Lecture 10 - The History of Christianity in Asia, Part Three

hello Heroes today we are looking at series three lecture two with the title of history of Christianity in Asia part three for my devotional I'd like to ask if you remember the story of Daniel in the Bible how as a young man he was taken into exile to serve at the court of King Nebuchadnezzar during the preparation time Daniel shows himself to be a man of principle in Chapter 2 God makes it possible for Daniel to interpret Nebuchadnezzar's nightmare later in chapter 3 Nebuchadnezzar goes mad as predicted in the nightmare he eats grass like an

animal ultimately God restores Nebuchadnezzar to his senses this leads him to give praise to the Lord in chapter 4: 36 and 37 listen to how the New Living Translation puts it now I Nebuchadnezzar praise and glorify and honor the king of Heaven the judge of all whose Every Act is right and good for he is able to take those who walk proudly and push them into the dust during this lecture you will learn about one woman who made a major difference as a Christian among some of the leaders in the Mong M Empire in our

day and age leaders and everyone need to heed Nebuchadnezzar's words so in the previous two lectures we have learned a great deal about the history of Christianity in Asia through writings and archaeology we have seen that it looks like Thomas indeed went to Southwestern India and established or planted churches we have realized that noorus was not a herit representatives from Egypt and Persia went East with the gospel to India and as far as the taang Chinese Court we have witnessed the ambivalent relationship between Muslim rulers and their Christian subjects now we turn to the last

section of moffett's book that goes up to ad 1500 it has to do with what he calls the Pax or pox mongolica from gasan to tamarlane do you remember the pox Romana the pece brought about by the Romans established and imposed by the Roman Empire it enhanced the efforts to spread the gospel around the Mediterranean even in the midst of sporadic persecutions listen to what mfet has to say about the quite different pox mongolica it seems abs surd he says to link the names of genas Khan here's an image of him and tamarlane another image

as merciless a pair of Warriors as the world has ever known to peace but there is a reason for the title which prefaces this part of the history like other ages of revolutionary change it was the best of times it was the worst of times which you might know comes from Charles dickens's A Tale of Two Cities and here's an image of a cover of that book gas Khan mfet writes no man of Peace nevertheless laid the foundations of a temporary interlude in the turbulent history of 13th century Asia a short period of relative peace

and Contin Continental unity and religious toleration that like the Pax Romana centuries early earlier prepared the way for the expansion of Christianity and it was tamarlane a century and a half later who put an Abrupt end to that time of Christian hope and progress then mfet talks about quote Christian Kites and shamanist Mongols only a few years before the caleff of Cairo destroyed the Church of the Holy Seiler in Jerusalem and thereby loosed emotions that later erupted into the Crusades thousands of miles to the east in the heart of Asia unknown nestorian lay missionaries Christian

Merchants engaged in trade with the Restless tribes of the Mongolian steps began to convert a Turk Mongolian tribe called the kites or kerid the only account that survives is that of the 13th century historian the Jacobite mafan Wikipedia says mafan originally known as the Grand Metropolitan of the East and also known as catholicos is the second highest rank in the ecclesiastical hierarchy of the syc Orthodox church right below that of patriarch the office of mafan is uh mafre andite there have been three mafan ites in the history Syriac orthodox church and one briefly in the

Syriac Catholic church so there was this historian in the 13th century who was a mfon his name was Gregory bar heos and here's an image of him at that time the king of PE of people called kth lost his way while hunting in the high mountains when he had abandoned all hope a saint appeared in a vision and said if you will believe in Christ I will lead you lest you perish he returned home safely and remembered the vision when he met some Christian Merchants so he questioned them about their faith they said you cannot

be saved unless you were baptized and urged him to send a message to Eed yishu The nestorian Metropolitan of murv asking for priests and deacons to baptize him and his tribe barabus goes on to quote a letter from eedu to the nestorian patriarch John I 6 in Baghdad dated 1009 which reports that as a result of the mission that followed the kerite prince and the 200,000 of his tribesmen accepted baptism here's an image and kite is north of the lower darker colored area whether the remember details and numbers are authentic or not the fact remains

