The church with the language of Jesus

Описание: This might be one of the world’s oldest living languages—and it’s still spoken in a small village far from where it began.

Welcome to an Assyrian community where faith, history, and language are woven together. Here, the Gospel is explained in modern Assyrian, but the prayers—the entire liturgy—are in Aramaic, the very language Jesus spoke.

Assyrian is part of the Semitic family, alongside Arabic and Hebrew, which is why greetings like šlāhəm ʔalāhən, sālam ʿalaykum, and šalom ʿalaykum all share the same meaning: “Peace be upon you.”

In this village, children can grow up speaking four languages. At school, they learn Armenian, Russian, and Assyrian, with some also picking up English or German.

The people here belong to the Assyrian Church of the East—a branch of Christianity rooted in modern-day Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Türkiye. Known for its missionaries, this church was among the first to bring Christianity to China and India.

For centuries, it has been the guardian of Assyrian identity. And even without a country of their own today, hope remains alive that one day, that will change.

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