jookbeard: seems to be a big let down this great prospect of the WT reaching India and China, ... ( and with) well over a billion people and just 30k jw's China is has a bigger population and far fewer jw's.
Christians of many brands have tried to 'convert' China - so far they have all failed.
First chance: Second or third century It is unprovable without further evidence but possible, based on the silk road trade network traffic, it is easy to imagine some Jesus obsessed Christian travelling to China to "save" the bloody heathens. If it was not a conventional form of Christianity, then almost certainly a Manichean Christian would have reached China. The Manicheans were fairly strong in Central Asia, so some missionary may have preached in China in the third or fourth century. Just fyi the last known Manichean temple in the whole bloody world is in the Quanzhou city (southern China) suburb of Jinjiang. (pictured below). In China the Manicheans were known as 明教 Míngjiào, "bright religion."
In any event Buddhism had started filtering into China before Jesus even started kicking in his mother's womb, and it became the religion of choice in China.
More information at: http://trace.tennessee.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1529&context=utk_chanhonoproj
and
https://books.google.com.au/books?id=krSAAgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false
2. The second and third chance: During the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE) By this time Buddhism was well established, but the Syrian based Church of the East (aka, the Nestorians) were given some freedom to preach in China. The first known record of their activity notes that in 635 CE, during the reign of the Emperor Taizong, a Syriac monk known (in Chinese) as Alopen arrived in the capital Changan with a delegation. They were given official permission to preach and the assistance of the Imperial Library to translate their religious texts.
In the early 8th century the head of the Syrian Church Patriarch SlibaZkha established China as a metropolitan province of the church (known as Beth Sinaye). This attempt to Christianise China probably failed during the collapse of the Tang dynasty. But a strong record of their history was left behind on a Stele set up in 781.
An image of it is below.
The failure of this church was mentioned by an Arab Writer of whom the Wikipedia entry says: " The province of Beth Sinaye is last mentioned in 987 by the Arab writer Abu'l Faraj, who met a Nestorian monk who had recently returned from China, who informed him that 'Christianity was just extinct in China; the native Christians had perished in one way or another; the church which they had used had been destroyed; and there was only one Christian left in the land'
The Nestorians gained another chance during the era of Mongolian domination of China known as the Yuan dynasty. They occupied many official positions and there seems to have been a church administration established to care for local churches but again failed to secure a mass following. Some Catholic Christians travelled to China on commercial or religious business, and mention the church. For example, Williiam of Rubruck tells of meeting a Nestorian bishop in 1253, in a town named "Segin" (probably modern Datong in Shanxi Province). And in Quanzhou (Fujian Province) the tomb of a Nestorian bishop named Shlemun, who died in 1313 has been found. Interestingly his epitaph described him as an administrator of the Christians and Manicheans in south China.
A wall painting, in a building thought to have once been a Nestorian church and believed to represent a Nestorian priests in a Palm Sunday procession (though some scholars may dispute that)
More information at: This Cardiff University Site: http://www.caerdydd.ac.uk/clarc/projects/chinesenestorian/index.html
and this Macquarie university site:
http://www.mq.edu.au/research/research-centres,-groups-and-facilities/resilient-societies/centres/ancient-cultures-research-centre/research/research-projects/manichaean-and-nestorian-christian-remains-in-zayton
Neither YHWH or JESUS were able to save these Christians in the next dynastical collapse as peasant revolts rose up against the ruling Mongols who were driven out of China. Mongols in central Asia began converting to Islam and the Muslim Mongol leader Timur (1336–1405) nearly eradicated the remaining Christians in Persia. As a result Nestorian Christianity remained largely confined to Upper Mesopotamia and to the Malabar Coast of India.
Then in the 16th century, the Church of the East underwent a schism from which three distinct churches eventually emerged: the modern Assyrian Church of the East, which has been largely dispersed as Christians in that area migrated to from west Asia. There's also the Ancient Church of the East (which split from the former over reforms such as the use of the Gregorian Calender), and the Chaldean Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic Church in communion with the Holy See. (Also from Wikipedia
That's enough for now - I'll cover the next two chances later. but in spite of the claims of Christians, its doubtful that they will be more successful today.
