Note to the reader

This book is believed to be the first attempt to present an overview of all Christian activity in Tibet throughout history.

“Tibet” means many things to different people. The present-day Tibet Autonomous Region contains only about two-thirds of the area inhabited by Tibetans in China. In the 1950s and earlier, vast swathes of Tibetan territory were carved off and incorporated into today’s Qinghai, Gansu, Sichuan, and Yunnan provinces.

Some ethnic groups historically located within “Greater Tibet” have not been included in this book. For example, in Sichuan Province a few dozen tribal groups, including the Qiang, Baima, and a host of others, have lived in the Tibetan border areas for centuries, but they have retained their distinctive cultures and languages, and for the most part have not converted to Tibetan Buddhism. These groups have been excluded from this book and will be covered in their respective provinces in the China Chronicles.

The “Tibet” covered in the articles within this book, therefore, refers to all Tibetan areas in Mainland China. The author is not attempting to make a political statement but simply desires to document the history of Christian efforts to reach the Tibetan people. Past missionaries rarely spoke about reaching Tibetans in a certain province. They simply considered themselves ambassadors of Christ to Tibet.