Sunday, 14 August 2016

The Letter of King Abgar to Christ and Christ's reply to it

Jesus Christ didn't write any book in the Bible. But interestingly he has written a reply letter to King Abgar V.

The Letter of King Abgar to Christ

The text of the letter was:

Abgar, ruler of Edessa, to Jesus the good physician who has appeared in the country of Jerusalem, greeting. I have heard the reports of you and of your cures as performed by you without medicines or herbs. For it is said that you make the blind to see and the lame to walk, that you cleanse lepers and cast out impure spirits and demons, and that you heal those afflicted with lingering disease, and raise the dead. And having heard all these things concerning you, I have concluded that one of two things must be true: either you are God, and having come down from heaven you do these things, or else you, who does these things, are the son of God. I have therefore written to you to ask you if you would take the trouble to come to me and heal all the ill which I suffer. For I have heard that the Jews are murmuring against you and are plotting to injure you. But I have a very small yet noble city which is great enough for us both.

Jesus gave the messenger the reply to return to Abgar:
Blessed are you who hast believed in me without having seen me. For it is written concerning me, that they who have seen me will not believe in me, and that they who have not seen me will believe and be saved. But in regard to what you have written me, that I should come to you, it is necessary for me to fulfill all things here for which I have been sent, and after I have fulfilled them thus to be taken up again to him that sent me. But after I have been taken up I will send to you one of my disciples, that he may heal your disease and give life to you and yours.




Fact
The church historian Eusebius, Bishop of Caesarea records that the Edessan archives contained a copy of a correspondence exchanged between Abgar of Edessa and Jesus. Abgar V was one of the first Christian kings in history, having been converted to the faith by the Apostle Thaddeus of Edessa.  

According to some Eastern Christian traditions, Thaddeus, Syriac-Aramaic Addai or Aday (ܐܕܝ) (sometimes Latinized as Addeus), was one of the seventy disciples of Christ, possibly identical with Thaddeus (Jude the Apostle) of the Twelve Apostles.


Source
https://youtu.be/1HIeyDP2lzA
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abgar_V#The_Letter_of_King_Abgar_to_Christ

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