What about a sub-section for the non-canical works?

[Paul Younan]

As far as The Church of The East and the Eastern Orthodox Church are concerned, if they had been obeying the Great commission, perhaps there would have not been "The Dark Ages". Is Apostolic succession a tradition of disobedience to God? Why hasn't the world heard of a Church of The East? I hadn't until two years ago.

Shlama Akhi Dave,

Actually, the Church of the East in the 11th century was the largest church on the earth, far surpassing both the Roman and Greek churches combined.

During this time, the Church of the East was spread from Cyprus to Japan. It had metropolitan bishoprics in Cyprus, Israel, Syria, Assyria, Babylonia, Persia, Georgia, India, Russia, Turkestan, Korea, China, Philippines, Java, Socotra, Mongolia, Siberia.....you name it, the entire Asian continent.

The reason you had previously never heard of the Church of the East is because during the 14th century, Tamerlane (a fanatical Muslim Turk) wiped out 99% of the Church in Asia. After the arrival of the Turks, the Church of the East was a mere shadow of its former status as the largest Christian congregation on the face of the earth. This is because hundreds of millions of people were slaughtered or forcibly converted to Islam.

It may be hard to imagine, but for the first 12 centuries of the Christian faith, there were more believers to the east of the river Euphrates than to the west of it. And to the east they were Aramaic-based. Yes, Koreans and Mongolians and Japanese were saved and they prayed in Aramaic, read scriptures in Aramaic.

The Church of the East is not an ethnic church that is limited to Assyrians or Persians or Indians. It is and always was a "universal" church, comprising almost every nation to the "East" of Antioch. And, as I said earlier - it was larger than the Latin and Greek churches combined. So it is not that God was locked away in Persia during the Dark Ages of Europe. In fact, the Holy Spirit was making converts throughout all of Asia.

As for the Church of the East obeying the Great Commission or not obeying it, you may not realize that Western historians call the Church of the East "the Greatest Missionary Church that has ever existed." This is because it carried the Gospel across the vast continent of Asia, by foot, for 1300 years!

It is only in the last 700 or so years that Western Christianity has surpassed eastern in numbers. But again, this is because the Church of the East was nearly wiped out by Tamerlane. The only remnants to surivive this slaughter were some pockets in India and Assyria. Everywhere else in Asia the church was martyred.

If you look at the history of Christianity with only one eye open (one towards Europe), you would be doing yourself a great disservice. I highly recommend these resources to broaden your knowledge in this area:

"By Foot to China" - http://www.peshitta.org/pdf/bftc.pdf

"History of the Church of the East" - http://www.peshitta.org/pdf/wigram.pdf

"The Monks of Kublai Khan" - http://www.peshitta.org/pdf/mokk.pdf

For the best treatment of the topic to date, here is a great book from Barnes and Noble by Samuel Hugh Moffett: (VERY highly recommended) <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/smile.gif" alt="" title="Smile" /><!-- s -->

http://search.barnesandnoble.com/booksea...1625&itm=1