhad - 09/21 23:34
- Re: Egg on Parhad's Face parhad - 09/21 23:23

Content-length: 12743
Content-type: application/x-www-form-urlencoded
Accept: image/gif, image/x-xbitmap, image/jpeg, image/pjpeg, application/vnd.ms-excel, application/vnd.ms-powerpoint, applicatio...
Accept-encoding: gzip, deflate
Accept-language: en-us
Cache-control: max-age=259200
Connection: keep-alive
Cookie: *hidded*
Host: www.insideassyria.com
Pragma: no-cache
Referer: http://www.insideassyria.com/rkvsf2/rkvsf_core.php?.QOHz.
User-agent: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1)
Via: 1.1 proxy1.allantgroup.com:3128 (squid/2.5.STABLE6)
X-forwarded-for: 172.16.3.148