In the case of Christianity, contention was not only religious, but military. "There was a state of perennial war between Sasanian Persia and Byzantine Rome, which had embraced Christianity." A prime instance would be the border region of Armenia, which had included Zoroastrian believers since the Persian Achaemenid Empire (c. 550-330); centuries later despite Sasanid pressure, Armenia converted to Christianity (after 300) and took the Byzantine side. In general Zoroastrian arguments contra Christianity first developed in the strong and prosperous Sasanid Empire; however, following several centuries under Islam, Zoroastrian fortunes had declined drastically. Mardan-Farrukh first questions the virgin birth, concluding skeptically "the origin of their religion has all come forth from the testimony of a woman, which was given about her own condition." He demonstrates a studied knowledge of the Christian doctrine of the Incarnation, although the premise of "God taking the status of human being" evokes no response, other than to call it "very strange". About the crucifixion ("death and execution on a tree") and its "resurrection" message for humankind, its 'brutality' and its "disgrace" offend Mardan-Farrukh. He questions why, from all the possible ways there are to signal human resurrection, God would want to choose to suffer such a death, if God is indeed omnipotent. If so, he asks why God did not make it "without doubt" and "clear knowledge" to humankind? Mardan-Farrukh continues, asking rhetorically if God chose such a death "through the will of his enemies" why does he curse them? Should they not be rewarded? Mardan-Farrukh next challenges the doctrine of the Trinity, "the father and son and pure wind". Yet he begins without finesse: "If it be proper for three to be one, that implies that it is certainly possible for three to be nine... ." He questions how a son could be equal to the father; then he discusses the trinity and the crucifixion. After a theodicean analysis similar to his about Adam and Eve (see the Judaic section above), Mardan-Farrukh observes that "the sacred being himself created the executioners of his son," and concludes that these enemies then slew "the Messiah, who is the son, through the will of the father." The author's interpretation here resembles aspects of the Christian heresy fostered by the 2nd century gnostic Marcion.