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A History of Christianity in Asia, volume 1, Beginnings to 1500. By SAMUEL HUGH MOFFETT. Second Revised Edition. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1998. xxvi, 560 pp. $25.00.
This remarkable synthesis narrates the geographical expansion, institutional development, and ultimate collapse and downfall of the Church of the East. This church was distinct from Roman Catholicism and Eastern Orthodoxy politically, culturally, and theologically, and was at times a vital Christian presence in Asia. Moffett's textured account provides a rich history which should serve as the standard introductory work to the subject. His projected second volume will concentrate on the other Christianities brought to Asia largely by Europeans and Americans, and together the two will fill an unfortunate lacuna in overviews of Christianity in Asia.
In volume 1, Moffett surveys the Christianity "that grew and spread outside of the Roman Empire in ancient oriental kingdoms east of the Euphrates and stretching along the Old Silk Road from Osrhoene through Persia to China or along the water routes from the Red Sea around Arabia to India" (p. xiv). The history of this church inevitably entails discussions of conquests and empires. Unlike the churches west of the Euphrates which eventually cane to be the official religions of the two halves of the...