that for the next 200 years the kites were known as a Christian noorian tribe of ever increasing importance by the 12th or 13th century the whole tribe was considered Christian and what was of great import for the future had become the first of all the Turk Mongol tribes to befriend and protect a petty Chieftain of of an insignificant Mongol subclan the chief was named yesugay the father of tamuin who was better known as gingas Khan toward the end of the 12th century the Christian chief of the kites tagu Wong Kong his title indicates a position

of some prominence both in Chinese and Mongol politics became patron of the young ujan later known as gas Khan approximately 1162 to 1227 it may have been reports of this Mongol Christian ruler the karite Wang Kong that gave rise in the west to the various legends about a Christian king of Asia prestor John who was said to be a disciple of the noorans however it was not the Christian tog rule Illustrated here who was to change history but his fiery young Protegé whose ambition and organizing skills soon absorb not only his protectors and principal allies

the kites into his own Rising orbit but crushed other semi- evangelized tribes as well such as the more powerful merket the myON and the angut and began to unite them into the most warlike Empire the world has ever known it was in this period that the Mongols first became a political entity and the organization of the Confederation the Kates though subdued by genus were greatly influential and you will see why in a little bit but Griffith of Moffet quotes a man named a lobanov rovski who credits historians with shaping parts of gask Khan's written law

the yasa or yasak which became as sacred to Mongol rulers as the Ten Commandments among the most important of the laws was all men are to believe in one God creator of Heaven and Earth close quote mafen presents the last six years of gagas Khan's life quote nishapur the capital of Persia's Rich Eastern province of Kuran and last governmental Center of the kazian empire fell to toui in 1221 that was the Mongols farthest major thrust to the West under genas Khan his generals continued their raid as far as the government or country of Georgia which

is south of Russia genus however with toui who seems to have been his favorite son turned back Eastward across what is now Afghanistan and fought his way south to the banks of the Indus River but there at the edge of Great India again he stopped from that time on he did little further fighting himself leaving that to his sons and Generals until he died instead he contented himself mainly with hunting and trying to main or order among the turbulent Mongols it is said that he turned philosophical asking questions about the nature of the world and

of its religions concerning the latter he was skeptical and tolerant of them all including historian Christianity his people remained basically shamanist gasan was buried in 1227 close quote Moret writes about the Mongol Empire after the death of gasan that is Moffet writes about it quote gasan had four Sons by his first wife Joi chagatai ogai and talui and through laws of desent and tradition through these four the Mongol Empire developed its line of authority and Rule it is astounding how quickly illiterate but by no means unintelligent Nomads who are unaccustomed to settled government managed to

organize and stabilize the succession to the rule of half of Asia the empire was divided into four units one for each of the Suns and these units were under the titular rule of one of them a great con elected by royal family Council Moffet reveals the first Franciscan missions to the Mongols as the ax Romana had prepared the way for the work of the Apostles in the first century so now in the 13th century aox mongolica open doors for Catholic missions across Asia to in the to the half of the world Beyond Constantinople never once

in the century in a quarter from the first Catholic mission to Mongolia in 1245 to the fall of the Mongol dynast Y in 1368 was there not at least one cross Asiatic artery open for trade and cultural interchange between East and West whether by the old Sil Silk Road through Persia or the two Northern routs across Mongol Russia or by sea around India the Far East was nearer to Europe than it had ever been before mfet gives the Nam and years of the missionaries to Oriental Asia all but two were Franciscan monks the other two

were Dominicans the first time the polo Brothers journeyed East between 1260 and 1269 they were without missionaries the second was with Marco and missionaries from 1271 until 1295 mfet provides the most information on The Franciscan monk William of rub or rub who was Flemish and here's a picture of him who arrived in the court in 1253 at the court of Korum uh Illustrated here if you see the Red Dot in central Mongolia to find a new great K con of a new line of descent from from gangus on the throne monky m o n g

