Sutra of Hearing the Messiah

[1] The Sutra of Hearing the Messiah was found at the Mogao Caves in Dunhuang and collected by Takakusu Junjiro.

It begins with twenty verses of invocation about the invisible God and to the heavenly spirits that serve him, followed by a description of humanity and the distance caused by sin and the condition of mortality.

The text continues to speak of the virgin birth and the death of Jesus Christ.

The manuscript is incomplete, ending abruptly and mid-verse discussing Jesus' death.

[2] This document is thought to have been one of the early missionary devices of the Church of the East, dating around the time of Bishop Alopen, a Syriac-speaking Persian.