When did St.Thomas the Apostle go to India?

Answer 1

There is no authentic historical record of St. Thomas traveling to and living in India. The early Church Fathers Clement, Origen and Eusebius record that he went to Syria and Persia (or Parthia as it was called in the 1st century CE) and established a church in Fars (Persia).

Pope Benedict XVI stated on 26 Sept. 2006 that "Thomas first evangelised Syria and Persia and then penetrated as far as western India, from where Christianity also reached South India." Western India refers to Baluchistan and Gandhara (now Pakistan).

The first verifiable record of Christians in India is dated to ca. 345 CE. They were refugees from Syria and Persia fleeing religious persecution by the Persian king Shapor II. They were led by a man called variously Thomas of Cana, Thomas the Canaanite, Thomas Cananeus, Thomas the Merchant, Thomas of Jerusalem, and Knaye Thoma. Historians believe that it is this merchant Thomas from Jerusalem whom Indian Christians have mistakenly identified with the 1st century apostle Thomas.

The first account of St. Thomas traveling to India is found in the Acts of Thomas written by the Gnostic Christian poet Bardesanes in ca 200-225 CE at Edessa in Syria. Bardesanes had met Buddhist monks travelling to Alexandria and was familiar with India though he had not visited it. His religious romance Acts of Thomas is full of the fantastic miracles and dramatic encounters of Judas Dydimus Thomas (as St. Thomas is called in the story). Its central theme is that a Christian must remain celibate throughout life even when married. Judus Didymus Thomas (St. Thomas) is described as the lookalike twin brother of Jesus Christ who has sold him into slavery because he has refused to obey orders.

The designation "India" in ancient geographies was a synonym for Asia which was used by ancient writers for all countries south and east of the Roman Empire's frontiers. India included Ethiopia, Arabia Felix, Edessa in Syria (in the Latin version of the Syriac Diatessaron), Arachosia and Gandhara (Afghanistan and Pakistan), and many countries up to the China Sea. In the Acts of Thomas, the original key text to identify St. Thomas with India (which all other India references follow), historians agree that the term India refers to Parthia (Persia) and Gandhara (Pakistan). The city of Andrapolis named in the Acts, where Judas Thomas and Abbanes landed in India, has been identified as Sandaruck (one of the ancient Alexandrias) in Baluchistan.

The story of St. Thomas being martyred by a Hindu king and his priests in Mylapore, Madras (Chennai), India is fictitious and was invented by the Portuguese to cover up their destruction of the ancient Kapaleeswara Shiva Temple on the Mylapore beach. The present San Thome Cathedral and Bishop's House stand on the ruins of that great temple, a Buddhist temple built in the same area, and a Jain temple dedicated to Neminathaswami.

The whole story of the various legends of St. Thomas in India - there are five different legends - has been discussed by Ishwar Sharan in his path-breaking book The Myth of Saint Thomas and the Mylapore Shiva Temple. The book is available on line in both English and Tamil at www.ishwarsharan.wordpress.com. This website also hosts numerous articles on the St. Thomas in India controversy by noted historians, researchers, and journalists.