ke pictured here was the son here we go of the Christian princess Sor kakani and here is a stylized uh image of her and genus's Son toui sorok Tani quote had proved to be a woman of Iron Will great great courage and remarkable political shrewdness bar heraus who lived in that same period writing about her uses terms of Praise about a woman who about a woman as are not often found in the writings of 13th century Bishops much less in the mouth of a monophysite writing about an historian woman here are some of what he

wrote as quoted in Moffet now this Queen had four sons and trained her sons so well that all the princes marvelled at her power of administration and she was a Christian sincere and true like Helena wife of emperor Constantine way back when and it was in respect of her that the certain poet said if I were to see among the race of women another like this I should say that the race of women was far superior to that of men William found the nestorians at the court better grounded than the weager nestorians he had passed

on his journey he did find syncretism with shamanist Superstition syncretism has regrettably occurred in many places around the world and through time it highlights the need for Clear teaching and living of the historic Christian faith but William was most concerned about the poor Poe morals of the nestorians next mfet moves to the Mongols and the church in Persia he opens with this quotation from bar heus who wrote it around 1286 and in the year 1576 of the Greeks that is AD 1265 Hulu or Hulu pictured here King of Kings departed from this world world the

wisdom of this man and his greatness of soul and his wonderful actions are incomparable and then the days of summer toku Katon again here is a stylized image of her the believing Queen departed and great sorrow came to all the Christians throughout the world because of the departure of these two great lights who made the Christian religion triumphant Moffett opens this chapter with a summary quote the history of the church in Asia in the 13th and 14th centuries outside the subcontinent of India to the South is dominated by the political power and traditions of three

great Mongol conquerors Hulu kubl KH pictured here and Timmer the great better known as Tamar Ling and here is an image of him the first two were brothers sons of the nooran princess sorani the third tamarlane was an outsider not of Royal Mongol blood and more Turk than Mongol hulagu and Kublai were protected Christians hulagu and kubli protected Christians were destroyed by them but for the space of about 45 years from the accession of genas Khan's grandson Mony as great Khan in 1251 to the conversion to Islam of gas's quadruple great grandson gazan ilon or

Governor I guess we would say of Persia in 1295 Asia though hesitant and wary seemed at times on the brink of adopting the Christian faith as the Rel religion of a continental Empire close quote moffen Moffet looks at Hulu's relationship with Christians then ilon and Patriarchs in Mongol Persia quote when Hulu returned to Persia and the election in karakorum gave the Throne of the Mongol Empire to his older brother Kublai he placed his Capital at Maraga north of Baghdad in today's azerbijan territory near Lake iria and appointed the tolerant Persian historian juvani who died in

1283 and is shown here in a painting he was appointed governor of Baghdad those first 37 years of Mongol rule in Persia from the fall of Baghdad in 1258 to the conversion of holigoo great-grandson gazan to Islam in 1295 were the last short years of flowering for the nestorian church bartan who was at the court of Hulu in 1264 noted the presence there of the Christian Kings of little Armenia and Georgia and the Crusader Prince of Antioch and was given a private interview with the ilon in which Hulu told him that his mother sorani was

a Christian and that he felt much attached to the Christians there was progress among the historians until there was not mfet continues the quote more sober realities affecting the Mongol Court in Persia were less promising for Christianity than such indications might have suggested when the Christians of tagre north of Baghdad and SE of the Jacobite Metropolitan rioted against the Muslim part of town with typical Mongol ferocity Hulu simply ordered all the Christians there killed except for the very old and very young and he turned their Cathedral over to the Muslims Moffet notes that hulagu was

