Church of the east nestorian mission to china

1. Christian missions along the Old Silk Road
from the 7th to the 10th centuries

2. In his introduction, Dr. Moffett wrote, "...the Church began in
Asia. Its earliest history, its first centers were Asian.
Asia produced the first known church building, the first New
Testament translation, perhaps the first Christian king, the
first Christian poets, and even arguably the first Christian
state...Asian Christians...mounted global ventures in
missionary expansion the West could not match until after
the 13th century.
By then the Nestorian Church exercised ecclesiastical
authority over more of the earth than either Rome or
Constantinople".

3. In 635, the first Christian missionary, Alopen, arrived at the
Chinese capital of Chang An (Xian) from the Syrian Church of the
East.
In 1625, workers digging in Chang An discovered the Nestorian
tablet, constructed in 781 by Emperor Taizong of the Tang
dynasty to celebrating 150 years of Christianity in China, with
the arrival of the ‘Religion of Light’ in 635.
Who were these Syrian and Persian missionaries? How did their
legacy spread all across the steppes as ‘Nestorian’ Christianity?
Where are they now? Why did their influence in China decline
along with the fall of the Tang dynasty?
What can we learn about Christian missions along the Old Silk
Road from the 7th to the 10th centuries?

4. A Monument Commemorating the Propagation of
the
Daqin Luminous Religion in the Middle Kingdom
大秦景教流行中國碑
abbreviated to
大秦景教碑

5. The stele was erected on January 7, 781, at the imperial
capital city of Chang'an (modern-day Xi'an), composed by the
Nestorian monk Jingjing.
A gloss in Syriac identifies Jingjing with "Adam, priest,
chorepiscopus and papash of Sinistan.”
Adam was the metropolitan of the Nestorian ecclesiastical
province of Beth Sinaye, under the Nestorian patriarch
Hnanishoʿ II (773–780), news of whose death several months
earlier had not yet reached the Nestorians of Chang'an.
In fact, the reigning Nestorian patriarch in January 781 was
Timothy I (780–823), consecrated in Baghdad on 7 May 780.

6. Some of the Nestorian monks had distinctive Persian names
(e.g. Isadsafas, Gushnasap), suggesting that they might have
come from Fars or elsewhere in Persia, but most of them had
commonplace Christian names or the kind of compound
Syriac name (e.g. ʿAbdishoʿ, 'servant of Jesus') much in vogue
among all Nestorian Christians.

8. About 1,900 Chinese characters, occasionally in
Syriac. Calling God "Veritable Majesty", the text
refers to Genesis, the cross, and the baptism.
It pays tribute to missionaries and benefactors of
the church, known to have arrived in China by 640.
The text contains the name of an early missionary,
Alopen.
The tablet describes the "Illustrious Religion",
emphasizing the Trinity and the Incarnation, but
there is nothing about Christ's crucifixion or
resurrection.

9. The Syriac proper names for God, Christ and
Satan (Allaha, Mshiha and Satana) were
rendered phonetically into Chinese.
Chinese transliterations were also made of one
or two words of Sanskrit origin, such as
Sphatica and Dasa.
There is also a Persian word denoting Sunday

11. According to the account by the Jesuit Alvaro Semedo,
workers who found the stele reported to the governor, who
had it installed on a pedestal, under a protective roof.
The stele attracted attention of local intellectuals. Zhang
Gengyou first identified the text as Christian. Zhang was
aware of Christianity through Matteo Ricci, and sent a copy
of the stele's Chinese text to his Christian friend, Leon Li
Zhizao in Hangzhou.
Li published the text and told about it to the locally based
Jesuits.

12. Alvaro Semedo was the first European to visit the stele
(between 1625 and 1628).
Nicolas Trigault's Latin translation of the monument's
inscription made its way in Europe, and was published in a
French translation in 1628.
Portuguese and Italian translations, and a Latin re-
translation, were soon published as well.
Semedo's account of the monument's discovery was published
in 1641, in his Imperio de la China.

13. The Nestorian Stone attracted the attention of some anti-
Christian, Christian anti-Catholic, or Catholic anti-Jesuit
groups in the 17th century.
They argued that the stone was a fake or that the
inscriptions had been modified by the Jesuits who served in
the Ming Court.

