Sorry, dedication. I do not accept as "proof" the posting of "someone" on "another forum", and particularly when the posting is a quote from someone as twistedly biased as James Arrabito.

Try reading some scholarly journals that are peer-reviewed and use actual primary-source documents as evidence. Read some articles that deal with the problems and challenges of translating ancient documents, and you will probably find that document "doctoring" (especially for nefarious purposes) is far less prevalent than conspiracy theorists would have you believe.

The arguement that the Catholic church changed Sabatarian documents is a non sequitur at best, since the church claims the right to change the day. Why would they care what the documents say? To go to great lengths to "erase accounts of early Sabbath keeping" implies that they are doing something wrong (worshiping on the wrong day) and need to cover it up. This is not true. They can worship on any day they like; they have the authority to change the day.

Of course they are doing something wrong, worshipping upon the wrong day.
They have acknowledged that they have no Biblical support for doing so, so they have to make it appear their "right" to change the day is based on "apostalic" example.

So they DO need to cover up the fact that early Christians continued to worship on the 7th day Sabbath in many different countries for centuries and they worked hard to exterminate God's Holy Day and replace it with their own day.

So you don't like the author of that rendition of the story of the Chinese monument -- well lets look further.

This is interesting

The following is by C. Gary Hullquist MD
"A Diagnostic History and Examination of the Biblical Day of Rest. p. 83-85

In the 16th century Jesuits began establishing a presence in the Orient....
The educated Chinese were attracted to the Jesuit knowledge...In 1615 China commissioned the translation of all the best European books into Chinese and the Jesuits because of their mastery of languages were given the assignment....

When the 8th century monument was accidently discovered in 1625, suddenly everyone was interested. Both the Chinese and the Jesuits wanted to replace the original stone with a newer, improved, updated version.
The Chinese were alarmed that they could not read the ancient characters which was embarrassing as they had long boasted that their language had remained unchanged over thousands of years. So it was their policy when finding ancient artifacts to replace them with new copies featuring the more modern and readable Mandarin characters (Wall, Charles William, "Ancient Orthography of the Jews" Whittaker and Co, London 1840, Vol. 2 p. 162)

The Jesuits found evidence of a strong Christian community that had existed long before they had arrived. This was damaging to the claim of Rome that their brand of religion was the first and dominant one. So the Jesuits prompted an official explanation that the replica was necessary because the Chinese characters were badly damaged when the original monument was unearthed. So the original stone, threatening to both the Chinese and the Catholic missionaries was conveniently destroyed.

Martin Martini, a Jesuit missionary in China around 1655 wrote:

“The governor was no soon apprised of the discovery of the monument then by a curiosity natural to the Chinese, he betook himself to the place and as soon as he examined the tokens of its venerable antiquity, he first composed a book in honor of the monument, then ordered that a stone of the same size be made on which he engraved the contents of the other and had inscribed point by point the same characters and the same letters which had been impressed in the original. (Kircher le Chine p. 10,11, also Wall, Charles William, "Ancient Orthography of the Jews" Whittaker and Co, London 1840, Vol. 2 p. 160)

Two other Jesuits, Boim and Samedus also mentioned that a second stone was prepared with the same dimensions and a replacement inscription. (Wall, Charles William, "Ancient Orthography of the Jews" Whittaker and Co, London 1840, Vol. 2 p. 163)

The Jesuits were very interested in the marble stone’s inscription as it clearly detailed the emergence and growth of the church in China, its acceptance by the T’ang Dynasty, and the tremendous influence it had on China, despite the fact that this same eastern church had been excommunicated by the bishop of Rome some 500 years earlier. The kind of Christianity described by the monument differed dramatically and embarrassingly from the flavor offered by Rome.

Compared to the Syriac inscriptions the revised Chinese message contained liberal embellishments and glaring omissions.
Charles William Wall made a comparative analysis of the Syriac and Chinese inscriptions with their respective usage in historical ages. His evidence is convincing proof of the Chinese counterfeit.

The Jesuits clearly assisted in the translation process. But neither they nor the Chinese could understand the seventh century Syriac , so they left it alone.

And one of those ommissions that appear in the Syriac is reference to worship on the seventh day.

dedication, it seems you have difficulties in understanding the thrust of your opponent's arguement. Two stories about the same incident do not make a conspiracy. Besides, you never said who the author was, just "a poster on another forum." Hardly authoritative.

I will try to spell out exactly why this (the second story) is not a credible source either:

A) The author is a MEDICAL DOCTOR. (C. Gary Hullquist MD), which, though he may be very good, does not make him an authority on ancient manuscripts. A simple internet search indicates that his area of expertise seems to be garlic.

B) He has an obvious bias. (He is a Sabbath keeper.) I'm NOT saying that is a bad thing; you and I are both Sabbath-keepers. But it does not make for a ballanced (UN-BIASED) reporting of history.

C) The title of the book indicates a treatise on Sabbath keeping. The question under discusstion, however, is a massive conspiracy by the Catholic Church to cover-up and alter original documents. So the story, at best, is anecdotal.

I think I understand what you are saying --
We are only allowed to study the "orthodox" presentations of certain scholars.

I thoroughly disagree!!!

After all a prophet of God wrote:



Who said that "Two stories about the same incident make a conspiracy."

The story is just ONE example to show the prophet of God was shown the reality of history.

The good doctor took his information from another -- a man named

Charles William Wall

who was definitely into ancient writing.

When argueing with a fool be sure they are not doing the same thing.

God said through His prophet --



Man's wisdom says that's foolishness.
Even the "few traces" must be discredited.

:sad

Actually this monument opens up a whole scope of Christian history that we rarely hear anything about.

The "Assyrian" Christian Church, which mainly comprised the region east of Jerusalem -- east of the Jordan with it's center in Persia.

These people were Sabbath keepers! Historians dismiss this fact as, "well they were mainly Jewish converts who were loath to leave the traditional Sabbath".
True -- many were from a Jewish background as the Christians in Jerusalem fled to that region just before Jerusalem fell to the Romans. But NOT all were from Jewish backgroun -- there were many who weren't Jewish, but from Syraic or Persian background.

It's apostalic leaders are reported to be Thomas, Bartholomew, Thaddeaus and Peter.

And this was no little group -- they had many churches and covered a large area.
It is astonishing to see how the Assyrian Church preserved the unity of its faith throughout its far-flung spiritual domain whether it was in India, Tibet, Turkestan, Persia, or China.

But unlike the western Roman church or even the Greek Orthodox Church the Assyrian church did not gain the protection of Rome.
They suffered persecution not only from the Roman Christian world, but also from the eastern heathen kings, and finally from the Moslems who destroyed the once thriving cities where apostalic Christian faith once thrived. They now lie in ruins.