Where are Nestorian Christians today?

The  Nestorian Church had a presence in China during two periods:

 first from the 7th through the 10th century
 Later during the Mongol Yuan Dynasty in the 13th and 14th centuries

Today the Assyrian Church has around 170,000 members, and they are located mainly in Iran, Iraq, and Syria.

This is a picture of a Nestorian Church in Baghdad.

The Christology of the Church of the East has its roots in the Antiochene theological tradition, which was of the early Church.

Citations and Links

LINKS:

The Editors of Encyclopedia Brittanica. "Nestorian." Encyclopedia Britannica. N.p., n.d. Web. 11 Mar. 2014.

"Silk Road." Silk Road. Ed. JIYELAN Media. N.p., 2004. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. <http://www.chinaoceantour.com/enimage/culturesilkroad.htm>.

"Religions." Religions. N.p., n.d. Web. 10 Mar. 2014. <http://www.jcu.edu/faculty/nietupski/rl251/projects/n_silk_road/religion/main.htm>.

"Christ on the Silk Road." Touchstone Archives:. The Fellowship Of St. James, 2014. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. <http://touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=20-03-030-f>.

Lynn. "Nestorian Tablet." Nestorian Tablet. N.p., Dec. 2007. Web. 11 Mar. 2014. <http://www.lynnsupdate.com/nestorian_tablet.htm>.

Nestorious' troubles

Nestorius’ Troubles

-Nestorius was accused of heresy for preaching his specific brand of Christianity

-He and his followers were banished from the Byzantine Empire, and other religious and political institutions gave him sanctuary

-He soon outraged the Roman and Byzantine worlds with his unorthodox doctrines.

 

 

Now I will go aside from all the facts and figures, which I find tiring to read and really boring.
I am going to compare the doctrines of Nestorian Christian's to Mormonism that we see today.

Among the Christian community, Mormonism is not considered a truth or a respected culture and religion. In fact, my Dad is a pastor, and when I asked him why Mormonism was so "bad" in his mind, he was completely speechless and asked me to look up their doctrines. And so I did.

They believe in Jesus too, but they added on more information to kind of change the scriptures a little. Basically they look to more than the bible for answers.

I feel that I can compare this to Nestorian Christians. Nestorius kind of created his own rules, and went against the flow. And his ideas were not really accepted in the world at his present time. So his culture really wasn't respected, and he was given a lot of hate and was pushed aside for that.

I think Mormonism is quite the same, except in this society today, we are taught to accept one another for what the other believes, even if we do not think they are right.

Important dates and artifacts

-In Xian, 781 AD, was the official arrival of Nestorian missionaries in China.

-In 1623 an ancient stele was discovered near Xi’an, just thirty miles from the Christian pagoda.

 

 

 

By 1625, the stele’s inscriptions had been published by the Jesuit Father Trigault.

 In the early twentieth century the stele stood near a Buddhist temple, a mile outside the western gate of Xi’an.

In 1907 it was moved to its present location among the Xi’an historical museum’s famous collection of ancient steles.

The tablet stands about eight feet high, is just over three feet wide, and about a foot thick.

 It weighs nearly two tons. It contains 32 vertical lines with approximately 1,800 beautiful and well-preserved Chinese characters.

 Setting this inscription apart from similar ancient inscriptions are the words in its bottom margin—23 short lines in ancient Syriac script.

On the narrow sides of the stone are an additional 70 lines in Chinese and Syriac.

-This tablet is now housed at the Forest of Steles Museum in Xi'an, and is available for visits by tourists, as seen in the picture below.

-In 638 the first Nestorian church was created in Changan. Evidence of Nestorian Christian writings can be found in previously mentioned cave temples at Dunhuang

-The councils of Ephesus (431 AD)

-Chalcedon (451 AD)

Background on Nestorian Christians

Here is some background info on Nestorian Christians for people who have never heard of this specific group.
Or, you are curious to see what other information you can find out about the background.

Nestorians were members of a Christian sect, which originated in Asia Minor and Syria out of the condemnation of Nestorius and his teachings.

Nestorius had been anathematized at Ephesus in 431 for denouncing the use of the title Theotokos (“God-Bearer”) for the Blessed Virgin.

Their culture stressed the independence of the divine and human natures of Christ.

In the west, the Persian church is referred to as the Nestorian Church.

Most of its members (numbering about 170,000) live in Iraq, Syria, and Iran.

Nestorian Christianity spread to Persia, India, and China, bringing with it the Syriac language and script.

Nestorian churches were to be found in cities all along the Silk Road.

Though there were undoubtedly many more Buddhists than there were Christians.