NEW DELHI: A book - Origin of Christianity in India - written by Rome-based Father Benedict Vadakkekara has rekindled the debate over the arrival of St Thomas, one of the 12 disciples of Jesus Christ in Kerala 2,000 years ago.
The book, a historiographical critique, recapitulating the tradition and history of ancient Christians in Kerala, comes in the wake of a controversy stirred by Pope Benedict XVI's recent comment that St Thomas visited western part of India (meaning Pakistan) and not Kerala. After criticism by Kerala clergy and laity, the Pope corrected himself acknowledging the visit of the Apostle of Christ to the southern peninsula.
Father Benedict Vadakkekara, who teaches Franciscan Mission history at the Pontifical University Antonianum and a research scholar at the Capuchin Historical Institute, Rome, undertook the task of writing the history of the origin of Christianity in India much before the Pope's observation.
Talking to DNA, Father Benedict, who was in Delhi en route Rome, said St Thomas's arrival in 52 AD coincided with the disappearance of the Kingdom of Gondopharnes in North-West India and the Council of the Apostles in Jerusalem. Both are historically proven events and there is consistent reference among Indian Christians to Mylapore (Chennai) where St Thomas was buried and certain families associated with him.
The arrival of Thomas of Cana with a group of Christians in Kerala to back the Church of Thomas, the interest shown by the St Thomas Christians (Christians evangelised by St Thomas in Malabar, Kerala) to the visit of Marco Polo, John of Monte Corvino, bishops Theophilus and David are also historical pointers towards the presence of St Thomas in Kerala, Father Benedict said.
Scholars and theologians such as K N Panikkar, Scaria Zacharia, Major Archbishop Varkey Cardinal Vithayathil, Archbishop Pedro Lopez Quintana (Vatican Embassy), Apostolic Nuncio, Bishop Joseph Mar Barnabas have paid glowing tributes to Father Benedict's attempt to study St Thomas's tradition and historiography.
Though there is lack of concrete historical evidence to prove that the apostle landed near Cranganore sea port in Malabar and introduced Christianity to the Indians, Father Benedict relied "on the fact of a tradition, role-played by this particular tradition and documented part of history of the country."
"From almost the very moment of the apostle's death, the Nasranis (Christians are addressed in Kerala for their link with Nazareath) in Malabar whom St Thomas had converted to the faith, made pilgrimages to the tomb of the apostle, keeping up the custom to the present day."
The book said: "In India, an indigenous Christian Church existed when the first Portugese arrived around 1500. These native Christians, mainly around Kerala, and numbering about 100,000, believed they sprang from the evangelising of India by St Thomas in the first century AD. They had a Syriac (Syrian) liturgy and, apparently, a true apostolic succession."The Pope is said to have stated in a speech: "Thomas first evangelised Syria and Persia and then penetrated as far as western India from where Christianity also reached south India".
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