probably always to the end of his life no candidate for baptism but an Eclectic shame who may even have finally turned Buddhist rather than Christian the favor he showed to Christians apart from a desire to pleas his wife was undoubtedly due to his need for Christian allies against the rising tide of Islam encircling him on three sides maralu of Egypt and Syria in the west spreading conversions to the Muslim faith among his cousins of the golden horde on the North and the chaati kanate emerging on his Northeastern Frontier in Central Asia we love the Christians

he said to Varan and their religion is popular in our Palace whereas my cousins favor Muslims close quote mafit provid some fascinating Reflections on the historian bar hus who lived from 1226 to 1286 I am intrigued by any discussion of historiography or the writing of history and remember you are living out Acts chapter 29 and making and writing Christian history yourselves here is what Moffet writes about bar habus the historian like quote most of the scholars of his age he was sometimes uncritical and sometimes credulous meaning he believed things too easily without a Critical examination

but he was superbly equipped and well connected for writing the history of those times and he is unequaled as an eyewitness source of information from a Christian perspective about the church in Persia and to provide perspective about the church in Persia under the Mongols as the name indicates he was the son of a Jewish physician living in meltin now Malaya in Eastern Turkey and this image might be hard to see on the screen it's very light background and you do see a region in blue which is more um East Central in what is today the

country Turkey and his mother may have been Arabic for he also had an Arab name Abul Farah that quotation from Moffet is an example of outstanding modern historiography itself he critically examines his historical subject while also remembering core's Golden Rule of History judge those people in the past with the same understanding by which you hope people in the future will judge or understand you Moffet recognizes the limitations but also notes that the standards were similar to others of his time Moffet writes about the travels of the monks of kuon he also points out intimations of

weakness in Persian Christianity mfet concludes the chapter with the transition to the final two chapters of his book though signs of syncretism and foreignness were never altogether absent at least in this period we must rather look more closely for an explanation of the calamities that fell that befell the church to other two reasons a failure of intellect and dependence upon government but he says quote be but before that we must move in the final two chapters of this volume to what was happening to the church in the 13th and 14th century Empire of the Mongols

of kuon and in a very different vein we must note the Omens of a Christian disaster brewing in Central Asia close quote next mfet examines Christianity in Mongol China he gives the quotation from Marco Polo approximately in 1300 writing about a rebellion against kubl KH in 1287 another example of historiography it is translated by Arthur Mo so we have historiography within historiography quote Nan cousin and rival of kuon was a baptized Christian and in this battle he had the Cross of Christ on his standard but it availed him nothing and after the great KH Kublai

had won this battle many made fun of the Cross and spoke against the Christians who were there then Kublai begins to comfort them and says if the cross of your God has not helped nion it is done very right nion who came against his Lord was both disloyal and treacherous and so there is great right in what has happened to him and the cross of your god did well if it does not help him against right close quote mfet opens the chapter with the survey of some Mongol rulers and the very important princess and mother

of Kings quote kubl is more like his mother's people the kites said gasan one day as he was watching his grandson play he is dark not ready like our side of the family but in fact kuon 1215 to 1294 owed much to both sides of his lineage he had something of the same world conquering ambition of genas and the love of compat for which his father toui was famed he also had a good measure of the political wisdom and religious fair-mindedness of his mother the Christian princess sarani he was the greatest of the Mongol rulers

of China in the short Yuan Dy 1260 to 1368 and the most powerful man in the world of his time sorani died in 1252 she lived just long enough to see her first son Mony succeed to see her first son succeed to the title of great KH uh first born by her father-in-law genas great KH of the Mongols but not long enough to rejoice in the elevation of her third son Hulu to the Persian Throne as ilon in 1261 nor did she leave to live to see her second son Kublai carry the line of gangus

to its greatest Heights she died while Kublai was still fighting his way to Imperial power in China what was called the center of the world but her influence on her son's character and policies was widely credited as shaping a shaping factor in the ultimate success of this remarkable family of rulers of Asia close quote Moffett writes about the visit of the polos to the court of kuon quote the polo brothers and their famous son and nephew Marco were not missionaries but Marco Polo's account of his journey to Mongol China and of the Christians he found

