On 28/1/03 5:36 AM, "David Miller" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I would not fret too much about that, Terry. It is my understanding that > Christianity is illegal in Iraq. I could be wrong, because I have not been > there, but from what I have read, the Iraqi government destroyed their > churches.
G'day Guys, I hope Tariq Aziz the foreign minister doesn't know about that as he is nominally a member of one of the Christian churches in Iraq. Iraq was an important centre in early Christianity as if spread Eastwards from Antioch among the Syriac speaking people. Christianity spread though Iraq (then Persia) into India and China. The Syriac speaking Christians survived under Islam as a millet (protected minority) because they taught the Arabs Greek science and medicine. About the year 1000 CE the "Church of the East" was larger than the combined Catholic and Orthodox churches but was destroyed by Temur the Lame (a mongol). Western missionaries found a primitive (i.e. Early) Christian church when they went in to China in the 1850s. (In the ships with Bibles also came heroin to break up Chinese society.) Anyway back to Persia. There is a remnant Church in the North near Mosul which apparently doesn't back SH and the Church in the South (Baghdad) supports him. For more background see http://newt.phys.unsw.edu.au/~epe/4010/notes/4010.N16.html Cheers Peter -- Peter Eyland Sydney Australia Web page: http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/~epe ---------- "Let your speech be always with grace, seasoned with salt, that you may know how you ought to answer every man." (Colossians 4:6) http://www.InnGlory.org If you do not want to receive posts from this list, send an email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and you will be unsubscribed. If you have a friend who wants to join, tell him to send an e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and he will be subscribed.
