Are the Earliest Chinese Christian Manuscripts Modern Forgeries? Critiquing the Recent Research on the Authenticity of The Messiah Sutra and On One God.

This paper makes an attempt to systematically critique the recent forgery theory concerning The Messiah Sutra (Xuting mishisuo jing 序聽迷詩所經) and On One God (Yishenlun 一神論), allegedly the earliest Chinese Christian manuscripts created by the first known missionary Aluoben 阿羅本 and used in his discussions with the Tang Emperor Taizong 唐太宗 in the 640s. To achieve this goal, the paper not only re-reads the original texts, but traces the emergence of the forgery thesis, and also evaluates the skeptics' arguments, exposing their inherent defects. The paper argues that the weakness of the arguments is in itself a sufficient basis for discrediting the theory, and proposes that the two documents continue to be taken as authentic sources. While doing so, the paper also explores the nature, provenance, and composition of the manuscripts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]