there is one of the most important pieces of information that has come down to us about nestorianism in China in the 13th century again historiography more over on the second Polo Journey the older polos had made the trip once before in 1260 to 69 without Marco two Dominican missionaries Nicholas of Venza and William of Tripoli were assed by the pope to accompany the merchants but dropped out on the way on their earlier Journey the polo Brothers became the first known Europeans to reach China quote Kublai not only welcomed the the westerners warmly asking them many

questions about their kings and countries but also expressed much interest in their religion Christianity he even asked them to return to Europe with letters from the con to the pope asking for a hundred missionaries Moffet quotes from the letter that says wise men of learning in the Christian religion and Doctrine who should know also the seven Arts be fitted to teach his people and who should know well how to argue and to show plainly to him and to the idolators and to other classes of people that all their religion was erroneous and who should know

well how to show clearly by reason that the Christian faith and religion is better than theirs and more true than all the other religions and if they prove this that he kubl and all his potentates would become men of the church wow sounds like he was asking for apologists of the Christian faith this became one of the great wha ifs of History Because by the time the first Catholic Mission reached Beijing in 1294 the great Overlord of Asia from Korea kublan to the Euphrates and South to Hanoi and Burma had just died Moffett next writes

about the writings of Marco Polo again we have historiography and here is what his moffett's historiography has to say about Marco Polo here's an image of a book of Marco Polo's writings quote despite its minor inaccuracies and although it was first greeted in Europe with wide disbelief Marco Polo's report of his incredible 16 or 17 years in China slowly changed the West's vague images of the far east as a land of ill taught Savage barbarians its tempting Tales of great riches and magnificent cities loosen the purses of Western rulers and open the doors to the

age of Discovery Columbus possessed a copy of the book and used it in planning his first voyage he carried a letter of credence from fer and Isabella for presentation to the great con by a whole Dynasty in 10,000 miles or more was not Polo's fault the polos tracked down a group of people who might be Christian descendants of the missionary alopen whom you might recall from a previous lecture and the pistori and missionaries Adai aai and Mari mfet notes that the Christian Prince George of the anuts who were close neighbors of the Christian karite group

mfet examines the religious policies of kubl khon mfet discusses the first Roman Catholic missionary to reach China as distinct from Mongolia John of Monte Corino was a Catholic who built a church in Beijing in 1299 and a second church only a Stones Throw from the emperor ur's gate Moffett also looks at the outer limits of the nestorian advance some wonder if it went as far as today's Korea Burma and Thai Vietnam areas as well as the Philippines mfet concludes the chapter with these words the question remains was the missionary anshan in Korea or manua at

the beginning of the 10th century and in this image if you look in the upper right area you will see a darker area that is man Manchuria in the 7th Century the Leung Peninsula was Korean under the rule of kagu Rio the northernmost of the three Korean kingdoms before their unification but by about 1,000 the apparent date of the burial the Korean border had been pushed South to the yalu and a maruan tribe the leao had taken that part of the Northeast from the Chinese Sun Emperor all we can say with certainty therefore is that

as early as 1,000 there were historian Christians in what had not long before been Korean territory the second to the last chapter in moffett's book is entitled the eclipse of Christianity and Asia he opens with two quotations the first is from HH howarth's history of the Mongols quote the history of the Mongols is necessarily A Drum and trumpet history it deals chiefly with the conquests of great Kings and the struggles of rival tribes it is the story of one of those Hardy bronny races cradled amidst want and hard circumstances in whose blood there is a

good mixture of iron which are sent periodically to destroy the luxurious and the wealthy close quote here is the second opening quotation which is from Renee gr the Empire of the steps page 434 to this ferocity tamarlane added a taste for religious murder he killed from piety he represents a synthesis is probably unprecedented in history of Mongol barbarity and Muslim fanaticism and symbolizes that advanced form of primitive Slaughter which is murder committed for the sake of abstract ideology as a duty and a sacred Mission Moffet introduces the chapter with a link to its title like

