What happened to the Nestorians?

[rglencheek]

The NEstorian church was the largest in Christendom up until around 1000 AD, then they just disappeared.

Are there any theories to account for this?

I have heard two:

1. Muslims took over and forced the vast majority to convert.

I dont buy this one.

2. They converted to Islam because they expected Jesus to return by 1000 AD.

Nor this one.

So whats left?

 

[Kripost]

I am not sure what happen to most of them, but some of the Turkish-Mongol tribes were Nestorian. Genghis Khan's sworn-father's tribe was Nestorian, and Kublai Khan's mother Sorghaghtani Beki was a Nestorian too. Some envoys such as William of Rubruck from France, and Fransiscan Monk John of Plano Carpini, did encounter and write about them in their travels to China or Mongolia. This was after 1200AD.

 

[wildthing]

Nestorian Christians were Asiatic. It is suggested that kublai khan was one. after 1269 there was many abortive missions to Mangu Khan. It is believe that the popes sent many missionaries there but they either failed to arrive or died in transit. These christian would appear to have been swallowed up by other groups.

 

[Dale]

Nestorius held the rank of Patriarch of Constantinople from 428 to 431 AD. He was elevated to this rank partly because he was thought to be particularly orthodox.

How he got in trouble:
"One of the practices assailed by Nestorius was the custom, which had become almost universal in Constantinople, of bestowing the epithet 'Mother of God' upon Mary the mother of Jesus." --Encyclopedia Brittannica, 1946, under Nestorius
Patriarch Nestorius had a co-presbyter named Anastasius. "This Anastasius, in a pulpit oration which the patriarch himself is said to have prepared for him, caused great scandal to the partisans of the cult of Mary by saying, 'Let no one call Mary the mother of God, for Mary was a human being; and that God should be born of a human being is impossible.'"
Protestants should be able to sympathize with this.

The excommunication and exile of Nestorius was rather messy. It wasn't the Pope who excommunicated him. An assembly of Bishops sort of tried him in absentia and excommunicated him. "The accused and his friends never had a hearing." EB
The procedure was so irregular that it was condemned by the Roman Emperor and by religious authorities at the time. Nevertheless, after some conflict, Nestorius was exiled to Arabia.

Modern Nestorians will call Mary the Blessed Virgin but still object to the RC title Mother of God. The only other doctrinal difference with other Christians is "semi-patri-passianism (the apparent identification of all three persons of the Trinity in the sufferer on the cross) which marked the Nestorian teaching." EB under Nestorians
I don't see a reason to object to this.

Nestorians have been found in numerous locations in Syria, Persia, India and China. Nestorians have been found as far south as Ceylon (Sri Lanka). The Nestorians in Ceylon apparently came from Persia, fleeing religious persecution there.
"Marco Polo is witness that there were Nestorian churches all along the trade routes from Baghdad to Pekin." --EB
I'm glad there are Nestorians. The RCC should have agreed with Nestorius.

 

[Suzannah]

The Nestorians are still alive and well in Armenia (one of the first countries to embrace Christianity as a whole). Beyond that I will not comment. But our brothers and sisters are still on Earth and still have their doors open.

 

[Suzannah]

The NEstorian church was the largest in Christendom up until around 1000 AD, then they just disappeared.
QUOTE]

A second thought: I'm not sure where you read this, or found this during your research but I thought I would just offer this link, if it's helpful. (I would debate it but I'm not much for debate....just don't like the upset stomach that results. )

The Orthodox Church by kallistos Ware. You can read the whole thing online free, here:
http://www.intratext.com/X/ENG0804.HTM
He touches on the Nestorians, I think and may give you the info you are looking for.

 

[stillsmallvoice]

Hi all!

The Nestorians are alive & well; see http://lexicorient.com/e.o/nestorian.htm, http://www.cired.org/ace.html & http://lexicorient.com/e.o/chaldean.htm.

There is a small Chaldean Catholic community here in Israel (see http://tinyurl.com/26rvr for a good read on Israel's various Christian communities, including the Chaldean Catholics).

Be well!

ssv

 

[mindfull]

I don't believe that there was ever a Nestorian church.
Modern scholarship has concluded that Nestorius did not subscribe
to what he was accused of. (what else is new) which was that jesus was two persons.
That belief is now sanctioned by the RCC in different language:
two NATURES !

The "two" comes from the geography of mesopatamia: two rivers.

For example, in Egypt, their perspective is oneness (due to one river).
Greeks like "nothing" because they have no rivers.

What all those travelers were observing was the Church of the East,
which was headquartered in the Persian Empire.

Today that church is alive and well, headquartered in Chicago,
by Mar Dinka IV.

His publication is "the voice of the east".

---mindfull