Asahel Grant (August 17, 1807 – April 24, 1844) was one of the first American missionaries to Iraq.
Asahel Grant was born at
Marshall, New York, studied medicine at
Pittsfield, Massachusetts, and practiced in
Utica, New York.[1] In 1835 he went as a missionary with the
American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions to Iran.[2] He settled at
Urmia and worked among the
Nestorians there and elsewhere in western Asia. He died in
Mosul in the
Ottoman Empire.[3] He was a daring adventurer throughout the Middle East, but had little success in converting the fierce Nestorians, whom he considered among the "
ten lost tribes" of Israel.[4][5] He wrote The Nestorians[6][7] and an appeal for Christian doctors to engage in missionary work.[8]
Like
David Livingstone before him (although not as famous), Grant thrilled western audiences with his adventures, inspiring a number of biographies, including those cited on this page. His success as a physician not only saved his life on several occasions, but opened the way for missionary successors.[9]
^Taylor, Gordon. Fever and Thirst. An American Doctor Amid the Tribes of Kurdistan, 1835-1844. Academy Chicago Publishers, 2008. p.6.
^Taylor, Gordon. Fever and Thirst. An American Doctor Amid the Tribes of Kurdistan, 1835-1844. Academy Chicago Publishers, 2008. p.9.
^New international Encyclopedia, Volume 8, edited by Daniel Coit Gilman, Harry Thurston Peck, Frank Moore Colby, Talcott Williams. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1903.
^Taylor, Gordon. Fever and Thirst. An American Doctor Amid the Tribes of Kurdistan, 1835-1844. Academy Chicago Publishers, 2008.
^The Nestorians; or The Lost Tribes; containing evidence of their identity; an account of their manners, customs and ceremonies; together with sketches of travel in ancient Assyria, Armenia, Media and Mesopotamia and illustrations of scripture prophecy. London: John Murray, 1841.
^Lathrop, Rev. A. C. Memoir of Asahel Grant, M.D., Missionary to the Nestorians...containing also An Appeal to Pious Physicians by Dr. Grant. New York: M.W. Dodd, 1847.