the one being a history, and the other a piece of hagiography.
Mshikha-Zca makes no reference whatever to Mari in his work, and his editor is inclined, on that ground, to regard the saint as purely legendary. This we consider too stern a judgment. Even if the Acta be ruled out of court altogether as an authority, we have to account for the fact that from the fifth century and before it (i.e. from before the time of the composition of the Acta) this Church has looked back to Adai and Mari as its founders.[1]
How came they, on the legendary hypothesis, to select an absolutely unknown name as that of their founder, when such an one as St. Thomas, who traditionally passed through the country on his way to India, was ready to their hands?[2] That the life contains much legend (even apart from some of the miraculous episodes) need not be doubted. But it also contains matter that a mere hagiographer would scarcely ascribe to his hero, unless he were following some older tradition or authority. The saint's discouragement, and request to his Edessene senders for his recall; his finding Christian traders in Khuzistan; his comparative failure in Seleucia itself, where, as we now know, Christianity gained no strength till late in the third century; and his peaceful death at the obscure shrine of Dor Koni;—all these have the ring of truth rather than of invention; and the most conspicuous "blunder" in the book, namely, the fact that Papa, the fourth-century bishop, is declared to have been the immediate successor of Mari as Bishop of Seleucia and Catholicos of the
- ↑ See History of Karka d'B. Slok, Bedj., ii. 512.
- ↑ St. Thomas is called the "Founder" by Bar-Hebræus, but is represented as a bird of passage only. The work is done by Adai, and his disciples Agai and Mari. B.-H., § 1.
