Author: R. Todd Godwin File Type: pdf The Xian Stele, erected in Tang Chinas capital in 781, describes in both Syriac and Chinese the existence of Christian communities in northern China. While scholars have so far considered the Stele exclusively in relation to the Chinese cultural and historical context, Todd Godwin here demonstrates that it can only be fully understood by reconstructing the complex connections that existed between the Church of the East, Sasanian aristocratic culture and the Tang Empire (617907) between the fall of the Sasanian Persian Empire (225651) and the birth of the Abbasid Caliphate (7621258). Through close textual re-analysis of the Stele and by drawing on ancient sources in Syriac, Greek, Arabic and Chinese, Godwin demonstrates that Tang China (617907) was a cosmopolitan milieu where multiple religious traditions, namely Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and Christianity, formed zones of elite culture. Syriac Christianity in fact remained powerful in Persia throughout the period, and Christianity not Zoroastrianism was officially regarded by the Tang government as The Persian Religion. Persian Christians at the Chinese Court uncovers the role played by Syriac Christianity in the economic and cultural integration of late Sasanian Iran and China, and is important reading for all scholars of the Church of the East, China and the Middle East in the medieval period. **Review Ever since its discovery in the 17th C., the Xian (Nestorian) Monument - the oldest Christian monument in stone to be found in China - has been a source of controversy and fascination. Earlier Catholic scholars had hoped to see in it evidence of Catholic mission to Tang China but modern scholars now regard it as an important document on the diffusion of the Church of the East along the Silk Road and in pre-Modern China. The present volume by a scholar who does not shirk the enormous linguistic demands of mastering the bilingual text of the Monument and of the relevant historical sources is a landmark publication which will benefit both the series study of Eastern Christianity and the general reading public with an interest in an extraordinary but too often neglected testimony to early East-West contact. - Samuel N.C. Lieu, Emeritus Professor, Macquarie University, Sydney, Godwins book is a magnificent exploration of one of the most important themes in the new global medieval history Persian Christians in the empire of Tang China. Not unlike the Silk Road itself, this study brings East and West together in one overarching Eurasian worldview. Erudite and subtle, Godwin weaves together all the languages and literatures of Mesopotamia, Iran, Central Asia, and China to create a vivid textile of religion, culture, and political dominion. Godwin places his own bold argument within a history of debate over the incredible Xian monument that extends back to the time of Voltaire. Students and scholars interested in the Asian history of Christianity - obscured by unfamiliar languages and historical sources - will find in this book the hidden pearl of a remarkable story. Godwin has uncovered this story with a sincerity of research that is reminiscent of golden age scholarship and the work of Paul Pelliot himself. This is history on a grand scale, invoking the rise and fall of empires, intrepid missions across thousands of inhospitable miles, and the durability of monastic institutions that are still with us. - Scott Fitzgerald Johnson, Associate Professor of Classics and Letters, University of Oklahoma, This is a groundbreaking study that is soundly based on both Chinese and Syriac primary sources. It demonstrates compellingly that the Church of the East in Tang China and in Sasanian Persia saw itself as an active participant in maintaining the Empire and ensuring its very survival through the blessing of Christ dispensed through its ascetic leaders. - Steve Eskildsen, Professor of Philosophy and Religion, International Christian University About the Author R. Todd Godwin received his Ph.D. from the School of African and Oriental Studies (SOAS), University of London, and now lectures at the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies, Cambridge, UK and the Classical Language Learning Resource Center in Idaho. He has published in peer-reviewed journals on the early medieval Church of the East.

Author: Andrea K. Scott File Type: pdf