a sun in Eclipse Christianity and Asia moves so abruptly yet so imperceptibly from its peaks of expansion down into the shadows of history that it is difficult to pinpoint any precise moment at which progress turned into decline l e Brown in the book from which the title of this chapter is borrowed the exact same title begins his analysis of the decline as far back as Muhammad for there is no question that the rise of Islam is the first decisive turning point in Asian church history but it was not the last in Muhammad's own lifetime Asian

Christianity launched its most vigorous missions of expansion for 600 years and more it pushed on across Asia though not without other nearly fatal defeats and did not reach its widest extent and nearest approach to Continental acceptance until the Pax mongolic of the 13th century as we have seen it could be argued that the definitive turning point was not reached until 1294 in East Asia and 1295 in West Asia in the space of one year the emperor kublan protector of the church in China died and in Persia the Ilan gazan announced his conversion to Islam the

death of Kublai last of the truly great cons signal the approaching dissolution of the Mongolian Empire in the Far East gan's conversion turned the Persian sector of that Empire ably Muslim and carried with it into the world of Islam most of Asia from the Western end of the great wall to the Euphrates the protecting Continental umbrella of the mongolica was folded and withdrawn it had never been much of a piece but it had not completely collapsed under the battering of the persistent Civil Wars among its first major sectors after 1259 China including Mongolia Central Asia

Persia and Russia all four were then still nominally United under the fifth great con of the Mongols Kublai but never again was so much of the Asian continent to be so nearly United in the next 100 years the religious tolerance of Mongol empiric rule gave way to a new destructive wave of widespread Mongolian feroci fueled by conquering Muslim Zeal and the shattered remnants of Asian Christianity were left isolated and every smaller pockets of desperation close quote Moffet explains the second appear disappearance of the church in China then the conversion of the Persian Ilan to Islam

he follows that with quote tamarlane scourge of God and tear of the world in the year of the last effective Ilan Abu sa died a Mongol infant was born on the ancient border between Persia and Turkish an who was destined to rival even the World Conqueror gingas as a destroyer of Kingdoms both were militarily merciless but whereas the victories of the religiously tolerant genus opened up Asia to Christian missions the return of Mongol power under the fiercely Muslim tamarlane brought unparalleled destruction of churches synagogues and temples all across Asia from the western edge of China

to the Christian Fortress of Smyrna on the aian sea and as far south is Indian Delhi close quote later in the chapter Moffet writes that the Church of the East that is noorian which had once directed a continental network of Christian influence and expansion from its first tentative Beginnings in adessa later in salua Syphon and finally in Baghdad was left without a home on Earth Baghdad was no refuge the continuation of barra's chronography lamented quote and in those days the foreign peoples the Mongols stretched out their hands to tabes and they destroyed all the churches

which were there and there was great sorrow among the Christians in all the world the persec utions and disgrace and mockings and ignominy which the Christians suffered at this time especially in Baghdad words cannot describe mafit continues barus is referring here to the time of the Muslim Ilan Gan but it became yet more of the demonstations of tamarlane which though less directly anti-christian were indiscriminate and more thoroughly brutal in tamerlan's General Massacre of the inhabitants of Baghdad in 1401 it is said that 199,000 people were killed after that Empires fell apart and there was even

further brutality with that we come to moffett's last chapter entitled the church in Shadows in the shadows he opens with a quotation from the man he replaced when the other man retired that man's name was Kenneth Scott Lett you might recognize that name he is part of your required or guided reading this semester this quotation is from volume two page 341 of volume two of the history of the expansion of Christianity here is lett's historiography or historical writing beset by an advancing Islam in the East having lost the larger proportion of its wide flung communities

