This is the commemorative edition for the 4th International Conference on the Church of the East in China. This is a collection of essays used as background research to seek and find the lost churches of the Silk Road. The author has used the "Da Qin Jing Jiao" Stone to provide clues for searching for the reported churches and monasteries that we built during the Tang dynasty. For later periods material from Mogao and other artifacts have been used in the investigation.
The silk road is a loose network of ancient trade routes from China to Bulgaria. In 2007, Richard and Jewel Showalter traveled this ancient highway and visited with missionaries, church leaders, pastors, and ordinary people of the Church of the East, an expression of Christianity little known to the West. In this book they share glimpses of their journey across Asia and invite readers to explore the historical landscape.
This volume includes cutting-edge research on the spread of Syrian Christianity along the Silk Road from the 6th to the 14th century. Recent archaeological discoveries and excavations of ancient and medieval Christian sites in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and China shed new light on Christian communities in Central Asia, China and Mongolia. Scholars from such fields as archaeology, manuscript studies, history and theology have contributed, offering new insights into the influence of Syriac Christianity along the Silk Roads.
This volume includes cutting-edge research on the spread of Syrian Christianity along the Silk Road from the 6th to the 14th century. Recent archaeological discoveries and excavations of ancient and medieval Christian sites in Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan and China shed new light on Christian communities in Central Asia, China and Mongolia. Scholars from such fields as archaeology, manuscript studies, history and theology have contributed, offering new insights into the influence of Syriac Christianity along the Silk Roads. Li Tang is Senior Research Fellow at the Center for the Study of the Christian East (ZECO), University of Salzburg/Austria. Dietmar W. Winkler is Head of the Department of Biblical Studies and Ecclesiastical History, and Associate Director of the Center for the Study of the Christian East (ZECO), University of Salzburg/Austria
In this groundbreaking book, renowned religion scholar Philip Jenkins offers a lost history, revealing that, for centuries, Christianity's center was actually in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, with significant communities extending as far as China. The Lost History of Christianity unveils a vast and forgotten network of the world's largest and most influential Christian churches that existed to the east of the Roman Empire. These churches and their leaders ruled the Middle East for centuries and became the chief administrators and academics in the new Muslim empire. The author recounts the shocking history of how these churches—those that had the closest link to Jesus and the early church—died. Jenkins takes a stand against current scholars who assert that variant, alternative Christianities disappeared in the fourth and fifth centuries on the heels of a newly formed hierarchy under Constantine, intent on crushing unorthodox views. In reality, Jenkins says, the largest churches in the world were the “heretics” who lost the orthodoxy battles. These so-called heretics were in fact the most influential Christian groups throughout Asia, and their influence lasted an additional one thousand years beyond their supposed demise. Jenkins offers a new lens through which to view our world today, including the current conflicts in the Middle East, Asia, and Africa. Without this lost history, we lack an important element for understanding our collective religious past. By understanding the forgotten catastrophe that befell Christianity, we can appreciate the surprising new births that are occurring in our own time, once again making Christianity a true world religion.
The story of Abraham is also a story about an immigrant. When the Patriarch Abraham was called by God to lead his people to strange lands and form a holy people, he called himself a wandering Aramean. He was not the first refugee but he may have been the first self aware refugee.
This book is about a Holy Mountain, holy to indigenous Christians of the Middle East and the Orient who still use the language of Jesus. It is about monks who once lived on this mountain and pioneered the Silk Road, it is about a modern mission to counter the crisis in Iraq, Syria and Turkey that is terrorizing this religious minority.
This is the fourth book in the Gunner Wales Detective Series. It features papers from the eclectic mind and life of one of the greatest detectives from the Pacific Northwest.
A series of essays originally published in various academic journals and publications that expose the rich culture and history of the Syriac Christians and their extraordinary influence in art, science, and religion.
