Saint Thomas Christian denominations

[41][42][43] These are located at Kodungalloor (Muziris), Paravur, Palayoor, Kokkamangalam, Niranam, Nilackal, Kollam, and the Thiruvithamcode Arappally in Kanyakumari district.

[48][49] St. Thomas Christians were classified into the social status system according to their professions with special privileges for trade granted by the benevolent kings who ruled the area.

[49] According to the 1st century annals of Pliny the Elder and the author of Periplus of the Erythraean sea, Muziris in Kerala could be reached in 40 days' time from the Egyptian coast purely depending on the southwest monsoon winds.

[53] The lure of spices attracted traders from the Middle East and Europe to the many trading ports of Keralaputera (Kerala) — Tyndis, (Ponnani), Muziris, near Kodungallur, Niranam, Bacare, Belitha, and Comari (Kanyakumari) long before the time of Christ.

[58] The Apostle established seven "and a half" churches in Malabar at Kodungalloor (Muziris), Paravur, Palayoor, Kokkamangalam, Niranam, Nilackal, Kollam, and the Thiruvithamcode Arappally in Kanyakumari district.

Ephrem the Syrian (300–378) writes in the forty-second of his "Carmina Nisibina" that the Apostle was put to death in India, and that his remains were subsequently buried in Edessa, brought there by a merchant.

Granting that Judea was the country of Peter, what had Saul to do with the Gentiles, Luke with Achaia, Andrew with Epirus, Thomas with India, Mark with Italy?."

Ambrose (340–397) writes "When the Lord Jesus said to the Apostles, go and teach all nations, even the kingdoms that had been shut off by the barbaric mountains lay open to them as India to Thomas, as Persia to Mathew."

"[87] The beginning of Kolla Varsham resulted in the origin of Christianity in Kerala as an individual religion outside vedic Vaishnavism[citation needed] In 190, Pantaenus, probably the founder of the famous Catechetical School of Alexandria, visited India and the Nasranis.

The territorial administrative system which developed after the diocesan pattern within the eastern and western Roman empires did not exist in the Indian Church.

[91][92] St. Gregory of Tours, before 590, reports that Theodore, a pilgrim who had gone to Gaul, told him that in that part of India where the corpus (bones) of St. Thomas had first rested, there stood a monastery and a church of striking dimensions and elaborately adorned, adding: "After a long interval of time these remains had been removed thence to the city of Edessa.

He was appointed a bishop in 1328 and nominated by Pope John XXII in his bull Venerabili Fratri Jordano to the see of Columbum or Kulam (Quilon) on 21 August 1329.

He visited Malabar, touching at Pandarani (20 m. north of Calicut), at Cranganore, and at Kulam or Quilon, proceeding thence, apparently, to Ceylon and to the shrine of St. Thomas at Mailapur, South India.

[101] Jordanus, between 1324 and 1328 (if not earlier), probably visited Kulam and selected it as the best centre for his future work; it would also appear that he revisited Europe about 1328, passing through Persia, and perhaps touching at the great Crimean port of Soidaia or Sudak.

He was appointed a bishop in 1328 and nominated by Pope John XXII in his bull Venerabili Fratri Jordano to the see of Columbum or Kulam (Quilon) on 21 August 1329.

[103] Either before going out to Malabar as bishop, or during a later visit to the west, Jordanus probably wrote his Mirabilia, which from internal evidence can only be fixed within the period 1329–1338; in this work he furnished the best account of Indian regions, products, climate, manners, customs, fauna and flora given by any European in the Middle Ages – superior even to Marco Polo's.

[103] In 1347, Giovanni de' Marignolli visited the shrine of St Thomas in South India, and then proceeded to what he calls the kingdom of Saba, and identifies with the Sheba of Scripture, but which seems from various particulars to have been Java.

Catholicos Simeon VII Denkha sent a prelate to India, in the person of Abraham, who was later to be the last Syrian Metropolitan of Malabar, after having gone over to the Chaldaean side.

[citation needed] The Portuguese erected a Latin diocese in Goa (1534) and another at Cochin (1558) in the hope of bringing the Thomas Christians under their jurisdiction.

[106][108] This visit resulted in the Mar Thoma faction claiming spiritual authority of the Antiochean Patriarchate and gradually introduced the West Syriac liturgy, customs and script to the Malabar Coast.

[64] In 1500, Joseph, a priest, told the Pope Alexander VI, in an audience, that Indian Christians accept the Patriarch of Babylon as their spiritual leader.

[citation needed][110] A letter written by East Syriac bishops announces the arrival of the Portuguese and the friendly relationship between them and the St. Thomas Christians.

To their dismay they found that these Christians were followers of the East Syriac Church, and its bishops looked after them, and the Patriarch in Babylonia was considered their ecclesiastical superior.

Catholicos Simeon VII Denkha sent a prelate to India, in the person of Abraham, who was later to be the last Syrian Metropolitan of Malabar, after having gone over to the Chaldaean side.

[citation needed] The Portuguese erected a Latin diocese in Goa in 1534 and another at Cochin in 1558 in the hope of bringing the Thomas Christians under their jurisdiction.

Ahatallah was never heard from in India again, and the rumor soon spread that the Portuguese had murdered him, fomenting discontent in the Saint Thomas Christian community and leading directly to the Coonan Cross Oath.

[106][108] This visit resulted in the Mar Thoma party claiming spiritual authority of the Antiochean Patriarchate and gradually introduced the West Syriac liturgy, customs and script to the Malabar Coast.

In 1772 the West Syriac Christians under the leadership of Kattumangattu Abraham Koorilose, Metropolitan of Malankara, formed the Malabar Independent Syrian Church (Thozhiyur Sabha).

[113] But on 16 January 1836, Metropolitan Dionysius IV of Cheppad, convened a Synod at Mavelikara, in protest against the interference of Anglicans in the affairs of the Malankara Church.

[122][123][124] As the movement gained momentum, groups of people from all traditional St. Thomas Christian denominations became part of various emerging Pentecostal and evangelical fellowships.