Nestorianism, Christian sect that originated in 

Asia
Minor and Syria stressing the independence of the divine and
human natures of Christ and, in effect, suggesting that they
are two persons loosely united. The schismatic sect formed
following the condemnation of Nestorius and his teachings by
the ecumenical councils of Ephesus (431 CE)
and Chalcedon (451 CE). Originally, Nestorianism envisaged the
divine Word as having associated with itself at
the Incarnation a complete, independently existing man. From
the orthodox point of view, Nestorianism therefore denied the
reality of the Incarnation and represented Christ as a God-
inspired man rather than as God-made-man. Since the 5th
century all the principal branches of the Christian church have
united in condemning Nestorianism and have affirmed that
Christ is a single person, at once wholly human and wholly
divine.

Christianity in Persia faced intermittent persecution until the

Persian Church in 424 formally proclaimed its full
independence of Christian churches elsewhere, thereby freeing
itself of suspicions about foreign links. Under the influence
of Barsumas, the metropolitan of Nisibis, the Persian Church
acknowledged Theodore of Mopsuestia, the chief Nestorian
theological authority, as guardian of right faith, in February
486. This position was reaffirmed under the patriarch Babai
(497–502), and since that time the church has been Nestorian.

Nestorius had been anathematized at the Second Council of

Ephesus in 431 for denouncing the use of the title Theotokos
(“God-Bearer”) for Mary, insisting that this compromised the
reality of Christ’s human nature. When supporters of
Nestorius gathered at the theological school of Edessa, it was
closed by imperial order in 489, and a vigorous Nestorian
remnant migrated to Persia.

The Persian Church’s intellectual centre then became the

new school in Nisibis, which carried on the venerable
traditions of Edessa. By the end of the 5th century there were
seven metropolitan provinces in Persia and several bishoprics
in Arabia and India. The church survived a period of schism
(c. 521–c. 537/539) and persecution (540–545) through the
leadership of the patriarch Mar Aba I (reigned 540–552), a
convert from Zoroastrianism, and also through the renewal
of monasticism by Abraham of Kashkar (501–586), the
founder of the monastery on Mount Izala, near Nisibis.After
the Arab conquest of Persia (637), the caliphate recognized the
Church of the East as a millet, or separate
religious community, and granted it legal protection.
Nestorian scholars played a prominent role in the formation of
Arab culture, and patriarchs occasionally gained influence
with rulers. For more than three centuries the church
prospered under the caliphate, but it became worldly and lost
leadership in the cultural sphere. By the end of the 10th
century there were 15 metropolitan provinces in the caliphate
and 5 abroad, including India and China. Nestorians also
spread to Egypt, where monophysite Christianity
acknowledged only one nature in Christ. In China a Nestorian
community flourished from the 7th to the 10th century.
In Central Asia certain Tatar tribes were almost entirely
converted, Christian expansion reaching almost to Lake
Baikal in eastern Siberia. Western travelers to the Mongol
realm found Nestorian Christians well established there, even
at the court of the Great Khan, though they commented on the
ignorance and superstition of the clergy. When during the 14th
century the Church of the East was virtually exterminated by
the raids of the Turkic leader Timur,
Nestorian communities lingered on in a few towns in Iraq but
were concentrated mainly in Kurdistan, between the Tigris
River and Lakes Van and Urmia, partly in Turkey and partly in
Iran.

In 1551 a number of Nestorians reunited with Rome and were

called Chaldeans, the original Nestorians having been termed
Assyrians. The Nestorian Church in India, part of the group
known as the Christians of St. Thomas, allied itself with Rome
(1599) and then split, half of its membership
transferring allegiance to the Syrian Jacobite (monophysite)
patriarch of Antioch (1653). In 1898 in Urmia, Iran, a group of
Nestorians, headed by a bishop, were received in the
communion of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The modern Nestorian church is not Nestorian in the strict
sense, though it venerates Nestorius and refuses to accept the
title Theotokos for the Blessed Virgin. Contemporary
Nestorians are represented by the Church of the East, or
Persian Church, usually referred to in the West as the
Assyrian, or Nestorian, Church. Most of its members live in
Iraq, Syria, and Iran.