230 



EASTERN CHURCHES. 



authority, like that between a sovereign and 

 his ambassador, who, physically two, are held 

 to be morally one. Nestorius was condemned 

 for his heresy by a council held under the 

 direction of Pope Celestin at Rome, in 430. 

 He and his followers were excommunicated by 

 the Council of Ephesus, in 431 ; and he was 

 deposed from his seat. This vigorous action 

 repressed his doctrines in the Roman Empire, 

 but they were successfully propagated in the 

 East. Nestorianism was taught in the great 

 Persian school at Edessa, till that institution 

 was overthrown under the Emperor Zeno. 

 Another school was founded at Nisiba, to suc- 

 ceed that at Edessa, and had at the end of the 

 sixth century about eight hundred students. 

 Other celebrated schools were founded at Se- 

 leucia and at Doskena. The Nestorians were 

 favored by the Kings of Persia, who found them 

 effective auxiliaries against the encroachments 

 of the Emperors of Constantinople. They 

 possessed all the Episcopal sees, and conferred 

 upon that of Seleucia the title of the Patriarch- 

 ate of the East. They were likewise favored 

 and endowed with powers and offices under 

 the caliphs, but in Babylonia were occa- 

 sionally subjected to persecution, though raised 

 above other Christians. The faith was widely 

 diffused. Among the countries in which it 

 grew were Chaldea, Persia, Mesopotamia, Ar- 

 menia, Syria, Arabia, the Island of Socotra, 

 Bactriana, Tartary, India, Ceylon, and even 

 China, there having been at one time an arch- 

 bishop at Peking. The period of the decay of 

 the Nestorians commenced in the fourteenth 

 century. The early Mongol emperors favored 

 them, or at least did not obstruct them, but 

 under the later ones they suffered severe perse- 

 cutions. Tamerlane drove them from nearly 

 all the countries to which they had spread, 

 but Assyria. They were considerably weak- 

 ened also by conversions to the Roman Catho- 

 lic doctrines. In 1247 their vicar in China 

 gave his adhesion to the Pope. Several arch- 

 bishops and bishops followed his example. 

 Fifty years later, Jaballaha, the Patriarch, sub- 

 mitted to the Pope. His successors returned 

 to Nestorianism. In the middle of the fifteenth 

 century the Nestorians of the Island of Cyprus, 

 with their metropolitan, joined the union. 



In the middle of the sixteenth century a se- 

 rious schism occurred, resulting in the eleva- 

 tion of two patriarchs, at Kotchannes, in Koor- 

 distan, and at Mosul. Soulaka, of Kotchannes, 

 went to Rome, and abjured Nestorianism, and 

 received consecration and the dignity of Pa- 

 triarch from Pope Julius III. His successors 

 subsequently returned to their old belief. 

 Pope Gregory XIII. effected a union with the 

 Mosul branch, but they fell away again at the 

 close of the seventeenth century. The patriarch 

 of this line, in 1781, effected a union with the 

 Roman Catholic Church, which has continued 

 to this day. The Nestorians who are in com- 

 munion with Rome are generally called Chal- 

 deans. 



The following are the statistics of the two 

 branches : 



Statistics of the Chaldean Mthops (1867). 



Statistics of the Nestorian Bishops (1852).. 



Badger, cutting off a third from the num- 

 bers furnished him by the Patriarcli of Kotch- 

 annes, estimates the number of the Nestorians 

 at 70,000. Joseph Audo, actual Patriarch of 

 the United Chaldeans, raises the number to 

 200,000. M. d'Avril considers this too large, 

 and fixes it at 130,000 in Turkey, and 10,000 

 in Persia. 



Early in 1867, Joseph Audo, the Chaldean 

 Patriarch, addressed a long and pressing let- 

 ter of invitation to the Nestorian Patriarch, 

 Simeon, to return to the Roman Catholic unity. 

 The latter replied, refusing, as follows : 



"We cannot dissimulate the surprise we feel at 

 your persistence in holding with the Pope, after the 

 outrages lie has perpetrated upon you, and the indif- 

 ference with which he has treated your pontifical 

 dignity on the occasion of your last voyage to Rome, 

 as we have learned from persons entitled to credit. 

 With such a condition existing how can you have 

 the heart to propose to us to subject ourselves to the 

 like outrages, to expose ourselves to similar con- 

 tempt? In this you certainly have not consulted 

 what is proper. As to the other questions which you 

 have taken pains to expose at length, we have not, 

 for the present, any reply to make to you. "We have 

 learned of the excesses and the crimes of every kind 

 that have been committed against those of your na- 

 tion who are established in the villages of the districts 

 of Zakhou and Gazartha ; we are informed that these 

 unfortunate people have been pillaged and reduced 

 to slavery by the Koords of those countries. Now, 

 if you cannot protect the children of your own nation, 

 how can you promise help and advantages to those 

 who are strangers to you ? And while you yourselves 

 are groaning under the yoke of the Pope, how do you 

 presume to engage men who are yet free to cast them- 

 selves into bonds of slavery? You invite me to 

 humbly kiss the slipper of the Bishop of Eome ; but 



