Nestorian Tablet in China

Internet History Sourcebooks Project, Fordham University ^ | July1998 | ed Paul Halsall

[SunkenCiv]

This remarkable record of the fact that Christianity flourished in medieval China is a huge stone about ten feet high. Carven dragons and a cross adorn its summit, and its main shaft is completely covered with some two thousand Chinese characters. It stands now in the Peilin or "Forest of Tablets" in Sian-fu, this Peilin being a great hall specially devoted to the preservation of old historic tablets. Up to a few years ago the ancient stone stood with other unvalued monuments in the grounds of a Buddhist monastery, exposed to all the assault of the elements. Only European urgence has led to its being preserved in the Peilin... [I]n the year A.D. 781 erected this stone in commemoration of its triumphs. Now, alas, only the stone remains. The record of the sect's decay has needed no stone to make it manifest. Nestorian Christianity, shut off from its mother land by the rise of the Mohammedan powers in between, proved unable to resist the inroads of ignorance and superstition and changing political affairs. It degenerated and disappeared

[SunkenCiv]

Rock will never die.

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[SunkenCiv]

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[curmudgeonII]

Where's Prester John?

[happygrl]

This is fabulous.

I have a keen interest in the Nestorian Branch of the The Faith.

As the article indicates, the Faith was flourishing in China until the "Mohammedans" cut them off from the larger community. The world was pretty much Evangelized within a few hundred years after Christ's Death and Resurrection.

There is evidence that missionaries reached this hemisphere (New World) within a few hundred years.

[Henchman]

This is neat! The dates are in AD as in not BC and as opposed to the current BCE and CE which refer to the common era but obfuscate the era having been created by Christianity.

[blam]

"As the article indicates, the Faith was flourishing in China until the "Mohammedans" cut them off from the larger community. "

Christian Designs Found In Tomb Stones Of Eastern Han Dynasty (86AD)

[ThanhPhero]

The Christians in China seemed to have flourished in the 600s and 700s and again in the 1200s but were tied to the emperor and theruling dynasty. When those dynasties crumbled and the protectors were no longer extant, the Christians withered.There were a couple of obscure religious groups in China at least up until the communist era that could be echoes of those Christians but it is hard to tell.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks Blam, I'll add that link if needed, but after I get home. :')

[NYer]

Thanks for the ping!! Most interesting!

Nestorian Christianity, shut off from its mother land by the rise of the Mohammedan powers in between, proved unable to resist the inroads of ignorance and superstition and changing political affairs. It degenerated and disappeared

Even then, Islam was wielding power.

3) Nestorius and His Theological Influences

• Nestorius, a Syrian monk from Antioch, was elected Patriarch of Constantinople in 428, possibly because he was a popular preacher.
• Prior to his election, he had been a relatively obscure priest.
• Upon election to his new position, he embarked on a campaign of persecution against Arians and other heretics.
• He had been influenced by the Christology of Diodore of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia, under whom he probably studied.
• Diodore presented Christ as having two natures, human and divine; the divine Logos indwelt the human body of Jesus in the womb of Mary, so that the human Jesus was the subject of Christ's suffering, thus protecting the full divinity of the Logos from any hint of diminishment.
• Theodore, the father of Antiochene theology, taught two clearly defined natures of Christ: the assumed Man, perfect and complete in his humanity, and the Logos, consubstantial with the Father, perfect and complete in his divinity, the two natures (physis) being united by God in one person (prosopon).
• Theodore maintained that the unity of human and divine in Jesus did not produce a "mixture" of two persons, but an equality in which each was left whole and intact.
• Diodore and Theodore were considered orthodox during their lifetime, but came under suspicion during the Christological controversies of the fifth century.
• The Syriac Fathers (including Diodore, Theodore, and Nestorius) used the Syriac word kyana to describe the human and divine natures of Christ; in an abstract, universal sense, this term embraces all the elements of the members of a certain species, but it can also have a real, concrete and individual sense, called qnoma, which is not the person, but the concretized kyana, the real, existing nature.
• The Greek word prosopon (person) occurs as a loan word parsopa in Syriac; thus, the Syriac Christological formula was "Two real kyana united in a single parsopa, in sublime and indefectable union without confusion or change."
• Whereas Antioch taught that Christ had two natures (dyophysitism), Alexandria interpreted their position as teaching that he had two persons (dyhypostatism).
• Whereas the Syriac Fathers were willing to leave the union of Christ's humanity and divinity in the realm of mystery, the Alexandrians sought a clear-cut doctrine that would guard the church against heresy.

THE NESTORIAN PAGES

The contemporary nestorians are found in the Chaldean Catholic Church.

Catholic Ping - let me know if you want on/off this list

[Coleus]

The things one can learn from the FR, it's amazing.

[Smartass]

Interesting post...

THANKS FOR     THE PING!

[ninenot]

Hmmmm. Interesting article. Thanks.

[Ronaldus Magnus]

The Nestorian Heresy.

[SunkenCiv]

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[SunkenCiv]

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