-
Title
-
The Lesser Eastern Churches
-
Creator
-
Adrian Fortescue
-
Date
-
1913
-
Description
-
Fortescue argues that the proper technical name for Mar Shimun’s flock is “Nestorians,” the term used universally since the fifth century and one they themselves have often accepted in devotion to “the Blessed Nestorius.” He criticizes the growing Anglican habit of avoiding “Nestorian,” insisting the label need not imply agreement with the condemned heresy and that the group was not founded by Nestorius in any case. Alternative labels fare no better: “Persian Church” or “Turkish Church” are vague; “East Syrian Church” is closer, but too imprecise because there are many different East Syrian bodies.
He reserves particular disdain for the newly adopted “Assyrian Church,” calling it “the worst of all.” In his view they are “Assyrians in no possible sense.” The people inhabit only a corner of the territory once ruled by the Assyrian Empire, a land also covered by the Babylonian Empire; if one follows that logic, he quips, why not call them the “Babylonian Church”? On descent, he says no one can specify the mixture of blood in these lands; while some Nestorians may carry the blood of old Assyrian subjects, so do many other Mesopotamian sects. The empire itself ended centuries before Christ, so a tiny modern sect cannot inherit the name of the vast, long-vanished state. For Fortescue, “Assyrian Church” is neither old, accepted, nor common; it is a recent fad among a handful of Anglican sympathizers.
On “Chaldean,” he explains that this title belongs to the Uniate body corresponding to the Nestorians. Although the word is not ideal, it is fixed by universal and official usage at Rome: they call themselves Chaldeans; their liturgical book is the Missale chaldaicum; and their head bears the style Patriarcha Babylonensis Chaldaeorum. Hence, for the Catholic Uniate counterpart he prefers “Chaldean,” while for Mar Shimun’s non-Uniate community he retains “Nestorian,” and, when a broader confessionally neutral term is needed, “East Syrian.”
-
Language
-
English
-
Publisher
-
The Lesser Eastern Churches, Adrian Fortescue, 1913, pp. 7–9.
-
archive.org
-
Subject
-
Church History
