Context and Text

Fr. Francis Dionisio S.J. was the Rector of the Jesuit Seminary in Cochin during the late 1500s. In a report addressed to his Superior General, dat. Jan. 4, 1578, he provides a concise account of the history of the Christians of Malankara: one that diverges in major points from the native tradition(s).

These Christians say that the glorious St. Thomas came from [Socotra] to preach in this Malabar and went to the Choromandel, which is more or less two hundred leagues away from this city to the south. The glorious saint made many disciples by his preaching, and for some differences which a pagan king had with him, the glorious saint, staying at prayer on a mountain, a league away from the Portuguese settlement, was killed, pierced by a lance as ordered by the King. This is held as tradition very much accepted among the pagans as well as the Christians. .. I knew the things written below on information received from old and trustworthy persons; and in these all are concordant, because they keep these as firm tradition, and as written in books and sung in their songs. .. With the passing of time, it happened that the Christians were persecuted by the pagan king of that country, who maltreated them for being Christians and for having reverence for the body of the saint. Hence, they say the glorious Apostle pulled back his hand to the sepulchre, and they fled from that country leaving the sepulchre well mended and protected. And they came fleeing to this Malabar and its forests, with them some honourable Christians. .. And so, they affirm, there are many such people far inside the forest and in the kingdom of Travancor. After many years came two holy men from Babylon to Quilon. .. After that came a Christian by name Quinai Thoma, native of Babylon, a merchant, who disembarked at Cranganor and began negotiating his merchandise. .. It is now 753 years since this Quinai Thoma came from Babylon. All this is according to an inscription written on a sheet of iron, which the Portuguese found in the possession of these Christians. This is what is known with certainty about the origin of these Christians on information gathered from books and from tradition handed down by old people and Catanars, i.e. the priests of these Christians. Hence it happens that [this is] the Christianity which they hold in affection, and that they entertain the bishops who come from Babylonia and Syria. They say that their Christianity had its origin from there, and it conserved itself and increased with those who came from there.

• Wicki S.J., Documenta Indica XII:131-143; translation adapted from Jacob Vellian ed., Symposium on Knanites, pp. 6-7

Relocation from Mylapore

The first major point to be noted is Dionisio's unique note of a persecution of the Thomasine Christians in the Coromandel Coast by the Hindu rulers, and their subsequent migration to Malabar. Istvan Perczel posits, largely based on Fr. Mattai Vettikkunnel's Events that Befell the Syrians of Malayalam (1720), that the Knanaya migration and the subsequent Persian ecclesiastical colonisation (so as to speak) of Malankara took place in the ninth-century, after the persecution and destruction of the Christian communities in the Eastern coast (“Syriac Christianity in India”, in Daniel King ed. The Syriac World, pp. 664-5).

This coheres with Dionisio's narrative. There existed Thomasine communities on the shores of both the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal: however, the native Church's centre of gravity shifted to Malabar after the ninth century, following the persecution attributed to Māṇikkavācakar, the ninth-century Shaivite scholar and poet, by native sources (including Vettikkunnel 1720 and the Kandanad Granthavāri).

Chronology: Edessan and Persian Migrations

The local tradition at least since the Portuguese arrival, as reported by Francis Ros S.J. in 1604 and subsequent native sources including Vettikkunnel 1720, has been that Knai Thoma and his group migrated in “345 AD”, with the Persian migration led by Mar Sapor and Mar Proth with the merchant Sapir Iso taking place centuries later, ca. “825 AD”. Dionisio, on the other hand, provides a differing chronology. After the Mylaporean persecution and migration to Malabar, there came “two holy men from Babylon to Quilon”, i.e. Mar Sapor and Mar Proth. After them came Knai Thoma, in “825 AD”, and this chronology is allegedly supported by an ancient inscription, as well as “books and.. tradition handed down by old people and priests”.

Now, we could keep aside Dionisio's account if he were the only source supporting this chronology. Apart from him, however, Diogo do Couto (1611) and Mar Gabriel (1709) provide “811” and “745” as the dates for the Edessan migration, respectively. Besides these non-native sources, even the native sources, particularly Vettikkunnel 1720 and Pukadiyil Ittoop Writer's History, which report “345 AD” as the date, state that the Edessan migration occurred after the Mylaporean persecution and subsequent migration, explicitly connecting this with the career of Māṇikkavācakar (as for the erroneous hypothesis of Sarah Knight and a couple of others that this is referring to Mani, the third-century Parthian prophet, I will address this in a later post).

Then there set out a sorcerer by the name of Manikka-Vacher who opposed the Way and Baptism, and arriving in Mylapore he performed many many conjurings and forbade Baptismal immersions; and because of this all the leading figures of the Way, and the Elders, abandoned Baptism and believed Manikka-Vacher. [..] In those days in the Kingdom of Edessa, because of a vision seen in a dream by the Bishop who ruled there and by the decree of the Catholicos of the East [they] deputed a merchant called Thoma, a Nazarani who dwelt in Jerusalem [..]

• Events that Befell the Syrians of Malayalam, Malayalam Recension

Therefore, it is quite probable that Knai Thoma's migration occurred after the Persian migration of Sapir Iso and Proth, sometime in the late ninth century.

“Interest” in Syro-Persian Bishops

Lastly, Dionisio provides his General with a reason for why the native Christians hold affection for bishops who come from “Babylonia and Syria”: due to the positive changes brought by Knai Thoma and his group(s), whose commercial activities helped the native communities flourish. In other words, the Persian connection — though it existed prior to the ninth-century — was strengthened by the Edessan Migration of the ninth century.