Armenia’s Acceptance of Christianity and Grigor Lousavoritch (288-301)
During the reign of Tirdat III, whose magnificent battles against the Persians we already have discussed, an event took place which came to have a decisive role in the life of the Armenian people and that was the acceptance of Christianity as the official state religion of the country. 25 This event can be viewed as the turning point in the history of this people and everything that they came to experience later on was the direct consequence of this single decision.
Moreover, Christianity proved to be the factor which first contributed to the development of the nation and later the force which maintained and preserved it and in that way became its guardian. According to the Austrian researcher H. Abich “…and it is because of this that the Armenian people, under the influence of Christianity, reached a high level of cultural development and,, until the present time, have played an important symbolical role in the history of humanity.” 27
Later on, as Bertrand Bareilles noted of the periods when Armenia was under foreign rule, “it was only because of the existence of the church that they, despite the external controls forced upon them and the weight of their own unique destiny, could ensure their survival and maintain their identity.”
According to history, the very first foundations of the Armenian Church were laid by the two apostles of Jesus Christ, Bartholomeus and Thadeos 31 and their work was continued by other preachers. These came from Syria and from the south, i.e. from the present city of Edessa (Ourfa). But the Armenians, whose national identity was characterised, among others, by their great and fanatic predilection and loyalty to their old faith and customs, showed a fierce resistance towards this new religion.
Even though there were Christians in Armenia from the very dawn of Christianity, and especially from the beginning of the 2nd century AD,.Armenia continued to be faithful to its heathen gods, which were quite primitive, in spite of the fact that they were figures surrounded by myths and ascribed with poetic characteristics and praised in songs and poems. This heathen belief was common to many of the nations and people of that time, something that Bossuet summarised in a beautiful way with his well-known words: “Everything was god but god itself. Human kindhad reached such a degree of ignorance that she started to worship her dreams, lusts and errors.”
Converting Armenia to Christianity happened through the efforts of holy Grigor Lousavoritch (Illuminator), a man who has the same status in Armenia as St Patrick has in the history of Ireland and like Constantine is known as as “Apostle”.
Grigor Lousavoritch, the apostle of Armenia, was of Arsacid origin and according to legend was the son of the same person who was manipulated by the Sasanid king to assassinate the Armenian king, Khosrov I. Grigor and his family were forced to flee the country and searched for asylum in Caesarea, Cappadocia. It was here that Grigor became Christian.
The story goes also that when Tirdat III, son of Khosrov I, had to leave the country after the Sasanid attack on Armenia, it was Grigor who helped him without revealing his identity to the king. Upon the return of Tirdat III to Armenia, after the defeat of the Sasanids, Grigor was in the king’s company. But when Tirdat III, during a visit to the temple of the goddess Anahita in Erés (Erzinjan), ordered him to put a wreath in the temple Grigor refused to obey because of his Christian faith. The king became furious and Grigor was thrown into a dungeon (Khor Virap) and left there to die. According to legend he was fed by an old woman who on a daily basis hoisted down water and bread to him through a hole in the wall. This way Grigor was able to survive for 13 years in the dungeon.
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