Nestorius & the Two-Natures Doctrine

The attribution of a divided essence of Christ with Mankind described as two-natures is attributed to Nestorius the arch-bishop of Constantinople. Condemned by the Council of Ephesus in 431, it became a popular methodology within the middle-east centered at Nisibis and with the Edessa School under the Sassanids originally. The Nestorians enjoyed protection later under Islamic code, and the Mongul conquests did little to change their status, despite outright devastation wraught by Amir Timur. By the 16th Century the Ottoman's attained rule, and in the time the religion was contained by the Euphrates and Bohtan rivers, the Urumia lake of Persia, the Musul vilayet and Firat river. As classed within the millets, the Nestorian's remained exclusive to other emergent Christianity until 1915, that mostly denominated by Imperialism within the western sphere of influence; before finally succumbing.

Amid Ottoman instability of the 19th Century, expeditions instigated by the British and Foreign Bible Society triggered a serious political rift, initially evident in an ideological divide between American and British Missionaries. Governing the Hakkari province, Bedirhan Bey was descended from Saladin. Without fixed religious loyalties he would perceive the intervention as a Nestorian political issue rather than a religious amalgamation. He would respond with a strike on the Nestorians in 1840, absconding foreign missionary activities, which resigned to Urumia, Persia. Inadvertently however the Christian cause was interceded when the Nestorian patriarch left Kuchanis for the British board in Musul.

The Bukhtis and Bajnawi Kurds had ruled the area surrounding Sinjar and Jazira mountains known under the name Zozan by Arab geographers. Yaqoot Hamawi describes their residing area to be from Ikhlat to Salmas which included many strongholds belonging to Bokhtis; he also mentioned town of Jardhakil as their capital. The Kurdistan culture is diverse from Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey is identified by national and ethnic multi-lingual communities with exclusive dance, music, food, art and anthropomorphic myths. Including Arabic, Armenian, Iranian and Turkish, the Kurdish dialects are Northern Kurmanji, Central Sorani, and Southern Sorani with the additions of Kermanshahi, Ardalani and Laki. Zaza and Gorani are also ethnic Kurdish but unclassified as such. Bedirhan Bey, 1803–1868, as the arbiter for a Holy war, was the last Kurdish emir and mutesellim of the Bohtan Emirate. An ethnic Kurd born in Cizre, his power was threatened following his actions against the Christian minority, of whom the American Mission perceived as a lost tribe, although having lived peaceful among both the Sunni and Shi'ite Muslim majorities across several states since shortly after the time of Jesus Christ. It wasn't long before the Nestorian Christian's were renamed as the Assyrian Church.

The Tanzimat Edict & the Hakkari Massacres

Officially the regional conflict began when the centralist policies of the Ottoman Empire culminated in the Tanzimat Edict of 1839, as a wide scale reformation and modernisation instigated in response to foreign powers after the Empire's significant depreciation particular to upper Mesopotamia. War broke out in the same year in Hakkari between Nurallah the governor of Bash Qal'a, and his nephew in Gullamerk. Splitting the region particularly the Assyrians, those including the Patriarch of the Church of the East (Nestorians), Shimun XVII Abraham supported Suleyman. A massacre soon eventuated when Nurallah struck Assyrian villages and the Patriarchate of Qodshanis in 1841, causing a irreparable rift between Christians and Kurds. The Kurds and Ottomans fought in summer 1842. In early 1843 Nurallah sent for a meeting with the Patriarch and the latter apologized using the weather, his religious duties, and the presence of a guest, the British missionary George Badger, as a pretense. It seemed that the Patriarch made his decision after being convinced by Badger to distrust the Kurds and to request assistance from the English or the Porte if the Kurds were to attack. Once Badger left, Nurallah renewed his alliance with the Badr Khan and Ismail Pasha, seeking to subjugate the Christians.

In July 1843 the Kurdish alliance, led by Badr Khan attacked the Nestorians in Hakkari, destroying their villages and killing many of them. Hormuzd Rassam tried using his influence with the Vali of Baghdad Najib Pasha to pressure Badr Khan for the release of prisoners which included close relatives of the Patriarch of the Assyrian Church (Nestorians), who had in the meantime taken refuge in Mosul. His attempts only led to the release of about 150, one of whom was the sister of the Patriarch, while the rest were distributed as war booty between Kurdish and Turkish Agha's and Mullahs. European powers instigated a response to a second massacre forcing the Ottomans to invade Bedirhan Bey's territories, deporting Bedirhan Bey and ally Nurallah of Hakkari to Crete in 1850.

More than 10,000 Assyrians perished during the massacres as Kurdish and later Ottoman incursions would bring an end to the semi-independent status which many Assyrian tribes enjoyed in the mountainous areas. The Ottoman intervention would indeed lead to complete control over the last semi-independent Kurdish Emirates and the eastern frontier by 1847.

The Crimean War & the Nestorian Orthodox Conversion

The Crimean War would culminate with the English declaring war on Persia in 1856. The Presbyterian Board had based itself in Tebriz, Tehran, Hemdan and Rasht. The Anglicans suffering from a failed mission, but later returning to Persia, all whilst the Church Missionary Society had commenced in Esfahan, titled the 'Mission to Persia'. The Christian schools were first based in Van south eastern Anatolia under W.A Wigram, where the schools for boys multiplied until moving, along with the printing press, to Imadia to also include Nestorians from Hakkari, as well as other Assyrian 'Chaldeans' and 'Jacobites' in the Euphrates valley. The complex dissolution between Sunni and Shi'te Muslim communities was established hence where funding and resources 'from the west' were strictly Christian solutions. While the churches worked out their differences and coming to an agreement, Nicholas I of Russia and the French Emperor Napoleon III had absolved a deeper consternation in military occupation. Nicholas issued an ultimatum that the Orthodox subjects of the Empire be placed under his protection. Britain attempted to mediate and arranged a compromise that Nicholas agreed to. When the Ottomans demanded changes, Nicholas refused and prepared for war. Having obtained promises of support from France and Britain, the Ottomans declared war on Russia in October 1853. When the Russians invaded Azerbaijan, it's 20,000 Nestorians converted to the Russian Orthodox Church and attained protection from both Persian and Ottomans. Later many of the order would join the Church of Rome, and wider still, the Lutherean's, all at large due to divesting missionary work by the French, and Germans.

As the actual first installments of the prolonged World War were under way, the Balkans were subsequently, in July 1853, occupied by Russian troops along the Danubian Principalities (part of modern Romania), which were under Ottoman suzerainty, who then began to cross the Danube. Led by Omar Pasha, the Ottomans fought a strong defensive campaign and stopped the advance at Silistra. A separate action on the fort town of Kars in eastern Anatolia led to a siege, and a Turkish attempt to reinforce the garrison was destroyed by a Russian fleet at Sinop. Fearing an Ottoman collapse, France and Britain rushed forces to Gallipoli. They then moved north to Varna in June 1854, arriving just in time for the Russians to abandon Silistra. Aside from a minor skirmish at Köstence (today Constanța), there was little for the allies to do. In the day Karl Marx joked: "there they are, the French doing nothing and the British helping them as fast as possible".

Written by Jason Steven Jowett. Sourced from historical fact. This blog may not be reproduced in whole without the author's express permission. Copyright © 2024. greatbrittania.blogspot.com