¹ Anderson, Rufus, History of the Missions of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions to the Oriental Churches (Boston, 1873 [I], 1872 [II]; 2nd edn Boston, 1875 [III and IV], same pagination).Google Scholar

² In the following I will use the designation ‘Eastern’ to refer to all ancient Christian Churches of Western Asia, including the Chalcedonian Churches of the Greek tradition as well as the non-Chalcedonian ‘Oriental’ Churches, like the Armenian and Syrian-Orthodox ChurcL The Church of the East, representing a separate non-Chalcedonian tradition, is included too.

³ Walker, Mary A., ‘The American Board and the Oriental Churches. A Brief Survey of Policy Based on Official Documents’, in International Review of Mission, 56 (1976), pp. 214–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Kawerau, Peter, Amerika und die orientalischen Kirchen. Ursprung und Anfang der Amerikanischen Mission unter den Nationalkirchen Westasiens (Berlin, 1958)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Kerr, David A., ‘Mission and Proselytism: A Middle East Perspective’, IBMR, 20/1 (1996), pp. 12–22.Google Scholar

⁴ Habib Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians”: The Policy and Practice of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and its Missionaries Concerning Eastern Churches which led to the Organization of a Protestant Church in Beirut (1819-1848)’ (Ph.D. thesis, Princeton, NJ, 1992).

⁵ For the history of this mission, including further biographical references, see Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians”’; Kawerau, Amerika; and Tibawi, A. L., American Interests in Syria, 1800-1901. A Study of Educational, Literary and Religious Work (Oxford, 1966).Google Scholar

⁶ Prime, E. D. G., Forty Years in the Turkish Empire; or, Memoirs of Rev. William Goodell, D.D., Late Missionary of the A.B.C.F.M. at Constantinople (New York, 1876), pp. 64–5Google Scholar: The History and Present State of Armenia as a Missionary Field’.

⁷ Smith, Eli and Dwight, H. G. O., Missionary Researches in Armenia: Including a Journey through Asia Minor, and into Georgia and Persia, with a Visit to the Nestorian and Chaldean Christians of Oormiah and Salmas (London, 1834)Google Scholar. For this work, Smith and Dwight made use of the work of the Maronite scholar Assemani, J. S., Bibliotheca Orientalis (Rome, 1719)Google Scholar, which was one of the most extensive studies on Eastern Christianity then available.

⁸ Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians”’, pp. 90–4; Richter, Julius, A History of Protestant Missions in the Near East (New York, 1910 [repr. New York, 1970]), p. 187.Google Scholar

⁹ Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians’”, pp. 119–25.

¹⁰ Kawerau, Amerika, pp. 488–91.

¹¹ Richter, History, pp. 188–9.

¹² Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians’”, pp. 100–3.

¹³ Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians’”, p. 167.

¹⁴ Anderson, Rufus, ‘Report to the Prudential Committee of a Visit to the Missions in the Levant’, also ‘A Letter to the Committee from the Rev. Dr. Hawes’ (Boston, 1844)Google Scholar. On Anderson and the influence of his mission policy, see Beaver, R. Pierce, ‘Rufus Anderson 1796-18 80. To Evangelize, Not Civilize’, in Anderson, Gerald H., Coote, Robert T. et al, Mission Legacies. Biographical Studies of Leaders of the Modern Missionary Movement (Maryknoll, NY, 1994), pp. 548–53, and Hutchison, William R., Errand to the World: American Protestant Thought and Foreign Missions (Chicago, 1987), pp. 62–90.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Anderson, ‘Report’, p. 25.

¹⁶ Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians’”, pp. 275–80.