in Asia and suffering from corruption and indifference in the church which represented it in the West in 1500 Christianity did not seem to face a promising future the coming centuries might well have appeared to belong to Islam Muslim merchants were in charge of most of the trade routes to the Malay Peninsula and the islands of the East Christianity was slowly yielding its remaining footholds in Asia and was combined almost ire entirely to Europe close quote here is how Moffet begins his final chapter after 1500 years the story of Christianity in Asia beyond the Euphrates nearly

ends about where it began in two small Circles of survival in earlier chapters we trace the beginnings of its expansion outside the Roman Empire to two pockets of Christians one in the Northern Hills of Eastern Syria and the other in India a millennium and a half later the same two pockets are all that is left of an Asian church that once spread all across the continent from Mesopotamia to the Pacific the Syrian Center had shifted only slightly Eastward from adessa on the upper Euphrates to a village called garta on the upper Tigris which today is

called cisr a staging area for Kurdish refugees about two and a half th000 miles away in India the St Thomas Christians on the Malabar Coast still held to their Beach head in South Asia and their memories of the Apostle to Asia little else remained of the church in Asia as the end of the at the end of the 16th century but for a brief moment in approximately 1499 the two circles touched then separated when they came back together again the whole world was changing around them the Black Ships of The Barbarians from the other side

of the Earth had entered the Indian Seas the contrast at this point between eastern and western church history is startling what was it about the Asian branch of Christianity that makes its record of expansion and subsequent decline so somberly different from the dramatic Triumph of the faith that conquered Europe the west and 1800 was exploding into Global Mission Spain drove out the last of the Muslim Moors the pope sent Columbus with his image here to convert the ends of the Earth Loyola would soon organize the greatest missionary Society Christianity had ever known Russia pushed the

Mongols East and replaced a Muslim con with the Christians Zar and the Holy Roman Emperor proclaimed an age of Perpetual peace not so in Asia at the turn of the century in 1500 the situation facing Asia's Christians resembled more the end of Hope than the beginning of Perpetual peace the crusaders had long lost Jerusalem and Antioch the ottoman Turks who ruled Western Asia for the next 400 years and 450 years had recently 1454 stormed across the bosporus to capture Constantinople and turn its thousand-year-old churches into sunite Muslim mosques Persia was recovering its sense of national

identity after centuries of foreign rule its new Dynasty the SIDS 1499 to 1736 claimed descent from the sesanian Sha of Persia's Glory Days and continued the Muslim pressures on Christians that had driven the nestorian patriarch out of Baghdad and Maraga to seek safety in the Kurdish Hills in far off India the Thomas Christians had nearly lost their tenuous links with the Persian patriarch and were adjus ing themselves to life as an isolated Christian cast within the Hindu Society in Ming Dynasty China Christians had simply disappeared once more few would have denied the obvious Asian Christianity

was on the verge of Extinction Moffet also examines the causes of decline in the Middle East in India mfet concludes his book with these words quote there are times when history can only be described not explained and perhaps the history of Christianity and Asia is best left as one of the Mysteries of the Providence of God whose ways as seen from a Christian perspective are not our ways nor as his purposes ever entirely known but for that same Christian Perspective history does not end with despair but with hope hope allow us therefore to close this

part of the history with the words from a later missionary to Asia adinam Judson shown on this book cover with his wife for whom AJ Gordon here's a cover of a book about him of Gordon Conwell Seminary here's a picture of that Seminary would be named who said back to adinam Judson said at a time when his own Pro aspects never seem darker quote the future is as bright as the promises of God who would have dared to predict in 1500 that before another 500 years had passed the Christians of Asia revived and renewed would

emerge from the shadows and begin again to outpace the west and the growth of the church and AD mission to the world close quote I closed last time with a benediction from the Bible the word benediction means good word or to speak a good word I speak God's good word over you in the coming week and pray that you yourself will speak good words over all you come in contact with amen