15. The Danish scholar and adventurer Frits Holm came to Xi'an
in 1907 with the plans to take the monument to Europe but
local authorities intervened.
It is now housed in Xi'an's Beilin Museum (Forest of Steles
Museum) Room Number 2.

17. Holm made an exact copy of the stele and had it shipped to
New York, planning to sell it to the Metropolitan Museum of
Art, which rejected it as of no artistic value.
In 1917 George Leary purchased the replica stele and sent it
to Rome, as a gift to the Pope.
A full-sized replica cast from that replica is on permanent
display in the Bunn Intercultural Center on the campus of
Georgetown University.
Another copy of the stele exists in Japan, installed on Mount
Kōya

19. The true Lord is without origin,
Profound, invisible, and unchangeable;
With power and capacity to perfect and transform,
He raised up the earth and established the heavens.
Divided in nature, he entered the world,
To save and to help without bounds;
The sun arose, and darkness was dispelled,
All bearing witness to his true original.
The glorious and resplendent, accomplished Emperor,
Whose principles embraced those of preceding monarchs,
Taking advantage of the occasion, suppressed turbulence;
Heaven was spread out and the earth was enlarged.

20. The true doctrine, how expansive! Its responses are minute;
How difficult to name it! To elucidate the three in one.
The sovereign has the power to act! While the ministers
record;
We raise this noble monument! To the praise of great
felicity.

21. 6th C: Earliest documented presence of Christianity in China -
Persian or Bactrian traders, settling in Lin-Tao, Kansu.
7th C: Patriarch Yeshuyab II sent a Persian monk from Syria,
Alopen to China. In 635, he reached Chang An, the largest
city in the world , with a library of 200,000 volumes. Here,
the first translation of the Bible into Chinese was made.
8th-9th C: Patriarch Timothy I (780-823) via his Metropolitan,
ruled over Christians in all 10 provinces of China.
10th C: Christianity in China declined with the Tang dynasty.
17th C: Rediscovered with the Nestorian tablet of 781.

22. 16th C: Jesuits from Rome arrived in China and reported that
there was no trace of Christianity in Cathay (China).
17th C: Discovery of Nestorian stele originally erected at a
monastery. Inscribed with a Persian Cross
standing in a lotus blossom and edged with
flame, flowers and cloud formations.
20th C: Archaeological finds at the
Dunhuang Oasis and the Turfan
discoveries include 9 Christian mss
in Chinese (4 which date to the 7th
century and are now known as
‘the Bishop Alopen documents’

24. 1900 Chinese characters.
70 words of Syriac and names of bishops, presbyters, monks
and others, both in Syriac and Chinese.
The Chief composer: T’sing-tsing (Adam), a Chinese scholar
of Chinese classics, Taoism and Buddhist philosophy .
‘The Tablet of the Spread of the Ta Chin Illustrious Religion in
China’

26. IN SYRIAC. In the year one thousand and ninety-two of the
Greeks (1092-311=.D 781) my lord Yezdbuzid, Presbyter and
Chorepiscopos of Kumdan228 the royal city, son of the
departed Meles, Presbyter of Balh, city of Tehuristan,
erected this stone tablet, wherein are written the disposition
of our Saviour, and the preaching of our fathers to the kings
of the Chinese.
IN CHINESE. The priest Ling-pao.

27. IN SYRIAC. Adam, Deacon, son of Yezdbuzid, Chorepiscopos;
Mar Sergius, Presbyter and Chorepiscopos.
IN CHINESE. Examiner and Collator at the erection of the
stone tablet, the priest Hsing T'ung.
IN SYRIAC. Sabran Yeshu, Presbyter; Gabriel, Presbyter and
Archdeacon, and Head of the Church of Kumdan and of Sarag.
IN CHINESE. Assistant Examiner and Collator, the Presbyter
Ye-li, Chief of the Monastery, Director of the Sacrificial
Court, and gifted with the Purple Cassock.

28. ‘Whereupon one person of our Trinity became incarnate: ...
and came into the world as a Man (or among men).
An Angel proclaimed the joy. A Virgin bore a Sage in Ta Chin
(Palestine)...He fulfilled the Old Law of the Twenty-Four
Sages’ discourses (Old Testament)...
He rowed ‘Mercy’s Barge’ which took him up to the courts of
light...His mighty task once done, at noonday, he ascended
into Heaven.