¹⁷ Makdisi, Ussama, ‘Reclaiming the Land of the Bible: Missionaries, Secularism, and Evangelical Modernity’, AHR, 102-3 (1997). pp. 680–713.Google Scholar

¹⁸ For a recent evaluation of the influence of ABCFM policy on the mission among the Armenians, see Paul Harris, ‘Denominationalism and democracy: ecclesiastical issues underlying Rufus Anderson’s Three Self Program’ (unpublished paper presented at the North Atlantic Missiology Project Consultation in Madison, Wisconsin, 2-4 November, 1997, NAMP Position Papers, 43). For an overview of the start of the mission work, up to the establishment of a separate Protestant Church in Constantinople, see Kutvirt, Thomas Otakar, ‘The Emergence and Acceptance of Armenia as a Legitimate American Missionary Field’, Armenian Review 37 (1984), no. 3-147, pp. 7–32Google Scholar and The Development of the Mission to the Armenians at Constantinople through 1846’, Armenian Review, 37 (1984), 4-148, pp. 31–62. For older overviews of the history of this mission, see Prime, , Forty Years, and Leon Arpee, The Armenian Awakening. A History of the Armenian Church, 1820-1860 (Chicago and London, 1909)Google Scholar. The chapters in the latter book concerning Armenian Protestantism were later re-published as Arpee, Leon, A Century of Armenian Protestantism, 1846-1946 (New York, 1946).Google Scholar

¹⁹ Anderson, ‘Report’, p. 14.

²⁰ Ibid., p. 26.

²¹ On this issue, see Kutvirt, The Mission to Armenians’, p. 58. According to Kutvirt, the missionaries from 1844 onwards began to work towards a separate Protestant Church, even if no concrete steps were taken before 1846. The same is suggested by Arpee, The Armenian Awakening, pp. 161–3.

²² Kawerau, Amerika, pp. 535–40.

²³ Prime, Forty Years, pp. 315–22.

²⁴ On the history of this mission, see Joseph, John, The Nestorians and their Muslim Neighbors. A Study of Western Influence on their Relations (Princeton, New Jersey, 1961)Google Scholar, and Berg, H. L. Murre-van den, From a Spoken to a Written Language. The Introduction and Development of Literary Urmia Aramaic in the Nineteenth Century (Leiden, 1999)Google Scholar. On the early period, see in particular Perkins, Justin, A Residence of Eight Years in Persia among the Nestorian Christians with Notices of the Muhammedans (Andover, 1843).Google Scholar

²⁵ On this period, see Berg, H. L. Murre-van den, ‘Geldelijk of Geestelijk Gewin? Assyrische Bisschoppen op de Loonlijst van een Amerikaanse Zendingspost’, Nederlands Archief voor Kerkgeschiedenis, 77-2 (1997), pp. 241–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and The American Board and the Eastern Churches: the Nestorian Mission (1844-1846)’, Orientalia Christiana Periodica, 65 (1999), pp. 117–38.

²⁶ The female seminary was headed by the missionary Fidelia Fiske. On her role in the context of the American missionary enterprise of the mid-nineteenth century, see the recent studies of Robert, Dana L., American Women in Mission: A Social History of Their Thought and Practice (Macon, GA, 1997)Google Scholar, and Porterfield, Amanda, Mary Lyon and the Mount Holyoke Missionaries (New York and Oxford, 1997).Google Scholar

²⁷ By far the most interesting published source on this period of revival is Laurie, D. T., Women and her Saviour in Persia (Boston, 1863)Google Scholar. Laurie, a former missionary to Mesopotamia, composed the book in close co-operation with Fidelia Fiske. He included a considerable number of texts written by the early Assyrian converts.

²⁸ See Murre-van den Berg, From a Spoken to a Written Language, pp. 66–70.

²⁹ In this article, I have not paid attention to what might have been behind Anderson’s policy in these matters. Harris, ‘Denominationalism and democracy’, suggests that Anderson’s views were influenced at least by two other factors: internal American discussions on ecclesiology (‘denominationalism’), and financial worries. These financial worries became all the more pressing when no ‘tangible results’ (compare also Arpee, The Armenian Awakening, pp. 162–3) could be reported, making fundraising increasingly difficult.

³⁰ Badr, ‘Mission to “Nominal Christians’”, pp. 308–12.