Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume IV.djvu/558

 546 CHRISTIANS OF ST. JOHN CHRISTIANSTAD is remarkable for its hardiness, laboriousness, and tall stature. II. A city, capital of the province, situated upon a deep bay called Topdals fiord, which makes into the land from the Skager Rack, a few miles E. of the Lindesnas, or South cape of Norway; pop. in 1870, 11,468. The situation is picturesque, and the town is regularly built. Many of the houses, chiefly of wood, are surrounded with gardens. The cathedral, a Gothic structure of gray stone, is only second in size and in- terest to that of Drontheim. Ship building has somewhat declined owing to the diminished abundance of timber consequent upon the clearing of some of the forests ; but trade and navigation are active. The principal exports are timber, fish, hides, copper, and iron. Du- ring the lobster season over 20 smacks are regu- larly employed in shipping lobsters to London. Tobacco and other articles are manufactured to some extent. The town is defended by a for- tress at the entrance to the fine harbor on the island of Oddero, which divides it into two parts. Christiansand was founded in 1641 by Christian IV., king of Denmark and Norway. CHRISTIANS OF ST. JOHN, Disciples of si. John, Yi/areans, JMendsetns, or Sabaeans, designa- tions applied indiscriminately, and with great confusion, to a sect of religionists now only found in Persia, chiefly in the neighborhood of Bassorah. They are not Christians in any sense, as they assert Jesus to be an impostor, and install John the Baptist in his place. They claim to have existed from his time, and con- sider their origin to have been on the banks of the Jordan. They account for their present locality by asserting that the Mohammedans drove them away from Palestine, some to Per- sia, and some to India. They afterward joined the Nestorians to avoid another persecution, and allowed themselves to be called Christians. They were separated again from the Nestorians more than 300 years ago. Critics and histo- rians are divided in opinion as to their origin. Neander thinks that the name Mendseans signi- fies disciples, and Sabaaans, baptizers ; and that the sect took its origin from those disciples of John the Baptist who, after the martyrdom of their master, adopted a course hostile to Chris- tianity, and that from them afterward sprung up this sect, formed out of the elements of an older eastern theosophy. Their doctrines are, however, well defined. They consider the Jehovah of the Old Testament a spurious God, and the Christ of the New a false teacher. They consider the world to have been created by gloomy angels, who belong to the kingdom of darkness, of whom there are seven, who in- habit the seven planets, while there is also a kingdom of light, superintended by good an- gels. Back of these kingdoms, in unspeakable splendor, is the supreme original being, Ferha, and the female principle, Ajar. Darkness tri- umphs over light, but there is a struggle be- tween the two kingdoms, and through succes- sive revelations to the kingdom of light, and so to the world, the rule of darkness is to be broken. The Jewish system was not such a revelation ; it came from the realm of dark- ness. So did that of Jesus. But in John the Baptist they hold that the revelation was from the kingdom of light. The means of in- troducing men to that kingdom is baptism. John they relate to have been born from a kiss of Zachariah. They also say that John himself was married, but that his children sprung out of the Jordan. They have five sacred books, four of them doctrinal, and the fifth on astrol- ogy. They consider baptism as the great and only means of forgiveness and salvation. They prohibit mourning for the dead, tolerate polyg- amy even among the priests, and forbid the "elect," or those advanced to the higher de- grees of the faith, to use sensual indulgences, or to sing or dance. They keep a sort of festi- val resembling.the agape of the primitive Chris- tians, and have a singular antipathy to blue color. In the middle of the 17th century, when they first became known through the Per- sian missionaries, there were supposed to be from 20,000 to 25,000 families of them. CHRISTIANS OF ST. THOMAS, a branch of the ancient Syro-Persian church, established on the coast of Malabar. They have a tradition that St. Thomas himself preached the gospel to them, and established their church. The ear- liest certain history we have of the Syro-Persian church is in a writer of the 6th century. It was formed by the union of the excommuni- cated Nestorians (499) who held to the Mono- physite doctrine. In their practices and doc- trines they claim to be primitive. They still celebrate the agape, commemorate the Lord's supper with bread, salt, and oil, and anoint the body of the infant at the time of baptism. Their priests shave the head, and are allowed to marry. They use the Syriac language in the liturgy. During the Portuguese occupancy of the country they submitted to the Catholic church ; but when the Dutch obtained the as- cendancy the Nestorians resumed their ecclesi- astical independence, and still preserve it. CHRISTIANSTAD, a fortified town of Sweden, capital of the Ian or district of the same name, in the province of Gothland, 262 m. S. S. W. of Stockholm ; pop. in 1868, 7,710. It is built upon a little promontory in a lake formed by the Helge-a, 10 m. from Alms, its port on the Baltic. The town has a good aspect. The crown house, on the N. side of the great square, for government and garrison purposes, a single large church of the year 1628, a lazaretto, a theatre, and school houses are among the principal buildings. The harbor of Ahus is open, but tolerably safe. The trade is chiefly with Liibeck, Russia, Denmark, and England. Much domestic brandy is sent to Stockholm. Christianstad was founded by Christian IV. of Denmark in 1614, the southern part of Sweden being at that time a Danish possession. The place suffered much during the frequent wars between Sweden and Den-