29. ‘When the accomplished emperor Tai Tsung, an enlightened
Sage over his people, began his magnificent career in glory
and splendor ...
there was a highly virtuous man, a bishop (Lofty Virtue)
named Alopen in the Kingdom of the Ta Chin (Roman Empire
or Syria).
Auguring from the azure sky, he decided to convey the true
Scriptures (Sutras) with him, and observing the course of the
winds, he made his way through hardship and danger,
difficulties and perils.

30. Thus in the 9th year of Cheng Kuan (635) he arrived at Chang
An. The Emperor dispatched his Chancellor, Duke Fang Hsuan-
ling to meet the visitor with an escort at the western suburb,
and conduct him to the Palace as a guest.
The Scriptures were translated in the Imperial Library, and
their doctrine examined in the Private Apartments, knowing
full well that it was right and true, the Emperor expressly
commanded its propagation.’

31. In the ... seventh month of the twelfth year of Cheng Kuan
(638), he issued this proclamation ;
“The Way (Dao) has no constant name, nor the sage a
constant form. According to its environment, religion is set
forth quietly affording salvation to all the living” ...
Alopen, bringing Scriptures and images from afar...for the
salvation of creatures and he benefit of man it ought to
spread throughout the Empire’

32. The Dao of Chinese folk religion is compared to the ‘Way’
used in New Testament Christianity. Both religions claim a
pathway to blessings. It is not difficult to see the
temptations for syncretism between Christianity and the
Asian religious language already in use.
The reference to the Dao with no specific and static name
may be an accommodation to the reception of Christianity
among the other religions or it could be due to the less than
precise way in which the Scriptures were translated.
The question of whether the mistake was wittingly or
inadvertently made determines the answer to the question of
orthodoxy.

33. There is debate among scholars on whether syncretism is
merely a more aggressive form of ‘accommodation’ or of
becoming more ‘user-friendly’, what church growth experts
regard as becoming more ‘outward-face friendly’.
The arguments tend to base their positions on Paul’s
injunction to become as a Jew to the Jews and all things to
all men that he might by all means save some (1 Corinthians
9:20).

34. The Persian missionaries from Syria who made
it to China chose to leave their theological and
ecclesiastical quirks at home and concentrated
on the core message of Christianity, ignoring
the issue of Theotokos or Christokos.
The Chinese ideographs, loosely translated
‘Three One Body Divide’ was sufficient to
affirm the divinity of Jesus as well as his full
partnership in the Trinity

35. The ‘Jesus-Messiah Sutra’ contained a brief
summary of the essentials of orthodox
Christianity, along with the specific name of
Jesus, written as Hsu-ting, but pronounced in
the seventh century as Yesu

36. ‘Three great Precepts’ and the ‘Seven Other
Commandments’ do add up to the ‘Ten
Commandments’ with minor variations.
The sin of all caused God to send the ‘Cool Wind’
(Holy Spirit) to enter a virgin named Moyen (Mary)
so that all may return to good relation. Moyen
bore a son named Ishu (Jesus).
Those who did not believe in him brought him
before Pilotussu (Pilate), who was forced by the
wicked ones to sentence Ishu to death. One of the
three precepts was to obey the emperor.

37. On December 6th: Marco Polo & Kublai Khan in Cambaluc.
Niccolo and Matteo Polo met Kublai Khan in the 13th century and
discovered that the Great Khan of the Yuan dynasty grew up as the
son of a Christian princess, Sorkakthani-beki, wife of Chinggis' son
Tolui Khan.
In this little known encounter, Kublai asked the Polo brothers to
send him 100 Christian monks to enlighten him about the Man on
the Cross. Kublai was also interested to learn from the West, the
SEVEN (Liberal) ARTS of the Medieval Age. When the brothers
returned to Cathay (China) in 1274 with the young MARCO POLO,
the Great Khan too a liking to the Venetian and for the next 20
years, Marco and Kublai forged a tumultuous and fascinating
friendship.
How did the Great Khan even know about the Christian West and
the Man on the Cross?

38.  First recorded Christian mission to China -
7th century
 Marco Polo and Kublai Khan - 13th century
 13th century - Genghis Khan stabilized Asia
and permitted Christianity
 15th century - Tamerlane destabilized Asia
and stopped Christian missions