Persian Christians at the Chinese Court: The Xi’an Stele and the Early Medieval Church of the East

Description

The Xi’an stele, erected in Tang China in 781, describes in both Syriac and Chinese the existence of Christian communities in northern China. Scholars have considered the stele exclusively in relation to the Chinese cultural and historical context, Godwin here demonstrates that it can only be fully understood through the complex connections that existed between the Church of the East, Sasanian aristocratic culture and the Tang Empire. 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 was a cosmopolitan milieu where multiple religious traditions, namely Buddhism, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism and Christianity, formed zones of elite culture. Syriac Christianity 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. Cover Title Copyright Contents A Note on Sources and their Usages A Note on the Romanisation of Chinese Characters Map 1 Map 2 Introduction Between Dhimmitude and Emperor Worship: East Syrian Agency and its Historiography The Xi’an Stele’s Sasanian Persian Longue Durée Chapter Summaries Part I: ‘What’s in a Name?’ 1. The Late Sasanian Court and Divine Economy Introduction Tabari’s Account of the Death of Yazdegird III and East Syrian Involvement Cosmas the India Traveller and Divine Economy Zachariah of Mitylene, the Sasanian Comitatus, and Mdabranoutha Inter-courtly Physicians, Rhetors and Rome Mar Aba I, the Fall of Hephthalites and the Re-Opening of the Silk Road Patriarch Ishho’yahb III, Divine Economy, and the Sasanian Comitatus Isho'yahb III and the ‘Rulers of this World’ The Church of the East’s Divine Oἶκoς in the Early Arab-Ruled Persian Gulf 2. ‘Repairing the Imperial Net’ before the An Lushan Rebellion Introduction The Empire Strikes Back: Persian Agency in the Early Tang Period Church of the East Prince Aluohan of Persia: ‘Nation Founding Duke’ and ‘Prominent Clansman’ ‘Mysterious Items of Foreign Cunning’: Imperial Buddhism, Worldly-Asceticism and Persian Agency During the Period of Wu Zetian and Xuanzong Part II: ‘The Lord is King: He is Robed in Majesty’ 3. The Habitus of Patriarch Timothy I Introduction The Church of the East’s Noblesse de Robe and Emergent Central Asian Kingship Persian Knowledge-Holders in the Long Orbit of the Abbasid Court Cosmopolitan families on the Abbasid Silk Roads Empire, Court and Worldly Asceticism in the Writings of TimothyI 4. The Court of Emperor Tang Dezong as ‘Imperial Net’, and the Church of the East’s Persian Longue Durée Introduction The Translation Incident of 787, the ‘Imperial Net’ and Agency Late Tang Eunuchs, the Buddhist Cosmopolis, Dezong’s Court, and Agency Dezong’s Court and Chancellor Li Mi Li Mi, the Uighur Empire and the Church of the East’s Persian Longue Durée Li Mi, Tibet and Dezong’s Imperial Net Divine Economy and the Late Tang Empire’s Non-Han, Scientific Families Conclusion Appendix A: Persian, Arab, Chinese and Church of the East Leaders, c.400–c.850 Appendix B: The Xi’an Stele in Chinese Characters Appendix C: The Pillar for the Propagation of the Luminous Religion in China Appendix D: Theoretical Concepts Used in the Study and Their Definitions Notes Bibliography Index