In the year 344 AD, by tradition on Good Friday, the bishop who
held the See which would later be called the Patriarchate of
Babylon was executed by the Persian emperor Shapur II. Because
of the tension between the Zoroastrian Persian and the Christian
Roman empires, some in Persia began to see the Christians of
there land as outsiders and spies, since they shared the
religion of the enemy. The accusation, a false one, was that
even the bishop of the empire’s capital city Selucia-Ctesiphon,
Shim’un, was personally a spy for Caesar. The Shah decided to
institute a double tax on his Christian population, since this
would break the back of an already poor population. Even worse,
he ordered that Mar Shim’un, the son of a garment stainer, (“bar
Sabba’e”), was to collect the taxes himself. The noble bishop
refused, saying “I am no tax collector, but a shepherd of the
Lord’s flock.” This became an excuse for the Shah to declare
open season on Christians, and especially clergy. Mar Shim’un
was arrested and brought be