Apostle Tomb, Coonan Cross Oath, Division and Rite, Early History, Early Reference, Medieval History, Syond of Diamper, Thomas the Apostle

Dear Vincent, This statement of “founding of Christianity in …

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Comment posted Kerala Syrian Christian, Apostle in India, The tomb of the Apostle, Persian Church, Syond of Diamper – Coonan Cross Oath, Subsequent divisions and the Nasrani People by Admin.

Dear Vincent,

This statement of “founding of Christianity in India by Persian Christians in 4th century” is made based on the historical parallel of the Persian Zoroastrians, who fled Persia and eventually migrated to the western shores of the Indian subcontinent, where they finally settled.

The Persian Zoroastrians, who, at the beginning of the eighth century, fled to Western India ( known us Parsis) to escape the sword of Islam, gives this conjecture a certain plausibility, but most importantly we must consider that there are no scrap of actual evidence for even an or a large scale immigration of Persian Christians to South Indian shores in fourth century exists.

The Sassanid Empire of Persia were suspicious of Christians mostly because of their perceived ties to the Christian Roman Empire. But we see that, those Christians loyal to the Patriarchate of Babylon after the break of with Church of Rome were tolerated and even sometimes favored by the Sassanids.

There is less evidence for it, than for the Church of St. Thomas.

Thus we see that there is less evidence for such a founding by Persian Christians comparing to the early Christian writings and for the traditions of Church of St. Thomas Christians.

Further, the theory is now quite untenable and questioned due to lack of evidences.

From the documentary evidences which we have, we see that,

1] Bishop David, was sent from Mesopotamia to India towards the end of the third century, and
2] John, Metropolitan of Persia and India, in the first quarter of the fourth century, was present at the Nicene Council

It is now very much clear that, whatever one subscribe to the Apostolate of St.Thomas in India, the Christian movement in India was already in existence some considerable time before the Sassanian persecution broke out, ruling out founded by Persian Christians possibility.

Though we can not rule out migration of Persian Christians, from the evidences detailed, we see that Christian movement in India was in existence much before that. If such a large scale migration happened in 4th century, the primary reason it eventually ending up on shores of South India might be the existence of Christians of St. Thomas.