Origins
West Syrian Orthodox Christianity has its roots in the ancient
city of Antioch, the ruins of which
are located in present day southern Turkey.
Tradition holds that St. Peter established the Church in Antioch in 37 AD,
and that St. Paul also preached there. Antioch was under the control of the
Byzantine Empire in the first century, meaning that it was culturally
Hellenistic and Greek speaking. However, Christianity spread rapidly from the
city of Antioch into the country throughout
Mesopotamia in the first few centuries after the death
of Christ. The Arameans, a Syriac-speaking, culturally
Semitic people, were a major ethnic group in this area. This group converted en mass to Christianity, translated
scripture to Syriac, and developed a liturgical and exegetical style distinct
from the Byzantine tradition.
The See of Antioch
The See of Antioch at one time had jurisdiction over countries east of the the Roman Empire, including parts of India and China. In 451 AD, a schism occurred after the Council of Chalcedon.
The Syriac Church of Antioch
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Jacob Baradeus wore beggars clothing
to disguise himself and avoid capture
by Byzantine officials | |
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and the other Oriental Orthodox Churches refused to accept the Council, and communion was ruptured between the Chalcedonian and Non-Chalcedonian Churches. This resulted in persecution of the Syriac Church by certain Byzantine Emperors. Efforts were made for reconciliation, such as Emperor Zeno's Henotikon in 482, and Justinian I's condemnation of the Three Chapters at the Council of Constantinople II in 553, yet none of these attempts were successful. Empress Theodora, wife of Justinian I, was particularly sympathetic to the Syriac Church of Antioch, and allowed the ordination of Jacob Baradeus in 543, a non-Chalcedonian bishop of Edessa. Jacob subsequently ordained a multitude of clergy, giving the Syriac Non-Chalcedonian Church clerical and administrative independence from the Chalcedonian, reducing their dependence on the Chalcedonian Church, and therefore diminishing any motivation for reunion. With a foundation of clergy, the Syriac Church grew rapidly, as churches and monasteries were built in present day Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Iraq, Armenia, Afganistan, and India. A monastic tradition of strict asceticism and biblical scholarship developed from this milieu.
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St. Ephrem the Syrian was a prominent Church Father and poet of the
4th century who came out of the Syriac Christian Tradition |
Adversity
The Syriac Christians underwent persecution under the Byzantine
Empire in the 6th and 7th centuries, during the Crusades in the 11th
and 12th centuries, under the Mongols in the 14th century, and under
the Ottoman Empire in the 19th and 20th
centuries. In the present day, they continue to inhabit areas in Turkey,
Syria, Iraq, Lebanon, and Jerusalem, though their numbers have dwindled
significantly.
Persecutions of 1894 and 1915
It was the persecution under the Ottoman Empire
in 1894-96 and again in 1915 that led to the migration of Syriac Christians to North
America. Leading up to the first massacre in 1894, certain Muslim
groups increasingly came to see Christians (Armenian, Chaldean, Greek, and Syriac)
as second-class citizens that had no right to be living in the region. This
escalated to the point where Kurdish Muslim tribal leaders lead a series of
massacres in the Tur Abdin Region in South East Turkey from 1894-96, which resulted in the deaths of an estimated 25,000 Syriac
Christians. Along with these massacres, Muslims also forced Christians to
convert to Islam under the threat of violence. Then, in 1915, named Sayfo
(Year of the Sword) by Syriacs, Muslim Turks and Kurds launched attacks on a
larger scale. Patriarch Aphrem I reported an estimated 90,000 Syriac Christians
were killed during this assault.
Migration and Beginnings in the U.S.
The earliest Syriac Christian immigrants to the U.S.
were weavers, farmers, merchants, and craftsmen who left Turkey
and Syria to
escape the persecutions of 1894-96. They settled in New Jersey, Worchester, MA,
Central Falls, RI, and Detroit, MI. A Church leader during this period was
Dr. Abraham Yoosuf, who traveled from Turkey to the US in 1889 and established
the Assyrian Benefit Association in 1897 which collected funds to support the
suffering Christian communities in the Middle East. In 1907, Archbishop Mor
Ivanios Elias Halouki ordained Hanna Kourie to the priesthood in Jerusalem, and
sent him to the community in New Jersey to be the first Syriac priest in the
U.S. The Assyrian Ladies Society raised funds to purchase the first Syriac
Church in the U.S. in West Hoboken, NJ in 1909. Soon after, communities in West
New York, Worchester, Central Falls, and Detroit built churches, and Archbishop
Mor Severios Ephrem Barsoum ordained priests to serve these parishes. By
1948, there were approximately 3000 Syriac Orthodox Christians living in the
U.S.
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St. Ephraim Syriac Orthodox Church
of Central Falls, RI was consecrated
in 1913 |
Archdiocese in the U.S.
In 1949, Patriarch Ephrem I Barsoum sent Archbishop Mor
Athanasius Yeshue Samuel to the U.S.
to gather financial support for the brethren in the Holy Land.
Then in 1952 the Patriarch appointed Archbishop Samuel as Vicar of North
America, and gave him a two year period to see if the community in the U.S.
could financially support a bishop. The community bought a residence for the
bishop in Hackensack, NJ, and in 1957 Patriarch Jacob III
created the North American Archdiocese and appointed Mor Samuel to the
bishopric. The Archdiocese used the name Syrian Orthodox Church of
Antioch, however this caused a dispute with the Rum Orthodox who claimed the
same name. The issue was decided in court, which gave the name to the Syriacs,
and the Rum Orthodox subsequently changed their name to the Antiochian
Church.
References
Chadwick, Henry.
The Early Church. London: Penguin Books, 1993.
De Courtois, Sebastien. trans. Vincent Aurora. The
Forgotten Genocide. Piscataway, NJ:
Gorgias Press 2004.
Edip, Aydin, “The History of the Syrian Orthodox Church of
Antioch in North America: Challenges and Opportunities”
(Ph.D. diss., St. Vladimir’s Orthodox Theological Seminary, 2000)
Menze, Volker.
Justinian and the Making of the Syrian Orthodox Church. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
McCullough, Stewart.
A Short History of Syriac Christianity to the Rise of Islam. Chico: Scholars Press, 1982.
Thomas, Joseph. “Syriac Orthodox Rescources,” March 23 2002. Online: http://sor.cua.edu/History/index.html.