The Church of the East and the Church of England: A History of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Assyrian Mission [Hardcover]

J. F. Coakley (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0198267444 | ISBN-13: 978-0198267447 | Publication Date: August 20, 1992

In the years before the First World War the Church of England maintained a mission of help to the Assyrian Church of the East (popularly known as the Nestorian Church) in its homeland, a corner of eastern Turkey and northwestern Persia. Its ideal was to restore this body to its ancient vitality and its place as an independent branch of the true church. The Mission faced many problems. At home there was the difficulty of justifying support of a "heretical" church. In the field, the confidence of the Assyrians proved difficult to gain, especially in competition with other missions: French Catholic and American Presbyterian. Still, it had notable accomplishments. Archbishop Benson, the founder, strictly ruled out any proselytizing to the Anglican church, and in this respect his Assyrian Mission withstands scrutiny in modern eyes better than some other missions of the Victorian era. The first study to cover this history, Coakley's book will be of interest to scholars concerned with oriental churches and church history, as well as students of Middle Eastern history.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"Coakley tells this story of grinding tragedy with insight, formidable command of the sources...and with dignity. Superb and haunting scholarship."--Religious Studies Review

"This book offers a detailed study of a previously overlooked chapter in Angelican mission history.... This book rises above what could be viewed as an arcane subject....Coakley clearly has encouraged further work on the culture of missionary work, at home and in the field."--Church History

About the Author

J. F. Coakley is a Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies at Lancaster University.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA (August 20, 1992)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0198267444
• ISBN-13: 978-0198267447
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 5.7 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #569,563 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #45 in Books > Christian Books & Bibles > Other Denominations & Sects

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars Hit-and-miss, March 6, 2009

By 

I. Holder (Sydney, Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Church of the East and the Church of England: A History of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Assyrian Mission (Hardcover)

A comprehensive account of the Church of England's Mission to the Church of the East in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which details successes as much as it does the many, sad, failures. Though a bit hard-going at times, and some cringe-inducing letters from the English about the so-called "uncultured" Assyrians [though we can't apply standards today back then, it still jarred for me], this is an in-depth account which helped fill in many gaps of my knowledge of this interesting Mission.

1 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Boring, March 22, 2003

By 

Jedidiah Palosaari "Not My Real Name" (Fes, Morocco) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Church of the East and the Church of England: A History of the Archbishop of Canterbury's Assyrian Mission (Hardcover)

This book has little to commend itself, and less to recommend itself with. I had high hopes, wanting to read about this fabulous church, the largest in the world until 1000 AD, with one million people, spread throughout the Middle East, Central Asia, China, India, and maybe even Japan and SE Asia. But the writing is very poor, and not gripping. And the author seems lost without a main point. It is as if he did a lot of research on the relationship between the Anglican and ancient Nestorian Church, and then dumped it all out, without any clear format or guiding principle. It is chronologically written, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, but there is no main point by which the author displays his data. When reading a research book, I expect that it is not just a catalogue of research, but guided by a point the author is trying to communicate. I couldn't see this point, and it made for very boring reading, in many different directions.

Coakley writes about the coming of the Anglican Church to revitalize the ancient Nestorian/Assyrian Church/Church of the East/Church of Theodore of Mopsuetia. (They have a number of names.) The Anglican Church desired not to proselytize or convert the ancient church to the Anglican beliefs, but to revitalize a church that had become stagnant, with the leaders having no care for God, the people knowing little of faith or belief, and the hierarchy becoming hereditary rather than by merit. But this history seems mostly filled with what I can only describe as gossip. The Anglicans seem to have mostly difficulty with other missions, like the despised American Protestants, and see the Assyrians as a backward people, with little redemption. They go there to educate, but face constant obstacles, which seem mostly of their own making, for not truly valuing the people inn the Nestorian Church. Though they claim to not want to proselytize, they end up trying to get the ancient church to change it's beliefs to come in line with the rest of Christendom. (The Assyrians' Christology believes Christ is "two natures, two persons"- but it's not entirely clear what that means in the context of Syriac, their liturgical language, and within their culture.) I desired to read about stories of people coming to God and God's great work, and behold, gossip. I wanted to hear about the changes wrought by this mission within the politics of the region, and behold, random imperialistic pericope.

Two stars, for the last chapter, where we finally get some stories, and some more clear interaction of this ancient church with the rest of the world. And in the final chapter we learn that, in the 1930's, the ancient Nestorian people in large part fled the area due to massacres by Kurdish and Turkish troops. When they sought to return to their homeland, they faced great difficulties, because Turkey now controlled the region. They ended up settling in Mosul, but again faced new difficulties, because the new Iraqi regime, created by the European powers, now controlled Mosul, and the Arabs were in the majority. Some worked to create an independent Assyrian land covering much of Kurdistan, including Mosul, but it came to naught. And so many of the ancient Assyrians, including their patriarch, moved to the United States. The only ancient church with the patriarchate in the U.S. is the Assyrian, based in Chicago. A remnant is left in modern-day Iraq/Iran/Turkey, what is called Kurdistan, and is currently being bombed in Mosul by the Americans and the British, who once came to revitalize their church.