Nushirvan died 578 A.D., and was followed by a number of weak monarchs till the ill-fated Yazdijird III., last Zoroastrian king of Persia, who, defeated at Qadasiyya by the Arabs in A.D. 635, died, an exile, in Khurasan, in A.D. 651.
At this, one of the most important turning-points in the history of the East, and the occasion of the inception of a doctrine that numbers among its adherents a large portion of the total population of the world, it is advisable to turn aside for a moment from the history of the Eastern Christians to ascertain in what condition the Church was at that time. Most commentators upon Islam and the Christianity of this period agree that the Church of Jesus Christ had, by its adoption of various heterodox ideas, become split up into little more than a widely spread religion, which, while nominally one in faith and aim, was actually nothing more than a number of sects at war with one another upon points of dogma, and generally sunk in corruption. This certainly was the case among the Christians of the West under the Byzantine Emperors, and the Syrian or Arab Christians of Western Arabia and Damascus. In such confusion was the Christian Church in these parts that Muhammad in seeking between the two great faiths of his land, Judaism and Christianity, for material wherewith to compile the Quran, turned away from the involved and contradictory views of the Christian priests, to the more comprehensible doctrine of the Jews.
But we are concerned with the Nestorians alone, and of all the sects, or schisms, this was the least corrupted in fundamental idea, and we find that it compared very favourably in organisation and unity of purpose, with the almost idolatrous sects of the Syrian and Coptic Churches.
Secessions and heresies occurred in Malabar, Socotra, and Diarbekr, but the original Nestorian idea seems to have been generally retained, namely, that of the dual nature of Jesus Christ, one personality the man, and the other the Word of God, and the refusal of the title of “Mother of God” to the Virgin Mary, who, they said, was the carnate vessel, albeit purified, that received the purely material seed communicated by a miracle, and therefore the mother of the man Jesus, the carnate individuality.
At any rate it may be seen that such doctrines, in themselves the result of speculation, are by no means bound to be the final expression of speculation, which is ever progressive, and it is hardly remarkable that many sub-theories should have sprung into existence among the Chaldeans. Yet we notice that the Chaldean Church existed, homogeneous, through the great bulk of its immensity from the year 410 till about the 17th century, a fact which speaks as no argument can for its unity of idea and teaching, as compared with the lamentable condition of the degraded Christian institutions of Syria and Greece.
In the first years of Islam there was more tolerance for Christianity than ever afterwards, as well as for Jews. Even Zoroastrians met with a certain consideration owing to a half-reverence Muhammad had accorded to their prophet. The Christians and Jews, however, were “People of the Book”—that is, people of a revealed faith—and as such entitled to more merciful treatment than pagans and idolaters. Moreover, Muhammad was considerably indebted to Christians and Jews for a great part of the Quran; and a Nestorian priest, Sergius, is said to have assisted him in the compilation of certain chapters. In answer to an accusation by the Arabs that he was assisted by a foreigner, the passage in the Surah ul Nahl (The Chapter of the Bee) was “revealed.” “We also know that they say, ‘Verily a certain man teacheth him to compose the Quran.’ The tongue of the person to whom they incline is a foreign tongue, whereas the Quran is written in the perspicuous Arabic tongue.”
MUHAMMAD AND THE CHALDEANS
So, while Muhammad displayed the greatest abhorrence for all Christian symbols, execrating above all the cross or crucifix, yet he did not force them to retract their beliefs, and arranged a special code of treatment for them, particularly exempting them from military service, in lieu of which they paid a poll-tax, or “jaziya.”[38]
In the case of towns and countries which submitted to the Islamic army, the generals of Muhammad entered into covenants of protection in some cases, agreeing to protect them as long as they paid this tax, and there is ground for believing that the treaty between Muhammad and the Chaldean Church, of which an exact copy was published in A.D. 1630,[39] but the authenticity of which is doubtful, existed in some form. By the terms of this treaty the Nestorians were protected and exempted from many vexatious taxes.
The Chaldeans now entered upon a second period of prosperity, which lasted 200 years, and during which under the early Khalifas they attained premier positions in all matters of philosophy, learning, and even statesmanship, causing more than once complaints from the less gifted and, consequently, the less favoured Musulman Arabs. The 2nd century of this period, from the time of the battle of the Zab (see [p. 107]), when a Persian dynasty reigned, was as well the golden age of the Khalifate as of the later Chaldean Church. Under the beneficent rule of the earlier Abbasid Khalifas (among whom were the renowned Harun al Rashid and Ma’mun) the patriarchate was transferred to Bagdad, and a new bishopric was founded at Kufa, the very heart and centre of Islam. Under the Khalifas Ma’mun and Harun al Rashid particularly, the Chaldeans found themselves in the greatest favour. Their colleges were protected, and as they were versed in many languages and sciences, their priests and philosophers were given the translation into Arabic of books from the Greek, Persian, and Chaldean languages. It is to the Chaldeans of this time that Islam is indebted for many of the Greek authors’ works, particularly Aristotle, whose philosophical treatises have been ever popular among the Arabs.