The interface between the current Shi'ite landscape and Christian thinking is of the greatest significance for the shifting political and religious dynamics of the Middle East. Sasan Tavassoli here examines Iranian Shi'ite thinkers' encounters with Christian thought since the Islamic revolution of 1979, and provides insight into the cultural and intellectual climate surrounding Christian-Muslim dialogue in contemporary Iran. The literature on Christianity in Iran reveals a wide range of approaches and attitudes, and Tavassoli demonstrates that traditional polemics are giving way to a more descriptive and subjective understanding of Christian thought. He also studies Muslim-Christian dialogue and research conducted and supported by governmental as well as non-governmental organizations, and offers a close examination, with interviews, of the work of three prominent liberal religious intellectuals - Abdol Karim Soroush, Mostafa Malekian and Mojtahed Shabestari. Placing contemporary Shi'ite thought in the broad historical context of pre- and post-revolution Iran, Tavassoli relates concrete religious, cultural and socio-political realities to the themes and orientations in the latest phase of the Shi'i Islam-Christianity encounter, and offers fresh insight into the dynamism of contemporary Islam and the religious complexities of the Muslim world.

Maryam Rostampour and Marziyeh Amirizadeh knew they were putting their lives on the line. Islamic laws in Iran forbade them from sharing their Christian beliefs, but in three years, they’d covertly put New Testaments into the hands of twenty thousand of their countrymen and started two secret house churches. In 2009, they were finally arrested and held in the notorious Evin Prison in Tehran, a place where inmates are routinely tortured and executions are commonplace. In the face of ruthless interrogations, persecution, and a death sentence, Maryam and Marziyeh chose to take the radical—and dangerous—step of sharing their faith inside the very walls of the government stronghold that was meant to silence them. In Captive in Iran, two courageous Iranian women recount how God used their 259 days in Evin Prison to shine His light into one of the world’s darkest places, giving hope to those who had lost everything and showing love to those in despair.

ONE MILLION MUSLIMS TO CHRIST. In the mid 1980’s, Dr. Shariat together with his wife, prayed, “Lord, use us to save Iran!” His passion for Muslims stems, in part, because of the murder of his brother, Hamraz, who was arrested in Iran at the age of sixteen on a minor political charge. After two years in jail, he was executed by firing squad. God showed Hormoz the best way to respond to this tragedy was to dedicate his life to bring one million Muslims to salvation in Christ. Join Dr. Shariat on a journey out of bondage to Islam to freedom in Christ. Learn what the Bible says about Iran and why Iran is just the beginning of something big, eternal, and of historical proportion that is already happening! God said, “I am going to do a great work in Iran and change that nation forever, and I am giving you the honor to be a part of it.”

In Erin and Iran, North American and European scholars consider parallel themes in and interactions between Irish and Iranian cultures from ancient times to the twentieth century. These studies of mythology, literature, and travelogues constitute the first-ever volume dealing with cultural encounters between the Irish and the Iranians

This work explores the interaction of American Protestant missionaries with Iranians during the 1960s and 1970s. It focuses on the missionary activities of four American Protestant groups: Presbyterians, Assemblies of God, International Missions, and Southern Baptists. It argues that American missionaries’ predisposition toward their own culture confused their message of the gospel and added to the negative perception of Christianity among Iranians. This bias was seen primarily in the American missionaries’ desire to modernize Iran through education and healthcare, and between the missionaries’ relationship with Iranian Christians. Iranian attitudes towards missionary involvement in these areas are investigated, as is the changing American missionary strategy from a traditional method where missionaries had the final say on most matters related to American and Iranian Christian interaction, to the beginnings of an indigenous system where a partnership developed between the missionary and the Iranian Christian.

Writing on an often overlooked section of contemporary Persian culture, A. Christian van Gorder provides a comprehensive and readable introduction to the experience of Christians and other non-Muslims in Iran throughout history and into the present day. Van Gorder gives a fascinating account of the history of Christianity in Persia. By debunking the common misconceptions and stereotypes driven by recent political events and the media, he shows the current relationship that the Muslim majority in Iran has developed with people of other faiths. Book jacket.

Most Americans have little understanding of the relationship between religion and nationalism in the Middle East. They assume that the two are rooted fundamentally in regional history, not in the history of contact with the broader world. However, as Adam H. Becker shows in this book, Americans—through their missionaries—had a strong hand in the development of a national and modern religious identity among one of the Middle East's most intriguing (and little-known) groups: the modern Assyrians. Detailing the history of the Assyrian Christian minority and the powerful influence American missionaries had on them, he unveils the underlying connection between modern global contact and the retrieval of an ancient identity. American evangelicals arrived in Iran in the 1830s. Becker examines how these missionaries, working with the “Nestorian” Church of the East—an Aramaic-speaking Christian community in the borderlands between Qajar Iran and the Ottoman Empire—catalyzed, over the span of sixty years, a new national identity. Instructed at missionary schools in both Protestant piety and Western science, this indigenous group eventually used its newfound scriptural and archaeological knowledge to link itself to the history of the ancient Assyrians, which in time led to demands for national autonomy. Exploring the unintended results of this American attempt to reform the Orient, Becker paints a larger picture of religion, nationalism, and ethnic identity in the modern era.