Constantine, and had adopted Roman manners. He was, or became, an Arian. The Emperor Constantius (337-340) sent him to Arabia to reform the Church of the Christian Sabæans, or "Homeritæ." He accomplished this mission with success. The point which interests us here is his origin. Where is Dibus? It seems now generally agreed that it is Diu, the island off Guzerat.[1] Eventually he went back home to India and made some attempt to propagate Arianism there.[2] The next incident of which we hear comes from a Malabar tradition. The story is that, in the middle of the 4th century, a Metropolitan of Edessa had a vision (not further described, but presumably about the needy state of a distant Church). He tells his vision to the "Katholikos of the East," who summons a synod to discuss the matter. At the synod a merchant, Thomas of Jerusalem, rises up and says that he knows what this Church is: he has heard of Christians "of Malabar and India." So the Katholikos sends him to Malabar to investigate. He comes back with a full report. Then the Katholikos sends him out again with the Bishop of Edessa, who had seen the vision, with many priests, deacons, men, women, boys and girls, who come to Malabar in the year 345.[3] It seems that this Thomas the merchant of Jerusalem is the Thomas Cannaneo of whom many European authors write.[4] "Cannaneo" would be the Portuguese form of the name they heard, which means really "Canaanite," that is, "Palestinian." Others make him an Armenian,[5] apparently again a corruption for Aramæan.[6] "Thomas Cannaneo" plays a great part in many accounts of the origin of the Malabar Church. He appears as a bishop and a reformer. Some think that he is the founder of the Church, the real Thomas, later confused with the apostle.[7] He is said
- ↑ Germann (op. cit. p. 75) quotes Tillemont, Fleury and many others for this.
- ↑ Meanwhile he had been to Ethiopia. For all this, see Philostorgius, loc. cit.
- ↑ The text of the whole story is in Land: Anecdota syriaca (Leiden, 1862), i. pp. 123-127.
- ↑ E.g. Howard: The Christians of St. Thomas, pp. 15-16; see Germann: op. cit. 92-93.
- ↑ Swanston: "A memoir of the primitive Church of Malayála" (Journal of the Royal Asiatic Soc. 1834, pp. 171-172).
- ↑ Germann: loc. cit. 93.
- ↑ See Howard, loc. cit.
